← ArchiveDesperate Households Part 3DateOctober 19, 2014SpeakerDan MoranTextEphesians 2Passages in this sermonEphesians 21:03Ephesians 2:191:38Genesis 13:58Genesis 1:164:05Acts 4:124:33Romans 3:234:54Genesis 25:08Romans 55:42Romans 6:236:30Romans 107:37Romans 10:97:43Revelation 3:2010:06Romans 1214:34John 14:2714:45Proverbs 3:1–415:14Proverbs 315:19Hebrews 10:2518:43Acts 2:4222:14TranscriptClick any line to jump there.0:00That's awesome. That is awesome. Amen. Thank you, Miss Kim. Thank you. I would say we put that on the new CD, but it's already on the old CD. And by the way, if you don't have that CD, we probably got some laying around here. We'll sell you for about $100 each. So get your0:28checkbooks out. We'll take those dollars away from you for that CD. Need some of that good music as you're traveling around here in the city. Thank you so much for all the kind remarks over the last two messages in this series, desperate communications. Thank you so much for some of you being blatantly honest with me on your emails to me, how I spoke to you, and I thank you for that. It's encouraging. And I also want to continue to thank those of you that didn't like it,0:55keeping your comments to yourself. That just blesses me when you keep those things to yourself. If you brought your Bible, and I hope you did, turn with me to Ephesians chapter 2. Desperate to belong. Ephesians chapter 2, beginning with the 19th and only the 19th verse, we've got a selection of. This is not an expositional study of the book of Ephesians. If you want to hear that, each Sunday night at 5 30 here in this room, I'm teaching verse by verse through the book of Ephesians. So come join me if you're not in a small group. And if you're if you're not in a small group1:24and you're not here, then why? You should be. We'd love to have you back. But Sunday nights at 5 30, I'll be I'm finishing up through the book of Ephesians, and we're studying God's word through there. But today we're going to look at one verse. Ephesians chapter 2, verse 19. It says, So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God's household. Now we began this series, we're talking about doing relationships our way versus1:52God's way, and we all should all commit to making our relationships God's way, not our way. We should always have our relationships God's way. And we all should have communication skills that we'd be able to understand each other, knowing the different sexes in the room, different guys and gals, speak differently, you know, and we need to learn how to do that. Stop lobbing the dead fish in someone's ear. And you know, we said that last week. But we're talking about today belonging to2:19something. Now in the message truth, even surrounded by a sea of people, we can struggle with the profound feelings of loneliness. It's emotionally healthy to crave meaningful relationship, to desire love and acceptance. The message thought is this. God has hardwired into human spirit, a desperate need to belong to something. We need to belong to something. Now, I know a lot of people that went to college in2:48this room, maybe you were involved in fraternity or sorority, you were involved in clubs and those kind of things. It's because we have a need to be involved in connecting groups. We have needs to be involved in motorcycle clubs and all kinds of different situations. So we all have that great need to be connected to something. Now this message today has two parts to it. The first thing we need to understand is that we have a great need, if you're in this room, regardless if you're a Christ follower3:17or not. We all have a need to be connected to something. But the most important thing that we're connected to is God first. We must be connected to God first. I want you to understand in this message today, we are going to unpack why you should be connected to God first and then the people second. Here's what happens. We want to get connected to people. We want to have our friendships and our relationships and all of those things. And somewhere along the way, we forget, we forget3:46to be connected to the star maker. You see, we must be connected to the star maker. Turn with me to Genesis chapter 1. You say, wow, what an interesting statement. Being connected to the star maker. Genesis chapter 1 verse 16. And God, this is the fourth day now, and God made two great lights and the greater light to govern the day and the lesser light to govern the night. He made the stars also. You see,4:12God made the heavens and the earth. On the fourth day, he made the light and he hung each and every star that is out there. So we have a great need, whether you realize it or not, we all have a great need to be connected to the star maker. Acts chapter 4 verse 12 says, and there is salvation in no one else, for there is not one, not one other name, not another name under heaven that meant that has been given4:40among men by which we must be saved. You see, there is no other name by which person can be saved by the name of Jesus. Romans chapter 3 verse 23, very familiar passage. And the Bible says in Romans chapter 3 verse 23, for all has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. You see, everybody in this room has fallen short of God's glory because of our sin nature. Go back to Genesis chapter 2, it all began5:08there. That's right, when woman ate us out of house and home, right? She grabbed the fruit and it started to hold the process of sin right then and there. Thank you, thanks a lot, ladies, for helping us out there, right? But you see, everybody in this room, because of our sin nature, we are separated from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus. We are sinners. It's all his sin and fallen short of God's glory. I love what5:35Romans 5 verse 8 said, but God demonstrated his own love towards us that while we were, what? Yet sinners. Christ died for us. Now, I know some of you say, this is not very 21st century preaching, is it? Oh, you're talking about those evil sinners in the room. Well, let me tell you something, folks. I want you to gather in here real close. Every person in this room is a sinner. Every person in this room is a sinner.6:02Some of us are sinners that are saved by his grace. And some are just sinners. But God demonstrated his love towards us. That while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Now, I want you to look with me to Romans6:30chapter 6 verse 23. Listen to what the Bible says. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Now, every person in this room that has ever earned any money of any sort, maybe babysitting, mowing the lawn, or your job, raise your hand, please. Thank you very much. Every one of us virtually in this room has earned some form of wage. The wages of our sin is separated from the love of God in Christ Jesus. It is separated from the love of God for all of7:00eternity. You see, because of our sin nature, and then God demonstrated his own love towards us, that while we were yet sinners, Christ died, paid the penalty for those sins. But we've earned that spot in hell separated from his love for all of eternity. The wages of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord. Man, that ought to make a mannequin shout hallelujah. You see, we have earned that spot in hell already. The wages of sin is death. But the gift of God7:30is eternal life through Jesus Christ. Now, I want you to see how that happens in Romans chapter 10. You'll know this, Romans chapter 10 verse 9, that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you shall be, say it with me, saved. If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, he7:59demonstrated his own love towards us, that he died on the cross for our sins, you will be saved. Folks, let me tell you something. To get salvation, you've got to confess sin publicly. You've got to profess sin out of your mouth. You can't just whisper it and say, oh, yes, God can do that. But you must say, I am a sinner8:25separated from the love of God. If you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. Now, folks, I know some of you are sitting here, wow, that is the plan of salvation. Some of you have just said that. Some of you Bible scholars are sitting8:51there thinking, wow, he just delivered what we call in biblical terms, the plan of salvation. We must confess before men, and our Father will confess us. He will be confessed before our Father, which is in heaven. You see, we must be connected. Before we have a meaningful relationship with others, we must be connected with God the Father first. So I want to ask you to do something for me. Maybe a bit9:17unusual for you. Maybe you've not been in a worship gathering like this when this, at this time of the worship gathering that this happened. But I believe that there's some people in this room right now that need to invite Jesus Christ into their lives. Before we go on any further about encouraging you to connect with fellow believers, about connecting to the church, some of you need to connect with a star maker9:44right now. Some of you need to confess your sin right now and invite Jesus Christ into your heart. Believe that Jesus Christ is Lord. Believe in your heart and that God raised him from the dead. You will be saved. Revelation chapter 3 verse 20 says, Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hear my voice, I will come in and be with him. Listen to me, folks. Gather in here close.10:11Jesus Christ, the Son of God, will never force his way into your life. He will never knock the door down. He will not run through a wall to come to you. But he is knocking at the door of your heart. And all you simply have to do is say, Dear Lord Jesus, I believe that you are the Son of God. That you died on the cross for my sin. And I confess that sin10:37to you. And I receive you now into my life as my Savior and my Lord. So with heads bowed and eyes closed in this room, I want to give you that opportunity right this second, right here in this room, right now. If you're here today and you've never truly invited Jesus Christ into your life.11:00You're here today and you say, I want to get connected to the star maker. Pastor, I want to confess my sin. I want to receive him into my life. Would you simply repeat these words? They are nothing more than words. But if you mean it in your heart, God will reach down from the halls of heaven right now11:26and snatch your soul out of the grasp of hell right here. And he will write your name in the Lamb's book of life, never to be erased. He will rivet it into the angels of heaven. And should you die today, you will spend eternity, all of eternity in heaven today. Because you today in this room, at this moment, you connected with the star maker.11:55So simply pray this prayer. It's nothing more than words unless you mean it. It becomes a prayer if you do. Dear Jesus, right now, In the quietness of this worship room, I confess my sin to you. And Jesus, right here in this room, right now, I invite you12:24into my life. Today, I confess my sin to you. And I believe that you died on the cross for my sins. And I today transfer my faith in myself into you, the star maker. Thank you, Jesus, for hearing my prayer.12:54Thank you for saving me. In Jesus' name, I pray. With heads bowed, eyes closed, no one looking about, please. As the pastor right now, I ask if you did that, would you just quietly, just don't look around, but just quietly just slip your hand up. I'm the only one looking. Just slip your hand up and say, Pastor, I'm that person. Yes, ma'am. God bless you. Is there others? Absolutely. Thank you. Father God,13:24Father God, you saw the hand. More importantly, you saw the heart. And these that have never truly invited you into their lives, they invited you into their lives today. And we rejoice with that. Heaven's angels rejoiced today, Lord Jesus. There's a party going on right now because one lost sinner came to you. And we give you all the glory for that. And Father, I thank you so much for this day. And thank you for the courage that you put in my heart to step out of the box13:54and do something unusual like give this opportunity now instead of waiting to the end. And Father, thank you for the privilege of standing in this pulpit. And God, I pray that you do something uniquely special with the rest of our message today. Change our lives in this place. In Jesus' name we pray. And the church said, Amen.14:22Amen. You first must be connected to the star maker. The second is you must be connected to others. You must be connected to others in such a way that here's what the Bible says in Romans chapter 12. Listen to what it says. If it's possible so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. John chapter 14 verse 27 says, This peace I give you not that the world gives you, yet do I. Let not your heart be troubled.14:51You see, I believe in this room some of you not only needed to be connected to the star maker, but some of you and a vast majority of you need to be connected to each other. You show up, you do an hour worth of worship gathering, you go about through business, and you're not connected anywhere else and getting that encouragement. We need the connection of other people. Proverbs chapter 3 verse 1 through 4 tells us how we can do some of those things. Proverbs chapter 3, My son, do not forget my teaching,15:21my teaching, but let your heart keep my commandment and for length and days and years of life, and peace they will add to you. Do not let kindness or truth leave you. Bind them around your neck. Write them on the tablet of your heart so you'll find favor and good repute in the sight of God and man. Folks, we as Christ followers have a great need to be connected to each other. We must be connected to each other. We need other people so that we can hold each other accountable. We need to be connected to the star maker. Secondly, connected to other people.15:50And thirdly, we must be connected to a spiritual family. Ephesians chapter 2 verse 19 again, a different translation says you're members of God's very own family, citizens of God's country, and you belong to God's household with every other Christian. Now I know that there's going to be some people that are going to come up to me and say, you know what pastor? I can worship at, you know, sitting in the bass boat. Really? Why would you do such a crazy thing16:20as sitting in a bass boat? Unless it can pull you on a ski, why would you do that? I know some of you are going to say, wow, I love the fish. Why? I mean, you can go to Publix. They already have them filleted for you. You don't have to sit out there in that heat all day long and drop that hook and get those nasty worms and all that. Some of you love that fishing. That's okay. Some of you say, I can hunt, I can get in the deer stand and I can worship just as much as I can in this place. probably so. You probably can16:49in the bass boat. I know you can worship if you're playing good at the golf course. If you're playing bad, it's not much worship going on. I mean, we're really struggling. If you're not playing good, you're probably not talking good so you're not worshiping good. Right? Let's get real in this place. But folks, we have a great need as believers of Jesus Christ to gather together as the citizens of heaven. We have a great need to be connected to one another.17:18Now, let me tell you something. If you're not a member of this church, let me just tell you. This church is a good church. It's a good church. You say, wait a minute, they're not a great church? No. Because we're flawed people. But we serve a great Savior. And that makes us striving to be great. We are not a great church, but we serve a great Savior. And that's why we're together. And that's why we need together. That's why we need the fellowship of one another. Folks, let me tell you something.17:48If you get men, especially in this room, if you miss Thursday night and you had to be at work or had to be somewhere else and you missed last Thursday night's fellowship time together, you missed a fantastic meal. I mean the best steak I've had in a long time. And you missed the most fantastic speaking I've heard in a long time. Yes, I was a speaker for it and it was fantastic. You are missing out by not being connected18:17one to another. We must be connected to a spiritual family. So how does that happen? Flip your page over. Let's get started. How do you get started? getting connected to a spiritual faith family. Number one, for good things to happen, you just got to show up. For good things to happen, you got to show up. Hebrews chapter 10, verse 25. Let us not give up18:45meeting together as some are in the habit of doing. Brad sent me a unique link to a guy that we both follow on Twitter and we also follow him. He's the director of Lifeway Christian Resources out of Nashville named Tom Rainer. He sent me a link. We read it together and studied through it and there's five things about why churches are declining in America today. And they did a study. This is not our national denomination study. Said if their church averages about 20019:14and a half of them, half of the 200 in average attendance just decided one Sunday out of four not to show up, that would average out the attendance of 175 people and would drop the percentage of 10% of the 12% decline throughout America. Wonder why? It's because people are not showing up. Now, there are some reasons for not showing up. Maybe we're not offering the right programming. Maybe we need to19:44evaluate some of those things. That's what we're doing during this transition time. We're evaluating what works and what doesn't work. We're pushing it in the ground, pushing the dirt over and getting somebody to blow taps over it. It's dead and gone and needs to go away. But you need to transition, that's what we do. But we need for you to show up. If you want to see good things happen, you've got to show up. One of the greatest baseball players of all time 2,60020:102,600 consecutive games he played in. His name is Kyle Ripken Jr. I'm not a big baseball fan. The only time I really get interested in baseball is right now because the World Series is about to start. The rest of the time it's just crazy. It's too long. It takes too long to watch it. My mentality can't stand it that long. But Kyle Ripken Jr. played in 2,600 consecutive games. We think that's a feat. There's another guy20:40in the NFL. He played 285 consecutive NFL football games. Now they play 162 regular season baseball games plus the playoffs and all the league play in the World Series. They only play 16 NFL regular season games. This particular individual played 285 regular season games and when you add including the playoffs it was 30921:10309 consecutive NFL football starts. His name is Brett Favre. He has a World Series he has a national championship Super Bowl ring. He is an amazing guy. You see for good things to happen you've got to show up. We need some holy habits happening in our lives. We need to make a commitment to be here at every possible time. Righteousness versus the resolution of a relationship we need to be committed21:40committed to this faith family not just every now and then and if we don't feel like it don't show up. Folks we only offer one worship gathering a week one hour for this hack to holler at you one hour a week and I say Dan I'm here why are you screaming at me don't tell the other guys we want to see good things to happen you got to show up amen we need to jump in the22:09in the deep end of fellowship jumping into deep end of fellowship Acts chapter 2 verse 42 says they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and fellowship how does that happen we need to commit to corporate worship every day they continue to meet together in the temple courts did you see the word every day what if we did that every day none of y'all would show up would you we can't get most of you show up once a week on a consistent basis church we need22:39we need desperately to say I commit I commit to being in corporate worship I commit to being in small group we need to get involved in a small group they broke bread in their homes and ate together and glad sincere hearts attending worship we know that true spiritual growth does not happen in this room this is a celebration and encouragement true spiritual growth happens within a small group confines and we call that23:09call that in Baptist work Sunday school and then we have other small group specialized teaching segments on Sunday nights and other times throughout the week but we must be committed to that you want to see good things to happen jump in the deep end of fellowship commit to corporate worship get involved in a small group now I want to confess sin to you this morning we in church ministry sometimes we over church you we do we do we want you to23:39you to come in 15 times a week no we really don't what we want you to do is the times that we have set aside for us to worship together and be motivated to go out and make disciples of the nations be here and be a part of that get committed to a small group be committed to corporate worship and third volunteer for a ministry team now this is my eighth intentional interim I have to admit this is a church that has a pretty good volunteer base I was asking how our volunteer base24:09base is it's good you'll jump in once we ask you and we're going to be asking some of you to jump in a little bit deeper take off your water wings and get into the deep end of the pool with us we need to volunteer for a ministry each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others we need to find out what God has called us to what God has gifted us to and be connected to that area so for good things to happen you got to show up you got24:39you got to jump in the deep end of fellowship you got to commit to corporate worship you must be committed to a small group you must get involved and volunteer for a special ministry team now there's one last statement on that sermon outline and it's for you to fill in there's not a blank that fills in my spiritual life took off when I you fill in the blank you see your journey is your journey not mine my25:07my spiritual life took off when I surrendered to his lordship and said whatever you want me to do wherever you want me to go I go I'm not directing my steps any longer God you are whatever you have me do that's where I go wherever you have me serve that's what I serve you open the door I go through it my spiritual life took off when I decided folks let me tell you something it's not just getting connected to the star maker which is the most important thing we do but we must get25:37get connected yes connected to other people in fellowship we must be connected to a spiritual church family and we must see good things to happen we gotta show up we gotta see that happen jump in the deep end of fellowship be committed to corporate worship get involved in a small group and volunteer for a ministry team my spiritual life took off when I decided to make the commitment Hebrews chapter 10 verse 25 says let's not give26:07give up meeting together as some are in the habit of doing but let us encourage one another and all the more as you see the days are approaching over the next few the staff and I will do everything possible to raise the bar of expectancy we are going to raise the bar of expectancy because I believe that's what God would want us to do our best God honors obedience he blesses26:37blesses excellence when we're obedient to the call obedient to the command he blesses the excellence if we do it with the best of our abilities so guys I'm asking you in these next few weeks we need every person being connected together and reaching the community like never before we must be connected to each27:06each other let's pray father God we thank you for our time together in this word father father I pray as we set aside our time now we call the invitation where we invite people to be a part of this faith family to be connected I believe there's some in this room right now Lord Jesus that are just been sitting on the sidelines and I get that it happens to us all and Lord I27:36I believe there's some in this room right now that just need to slip out and say pastor today I want to get connected I want to be connected to this group of believers maybe they're here today and they've never truly invited you into their lives and maybe during that time a moment ago they they prayed that prayer and they invited you into their heart and Lord I just pray that you give them courage to stand up and step out and Lord as we as our instrumentalists and our musicians begin to play softly over us Lord right now28:06now I pray God I pray Lord Jesus that we will not shy28:20if we need to come individually we'll come rip down any barrier that might stand in the way from those who need to slip out right now God you never called us silently you speak to us silently but you call us publicly to pronounce what you've done silently in our lives and God give us give us courage to stand up and step out being connected to the star maker being connected to others and being connected28:50connected to this spiritual faith family Lord I ask you to do your work in this place today and we give you all the praise and all the glory in Jesus name we pray we stand right now brother Greg is coming to lead us the altar is open some have already come you come right now as we stand and sing you come right nowMore sermons on Ephesians →
