Pastor_Transcript7

40 Days of Community

Part 7

What Have We Learned

Transcript of Message by Rick Warren

November 13-14, 2004

I love you guys. And as I said in the last service, the people who are here for the very first time are going, “This is a very weird church… a very, very weird church.” Now, we’re glad you’re here and you can figure out by the suit that this is a different week. We are going to party today. We are going to celebrate the conclusion of 40 Days of Community. I am so proud of you and we’ve just had a wonderful time. How many of you have been in a small group? Can I see your hands? Look at that. Unbelievable. And that’s what it’s all about: Being together, fellowshipping together, loving together, serving together, all of these things that we’ve done over the last 40 days.

Now the service today is going to be a little bit different, as you can tell. Instead of me speaking and teaching a message to you, we’re going to actually just celebrate what we’ve learned. We’re going to remind ourselves what we’ve learned in the last 40 days and we’re going to do a lot of singing and hear a lot of testimonies. We went out this week and videotaped you and a lot of our groups. We had somewhere between 22 and 24 thousand in small groups.

And so, we’re going to let you hear from yourselves today. It’s going to be kind of an aerobic service. You’re going to be up and down, and up and down, because we’re going to do a lot of singing too. And during this next song, you’re going to see a little montage on the video of what happened in the last 40 days, so let’s get started. Let’s party hardy. Stand up, would you?

Well, let’s take out… these aren’t really actually a message outline, but it’s kind of an outline of where we’re going today in the service. The Bible says in Deuteronomy 11:2 “Remember today what you have learned about the Lord through your experiences with him.”

Now something you only learn through experience. You can’t learn them any other way, and I could’ve taught you for a full year on the value of community, of fellowship, God’s family, the importance of being together, one another; we need each other in life, and you just don’t get it until you actually get into a group. And then, you experience what real koinonia – being as committed to each other as we are to Jesus Christ – is all about.

Now, I want to know, how many of you would say, “I learned something new during 40 Days of Community”? Yeah, sure we did. And the Bible says, if you look on the notes there, circle the word remember. It says “Remember what you’ve learned about the Lord through your experiences with him.” And why does he want us to remember? So we don’t have to learn it again.

Now this weekend, as I said, we’re going to review what we learned during 40 Days of Community.

Let’s just start with what did we learn ABOUT WORSHIPPING TOGETHER. Well, we learned a couple of things. The first thing we learned is this: Matthew 18 verse 20, “Wherever two or three of you come together in my name, I am there with you.”

Now we learned first, worship can take place anywhere you’ve got two or three people together, corporate worship. You see, you don’t have to just come to a church building to worship. A lot of people think the only time they worship is if they come on a weekend to a church service but God says, “No, you can worship in a group.” In fact, he says, “Wherever two or three people are gathered in my name,” he said, “I’m there in the midst of them and you can worship me.”

Now God is with us all the time, he’s always with us. But when two or three are gathered, he said, “There’s a special sense of my presence, you’ll be able to sense me a whole lot better in a group.”

Now the other thing we learned is that worship is to be a celebration. Look at the next verse: “O God, you are the one who rides on the clouds, and we praise you. Your name is the Lord, and we celebrate as we worship you.” Circle that word ‘celebrate.’ God says, “I want worship to be fun. I want it to be a celebration. Worship is to be a festival, not a funeral.” You ever been in one of those churches that felt like a funeral? You know what I’m talking about? The First Church of the Frigidaire? And it’s so cold, the ushers skate up and down the aisles on ice skates, and you have to look in front of the pulpit to make sure there’s no body down there. You know? It’s God’s frozen chosen.

God says, “I don’t want that. I want worship to be a festival. I want you to celebrate. I want you to enjoy me.” Why? Because God is a great God, and when we understand how great he is in worship, one of the things it does is it shrinks our problems. Problems seem so big until you go to worship. And then when you go to worship, you go, “Whoa, God is so big. He can handle this one too. He can handle this problem too.” And it just shrinks the problem down to size.

So we’re going to begin today by looking at how great God is. Let’s stand up again.

So we learned about worshipping together that God is great and every time we express love to God that is worship. And worship is a whole lot more fun with other people than just by yourself. Would you rather sing by yourself or with this choir? There’s no question about it. When we worship together, it lifts your spirit.

Now number two, what did we learn ABOUT FELLOWSHIPING TOGETHER? Well, we learned two of the most important truths in life: #1, That we belong to each other; and #2, That we need each other. And we covered this almost every week as we looked at being together in the Lord. Romans 12 verse 5 says this, “Since we are all one body in Christ, we belong to each other and each of us needs all the others.”

We hammered this truth home over and over. God never meant for you to go through life by yourself. God never meant for you to walk through life alone. Whether you marry or not marry is irrelevant, you need a spiritual family that’s going to be there in the tough times.

Remember when I talked about the illustration of the redwood trees. That they don’t have very deep roots but they are the biggest things on the planet because they grow in groves and they interconnect their roots together, and they hold each other up in the storms and the winds and the fires of life. And so, we need each other and we belong to each other.

Now during 40 Days of Community, somewhere as I said, 23 to 24 thousand people were involved in small groups here at Saddleback Church. That included 3,061 of you who were hosts, and I want to say thank you to do; the 2,229 groups and 929 new groups that were started. We had groups in 13 different languages, and we now have Saddleback small groups in 83 different cities. Now think about that. In fact, we now have small groups… Saddleback Church has small groups as far to the north as Santa Barbara, as far to the south as San Diego. We have small groups as far to the east as Palm Springs and as far to the west as the Pacific Ocean. That one is lead by Nemo, and they do baptizing all at the same time, in the water.

Now, we learned a lot in being together in groups and fellowship. I want you to watch this video.

Woman #1:

I love this group because when I walk through the doors, I feel like I slow down, and I re-center myself and I feel like there’s a God in me that really starts expressing himself and that’s something that really, really has been really powerful for me.

Woman #2:

We all care about each other. We all share what we have with each other.

Woman #3:

It’s finally given me a real sense of belonging in a church family.

Man #1:

What I love about this group is the openness.

Man #2:

It’s just all such a building experience, a communal experience if you will.

Woman #4:

When we came together, we just instantly bonded and so there was a family here, and a family… we could call each other in the middle of the night or do anything that we needed and somebody was there for us.

Woman #5:

Makes me feel I belong in a family. It’s a really good feeling.

Man #3:

What I love about this group is just the weekly connection. Being new to California, they truly are my family away from home.

Woman #6:

We grew so close, so fast. We shared a lot. There are hugs for you when you get to the door, and you just sit down and it just gives us all a chance to just connect with each other and learn more about the Lord.

Man #4:

What I enjoy about this group is just the connection with the guys. We’ve grown closer.

Man #5:

I think we’ve developed some really solid relationships out of this.

Man #6:

We’ve grown to love each other, and it’s just great to have someone that like as Bill said, “watching your back throughout life.”

Man #7:

At any time, we can do things together and talk about our life, our struggles, and share our victories together. And it’s just so neat.

Man #8:
I have trust here, confidentiality.

Woman #7:

This group has not only been my family and my support. They’ve given love, and most importantly, they’ve brought me closer to God.

Woman #8:

And they’ve been a real blessing to me.

Rick:

During 40 Days of Community, we looked at the fact that relationships are what life is all about. God says if you summarize the whole Bible, it’s ‘Love God with all your heart’ and ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There’s a vertical and there’s a horizontal part to life. You have a relationship to God and you have a relationship to others. You learn to love God, and you learn to love others. If you do that, God says, “You got it. You got it,” because life is all about relationships, to God and to each other.

Now we also learned that during those relationships, we have to work at them. They’re not always easy. And I’m sure that during 40 Days of Community, there were times that you didn’t feel like going to your small group. You thought, “I’d rather stay home and lay on the couch.” But you got up and you went anyway, and it not only blessed you, it blessed other people. It takes effort.

Look at the next verse, James 3:18 says this, “You can develop a healthy, robust community that lives right with God and enjoys its results, only if you do the hard work of getting along with each other and treating each other with dignity and honor.” He says it takes hard work. Yeah, it takes hard work to build relationships. It takes hard work to build community, to build fellowship. But the benefits are worth the effort because you have people that are in your life, walking through life with you, and you’re not alone. And they care about you, and you care about them and the benefits are enormous.

The Bible says it’s good and pleasant when God’s children dwell together in unity. When there is community, God says it’s good. That means it’s beneficial, and it is pleasant. It means it’s pleasurable. And today, we want to celebrate the fact that many people discovered community in ways they never knew possible. So let’s stand up again.

So what did we learn about growing together? Well, we learned that it takes participation. You just don’t grow by what you hear, by what you learn. You don’t grow just by going to Bible studies. It’s by putting it into practice that you grow. The Bible says, “Be doers of the word.”

Now I just wonder, how many of you either hosted a group for the first time, attended a group for the first time, prayed in public in a group for the first time and either served in a small group project or served in an outreach project for the very first time? Can I see your hands? Look at that.

See you all grew. You grew during that time because you were stretching muscles. You don’t grow by sitting down and reading a book on bodybuilding, okay? You know, you could sit there and have your Pringles and Coke and read every page. You could underline a few chapters. You might even memorize a few, you know, verses of a bodybuilding book. It’s not going to build your body at all. The only way you build it is by putting it into practice and actually doing something about it.

Now what did we learn about growing together? Well, we learned some real important truths: #1, We learned that we grow faster and we grow stronger together. In fact, you can’t grow spiritually by yourself. Oh, you could get head knowledge of the Bible but that’s not what God says is growth.

Notice Ephesians 2:21, “We who believe and are carefully joined together with Christ as parts of a beautiful, constantly growing temple for God.” We grow by being connected.

And remember we talked about if you cut off a hand, and it’s laying over there, it’s not going to grow. It’s not even going to survive. It’s going to die, and if you get disconnected from the body of Christ, if you’re not connected to a group of other believers who are in your life and you’re in theirs, there is no lifeblood. You cannot grow apart from the body, which is the family of God, the body of Christ. You’ve got to be connected in, and we grow faster and stronger that way.

The second thing we learned is that the goal of growing together is to become like Jesus Christ. Look at the next verse. Let’s read it aloud together: “This work must continue until we’re all joined together in the same faith and in the same knowledge of the son of God. We must become a mature person, growing until we become like Christ and have his perfection.” We become like Christ. Now it says we become mature and what is maturity? Like Christ. And what is Christ? Perfection.

Have any of you attained perfection? Okay, you haven’t? So you still need a small group. In fact, I hate to let you in on this, you’ll never grow into perfection until you get to heaven. In heaven, God’s going to finish the task of growth in your life and he’s going to make you perfect in heaven. But he wants you to get as far along the way as you can while you’re here on earth, and he says you do that by being in connection with other believers, other members of the family of God and then you become more and more like Jesus Christ.

Let’s hear what some of you said about growing together. Watch the video.

Man #1:

I’ve grown spiritually by knowing these guys are in the battle with me, and that we have the common challenges and that they’re right next to me when I got problems, and I’m there with them.

Woman #1:

I have grown so much deeper in my faith for my group. They keep me accountable.

Woman #2:

It makes me feel that God is getting closer to me.

Woman #3:

It’s given me such a curiosity about God’s word, and just like wanting to dig deeper.

Man #2:

The loving of God and trying to understand him and knowing him, just has grown exponentially.

Man #3:

And I have a confidence that I never had before.

Woman #4:

As a leader, I have felt like I’ve had to be one step ahead of them although I feel they have led me probably more than I have led them.

Woman #5:

Realizing that it’s just not all about me.

Man #4:

So it forces you to walk the talk, and that’s the way I grow.

Woman #6:

This really helped me to get focused again.

Woman #7:

One of the ways that I’ve grown in this study is definitely giving unselfishly and just giving to other people in our group whether it be through prayer or support.

Woman #8:

I’ve grown through this group by really learning trust.

Woman #9:

When you share with others in your group and hear all the different problems or praises that they have, it makes you grow more spiritually.

Woman #10:

I just really remembered that we’re here for one another.

Man #5:

When there are issues that I know in my heart that need to be resolved, to not be afraid to make that step.

Man #6:

I gave up my control and given it all to God, and great things have happened since then.

Rick:

“I gave up control and gave it all to God.” One of the other things that we learned about growth during 40 Days of Community is that growth is a choice. And remember I said, “You’re as close to God as you choose to be.” If you’re not growing spiritually, if you’re a spiritual baby, it’s your fault. It’s your choice. You are as close to God as you choose to be, and you can choose to grown. But growth is a daily choice, it’s every day. Let’s say it together. “Every day.”

Every day I have to make… I can’t just make one choice and say, “For the rest of my life, I’m going to keep growing.” No, I have to make that daily choice and say, “Every day, I choose to follow you.” Let’s stand up again.

So what did we learn ABOUT SERVING TOGETHER? Well, we learned two very important truths: #1, That we all need to be served; and #2, That we all need to serve others.

First, you’ve got to learn to be served. You’ve got to learn to accept help from other people. If you can’t accept help from other people, you’ve got a pride problem. You’ve got an ego problem if you can’t help accept help from other people. On the other hand, if you never help anybody else, you’ve got a selfishness problem.

Either way, God says, “That’s not the way it was supposed to be.” You are designed to give and receive help all the time, to serve and to be served, to share and to be shared with.

And during ‘40 Days’, we clarified a bunch of the family responsibilities. What is the responsibility that I have in the family of God? And during our daily devotionals, we looked at 40 of the ‘one anothers.’ Love one another. Care for one another. Help one another. Serve one another. Share with one another. Greet with one another. Encourage one another. Counsel one another.

All through the New Testament, it is the Bible saying we need each other. And we are to serve each other in so many different ways and when I’m down, you’re supposed to help pull me up. And when you’re down, I’m supposed to help pull you up. And we serve each other. We give and receive.

Look at these verses from Galatians 6:10, which says, “Every time we get the chance, let us work for the benefit of all, starting with the people closest to us in the community of faith.” That’s the family of God. It’s the church. He is saying you’ve got to care about everybody. But he says you start with those closest to you in the church family, in your small group.

Look at the next verse. Let’s read it together, “We work together as partners who belong to God.” Let’s listen to some testimonies of people who learned about serving together during ’40 Days.’

Woman #1:

One of the ways that we minister in this group is we take notice that when one member cannot get to church, then we make the effort to call that person and to invite them to go with us.

Man #1:

Christy is a member of our group, who we found out recently that she is homeless. So what we decided to do is to… I guess she qualifies as one of the 35,000 homeless, hungry people in Orange County. So we helped her out last week by going to the store and buying groceries and delivering them to her home.

Woman #2:

One of the ways our group has helped each other, I think, is by being there for each other. And unfortunately, we had a situation in our group this past week where one of the ladies, we’d been praying for her dad, who became a part of the ‘40 Days’ group. And just the excitement to see, on her face, the growth that’s been in him and tragically, she lost her dad this week. And so, right there. Just for us to be able to rally around her, pray for them, support them.

Woman #3:

When we entered 40 Days of Community, we had a member that was not in good health. He was in a wheelchair and in and out of the hospital, so automatically we agreed that Bob Parrs was our small group project. We visited him in and out of the hospital, brought him meals. We were just there for him. Even when he couldn’t meet at our meetings in my home, we would set the cell phone on the table and talk to him and pray with him. And after he passed away, we were so much closer and learned a lot from him because of that experience. I just know that we hug a little harder and we care a little bit more, and love a little bit more.

Man #2:

Initially when I came in, I thought that I was coming in, you know, to give what I could. But I actually ended up receiving too. I didn’t know at the time that a few weeks later, I would start having major trouble with my car, and I didn’t have the finances to fix it. And God put it on the heart of one of our group members for her and her husband actually to fix my car for me.

Woman #4:

They have kept me accountable. They have kept me real. They have kept me transparent to be willing to share what’s going on in my life, what my goals are, what my struggles are and how we can grow together.

Rick:

Now many of you during 40 Days of Community experienced the joy of serving for the very first time, and I say congratulations to you. But I want to say a special thanks to the over 3,000 of you who were hosts during 40 Days of Community. Because if it hadn’t been for you, if you hadn’t volunteered to host a home, there would be 22-24,000 people who would not have had to experience what we did during 40 Days of Community. So let’s just applaud those who were hosts, okay…during this time.

Now some of you who were hosts were already involved in an existing small group and you unselfishly left that small group to go help start another one, so new people could be involved in a ‘40 Days’ group, and I want to say thank you for that. Some of you will be going back to your old group, and some of you will be staying with your new group. It really doesn’t matter, whichever one you feel led to do. That’s fine because we thank you for helping start. But if go back to your old group and you helped start one, you need to hand off the responsibility of the host to somebody else.

I want you to hear a good example of that from Kim Gore and from David and Sabrina Upton. Would you give them a warm welcome?

Kim:

Hi. My name is Kim Gore, and I was encouraged to start a 40 Days of Community small group, so that I could share with others how great fellowship within a small group is. It was my opportunity to invite some neighbors, friends, even some football moms to experience the same spiritual growth and connections that I’ve enjoyed in my own small group. I wanted to step out beyond the comforts of my own group to help other people that I cared about, and help them get connected to be a part of something special that Saddleback was doing to reach out to our community.

I learned that each time I serve others, I feel the joy of how the simple act of opening my home can impact the lives of those around you. I’ve also learned that you can bring a very diverse group of people together and get a very amazing exchange of thoughts, hopes and ideas, that I would otherwise never experience.

Serving others, by starting and hosting a small group, made me feel a part of the special campaign to build relationships, fellowship and service in our community. Everyone enjoyed the small group so much that four of the couples started a couples’ small group, and some of the women are getting plugged into women’s small groups.

I know it can be intimidating the first time you decide to host a small group. But like Rick says, “You turn on the coffee. Plug in the video, and serve some dessert.” It’s that simple. And from my own experience, I can tell you that any anxiety you feel quickly fades and there’s nothing more rewarding than serving.

I’m so thankful that God used me in this process to serve others. It’s your small group that’s going to be there for you in the hard times and in the good times. I’m so thankful for my small group.

David:

Hi. My name is David Upton and about nine months ago, my family and I decided to try that big church over near Foothill Ranch. Pastor Rick’s message that Sunday was on how God speaks to us, and Sabrina and I were completely convinced that that particular message was devised solely with us in mind. I’m sure none of you have ever felt that way. But God was speaking to us that day, and we’ve attended here ever since, especially since we found our home in ‘Overdrive.’

A couple weeks before the start of 40 Days of Community, we were signing documents on our new home in Ladera Ranch, so we took two 40 Days of Community signs; one for our old house and one for our new house. After placing our sign in front of our new house with only a small… really small understanding of what a small group even was, our new neighbor, Kim Gore, invited Sabrina and I to join her ‘40 Days’ small group. So we decided to join this group with complete strangers, thinking, “It really couldn’t be that bad, it’s only six weeks and it’s a great way to meet some of our new neighbors.”

On the first night of our small group, we realized that God had purposely put us in that room, and we began to open ourselves to a small group about spiritual matters more than either of us had ever done in our entire lives. Almost everyone else in our group had a similar oddball story that somehow put them in this ‘40 Days’ small group, and we were all struggling with the same types of issues in our lives. We’ve rapidly formed a strong bond with the other members of this group, and we’ve already begun to help coach each other through some of life’s challenges as a team.

Last week was our last session of the ‘40 Days’ group. Tom and Kim, our small group hosts, are returning to the small group that they’ve been a part of for a long time. They left their own small group to help start a ‘40 Days’ group, to get more people involved from our community. But the rest of us in our group agreed to stay together, and believe it or not, I’ve been nominated to serve as the host.

Now I’m actually looking forward to continuing my growth with my wife and my new found friends and teammates in our new small group. In closing, I would encourage you all to stay with your ‘40 Days’ groups, even after the 40 days, and I urge you to consider being a host as well as we all continue to work toward growing and living a purpose-driven life in this Orange County community together. Thanks.

Rick:

Now you’ve heard me say many times that the two most dangerous words you can pray are the words, “Use me.” When you say, “God use me,” get ready to have your socks blessed off because God is looking for people to use.

But I’ve learned there’s a one word prayer that’s just as dangerous as the prayer “Use me,” it’s the prayer “Whatever.” Whatever God. Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do it. Whatever you want me to be, I’ll be it. Whatever you want me to say, I’ll say it. Whatever you want me to give, I’ll give it. Whatever you want me to think or go or whatever, I will do it. And when you come to that point in your life, “God whatever,” then you begin to experience life as it was meant to be lived. Life as a journey. Life as an adventure. Life as the thrill of a lifetime, rollercoaster ride of God saying, “Okay, you said ‘whatever’, here we go. Buckle up.”

And so, this is how we learn to serve by just going, “God, whatever.” I’ll serve in little ways, big ways, anyway in between. And that’s how we grow, and that’s how we serve. And I think on this song, I’ll let you stay seated.

Now, what did we learn ABOUT REACHING OUT TOGETHER? Well we learned some really important truths about that, and the first one is this verse in James chapter 1 verse 27, “Real religion,” listen to this, “Real religion, the kind that passes muster before God the father is this: Reach out to the homeless and loveless in their plight.” God says the test of your faith is not what you know. The test of your faith is not what you say you believe. The test of your Christianity is how you treat other people. That’s it; specifically, those who need help. He says, “I’m looking to see not what you say you believe or what you know. The real test of your faith is this: Do you love people enough to help them when they’re down.”

And during 40 Days of Community, I was so proud of you and am proud of you for what you did, because you attempted the impossible. Once again in the history of Saddleback Church, you attempted the impossible, and we have watched God come over and over and over and bail us out when we would stretch ourselves.

And you attempted to do something that no other organization or church or anybody has ever attempted, and that was to feed every homeless person in Orange County, 35,000 is what we thought, for three meals a day for 40 days. And not only did you reach that goal, but you exceeded it. You blew way past it.

In fact, just last night when the final tabulations were in, you fed three meals a day for 40 days, not 35,000, but over 40,000 people. Congratulations. 40,000.

That happened because we were in small groups. It would have never gotten done on our own. It happened because we’re in small groups; 9,300 plus volunteers through their small groups either sorted or collected or served or distributed over 800 tons of food, almost 2 million pounds. It was an amazing feat. And together we worked with over 80 different agencies to help it get distributed. We worked through 40 different homeless hotels. Oh and by the way, we gave out 20,000 free copies of The Purpose Driven Life in Spanish or English while we were delivering that food. Imagine that.

This Wednesday night here in the Worship Center at 7 p.m., we’re going to have a special celebration for those of you who are part of the food drive. We want to have you come, if you want to be a part of that, on Wednesday night.

Now there are so many, many stories I could tell you, like 40,000 of them. So when you’ve got a couple of weeks, I could tell you story after story of changed lives just through these simple acts of kindness. But I want you to just hear one, and this one has to represent all 40,000 stories. It’s the story of Eddy. Eddy is a wonderful woman who we were able to give some food to during the 40 Days of Community and I want you to watch her story. Listen to this.

Eddy:

I think you should know that the things you’ve done in this last 40 days has been really marvelous. Pastor Warren and all the people at the church, and from my understanding now, there are thousands. On behalf of everybody that I know that received food from them, and believe me some of that food was badly needed, I want them to know that we thank them very much. There’s so many people that gave time and their money, and they work all week long. I know that they don’t have much time off and they spend their weekends doing for somebody else they didn’t even know.

But you helped children… I’ve seen it myself, you helped little kids who didn’t have food to eat. You helped grownups who didn’t have food to eat because I live in a motel now… I’m sorry if I’m crying, but I see things this last year that I just didn’t think I’d ever see in my life. People so poor. People being kicked out with children, kicked out of the motels onto the street. Then you brought Bibles to people, 22,000 Bibles you gave out. My favorite chapter, Pastor Warren, happens to be chapter 33 and 16 and 37; those three chapters kind of have been the way I’ve tried to live all my life. I mean if I can do one good deed a day for somebody, that was fine. But if I could do two, that was even better.

The volunteers that came and carried heavy boxes to the rooms, and they were heavy. They had to climb up the stairs. There was no elevators for them to use. More important, the food than you brought to me was the prayer that you brought to me.

All the things you think might have been out of your comfort zone, like one lady from your church said… God bless her because that prayer she said with those people in Santa Ana and that hello she said might have been the one thing that helped turn their life around. And now if they come back and they say prayers, they teach some of those little children the Bible and everything, their work will continue.

When I was a little girl for the neighbors if you were sick, would help you; or you went and helped on a farm. You always… I mean, you shared. And that’s what all your whole church has done, is you have shared. The little boy upstairs, you don’t see him much, but he was smiling and bouncing around the day after you guys came too because he had food in his stomach. You guys kind of reminded me of when he took the fishes and the bread and he made it multiply because you made the boxes multiply.

Some of the money they would’ve had to spend for food can go into paying the rent. Most of the time, the last part of the month or the last part of the week sometimes, people are really struggling to find the money to pay the rent. Once you get in, it’s very hard to get out because you can’t get the last month’s rent and the security all together, not when you have a low income. I didn’t think that day would ever happen to me, but it has.

I think God will help me. He always has, no matter how bad things got, he has always helped us. Motels, it’s not they’re bad places. They’re just not a very good place to raise a family, and they’re not a very good place for people to have to live permanently.

They told me that you have all kinds of services that it’s not just one. I don’t know how to get there by bus, I mean you know, because I don’t know… it’s quite a ways away. And I wanted to be able to say thank you to you in person. I wanted to come to the church and see what it was like to be in a church with people that really care.

Rick:

Eddy wanted to say thank you to you personally, and so we made sure of that. Would you welcome her? God bless you, Eddy.

Eddy:

God bless everybody here. Thank you for having me here.

Rick:

I know.

Eddy:

You’re such good people.

Rick:

You know, let’s stand and let’s join hands together and I’d like to pray for Eddy and for all of our new friends that we made in the last 40 days. Let’s pray together.

Dear God, we know that you love every one of us. That you’ve never made a person that you didn’t love, you’ve never made a person that you didn’t have a plan and purpose for. None of us are accidents. That you love us all and you want us to love each other. And we ask you to forgive us for the times that we’ve overlooked fellow brothers and sisters who needed help and we weren’t there. Lord, we want to be a church like Jesus. We want to love everyone and show it by our deeds and by our actions. We ask you to bless Eddy, and we ask you to bless her life and we ask you to bless all of the other friends that we made and those that she represents here in Orange County. And may together we make a difference in this world simply by being better together. In Jesus’ name. Thank you everybody.

Eddy:

God bless you all.

Rick:

You can be seated. If you were to look at Saddleback in 1980 when we started the charter of this church, says, “We exist to help the people of Orange County every way possible,” spiritually, physically, socially, mentally, relationally, financially, because God cares about every part of you, not just one part of you. And as a church, we want to do that.

But most of all, God wants us to know him. He wants us to know the good news, that you are not an accident. That you were made to last forever. That God has a plan and purpose for your life, and that he wants you to know him as well as He already knows you. And that he sent Jesus Christ to die for your sins, so all your sins could be forgiven and you can spend eternity in heaven and you can have a purpose for living now. That’s the good news, and we’re committed to sharing that with everybody. Why? Look at the next verse.

Romans 10 says this, “Anyone who calls in the name of the Lord will be saved. But how can they call on him to save them unless they believe in him and how can they believe in him if they’ve never heard of him, and how can they hear about him unless somebody tells them?” And the answer is: They can’t. They can’t. There are people living on your block who will die without Christ if somebody doesn’t tell them. They have to be told that God loves them, that he has a plan and purpose for their lives.

During the next few weeks, you are going to have three of the greatest opportunities to share the good news with your friends, your family, your relatives, your neighbors, that all year.

In the first place, this next week, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, Billy Graham is coming to Los Angeles, to the Rose Bowl, to do his very last crusade. This will be history in the making. Fifty-five years ago, the most famous preacher in American history started his ministry in Los Angeles, and he’s ending it here in the Rose Bowl this week. I want to encourage you to take a friend, a relative, a neighbor to the Rose Bowl on Thursday night or Friday night or Saturday night or Sunday night. And help them hear the good news about Jesus Christ.

Second, starting next week, I’m beginning a new series called “Cheer Up.” You know during the holiday seasons, a lot of people get a little down. They get a little droopy in the mouth. They think, “Aunt Matilda is coming, and I’ve got to buy her a present and she’s not going to like whatever I buy her.” And you get a little depressed or a little down.

And so, we’re going to do for six weeks, the most uplifting series we’ve probably ever done at Saddleback on overcoming depression and defeat and despair and overcoming discouragement and disappointment, taking it all the way to Christmas.

If you need a lift and you know anybody else who needs a little boost emotionally, do not miss any of the next six weeks. It’ll be a great, great series to bring friends to, “Cheer Up.”

And then, the third thing is during Christmas week, we’re going to do 13 Christmas services. Now, we don’t just do Christmas Eve anymore because it’s too crowded. So you don’t have to come on Christmas Eve anymore, we’re actually going to have services on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Same service, 13 Christmas services, two on Wednesday night, two on Thursday night, 6 on Friday night which is Christmas Eve. And then on Christmas Day for the first time, two services, it’s Saturday so we’re going to have our 4:30 and 6:30 service and you can come on Christmas Day. You don’t have to come on Christmas Eve and miss the crowds. And then the day after Christmas, Sunday, we’re going to have one service that morning at 11:00. Same message for 13 times, same service.

So here’s what you do: You come on Wednesday and you bring somebody who goes to another church, so they can be in their church on Sunday but they get to experience Christmas at Saddleback. And then all the other days, you bring a friend who doesn’t know the Lord, each day.

Now why do we do that? Why are we going to do 13 services? Why do we do 6 services here every weekend? Why do we do this? Because everybody needs the Lord. Everybody needs Jesus Christ in their lives. Everybody needs to know that God loves them. And as long as there is one person who doesn’t know Jesus Christ on this planet, this church is going to keep reaching out because that’s what God told us to do.

And we have to care because God cares. God so loved the world, and God wants the whole world to know him. That’s why in 2005, we’re going to launch the PEACE Plan, ‘The Global PEACE Plan’ at Saddleback Church, which will then be copied by tens of thousands of other churches. God is going to use that in an amazing way. You see all of what we’re doing has been preparation for the peace plan, and we’re going to involve thousands of other churches like we have in the past because our goal is the global glory of God. The global glory of God.

One of the theme verses of this church is Psalm 2 verse 8, which says this, “If you ask me, I will give you the nations.” “If you ask me, I will give you the nations. All the people of the earth will be yours.” Now what does that verse mean? God says whoever is brave enough and is courageous enough and loving enough to ask me for the privilege of sharing the good news with other people, I will give them that privilege and they will be the ones that get to spread it all around the world. And the Bible says once everybody has had a chance to hear, history is going to end and Jesus Christ is going to come back.

He says, “Ask me and I will give you the nations.” All you have to do is ask. I intend to be one of the people who ask, and I believe God has chosen this church, Saddleback Church, in history to ask him for things that other churches maybe just haven’t chosen to. But God is going to use this church to bring in a new reformation in Christianity and to spread the news all around the world. I believe it with all my heart, and I know that God has chosen you. And that’s why you’re here. You’re not here by accident.

All we have to do is claim God’s promises. He said, “Ask me.”

Do you realize what a privilege it is to be a part of God’s work in the world? That the God of the universe would choose you and me and normal human beings with all of our faults and our hang-ups and fears and problems, and say, “I’m going to use you for a cause greater than yourself that is going to have eternal implications for all of destiny.”

If you know a more significant thing to do with your life, I would invite you to stand up right now and tell us because there is nothing more important than first, doing what God’s called you to do, fulfilling his purposes in your life that he put you on this planet to fulfill and then helping spread that news all around the world. There is no greater cause that.

And that is what gives your life meaning and significance and everything else is trivial and petty and pointless by comparison. You were made by God and for God, and until you understand that, life will not make sense. And God has chosen to use you in this church in a mighty way.

NOW WHAT are we going to do? What do we do next now that 40 Days of Community is over? Well, the Bible is very clear about it. There are three things he wants us to do.

Look at these verses, Hebrews 10, would you read it with me? “Let us not give up the habit of meeting together as some are doing. Instead let us encourage one another all the more.” He says don’t stop doing what you’re doing, keep meeting together. You need to stay in a group.

Now I told you I only wanted you to stay for 6 weeks in this group. And so, now’s the time to change if you want to change. If you really can’t stand the people in your group or they can’t stand you, it’s now the time. You say, “I want to meet on a different night. I want to meet on a different day. I want to meet at a different place… different group.” This is okay. If you didn’t happen to particularly fit your group, that’s okay. I hope you’ll stay with the group you’re in, I really do because you’re just starting to build trust. But if that didn’t really click with you, it’s okay.

It’s like when you go to a doctor… you go to the doctor the first time, if you don’t like that doctor, what do you say? “Well I’ll never go to a doctor again.” No, you just find one that you like. It’s like if you eat a meal and you go, “Well, I didn’t like that meal, I’m never eating again.” No, you just eat something else the next time.

And so if you didn’t happen to really click with your group, that’s okay. Congratulations for sticking it out. And now… I don’t care if you stay in this group or not, but you need to be in a group because you know better now. You can’t go through life alone. Watch this.

Various Groups:

We’re staying together!

Man #1:

You know, we had a great time. We had a great study. Good fellowship.

Woman #1:

After we finish this session, we’re going to start a new one in January and grow and serve in the community and love each other more.

Various Groups:

We’re staying together.

Man #2:

We’ve grown together. We’ve connected together. We’re staying together.

Woman #2:
We’re going to be staying together, probably forever.

Various Groups:

We’re staying together.

Man #3:

We’ve decided to commit to meeting long term and going on and going through a variety of studies to grow closer together.

Woman #3:

It’s been such an incredible thing that none of us could ever let go of it.

Various Groups:

We’re staying together.

Rick:

All right, I hope you will too.

Now here’s the second thing God says I want you to do, Philippians 4:9, “Keep on doing the things that you’ve learned and received and heard and the God of peace will be with you.” He says you just not only stay in a group, don’t give up the habit of meeting together. Keep on doing what you’ve been doing. What have you been doing? Well, you’ve been having a daily quiet time, reading a little bit every day, a daily devotional, read some from the Bible. You’ve been coming to weekly worship. You’ve been trying to memorize a Bible verse every week. You’ve been working on projects of serving and sharing. He says just keep doing those things and the “God of peace will be with you.” God will help you.

So he says keep meeting together, keep doing what you’re doing; here’s the third thing I want you to do. I want you to pray for other churches. Pray for other churches because in January of this year, we’re going public with the 40 Days of Community, just like we did with 40 Days of Purpose, which we did two years ago.

Since we did 40 Days of Purpose two years ago, maybe over 25,000 churches around the world have done 40 Days of Purpose; a couple thousand in the Philippines, a couple thousand in Great Britain, a couple thousand in Brazil, all around the world, tens of thousands in America; millions and millions and millions of people have now gone through 40 Days of Purpose.

And in January, we’re going to release the second of three campaigns, which is 40 Days of Community and I want you to pray for those churches. We had 700 other churches go through this with us when we were doing it this fall. They helped test this and we’ll release it in January.

And here’s what I want you to pray in this last verse, “Pray that the master’s word will simply take off and race through the country to a ground swell of response.” Wouldn’t that be cool? Does our nation need a spiritual awakening? It does. It does. Pray that the master’s word will take off and race through the country to a ground swell of response.

Let me tell you one other thing. In January, on January 30th, we’re going to have the 25th anniversary of Saddleback Church. It’s our birthday. And on that Sunday, we’re not going to have any Saturday night services, we’re not going to have any Sunday night services, we’re only going to have two. And they’re going to be one at 10:00, and it’ll probably be about 10 to 12; and then next one will be from 1 to 3 in the afternoon. And of course, there isn’t any place to hold our entire church family so we have rented The Pond.

And it’s the only thing big enough in Orange County, it’s not even big enough to hold our church family because it only seats 17,000 so we’re going to have to have two services. Two services. Two services at The Pond and it’s going to be an amazing, amazing time. Now guys, that’s the week before the Super Bowl, so there’s no other game that Sunday. It’s okay. It’s okay.

God has chosen you and this church to do great things, and we should be grateful. And the Bible says we express our thanks to God by giving. Thanks and giving go together, we’re going to give our Thanksgiving offering in a moment.

But as we end this 40 Days of Community, I want us to join in a prayer of thanksgiving to thank God not only for what he’s done in the last 40 days but in the last year. Would you bow your heads?

Dear father, we thank you so much for all you’ve done for us in our lives. Thank you for life itself. Thank you that you created us. You saved us. You’ve given us a purpose. You’ve guaranteed us a home in heaven. We wouldn’t have anything without you. So today, we express our thanks to you for you, and we thank you for each other, for our church family. That we get to be a part of something so significant in the world. Thank you that we can have a small part together as we worship together and serve together and share and grow in fellowship together. And so, we offer our sincere thanks; first by giving you our own lives and we’re saying to you, “Whatever.” Whatever God. Whatever you want to do with our lives, we are yours. And we ask you to bless this thanksgiving offering now. In your name, I pray. Amen.

Now don’t leave. These guys are going to sing the party song of all party songs because God is good.