Beginner's Guide - Week 2

INTRO VIDEO

INTRODUCTION

3 MINUTES

Sometimes the idea of connecting with God seems kind of complicated—almost like we need an instruction manual or guide to help us figure it out! That’s why this series is called The Beginner’s Guide to Connecting With God. It’s designed to help walk us through some of the things we can do to connect with God.

Because sometimes when we see other people connecting with God, it can leave us questioning why we sometimes have a hard time doing the same. That’s why I can’t wait for you to hear what we’re going to talk about today. It’s something that could change the way that you think about coming to church and the way you think about God.

But before we get into all that, let me ask you a question: Have you ever been somewhere that made you feel completely out of place? Somewhere you felt like you just didn’t belong?

PERSONAL STORY:

· When I was in the seventh grade, I changed schools. I left the comfortable confines of Thomas Jefferson Middle School and transferred to the absolute unknown of Western Height Jr. High. I left all of my friends that I had grown up with—Mike, Prabhat, Paul, Scotty and Jay—to go to a place where everyone else had grown up together. It was not an easy transition.

· I remember my first day as a Jet, walking into this school with no idea where to go. I had not even had a tour of the school and had only received my schedule a week and a half before. I was lost, alone and to top it off, all of these kids seemed much cooler than me. They dressed nicer. They seemed more mature. They all seemed so normal and I seemed so different. Honestly, I felt like an outsider who would never measure up.

TENSION

4 MINUTES

Chances are, you’ve felt that way at least once in your life!

Maybe it was when you tried out for the travel team and everybody seemed bigger, stronger, and faster than you. Or when you took that class where everyone seemed to know all the answers, but you were left scratching your head with questions. Or when you auditioned for that big part in the school musical, and everyone else seemed to nail the high notes in every single song.

No matter what your experience was, it left you feeling the same way I felt in the story I just shared. Not good enough. Like you didn’t measure up. Almost like you didn’t deserve to be there.

Now let me ask you a question: Have you ever felt that same way when you come to church? Let me phrase it this way…

Have you ever felt like you wanted to be close to God, but you felt distant or like you couldn’t connect with Him?

Maybe you come to church only to feel immediately like you don’t belong. Maybe people talk about God and faith like you’re supposed to understand, but you don’t really get what they’re saying. So it makes you feel like you don’t belong at church or like you don’t deserve to have a faith of your own.

Or maybe you feel like you aren’t good enough to be at church. Maybe it’s not because of what someone said to you or even knows about you. But maybe it’s because of what you know about yourself—because of what’s going on in your heart.

Maybe everyone sings during worship or bows their heads to pray, but you feel like you can’t join in to talk to God. You know what you’ve been looking at online, or saying behind someone’s back, or posting on social media that your parents don’t see. And that makes you feel like you shouldn’t talk to God the way everybody else does.

Or what about when everyone is opening up about their lives in small group? You have something to say and want to contribute to the conversation, but you feel like you can’t. Everyone in your circle knows what’s really happening between you and your boyfriend or girlfriend. They know about the choices you’ve been making on the weekends. Surely they think you don’t deserve to share about your faith when it doesn’t seem like you’re living it, right?

Sometimes even if we want to be close to God, we don’t feel worthy of connecting with and worshipping Him. Maybe it’s because of the choices we’ve made, or behaviors we’ve engaged in, or even thoughts we’ve had. We feel like we don’t deserve to connect with God the same way everybody else does. We allow our actions to become distractions to our worship. We allow them to put space between God and us.

Instead of feeling forgiven and free when we walk into church, we feel shame. We feel guilt. We feel like there’s a distance between us and God. And maybe we even start to think we don’t belong. We wonder, “Am I even allowed to connect with God if I’ve done something wrong?”

I’m going to go ahead and tell you that (spoiler alert!) the answer to this question is a big, huge, “YES!” Our actions, thoughts, and choices don’t have to keep us from connecting with God. Our fears of not measuring up or not being good enough don’t have to keep us from showing up to worship Him here at church.

TRUTH

5 MINUTES

How do I know? Well, there’s a story in the Bible that I think can help us out a ton with this. It’s in a part of the Bible called the New Testament, which is a collection of writings that are all about Jesus. It includes details about His life, His death, His resurrection, and what it looks like for us as we follow Him.

Today we’re going to read about an encounter Jesus had with a woman from a book in the New Testament called Luke. Let me set this story up for you. Jesus had been invited to have dinner at a house owned by a Pharisee named Simon. A Pharisee was someone in Jesus’ time who followed the Jewish law very strictly—almost perfectly—and they taught these laws to others. They were well respected because of their reputation for strictly following the laws and living a “good” life.

While Jesus was at Simon’s home, someone else joined them. Luke told the story like this:

When a certain immoral woman from that city heard he [Jesus] was eating there, she brought a beautiful alabaster jar filled with expensive perfume. Then she knelt behind him at his feet, weeping. Her tears fell on his feet, and she wiped them off with her hair. Then she kept kissing his feet and putting perfume on them (Luke 7:37–38 NLT).

Now if you are anything like me when I first read this story, you may be thinking any of these things:

1. What does a “certain immoral woman” mean?

2. What is “alabaster”?

3. Why was the woman crying?

4. Jesus just sat there while this random woman cried on His feet, wiped them with her hair, and then kissed and poured perfume on them? Who does that?

All understandable questions! This is what I’ve learned.

1. When the author used the phrase, “immoral woman,” he most likely meant that she was a prostitute.

2. Alabaster is a type of stone similar to marble that was used to make expensive containers for things like perfume.

3. We don’t really know exactly why the woman was crying. Maybe it was because she didn’t feel worthy to be in the presence of Jesus. She may have felt guilty because of the choices she’d made. Or maybe she was upset about something that had happened in her life recently. All we do know is this: Once she came into contact with Jesus, whatever was going on inside of her led her to weep at His feet.

4. And yeah. Jesus just sat there and let this woman cry on His feet, wipe them off with her hair, and then kiss and pour perfume on them. We’ll discover why in a few minutes.

Okay, so let’s get back to our story. After seeing this woman interact with Jesus, Simon, the Pharisee, had some thoughts. Surely if Jesus was a prophet, He would know that the woman who was touching Him was sinner. So Jesus responded to Simon’s thoughts with this story:

“A man loaned money to two people—500 pieces of silver to one and 50 pieces to the other. But neither of them could repay him, so he kindly forgave them both, canceling their debts. Who do you suppose loved him more after that?”

Simon answered, “I suppose the one for whom he canceled the larger debt.”

“That’s right,” Jesus said. Then he turned to the woman and said to Simon, “Look at this woman kneeling here. When I entered your home, you didn’t offer me water to wash the dust from my feet, but she has washed them with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You didn’t greet me with a kiss, but from the time I first came in, she has not stopped kissing my feet. You neglected the courtesy of olive oil to anoint my head, but she has anointed my feet with rare perfume.

“I tell you, her sins—and they are many—have been forgiven, so she has shown me much love. But a person who is forgiven little shows only little love.” Then Jesus said to the woman, “Your sins are forgiven.” (Luke 7:41-48 NLT)

It’s obvious that this woman didn’t have her life together. Yet she came to Jesus. She worshiped. She connected with Him. And what I love about this story is this: Jesus didn’t turn her away. He accepted her and even complimented her. In fact, Jesus never turned any sinful person away who came to Him with a humble heart.

Here’s the truth: It’s not about having your life together; it’s about coming to Jesus. Jesus loves us no matter the mistakes, or bad choices, or wrongdoings we might carry into church with us every week. He set us free from the weight of the guilt, and shame, and frustration, and even separation we feel because of our sin.

And because of that, we don’t have to worry about whether or not we’re good enough or deserving enough to connect with Him. We don’t have to earn the right to worship God through our good behavior. We don’t have to fear that He’ll turn us away or not want to connect with us because of who we are or what we’ve done.

You see, because of Jesus, we can all freely connect with God. It’s not our actions that give us access to God; it’s Jesus. It’s not our behavior that connects us to God; it’s Jesus. And worship isn’t about you or what you’ve done; it’s about what Jesus did for you!

We can all freely connect with God.

APPLICATION

1 MINUTE

So what does that mean for you? Well, I think it means that none of us have to walk in here feeling the weight of the choices we’ve made this week. We don’t have to worry that we don’t measure up in God’s eyes because of our bad behaviors. We don’t have to fear that our negative thoughts or harsh words will hold us back from connecting with Him. It means that because of Jesus, we’re free to love God with all of our hearts. We can all freely connect with God. And that’s great news!

Of course that doesn’t mean there aren’t consequences to your decisions and actions. Jesus offers us freedom and forgiveness for our sins, but that doesn’t mean we get to do whatever we want and avoid the consequences.

But it does mean we can show up every single day to connect with God no matter what. We can worship in response to what He’s done for us. And we can let that motivate us to keep moving our lives in the right direction.

Remember, we can all freely connect with God. And this week, I think we can all take a first step in doing just that.

For some of you, maybe it’s believing in your heart that what Jesus did for you on the cross is enough. Jesus died on the cross to make a way for us to connect with God no matter what. You can rest in the fact that your connection with God is something you’ve been given; it’s not something you have to earn.

For others of you, it might mean that the next time you do mess up, or make a mistake, or start feeling the weight of your negative choices, you’ll change your response. You won’t freak out, or panic, or beat yourself up, but instead, you’ll reconnect with God as soon as possible. You’ll get your heart close to Him again and remember what Jesus did for you.

LANDING

1 MINUTE

Remember, because of Jesus, we can all freely connect with God.

So as I end this message, I want you to think about this question: What’s one thing that keeps me from connecting with God?