Latest / Citipointe Church Caboolture / From Believers to Followers Part 2 | Ps Graeme Politanski

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From Believers to Followers Part 2 | Ps Graeme Politanski · Citipointe Church Caboolture

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Hey, welcome to the City Point Church podcast.
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Thanks for joining us. Every day is an opportunity to
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take hold of. So we hope this message inspires
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you and build your faith that it helps you have more of the God
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perspective for your day. Enjoy.
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Who's ready to declare today? My heart is open.
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My ears are alert to grow and change and never be the same.
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Amen. And then once you take your
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seat, Nicole, you are louder than everyone.
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It's awesome. I love it.
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So who knows that we exist to spiritually and for spiritual
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and social transformation in our city.
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This is the purpose of our life. This is the purpose of City
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Point North and Bribie Island is we are here to not just see a
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spiritual but also a social transformation in our city.
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And I love that because spiritual, that's easy for the
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church to go. Yeah, we want a spiritual
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transformation, but we want more than just a spirit
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transformation for you and I. We want to see a spiritual
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transformation in society, in the world around us, in the
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world that we live in now. Pastor Mel started the message
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that we're doing a little like a mini series for three weeks on
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discipleship who enjoyed that last week and I hope you've all
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listened to the podcast. If you've never done that
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before, there is an app out there called podcast.
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You can download that or basically on all streaming
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platforms, I think Apple and Google and and all of that.
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And you go search City Point North and you can listen to
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every Sunday's messages there and they're very good.
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So I encourage you to do that from last week.
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But we titled this mini series Believers to Followers.
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From Believers to followers. Let me give you some thoughts
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this morning. There is a start point and an
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end point to discipleship. The start point is when you're
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born and the finish point is when you die.
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There is a context change that happens in a person's
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discipleship journey. From birth, it's to be the best
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you. From salvation, it's to become
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more like Jesus. That's now our purpose.
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Church, if you're a St. we should endeavour every day to
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become more and more like Jesus. There are two purposes to
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discipleship #1 personal discipleship.
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So growing in one's own relationship with Jesus, but #2
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making disciples, helping others grow in their faith with Jesus.
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There is one goal of discipleship, to become more
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like Jesus in character, in conduct, and in purpose.
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There are two reasons for discipleship #1 righteous living
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discipleship matures us, discipleship is designed to
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mature us, and #2 mission living discipleship is designed to
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equip us, discipleship is to mature us, and discipleship is
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to equip us. Let me tell you, discipleship is
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to mature you and discipleship is to equip you.
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Discipleship is not planting flowers, it's not riding bikes,
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it's not driving cars together. But I think God missed that one.
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I think it should be driving cars together.
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There are many, many things in the church and in our lives that
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are parts of discipleship but are not discipleship wrapped up.
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Let me give you a really good corporate idea of this is life
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groups. Life groups does not allow us to
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tick a box of discipleship because the life group is just
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one small element of discipleship.
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You don't really want to know what discipleship is, so I'm not
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going to tell you this morning. I'm just going to get to the
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word of God. You do Nicole though, don't you?
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Nicole's my best friend today. He's not even take my jokes
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anymore. So useful discipleship is when
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one person completely gives up their whole life and follows
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another. And we get discipleship through
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the early church now, I mean, before the Jesus Church in the
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sense of Old Testament. I'm going all the way back to
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the Hebrews. All right, the Jews.
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See, when you turn 14 years old, mum and dad kicked you out of
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the house and you became a disciple of a disciple or an
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apostle or a, a, a, what's the word?
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I'm looking for a rabbi. And so you would then live with
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the rabbi. And the whole intention of this
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discipleship was a lifelong journey.
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I told you you didn't want to hear this.
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And discipleship is a lifelong journey.
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And the objective biblically, which we'll get to in a moment
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in discipleship, is that you would speak like your rabbi,
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that you would think like your rabbi, that you would have the
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same concept. You would even sleep as your
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rabbi slept. This is crazy stuff, right?
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This is why we don't talk about it much in the church anymore
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because this is really out there.
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But let me tell you, we need to be talking about this.
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It's because I'm learning in my life.
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I've been, I've been a Christian for 44 great, amazing years.
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But let me tell you the the Christian journey has completely
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transformed my life. But where I am today, I should
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have been about 15 years ago if I had this understanding of what
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real discipleship is. This is why I would be a
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different man today. I'm just being honest, OK?
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I hope this is OK. It's because the people that God
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had brought into my life and I chose to follow, I would have
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stopped judging them. I would have stopped criticizing
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the things I don't agree with. See, obedience isn't obedience
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until you disagree and discipleship.
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You want someone's disciple until they can challenge your
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core and you are a disciple of this person when your core gets
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challenged. But you say yes Sir.
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And so This is why choosing correct disciples is so
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important. Disciple is this or rabbis is so
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important. It's because we need to look at
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the person we're about to follow and say they have the fruits of
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life. They have the fruits of Jesus
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living that I want in my life. So I lay my life down before
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you, Sir, and I say, would you take me on the journey?
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Yes, and the more my core gets challenged, the more my core
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belief system gets refining and the Bible's got this scripture
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about iron sharpening iron. But whenever we see real strong,
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determined God infused iron, we judge it.
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Well, at least I judge it. I'm just going I'll be honest
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today. I I judge it.
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Does anyone else judge it? Like we look at these people,
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Billy Graham and we judge him, but why would we judge him?
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Now we're talking about Billy Graham, but you do this too.
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You go, well, that's God's man for the hour.
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This is awesome. I love it's like a candle in our
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midst, the iPad. We, we often say things like
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that's God's man for the hour, but Jesus never taught us that.
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That's not what he taught. He said.
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He said whoever comes after he, he and he exampled it with his
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12 disciples. He said go heal the sick, cast
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out demons. He didn't say in history's time,
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in the future to come, there will be a man.
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His name's Billy Graham, and he's going to cast out demons,
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heal the sick. No, no, no.
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He sent his disciples. And then he said to his church,
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all of us, he said, I give you this power and authority just as
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I rose from the dead. The same spirit is in you.
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And so we have, we have this judgement thing.
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But let me tell you, every time we're looking at people like
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this and we're not allowing iron sharpen iron, it's us that gets
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held back, not them, because they have the revelation.
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It's us that are struggling with the revelation.
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And so this is the journey of discipleship.
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It's that I've had people in my life.
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I remember Steve, my old music director, he would see things in
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me and he would just speak life into those things.
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Man, I wish I didn't judge his every word.
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I I just really wish his words just flooded over my life.
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And I just said, if you see it, I'm going to see it because if
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you speak it, I'm going to speak it.
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If you behave that way, I'm going to behave that way.
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You know, we did it in one area of our lives with housing.
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You know, we allow them to disciple us with housing, Mel
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and I've had six houses in our life already.
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We've had investment properties at one point in our life, you
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know, because iron was sharp and you know, that were teaching us
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amazing things for our life. Amen.
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And so these are the purposes of discipleship.
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Jesus said in the Holy Bible just before leaving planet earth
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in the book of Matthew chapter 28, he said go therefore and
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make disciples of all the nations.
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However, a year or so earlier than that, Jesus taught the
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reason we need to be disciples, and this is found in the book of
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Luke, and we're going to look at this now by understanding the
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reason we need to be disciples and we need to make disciples,
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we can work out how best to be disciples.
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So let's look at the reason that he taught us.
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If you've got your Bible, why don't you just turn turn to the
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book of Luke and we're going to read from Chapter 9 this
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morning. It will be up on the screen, so
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you can read from there as well. In the new King James Version,
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Luke 91 to 6:00, we're going to read our fair few verses here.
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It says this titled Sending out the 12.
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Then he called his 12 disciples together and gave them power and
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authority over all demons. We already like this.
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Hey, we're a Pentecostal church. We like this stuff over all
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demons and to curse diseases. He sent them out to preach the
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Kingdom of God and to heal the sick man.
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I love this already. He and he said to them, take
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nothing for the journey, neither staff nor bag or bread nor
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money, and do not have two tunics apiece.
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Whatever house you went to, stay there and from there depart and
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whoever will not receive you when you go out of that city,
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shake off the very dust from your feet as the testimony
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against them. So they departed and went
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through the towns preaching the gospel and healing everywhere.
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And then the next title in the New King James Version is Herod
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seeks to seek Jesus, followed by feeding the five thousands,
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which was a an amazing mirror miracle.
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And then we have Peter confesses Jesus as the Christ, which is
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all good. And then we're going to pick it
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up in verse 21. Jesus predicts his death.
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Just hang with me. I'm going somewhere.
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Jesus predicts his death and resurrection. 21 And he strictly
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warned and commanded them to tell this to no one, saying, the
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Son of Man must suffer many things, and be rejected by the
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elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be
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raised on the third day. Jesus has expressed that power,
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authority and blessing of living like Him is ours.
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Then he expressed the surrender required to live such a life
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brings transformation to a corrupt world.
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Then what Jesus says next is not only how disciples would be
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sustained through Jesus death, but how we all will be sustained
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through our life. Verse 23 and 24 says this.
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Then he said to them all, If anyone desires to come after me,
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say come after me. If anyone desires to come after
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me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and
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follow me. For whoever desires to save his
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life will lose it, but whoever desire loses his life for my
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sake will save it. The point is surrender.
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The disciples had power and authority over demons, to curse
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diseases, to preach the gospel so that you and I to heal the
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sick. But we need to understand
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church, that this will bring rejection from society when the
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church rises up, that we enter a spiritual battle.
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It's not all just shouting in church on Sunday.
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It's not all just, well, look what the Lord has done.
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You know, it's not all just, you know, the joy, the joy of the
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Lord. It's all of those things.
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But it also brings rejection because there is a real enemy
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out there. His name is the devil and he's a
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deceiver and he's a liar. But for those who do not know
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Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior, they come under that
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that dark cloud of that society is under.
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But as the church rises up in righteousness, the enemy gets
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every weapon he has against us. Now, his weapons have no power
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over us. This is the weird thing.
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Like, you think he would just give up, right?
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I would have just given up like a real long time ago.
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But you know when, when in the Garden of Eden, when God said
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that the serpent will be on under our heel, I would have
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just given up then, right? I would just be like, I'm not
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going to win this. But the reality is, is we human
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beings feel sometimes like we're under a dark clouds.
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The pressure, the rejection of society in our schools, in our
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universities, there's like this. The world is coming against us.
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No, the world's not really coming against us.
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The church is rising up and showing what victory looks like.
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But the reality is, is we have to fight for the souls of
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humanity. We have to get into battle for
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the souls of human humanity. Then Jesus said after that come
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after me, church, deny yourself, follow me.
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And then he said, this will give you life, this will give you
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life. I think sometimes we can
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struggle with the feelings of life, purpose of life, a new
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breath of life, because we haven't yet come to the altar
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and surrendered our all. And when you surrender your all,
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your all, this will give you life.
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Jesus is saying I have life and I have life abundant.
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Who knows in this place that when Christ sets you free, you
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are free indeed. Who believes that?
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I know we all do. Let me tell you this freedom is
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the breath, fresh breath, the Holy Spirit breath of life.
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But to walk in this breath, this newness, newness of life, to be
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a new creation constantly on the forming of new constantly of the
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on the journey of I'm a new creation.
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I have been born again into a new life as we surrender every
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single day like a disciple with a rabbi.
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And we we, we surrender ourselves, our will, our
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desires, our passions as as God, as Jesus said in in the book of
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Galatians, he said those who are in Christ crucify their flesh
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with their passions and the desires.
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And I, I used to read that and go, really, you want all of that
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from me. And I've learnt that the more I
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give to him, the more breath of life I have inside of me, The
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more that God feels me, the more that he sustains me, the more I
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feel the the movings and The Walking in power.
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Let me ask a question, what is your prayer life like, Church,
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What is your prayer life like? Because there's no shortcuts.
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If you want more, you pray more. If you want more, you read more.
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If you want more, you surrender more.
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In fact, the the the objective is surrender.
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All the big idea here is surrender allows discipleship
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and equals really living. Surrender allows discipleship.
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Discipleship does not mean surrender.
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And I think we've got this wrong.
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I've had this wrong because I thought I'm being discipled.
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That is my surrender. But I get discipled when I
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surrender. That's true discipleship here.
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I judge here. I've got nothing left to judge
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with here. I'm my own restriction here.
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I'm at surrender to my rabbi, my apostle, my apostle, my
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disciple. Does this make sense?
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And then let's take this to gospel here.
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I'm under the will of Jesus because I've surrendered all.
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Now He can mould me. Does this make sense?
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But in the church, if we're too, not too focused, but only
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focused on discipleship, we stop allowing Jesus into every room
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of our hearts of our lives. But As for me in my house, we
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will serve the Lord. Not As for me in my entryway, As
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for me in my lounge room where I sit and pray with Jesus.
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As for me in my every room, every fibre, every part, all the
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furniture, every dream of this house, we will serve the Lord.
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Amen. And so surrender allows
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discipleship have its place. And when we get there, let me
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tell you, church, the word of God inside of us comes alive and
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that's where the really living happens.
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That's when you walk out and you pray for someone and they get
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healed. Remember, He gave you the power
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to cast out demons and to to cure diseases and to heal the
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sick. He's given to preach the gospel.
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Who's preachers in this house? Lift your hands right now.
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If you know that you've got a gift of preaching on your life,
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lift your get bold, get bold. I know there's people here that
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know it, have never done it, never walked in it, never been
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seen yet and you've got to. I just speak over you right now.
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Would you allow your soul and your spirit man be discipled
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because your disciple will get you to the destiny that God has
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on your life. Amen.
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You know what I love about the idea of a rabbi is a rabbi or,
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or the person that I'm being discipled by, They, they are so
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invested in me that they will, they will move the world for me.
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That makes life, it makes life so easy to walk in and to live
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in. Amen, Luke 1427 says.
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And whoever does not bear his cross and come after me cannot
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be my disciple. Matthew 1038 And who?
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He who does not take his cross and follow after me, is not
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worthy of me. Can you see this Surrender
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first, Mark 834 And whoever desires to come after me, let
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him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.
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The denying is before the following because if you follow,
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you're just following a person, but when you deny yourself,
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you're actually following Jesus, not the person.
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Amen. So through the lens of
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discipleship, God is calling us to obedience but desires
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surrender. I just dropped gold and no one
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got it. Oh my gosh, I'm just going to.
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I just said it too far. Did I say it too far?
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God is calling us to obedience, but He desires surrender.
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Let me tell you something, obedience is what I do.
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It's not what you call me too or require of me.
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The obedience is the followers responsibility.
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When the leader requires obedience it's called
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dictatorship. This needs to sink.
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Is this sinking? Is this good?
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I have to come with a heart and a spirit of obedience, not
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judgement, but the one that I am following.
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Even Jesus didn't do this. If we are got people that we are
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disciple in and we expect them to be obedience, that reminds me
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of someone else in history. What's his name?
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Hitler. It's true Jesus desires
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surrender, and when we can get ourselves to the place of
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surrender, we want to do nothing more than obey.
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Does this make sense? And sometimes we get more
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focused on the obedience. But God doesn't just want blind
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obedience, He wants everything. This is the New Testament.
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The difference between tithes and generosity.
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Tithes is 10%. It's law, generosity,
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everything, everything. It's everything.
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God is calling us to obedience, but really he desires surrender.
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Obedience is doing what God commands.
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Surrender is yielding your will to God's will.
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Obedience is behaviour and actions.
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Surrender is heart and posture. Obedience is rooted in faith,
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fear, and duty. Surrender is rooted in trust,
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love, and humility. Surrender desires
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transformation, but obedience doesn't.
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Surrender desires transformation, but obedience
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doesn't. The biblical objective of
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discipleship is to become like Christ and help others to do the
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same. Discipleship is not just about
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learning information or behaviour, but about
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transformation, becoming more like Jesus, and character,
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conduct and mission. Surrender is the catalyst to
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transformative discipleship. Amen.
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You believe that today. And So what I would love to do
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right now, very unnormal in a church, but I want to open up
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the altar this morning. And so I've asked some spirit
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LED musos. I got like that because that's
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the that's the spirit thing. The twinkling feels of the
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spirit. Is that all right?
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Can everyone just do that right now?
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And so as these guys lead us in some atmosphere, can we just all
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stand to our feet for just a moment?
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I'm going to continue in the message, but I've asked just to
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sing a great song that I remember as a kid that is
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appropriate in this very moment. You've been listening to this
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and you're like, Pastor Gray. I'm not sure I've got myself to
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that point where I surrender all I believe all I believe the word
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of God, but I haven't really surrendered.
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Pastor Grey. I can I can see right now that
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when I read the word, even I judge it, I go, is this for me?
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Can I do this? Do I want to how how does this
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happen? God and, and we're looking at
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the word and we're filtering the word of God instead of letting
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the word of God filter us. And so I know this can be bold
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right now, and I'm just going to open the altar.
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We call this an altar because at an altar you sacrifice, we
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surrender all. And so Tyron's just going to
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sing that chorus for us a couple times.
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And if you'd like to come down and just say, God, I'm moving
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beyond rooms of my house, I'm going to give you the house.
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I'm not just giving you hopes. I'm giving you my will.
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I'm giving you my everything. Or to me, or bless the say girl.
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Or to me and do more. Or to heed my lessons that
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surrender. You know, I remember a song,
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this song being sung when I was a kid and I remember the posture
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of my heart this particular day in Townsville where I did, I did
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what these people are all doing and I do it all the time.
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It's not a once off thing because the Bible says that we
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wrestle against flesh and spirit daily.
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There's this wrestle. The flesh wants to do what the
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flesh wants to do, but the spirit is craving more of God,
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more of righteousness, more of purity.
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And so the surrender idea is a daily Christian walk.
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It's part of our Christian journey.
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And I know that there's people that aren't out here, but you
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are out here. I, I, this isn't any form of
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grading Christianity because I understand, because I didn't
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come out the front. I, I sat right at the back as a
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kid, teenager. But you know, sometimes the
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action, remember, it's not about obedience as much as it is about
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surrender. So if you were wishing you were
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out the front, could I just give you another little option?
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Why don't you just hop to your knees and surrender?
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What a great noble thing to do. And I know that this can be
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revealing for some of us. This is what I love about the
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Christian journey is when you gave your life to Jesus, you
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surrendered all, but it's just the journey of continually
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walking that which is just so powerful.
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Can I just pray? Holy Spirit, thank you for your
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presence. Lord God, in this place right
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now, there are people that have never given their lives to you.
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There are people that are fresh that gave their lives to you
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maybe this year. And then there's some of us,
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Lord God, that have grown up in the church.
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Father, wherever we're at, you don't see us like this.
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We are all your children and so far they're in this place.
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I just pray that you do a transformative work inside of
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us. Father, we want to go from being
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soul LED to being spirit LED. We want to go from being flesh
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LED to being spirit LED. Father, we want to move daily
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from allowing the thoughts and the burdens of the enemy in our
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minds dictating to our lives, but we want to be spirit LED.
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And so, Father, I just pray, would you mould us, every one of
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us in this place? Let it be done according to our
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faith in Jesus mighty name, Amen.
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Amen. You know, I've got a little bit
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more of my message and I didn't really think this through.
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It's so I don't know if we want to do a little bit of a youth
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rally concept where you stay at the front and I preach.
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That's very exciting. Otherwise, feel free to take
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your seats. And we're just such a blessed
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church, such a blessed church. Thank you Jesus.
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I want to move the message now in just the last few moments
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that we got to some practical teaching for you and I.
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We now know the reason. But I want to give you 5 keys of
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discipleship. Number one, desire and seek God
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first before seeking a person to disciple you.
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Scripture shows that discipleship begins with the
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heart surrendered to God. Proverbs 35 to six.
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It's not on the screen. It says trust in the Lord with
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all your heart and lean not on your own understanding in all
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your ways. Acknowledge him and he will
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direct our paths. You know, in giving our lives to
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Jesus, I know that you remember that you did that because you,
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you need guidance in your life. You knew that your way wasn't
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the way. The way is Jesus Christ, and so
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you surrendered. If you want to be discipled,
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first ask God to lead you to the right person.
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That's how discipleship works #2 be teachable and willing to
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follow. In the Bible, those who were
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discipled had a teachable spirit and a willingness to submit to
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guidance. In Second Kings 2, we see Elijah
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and Elijah. Elijah refused to leave him
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alone. He needs to be discipled.
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In the the book of Luke, the disciples left everything and
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followed Jesus. In Acts, the Ethiopian eunuch
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says, how can I understand unless someone guides me?
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Are you ready to learn to serve and to be corrected?
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And then #3 we look within the body of Christ.
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Biblically, discipleship happens within the local church or the
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community of faith. In Titus, the older men and
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women are to train the younger in the godly living.
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Let me tell you something, discipleship isn't going to
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appear peer relationships that you feel safe in.
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That's not discipleship. You don't go to those people
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just because they accept you the way you are.
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You want people that don't accept you the way you are
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because they see greater on your life.
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People that are going to call things out of you, not just
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accept your dysfunction. This is makes sense.
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So this is this. If you're older than 44, A 45
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man, I just had my birthday this year.
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If you're older than 45, I need you.
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I need you. I need your wisdom.
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You know, I know, I know that I'm very, very young.
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I get that, which makes you very young too.
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I'm very, very young and you're very young.
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But here's the thing, if you're older than someone, they need
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you and they need you to continue growing so that you can
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take them further than where you are now.
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Does this make sense? This is the discipleship model
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#4 initiate, initiate relationship and ask humbling.
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Jesus called these 12 disciples, but we also see examples where
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people pursued mentors like in Ruth.
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Your people will be my people. What if she never said that?
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And your God will be my God. Elijah left his family to follow
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Elijah and asked. Timothy joined Paul because he
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was well spoken of. He had a reputation.
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Of a as a godly, well spoken man who knew his stuff, man, you've
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got to disciple me. Mel and I are so desperate for
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this. We paid someone this year to
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disciple us. We were like, because they're
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they're in a world greater than us.
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We're like, how do we get into that world?
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We'll just pay for their time now.
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They owe us. We've got them.
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You know. It's biblical and wise to ask
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someone humbling, would you be willing to walk with me in faith
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and help me to grow in Christ #5 Watch their life before
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following their teaching. Don't desire the fruits of a
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dying tree. I just made that up on the spot.
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But that was the Holy Spirit. Thank you.
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But often we do we we go, oh, don't do this.
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Don't go. I love the fruits of your life.
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And so please disciple me. Yet that person's not growing
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anymore, because what that will actually teach you is how to get
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stagnant in your faith. Look for a tree that's got fruit
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and fruit and next year more fruit, next season, more fruit.
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They're growing. You thought that they were at at
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the top of it and then the next year they go, would someone
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prune me because I've got my next leg, my next journey, the
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next part of my life to go. They want fruit.
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Look for that person because they're going to take you places
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to someone who models Christ, not just talks about him.
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There is no such thing as graduation day.
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Everyone at every stage and at every age needs discipleship.
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And I want to equip us all in the church today with a great
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question. So I'd love you to repeat out
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loud after me. Who's discipling you?
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Who's discipling you? Church Nicole, you're all over
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this. Was that you?
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Listen, this is your Cafe question for today after church,
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when you go out in the Cafe, because you'll be talking about
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the message because that's what we do every Sunday.
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Why don't you ask this question of each other and ask it of
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yourself as well. Who's disciple in you?
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If someone's, if someone's offering to be your disciple,
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the question back is, but who's disciple in you?
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So we don't want a stagnant tree.
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We don't want a tree on its last season and then it gets cut
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down. We want a tree that wants
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pruning so that it can continue to grow.
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So if they're growing, you're growing.
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And then let me tell you, Christian, there is a
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responsibility on your life to continue to grow.
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No graduation days here at City Point.
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NO ma'am. So we all ask of ourselves and
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the one we want. The band can be with me.
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I'm on literally my last sentence.
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We also ask of ourselves and the one we want to disciple us.
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So the reason we get disciple is because discipleship matures us
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and the discipleship equips you for what God has for your life.
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Amen. You know, becoming a follower of
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Jesus wasn't the end of our new life.
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It was the beginning of becoming new creations.
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You received that today, Church.