The title of it is, I might follow
Him.
I might follow Him.
You say, Shane, what do you mean by
that?
Well, this is going to be the cost
that many will not pay.
What I'm talking about tonight is a very
serious issue.
It can change your life.
It can radically change your life.
But it's not the cost that many cannot
pay.
It's the price that many will not pay.
And I know already up front that many
of you will hear this tonight and nothing
will change.
Nothing will change.
So, you're not fooling me and you're not
fooling God.
But for those who want to change, those
who are tired of the mediocrity, of tired
of this being distant from God and this
lukewarm lifestyle, I want to challenge you tonight
to think about this issue.
And what I'm talking about in a nutshell
is discipleship.
Is it not?
Following Christ is about discipleship.
We're following Christ.
And what happens is, Christ says, come and
follow Me.
Die to yourself.
Carry your cross.
But the American church says, live it up.
Jesus is going to bless you.
Everything is going to go well.
Christ says, no, no, no, no, no.
That's not the case.
Come and follow Me.
But we hear the opposite.
And so what happens when things don't go
very well?
It's Christ's fault.
I didn't sign up for this, Shane.
I didn't sign up for this.
But He's up front here.
He says, come and die to self.
Die to yourself.
Follow Me.
Pick up your cross and follow Me.
And if we would paint the correct picture
of Jesus, it wouldn't be difficult.
Because as sinners, here we go.
I'm going to get upset, people upset again.
But as sinners, it's OK to say that
word.
We're all sinners in this room.
Nobody's being fooled here.
We're under the wrath and condemnation of God.
Oh, I don't like that.
Well, it doesn't mean it's not true still.
But God, but He said, but I sent
my son.
Listen, we all know the story, right?
But it goes in one ear and out
the next.
So God came and He died for me.
And I can't follow Him unconditionally.
I can't pick up my cross and follow
Him.
Die to self.
So what happens is you'll hear many pulpits
saying the opposite of what I'm saying.
They'll come up and it's God just cheerleading
all the time.
And there's no dying to self and following
Christ.
There's no crucifixion to the world.
And what the Bible talks about being genuine
discipleship is difficult to hear, but it must
be said.
And I believe this will help this topic.
Do any of you want to know God's
will for your life?
Man, I don't know if I should do
this, if I should do that.
Should I marry this person?
Should I not marry this person?
Should I go here?
Should I move?
Should I buy?
Should I sell?
What should I do?
Lowing God's will a lot of times is
all about choices, right?
We make certain choices.
And when a person is sold out for
Christ, and let me put a big disclaimer
in there.
I've never mastered this yet.
And I'm not going to master it.
I'm not talking about perfection.
I'm talking about faithfulness.
So in this area, we'll never follow Him
unconditionally, fully surrender, everything's on high alert 100
% perfectly.
But we can be very faithful to that
calling.
And God's will.
God says, Come die to yourself.
Follow me.
Let me guide you.
Let me be your anchor.
Let me sustain you.
But we say no, no, no, I got
to build this and I got to do
this.
And I want the trophy wife and I
need this car and this house.
And it's Jesus, I want you when it's
time to go to heaven.
But I don't want you right now.
So we wonder why we're confused about life.
When you're following Christ, you're saying I don't
care if this happens or that.
Well, I care.
But I if this happens, or that happens,
or what I'm following him.
So I might lose my job next week.
But he's still my anchor.
I might lose my 401k.
But he's still my anchor.
And many people as we're following Christ, once
you begin to serve others and follow him,
God's will begins to just flow because you're
walking in the wills and ways of God.
If not, there's competing forces.
The Bible says, love not the things of
the world, for all that's in the world,
lust of flesh, the lusty I the pride
of life is not of the fathers of
the world.
So for loving these things, and we're not
able to follow Christ, we've got the we
don't have the love of the Father in
us, it's gonna be very hard to determine
God's will.
This is why many people are frustrated.
Because you'll never keep up with the Joneses.
Nobody's ever caught up.
Just $1 more just one this and we
in our in America, our blessing has become
our curse.
God has blessed us so that we can
bless others.
What happens when he blesses us, we have
abundance, we just hold on to it.
I'm not gonna let it go.
And that's really what this thing about discipleship
is.
It's very difficult.
How blessed we are in this nation, we
should we should but how, how we become
so unthankful.
How we become so cynical and so judgmental.
In a nation is blessed of God, our
abundance, you realize all of you, and if
you don't have a job, you would be
considered almost a millionaire in third world countries.
I don't have a car, I don't have
a job, you've got clothes on your back,
you're sitting in this facility, you're going to
eat a hot meal tonight, you've got a
lot more than most people have.
So this cost of following Christ is going
to be difficult, but it must not must
be heard.
And we need to sometimes wake up the
church.
Now you've heard me say that the you
cannot awaken the sleeping church with bedtime stories.
The church needs to be awakened.
And you can't lay me down to sleep
rockabye baby in the tree.
And they're not awakened.
That's why I put my baby to sleep,
not the church.
So sometimes we need to be rattled.
Our cage needs to be shook.
Our world needs to be rocked so we
can say, Lord, is it I?
Lord, is it I?
And this realization hit me hard this week
on Thursday, some of you saw the Christian
Post, they picked up the article that I
wrote, it's in your bulletins, it's entitled in
an indictment against America, God help us.
And they picked it up.
But then above that is the the Christian
pastor in Iran, Said, who's been beat, they
chained him down, they wouldn't allow hospital care.
He's suffering for the very thing I'm preaching.
I can proclaim it, he's suffering for it.
Look out, look at the parallels there.
You saw you saw the recent news clip,
I think we have it up here of
North Korea, what's happening there.
And this guy who thinks he's God, he's
gonna have to answer to God someday.
He's not God, but they think he's God
in that country.
He's going to execute, they want to execute
33 Christians.
Why?
Because of this, the truth.
Following Christ has a cost.
And the sooner we realize that, thanks, Fred,
the sooner we realize that the better.
Because Jesus never said you'll be liked.
He actually said, woe be to you and
all men speak well of you.
Jesus, I want a great life.
He said, it might be a difficult life,
it might be challenging.
Carry your cross, follow me.
And that's what we're talking about tonight.
Many don't continue with Christ because they're expecting
a party and not a battle.
They're expecting wealth and not dying to self.
Did you catch that many do not continue
with Christ because they're expecting a party, not
a battle.
I mean, think about we watch TV and
the guy say you're going to God's going
to be healthy and wealthy and do this
and God's going to bless you, you're going
to own 100,000 cattle on 100,000
hills and all the and like, okay, when
that's not happening, what's happening?
I just lost my job.
Where's the Christ you told me about?
My spouse just walked out.
Where's the Christ you told me about?
My child is still sick.
Where's the Christ you told me about?
And then what happens?
That's why the Bible says when the cares
of this world begin to choke us, and
tribulation comes, they fall away.
So counting the cost is very, very important.
And a sense of pride and entitlement in
our country, especially in the church in America,
our blessings have become our curse for this
very reason.
See, God has blessed us to be a
blessing to others.
That's the whole point.
Anytime you hoard something, and begin to build
and build and build, that's what the message
is coming against.
You remember the man in the Bible, where
his barns were full.
And he said, I'll tear them down and
build bigger barns and store more and more
and more.
Did the Bible say, great job?
He said, you fool, tonight, your very soul
be required of you.
And I find it interesting that the man
had plenty, his barns were full.
How did you said, Lord, what do you
want me to do with what you've blessed
me with?
You would have read that story entirely differently.
And the reason I want to preach on
this topic is because it's not things aren't
wrong.
But when things have us, that's where the
damage comes.
It's a competing force, loving the things of
the world more than the things of God.
We're pulled or gravitating towards these things.
And don't get me wrong, comforts are good.
God given entertainment is good.
God blesses his people with certain things.
We should thank him for that.
But when it becomes to inhibit our walk,
that's why Paul would say, remove away every
way to believe the writer of Hebrews, who
probably could have been Paul, remove every weight
and every sin that ensnares us.
And as Christians, we're in battle.
This is a battlefield.
Life is not a playground.
It's a battlefield.
So as we're going into battle, he says,
remove every sin, every snare, every weight that
entangles you.
And follow Christ unconditionally, and this will be
very easy to hear, but very difficult to
do.
Will it not?
Very difficult to do.
So with that said, we're in Matthew chapter
eight, verse 18.
I'll read here if you don't have a
Bible, unless you have a real Bible.
Matthew chapter eight, verse 18.
When Jesus saw the crowd around him, he
gave orders to cross to the other side
of the lake.
Then a teacher of the law came to
him and said, teacher, I will follow you
wherever you go.
And Jesus replied, foxes have dens and birds
have nests, but the son of man has
no place to lay his head.
Another disciple said to him, Lord, first let
me go and bury my father.
But Jesus told him, follow me and let
the dead bury their own dead.
This is a high call to following Christ.
A couple things I gleaned from this passage
where we're at is it won't be easy.
I'll just tell you up front, it won't
be easy.
We've got to reprogram our mind, thinking everything
is easy and comfortable.
Following Christ is difficult.
It won't be easy.
I told the first service, we have a
four o'clock service, by the way, for
those of you who can't make the 5
.30 sometimes.
I opened up maybe too much.
I told a lot about my own personal
testimony in this area, but I hope, I
think it helped a lot of people.
I kind of want to still keep doing
this, because when I talk about, this struggle
is just as real for me as it
is anyone else.
And it won't be easy.
And I talked about a time where, you
know, we qualify, we recently bought a we
wanted that house, but we had to come
down to very, you know, get our payments
down five, six hundred dollars less a month.
I just paid off my truck.
And now what do you want to do
when you do that?
You want to go buy another used truck,
right?
I mean, that's what Americans do.
So I had to fight against like, no,
Lord, that payment.
And we have to structure our life, not
as many vacations, not as many this.
And it hurts.
There's a cost to it.
It's not easy.
It's not easy to give these things, live
on less and let it go, because the
God of materialism will hold you as long
as you allow him.
He'll hold you.
How do you let him go?
You say, you know, go get away from
me.
Let me give up some of my stuff.
And pastors, it's hard to preach on this
because people think, well, the church just wants
my money.
We don't we don't want your money.
We don't need your money.
But what all it all giving is giving
organizations, giving the different things, you're giving it
away.
If you release the God of materialism and
you're following Christ more easily because you're not
worried about the 401k and your gold and
all these things and your real estate, I'm
holding on to all these things.
I've got Christ as my backup plan.
Right.
I mean, I got to go to heaven.
I know that.
But I'm not going to follow him because
I have all that.
Jesus, you've got to you've got to begin
to remove some things from your life.
That's pulling you away from me.
And we all know what those things are,
right?
The thing that it is, is the thing
we're making excuses for right now in our
mind already.
Yeah, but yeah, but it's a tax write
off.
I used to do that all the time.
I go spend thirty thousand dollars on a
car, but it's a tax write off.
Oh, yeah, sure.
About four percent of that.
So we justify we make excuses.
And this is a difficult sermon, because on
one hand, we live in a very blessed
country.
I don't know if you know that or
not.
Read some of the books I have about
on the mission field, and we are very
blessed and God has blessed us.
And there's sometimes we can feel we can
feel bad about that.
But I don't think we need to feel
bad.
I think we need to feel good about
what God has done.
Now, Lord, how can I be a blessing?
How can I structure my life in such
a way that these things don't have me?
I have them and I can give the
more you give me, the more I want
to help others.
And we structure our life in that way,
that we're counting the cost, so it's not
easy.
It's not easy following Christ.
It will cost us friends.
It will cost us family.
Sometimes it'll cost us comfort.
And it'll cost us business deals, because sometimes
we make decisions based on the almighty dollar
and not on what God knows is best
for us.
I gave this example earlier today and I'll
do it again.
I've never talked about this, but about a
year ago, I got an email from a
large publishing company, from the vice president of
a big publishing house like Zondervan, Bethany House,
Random House.
They emailed me and said, hey, we want
to publish your next book.
I'm like, oh, wow, that's wonderful.
So I spent two months pouring my heart
out.
Basically, everything you see in the sermons and
articles, everything, condense it down.
Here it is.
And he's like, oh, I love your title,
but that's not going to work.
We need something that pops.
We need something that's marketable.
We need to hit the reader's felt need,
and we need to be able to sell
it for $15.
Like, I just, I can't, people are, the
name of the book is Desperate for More
of God.
We have titles, actually, we have copies here.
If you want to ask an usher on
your way out, you can, we'll just give
you free copies of Desperate for More of
God.
And I finally was able to do it.
But the whole time is he's wanting to
me to change everything to make it more
marketable.
And I said, Lord, if this is what
you, for people to be truly desperate for
more of you, here's what it takes.
I can't remove that.
It was a very depressing week.
But the year prior, I've been praying for
at least a year or two, Lord, motivate
me.
If you want me to write another book,
you have to motivate me because I'm not
going to take the time.
It's way too much work.
I've got to edit.
I've got to, you know, you've got to
motivate me.
And he used that and then got that
out of the way.
And now the resource is done.
So that was my point was that following
Christ and not compromising.
See, the money looks good, right?
But the message is hindered.
What's the point?
So there's a cost involved.
And we have to tell people that, listen,
I want to tell my kids, following Jesus
Christ will not be easy.
They will mock you at school.
God, if you go to end up in
a university, not only will they mock you,
they'll chastise you.
Why?
Because following Christ is not easy.
At least the real Christ in the Bible,
even Madonna will have a cross on her
necklace or something.
It reminds me of the story of the
lady who went into a jewelry store.
And she said, oh, I love that cross.
Oh, man, I think I can afford that
cross.
I've never seen anything quite like that.
She said, but there's one problem.
Is there a way you can take the
little guy off of it?
We gasp, but that's true.
Get Christ out of the way.
I love the cross as a symbol, but
don't tell me that I'm a sinner.
I like Jesus if he was a good
teacher.
If you say Jesus is just a good
teacher, don't you think, oh, yeah, of course
we should all follow his teachings.
But when you say that he's the son
of God and that every knee will bow
and every tongue will confess that Christ is
Lord, now you're going to upset people when
you live in such a way that you
say Christ beckons me, die and follow him.
I have to do that.
Now you upset people when you challenge the
moral culture.
Of our decadent society and say that lifestyle
is wrong, God calls an abomination.
I don't care how many laws are passed.
God calls it wrong.
You're going to upset people.
Christ upsets.
Why?
Because it's a light shining in the darkness
and those living in the darkness don't want
to hear the light.
I can tell often when I preach like
this, the unbelievers, they want to get out
of here as quick as they can.
You can tell they're like, oh, why?
Why do you want to leave?
Well, if what I'm saying is wrong and
I'm just some nutcase up here, why do
you want to leave?
Why are you upset?
Why are you offended?
Why do you want to leave?
If what I'm saying is wrong, it's because
the truth of the gospel hurts.
Do you realize that the message of the
gospel is supposed to hurt these types of
messages are supposed to hurt to awaken the
sleeping church awake?
Oh, church rise.
And the hardest people sometimes to preach to
are young adults.
Right.
I was one.
I know everything at 18.
My dad doesn't know anything by 22.
I got it down.
He's they're just old fuddy duddies.
They don't know anything.
And then when life chews you up and
spit you out and you think you're all
that and a bag of chips and you
find out you're nothing, you're nothing, nothing, nothing.
Then you'll stop saying, oh, Christian is just
a crutch.
You'll say it's a hospital.
I'm sick and I need the Savior.
I need him.
So you don't understand that I need him
as much as I did 20 years ago.
I need him.
So when he says, I died for you,
I know it's best for you cast all
your cares upon me.
I will guide you.
I will lead you.
So when he says, come die, carry your
cross.
I know what that means.
And that's what we're trying to pull out
from you.
The final thing here on this point is
know what you're signing up for.
Know what you're signing up for, not this.
It's real simple.
Jesus died for us when you embrace his
gracious gift of forgiveness.
He bled and died on the cross and
said, listen, you have to follow me.
Count the cost.
I mean, surely if somebody dies for you.
Now he's just an inconvenience.
Yeah, whatever.
Think about that, how that affects our spiritual
life.
And the parallel we see is in Luke
14, 25.
This is kind of the same story.
Now, great multitudes went with him and he
turned and said to them, if anyone comes
to me and does not hate his father
and mother and wife and children and brothers
and sisters, yes, his own life, he cannot
be my disciple.
What's wrong with Jesus?
He wants me to hate my mother.
Hold on, let me get there.
Verse 27, and whoever does not bear his
cross and come after me cannot be my
disciple.
If I had time, I'd show you the
passion of the Christ that wonderfully articulates carrying
that cross.
And you see him carrying that we're supposed
to carry our cross.
We're not carrying a money bag.
We're not carrying a bunch of real estate.
We're carrying a cross.
But the ironic thing is true joy and
peace come from carrying the cross.
Stop fighting God.
Why are the most blessed people financially are
usually the most miserable.
I mean, I've read stories of Jim Carey,
all these people, they're so miserable, so depressed.
I'm like, why is success satisfies?
Why are they so miserable?
Because true, genuine peace and joy comes from
a right relationship with God as I'm following
him and carrying my cross.
That's where true peace and joy come from.
And then he goes on to say, for
which of you intending to build a tower
does not sit down first and count the
cost for whether he has enough to finish
it, lest after he has laid the foundation
and is not able to finish, all who
see it will begin to mock at him.
And they'll say this man began to build
and was not able to finish.
You guys saw this right when the housing
market crumbled.
You saw all these housing tracts, Cahovanian, Kaufman
and Broad, all these housing tracts.
You see a whole bunch of paths out
there.
Concrete sitting for years.
What happened, guys?
America's greed caught up.
Who does these things without first counting the
cost?
Or what king goes to make war against
another king and does not sit down first
and consider whether whether he is able with
ten thousand to meet who comes against him
with twenty thousand or else while the other
is still a great way off, he sends
a delegation and ask conditions of peace.
So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake
all that he has cannot be my disciple.
What do we do with those two verses?
Whoever hates his brother, mother, father more than
me or they need to hate them.
Let's read it.
I'm going to mess up now.
If anyone comes to me and does not
hate his father and mother, his wife and
children, brother and sister, yes, his own life,
he cannot be my disciple.
And then he tells me to forsake everything.
Well, I'm heading for the exit door.
Right.
That's what most people say.
I'm heading for the exit door.
Forget this guy.
Shame.
You guys are whacked out.
Jesus freaks.
Well, hold tight.
As with anything, let's look at what it's
saying here.
The interesting thing about hate is if you
look at this up in the Greek, it's
a Semitic meaning.
You've heard the word antisemitism, right?
Hatred against the Jews.
Semitism, Semitic is that Jewish, the Hebrew people.
So the Semitic meaning of this word miso
means to love less.
To prefer less.
So saying unless you love me more than
your parents, more than your kids, more than
your own life, you can't be my disciple.
Shane, are you saying that you love Jesus
Christ more than your own children?
Yeah.
More than your spouse.
Yep.
You'll tell them that.
Oh, absolutely.
Because then they say, but then Daddy will
love me more.
That's powerful, because he Christ is the foundation.
Christ is the foundation of everything.
So if I love him more, I don't
want to hit my spouse.
If I love him more, I don't want
to hit my children.
I don't do that just for you wondering
that.
But I'm but I'm saying that's the more
I love him, the more I will seek
him, the more I seek him, the more
I love my family.
They benefit as a as a result of
me putting Christ first.
Christ has to be the foundation of everything.
You go to school, you better have Christ
as a foundation.
You work somewhere, you better have Christ as
a foundation.
He's the foundation of everything.
Just a side note to show you how
far our nation has drifted as Christ is
the foundation on this theme, the 1642 rules
of Harvard University.
You guys heard of Harvard University?
Did you know it was founded by the
Reverend John Harvard?
What I'm about to tell you right now,
they would they would probably stone me in
that place.
But if you look up the rules of
Harvard in 1642, the rules say, let every
student be plainly instructed and earnestly pressed to
consider, well, the main end of his life,
which is to know God and Christ Jesus
as the foundation of all sound knowledge and
learning.
Harvard, I can't believe you memorized I had
to edit it to my book and I
had to edit it twenty five times.
We actually have that book available to one
nation above God.
If you want a free copy, see one
of the ushers.
We want to bless you guys with these
these resources.
But Christ was the foundation of Harvard.
Do you know where the legal system came
from in our nation from Blackstone's commentaries on
the laws of England based on the Bible,
the Ten Commandments?
You can't even run for office unless you
profess a faith in God and the son
Jesus Christ.
Now, look how far we've drifted.
I mean, again, my goal is not to
glorify a nation.
I don't like American pride, but I like
a proud American who's proud of what God
has done in his life.
There's nothing wrong with that.
You'll see in the articles there, I talked
about that Frenchman who came here in the
eighteen hundreds.
He said he wanted to know why America
was so great even back then.
Of course, it has its mistakes and its
tragedies and its failures.
But I'm talking about the remnant, the Christians,
the true Christians, not the ones who said
they were and did all these things, but
those who truly were Christ followers.
The guy said he looked for for America's
success in her boundless prairies and her fertile
fields, and it wasn't there.
He looked on her shorelines and in her
vast world commerce, and it wasn't there.
He said it was not until I went
to the churches of America and I heard
her pulpits aflame with righteousness that I understood
the secret to her success.
She is good because she is great.
If she ever ceases to be great, she
will cease to be good.
Why?
Because the pulpits were flamed with righteousness.
Christ was the foundation of all sound knowledge
and learning.
That's still applicable today.
You realize that, right?
Christ has to be the foundation.
And if we're pursuing other things, see, he
wasn't designed to be a savior to put
in your back pocket.
He's designed to be a savior.
Follow me, carry your cross.
It's everything dying to self things we don't
want to talk about, but we have to
because the human heart does not want to
hear these things.
So hate means to prefer something, someone above
another or to love less.
What about forsake?
So likewise, whoever of you does not forsake
all that he has cannot be my disciple.
Well, the Bible also says, if I don't
provide for my family, I'm worse than an
unbeliever.
So I can't go forsake everything, say, OK,
kids and wife, good luck.
We're just going to, you know, hopefully it
all works out.
We got a sleeping bag and we'll sleep
in the desert tonight.
I mean, if you take this to extremes
right now, there are people have done sold
everything and God's in that, you know, for
sure.
But this word forsake here means to abandon,
to withdraw companionship, to withdraw protection or to
withdraw support from somebody.
So Christ is saying, stop finding your support
in the stock market and find your support
in me.
Stop.
Stop finding your protection in your gun safe
and start following me.
See, abandon, forsake everything.
Sure, I've got to have some money.
Sure, I own a few of those Smith
Wesson's Glocks.
I got it.
But my protections in Christ and Christ alone.
You realize that, see, that's the word forsake.
It's not just give up everything.
It's to say these things I'm using for
the glory of God, but I'm forsaking.
They don't hold me.
They don't protect me.
I don't I don't they don't sustain me.
Christ does.
Christ sustains me.
So you've got to forsake those things and
the parting must come.
And all of you know right now, because
I know I'm convicted of it.
Right, you're convicted of these things.
We know these things that are holding us
back.
Christ didn't die so we can indulge and
enjoy the fleeting pleasures of life.
He died so that we could have eternal
life.
He beckons us.
He says, come follow me.
Do you realize that?
I love the Bible doesn't say, do you
want to consider this?
Would you think about it?
God might, you know, do.
He just says, here it is.
Here it is.
Here I stand.
Come back.
I beckon you.
Follow me.
Die to self.
We say, I don't want that.
Then do we want God?
If we say, I don't want that.
See what I say is I want that.
But, Lord, it's hard.
Can you help me?
Because that's where true freedom is.
That's where true peace and joy.
You realize how much easier it is when
you're not worried.
I've got money in the bank or I
don't.
Now, I didn't say it's bad to have
zero.
Right.
I think we should get.
But you're not.
You're not.
You're not up and down and up and
down on the things because we go.
We watch the stock market up and down.
I'm going to go.
We worry.
We're so worried about these things that we
forgot that Christ holds everything together.
So there has to be a disconnect there.
Lord, how can I bless people with these
things and how can I bless my family?
But, Lord, my hope is in you.
My trust is in you.
Listen, I love America just as just as
much as anybody.
But the American Christianity has perverted the gospel.
My dad was from Oklahoma.
My mom was from Southern California.
I love America.
Believe it or not, my brother makes duck
calls in Idaho.
Sometimes I still want to put on Hank
Williams, Jr. Country boy can't survive.
I know I love America, but it needs
a severe rebuke from time to time.
Pastors are not CEOs.
They're called to lead the people in complete
surrender to Christ.
See this.
You got it wrong.
This is not a glorified position.
Oh, Shane's church.
And he's a pastor.
No, no, I'm supposed to point you to
Christ to the cross and get out of
the way.
I'll just be sitting down in this chair
with you.
Can I just sit here with you and
listen and worship Christ?
It's not a glorified position.
We're not CEOs.
We're not professionals.
We're to point people to him, to him,
get let me can I get out of
the way while they worship?
Can I get out of the way?
Just just point to him.
He did it.
He's your answer.
He's your solution.
That's where true change comes from.
We're not we're not CEOs.
We're supposed to point you to Christ.
We don't give to receive.
All these telethons out there, you don't give
to receive, you give to kill the God
of materialism.
And we're feeding the very thing we're trying
to destroy.
We give so I can receive and Lord,
if I don't receive, then you're not right.
And we give with a false heart.
That's one of the things that they send
us $100, God's gonna bless you with 1000.
OK, you better do it, Lord, you better
do it.
We don't come to church to give God
his due.
We come to church because we desperately need
him.
I sometimes wonder, do we walk into this
place with enough awe and respect?
I mean, if I thought about this this
week, you're walking into a worship service, we
are worshiping God, we are praying for God,
we are looking to his word.
And some people just come in here like
they're chewing gum and snapping this and, you
know, give God a favor here and did
it my week.
I tell my mom I went to church.
Right?
People go, good people go to church.
But we don't come to church to give
God his due.
We come to church because we desperately need
him.
We don't have to apologize for the gospel.
We just have to present it.
But American Christianity is perverting all of these
things.
Jesus is not a genie in a bottle.
He's the Lord Jesus Christ.
See, be crystal clear on this young adults,
everybody who likes Jesus and I turn there
to God, every knee will bow and every
tongue will confess that Christ is Lord, period.
You'll either bow to him now or you'll
stand at the judgment seat saying, oh, God,
I wish I would have bowed to him
then.
What's wrong with me?
I'll tell you what's wrong with what's wrong
with all of us.
The sinful, prideful heart tells God no.
But he says every knee will bow and
every tongue will confess that Christ is Lord,
the most godly person on the face of
the planet.
Kim Jong, whatever, I've been genocide in Iraq,
all these guys, I don't pronounce their names.
They will bow their knee.
Acknowledge the one true living God, they will
bow their knee to Christ.
But folks, that's my concern.
We tell people Jesus will make you rich
and happy.
But we fail to mention persecution, hatred, scorn,
ridicule and disdain.
And I've been guilty of this myself.
Many years ago, I tell people, oh, life's
not going good.
And just turn to truth in that.
Hear me out.
Just turn to Jesus.
He'll fix all your problems.
But then life gets harder and more difficult.
Now they've upset the demonic realm.
You believe in that?
Of course.
I don't believe Satan's some image that people
have made up.
The Bible says that he's the prince of
the air, that we wrestle not against flesh
and blood.
We wrestle against principalities, against powers of darkness.
That's what we wrestle against.
So what's the solution?
People say, what's the solution?
I'll tell you in a nutshell.
Here's the solution.
We really need I'm going to use a
word here that people are afraid of, but
I'm not.
Let me explain it.
We need a baptism of love.
Like the baptism of Holy Spirit, you've heard
of that baptism of love, baptized baptism of
love just means an overwhelming sense and presence
of God's love in our hearts.
That's what changes a person.
When you when you realize that one of
the concerns I have for churches like this,
your heresy won't get 10 feet from the
front door.
But critical hearts will.
Critical, judgmental, arrogant heart, Bible believing Pharisees that
need the love of Christ in their life.
There's too busy picking apart the service or
they're too busy picking apart somebody else instead
of allowing the love of God to penetrate
their hearts.
This is so vital that somebody told me
this a few years before I started this
church.
Actually, a few months before I started this
church.
Is the fellow pastor, I was considering the
church and he said, well, I don't think
anybody should pastor until they're willing to die
for their people.
Lord, I think you got the wrong guy
because it bothered me.
I'm not willing to die for the people.
Don't get too upset.
Number one, the church wasn't started yet.
I didn't know anybody.
But why did it bother me?
Why did it bother me?
Well, let me show here.
I'll pass it without that.
And now I can honestly say it.
And it might happen someday.
I'm aware of that.
But I could say that I would die
for Westside Christian Fellowship for the people.
But God has done that in my heart.
God has done that.
So to see that removes a lot of
gossip, that removes a lot of critical thinking,
that removes a lot of criticism when you
truly love, when you truly love.
And the people who need to hear this
message are the ones right now putting up
walls and barriers as I'm giving it.
Yeah, but you don't know what I went
through.
I don't, but I know a God that
died for you.
And once you realize that love, it's like
you melt.
Think about that.
Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the
church.
Do you realize that often she's just a
little girl inside who might have been beat
up by her father, molested, rape, insecurity.
She just needs someone to love them.
And then that love changes everything.
The Bible says, wives, respect your husbands.
Why is that?
Because we've been beat up.
Our fathers have told us we're nothing, we're
worthless.
You'll never amount to anything.
You don't do anything right.
So when a spouse truly loves their husband,
they say, I respect you.
I love you.
I thank you for what you're doing.
And our kids need our love more than
our advice.
You realize that the reason many teenagers don't
change is because their parents are too busy
yelling at them and not spending enough time
loving them.
Well, Shane, give this message when your kids
are teenagers.
Yeah, I know it's difficult because I'm the
advice giver.
I love to give my kids advice.
My son had the ladder out yesterday.
I think it was up against the house.
He was getting ready to get up on
the roof.
I came outside.
Dad, stay in the house.
No, what are you doing?
He's going to jump on the grass on
a bunch of pillows.
Look how soft this is.
So no, it doesn't work that way.
It doesn't work that way.
It's soft from a foot.
But when you're 10 or 11 feet up
there and you miss it just a little
bit, it's not.
Oh, Dad, you're no fun.
That's right.
I'm no fun.
I'm not called to be fun.
I'm called to be your father and to
protect you.
But I have to love him more than
I offer advice because it's from the love.
They understand that the advice is coming from
a loving heart.
On this issue, too, we need to love
each other a lot more in the church.
You realize I need to love you.
You need to love me more.
We need to protect each other.
When was the last time we started to
protect instead of gossip against?
I'm protecting you.
You realize as Christians, we're on the same
team.
You guys got we're on the same team.
The guy we're fighting down here, metaphorically speaking.
Why is brother shooting brother and sister shooting
sister?
If we're on the same team, because the
flesh.
If I can pull you down, I'll look
better.
Right?
If I can pull them down, I'll look.
But did you hear?
Did you hear?
That's not love.
We wonder why we're growing bitter and cold.
Because we need this baptism of love in
our life.
And some of you need to see God's
love and stop fighting him.
Some of you are so beaten up.
I believe tonight is some God up.
God's up in heaven with a lightning bolt,
just right.
A bappy on the head.
You don't you, Mr. You better not.
The picture I get.
Yeah, every knee will bow and every tongue
will confess and Christ is going to judge
with a rod of iron.
And there's a side of God that makes
me fear him.
That's very healthy.
But I also picture a loving father saying,
don't do that.
Come back.
Which come back to me.
Don't go in that direction.
Come back.
He's drawing us back.
So if you see the love of Christ
compelling us, how many times have you blown
it and let God down?
A few hundreds and hundreds and hundreds.
It's still that loving father calling us back
to him.
Once you see the love of God, then
your worship changes.
You're not texting people you're worshiping.
Once you see the love of God, you
want to worship, continue.
Can you wish it's already eight or nine
or whatever?
I don't care.
I see the love of God in my
heart.
The problem is the church in America has
this glamorized form of Christianity that bears no
resemblance to Jesus's call to repentance and following
him.
So the hope would be to pray this
prayer, Lord, I've been wrong, remove my carnality,
crush my pride, draw me closer to you.
I repent of my sin and can turn
completely and unconditionally to you.
Let me tell you why this issue of
love is so important, and I'm going to
end here shortly.
Why are churches churches closing?
Thousands of year of thousands of year a
year, pastors resigning.
Thousands.
Church worship services that are dead as a
doornail.
There's no spiritual life there.
Why is that?
In many cases, they've left their first love.
It can happen here.
You realize that?
We can start going in that direction, getting
away, resting on the Lord, walking away from
our first love.
And it gets farther and farther and it
gets harder and harder.
And the more I go, the harder it
is to come back.
That's why it says return to your first
love.
Return to me and I will return to
you.
Return to your first love.
I could preach on this for the next
hour.
Christ still comes.
Christ still calls us.
Come and follow me.
Christ is still saying what we read in
Matthew.
He's still saying to many of you tonight.
And I'll be in another point of transparency
here.
I didn't share with the first group, but
one of the dangers I have with planting
a church where I was raised is many
people just say, oh, that's a shame.
Oh, that's a shame.
I know him.
I remember him.
But you have to remember, God uses the
foolish things to confound the wise.
He uses the broken to break the prideful.
He uses the weak to crush the strong.
He uses my past pain to heal your
broken heart.
And he uses my past to help your
future.
Jesus said a preacher is not without honor,
except.
The actual word is prophet there, but I
don't want to scare people.
A preacher is not without honor, except.
Except.
Here, among his own friends and family.
We've got friends and family I've been praying
for for decades, probably 10, 15 years now.
And that's one of the dangers.
Many people say there's too many hypocrites in
the church.
I'm finding that's not the case.
There are there's too many sick people.
Be careful the next time you say hypocrite,
no struggler.
See, hypocrite would do this.
I'm Shane over here and now I'm this.
I'm deceiving hypocrite with a mask.
Most people are saying, I don't have a
mask.
I need God.
I need Christ.
I'm not a hypocrite.
I'm struggling.
I come to church because you'll help me.
So next time somebody says, I have a
bunch of hypocrites in church.
Well, there's a few, but there's a bunch
of struggling Christians who are relying on God.
Follow me around for a week.
You'll see some inconsistencies.
I get upset in traffic when I'm in
a hurry.
Time to go to church and all hell
breaks loose with four little kids.
It's hard.
Life is hard.
We have to start telling people it's hard,
but I have the answer.
I have the solution.
Jesus said, cast all your cares upon me.
So just cast them all upon me.
My yoke is light.
So stop looking at the imperfect messenger and
start looking at the perfect message.
That's the key.
Listen, you guys don't have to clap.
I don't like claps.
I don't mind if you do, but I'm
just saying you don't have to do that
because guys clap when you leave.
People are emailing us now daily.
Thank you.
Message of tame my life.
What I tell all, look to him.
I'm just the messenger.
I'm just the imperfect messenger pointing to a
perfect message.
There are a lot of people hear me
tonight.
There are a lot of people who can
preach the gospel better than me, but nobody
can preach a better gospel.
Well, that'll sink you on your way home.
Nobody can preach a better gospel.
The gospel.
Christ died for sinners.
Christ died for us.
And as soon as you open up your
heart and say, Lord, I want that.
I need that.
And you guys right now who care less
what I'm saying, you want to get the
heck out of here.
You're running from the very thing you need.
You think you're going to get wake up
calls like this every week.
You think so?
Doubtful.
When you hear his voice, harden not your
heart.
Hebrews said three times, when you hear his
voice, harden not your heart.
When you hear his voice, harden not your
heart.
Now what happens when you hear his voice?
It's gone.
That conviction is gone.
Listen, I've preached at funerals.
I've preached at services.
I've seen people.
They're gone within a month or two.
The same people who rejected the message, who
mocked at this message.
Listen, God doesn't play games.
We need to stop acting as if God
plays games.
Come on.
I was only joking.
Come on, guys.
It's God saying, here it is.
I lay out.
I lay out before you the way of
life and the way of death.
Choose life that you may live.
And he leaves it at that.
He doesn't negotiate with.
He doesn't bargain.
He doesn't.
I'm going to upset somebody.
He doesn't ask your opinion.
He could care less what your opinion is.
He could care less how sincere you are.
I know that's hard to hear, but this
is God.
This isn't a friend where you negotiate.
This is a negotiation.
This is God saying, I've laid it out.
It's been consistent for thousands of years.
I laid out my truth.
My truth cannot change.
Choose the old path that you may live.