Latest / Bayside Davis Podcast / Ephesians 6:21-24 | Leaving a Legacy

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Ephesians 6:21-24 | Leaving a Legacy · Bayside Davis Podcast

0:05
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to the Baside Davis Podcast.
0:08
SPEAKER_00: You're listening to our current teaching series, Ephesians.
0:16
SPEAKER_00: How do you want people to think about you?
0:21
SPEAKER_00: It's an important question because all of us have a view of ourselves.
0:26
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes that view is accurate, sometimes that view is inaccurate.
0:32
SPEAKER_00: And just as a qualifier, a disclaimer in this conversation, when we talk about how we want people to view us, all of us have insecurities about ourselves.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Right?
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
0:45
SPEAKER_00: Raise your hand if you have insecurities about yourself.
0:47
SPEAKER_00: All of us.
0:49
SPEAKER_00: And as we think about this healthy view of how people view us, we also have to recognize the unhealthy view of how we view ourselves and continue to lean in the reality that we need to view ourselves how God views us.
1:09
SPEAKER_00: But people do view us in certain ways.
1:12
SPEAKER_00: People might see our corks and our flaws and our failures and our gifts and our charisma or lack of charisma or whatever it is that people define us by.
1:24
SPEAKER_00: It is vital for you and I, as followers of Jesus, to be intentional about the legacy that we want to live, and the legacy that we want to leave when we are gone from this earth and in heaven with Jesus.
1:42
SPEAKER_00: Do you want to be known as a prideful person, an angry person, a lustful person, an opinionated person, a too good for everyone person, a single issue, no compromise person?
1:59
SPEAKER_00: Or do you want to be known as a loving person, a kind person, a thoughtful person, a wise person, a person who year after year more and more looks like Jesus, Christ-like person?
2:18
SPEAKER_00: How do you want others to view you?
2:22
SPEAKER_00: And what do you want to be known as as you are cultivating the way of Jesus and ultimately leaving a legacy in your life?
2:32
SPEAKER_00: In our passage this morning, Ephesians 6, 21 through 24, which often the ends of these letters people just skip over, but there's so much spiritual gold in this passage.
2:45
SPEAKER_00: In our passage this morning, Paul talks about an individual in the first century church that had a legacy and was going to leave a legacy in the early church.
2:56
SPEAKER_00: I want you to notice there's really two sections to these verses.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: The first part is verses 21 through 22.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: Paul affirms an individual that most people have no idea how to pronounce his name in the early church.
3:14
SPEAKER_00: Tukekos is the actual original pronunciation.
3:19
SPEAKER_00: He says, verse 21, Tukikos, the dear brother and faithful servant in the Lord, will tell you everything so that you also may know how I am doing and what I am doing.
3:34
SPEAKER_00: I am sending him to you for this very purpose that you may know how we are and that he may encourage you.
3:42
SPEAKER_00: There's we have sermon prep, this was weeks ago.
3:47
SPEAKER_00: All of the lead pastors of Base I get together and some other people on our teaching team, and we do a sermon prep.
3:52
SPEAKER_00: And there was a great debate on how to pronounce this guy's name in sermon prep.
4:00
SPEAKER_00: And I've heard Tichikus, I've heard tyche, I've heard Tychikus, but his name was originally not pronounced any of those ways.
4:12
SPEAKER_00: It was Tukikos in the original language, Koine Greek.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: I bet you most of you have never pronounced it Tukakos.
4:20
SPEAKER_00: That's the Greek pronunciation of this individual's name.
4:26
SPEAKER_00: And uh since I taught New Testament Greek, I said none of those were the original pronunciation, and there was still a debate after that, and I was like, wait a minute.
4:37
SPEAKER_00: There is no ch in Greek, there's a chi.
4:40
SPEAKER_00: So it's two kakos in the original language, but in the English, pronounce it any way you want.
4:46
SPEAKER_00: Nobody's ever gonna know.
4:49
SPEAKER_00: And Paul lists two qualities of this individual.
4:53
SPEAKER_00: Notice these two qualities, and I think they're really important.
4:56
SPEAKER_00: He's affirming him, and there's a reason why he's affirming him because he has a special mission for this individual.
5:04
SPEAKER_00: Notice these two qualities, number one, that he was known for in the early church, and the legacy he leaves now as we read this as followers of Jesus for thousands of years at this point.
5:18
SPEAKER_00: Number one, he was a dear brother, a dear brother.
5:24
SPEAKER_00: Dearer comes from a related terminology in Koine Greek that has the idea of loved.
5:32
SPEAKER_00: It's agapetos.
5:34
SPEAKER_00: It means well loved.
5:38
SPEAKER_00: This guy was a Christian, a follower of Jesus, a co-worker of Paul, a leader in the early church.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: And Paul is saying that everybody in the early church that knew this guy, including Paul himself, loved him.
5:52
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a great legacy?
5:55
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's some Christians that nobody loves.
5:59
SPEAKER_00: They're like, oh man, so and so is showing up.
6:02
SPEAKER_00: Oh no.
6:04
SPEAKER_00: And then there's other Christians that everybody loves.
6:08
SPEAKER_00: They're like walk in a room and everybody feels warmed and encouraged and blessed and laugh or whatever by that individual.
6:17
SPEAKER_00: This guy was a Christian that people loved, including Paul, whom he had a legacy of working with in the ministry.
6:27
SPEAKER_00: He was a brother in Christ.
6:28
SPEAKER_00: He was a loved friend of Paul in the early church.
6:34
SPEAKER_00: And you guys are loved, hopefully.
6:37
SPEAKER_00: Hopefully, you walk into a room and you're one of those Christians that everybody loves.
6:40
SPEAKER_00: You're not like the Christians I talk about at Disneyland that you see them and you're like, oh no.
6:46
SPEAKER_00: That you walk into a room and people love you.
6:49
SPEAKER_00: Well, you walk in here and we all love you.
6:51
SPEAKER_00: We're glad you're here.
6:52
SPEAKER_00: Happy Thanksgiving.
6:53
SPEAKER_00: Great to see you at church.
6:55
SPEAKER_00: But he was a dear brother.
6:57
SPEAKER_00: He was well loved in the early church, and we want to aspire to be people of Jesus that God's people and really all people love.
7:08
SPEAKER_00: Now, there is persecution, and people didn't love Jesus because of what he said and did and all that stuff, and that's gonna happen.
7:14
SPEAKER_00: But for the most part, we want to be like Jesus in a way that we walk into a room and people love us.
7:23
SPEAKER_00: Second, notice the second characteristic that he's known by.
7:28
SPEAKER_00: Faithful servant in the Lord.
7:32
SPEAKER_00: He was faithful, he was trustworthy in ministry.
7:36
SPEAKER_00: He was trustworthy to Paul.
7:39
SPEAKER_00: He was in Rome at this point because Paul is in prison, and Paul is saying, This guy is with me while I'm in prison.
7:46
SPEAKER_00: That's when you really know your friends.
7:48
SPEAKER_00: When you are locked up, when you are suffering, when you are struggling, when you are in prison, so to speak.
7:56
SPEAKER_00: And somebody's right there by you and with you and for you.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: You don't necessarily know your friends when everything's going great.
8:05
SPEAKER_00: You know your friends when you're awaiting Caesar, the emperor of Rome, in prison.
8:12
SPEAKER_00: And this guy was by Paul's side in prison, and Paul calls him a faithful or trustworthy servant of God in the church.
8:21
SPEAKER_00: What I find to be interesting about this is if you go back to Ephesians chapter 1, in Ephesians chapter 1, Paul calls the church at Ephesus faithful in Christ Jesus, verse 1.
8:37
SPEAKER_00: So he begins his letter calling the Ephesians faithful, and he ends his letter calling Teuchakos faithful in Christ Jesus.
8:48
SPEAKER_00: Somehow, this book, the book ends, are faithfulness at the beginning and faithfulness at the end.
8:59
SPEAKER_00: And this individual, who nobody knows how to pronounce their name, is mentioned five times in the New Testament.
9:06
SPEAKER_00: Let me read each of the times he shows up, Acts 20, 3 and 4.
9:10
SPEAKER_00: Because some Jews had plotted against him just as he was about to sail to Syria, Paul.
9:16
SPEAKER_00: He decided to go back to Macedonia.
9:19
SPEAKER_00: He was accompanied by Sopater, Aristok uh Aristichus, Secondus, however you say that name, from Thessalonica, Gaius from Derby, Timothy also, Teuchakos, and Trophimus from the province of Asia.
9:39
SPEAKER_00: So Paul is traveling, and there is trouble because people were persecuting and wanted to kill Paul.
9:46
SPEAKER_00: And guess who's by his side?
9:48
SPEAKER_00: Teuchekos.
9:49
SPEAKER_00: Ephesians 6, verse 21.
9:52
SPEAKER_00: Teuchakos, the dear brother and faithful servant in the Lord.
9:54
SPEAKER_00: Second mention.
9:55
SPEAKER_00: Third mention, Colossians 4, 7.
9:59
SPEAKER_00: Teuchos will tell you all the news about me.
10:02
SPEAKER_00: He is a dear brother and faithful ministry and fellow servant in the Lord.
10:07
SPEAKER_00: 2 Timothy 4 12, at the end of Paul's life, he's with him.
10:12
SPEAKER_00: I sent Tukokos to Ephesus.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: Paul's talking about him at the end of his life.
10:18
SPEAKER_00: Titus chapter 3, verse 12.
10:19
SPEAKER_00: As soon as I send Artemis and Teuchakos to you, do your best to come to me at Nicopolos, because I have decided to winter there.
10:31
SPEAKER_00: In our culture, it's what's interesting is like you read through this and you're like, this guy was really connected to the Apostle Paul, who wrote half the New Testament, who was like the church planting, extraordinaire leader in the early church.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: And this guy is constantly mentioned by Paul in Scripture.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: This isn't just like some one-off name that we see in Scripture.
10:53
SPEAKER_00: This is a person named again and again and again and again and again five times.
11:02
SPEAKER_00: And twice he's called faithful.
11:06
SPEAKER_00: In our culture, we view talent or charisma or ability as sought-after characteristics.
11:12
SPEAKER_00: We're like, let's find the most talented, let's find the most charismatic, let's find the people with the greatest ability.
11:17
SPEAKER_00: But in scripture, availability and faithfulness are the sought-after characteristics.
11:24
SPEAKER_00: It's not, oh wow, this individual is so amazing and so charismatic, and look at the gift set that this person has.
11:32
SPEAKER_00: It's no, this person is available to serve the Lord, and they're faithful in their service to the Lord.
11:41
SPEAKER_00: And that's part of our legacy.
11:42
SPEAKER_00: Do we want to be famous or do we want to be faithful?
11:45
SPEAKER_00: Do we want everybody to know us, like let's be social media influencers or whatever?
11:49
SPEAKER_00: Let's be the greatest person around with the greatest skill set, or do we want to be known as people who are available and faithful in whatever God has called us to?
12:03
SPEAKER_00: This guy's legacy was faithfulness.
12:07
SPEAKER_00: And there's a reason that Paul mentions him at the end of this letter.
12:11
SPEAKER_00: He says, This is a dear brother and faithful servant of the Lord, and he will tell you everything.
12:17
SPEAKER_00: Why was Paul mentioning this individual?
12:21
SPEAKER_00: Let me let me paint a picture for you.
12:24
SPEAKER_00: There was no official postal service for citizens of the Roman Empire.
12:30
SPEAKER_00: There was no USPS.
12:33
SPEAKER_00: USPS, not UPS, not FedEx, not all the other things, the global services that you get a package and you have to sign if it's from another country.
12:43
SPEAKER_00: None of those things.
12:44
SPEAKER_00: There was no USPS.
12:47
SPEAKER_00: There was only an official postal service for government business in Rome.
12:53
SPEAKER_00: So a private citizen like Paul could not send any mail or letter in an official way in the Roman Empire.
13:02
SPEAKER_00: Nobody could.
13:03
SPEAKER_00: So unless you were the Roman government and you had the Roman government postal service, you could not send mail.
13:10
SPEAKER_00: You could not send scripture or letters.
13:14
SPEAKER_00: One writer talks about this individual's role in what Paul was telling him to do or sending him to do.
13:22
SPEAKER_00: He says, while a courier system existed for official mail, private letters were carried by private messengers or were sent along with people known to be traveling to the desired destination.
13:32
SPEAKER_00: The closer the relationship between the letter carrier and the letter sender, the more the firmer former would be expected to give additional information and explanation of details.
13:46
SPEAKER_00: That's why Paul says here, he will tell you everything.
13:50
SPEAKER_00: Paul is saying, this guy is the postman for Jesus.
13:55
SPEAKER_00: And he's gonna deliver scripture to you, and he's gonna tell you everything you need to know.
14:04
SPEAKER_00: It is likely that Tukakos was the letter carrier for both Colossians and Ephesians and Philemon, three letters that Paul wrote, which means he was very close to Paul and very trusted by Paul and by the early church.
14:21
SPEAKER_00: So this guy is the postman for Paul and the postman for Jesus.
14:25
SPEAKER_00: He is sending scripture, and he says, He will tell you everything so that you also may know how I am, how I am and what I am doing.
14:38
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna tell you everything you need to know about this letter, being scripture, inspired by the Lord, and he's gonna tell you how I am doing and what I am doing.
14:50
SPEAKER_00: This is so interesting.
14:54
SPEAKER_00: He's gonna travel to them, to Ephesus, from Rome, where Paul is on house arrest, awaiting trial before Caesar.
15:03
SPEAKER_00: And Paul is sitting there in his prison, so to speak, on house arrest, and he wanted to be known.
15:13
SPEAKER_00: That's so interesting.
15:16
SPEAKER_00: Paul's going through a rough moment.
15:18
SPEAKER_00: Paul is facing maybe impending death or judgment by the Emperor of Rome, and he wanted them to know how he was doing because they were discouraged about his situation.
15:32
SPEAKER_00: So he opens up his heart to them.
15:35
SPEAKER_00: He lets them know how he's doing via this messenger who's gonna be faithful to carry the message that Paul has for them, and part of that message is Paul being known.
15:46
SPEAKER_00: And I think this is a really easy thing for some and a really difficult thing for other people because some of us we are born or cultivated in households that are private.
15:59
SPEAKER_00: We don't talk about how we're doing.
16:02
SPEAKER_00: Or some of us are raging introverts.
16:07
SPEAKER_00: We don't like to talk about how we're doing.
16:10
SPEAKER_00: But let me just encourage you.
16:13
SPEAKER_00: I grew up in a family that is very private.
16:16
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if it's like our family heritage or roots, and people didn't necessarily like open up the deeper parts, the emotional parts of themselves.
16:27
SPEAKER_00: And that's changing slowly.
16:29
SPEAKER_00: And then a couple of us in our family are introverts, and then some are extroverts.
16:34
SPEAKER_00: So some people in our family would like talk about everything, it's overwhelming.
16:38
SPEAKER_00: And then other of us we're very slow to share.
16:43
SPEAKER_00: And that's all families, but I think that it's important when you're going through something hard, you have to have the courage to be known.
16:54
SPEAKER_00: Paul is setting that example, and Paul also wanted them to know what he was doing for Jesus.
17:01
SPEAKER_00: This is so cool to me.
17:02
SPEAKER_00: Paul is in Rome awaiting the Caesar, the emperor of Rome, and he's saying, I'm still serving the Lord, and I want you to know that.
17:14
SPEAKER_00: I'm in prison, but I'm still evangelizing, I'm still writing scripture, and I'm still pastoring people in prison.
17:21
SPEAKER_00: Paul redeemed his circumstances.
17:25
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we feel in prison and we're like, oh Lord, you can't use me.
17:29
SPEAKER_00: I'm unusable.
17:31
SPEAKER_00: There's nothing good right now in my life.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: There's no way that anything could be redeemed.
17:36
SPEAKER_00: It's too hard, it's too difficult.
17:38
SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna sit in my room and do nothing for the next year or two.
17:45
SPEAKER_00: Can I encourage you?
17:46
SPEAKER_00: That's not good for your spiritual health, that's not good for your mental health, that's not good for any health category in your life.
17:57
SPEAKER_00: And sometimes we feel unusable because of our circumstances, but Paul shows us you can serve Jesus and tell people about Jesus in any circumstance that you're in.
18:09
SPEAKER_00: Don't let your circumstances define your calling in any moment of life.
18:14
SPEAKER_00: Let your calling invade every circumstance.
18:20
SPEAKER_00: Whatever God has called you to, it the circumstance doesn't take the lead, the calling takes the lead.
18:27
SPEAKER_00: Let your calling invade every circumstance.
18:30
SPEAKER_00: Now, I'm not diminishing, downplaying the difficulty of difficult circumstances.
18:35
SPEAKER_00: I'm not trying to say, you know, let's let's dismiss that sometimes life is hard.
18:40
SPEAKER_00: What I am saying is sometimes we get so isolated and internalized that we forget that isolation and internalization causes us to lose our identity and our calling.
18:55
SPEAKER_00: And God doesn't want you to lose yourself in your hard circumstances.
19:01
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to be yourself in your hard circumstances.
19:06
SPEAKER_00: And in order to fully be yourself in your hard circumstances, you have to let your calling invade every circumstance.
19:14
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that what all the great people in Scripture did?
19:18
SPEAKER_00: Remember, Daniel, he's in Babylon, he's being persecuted for his faith, his prayer, his faith, uh, deciding to do things that other people were doing, compromising in culture.
19:29
SPEAKER_00: And Daniel went into the lion's den.
19:34
SPEAKER_00: He let hard situation and he came out of the lion's den.
19:39
SPEAKER_00: He did not let his circumstances define his calling, he let his calling invade his circumstances.
19:45
SPEAKER_00: What about Joseph?
19:47
SPEAKER_00: Joseph, rejected by his brothers.
19:50
SPEAKER_00: His father's has heartbreak because he thought that his son had died.
19:56
SPEAKER_00: He goes to Egypt.
19:57
SPEAKER_00: God's hand is upon him, his favor is upon him.
20:00
SPEAKER_00: He gets his high-ranking official, he's in charge of managing his entire uh assets and household and so on and so forth.
20:07
SPEAKER_00: And then the wife of this man comes on to Joseph over and over again, and one day she came on too strong.
20:13
SPEAKER_00: Joseph ran out the house, which is a great lesson for lust.
20:17
SPEAKER_00: Run out the house.
20:19
SPEAKER_00: He ran out the house, and uh she falsely accused him because she was uh embarrassed by the situation.
20:25
SPEAKER_00: He goes to prison, he's sitting in prison, he's still being used by God.
20:31
SPEAKER_00: And because he's still being used of God, God uses him and he gets out of prison and he becomes second in command over all of Egypt under the Pharaoh, and he saves his family and he saves the Egyptians.
20:48
SPEAKER_00: Like story after story, Joseph did not let circumstance define his calling, he let his calling invade every circumstance.
20:58
SPEAKER_00: Moses and Jeremiah and all the people you read about throughout the history of the Bible, they lived out their calling in hard circumstances.
21:10
SPEAKER_00: Don't lose yourself in hardship, don't lose yourself in pain, don't lose yourself in suffering.
21:18
SPEAKER_00: Be who God has called you to be in every season and circumstance of life.
21:25
SPEAKER_00: Notice what he says next.
21:27
SPEAKER_00: Verse 22 I'm sending him to you for this very purpose that you may know how we are, and that he may encourage you.
21:41
SPEAKER_00: Paracoleo to call to one side, to call upon for help, to cheer somebody up.
21:48
SPEAKER_00: They were a little discouraged, like all of us get.
22:00
SPEAKER_00: Heard that the church of Ephesus was a little discouraged, maybe by his circumstances, and they were worried about him.
22:06
SPEAKER_00: And Paul says, I want you to go there and I want you to encourage the people of God.
22:12
SPEAKER_00: What I find fascinating is Paul was not seeking encouragement, he was giving encouragement.
22:20
SPEAKER_00: You would think that Paul would be like, encourage me, write me a letter, help me, build me up.
22:27
SPEAKER_00: I'm in prison.
22:27
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if I'm about to die before Caesar.
22:30
SPEAKER_00: No, Paul wasn't thinking that.
22:32
SPEAKER_00: He was like, I want you to be encouraged.
22:36
SPEAKER_00: What a great pastor.
22:38
SPEAKER_00: Paul was thinking about encouraging others while he was in prison.
22:42
SPEAKER_00: That is remarkable.
22:44
SPEAKER_00: And it shows, it shows me and you that God can shape our heart for others even in the most difficult circumstances.
22:55
SPEAKER_00: Be an encourager.
22:57
SPEAKER_00: Do you know what our culture is lacking?
22:59
SPEAKER_00: Encouragement.
23:00
SPEAKER_00: Do you know what social media is lacking?
23:02
SPEAKER_00: Encouragement.
23:05
SPEAKER_00: Be an encourager.
23:06
SPEAKER_00: If you're just an encourager, even if in your tough circumstances you encourage other people, it will change the temperature of every sphere that God has placed you.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: Be an encourager.
23:19
SPEAKER_00: So Paul talks about this guy.
23:21
SPEAKER_00: He's faithful, he's loved, he's an encourager, he's a postman for Jesus, a postman for Scripture.
23:28
SPEAKER_00: And then he ends not just pointing out this great legacy that Tuchakos holds in the early church, but now he wants to bless the church as he ends this letter.
23:42
SPEAKER_00: Verses 23 and 24, Paul blesses the Ephesians church.
23:48
SPEAKER_00: Paul ends the letter of Ephesians by speaking a spiritual blessing over the people.
23:54
SPEAKER_00: Now, I want you to make a connection because if you just breeze through this book, you won't see some of these connections that's so important.
24:03
SPEAKER_00: Paul begins his letter to the Ephesians saying this: Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in the heavenly realms with every spiritual blessing in Christ.
24:19
SPEAKER_00: So Paul begins the letter with the spiritual blessings that all of us have in Christ.
24:23
SPEAKER_00: He wants you to know those things.
24:26
SPEAKER_00: And he ends his letter with a pastoral blessing available to all of the church in Jesus Christ.
24:36
SPEAKER_00: And he says three important things in this spiritual pastoral blessing.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: First, he says peace to the brothers and sisters.
24:46
SPEAKER_00: So you might want to just circle the word peace or underline it in your Bible, peace.
24:52
SPEAKER_00: He wants them to know peace.
24:57
SPEAKER_00: Isn't that beautiful?
24:59
SPEAKER_00: You know, we live in a turbulent, divided culture.
25:07
SPEAKER_00: And we think that maybe our day is much worse than their day.
25:11
SPEAKER_00: No, the Roman culture was very turbulent and divided and problematic on all levels.
25:20
SPEAKER_00: And they were living there.
25:22
SPEAKER_00: And in the midst of that, he says, May God's peace be with you.
25:30
SPEAKER_00: This is a peace that is from God because God is the true source of all genuine peace.
25:38
SPEAKER_00: And this is both peace with God that we have in Jesus Christ when we believe in him, and it's peace with one another because of God's work in our hearts.
25:48
SPEAKER_00: The peace that we have with God shapes our hearts to then pursue peace with one another.
25:56
SPEAKER_00: And I'm not going to say any more about this because I'm going to elaborate on this subject of peace more in our Advent series that begins next Sunday.
26:06
SPEAKER_00: Then notice what he says next.
26:09
SPEAKER_00: And love with faith from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.
26:15
SPEAKER_00: Circle the word love.
26:17
SPEAKER_00: That's the second part of this blessing.
26:21
SPEAKER_00: Love with faith.
26:24
SPEAKER_00: Love that you experience when you have faith.
26:27
SPEAKER_00: And it comes from God the Father and it comes from the Lord Jesus Christ because you put your faith in Jesus.
26:33
SPEAKER_00: And when you put your faith in Jesus, you experience the love that Paul speaks of, a love from God Himself.
26:43
SPEAKER_00: God loves each one of us.
26:46
SPEAKER_00: Hey, you might have had a dysfunctional Thanksgiving.
26:49
SPEAKER_00: You may have a meltdown, an argument, too little of sleep because you cooked for three days.
26:57
SPEAKER_00: I'm looking at some of my family.
26:58
SPEAKER_00: I was like, Mom, you're too stressed.
27:01
SPEAKER_00: All this food is not worth it.
27:03
SPEAKER_00: You need to be joyful and happy.
27:05
SPEAKER_00: We need to go out and buy some food next time.
27:08
SPEAKER_00: You might have been stressed out, having a bad day, didn't hit the mark, didn't enjoy like you thought you would.
27:17
SPEAKER_00: And you come here today because God wants one message for you.
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SPEAKER_00: I love you.
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SPEAKER_00: I love you on your most stressed, tired, grouchy, dysfunctional family day.
27:35
SPEAKER_00: God loves you.
27:37
SPEAKER_00: He speaks love from God over them.
27:41
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus' death on the cross is the ultimate demonstration of God's love.
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SPEAKER_00: God's peace be with you.
27:49
SPEAKER_00: God's love be with you.
27:50
SPEAKER_00: We're going to elaborate more on love in our Advent series that begins next Sunday.
27:55
SPEAKER_00: And then finally, notice what he says next: grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace is the core, the very essence of Christianity.
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SPEAKER_00: All religions in history say you must do certain works to get to God.
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SPEAKER_00: Christianity contrasts that by saying, you can't do any work to get to God.
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SPEAKER_00: Only Christ's work on your behalf gets you to God, which is called grace.
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SPEAKER_00: It's God's unmerited, undeserved favor.
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SPEAKER_00: You can't earn it, you don't deserve it, but he freely gives it out of the overflow of his very essence and nature through the gospel of Jesus Christ.
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SPEAKER_00: I like to think of grace as this God's riches at Christ's expense.
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SPEAKER_00: You should write that down.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace.
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SPEAKER_00: G.
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SPEAKER_00: God's R riches A at C Christ's E expense.
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SPEAKER_00: That's grace.
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SPEAKER_00: It's what Romans chapter 5, verse 8 says.
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SPEAKER_00: Turn with me there.
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SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 5, verse 8.
29:20
SPEAKER_00: Everybody turn there.
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SPEAKER_00: It's just so good.
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SPEAKER_00: I want you to see this on the pages.
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SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 5, verse 8.
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SPEAKER_00: This should be a verse that is highlighted, underlined, starred, whatever you like to do in your Bible.
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SPEAKER_00: Romans chapter 5, verse 8, when you're there, say, I'm ready, Wesley.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: Alright, here we go.
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SPEAKER_00: 5 verse 8.
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SPEAKER_00: But God demonstrates his own love for us in this.
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SPEAKER_00: How does God show, manifest, reveal, demonstrate his love for us?
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SPEAKER_00: Here it is.
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SPEAKER_00: While we, you, me, all of us, were still sinners, wandering from him, doing things contrary to his nature, contrary to his design for our life, living contrary to his will and purposes.
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SPEAKER_00: While we were still sinners, not while we were doing good works, trying to live a great life, being a great person.
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SPEAKER_00: No, while we were at our worst, Christ died for us.
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SPEAKER_00: That's how God demonstrates his love for us.
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SPEAKER_00: It is the essence of Christianity that the perfect God would die for imperfect people.
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SPEAKER_00: That the Son of God would give his life for sinners, people who have wandered away from God's nature and God's design and God's heart and God's will.
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SPEAKER_00: Christ died for us.
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SPEAKER_00: That is grace.
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SPEAKER_00: Remember that.
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SPEAKER_00: You know, sometimes when we come to Jesus and we start walking with the Lord, we forget grace.
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SPEAKER_00: We start thinking we're doing good and we feel good with God on our good days, and then God must not love us on our worst days.
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SPEAKER_00: No, the entire thing is grace from beginning to end.
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SPEAKER_00: It's all grace.
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SPEAKER_00: You need to remind yourself that on your very worst day that you've ever lived, Christ died for you, which demonstrates the love of God for you.
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SPEAKER_00: It is not merit-based, it is grace-based.
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SPEAKER_00: It is not today I'm doing good, so God loves me.
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SPEAKER_00: It's every day, no matter how I'm doing, God loves me.
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SPEAKER_00: Period.
31:44
SPEAKER_00: As they say.
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SPEAKER_00: God loves you.
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SPEAKER_00: It is the essence of the cross, it is the essence of the gospel, it is the essence of Christianity.
31:57
SPEAKER_00: It is called grace that Jesus gave you his very life so that you could be forgiven by God and have eternal life with him.
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SPEAKER_00: God gave us his very best while we gave him our very worst.
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SPEAKER_00: That's a great trade-off.
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SPEAKER_00: I'm giving you my worst, God, because I can't, I can't atone for it.
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SPEAKER_00: I can't deal with it.
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SPEAKER_00: There's no way that I can possibly make myself perfect and wash away my sins.
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SPEAKER_00: So God gave us his very best while we gave him our very worst.
32:38
SPEAKER_00: Let's say you go out to the parking lot today and you see my 10-year-old.
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SPEAKER_00: It is 10 years old because I bought it in 2015, my 10-year-old Honda HRV.
32:54
SPEAKER_00: And you're like, hmm, I don't have a car, but I need one.
33:00
SPEAKER_00: So you steal my 2016, but purchased it in 2015, Honda HRV, and I call the police.
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SPEAKER_00: Hey, I was at church preaching Jesus, talking about grace, and somebody stole my car today.
33:18
SPEAKER_00: And a week later, they found the car, and they catch you stealing my car, and they arrest you.
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SPEAKER_00: And a couple weeks later, you go before the judge, and I show up in the courtroom, and the judge carries on about what you did and the evidence and the punishment that fits the specific crime that you committed.
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SPEAKER_00: And he goes on and on and on and on and on, and he asks me, Do you have anything to say, Wesley?
33:51
SPEAKER_00: And of course, I'm a preacher, I have something to say.
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SPEAKER_00: And I say, Today I want to tell you, Judge, that this individual did steal my beautiful 10-year-old Honda.
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SPEAKER_00: But I want you to cancel that debt and set him free.
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SPEAKER_00: And I want him to join me for Christmas dinner at my house.
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SPEAKER_00: You're like, that's absurd.
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SPEAKER_00: That's crazy.
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SPEAKER_00: Isn't that a picture of what God's done for us?
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SPEAKER_00: We gave him our very worst, and he gives us his very best.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace is available to all of us who notice the qualifying, who love the Lord Jesus.
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SPEAKER_00: Now, some of you read that and you're like, wait a minute, is he saying that we receive grace because we love the Lord Jesus?
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SPEAKER_00: No, he's not saying that.
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SPEAKER_00: He does not mean that we earn grace.
34:58
SPEAKER_00: He means here that grace has regenerated our hearts from living apart from God to now living a life where we love God.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace has reshaped the ecosystem, the sphere of our heart.
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SPEAKER_00: Now we love God.
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SPEAKER_00: It's not us that are earning grace because we love God.
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SPEAKER_00: It's grace has invaded our hearts and now we love God.
35:26
SPEAKER_00: And notice the end of this verse, he says, with an undying love.
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SPEAKER_00: Grace is regenerated, reshaped the state of our heart, and now we love the Lord Jesus with an undying love.
35:47
SPEAKER_00: I read that and I was like, I've taught Ephesians four or five times now.
35:52
SPEAKER_00: First time I read that, I was like, what does that mean?
35:57
SPEAKER_00: We love the Lord Jesus with an undying love.
36:03
SPEAKER_00: The idea behind this word, it's used seven times in the New Testament, is that something is not subject to decay or death.
36:12
SPEAKER_00: But there's really two ways to think of what Paul says here at the end of Ephesians.
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SPEAKER_00: He's either saying, you love God with an eternal love that is not subject to death, that you're gonna love Jesus, you're gonna love God for all of eternity.
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SPEAKER_00: And I think that's beautiful.
36:33
SPEAKER_00: Or he's saying that to love with an undying love is not eternal, it's virtue.
36:42
SPEAKER_00: That all of us who love the Lord Jesus with a sincere, untainted love for God.
36:52
SPEAKER_00: Grace changes the state of our heart, and all of a sudden we're saved.
36:58
SPEAKER_00: We have a relationship with God.
37:00
SPEAKER_00: We will love God forever.
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SPEAKER_00: It's not subject to death, it's eternal.
37:06
SPEAKER_00: But we also love God out of virtue, meaning what He's done in us has changed us from the inside out, and now we have a sincere, untainted love for God.
37:24
SPEAKER_00: I was thinking right before I came up here to teach today of this verse.
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SPEAKER_00: For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.