SQUAD GOALS

Series Intro

Recap sermon Baggage Issues

Intro

List of things that don’t work well together

Sugar and grits

White people and black face

And we have to be careful that we don’t find ourselves maintaining relationships that don’t work well together.

We have to be careful that we don’t force relationships to go beyound their expiration dates. Because you will find that people come into your life for :

Reasons, seasons or lifetimes.

And the worse thing you can do is try to force a seasonal person into a lifetime appointment.

And our text this morning helps us learn the importance of being selective with who is in our squad.

Background

Here we are looking at one of Paul’s letters to the church at Corinth. I say one of Paul’s letters because he wrote several letters to them, we only have two available to us but he wrote several.

And he wrote several because they were near and dear to his heart.

Corinth, was a seaport city so you often have merchants coming into town to buy or sell their wares.

Corinth was a great commercial center. Luxuries from all over the world were available, and the vices of the world too. Now some of these vices didn’t need to be imported, the temple of Aphrodite, the goddess of love, was nearby with 1,000 cult prostitutes who sold themselves in the name of religion.

As a matter of fact they had a word to describe the men who went there, “corinthianize” to describe an act of immorality. “Corinthian girl” was a synonym for prostitute.

Paul came into town on one of his missionary journeys and while he tried to preach to the Jews they didn’t want to hear him so… he went to the gentiles in the area and they received him… and people were getting saved and baptized.

Paul ended up staying in Corinth for a year and a half and for Paul that was longer than most other place.

He stayed there and built relationships with the people… he saw them grow and mature in the Lord. He saw God moving and working in their lives.

It was a good time as he discipled those people.

Then he went on to found other churches… and a problem came as he got word that the people at the church he got started had started turning back to some of their old ways. They had got off track… so he wrote his first letter hoping to get them back on track.

He visits them in person and even that was tense so Paul writes this letter and it is an emotional letter. It’s like a parent seeing a child going down the wrong road in life and the parent does their best to get them onto the right road.

And Paul helps them and us understand that the relationships that you maintain determine where you’re going.

And Paul’s statement in 2 Cor. 6:14 prompts us to ask this question: who are you with?

I. Who Are You With?

Imagine if you will that it’s the summer time and you’re at the basketball court. You walk up and of course someone else is already playing… so you yell out , “I’ve got next” which means… you get to be the captain of the next squad. When it’s your turn to pick your team you look around for the best possible players, you pick those who you think have some athletic ability then on your last pick… Steph Curry walks on the court and says… hey can I play… now you’ve got a choose you can pick someone else or add Steph to your squad. If you want to win I suspect you’d add Steph to your squad because the team you select will determine if you win or lose.

And that’s really what Paul is trying to get us to understand in 2 Cor. 6:14 he says, “Don’t be unequally yoked.”

Paul here is painting a picture that his audience could easy understand. Because it was an agrarian society they knew what it meant “yoke” or “harness” animals together.

A yoke was a piece of bent wood that was placed around the necks of two animals in an effort to get the two animals to work together for a common goal.

We’ve all heard the phrase, “two heads are better than one.” When two people work together to come up with a solution for a problem, you are more likely to arrive at your solution faster.

During that time they would put two animals together to plow a field or to pull a cart because the two are better than one.

Oh but if you mess around and yoke two different types of animals together you’ve got a problem.

If you mess around and yoke an Ox with a donkey you’ve got a problem.

While they are both able to pull a plow or pull a cart… putting them together is problematic because they are built different...

They’ve got different qualities...

They’ve got different work ethics..

And because of their different qualities and work ethic the yoke becomes uncomfortable to both of them.

And instead of making progress you make a mess because the two are unevenly yoke.

And Paul is letting us know that as a child of God you cannot partner up with everybody.

You’ve got to be selective with who you yoke up with… wether it’s a romantic relationship, friendships, or business partnerships.

You’ve got to be selective with who you yoke up with.

You’ve got to be selective with who you allow on your squad.

Because if their qualities, values and standards are not the same us yours you’ll end up with a mess.

Three squad check questions:

I. Are they believers?

II. Do they have integrity

(If they will lie others they will lie to you)

III. Are they loyal?

Paul helps us understand that we cannot have everybody on our squad, we’ve got to be selective with who we are yoked with.

BECAUSE YOUR RELATIONSHIPS TELL WHERE YOU’VE BEEN AND WHERE YOU’RE GOING.

II. Where Are You Going?

There is a difference between friends, associates and squad.

Friends and associates are people that you can hang with and not expect to go anywhere or do anything.

Friends and associates are people that you know but you can’t trust them with your dreams.

Your squad is the one that hears your dreams and says let’s do this.

And the challenge that some of people have is that you’ve spent so much time developing friends and associates but no squad and you wonder why we ain’t going anywhere.

Your squad helps you get to your destination but you’ve got to be selective with who’s on your squad.

A farmer understand that the purpose of the yoke is so that two animals could work together toward a common end.

III. Why It Matters?

Conclusion

Come here Gideon… I know you have a small army and you are fighting a larger army but Gideon… you’ve still got too many people.. Gideon you don’t need more people you need the right people.

Jesus had a squad...

Call To Action