Welcome to the podcast of the White Church.
In Adelaide, South Australia. Well, Justin's going to be
bringing the word this morning. I was just thinking this morning
just about, about, you know, the, the law, it was in the
Lord's Prayer, just talking about your Kingdom come and your
will be done as on earth as it is in heaven.
And the, the the church, this space that we find ourselves in
right now, this gathering of the Saints together is something
very special that we need to understand and grasp because
this is where are the called out ones.
Jesus said to pray that the things that were in heaven would
be here. And praise is something that is
certainly in heaven. But you know, like we're not
going to get tired from praising in heaven.
Amen. So, you know, that's one of the
things you know, and just being together, being together.
When people come in from outside, from the world, from
their communities, from that which they know of the world,
when they come into the church, when they come into the body of
Christ, they should be experiencing something way
different than what they have, they have used to and what
they've seen. And we, we pray that they do.
And that means that the Spirit of God in US and through US is
the thing that they're going to be experiencing, you know, the
love of God, the community, the fellowship, but so much more
than that, God's power, healing, freedom, hope, hope, guys like
we're coming into Easter. Hope.
We have something that the world doesn't have hope and that is an
amazing thing and we praise the Lord for that.
But I'm going to invite Justin up.
I'm going to pray, Lord, we just pray your anointing on Justin
right now. We pray that you would speak the
words that you would want to say in him and through him.
God, we pray that everything else would fall to the wayside.
We pray that we we would hear your words today and that we
would be empowered to be the church that you've called us to
be. We pray this would be a time of
enlarging for Justin and for us. And we pray that we wouldn't
leave this place the same. In Jesus mighty name, Amen.
Amen. Cool.
Before I I kick off, we have Kiara with us this morning.
So Kiara actually lives in Perth.
Moved from Adelaide to Perth. Was it was for work?
Yeah, yeah. Moved there to work.
And then friends of ours, friends of this house, Liam and
Alana Meesk, planted a church in Perth called Represent, which
Kiara is part of. So I've just asked her if she
can share, just for a couple of minutes, what God is doing in
Perth, what God is doing through Represent.
So. Hi family, I'm so excited to be
here with you today. God's doing such an incredible
work in Perth. It's so honestly like such a
blessing to be part of it, adding new people to our church
every single week. We're based on a university
campus and we've got students. It's like, oh week.
So it's the start of the first semester and every single week
we have people coming in. I was just looking for a church.
I've moved from Interstate, I've moved from overseas and I found
I saw there was a church on curtain campus.
And so I came and, you know, just adding to our family and
we're seeing God just provide in like supernatural ways in, in
our ability to keep using the building on such a secular
campus. It's been so incredible.
And just seeing God's like blessing and favour and adding,
we've recently added deacons to our team, which has been really,
really awesome. And yeah, just seeing like so,
so many kids as well, just everywhere all the time and like
just seeing how God's moving in them and even just like how
we've got a couple of teenagers and stuff.
But yeah, it's just been so awesome.
We recently saw celebrated our first birthday as well, which
was so cool just to see how God's like, grown us so much
from Liam and Alana's little house to like a proper like,
lecture hall. And it's just so encouraging to
see more seats filled every single weekend.
And God be glorified in all of that.
So yeah. Father, we just pray for
represent right now is their their meeting this morning.
We just pray Father, just for your blessing upon them as
they've celebrated one year. We just pay that you would
continue to grow that house. You will continue to stretch why
they're 10 pegs. They would see more and more
people added in. They would see more and more
people added to their leadership team, more favour with the
university. We thank you for the great
fruitfulness and and as they they say on earth and in Perth,
as it is in heaven, we proclaim that we prophecy that again over
their church into their church. We thank you for Liam and Alana
laying down their lives to go relocate and plant this church
in Jesus name. Amen.
Awesome.
Thank you Chiara for allowing me to put you on the spot there.
Very cool. Well, as a as a local church
here, we've been very privileged and having some Apostolic input
over the last few weeks. We had Tyrone for a couple of
weeks who leads the NCMI team. He spoke in January.
We had Leona Kotra on the back of that as well coming in.
And those guys, they really spoke a lot around church
culture. What kind of culture do you want
in church? And it's not so much based on,
you know, lights and cool projector screens and great
coffee. That's when they were talking
culture. That's not what they were
talking about. They were talking actually, how
do we build a Kingdom culture into the life of the church?
Because ultimately the thing that's going to last is not the
church that we build, it's the church that he builds, right?
Jesus said, I will build my church and the gates of hell
will not prevail. And then the Psalms tell us that
unless the Lord builds the house, the laborers labour in
vain. And so we want to be a people
here who make sure that he's building his house.
We're not trying to build his house for him.
We're not coming in with our ideas of what we think church
should be like or our preferences.
But we're actually kind of saying, go what?
What do you say in the Bible about what?
Your house? Should look like.
And you know, God is very clear in his in his word about some of
the stuff and some of the pillars that he wants to build
into his house about what his house wants to look like.
And I'll just remind you the definition of culture is that it
is a shared set of beliefs, values and behaviours that
define a. Particular group of people.
That's what culture means. I did multicultural studies at
university back a long time ago and we've studied a lot around
culture and cultural communication and all of this
kind of stuff. And, and that's basically the
academic definition of culture is a shared set of beliefs,
values and behaviours that define a.
Particular group of people. You can't actually tangibly
explain it. It's that it's one of those
weird things like I can't quite. If I was to describe the culture
of my house, I could give you some ideas, but you'd pick up
way more when you were actually in the house and you were like.
Oh, I get it, I get it. I can't.
Really be like, you know, our culture is, I mean, if some of
you have been to our house, our culture, it's loud.
We have 4 young kids, it's loud. It's hopefully fun.
Our kids crack me up all the time.
It's fast. We move quite a fast pace.
Again with kids, the attention span is just we're doing this
and then we're doing that and it's, it's a whole bunch of
crazy fun. We hope like that some of the
culture. But again, until you're in it,
you don't really know it. Does that make sense?
It's not something you can be like, if you just do these five
things, then you've got the culture.
It's like we have to be immersed in the culture.
And that's why it's so important that when we go back to the Word
of God, we actually got to go. These aren't necessarily stuff
that we have to do, but it's stuff that we actually immerse
ourself in. Does that make sense?
So we don't come to church with our checklist and be like, if we
do these six things, then, you know, we're establishing God's
culture. We actually immerse ourself into
it and say, God, help me to encapsulate what you're trying
to say and actually action it out.
Does that make sense? So this morning I, I'd, I'd like
to actually look at just some attributes when I was looking
through the, the scriptures to kind of say what, what are some
of the characteristics of God's house?
Again, not trying to be like, here's a checklist of things we
need to do, but just what are some of the things when God
talks about his house? What are some of those values
and behaviors that he wants to build into his house?
And hopefully they become our hearts desire for what God wants
to do in this place. Does that make sense?
Yeah, cool. In One Timothy chapter 3, Paul
writes to Timothy this young Apostolic leader, and he he
gives him this command and says, go teach the people how to
conduct themselves in the house. Of the Lord.
So hopefully some of these things is is actually just kind
of go how what are some of the values and behaviors that we as
people should be like? Man, this is what we want to see
in this house here. All right, in Hebrews, the
writer of Hebrews says that we are God's house.
It's not so much about the values we want to see in the
Woodcroft Community Center. It's about the values we want to
see is when we meet together. Does that make sense?
Awesome. So we're going to run through.
We're going to see how many we can get through.
I apologize for my voice. It comes and goes.
I've been on well for a little bit and then I've just got this
tail end of no voice. So please forgive me with that.
But we're going to look at the first one and this Dave shared
last week on this in Isaiah 56, seven and Matthew 2113.
God says this. He says My house shall be called
a House of prayer. For all nations.
So my first thing if we're talking about attributes of
God's house or values and behaviors that God expects of
his house is that it would be a praying house.
It's a prayerful house. And when Dave shared about
prayer last week, you know, we can sometimes we can have veiled
prayers that are more like complaining prayers.
And we can be like, oh Lord, like my neighbor really annoys
me. And you know, I really don't
like how their kids hit the ball over the fence.
And it's really. So if you could just deal with
that's not prayer like that's not, that's not Godly's prayer.
When when we're talking about my house should be a House of
prayer for all nations. We're talking about the stuff
that Dave shared last week, like becoming God, you're a great
God. Bless my neighbor.
Let him be saved in Jesus name. Like let them come to Christ
like it. It's it's a front footed prayer.
And so when we're when we're talking about pillars and
behaviours and values, we should have a house desire to come and
to pray. I wonder if your first response
is, is to pray when there's situations.
And we pray with authority. We've tried very hard in our
kids to establish a value in our house that when we're injured,
it's our first response is have you prayed?
And to the point where now our kids pray for each other when
they're injured and they're going well, I've prayed, but
they're still hurt. They need a Band-Aid.
We're like, cool, but we're teaching them the first thing we
need to do whenever somebody's hurt or injured is we pray.
It's amazing how much that works.
And they're just like, yeah, cool, I'm fine.
Now we've prayed and they are on their way.
God has called us to be a prayerful people, a prayerful
house. Second thing which we've been
emphasizing this morning is that we would be a praising house, a
praising house. And again, it's, it's really
interesting some of the emphasis that's come through this morning
around praise because I think all of us in our hearts are
going, yeah, I praise the Lord when I get up in the morning,
I'm like, thank you, Lord, for, you know, the sunshine and
everything like that. And you know, it's a great day.
It's interesting when it says in Psalm 42, four, which is up
there, it says how these things I remember as I pour out my
soul. This is a psalmist writing how I
would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the
House of God with glad shouts and songs of praise.
A multitude keeping festival praise is not something that's
quiet. When the Scriptures talk of
praise, it is something that is allowed.
It is something that is, that is overflowing.
The psalmist in Psalm 135 says a similar thing.
Praise the Lord. Praise the name of the Lord.
Give praise, O servants of the Lord, who stand in the House of
the Lord, in the courts of the House of our God.
Praise the Lord, for the Lord is good.
Sing to his name, for it is pleasant.
For the Lord has chosen Jacob for himself, Israel as his own
possession. So it says again, it's this idea
that praise means something. It's got it's got an action to
it. I think we can hold a value of
praise in here. But even the Scriptures teach us
as a man thinks in his heart, so shall he be like.
The idea is that praise should actually look like something.
When I say, hey, praise the Lord as we've been sharing some of
the stuff this morning, it looks like something.
It looks like something. And so when God says I want my
house to be a praising house, it's going to be a house full of
dancing. It's going to be a house full of
jumping. It's going to be a house full of
clapping. It's going to be a house full of
singing, full of hands raised up, full of people aren't like,
that's the kind of house that God imagines when he looks at
this house. It's going, that's the house
that I want. I want a house like that of
people lifting their hands and and jubilantly singing with all
of their mind. That's the house that he wants.
The house he wants is a house that's prayerful, the house
that's praising. And Luke 14, Jesus tells this
parable of a guy throwing a wedding feast.
And it's Luke 1415 to 24. It's a big parable, but
basically this guy sends out, it says, go, go invite my invited
guests and all the invited guests that have excuses, you
know, one guy's like, I just bought a field.
I can't come. Like I've just bought some oxen.
I've got, I'm just getting married, all of this kind of
stuff. And he goes, well, go find other
people and invite them in and he invites them in and he's still
got room. And the statement that he says
to his servants is go off to the highways, to the byways, go to
the far off towns and invite people in that my house might be
full. So my third thing that Jesus God
wants, his desire for his house is that it would be a.
Packed house. A packed house.
Right. God's desire for this house here
is that it would be packed. Can you imagine that?
Can you imagine that viewing this, this is a big dividing
wall here. Can you imagine that God's heart
for this church isn't that it would stay this size, his heart
for represent over in Perth isn't that it would stay that
size that it would be packed. But more than that, not just our
venue, but our community groups, your homes like this.
Let's make it personal, right? So some of us we we enjoy our
our personal time, right. We're like, man, I just I love
coming to church, but I also like being at home on my own.
You know, God's desire for your house is that it will be packed
with people who want to know him because we are the House of God.
It's not about this space. It's about the people of God.
His he wants his house to be packed and that requires also
talking about being a packed house is those servants were
going out and now we're inviting anybody and everybody.
They're like, do you want to come to a wedding feast?
Do you want to come? Do you want to come and see what
God is doing? Do you want to come and be part
of what God is doing? Come and be part, come and be
part. I think in our thinking, we can
be so selective. Oh, that person, they're
probably going to say no to coming to church.
So I won't even bother inviting them.
Look, I need to extend a bit of a more of a relationship before
I invite that person to church. This parable teaches us it's
just like, just come, just come and I'm going to.
And if you say no, I'm going to go to the next person until
this. House is packed.
God wants his house to be packed.
I wonder if our desire as well is that this house would be
packed. The our desire is, you know
what, I'm just going to start inviting random people to
church. Come to church.
We've got Easter coming up. We've got to do some stuff here
on Easter Sunday. The idea is that we want this
house to be packed. So if you've got some people.
In mind that you're like, man, why don't you come to church at
Easter? Because God's heart is that he
wants his house to be packed, people to encounter him, right?
So, so God's. Idea these are all from
Scripture. This is what he these are some
of the cultures, the values and behaviors that he wants in his
house is that it would be a prayerful house, a praising
house, a packed house. Psalm 122 verse one says I was
glad when they said to me, let's go up to the House of the Lord.
He wants it to be a positive house.
I wonder I was thinking about this last night.
I wonder if you were glad when you woke up this morning because
you were coming to the House of the Lord.
I wonder if you were glad. I wonder if you were glad when
you realized prayer meeting was on Wednesday night and you're
like, man, it's Wednesday. I'm glad when they said to me,
let's go to the House of the Lord.
I wonder if you were glad on on Friday night when your community
group was on. You're like, man, I'm glad
because I get to go be. With the people of God.
God's desire is the people. We would be glad when they said
to us, let's go to the House of the Lord.
It's often said the Christian should be one of the most
positive people on the planet. Why?
Because we have an eternal hope and we have a people that he's
redeemed. Like we're all, we're all going
to get to hang out forever in eternity.
He's wanting this to be a positive house.
And we, we sometimes we do have bad days and bad sleep and all
that kind of stuff. But when somebody says man,
yeah, but do you want to be with the people of God?
I'm like 100% because that's going to be the most
encouraging, uplifting, hope filled place that I can find on
the planet. And so of course, I was glad
when they said to me, let's go up to the House of the Lord.
I wonder when we wake up in the morning, is our attitude.
I was glad when they said to me, let's go to the House of the
Lord. Or is it a burden?
Is it a struggle? Is it is it tough?
And you're like, look, I'll go to church out of duty, not
because I'm positive, I'm glad. Like it's a, it's a huge
privilege for us in this country to come to church in other
countries around the world, they're persecuted and stuff
like that. But you.
Should see the joy. I've been to some third world
countries, the absolute joy on their face when they get to meet
together. It's it's blows me away just so
like man, I get to be with the people of God encountering him.
That should be our heart, our attitude.
We are a positive people. That's God's idea for his house
is that it would be a positive people Next one.
He his desire is that we would be a prophetic Apostolic.
House Ephesians 219 to 20. It says that his house, the
household of God is built on the foundation of the apostles and
prophets. And what that simply means.
You can look at that and say, well, that means the Bible, but
it means more than that because we see apostles and prophets
kind of going extending beyond that.
A prophetic means to to see what God is doing, to see what God is
doing and to Apostolic is to be a sent people, to be a going
people, to be an outward looking people who can we send?
So it's the ability to see what God is doing, see what God is
doing in this house. Like the Bible gives us a whole
bunch of values and stuff, but there's also seasons in God that
we pick up and we say, well, God, this is where you want to
take us as a people. And he's called all of us to
come together as a prophetic Apostolic people and we partner
with a prophetic Apostolic team as well.
That helps in that regard. He's called us to his desire for
his house is it wouldn't be stagnant.
It wouldn't be ritualistic, traditional.
It's, it's it's hearing what God is doing in the season.
It speaks in the word of God about these people who knew the
seasons and knew what to do. And that's the idea of being a
prophetic Apostolic people that we can understand what God is
doing and we know what what needs to be done.
And God's desire for his house is that when we come together
here, we're all like, man, we know where God is taking us and
that all of our hearts is like, if God is saying, Hey, I want to
send you, you're like, yes, Lord, I'm there.
I have a heart to go. I have a heart to be sent from
this house and and sent out to our neighbors, sent out to the
nations. That's God's heart for his
house. One of the values and behaviours
that he wants in his house is that we would all be picking up
what God is doing in and through US.
So God has called us to be a prayerful people, appraising
people. He wants it to be a packed
house, a positive house, a prophetic Apostolic house.
And in Ephesians 220, it does go on.
It says built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets
with Christ Jesus as the chief cornerstone.
It, it's a house that is predicated on and pointing to
Jesus. It's the house that's predicated
on and pointing to Jesus. Well, second point came up.
That's cool. Predicated and pointing to
Jesus. Now, Leo, a couple of weeks ago,
I would encourage you to go back and listen to that.
He just basically preached on this whole idea that it is all
about Jesus. Do you come, do you come this
morning and kind of go, this is, this is great.
This is Dave's church. He's leading this.
So do you come and go, Hey, man, God planted A lampstand here.
God planted A lampstand. Dave was just the guy that said,
yes, this is God's house, right? This is God's house.
So it, it is predicated upon and pointing to Jesus.
Everything we do is pointing to him, right?
We can say, Oh man, you know, I, I love the way that this church
does XYZ, but ultimately we need to be pointing to him and
saying, actually, you come to church to meet him.
You come to church to sing songs to him.
You come to church to hear from him when somebody preaches,
right? So we're always pointing to him.
And when somebody comes to me for advice or like in the
privileged role that we have as elders in the church, when
people are like, Hey, what do you think our objective is to
point you to him. It's not to give you our ideas
or our advice. It's actually say we'll look to
him, look to him and everything we do comes from him.
Everything that we try and do in this house and in this place is
actually starting with the base of him.
And so we have to always go back and say, God, what is, what is
your desire? And then from there I move
forward. And so we're always predicated
upon everything that we're doing is founded upon Jesus to begin
with. And it's always pointing to
Jesus at the end. In fact, the scriptures, I was,
I was doing some more research on this.
They interchange with the word capstone and cornerstone
throughout the scriptures. And they're kind of going, well,
they kind of mean the same thing that they're different things.
A cornerstone, as Leo spoke about, is the first stone you
lay in the foundation. It sets the tone for everything
else. It is the thing that gives you
your straight edge. And Christ uses our cornerstone.
And a capstone is different. The capstone is the last stone.
You put in place. It's the one that holds.
Everything together right at the very end, and we need to
remember that everything. We do is.
Founded and grounded and guided by Jesus, and everything we do
is pointing to him and pointing to an eternity with him, our
great bridegroom. And so he wants church.
God's heart for his house is that we would be predicated upon
and pointing to Jesus, right? We're getting those so.
God's heart for his house, one of the values and behaviors that
he wants as well is that this would be a powerful house.
In the book of Genesis, this goes right back to the very
beginning. Actually, the first mention of
the word House of God in the Scriptures is found in Genesis
chapter 28. Jacob has his dream.
Jacob awoke from his sleep, so he's had this dream.
This dream is this ladder going from heaven to earth and angels
are ascending and descending. This really strange dream.
Hey, I don't know if you've had any dreams like that.
I certainly haven't. Like so vivid that I'm like, Oh
my goodness, wow. Like literally where he is, this
ladder going up to heaven and angels and heavens opened and
it's, it's crazy stuff. And then he woke awake from his
sleep, and he said, surely the Lord is in this.
Place and I did not know it. Next verse and he was afraid and
said, how awesome is this place this is none other than the
House of God. This is the gate of heaven and
it goes on. He says he called that place
Bethel, which means House of God.
God's heart for us as a people and heart for.
Every church is that. It wouldn't just be a place to
be come and go, but it would be a place where his supernatural
power is demonstrated well. We would see testimonies of the
miraculous. We would hear stories like that.
We're hearing from representative how God is
supernaturally providing buildings and people's lives
being turned around, people coming to Christ, which is the
greatest miracle, people being healed, people being set free.
He's expecting his house to be a house full of power.
One of I wonder if it's stirring in your heart saying.
Lord, I want this house to be a house full of power.
Lord, would you come and open up, make this a gateway of
heaven. The people would come in and
they would touch something of what the heavenly heavenly
realities is the Lord's Prayer right on earth as it is in
heaven. That's that's how Jesus taught
us to pray on earth as it is in heaven.
There's something of what is in heaven that we're expecting to
take place here on earth. And so God has called us to be.
A powerful house. A house demonstrating and
walking in the power of God and we see this throughout the book
of Acts like as Dave mentioned this morning, like this guy's
paralyzed on a mat. They're walking to a prayer
meeting and Peter and John look at this guy and say get up off
your mat and he goes in and he's miraculously healed.
There's a power. The early church is birthed in
Acts chapter 2 by the Holy Spirit coming upon them in power
Jesus command in Acts chapter 1. So we're going to go backwards
in time as you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes
upon you. And then you would be my
witnesses. There's something of the church
that should actually be demonstrating a walking in the
power of God. And I want to encourage you.
That's God's heart for you. That's God's heart for your
house as well. This isn't just, oh, I come to
the white church and that's where the power is.
No, no, no. The book the Bible actually
teaches that we are the House of God, which means when people
come into your house, that should be a House of power.
Where you're actually giving testimonies and testifying of
what God is actually doing in supernatural power in your house
that God is providing, that there are miracles, that people
are getting transformed and changed.
There's prophetic words, there's there's words of knowledge and
wisdom and all that kind of stuff that we see in the Bible.
That should be in your house as well.
Every time we come together, community group prayer meeting,
they should be powerful places where things are moved and
shifted on earth. Prayerful, praising pact,
positive, prophetic and Apostolic, predicated by and
pointing to Jesus. Powerful.
Malachi 310 The last one. The next one is that God wants
his house to be a providing house.
Malachi 310, which is often quoted when we're talking about
tithing. Do you have it there, Pete?
Awesome. Let's throw that up.
Bring all the ties into the storehouse that there may be
food in my house. Bring all the ties into the
storehouse that there may be food.
In my house, one of the values and behaviors of that God wants
for his house is that there would be food in the house.
I want to ask you, how does the food get into the house?
Because God has called us as people to demonstrate a value
and a behavior of bringing and providing for the house.
Bring all the ties into the house.
When they took up ties and offerings throughout the Old
Testament, when they said, hey, bring your offering, it was very
clear where they had to bring it.
Bring it to the house, bring it to the priest, into the
Tabernacle, into the temple. Bring it to where God is so that
there would be food in the house for those who need it.
One of the values and behaviors that God desires for every
church is that it would be a church that's able to to provide
for those who need it. We see this in the book of Acts.
When they met together, no one had need because everyone,
everyone sold what they had, what they had surplus of and
gave to the church that the church could then give beyond.
So God's heart for you is a a value and a behaviour that He
wants to instill in you and me. Is that we would be people who
actually provide for God's house through tithes, through
offerings that we would provide to God's house that God's house
could then administrate what he wants to do right.
We know the saying money makes the world go round right?
It's a reality. But there's something about this
that God says actually in my. House, bring your stuff.
To my house that my house might be able to provide it's a one of
God's values for his house as it would be a providing house that
when people come we're like we can provide why because people
have provided so God has called his house to be a providing
house with the provision of God just flows through.
It's not meant to be a dam. It's a river where we give to
God and God that just flows through and we say cool, we
could. We're just administrating what
God has already brought in so many times through the
Scriptures is. It's amazing.
I challenge you to go look it up.
When people provided to the House of God, they actually had
to tell the people, stop. We've got too much we've
actually we can't get. Rid of this.
Quick enough, we we're giving it away as fast as we can, but we
still can't do it. Like that is God's desire for
his house. That's his desire for this house
here that we would have to say, whoa, whoa.
We can't actually administrate everything that God's bringing
in because God is bringing in so much and we're just trying to
provide for everything and we've still got some leftover.
Because we serve a great and generous God, but it's going to
take every single one of us with this value and behavior that we
provide for the House of God so that the House of God can
provide. God has called us to be a
providing house. Psalm 92, our next point.
It's providing house. It's called us to be a planted
house. The righteous shall flourish
like a palm tree. He shall grow like a cedar in
Lebanon. Next verse.
Those who are planted in the House of the Lord shall flourish
in the courts of our God. What are the next?
They shall still bear fruit in old age.
They shall be fresh and flourishing.
I wonder for some of you older people in the room whether
that's your prayer, whether you actually read the Scripture and
you say, man, God, you've called me to bear fruit in my old age.
You've called me. To be fresh and to flourish when
you are planted, That's God's promise.
You shall be a fruit and be fresh and flourishing in old
age. Nexus to declare that the Lord
is upright. He is my rock.
There is no unrighteousness in Him.
The desire for God's house is that people would be planted.
People would be planted in His house.
God has called all of us to be planted in, to be knitted in, to
be knitted one to another. God's desire is that people
would be planted for a long time.
As it says, they still bear fruit in old age, which means
they've been there for a while. I'm not sure.
Leona Pat, you guys have been around church for how long?
Decades. Probably half a century or
something before 1960. That's 60 plus years, 60 plus
years planted in. The House of the Lord.
You still flourish and be fruitful and fresh when you're
planted in the house. We, we've heard even from Dudley
last year that unfortunately one of the biggest tragedies in
church life is people who call themselves Christians but are
not planted in. But the promise of God's house
is what he wants is that people who call themselves Christians
that would be planted in to a local church because that's
where you flourish, that's where you can be fruitful, is when
you're planted in, when you're built into the local church.
God once calls every single Christian to be planted into his
house, not just coming occasionally when they feel like
it, when there's a special event, when their favorite
preachers on, but that they would be planted in the House of
the Lord. God has called you to be planted
in, but not just to be planted as in coming on a Sunday, but to
be planted in, planted in with the people next to you.
God has called. His house to be a planted house.
I have three more and then we'll close.
Haggai one verse 4. It's it's what, and it's an
incredibly challenging text. This.
I'll just give you a summary. Basically, we heard last week,
Nehemiah, they're building a wall and they're rebuilding
Jerusalem. And then they get to the point
where they're trying to build their houses, right?
And the people of Israel are like, you know what, we're going
to build our own house. And the prophet Haggai comes in
this point, and it's not great. If we could throw that scripture
up here, his, his God's let it go for a while and he goes.
Is it time for you yourselves to dwell in your panelled houses,
and yet this temple to lie in ruins, or my.
House to lie in ruins. It's quite a challenging
scripture when God comes to these people and because they're
giving a lot of devotion to building their house.
But they're ignoring God's house.
And this can be a challenge for all of us, I think, because we
live in a world that that is all about making ourselves look
good. It's all about me making a
career for myself. It's more about me earning some
money, having a nice car and stuff like that.
And God comes to the people in the book of Haggai and says,
hang on, you're, you're building your house.
But my house lays in ruins. It's my point with this is that
God wants his house to be a priority.
His house is to be a priority. If I have a choice between being
with God's people and doing something else, my choice will
always be to be with God's people unless it is an
exceptionally rare circumstance. Because God has wants his house
to be a priority. And I know that can be.
There has been historically bad preaching on this, that it's
about giving everything you have to the church.
And if that's your heart, then that's that's not right.
But I give to his house because it's his house, right?
It's not because some pastor told me to that I have to be at
every meeting and I have to be there and serving or whatever
like that. I actually have a revelation
that this is what the house that God is building and that this
thing lasts forever as a God is cool.
God wants a priority, a value and a behaviour in his house.
Is that it is a priority in our lives?
That it is not the last thing on our list to kind of say, well,
I'll do this thing and that thing and if I've got some time
leftover, then I'll make it to church on time.
He's going, no, no, no. It actually takes high
precedence to be with the people of God, right?
And so we're like, oh, you know, maybe I'll do that thing and
then maybe I'm a bit tired now. I can't make it to prayer
meeting. God's called it to.
Be a priority because his house is to be a priority.
His house is to be a priority in our lives and he he expects it
to be a priority. And I want to just challenge
you. It's challenge for me as well,
kind of going, God, where in my life is your house not a
priority? And help me to make it a
priority. Do I need to swap some things
over? Do I need to change some of my
priorities here because I've actually let something take the
place of actually building God's house?
And it's not so much about just coming to God's house because
he, Haggai doesn't just say it's enough that you come to the
house. He actually says you've got to
come and build my house. And so it's not just enough to
say, well, I can go to church and that's enough.
That's that's what God is calling about a priority.
No, no, the priority is that I'm coming to participate and build
God's house. So are we making it not just a
priority to be here, but a priority to come and build here?
Which means I'm coming ready to contribute something.
I'm coming ready to encourage somebody, ready to pray for
somebody, ready to share something, ready to suggest a
song, ready to read something. The Bible actually speaks in the
book of Corinthians and says when you come together, everyone
should have a Psalm, A hymn, a spiritual song, a word of
encouragement, everyone, and that's challenging.
I want to ask you, did everyone come this morning whether you've
shared on the mic or not? Did everyone come with a Psalm
of him, a spiritual song, a word of encouragement, a word of.
Wisdom to share with somebody else.
When God says I want my house to be a priority, that's what he's
talking about. Not just I come to church on
time. God's house is to be a priority.
Hebrews 3, Four to six. Every house is built by someone,
but he who built all things is God.
Moses indeed was faithful in all God's house as a servant for a
testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward, but
Christ as a son over his own house, whose house we are, if we
hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope, firm to
the end. My next point, second to last
point, is that God wants His house to be a persevering house.
We don't run when things get hard.
You see so many people when a church goes.
Through a bit of a trial or or something happens or the leaders
make a mistake or something like that, people run to the hills
and they kind of go. That's it, I'm done.
I'm out. The church hurt me.
I'm out God's. Value that he wants for His
church is that it would be a preserving, persevering church
that we would hold fast to the end.
God has called all of us to hold fast to our confession to the
very end because it's hard for all of us is to be persevering.
Last point comes from Ecclesiastes.
Walk prudently when you go to the House of God, draw near to
here rather than to give the sacrifice of fools, for they do
not know that they do evil. If you go on into verse two and
three, it talks about watching what you say.
But my last point is that God wants a value in His House of
prudence, which is basically just to be careful when he
talks, like don't be so quick. We are meeting with the God of
the universe. Like I think sometimes we can we
approach God as our friend, which is great and God is our
father and that's awesome. But he's also Almighty God.
And the author of the book of Proverbs, Solomon, the wisest
man on the planet, said this the beginning, that the fear of the
Lord is the beginning of wisdom. And so when we come into this
place, we are so careful why we are so free.
We are free because Christ has set.
US free we're. Also very careful because this
is also almighty God. And so I'm coming in and I'm
checking my heart and say, Lord, let there be nothing offensive
in me as I come to your house. If I actually says in in
Corinthians as well when they're talking about the Lord's Supper,
like taking communion and Paul writes and says, if you have an
issue with your brother, stop, go sort it out and then come
because you do it, you're dishonouring God.
And so when God says I want my house.
To be a prudent house. He's talking about that kind of
stuff. And so that when we come in,
we're saying, God creating me a clean heart, that when I come
into the House of the Lord, you would accept me.
And I, I plead the blood of Jesus over everything.
I can't remember, but I come in holiness and reverence of an
almighty God. And so we come here, we kind of,
as we encourage this warning around praise and around
worthiness, we're actually saying, well, you are worthy
because you're the king of all kings and the Lord of all Lords.
And yes, you're my ABBA father, and yes, you're, you're my
savior and my friend, but you are also King of kings, Lord of
Lords, Almighty God reigning and ruling in power.
And so I come and say, whore, I need some fear of the Lord in me
when I come. And I don't just throw things
off when God pinpoints stuff in my life, I don't just go, yeah,
it's fine because Jesus covers my blood.
It covers me with his blood. I go, no, no, no.
That needs to be dealt with because he wants it to be a pure
and a prudent house. When God speaks of his house,
these are some of the values and the cultures that he wants.
And I, I, I want to ask you if this is some of the stuff that
God wants in his house. These should be some of the
stuff that we want in our house. I want my house to be a
prayerful house that when people come in, I want them to know we
pray that we are a praising house.
We are celebrating who God is, that we are a packed house.
We we are always inviting people and our door is always open.
Because I know that God wants a packed house.
He wants people coming in. He wants people coming in here.
So I'm like, come, come, come. He wants it to be a positive
house, a joyful house. He wants us even in, in our
house, in our, in our home where we live.
He wants us to be thinking of the nations, to be hearing God's
voice for what he wants to do into our future and where he
wants to send us and lead us. He wants us to always be
predicated by and pointing to Jesus.
In everything we do in our house, we're always teaching our
kids about Jesus. We're reading the word and
pointing them. They have this great Bible, I
can't remember what it's called, but basically every story in it
ends up with the last paragraph that actually just points them
to Jesus like you're reading about Abraham offering.
Isaac as a sacrifice and it's pointing and saying, but there
was a lamb to come to take away the sins of the world.
And it's always pointing to Jesus.
That's what I want in my house, that everything, everything that
happens, I'm pointing back and say, oh, Jesus, and I'm pointing
my kids to Jesus. I want my house to be a powerful
house where the testimony is that God is at work.
I'd love and I dream of this, my neighbors being like, man, we
know that when you pray, God moves your house.
It seems to be where God does stuff.
So hey, we've got this problem. Come and pray.
And I'm like, yeah, I believe that God will move in power.
I want my house to be a providing house that we would
not just provide for the House of God, but that God would use
us to provide for his purposes and plans.
It says I got any resources you give to me?
It's not a question of how much I should get.
It's just a question. It just flows through.
I'm just like, Lord, you asked me to give that I give.
Why? Because you've called me to be a
providing house. He's called me to be a planted
house. I'm this, this is not optional
for us, our kids, even when they're like, oh, we've got to
do this. We've got to do this, yes, but
it's a priority. This is a priority.
Why? Because it's God's priority.
He's building his house. We persevere in our house.
I want our house to be a house where we persevere in the things
of God. They were saying, you know what?
Yes, things might get hard and tough and whatever, but we
persevere and we hold fast to God.
No matter what goes on around us, we hold fast when when
things get tough, we hold fast and we cling to hope.
And I want our house also to be a prudent house where we deal
with things quickly and we say, Lord, keep us clean, creating us
a clean heart before you so that when we come, there's nothing.
There's no offense, there's no issues, there's nothing.
And I'm just it's, we're keeping quick short accounts with people
and with things. So I want to ask you, these are
some of the values and behaviors that you want to see in your
house as well in your home. This is what God desires for all
of us to walk in and to live in. Would you close your eyes?
And we'll pray. Father, we, we come before you
this morning again, as we've just heard attributes of your
house. And we we thank you that it's
your house, your building, that these aren't just things that we
like. Probably some things we don't
like to hear, but ultimately this is your house.
And that when you spoke of building your church and
building your house, you said that the gates of hell would not
prevail against it, that this would be an advancing house
taking ground for the king and his Kingdom.
And so we pray, Lord, as a local church, as you build some of
these things into our culture, some of these values and
behaviors, into our midst, into our homes, the Lord, we would
see the gates of hell push back. We would see this house advance
into all that God. Has for it.
We ask for our own lives on that list that you would highlight
something to us where you where we need to change, where we need
to adjust a value and a behaviour in our life to align
with what you want for your house.
We thank you for our time together this morning.
We thank you for allowing us to meet here, for all that you're
doing over the past few weeks and all that you're going to do.
Into our future we pray Lord, that you would build and
establish your Kingdom come and your will be done in this place
as it is in heaven. In Jesus mighty name we thank
you. Amen.
Good.
Job, thank you bro, can we can we put this the list just back
up for a second, please? You know, as I'm sitting there
looking at this, I was just like I was thinking about Jesus,
right? Like Jesus was all of these
things, like all of them, like you look at that Jesus represent
every one of these things. He's perfect, right?
And we are, you know, like as much as these things are for our
house and for our houses and we are, we are a vessel for his
Holy Spirit. That means that all of these
things can be found in US if we're yielded to God and that
he's able to use us powerfully, right?
And they like they, they, they, they crossover as well.
Like, you know, like if you've got a, if you've got a
conviction that the House of God would be packed, you would be
planted. But you would, that this would
be a priority to you, you would be here, right?
And it works back the other way. Like if you, if it's not a
priority, you, you probably don't think too much about this
house being packed. But the reality is, if we're not
here, this place isn't packed. Do you see what I'm saying?
So they do crossover and all of these things like we can't, we
can not do these things in our own strength.
And I was reading this morning about you just in the book of
Acts, because, you know, at Pentecost, the Holy Spirit comes
and empowers them, right? The Holy Spirit comes, that's
the thing. He empowers them, right?
But that's not the only place that you read that, because then
you read a bit further down and and they're praying and they're
persecuted and they're saying, Lord, you know, give us
boldness. What happens?
The Holy Spirit fills them. We need to be filled with the
Holy Spirit. So I'm going to pray today like
if you're willing, if you, if you want, if this is the desire
for you that you want to see the House of God built the way that
the Scripture teaches us to, to build and for him to do what he
says he would do. We're going to require for the
Holy Spirit to come and move in this place upon us, his vessels.
So would you, would you stand with me?
Like let's just stand on. I'm just going to pray and, and
according to your willingness, the Lord will give you what you
need to fulfill his will. Amen.
That is true. So Father, we, we look to you
and even as we see in scripture, they, they ask you, Lord, for
boldness. We've praised Jesus, we've lift
you high, we've lifted the name of Jesus in this place.
Lord, now we're asking, Holy Spirit, won't you fill us?
Won't you come and empower us? Lord, won't you allow us to
overcome the the hurdles to deal with the stuff that's held us
back, Lord, whatever it is, because there's things that are
going on in our lives, in our thinking, all of this stuff
that's contrary to your word. So I just pray that the Holy
Spirit would wash over us, wash over our minds, wash over our
spirits, wash over our bodies, Lord, and empower us to be the
vessels you've called us to be, but that we would be the house
that you've called us to be. And these things we pray in
Jesus mighty name, Amen. Guess what?
I think I've been sitting here, I, I really appreciate the, the,
the, the piece and I'm desperately trying to find
something that will convey the concept that house is mobile
because within an hour or two, the house is gone from here.
The house is in the house. I think we've got to separate in
our minds the brick and whatever mortal, whatever is around us
and the people of God. If we come to the House of God,
what are we coming to? We're not coming to a building.
We're coming to God's people. And I think it's very helpful to
realize that the word church, the word church is, if you go to
the etymology of the word church, it comes from a, a
Germanic base. It has to do with the building.
If we take the word from the the Greek text of the Bible, the
word is ecclesia, which is the coming together or the the
gathering of the covenant people of God.
We've got to I think it's such a pity we keep we've got to use
this word church, because you know, if you ask somebody
where's your church, you will say, Oh, well, it's on this Ave.
or that and to just here this morning just to separate
ourselves from the building. And I'm appreciate the building.
Don't misunderstand, but we've got to believe that when you
come to the House of God, where are you coming to?
You're coming to a family of God.
You're coming to the cold out and, and, and, and if you're
bringing money, where you, who are you bringing the money to?
To this building? No, no, no, you're bringing
money to this family of God that's being led by elders who
God is putting in position. It just helps me.
It helps me to separate that in my mind.
Very good. Very good.
Do you know that Kiara and Linda here, who are part of another
church, have come to church this morning, Right.
They've come to be with the family.
Amen. It's a wonderful thing.
Thank you, Leon. Thank you guys.
Let's enjoy this day. Let's pray for one another, ask
each other how we're doing, be the House of God, love one
another. Let's experience heaven in this
place. Amen.
Thank you for joining us for today's message.
For more information about The Way Church, please visit
ourwebsite@thewaychurch.com dot AU.
Have a blessed day.