As you're having a seat, turn to someone and say God is good.
Hey, it's so good to be with you this morning.
Happy Mother's Day to everybody. Guys, we got to learn how to
talk to the women in our lives, don't we?
Yeah. Amen.
There There was a mother and father, and they went away on
vacation. They went over to Europe, and as
mothers do, the mom called home every day to communicate with
her son. And so she called home the first
day, first day of her trip and said, hey, mom, how or hey son,
how's everything going at home? And the son said, well, I got
bad news. The cat died.
Now that was mom loved the cat. She said, oh, she was she was
distraught. She said that's why would you
tell me that on the first day of my vacation?
Why would you ruin my trip by just throwing that news out
there? He said, I'm sorry, Mama, I
didn't, I didn't know how to break it to you.
And and she said, well, here's what you need to do.
That guy's this a lesson for you.
She said you need to soften it. What you should have done is you
should have, you should have said, hey, you know, I got some
news. The cat got out and got on the
roof. She said.
Then the next day you could have said, you know, because the cat
got on the roof, the fire department had to come.
And then the next day you could have told me, you know, when the
fire department came, unfortunately the cat fell and
had to go to the vet. And unfortunately the cat had to
have surgery. And then the next day you could
tell me, unfortunately the cat didn't make it.
See, it softens it, it makes it better.
And the sun says, I'm so sorry, mom.
I'm sorry I didn't communicate. Well, get off the phone.
Two days later she calls and says, how's everything going?
And he says, well, grandma got up on the roof.
We got to learn to communicate with our moms.
Serious, serious lesson here. You got to learn to communicate.
When I was in high school, our youth group, this is true.
That's not true. This is true.
When I was in high school, our youth group went on a trip to
Texas. And I for the life of me do not
remember what I was in trouble for, but I was in trouble.
I got in trouble from time to time and I had to call home and
tell my parents what I had done. I still don't remember what I
had done, but I called home and I said, mom, I got some bad
news. I got a piercing.
Now, if you know my mom, my mom was like, oh, no, she was
terrified. I say, yeah, mom, I got a
piercing. I'm sorry.
And and she got all upset. And I said, oh, I'm just
kidding, Mom, actually I did this.
And she was like, oh, thank God you didn't get a piercing.
It works. It's it's good.
You got to learn to communicate. Listen.
That has nothing to do with the message, by the way.
I'm sorry. I just I just want to say Happy
Mother's Day. But we're working through roots
and fruits are to hope there's nothing on the screens.
We're working through our series roots and fruits.
And and here's the deal. We are we're talking about
bearing fruit. We as a church and, and I really
believe that God's put on my heart that we as a church are
called to bear fruit. Scripture is very clear that
every single one of us that is a Christian is a follower of
Christ should be bearing fruit in our life.
That there should be evidence that God is working in our life,
that there should be growth, but also that we should become a
part of what God's doing doing in the world around us.
There should be evidence inward and there should be evidence
outward as we work to follow along God's plan.
Now, it's not what we do. I want to be really clear.
It's not that we become a Christian, then we have to
figure out how to bear fruit for the Kingdom.
It's that God lives in US and works in US and works through
us. And as we walk with him, we bear
fruit. Last week we looked at we're,
we're working through Colossians, Paul's letter to the
church at Colossae. And last week we talked about
chapter 1, Paul's prayer for the church and his number one prayer
was that they need to know God's will for their lives.
He says, my, my prayer for you is that you will know God's
will. He goes on, he says, if you know
God's will, then you will bear fruit.
Then you will be strengthened, you will be filled, you will
have joy. He goes on to all these things,
but his main prayer is that the church would know God's will and
would bear fruit for his Kingdom.
And that's Paul's prayer for the church.
He follows that up. We're in Colossians 1 today.
Follows that up by keeping the church focused on the most
important thing. So stand with me.
We're going to read Colossians 115 to 29.
You can follow along on the screen as I read.
Starting in verse 15, Paul focuses us in on the most
important thing, and that's Jesus Christ.
He says the Son Jesus is the image of the invisible God.
He's the first born over all creation, for in him all things
were created, Things in heaven and on earth, visible and
invisible, whether Thrones or powers or rulers or authorities,
all things have been created through him and for him.
He is before all things. Jesus is before all things.
In Him all things are held together, and He is the head of
the body, the Church. He's the beginning, the first
born from among the dead, so that in everything he might have
supremacy. For God was pleased to have all
his fullness dwell in him, in Jesus, and through him to
reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or
things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on
the cross. Skipping down to verse 24, Paul
says, now I rejoice and what I am suffering for you, and I fill
up in my flesh what is still lacking in regard to Christ's
afflictions for the sake of his body, which is the church.
I have become its servant by the Commission God gave me to
present to you the word of God and its fullness.
The mystery that's been kept hidden for ages and generations,
but now is, is now disclosed to the Lord's people, to them.
God has made, has chosen to make known among the Gentiles the
glorious riches of this mystery which is Christ in you, the hope
of glory. He is the one we proclaim,
admonishing and teaching everyone with all wisdom, so
that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ.
To this end, I strenuously contend with all the energy
Christ so powerfully works and me.
Praise the Lord, you can have a seat.
Paul is writing to the church. He's writing to Christians, and
he's heard the good news that the church there in Colossi has
been bearing fruit. He's heard about the good things
God has done. And so he's writing back as a
pastor, as a leader. He's writing back to the church.
Now here's the thing that the church has been under attack
from false ideologies or false teachers that are trying to lead
the church astray. And so Paul is writing back and
he says, my first prayer is that you will know God's will.
You'll be clear on God's will that you will bear fruit.
And then he goes into this part and he says Jesus is the center
of everything. See, there were different
teachers and leaders coming in trying to distract from what
they really listen today. There is no shortage of false
ideologies and teachings. There is no shortage of people
who get up. Listen, I see stuff all the time
that I'm like, I don't know that that lines up with with who God
is and what he wants, but there's teaching all over the
place and there's all these ideologies and Paul's writing
saying keep focused on what you need to keep focused on Jesus
Christ. There's three things we see in
this #1 we see the source, that's Jesus Christ.
Any fruit that we will bear comes from and flows through
Jesus. If Paul's prayer is that they
will know God's will and that they will bear fruit, if Paul's
prayer for the church, if God's will for the church is that we
will bear fruit and we will build the Kingdom, the source of
all of it is Jesus Christ. Jim Stock, I don't know.
I don't know if I see him back there, but Jim, wonderful man of
this church, has been teaching a long time.
I've heard him say many times he said this, anything less than
Christ is inadequate. Anything more than Christ is
unnecessary. Jesus is the center.
He's the source of everything. He's in the middle of all of it.
And so the key to bearing fruit is Jesus.
The focus, our focus needs to be on Jesus.
The power at work comes through Jesus.
John 15 says if you abide in me, you will bear fruit.
If we are close to Him, if we walk with him, if we are filled
by his Spirit, that's when we bear fruit.
Not when you learn to speak well or you learn techniques or you
or not when I give you a certain gift.
No, no, when you are filled by the Spirit of God, when you are
close to Jesus, the source, you will bear fruit.
And so Jesus is the center. You know, there's a lot of
pressure as a pastor to be interesting there.
There's pastor. I mean, you, you guys can watch
YouTube, you can watch anyone you want preach.
I appreciate you being here to listen to me today.
It's not about me. We're here to worship God.
But there is this pressure. Just being honest.
We got to be interesting. We got to say something that
will keep your attention. And especially as a young
pastor, we, you really feel this, Hey, I've got to get up
here and I've got to tell you something and it's got to be
something new. Listen, No, no, no, no, let's
not get it wrong. Jesus is the key.
He's the source. He's all of it.
I don't care if you think I'm interesting or not.
I do care that you know Jesus and walk with Him and follow him
every day. If you'll do that, you will bear
fruit and you'll be everything that God created and called you
to be. Jesus is the Sinner.
In fact, listen to how Paul describes.
You can just kind of make notes in your head as I read through
this. The sun is the image of the
invisible God. He's the first born over all
creation, for in Him all things were created.
Things on heaven, in heaven and on earth, visible, invisible,
whether Thrones or powers or rulers or authorities.
All things have been created through Jesus.
And for Jesus He's before all things, and in Him all things
are held together. The thing that holds all of this
together is Jesus Christ, and He is the head of the body, the
Church. I'm not the boss here.
I'm not the head of the church, our church board, not the head
of the church. Jesus is the one that gives us
our marching orders. We are following him, trying to
do his will. He's the head of the church, the
body of the church. He is the beginning in the
first, born from among the dead, so that in everything he, Jesus,
might have supremacy. For God was pleased to have all
his fullness dwell in Jesus and through him to reconcile all
things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making
peace through his blood shed on the cross.
And Paul lays it out right here. Jesus created all things.
There's nothing that's been created, nothing that exists
that wasn't created through the power of Jesus #2 He holds all
things together. Guys, when we, when we get off
track, whether we're talking about the church, whether we're
talking about a family, whether we're talking about our country
or a nation, what, when Jesus ceases to be a part of it,
things fall apart pretty quick. He holds everything together.
He's the head of the church. This is his church and it's his
church. It's, it's not about me.
This is his church. It's what he wants.
We are his body. He's the head of the church.
He is the fullness of God. We, we, we think about God and
we can't even fathom who God is. Jesus is the fullest fullness of
God and, and, and Jesus Christ, He's the fullness of God.
He is the reconciler of all things.
I don't know if reconciler is a word, but it's up there.
If it's not, forgive me, but he is reconciling all things to
himself. If there is redemption and
reconciliation, if there's salvation, it only happens
through Jesus. We can't grow in our faith.
We can't bear fruit. We can't be Christians apart
from the source, Jesus Christ. Often I hear people say things
like I'm feeling discouraged, I feel disconnected, I feel
stagnant in my faith. I feel like nothing's happening.
Maybe some of you have felt that recently.
Let me ask you a question. Are you connected to the source?
Jesus has to be at the center of everything.
Paul says. I want you to know God's will.
I want you to bear fruit. The only way to do that is for
Jesus to be in the center of all of it.
He is the source. Say the source at the second
thing we see is, is our Commission now.
Now Paul says in verse 25, Paul had a very clear and distinct
purpose. He had purpose in life, he says.
I have become its servant, the gospel servant, by the
Commission God gave me to present to you the word of God
in its fullness, the mystery that's been kept hidden for ages
and generations, but it's now disclosed to the Lord's people,
to them. God has chosen to make known
among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery, which is
Christ in you the hope of glory. Not only do we know his will,
not only are we supposed to bear fruit, He's got to be the center
of everything. But we have purpose.
We are given a calling in a Commission.
Paul knew his job. He knew his purpose.
He was put on this earth to build the church.
He was put on this earth, earth to proclaim the message of the
gospel to the Gentiles. Paul knew exactly what God had
for them, for him. How many of us can say that we
know exactly what God has for us?
Oh, nobody. OK wow, we're struggling church.
Paul knew exactly what his purpose was.
He says I became a servant. I am commissioned by God to
present the gospel. Praise the Lord for that
clarity. Guys.
We lost a wonderful, wonderful member of our church last week,
Pastor Bob. Highly wonderful man of God.
We had the service on Thursday and one of the things that just
amazes me, I said it Thursday at the service, he's a hero of mine
because he knew exactly what he was called to do.
He was called to preach the gospel.
In fact, Pastor Bob pastored for over 60 years, all of it in the
Southwest Ohio area. He pastored a bunch of different
churches. We listed on on the program the
churches that he had pastored and people were coming up after
saying, hey, what about our church?
He was at our church. He did so many interims and he
filled in so many places. He knew exactly what God called
him to do. The purpose that God gave him it
was to preach the Word and to pastor the church.
Praise the Lord for God's calling.
But can I tell you it's not just for pastors and missionaries?
See, we have a little bit of a clergy problem in the church.
I remember when I was a youth pastor, people would, people
would treat it when I was a youth pastor.
Like, I'm not a youth pastor right now.
We're having fun with the teens now, by the way.
But I remember people would would come to me and it was like
they thought it was my job to, to teach their kids about Jesus,
that it was my job to help their kids grow in their faith, which
it was my job to do some of those things, but it was also
their job. It was as if they were saying,
Hey, I'm dropping the kids off to you now.
You make them good Christians and I'm going to go off and do
my thing. And as a youth pastor, that's
the worst thing in the world. Because we know that people are
our teens are shaped far more by their parents than they are by a
youth pastor. And so we understand that it's
not just clergy that do the work.
Sometimes in the church we, we get this wrong and we think that
it's just your job to show up and enjoy what we have prepared
for you. No, no, Ephesians chapter 4 says
this. For Christ himself gave the
apostles, the prophets, the evangelist, the pastors, the
teachers to equip his people for works of service so that the
body of Christ may be built up until we all reach unity in the
faith and the knowledge of Son of of the Son of God and become
mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of
Christ. What's that saying?
It's that yes, I am called by God to preach and to pastor the
church, but my job isn't to do the work of ministry and you
just to sit there and take it in.
My job is to prepare you and equip you so that you can go out
and you can do the work of ministry.
Paul's job wasn't just to lead the whole church.
Paul's job was to help the church walk in.
In ministry for Christ, we have a clergy problem.
The church will be what it's supposed to be.
Not when I preach the best sermons, or Brad sings the best
music, or we have the best programming.
It'll be what God wants it to be.
When each and every one of us as followers of Christ understand
that we are called and commissioned by God.
Every follower of Christ, every Christian, we are commissioned
as ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
He gave us the Great Commission. Someone said that, I don't know
where I heard this, but someone said it's the Great Commission,
not the great suggestion. We are called.
We are commissioned as followers of Christ to bear fruit and to
build the Kingdom. Let me ask you a question.
How are you using the resources and the position that God has
given you to build the Kingdom? Every single one of you has been
given unique gifts and abilities.
Every single one of you has been given a unique personality.
Every single one of you has been put in a unique position and you
are called to be a minister of the gospel.
You, you can reach people that I can't.
And, and when we all do the work that God's called us to, to, to
minister to, to build the Kingdom, that's when the church
is what it should be. You've been given unique gifts,
you've been put in a unique position, and you are called to
be a minister for Christ. Not all ministry looks the same,
but all ministry should point to the same God.
Man. The church is going to be at its
best when we are all pointing to the same God, when we are all
working in ministry towards the same purpose, to bring glory to
God. Let me ask you, is your life
pointing? To Jesus, do you consider
yourself a minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ?
Not that you have to get up and preach, not that you have to get
up and lead worship or singing, but that you are called, you are
gifted, you are placed and a unique place to minister for the
Kingdom of God. It's Mother's Day.
I didn't talk about mom and 1st service and I didn't cry, but I
do want to talk about mom for a minute.
So often people come up to me and they say you don't know what
your mom meant to me. And it wasn't because she stood
up and preached. It wasn't because she LED
worship. It was because she cared for
people. She set an example for people.
She worked in different ministries.
She, she taught, she did everything that God had gifted
her to do to build the Kingdom of God.
Praise God. When we know our purpose.
Jesus is the source, say the source.
We have a Commission, a calling, say a calling.
You are called by God to be a minister of the gospel, and God
has given you gifts and abilities to do that.
God has placed you in a perfect place for you to minister.
What you have to do is keep yourself connected to the
source. You have to abide in Him.
You have to know Him and walk with Him and allow His Spirit to
transform you and lead you and guide you.
And you can minister. There are all sorts of different
ministers. There are teachers.
We've got some great teachers in this church.
There are inviters. How many of you consider
yourself an inviter? They're inviters.
There are people that we we know, we see it that you're just
good at inviting people to church.
There are people that when someone new comes in, we know
exactly where to take them and who to take them to because we
know people are gifted with hospitality and inviting.
There are listeners. Carol Bechtel, our our pastor to
preschoolers. Oh, she is the best listener.
People tell her things that they don't tell me or anyone else.
She often comes into staff meeting and says, oh, I, you
know, we need to be praying for this.
And she is such a great listener and she cares so well that there
are people that are given resources to share with others.
They're they're people in our church that are wonderful that
God has given resources and they have the opportunity to bless
others and build the Kingdom through the resources God has
given them. God has uniquely gifted you and
positioned you to do the work of ministry.
Don't leave it to me or to us. We can't do it.
We are all called to build the church together and to bear
fruit for Christ. I love what it says in verse 27.
I'm it goes on and it says to them God has chosen to make
known among the Gentiles the glorious riches of this mystery
which is Christ in you the hope of glory.
I love this scripture tells us that we are ambassadors for
Christ as if God is making his appeal through us.
This says that that that he is Paul says I'm a a minister of
the gospel. I'm commissioned to preach the
gospel, to preach the good news. And by the way, the good news is
evident in your life when Christ lives in you and the hope of
glory is revealed. I'm sorry to keep talking about
Pastor Bob, but in his last week, I met with him and he was
telling me some stories about himself and and I honestly just
didn't believe him. If you know Pastor Bob highly
you, you know he was perfect, right?
Nod your head. If you know he was perfect, he
was telling me some stories that weren't perfect.
And I was like, there's no way. There's no way that's you.
Here's the deal. When when God saves us, when he
fills us with his spirit, he transforms us and we become
evidence of God's work and God's goodness and God's grace and
God's power to the point that others should say, man,
something is different about that person.
Something is different about that church.
God's done something there. They they shouldn't say all
that's the same old Alex, same old rotten Alex that lies to his
mom about getting piercings just to get out of trouble.
Now they should say, I can't believe that you would ever do
anything wrong because I see the evidence of God's working in
your life. We're called to be transformed,
to be filled with a heart of love, to reflect the glory in
the hope of Christ. We are ministers of the gospel,
and sometimes that's preaching and sometimes that's singing,
and sometimes it's inviting, but it's always reflecting God's
glory. If we stay connected to the
source, we're filled with the Spirit and transformed, and we
will be ministers of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
So we have the source, say the source, we have the calling, say
the calling now is the message. Verse 28 and 29 deal with the
message. Paul says he, Jesus, is the one
we proclaim, admonishing and teaching everyone with all
wisdom so that we may present everyone fully mature in Christ.
To this end, I strenuously contend with all the energy
Christ so powerfully works in me.
Paul says. Jesus is the center of it all.
He's the source. He says I am commissioned, I am
called, and by the way, you are commissioned and called.
But the message that we are called to proclaim is Jesus, the
center of it all. We are called to proclaim Jesus
Christ, Paul says. To this end, I strenuously
contend with all my energy to proclaim Christ Jesus.
Let me ask you a question. What are you proclaiming with
your time, with your energy, with your social media feeds,
with your conversation? What are you proclaiming?
I see it. You know, some people, they
spend their time proclaiming who the best sports team is.
We, we spend hours arguing and then listen, I've been guilty of
this, spent hours arguing over who the best team is or the best
players. Some people are so passionate
about sports. I, I mean, let's be honest, we
live in Ohio and there's another team that some people in Ohio
don't like so much and we are so passionate about that.
It seems like people's number one job is to proclaim which
team is better or which player is better.
For some people, it's their political ideologies.
I'm on social media. Some people, their number one
goal, the number one thing they talk about is why their way is
right and everyone else's way is wrong.
Why the other ideology is wrong but theirs is right.
I see this all the time. There are people that are so
hyper focused on what they believe politically that that's
what they proclaim. There are there are people I
have a friend that has a business and his business is he,
he's an e-mail marketer and everyday he posts and what he's
proclaiming is that I can change your business.
I can help you if you will just let me help you with your
e-mail. Some of us are proclaiming
we're, we're spending our time and energy.
We're contending to build our companies or our brand or our
net worth. There are a lot of different
things you can proclaim, but we are called to proclaim Jesus
Christ. As a follower of Christ, the
number one thing you should point to is Jesus.
Everything you say and do, your time, your energy should be
spent glorifying God. I'm not saying you can't talk
about sports. I'm not saying you can't talk
about politics. I'm saying that the number one
thing people should see when they look at a follower of
Christ or at his church is Jesus Christ.
When people come here, I don't care if they walk away saying
oh, he was a good speaker or we have good music.
That's not what's important. What's important is when people
come here, they need to encounter a holy God and Jesus
Christ, the Savior of the world. He is the message, not us.
I see a lot of people that their message is themselves or sports
or politics or whatever it is we get passionate about.
We should be passionate about proclaiming Jesus Christ.
We are called to proclaim the power and glory of Jesus Christ.
Every single one of us. He's the center, He's the
source. You are called, and He's the
message. You know, Scripture tells us
that Jesus is the light of the world.
John chapter 8. You know, Scripture also tells
us, Matthew 5, that we are the light of the world, that we are
filled by the light of the world, Jesus Christ, and we then
become the light of the world that we are to proclaim and
reflect Jesus to the world around us.
Let me ask you a question again. Who are you proclaiming?
Makes me think of the kids song, This little light of mine.
I'm going to let it shine. Yep.
Go ahead wave, whatever, I'll stop there.
It was going so well. I didn't want it to go off the
rails. Listen, we have a light within
us if we are believers in Christ, Jesus fills us with his
very spirit and presence, and we are called to proclaim, to shine
the light of Christ for others. It's all about him.
So Paul's writing this letter to the church and worship team.
You can come on up and I think God's will for us today.
I think what God wants from the church is for us to know him, to
walk with Jesus, to abide in Christ, to know his will for our
lives. I think he wants us to bear
fruit. I think we're supposed to.
Each and every one of us are supposed to bear fruit.
Jesus is the center. We are called.
You are put in a unique position.
You are gifted to be a minister of Christ.
You are called and we're called to proclaim Jesus Christ in
Colossians chapter 2, verse six and seven, Paul says this, and
this is where I'll I'll leave you with this.
So then just as you received Christ Jesus as Lord, continue
to live your lives in him, rooted and built up in him,
strengthened in the faith as you were taught and overflowing with
thankfulness. Stand with me, we're going to
respond to God's word. And here, here's the deal.
Maybe some of you have drifted off the source.
Maybe some of you have gotten off center and you'd some other
things have taken precedent. Today, Jesus needs to be at the
very center. He's everything.
He's the creator, He's the Redeemer, he's the sustainer,
He's what holds everything together.
If you've gotten off center today, it's time to come back to
Jesus. Maybe some of you are are
following Jesus, but you don't realize and you haven't been
doing the work of ministry that God has called you to.
You're not bearing fruit today. God is calling you to be a
minister of the gospel. Today we are called to proclaim
Jesus. Maybe your life hasn't been
proclaiming Jesus #1 maybe there's been some other things.
Today. Focus on the source, understand
your calling, and proclaim Jesus with everything you have.
We're going to respond to God's word.
We're going to sing a song. I believe you can respond in a
lot of different ways. As always in the church, the
altars are open. If you need to come and pray to
an altar. This is a place where where God
meets us. He can meet you where you are,
but this is a great place to come and pray and just lay down,
surrender and say, God, I want you to be at the center.
I want to be faithful to your calling.
I want to proclaim you, if God's speaking to you today, that's
one way you can respond. You can respond through worship.
You can raise your hand, you can sing with your voice.
You can pray whatever that looks like.
I want you to respond to God's Word.
Paul's prayer is that the church would know his will would bear
fruit, that we would be focused and called and empowered, and
that we would proclaim Jesus. Father, speak to us today.
Maybe you've been speaking to some of us and we need to come
to you. There's anyone here that needs
to respond to your word. I pray they would respond in the
way that you lead them. I pray that we would we would be
obedient. We wouldn't worry about what
other people think, but that we would be completely obedient to
you. You're speaking to us.
Help us to surrender whatever it is you're speaking to and help
us to live with you at the center of our lives.
We love you Lord, speak to us, help us to respond in Jesus
name, Amen.