Acts 13.9, here's my challenge.
I went through all the way to 14
and pulling out historical aspects and things.
I kind of turned this into a topical
expository.
So I pulled out some key elements from
this to speak on this topic.
Now last week we read that they were
sent out by the Holy Spirit.
They were praying and they were fasting.
They were praying God and fasting is basically
starving the flesh, putting the flesh in submission
so you can be filled with the Spirit
of God.
And point of confession, I am very hungry
this morning.
I promised God I'd stop yesterday and just
go to tonight just water only and I
wanted a donut and coffee this morning at
6.30 and I fought the devil for
a half hour and he did not win.
Praise God.
But I feel, and the only reason I
share these with you is to let you
know, when it comes to fasting, I fall
often.
We think of fasting this perfect 30-day
fast, didn't touch any sugar.
I mean, people sometimes blow it and the
key is to get back on track.
So prayer, and I've seen fasting, it's like
prayer on steroids.
And steroids aren't necessarily bad if you're using
them for a good way in medical purposes
but it's like increasing your prayer life.
You don't wanna stop, you wanna keep going.
You pulled down heaven, the flesh is starved
and the Spirit is alive in God.
So they were praying, they were fasting and
they were sent out by the Holy Spirit.
As a result, they encountered a sorcerer.
And I found that to be true often.
Sometimes we're full of the Spirit, Lord just
let me run into a Girl Scouts who
just wanna pray for them and give me
flowers but instead I run into the devil
himself.
Sorcery, these things, going to Walmart and people,
there's this attacking and cussing and looking at
you and it's like this demonic realm is
real.
Isn't it?
It is and they do not like people
filled with the Spirit of God.
So the disciples were filled with the Spirit,
they encountered a sorcerer.
It was Paul in verse nine.
Then Paul, filled with the Holy Spirit.
You know what, it's interesting.
I just thought of that again.
We've talked about it months ago.
But when the Bible says Paul filled with
the Holy Spirit, that tells me we should
take notice.
Because if every Christian was just filled completely
overwhelming with the Holy Spirit, the Bible would
never mention it.
It would be a given.
And Peter, breathing.
That doesn't say that.
And Peter, looking or walking or what, I
mean, these things, and Peter being filled with
the Holy Spirit.
There's something unique that comes upon a believer
when they consecrate their life and they're filled
with the Spirit of God.
He looked intently at the sorcerer and he
said, oh, full of all deceit and all
fraud, you son of the devil.
You know it's okay to confront the devil
like that, right?
Sometimes here's what we do.
I'm sorry, okay, no problem.
I know, I just cowered down and just,
you're right, and gentle, mild, meek Christians turn
the other cheek.
But sometimes you can say, you know what,
you full of deceit, you son of the
devil.
I'm gonna tell you what God's Word says.
And you speak boldly at that demonic realm.
It isn't about always cowering down.
Now don't misunderstand.
I'm not talking about being mean and arrogant.
But you can, I've spoke boldly to people,
haven't you?
No, that's not true, devil.
That's not true.
You're not going to take my family.
You're not going to ruin my marriage.
You're not going to, you fill in the
blank.
And you speak boldly to that demonic realm.
You son of the devil.
Well, here's why.
This sermon might take a lot of rabbit
trails.
I'm just telling you right now.
You have, do we all agree we're in
a spiritual battle?
If we're in a battle, you have to
be bold.
What soldier enlists in battle is not bold
and timid and runs so boldness is something
you better get used to.
And it's going, the Holy Spirit stirs up
something with you if you're in a school
district, if you work in a government office,
if you work or do what I do
around town, sometimes there's a boldness that has
to take place.
So he said, you son of the devil,
you enemy of all unrighteousness, will you not
cease perverting the straight ways of the Lord?
This is exactly what the demonic realm does,
what the devil does, pervert.
You know what we use the word in
our society?
Pervert, perversion.
A pervert, a perversion is something that is
good and God-given, going this direction.
They twist it and make it perverted.
So now something good, marriage, it was good,
the enemy perverts it.
And now the stuff in the news that
you can be whatever, like I don't have
to be male or female in this new
gender that's nothing.
And you can have it, they're trying to
get on your birth certificate.
It's like what is happening to, pervert.
They're perverting the truth.
They're actually telling kids in school, you don't
have to tell your parents if you're going
to get abortion or if you're doing something,
they think it's fornication, don't worry about it.
And they're perverting all of this stuff.
So perversion is what the enemy does.
So how does that apply to you?
Very easily, he'll make something seemingly that looks
okay, pervert it, twist it, you come up
with excuses and you fall into sin.
It happens all the time.
And now indeed the hand of the Lord
is upon you and you shall be blind,
not seeing the sun for a time.
And immediately a dark mist fell upon him
and he went out seeking someone to lead
him by the hand.
Then the procounsel, which is the governor of
that area, then he believed in the gospel
when he saw what had been done, being
astonished by the teaching of the Lord.
So basically Paul called him out, said because
you're a deceiver, you're going to be blind.
Now I wish we saw that same kind
of power today.
I think it still exists.
I think that God does miracles and things,
but I think, and I've said this before,
and the more I read the book of
Acts, the more I read even the Old
Testament, the men and women of God, there
was a holy consecration that many people don't
experience today.
They walk close with God.
And so when they spoke, the Holy Spirit
was prompting them and guiding them and leading
them.
So when Paul called out the blindness, God
honored that because the Holy Spirit put it
on his heart, in my opinion, to call
out this and call down blindness.
Now granted, miracles and signs and wonders were
following the apostles.
But I believe that same power exists today.
I don't think that God just suddenly stopped.
I mean, just read some good missionary books.
And I'm gonna recommend one.
I've got the title here at the end.
It's called An Asian Harvest, An Asian Harvest.
Many copies, we'll be sending those out to
you or making them available here.
Or missionary books on the mission field.
They see this, we see this often when
it's, for some reason, not in America.
I haven't put that connection yet, but I
think we're not really as consecrated as we
think we are.
I think we're not really, I mean, we're
full of Facebook, but full of the Holy
Spirit, I don't know.
I can tell you what Facebook says, but
I'm not sure what the Holy Spirit is
guiding me to do.
I can tell you what Mike Trout did
in the outfield, but I'm not sure what
the Holy Spirit's doing through the Word of
God.
And the closer you walk with God, the
more you'll see miracles and things coming to
life in your life.
So the first sign of a healthy church,
a healthy Christian, is boldness and spiritual power.
If you're a healthy church, there's boldness and
there's spiritual power.
There's no way around that.
You will have both of them.
So if there's no boldness, and it's just
timidity, and there's no spiritual power, you haven't
seen God moving in a while, you're going
to need what I'm going to talk about
at the end of the sermon.
Spiritual power needs to take place.
Boldness needs to enter into your heart.
And see, the reason a lot of times
people are afraid of boldness is because they
confuse it with arrogance, right?
I mean, haven't you been, those who are
bold, have you ever been called arrogant?
You're just bold.
Now, you have to be careful, because there
are some arrogant people who say, I'm just
bold.
I'm just bold.
I love my faith, and I'm gonna let
everybody know I'm a guardian of the truth.
No, you're arrogant.
You can tell.
The fruit of boldness is you can feel
the love.
It was said of D.L. Moody, he
wouldn't even preach a sermon without tears about
hell, without tears coming down his face.
Or Whitfield or Wesley, these people we love
to read, they were full of boldness but
full of compassion.
You have to have both of those.
Verse 13, then Paul came to Perga and
went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day
and sat down.
After the reading of the law and of
the prophets, the rulers of the synagogue sent
to him, saying, men and brethren, if you
have any word of exhortation for the people,
say on.
Boy, they didn't know what they were asking,
did they?
They see Paul, oh, a fellow Jew, we
just read the law, which was Genesis, Exodus,
Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and the prophets, they probably
read portions from the major prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah,
Ezekiel, Daniel, they read something from there, and
then the minor prophets, and minor doesn't mean
they were less significant, it just means they
didn't have as much to say.
And the prophets were called of God to
call that nation of Israel back to God.
That's primarily what they did.
So they read the law and they'd be
convicted by the law, then they read the
prophets and be convicted again and get direction
to give their lives back to the one
and true living God.
So, the second sign of a healthy church
or healthy Christian, in a healthy church there
is reading and exhortation.
Now you might say, well, duh, Shane, that
what you just got bored and threw that
point in there?
I mean, well, you'd be very surprised.
I can name churches around this valley where
people tell me it's just, there's the pastor
or different people speak, it's just they're telling
stories.
It's just stories and how we're gonna go
paint the neighborhoods, and when I was younger,
and stories are great, I tell them often,
and I'm not chiding anybody because I can
fall into this side as well, but to
be a true, healthy church, you've gotta look
at the word of God.
That's why I like to put this up
here front again.
We look to the word of God, the
centrality of Scripture, we read the Scripture, we're
encouraged by the Scripture, and actually, a lot
of traditional churches will read a passage of
the Bible before the service, and we could
even do that.
There's nothing wrong with that.
You read, say, Isaiah 58, you read the
first three or four verses as an exhortation
to the people.
That's very healthy, but then also, the reading
of the Scripture, and he said, exhortation, do
you have any word to give the people?
Now, exhortation is urging someone to do something,
urging someone to do something.
If you've been here any length of time,
you know that's what I like to do.
I have no problem with exhortation, reading the
word of God and urging people to do
something, and, you know, it's just, I think
a lot of the passion comes from, that
I see is, I see so many broken
lives out there, broken lives.
I spent three, not three hours, hour and
a half, three hours total, different people, but
an hour, hour and a half, calling out
of state, marriage issues, problems at their church,
other friends I know are getting a divorce,
friends I know are getting divorced, people hooked
on drugs, hooked, I see the kids, the
looks in the children's faces, the mommy and
daddy and the devastating, and I have to
exhort, I have to encourage, I have to
push back, push back, we have to, because
something that is attacking needs to be confronted,
and if you don't confront it, you will
not win that battle.
Here's what happened, reading an exhortation, a healthy
church, sin is exposed.
In a healthy church, sin is exposed, but
grace abounds.
That's a healthy church, a healthy Christian.
Sin is exposed, if you wanna be a
healthy Christian, expose the sin, expose it, tell
somebody, I've got a problem in this area,
I've fallen back into this area, I need
help, I need accountability.
Spouse, tell your spouse, I'm struggling with moral
purity right now, my thought life is a
mess, can we pray, oh, I'm never doing
that, then you're going to keep living in
deception, that sin is not gonna stay there,
it's gonna grow, and it's gonna grow, and
it's gonna grow, and it's gonna grow.
So we expose sin, but then grace abounds.
Well, what does that look like?
Well, we expose sin, we talk about sin,
and we confront sin, I've confronted people, you
have, but brother, we're here for you, grace
abounds, grace.
See, grace doesn't mean we continue in sin,
grace means we acknowledge the sin, we repent
of it, and then we have grace and
understanding, because I'm the same way.
We all, all of us in this room
should not cast the first stone.
We should be very graceful, but we should
be very against sin, and that's why some
of the biggest named preachers on TV, Sunday
mornings, huge audience, won't ever talk about sin,
because they confuse, brother, it's just about grace
and not beating people up, no, that's not
a healthy church necessarily.
It doesn't matter the size of the church,
the health of the church is predicated upon
what we're talking about, not the size of
the church, whether it's small or big, because
I've seen some churches, yeah, we're 25 people,
we're the frozen chosen, we're doing everything right,
and you know, that's why we're little.
People don't like to hear it, and we're
gonna stay little, and if they don't want
to hear it, they can just exit right
out that door, and they think because, you
know, it's just us, that's why nobody comes.
As soon as I start preaching, everybody leaves.
Well, that means there's no love in your
preaching, and not filled maybe with the spirit
of God.
Now, I have to be careful there too,
right?
You know, we don't want to push people
out, but we also don't want to encourage
sin, and avoid things, and this is a
hot topic for sure, because as you know,
I've talked about before, the majority of people
who no longer come here, or have left,
or do not want to come here, is
because of this issue.
They're convicted.
They're convicted, they don't want to hear it
right now, and people said, I'm not at
that point right now, I'll go to a
different, I'll go to this church, I'm not
going to Westside, I'm not ready for that
yet.
I mean, what does that mean?
I just heard it this week.
Somebody invited somebody, and they said, I'll go
to, I won't name it, and then, but
then, but I'm not ready for that church
yet.
I'm not there yet, you know, but they
don't understand.
We're all not there yet.
It's a point of lifting up, and encouraging,
and getting healthy, and walking people through that,
and because pastors aren't perfect, we can err
on the hard side sometimes.
Maybe I err too much on the law
side, or too much on the pounding side,
and then there's other guys who err too
much on the grace side, too much on,
so it's trying to find that balance, and
the only way you can find that balance
would be filled with the Spirit of God,
and to know, come the criticism or not,
you are preaching what God has put on
your heart.
Criticism can be good, it can be bad
as well.
You want to learn from it, if there's
nuggets of truth there, but you also want
to avoid critical people that constantly pull you
down.
That was another rabbit trail.
Verse 16 through 23.
Okay, well, let's put this in context.
So, Paul went into the synagogue on the
Sabbath day, and sat down, and there was
a reading of the law and of the
prophets, and the rulers of the synagogue said
to Paul, hey, Paul, if you have any
words of exhortation, let us hear them.
Oh, my goodness, they did not know what
they were asking.
The apostle Paul, who's just been converted, Saul
of Tarsus, this mean, angry Pharisee, is now
a believer.
So, verses 16 through 23, I'm just gonna
paraphrase.
Basically, God brought deliverance from David's seed.
He walked the people through Abraham, the covenant.
He brought the Messiah through David's seed.
And then Paul said, according to the promise,
God raised up for Israel a savior, Jesus.
And they're probably going, uh-oh.
Why did we ask this guy to speak?
Men and brethren, sons of the family of
Abraham and those among you who fear God.
So, see, this is a glimpse into the
old synagogue style.
Men and brethren of children, your children of
Abraham, mean there were Jews in the audience,
but also, and those who fear God.
So, there was Greeks that wanted to convert
and they feared God.
So, this is a multitude, not just of
Jewish believers, I believe, because, and those among
you who fear God.
To you, to you, the word of the
salvation has been sent.
And though they found no cause for death
in Christ, no cause for death in Christ.
You should let people know any time they
get upset at Christianity.
There is no cause, nothing, he died for
you.
He loves you that much, he died for
you.
There's no cause for him to die other
than the sin of man.
They asked Pilate that he should be put
to death.
Now, when they had fulfilled all that was
written concerning him, they took him down from
the tree and laid him in a tomb,
but God raised him from the dead.
So, he's preaching the gospel at the synagogue.
And it dawned on me, how do you
think he's preaching this?
Oh, here's what happened, you know.
I mean, there's passionate preaching.
There's passionate preaching.
That's why passion should come out in preaching.
If somebody's not passionate, I don't really wanna
listen to them because they don't, oh, well,
I guess it says this, and there has
to be a passionate passion in a healthy
church.
That's a point I forgot about.
There should be passion in a healthy church.
I mean, I don't know about you guys,
but the ones who are here early, as
we're singing these songs, I'm no longer a
slave.
If we were truly a slave to fear
death and the grave and eternity separated from
God, God saved us from that and redeemed
us.
Oh, it might change your worship.
I think Jamie had it right, right?
Oh, God, and just keep worshiping and worshiping.
That's why we want the freedom in worship.
It's not a four-minute song, a three
-minute song, a four-minute song, Shane, you
come up, you've got 35 minutes, and let's
go to lunch.
That's not worship.
It's there, my goodness, why shouldn't we be
passionate?
I mean, I have a feeling more people
would be passionate if we just said we
just came into a lot of money.
As you leave here, you're each getting $10
,000.
As you leave here, you're each, we would,
oh, my goodness, a passion in this place,
right?
So that's why you gotta take your mind
back to Calvary, back to Golgotha, the place
of the skull, the place of death and
crucifixion to give us life.
Well, if there's no passion there, I don't
know what to tell you.
You guys are doing good, though.
I'm just talking about others in the future
that are not passionate, because people say, well,
Shane, you're passionate.
Yeah, this is the most exciting thing a
person can talk about, but it's also the
most heavy.
A lot of you don't know this, but
when I, you go in the morning after
the sermon, I'm praying, and I know that
I'm coming up here, and thousands of people
on the radio, now San Francisco, the Bay
Area, Riverside, all over Los Angeles are hearing.
So I better be very careful that I'm
not just putting my opinion in there, and
I'm not just, what do I think, and
dumbing it down and trying to do, but
I have to say, God, what do you
want to say?
So the weight of that, the weight of
that, I mean, if I was just a
motivational speaker, I could just go wherever and
no big deal, but the weight of that,
and then also the passion, the passion of,
you're preaching light, you're preaching the best news
that has ever been heard, you're preaching the
gospel of salvation.
Shouldn't there be a passion there, a something,
an exciting?
So there is passion, but there's also the
third point that we glean from this, I'll
keep reading, verse 31.
Jesus was seen for many days by those
who came up with him from Galilee to
Jerusalem, who are his witnesses to the people.
And we declare to you glad tidings, the
promise which has been made to the fathers.
If we had time, we could go back
to the Old Testament, but the promise to
the fathers, the nation of Israel, was God
would send a Messiah to save his people.
Paul just said the Messiah has arisen, arisen
from the dead.
Pilate killed him, he's here, and I would
love to see the look on that audience's
face.
Or the rulers who said, Paul, would you
like to say something?
They're like, what just happened?
But we can also glean something from what
Paul said here in the synagogue, church style.
Another sign of a healthy church is you
feed the saints and you warn the sinner.
That's a goal of preaching, is to feed
the saints, to be edified and encouraged, but
also to warn the sinner.
That's why there is such an importance put
on, or I guess that's a good way
to say it, the importance of going through
the Bible every year.
And I would say one of the things
that shocks me the most is how many
Christians have never went through the entire Bible.
I just asked somebody this week, thought for
sure.
I've talked to pastors, elders, deacons, been serving
for 20 years, they've never read through the
entire Bible.
What happens is we put, well, I'm in
John today, I'm at Psalm tomorrow, and then
my daily devotion has me back in John,
and we never see the whole counsel of
God.
You start in Genesis to see creation, and
you see at Exodus, God's plan of bringing
his children out of bondage.
You see Leviticus, the Levitical priesthood, and the
need for that sacrificial system of the shedding
of blood.
Leviticus, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, the going through
the wilderness, and all the examples.
My goodness, you can learn so many examples
of idolatry and what not to do in
the book of Numbers.
In Deuteronomy, the law, the blessings, the curse,
and then it gets into the judges, and
what happened, these judges would, people would call
upon the name of the Lord, and they
would depart from God, and then you get
the kings, and all the prophets, and Ruth,
and we learn about our king's men to
redeem her, and who Christ was, and Boaz,
and you look at the whole Bible, and
you see the whole counsel of God.
It's 20 minutes a day.
Just start somewhere, and just keep going.
I usually have a paperclip in the Old
Testament and the New Testament, and just keep
them going together.
Keep them going together, check it off, and
that's how you get the heart of God.
That's how you'll know when something doesn't, you're
not sure, or you're not sure on doctrine
or theology, you'll know the heart of God.
So that's a primary goal of the church,
is to feed the saints, and what I
mean by primary goal.
A healthy church recognizes that our primary, the
primary goal is, now this, some might not
agree with this, but that's okay.
The primary goal is a gathering together of
believers.
It's to hear the word of God, to
be edified to worship.
What happens if the main goal of the
church is the center, and evangelism, and things
like that, the main goal, then what happens,
something comes in called the seeker-sensitive movement.
Have you heard of that?
It was big, probably 20 years ago, and
now a lot of pastors have spoke against
it.
But the seeker-sensitive movement is this.
Listen, Shane, we have to start being sensitive
to those who are coming in who are
not believers.
So that means you have to change everything.
You change the worship so it's not offensive.
You change your messages so they're not offensive.
You change the different things.
You make it sensitive to the seeker.
But the main goal of the church is
to come and be built up and to
glorify God.
The main point of the church is for
the believers.
Now, from that, we go out and we
evangelize.
We reach the unchurched.
We do things, but the main core of
coming together is tailoring the service for believers
to worship God.
Communion, worship, baptism, exhortation, it's all of us
coming together.
Now, if somebody happens to come in, 1
Corinthians 14, 24, if an unbeliever or an
uninformed person comes into your gathering, and is
convicted, I'm paraphrasing, and thus the secrets of
his heart are revealed, and so falling down
on his face, he will worship God and
report that God is truly among you.
See, unbelievers often are attracted to genuine worship
and to genuine anointing and genuine preaching.
They're attracted to that.
So you don't change things around to make
it sensitive to not offend anybody.
You center it around God, and they can
come in and be part of that if
God is drawing them.
Now, careful point here.
We're not to be seeker-sensitive in avoiding
the truth, but we are to be sensitive
in how we represent God.
So on one hand, I'm not seeker-sensitive,
in case you didn't know, on the preaching,
and the worship and how we do things.
I'm not really thinking, okay, now if unbelievers
come in, darn, they're not gonna like that
point either, or that point, well, I might
as well just start all over.
Now, but I do say, you know, how
is somebody going to take that?
Could I have worded that differently?
Is that offensive?
Did I get a little too arrogant?
And I wanna make sense of it.
We wanna make sure that when they come
in and check their children in the children's
ministry, they're not offended.
It's clean, it's organized.
We want excellence in everything we do, and
the people are full of life and welcoming
them.
See, you can be welcoming but not affirming.
You can be welcoming but not affirming.
Me and Morgan tried to invite a friend
of ours we know from the gym who's
gay for the church for the last 12
years.
We're welcoming, welcoming.
We just have a heart for this guy.
I won't say his name, but we'd say,
you know, come on, just come to church.
Oh, no, no.
Now, should I say, no, come to church.
You won't be offended.
No, come, we'll welcome and affirm.
See, that's the difference.
But you don't go out of your way
to pound that person.
You just let the word of God speak.
You're full of love, you're full of the
Holy Spirit, and if it offends, if it
cuts, it's meant to offend and cut.
So you can welcome and love people.
And I just wrote, I re-released an
article, What Did Jesus Say About Homosexuality?
And my goodness, I mean, it's like 500
comments on Facebook from Crosswalk, I think it
is, crosswalk.com.
And it's, I scroll through them sometimes.
I know it's not a good idea.
But people say, this is why I'm embarrassed
to be a Christian.
Because me, because this article, right?
This is why, see, everybody throwing, casting the
first stone, putting everybody down.
Read the article, read the article, it's not
about that.
But see, we have this concept that turn
the other cheek.
God loves everybody means he affirms sin.
He doesn't affirm sin.
He says, I love you enough.
I died for that sin, so would you
come out of it?
So woe is me if I do not
preach repentance.
I'm actually doing people a disservice.
And if a person's not ready to hear
it, yes, it does hurt.
Of course it hurts.
Who wants to hear you need to change
and repent?
Not even me sometimes.
Not even you, right?
So I understand that.
But a loving church is part of God's
design.
Verse 38, therefore, let it be known to
you, brethren, that through this man, Paul is
still speaking, through this man, Jesus, is preached
to you the forgiveness of sins.
And by him, everyone who believes is justified
from all things from which you could not
be justified by the law of Moses.
So what happened in the Old Testament, and
even up to this time, they're following the
law of Moses.
The Sabbath, the ceremonial laws, all the different
things that Moses outlined, they're following these, he's
following these.
Have you ever tried to follow a lot
of rules and how hard that is?
I mean, we still can't do it, right?
All these signs say, don't drive over 55.
A lot of you are not listening to
those signs.
But it's so hard.
So he says, we were not justified.
Justified means just as if I had never
sinned, if you remember that.
Justified, Christ, I'm allowed to go before God
the Father because of what Christ did on
the cross.
He justified me now in right standing before
God.
The law could never do this.
Following a bunch of rules could never do
this.
So Paul's breaking it down, that we've been
justified through Christ.
Beware, therefore, lest what has been spoken in
the prophets come upon you.
What's been spoken in the prophets?
Well, if you spend time in Isaiah, Jeremiah,
Ezekiel, not too much in Daniel, more prophetic,
more Babylon, but then the minor prophets, and
Micah, and Nahum, and Habakkuk, and Zephaniah, and
Zechariah, and all these guys that wrote, you
would know, you would say, aha, what did
they do?
The prophets often warned the people because they
stayed in rebellion.
They despised the things of God.
So he's saying, be careful, because what's happening,
happened in the prophets, which we love to
read on the Sabbath, is also happening in
your own life and in your own heart.
So here he gets real seeker-sensitive.
Beware, therefore, lest what has been spoken in
the prophets come upon you.
Behold, you despisers, marvel and perish, for I
work a work in your days, a work
which you will by no means believe the
one word to declare it to you.
So he's saying, you despisers, you despisers of
the truth, marvel, because you will perish if
you continue to reject that truth.
But I wanna just highlight point four.
Ever since Paul started to speak, here's a
sign of a healthy church.
Here's a sign of a healthy Christian.
Everything centers on Jesus.
Everything centers on Christ.
Everything we do, now, perfectly, no.
But when we start VBS this summer, and
Friday evening comes, what I'm already looking forward
to is presenting the gospel to the kids
and to the family members.
And throughout the week, what are we doing?
Presenting the gospel.
He's the only one that can heal and
restore these little ones.
What's the focus of the youth group that
we're gonna start?
We actually had one.
Nobody knew about it, really, and come to
find out.
So we're gonna relaunch that.
What's the focus?
Christ.
What's the focus when the elders get together
and start to make decisions?
Jesus, where do you want us to go?
What's the focus of the worship?
That's the center of everything.
And now, that can trickle into your own
life before you make decisions.
What would Jesus do?
That's a good little thing to wear.
He's the center.
It changes where you go.
It changes what you'll listen to.
It changes everything, doesn't it?
I mean, just for fun, I should've did
this, but just a minute.
I wrote an article about entertainment a while
back on how people, how it affects us
spiritually.
And I didn't even watch this movie.
I just saw some reviews.
And something about Deadpool.
I said, it's probably not a good idea.
Christians were emailing me, like, what?
It's fun.
I couldn't even have five minutes on there.
The cussing.
I'm like, how can people, how is this?
I did this for Harry Potter, too, because
somebody said, oh, it's a good movie.
It teaches this.
Let me rent this thing.
And after the snake comes out of this
guy's mouth and this lady's levitating, I said,
back to Breadbox.
I mean, because they challenged me.
Watch it, watch it.
You'll change your tune.
No, I didn't change my tune.
I actually increased my tune.
These things should not be glorified.
These things should not be in a heart
that's healthy.
That's the difference.
A healthy heart is very selective with what
they watch and where they go.
Because you know, right?
Your flesh gets locked on it, though, right?
My flesh wanted to keep going Deadpool.
And Logan, Jason Bourne, all those things for
guys, right?
You know, but I know, the flesh wants
it, but the spirit says, don't you dare.
So you have this constant battle going on.
So a healthy Christian centers everything on Jesus.
The church centers everything on Jesus.
Now, have we done it perfectly?
No.
But that's our goal.
Look at our mission statement.
It's on our website.
It's actually out front on the wall.
This man has preached to you the forgiveness
of sins.
So just ask yourself this question.
Have you been justified?
Do you truly know God?
It's a little trite and people say it
often, but it's probably because it's really good.
If you were to die, do you know
where you're going?
If you were to die today, do you
truly know where you're going?
Because you can't live your life with a
question mark here.
And I talk to people, oh gosh, Shane,
I think so.
I mean, I'm a good guy.
I'm a good person.
Oh, eh, eh, eh, eh, red flag right
there.
No, you're not a good person.
And they get offended at that.
See, because self-righteousness.
If somebody says, Shane, at the core, you're
not a good person, I'll say, amen, brother.
Preach it, please.
But I need Christ.
I need to be filled with the spirit
of God.
So if you've never repented of your sin,
acknowledged everything I'm talking about, I would encourage
you to do that this morning.
You don't have to come forward.
You don't have to raise your hand.
You don't have to do a special dance.
You just have to say, God, I need
you.
I've been running.
I've been hiding.
It's funny, on this subject too, when I
talk about things like this, people do leave
and they don't come back.
Weeks later, months later, that something is drawing
them back.
Drawing them back, it's that conviction of the
Holy Spirit.
And the reason I want to mention centers
on Jesus is because we can become so
busy, we can become so busy, we miss
why we're really here.
This is actually a sad point.
I've seen so many Christians, myself included, we
can get so busy and we forget why
we're really here.
Can't we?
We're so busy doing this and doing that
and we forget.
He's the center of everything.
Verse 42, so when the Jews went out
of the synagogue, the Gentiles begged.
Look up this word if you want in
the Greek.
The Gentiles beg, it's not like, hey, Chris,
would you talk about that next week?
It's like, Chris, Chris, please, would you come
back?
Please, you can't go.
Can you do it right now?
No, okay, and they're begging.
They want more of the scripture.
They want more of that, that these words
might be preached to them again the next
Sabbath.
Now when the congregation had broken up, many
of the Jews and devout proselytes, which are
converted, converted Jews, followed Paul and Barnabas who,
speaking to them, persuaded them to continue in
the grace of God.
So what we see here, another sign of
a healthy church, a healthy Christian, is spiritual
hunger.
See, that's a good sign.
That's why I often say, and I'm not
joking, if you don't wanna come to the
worship morning, that means you need to be
at the worship morning.
That's the whole, if you don't wanna do
something, that means you need to be there.
If you don't like what I'm saying, it's
because you need to hear what I'm saying.
See, a hungry heart desires more of God,
desires more of God.
They're hungry for more of God.
That's in a healthy church, and that is
in your life.
The reason people are comfortable in dead churches
is because they don't offend, alarm, or upset
them.
Have you seen dead churches?
And I'm careful, because this could become one.
Anytime we get away from the primary goal
of why we're here.
But the reason churches become dead is because
they're no longer hungry for God.
And when a church is dead, it becomes
a ritualistic thing.
Here's what we do.
Here's how we do it, and here's why
we do it.
And it's just this, every single Sunday, the
same old thing, and we're just dead.
There's no vibrancy, there's no growth.
There's nothing.
But if I move the pew 10 feet,
we'll hear tons of complaints.
Right, because it's dead.
There's no spiritual life.
And that's one thing I am so happy
about West Side Christian Fellowship with all of
you, is this is a hungry church.
This is a hungry church, for sure.
And I'm not trying to toot anybody's horn,
but I think sometimes you need to be
encouraged.
But I know churches after church, after church,
after church that has just stopped prayer meetings
because nobody's there.
And we've had up to 15 people next
door, and hopefully moving into a bigger room.
This morning, I was maybe 15, 20, I
thought I'd be here, we had 80 people.
80, that's a service for most churches.
80 people just to worship God before the
actual service.
That's a hungry church.
And now I've got people ask, can we
start a Thursday night prayer meeting?
Can we have it dinner at night?
Wow, you guys, this is a hungry church.
How can we be more involved?
How can we serve?
How can the altars fold?
That's a hungry church.
That's a spiritually healthy church.
So thank you guys so much for that.
And I know it's God gets all the
glory and credit, but I'm just, it makes
it much funner and easier to pastor a
church that's hungry for God.
I mean, if it was pulling the nails,
and oh, here we go, you know, and
just this constant fighting and bickering, that's not
healthy.
William Still, I think he was an abolitionist,
African American in the 1800s.
He was a preacher.
He said, many, many people who for the
first time come under the sound of Holy
Ghost preaching are mortally offended because they've never
been exposed to the white light of the
Spirit.
That's what happens.
Many, like, when you're preaching, I mean, I'm
talking anointed spirit-filled preaching, people are just,
what is this?
What is this?
I'm used to just the, like, just put
me to sleep.
Let me take my morning nap.
And now I'm just, I'm offended.
But that can be a good thing sometimes.
44, verse 44, on the next Sabbath, almost
the whole city came together to hear the
word of God.
But the Jews saw the multitudes.
They were filled with envy and contradicting and
blasphemy.
They opposed the things spoken by Paul.
And I'm gonna have to get through this
real quick because the second service is gonna
be in 15 minutes, and it doesn't matter
right now because we've been going since 7
.30, so we'll just keep going.
Oh, wait, actually, we got 45 minutes.
That's right, we got 45 minutes until the
second service.
I'm fine, all right.
If you need to go or you're bored,
just go.
Honey, I gotta go to the bathroom.
Meet me out there.
Have you done that?
I've done that before.
I said, I'm gonna go to the bathroom.
I'm gonna go to the bathroom, and two,
three minutes, you just go to the bathroom,
too, and then we'll just head out in
the boring, dead churches.
But number six, six, growth.
And if Brant wants to keep worship going
in the second service, I'm not gonna be
upset at all.
Here's what, in a healthy church and a
healthy Christian, now, let me talk about church
for a minute.
There is growth.
Now, there's big debates out there with, no,
you know, you shouldn't be focused on numbers,
and that's true.
God ripped that out of me a long
time ago.
I think I've told you that story before.
We were having good numbers, and then we
dropped down to, like, 50 people.
I'm like, uh-oh, well, Lord, whatever you
say, I'm still preaching.
I don't care if it's just me, Morgan,
and my mom, because I know you've called
me to do this.
And then it started to build up and
build up, and then radio stations were contacting,
hey, we heard this, can we get on
the air?
I'm like, we wanna get on the air?
Okay, and God's opening doors, and so he's
doing this.
But I wanted to put this in perspective,
because sometimes we think growth is bad, but
what farmer plants seeds and doesn't wanna see
a harvest?
You guys who have cherry orchards, you wanna
see just a few trees blooming?
I'll tell you, that big one down in
the corner wants to see every single one
blooming.
I'll tell you that right now.
Why?
Because it's fruitful, it's a harvest.
What youth director doesn't wanna go from five
to 50 kids that are reaching the gospel?
What pastor doesn't wanna preach, okay, you have
50 people hearing this.
One of my biggest frustrations is I want
the multitude of America to hear this, not
for pride and self and ego and all
that.
Sure, it comes into play now and then,
but the main goal is to get this
message out.
I wanna get it out to other people
to hear it, because that's a good steward
of what God has given us.
So sometimes we think numbers are bad, and
I was caught in this mentality, I really
was.
I took pride, especially back in Lancaster, a
small church, we're small, and we don't have
too many people, because big numbers meant big,
mega churches that are walking away from God,
but not necessarily.
I mean, I don't know whatever God wants
to do, he'll do, but numbers, I mean,
people bringing friends and family, and it's growing,
that can be healthy.
Now, at some point, you have to talk
about what's the plan, if it gets too
big, and what does that look like?
But be careful when we look at churches.
Now, some people prefer a smaller church setting,
and I get that, because I walked into
a big church in Antelope Valley eight years
ago, in the lobby, it was just, it
was like I was at a rock concert.
I'm like, I wanna go back to a
smaller church, the kids, you know, everybody, so
I, and that's why I think God has
given us different denominations and different churches.
But there's also something powerful in walking in,
and you've got 1,000 people singing No
Longer Slaves, and it just breaks out, and
you're worshiping, and there's a multitude of heavenly
hosts helping us out, right?
It's 1,000 people worshiping God, that's powerful.
It's not, well, the 1,000 aren't holy,
and these five are.
These five, with hymnals, without any musical instruments,
are more holy, and you 1,000 are
just misled by that loud music.
No, not necessarily.
I've been, I've seen both sides, and so
have you.
So see, sometimes my heart desire, I'd love
to, I mean, can you imagine 1,000
people worshiping God?
You know, and so sometimes we get stuck
on these things.
I've been in that trap, but spiritual growth,
spiritually and numerically.
So if you're growing by the numbers, you
better be growing spiritually.
Well, how do you know?
Prayer, morning prayer, evening prayer, morning times of
worship, the hunger of the people, they're not
in a hurry.
You see the spiritual health, that's how you
gauge it.
You gauge spiritual health by spiritual disciplines.
If you see, now I'm getting emails saying,
would you please explain, take a sermon, explain
fasting?
You mention it, but what does it do,
how do I do it?
I'm like, okay, hold on, I'm getting there.
I'm ramping up to that.
And people are hungry for God.
Can we come early, just open the church
and pray?
Are you kidding me?
Where are you guys coming?
Absolutely.
I mean, that's, so we love those things.
Now when the Gentiles heard this, they were
glad and glorified the word of the Lord.
I was gonna go off on the Sabbath
here for a minute, but I don't think
I will, I don't have time.
But a Sabbath, they were always meeting on
the Sabbath.
They were always meeting on the Sabbath.
And this could be a sermon itself, but
people say, well, Christians aren't required to keep
the law, it doesn't, no big deal anymore.
I think a Sabbath is still very important.
God's not gonna say, take a Sabbath and
don't worry about it.
But what I don't, because God rested, it's
a day of rest.
And if you even study the Seventh-day
Adventist, which I disagree with many of their
fell prophecies, I disagree with their legalistic approach
and many different things, so I don't promote
that at all.
It's not something I even wanna entertain.
But they're some of the oldest people in
the United States because they take that Sabbath
rest, they eat very healthy.
So, oh, look at those Mormons, they don't
drink caffeine and beer, ha, ha, ha, well,
you shouldn't either.
I mean, if you wanna be healthy, I
mean, you know, you can't smoke and drink.
Yeah, if you wanna be healthy, I mean,
how healthy?
So we see a Sabbath is a day
of rest.
I believe it should be honored where God,
I'm taking a day off from my busy
schedule.
I'm gonna disconnect from Facebook and all this
stuff.
I'm gonna spend time with my family, I'm
gonna spend time with you.
I don't know what that looks like, and
we're gonna have a day of rest.
Because that was, anytime God initiates something, here's
why it's important, we don't say, well, it's
not important anymore.
What we don't do is start to gauge,
because there's people, and I get emails on
this, too, that, well, if you go back
to Saturday, we'll come.
That's a true church, you know, because it's
Sabbath, Saturday worship.
I'm like, well, then you probably aren't, you
know, don't need to be coming, because that's
the wrong attitude.
Like, you can't worship God Sunday morning?
I mean, I can tell you there's Chinese,
in the underground church, China, that they're meeting
at 4 a.m. on Friday.
I know friends that get Bibles there, and
they're meeting whenever they can.
Now, if you, nope, nope, nope, nope, Saturday,
sunup to sundown, you Chinese believers, you better
not worship God on Friday.
See, we just get a little bit ridiculous
here, but I wish I had more time
to talk about that, because I think it's
good, but we don't have to put, we
don't live underneath the ceremonial laws, and this
would fall under, you know, you have to
live there.
Now, however, if people are just blatantly breaking
this, I would encourage you to take a
look at it.
You need a day of rest.
You need a day to just turn everything
off and focus on God.
There's very good benefits with that.
Verse 48, now, when the Gentiles heard this,
they were glad, and they glorified the word
of the Lord.
So, the Gentiles heard the message of the
gospel, and they were glad, and then it
says, and as many as had been appointed
to eternal life believed.
Now, this is a verse that those who
believe in eternal salvation, or eternal salvation, those
who believe in election, which I believe in
election, because it's taught in the Bible, but
it's how you define it, and again, time
won't allow me to go on to this,
but those who were appointed also means prepared.
If you look in the context, it just
said, since you rejected the word of God
and judged yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold,
we turn to the Gentiles.
So, those who are appointed to eternal life
believed, so that's another point of a healthy
church is salvation follows.
There are salvations taking place in this church
quite often.
Baptisms, they follow a healthy church.
Now, there are churches out there who haven't
had baptism or salvation in a year or
two, or three, it just doesn't happen because
it's the frozen chosen, right?
We just, it's just us, it's just us,
and we're the really cool group, and we
don't, you know, we're not worldly, we don't
do these things, and it's just this, but
in a healthy church, you see people hearing
the word of God, getting convicted, God draws
them to the church, and they are saved.
That's why after salvation, we honor two sacraments.
What I mean by sacrament is two things
that the early church did that we continue.
One is baptism, and the other is communion.
We do both of those, and then verse
49, down to verse 52, I'm just gonna
read the end of it, verse 52, and
the disciples were filled with joy and with
the Holy Spirit.
See, it's not me.
The Bible keeps mentioning it, filled with joy
and the Holy Spirit, so guess what, that's
a sign of a healthy church, for sure.
If you're filled with joy and the Holy
Spirit, that's a healthy church, not this.
You know what this is?
It's disunity, and it's a lot of people
being disgruntled.
It's in a lot of churches.
Many, well, I'll be careful here, but many
of the smaller churches, the reason they're small
is because of this.
There's a lot of disunity and disgruntled and
picking apart and naysaying and critical spirits.
That's not a healthy church, so believers that
are truly healthy are filled with joy and
the Holy Spirit, and you might say, Shane,
I'm not feeling too much joy today.
Well, don't be discouraged.
We all go through those valleys.
We all get the doctor's report or the
phone call or life is not going good
right now, and it's not a continual.
I believe that it's possible to be a
lot more joyful than we are, but we
also have to be encouraged and know that
God wants to fill us with the Spirit.
Your spiritual health depends on this.
This right here, your spiritual health depends upon
this joy and the filling of the Holy
Spirit.
And then Acts 14, we actually get into
chapter 14.
Basically, here's what happens.
As Paul is preaching, the Jews that were
unbelieving, they stirred up the Gentiles and they
poisoned their mind against the brethren.
They're like, oh, goodness.
Well, guess what?
That's number nine.
There is conflict in a healthy church.
You might as well just try to keep
the sun from coming up to avoid conflict,
and what I mean also by that is
spiritual warfare.
In a healthy church, in a healthy Christian,
there is conflict, isn't there?
Because it's light and darkness going like this.
There's conflict.
You're gonna have conflict.
Now, one thing I would encourage you, too
many people run from the heat before the
refining process is complete.
Oh, it's getting hard, I'm outta here.
Well, then you go to the next place.
Oh, it's getting hard, I'm outta here.
Then it's the next, and you never grow
spiritually.
If God has you here, stick with it.
Yes, it's challenging.
Yes, it's this, but stick with it.
It's part of the battle.
So there is conflict in a healthy Christian
and a healthy church.
There is spiritual warfare taking place.
We actually prayed this morning at 7.30
open knowing that many people were not gonna
come this morning because of family feuds in
the morning.
Has that ever happened to you?
Monday through Friday, it's great, no arguments really
in the morning, but come Sunday morning, come
Sunday morning, you didn't take my clothes out
of the washer.
They're still in the dryer, they're wet, or
the dishes, or in breakfast, we have no
milk.
I'm not going to church.
Well, you should've, and see, the devil says,
let me get that contention, that fighting, then
they won't go to church.
Good, I accomplished that.
There's always gonna be spiritual warfare in a
healthy believer.
So I'm gonna close with this.
How healthy are you spiritually speaking?
What I'm gonna do, I'm gonna throw this
out there.
I know this isn't for everybody, but we're
going to actually, I'm initiating this morning a
corporate fast, asking the church, we did it
in January, asking again in June, right now,
halfway through the year, what I want you
to do is begin to remove things that
are a stumbling block, begin to remove things,
and you know what they are, and they're
gonna be very hard to get rid of,
those things that keep you away from God.
You ever on Facebook so much you get
a headache?
You go, I gotta stop this thing.
It's very easy, disconnect Facebook and forget your
password, until you have to go onto a
computer or something, or stop the evening this
and news, it's just dramatizing you.
Why can't you get up early, spend time,
and I'm calling for food as well, for
those who want to, whether it's a meal
or two meals, and as you do it,
you'll build up strength.
You'll build up strength, like for me a
day now, with just waters, two years ago
I was screamed, but it builds up your
flesh and submission, and it builds up things,
and God honors somebody missing a breakfast just
as much as a whole day, depending on
where they're at spiritually, if their heart is
right.
See, we have to remember, if it doesn't
hurt me anything or cost me anything, it's
not an offering to God.
Now, I don't want to get caught on
rules, and we have to do this, what
I'm trying to do is prepare the body,
prepare the body, and it's going to culminate
on July 2nd, that's the Sunday I'm going
to talk about fasting.
I've got a book this high, and the
Bible, I'm going to give you everything I
know about fasting, and try to sum it
up, and it's going to end on July
2nd, for some of you it might just
begin for a deeper fast for 10 days
or so, but remove those things, why can't
you get enough time in the Word, why
can't you get to church every Sunday, what
is distracting you, begin to remove those distractions,
and begin to pray, that's what we're calling
the church to, so I'll send out emails
more about that, but so that leads me
to number 10, things you already know, in
a healthy church, in a healthy Christian, there
is prayer and fasting, what prayer does, why
we do it at the end, people come
in, they're broken, they're hurt, prayer leads to
restoration and renewal, there's restoration and renewal, I
was just reading in that book I recommended,
in Nepal, in Nepal, this is amazing, I
actually, these things bring tears to my eyes
sometimes, if it hits me at the right
time as I'm reading, just thinking about us
now, he's talking about churches, underground churches, they're
in their house, they put pillows on their
mouth before they're, as they're praying and crying
out to God, so they don't get heard
by their neighbor and get arrested, and we
have hardly anybody that wants to go for
prayer, or we're in a hurry, Jack's Place
sounds really good, we gotta beat the crowd,
think about where our spiritual hunger is, Ian
Bound said, the little estimate we put on
prayer is evidence from the little time we
give to it, see, and I didn't wanna
be a church that gave a little bit
time for prayer, I wanna give as much
time for prayer as we do preaching, prayer,
preaching, and word, and the word, through the
first, this early morning service, we were praying,
we were asking God, we were at the
altar, and we're gonna do that again after
this service, we're gonna be next door for
those who wanna come for prayer, I think
half this room should be making their way
next door to pray, just on the other
side of the hallway, and then we're gonna
also do baptisms, I'm gonna come back up
after the prayer time, after the worship, right
before the first service, probably, and do baptisms,
I would encourage you, if you want to
be baptized, we have towels, this is a
step of obedience, this is important, in that
book, again, in Western Christianity, the power of
the importance of baptism has largely been lost,
in other parts of the world, however, baptism
remains the most vital and dangerous action a
believer can take, thousands of believers are murdered
each year following their baptism, because it is
a clear-cut declaration to the spiritual realm
that an individual has crossed the line from
death to life, see, the Bible put a
lot of emphasis in baptism, I'm dying to
self, I'm being baptized, I'm identifying with Christ,
if people say, yeah, I believe, but I
don't wanna be baptized, brother, you better check
your heart, why not, and I talk to
people in the prayer room, oh, I'm coming
back to learn, have you ever been baptized,
no, I'm not ready for that right now,
now, I understand there's genuine concern sometimes in
processing things, but the desire of a hungry
heart, should wanna be baptized, so if you
need to be baptized today, I will baptize
you, women are on this side, men are
on this side, we'll wait, we'll go, we'll
take a little longer if we need to,
we wanna get everybody baptized, the final point
is, excuses must end if you want to
be spiritually healthy, oh, I see some smiles
on that one, are you excuse makers, too,
right, we have excuse for everything, it's too
early for the morning worship, I can just
show you how silly that is, and if
you take your favorite Hollywood actor, and if
I told you they were gonna be here
at 5 a.m. to greet me, you
would be here, you would be here, if
I told the kids, Mike Trout will be
here, LeBron James, Colby, they'll be here, you
couldn't even sleep, you set your alarm for
an hour and a half early to make
sure, see, there should be that same type
of desire for God, the problem is we've
grown into becoming callous to worship, callous to
being healthy for the things of God.