Introduction To For Madison County

MESSAGE TRANSCRIPTION: 

Oh, come on. Can we celebrate that? Knowing that this Jesus. This person can change your life forever. I think about this morning I was talking to some as we were coming together through the atrium. And some people are going, Hey, how are you? And I asked them how they were doing. And it seems like. Everyone right now needs to know about my Jesus. That’s what I know. I think about all the things that have happened this week and as I shared at the 9:30 service this morning. My wife is usually here as well, going the last 24 hours, have two kids that are just sick. You know, as a four-month-old and a year and a half old, it’s just kind of like the saddest thing ever when they start coughing like crazy. This morning, I was in there thinking, you know, in times of distress, in times of sorrow. Jesus went to the Father. And this morning, I was thinking, why is that so hard for me to do it sometimes? Right. And, you know, if you’re new with us this morning, first of all, I want to welcome you. And usually, we’re up here, and we’re just energized like crazy. We’re still here just because I know the Holy Spirit is here this morning. But also, I know that the week that we’ve had as a community this week as well. I’m excited for those that are watching online or if you’re new, or for those that come back. I’ve seen some of you from vacations and at the lake and all that fun stuff that we’re able to come together this morning. And we can tell others, and we can know about our Jesus. Amen. This morning, I’m also excited and energized because we got pastor Virgil back live on stage preaching this morning. We are excited about that. There are some of you that this past week or weeks they’ve been some of the best weeks of your life. There’s some these last two weeks, two months last year. It’s just been really, really hard. And what I love about when we can come together on Sunday mornings is that we’re able to come together all in the name of Jesus, who gives us peace. We’re going to start this new sermon series today called For. Pastor Virgil is going to bring the word he brought in at 9:30. Because we are for each other, we’re for the community, and we know when each other is hurting when there are times that we just need to hear that hope as we continue in worship this morning. There’s a line that I love that says you are peace. You are peace. And so this morning, I’m going to pray, and we’re going to continue to worship. And I just ask that we’re all able to come together at this 11:00 service. Able to sing that our God forever reigns. So, Father. Man, I love you so much. And God to know that here. In a moment, we’re getting ready to go into some baptisms, which we’re excited about, Father, because that lets us know that we are in the presence and there are those that have decided to take that step. And Father, I’m thankful that this morning, in times of questioning, times of wandering, Father were able to celebrate, knowing that there are those that are ready to proclaim their faith in you. Because, Father, we know that it is your goodness that we need. Father, that we can sing of your peace. We can sing of your love that our hearts can sing no other name but the name of Jesus. So, Father, I’m thankful. I’m thankful that we can come together in your presence. Sing this only, Jesus. We say this. Amen.

You know, as Brandon said a few moments ago, that our community has had a rough week. But you know what? I have hope today because Jesus is still on the throne. Jesus is still King of Kings and Lord of Lords. And today, we come not as those without hope, but those with hope, because the grave is empty. And Jesus is in heaven. Because of that hope, we are here today worshiping as a community of faith, not only here on campus, but online. And for those that are new, maybe around here I am Virgil Grant. I’m so glad to be back with you. I don’t know about you, but this last month has been incredible. Disney at the movies I mean the volunteers, the characters, the cast, they all killed it. Would you not agree with me? It was great. Let’s give it up for everyone who was a part of that. But today, we’re starting a new sermon series called For, and you’ll hear a bit more about that. But let me just say something to you. I am super, super excited not only about this sermon series but I’m super excited about what God is going to do in this fall ministry run. I mean, I believe that God is on the move, that God’s doing something in this community, in our Church, and in our lives. And what I want to do is I just want us to pray for this sermon series and pray for this coming fall. So would you join me? Father, right now, we come into the throne room of God not based on our pedigree or our degrees or our character or our financial status or anything else. Lord, We have the authority to come into the throne room of God because we’ve been covered by the blood of Jesus Christ, and He’s given us the access to the throne room of God. And today, Lord, we come declaring your anointing on this community. We come declaring you’re anointing on this sermon series called For. We call upon the name of Jesus and the Spirit to anoint this fall ministry run. Father, you’re wanting to see revival. You want a fresh awakening among your people and in this community, and in this world. And Lord, we’re willing to say that here we are. Use us in bringing that about. And, Father, we pray that there would be a revival that would break loose inside of us individually first, then this Church, then this community in the world, and that we could play a small part in having people find their way back home to you. Father, we pray that you would take our efforts and this feeble and as humble as they are, that you would take them in an exponential way, multiply them for your glory and for our good. And we pray all of these things in the name of Jesus. The name above all names and every one agreed and said together amen and amen.

Well, this morning I want to talk to you about the sermon series For and I want to introduce it, by sharing with you a famous T.E.D. talk that was given several years ago by the author named Simon Sinek. Simon in this Ted Talk. His title was Start with Why and Drew Your perfect mirror of This. He made it into a book and started with Why defines how. And for many people to, understand the why is very difficult. But can I just say something to you? The most difficult thing is not defining the why. The most difficult thing is staying with the why is to stay with it. Because why? Things have a tendency to drift. And this is true for any business in the organization, any nonprofit for school, or individuals. It’s difficult to keep the main thing, the main thing, the main thing. And we just have a tendency to let it drift. And so part of my responsibility as the pastor of this Church is to help us to keep the main thing, the main thing. And so as some of you may or may not know, I’m an avid reader. I tell people all the time they want to talk about becoming leaders. And the first thing I ask him is, How many leadership books have you read on leadership? You know, the answer is Drew or Andrew is zero. And I said. You’ll never become a leader unless you read books on leadership. And I’ve read more books on leadership and on personal spiritual growth than I can even count. But over the last year, as I’ve been reading different books, I’ve come across a principle that is very, very important that I want to share with you. It’s an important principle, especially when you implement it. It becomes incredible. Here’s the principle.

Leaders are REPEATERS.

Would you say that with me out loud? Leaders are repeaters. In other words, if it’s worth implementing, it’s worth repeating. We have to say it over and over. We have to be repetitive. We have to repeat the message. We have to stay on the main thing in order to keep the main thing. The main thing. This is the reason why if you’re a parent here today and you have kids at home. You ask yourself the question sometimes. How many times do I have to tell my children the same thing over and over? Or if you’re married and your spouse. And you go, how many times do I have to remind him or remind her about this or that? Or maybe if you’re a teacher or boss and you’re saying, How many times do I have to keep on repeating myself to my employees or to my students? Here’s the principal. If the message is worth implementing, it’s worth repeating over and over. Now, let me ask you a question. How many of you are Chick-fil-A customers and fans? How many of you? Now either you love Chick-Fil-A, or you hate it. I don’t know how anybody could hate Chick-Fil-A, but if you do, we’ll pray for you will lay hands on you right now. Let me ask you a question. This is not a trick question. When you say to one of their employees, thank you, what is their standard response? Do you know how my pleasure came about? It was implemented by Truett Cathy, the founder of Chick-Fil-A. Now, what Truett would do, and they still do this today, They would bring all the owner-operators together for a national convention, and you would show up, and you would have guest speakers. You’ll be motivated to share with you what the new rollouts are that are going to happen at Chick-Fil-A. At one of these conventions. When Truett was still alive, he said to all of his owner-operators, Hey, listen, whatever someone says, thank you to you. Our standard response is going to be my pleasure. So he made the announcement, and he thought, well, that was great. It’s going to happen. Well, then he started visiting the different stores throughout the country, and he would go up to an employee, and he would go, Well, thank you. And they would go, You’re welcome. And he goes, Well, that’s not what we talked about. So he didn’t get mad. He didn’t get upset. You know, what he did is he started reminding them and repeating to his employees throughout the nation that it’s not your welcome, but it’s my pleasure. And the people at Chick-Fil-A said that it took Truett over five years to get the message. My pleasure. Into the D.N.A. of the stores and now the Chick-Fil-A franchise. And so the next time you hear one of the Chick-Fil-A people say to you, it’s my pleasure. Now you know the rest of the story because leaders are repeaters.

The point that I’m trying to make to you this morning is that it’s very important that we stay on why and this is us revisiting our why. The question becomes, what is our why? And I would say to you maybe it is in the form of a question. If we really want to know what what is as a church. The question that I want us to ask is.

“What do we want to be known FOR”

What you’re known for is oftentimes you’re why. So here’s the question. What do we want to be known for as a church? If you’re a business owner, what do you want your business to be known for? If you are a school or nonprofit, what do you want your school or nonprofit to be known for? Now, in order for us to get perspective on what we want to be known for is that here’s a little bit of deeper question.

What is the Church in general known for?

Now, I think if we were to ask this question to you that you would say, well, the Church is about Jesus. Jesus is the focus of the Church. Some people would say it’s religion. Some people would say that it’s tradition. Some people would say that it’s about love. Some people would say that it’s judgmental. When you begin to ask people what the Church is known for, then what happens is that you get a broad range of responses. So to help us to understand all the different perspectives of what the Church is known for, maybe we can sum it up in this statement.

Many people are more familiar with what the Church Is AGAINST rather than what the Church is FOR

It doesn’t matter what they’re against. You can be whatever. But most churches are known for what they are against rather than what they’re for. What I’m trying to help us see is that God wants us to be for people because people are what God is for himself. And so we’re talking about this today. For many unchurched people, the Church isn’t for them because the Church isn’t for them. Now, let me say that again, Andrew. I got Drew, Andrew, and John. These are not people that are made up. They’re real people. One day I had a lady go to me. Is Andrew a figment of your imagination? I’m going. What? No. Andrew always sits in the front row. And I understand why some of you don’t. But Andrew sits in the front row. But, you know, So Andrew forgot what I was going to say. Now let me go back to my notes. I got sidetracked. Sorry about that. But. Oh, yeah. Let me. Let me just say this again. The Church isn’t for most people because the Church isn’t for them. Now, let that marinate for a second. Just think about that. For most people, the Church isn’t for them because the Church isn’t for them. Let that marinate. I really think about that when I was writing that out. Now, let me just say something to you. Let’s take this person who’s on the couch. This could be a woman. It could be a child. It could be a teenager. It could be a college student singled out. We just pick a guy on the couch. And this guy represents most of the people in Madison County. Now, John, there are almost 100,000 people in Madison County. And 80,000 people this morning do not attend a church in Madison County. Eighty thousand people do not attend Church. And you know why? Because the people are on the couch. Church is not even an option for them on Sunday mornings. Jesus is not even relevant to them. They’ve already said maybe no to Jesus and to religion and to the Church. And the question becomes, what is our responsibility as a church? And our responsibility as a church is to shrink the gap between the person that’s on the couch and who has totally just written off God, written off. The Church said no to Jesus. We have to shrink the gap between the person on the couch and the Church. And how do we shrink the gap between the people who’s given up on God, who said no to God, maybe even turned their back on God? And how do we shrink the gap between the person on the couch and the Church? How do we do that? Well, let me just say something. It’s not a new issue. It’s an issue that’s been around for at least a couple thousand years. If you have your Bible or your Bible app, let me invite you to turn with me to Acts chapter 15. And in fact, we’re going to read almost the entire chapter because you have to understand the story that’s taking place here now as you’re turning or clicking to Acts Chapter 15. Let me give you the back story of what’s going on here. Now, this is very important that you understand what’s taking place. The Church started after the death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. The Church has been around for a couple of seasons. The Church is exploding. It’s growing and growing. It has tremendous momentum behind it. And as the Church is growing, there are more and more people who are joining this movement. Now, most of the people who are joining the movement are first-century Jews. In other words, Jews are being converted to Christianity. And so all of a sudden, because the Jews are experiencing the resurrection power of Jesus in their own lives, something shocking starts to happen. You know, what starts to happen is that non-Jews, Gentiles says, you know what? I want to be a part of that movement. I want Jesus Christ in my life, and I want to receive Jesus, and I want to start attending synagogue and attending Church with you. And the Jews is going, Whoa, whoa, whoa. We’ve got a huge problem here. You can’t come to our synagogue because, basically, you’re not a Jew, and you don’t know anything about the Old Testament. You don’t know anything about the law. And so there’s all this confusion. There’s all of this chaos that’s taking place. And the question really becomes, who are the church members? Who is the Church for? How high do you raise the bar? How low do you put the bar? And what is the Church going to be known for? Now, based upon that background, we’re going to pick up verse 1 of Acts chapter 15 and notice what it says.

“While Paul and Barnabas were at Antioch, some men from Judea arrived and began to teach the believers that unless they adhered to the ancient Jewish custom of circumcision, they could not be saved. 2 Paul and Barnabas argued and discussed this with them at length, and finally the bellevers sent them to Jerusalem, accompanied by some local men, to talk to the apostles and elders there about this question. 3 After the entire congregation had escorted them out of the city, the delegates went on to Jerusalem, stopping along the way In the cities of Phoenicia and Samaria to visit the believers, telling them-much to everyone’s joy-that the Gentiles, too, were being converted. 4 Arriving in Jerusalem, they met with the church leaders-all the apostles and elders were present-and Paul and Barnabas reported on what God had been doing through their ministry.” Jewish customs and ceremonies. 6 So the apostles and church elders set a further meeting to decide this question. 7 At the meeting, after long discussion, Peter stood and addressed them as follows: “Brothers, you all know that God chose me from among you long ago to preach the Good News to the Gentiles so that they also could believe. 8 God, who knows men’s hearts, confirmed the fact that he accepts Gentiles by giving them the Holy Spirit, just as he gave him to us. 9 He made no distinction between them and us, for he cleansed their lives through faith, just as he did ours. 10 And now are you going to correct God by burdening the Gentiles with a yoke that neither we nor our fathers were able to bear? 11 Don’t you believe that all are saved the same way, by the free gift of the Lord Jesus? 12 There was no further discussion, and everyone now listened as Barnabas and Paul told about the miracles God has done through them among the Gentiles.”

ACTS 15:1-12 (TLB)

Now, verse 13, James. The half-brother of Jesus. Jesus is the older brother. James is the younger brother. Mary is his mother, and Joseph is his Father. James is like the lead pastor, the lead elder, and the president of the Church in Jerusalem. And he gets up, and he speaks, and he addresses. And notice when James took the floor. Notice what he says.

“When they had finished, James took the floor. “Brothers,” he said, “Listen to me. Therefore my judgment Is that we should not trouble Gentiles who turn to God, but should write to them to

ACTS 8:13, 18-20 (TLB)

In other words, for people who are finding their way back home to God, people are finding their way to God is that we should remove every single barrier that we can remove. We should not bottleneck it. We should not cause people to jump over and through hoops and, in other words, to become Christ’s followers. We were to remove every single thing. And if we go back to the person on the couch, that person, whether it’s a man, woman, youth, or single, it does not matter what we as a church have been called to do is to not make it difficult for this person on the couch to turn to God. This is our responsibility to pave the way because they don’t know the way so that they can find salvation in Jesus Christ. And to many churches, it has made it too difficult for the person on the couch to find their way to God. And we have to decide.

What we’ve been called to do is to NOT make it difficult for him to turn to God.

Folks hear me loud and clear. He said, How do we create a church that this guy, this gal, this student that is on the couch wants to attend her Church? How do we connect with the person on the couch who has said no to God, said no to religion, said no to God’s grace, said no to the Church? How do we do that? And we do that by clarifying our why. This is why. What do we want to be known for? Folks, do you know what we want to be known for? We want to be known for Madison County. We want to be known for our businesses. We want to be known for students and teachers and the E.M.S. and first responders. We want to be known for marriage as we want to be known for the people in this community. Do you know why we want to be known for people in this community? Because God is for those people. If God is for them, then we have to be for them. And folks, today we are starting a movement that we’re calling for Madison County. And in doing so, I need your help with three things. I don’t care if you write them down on your phone. I don’t care if you text them to yourself. I don’t care if you take notes on the sermon outline that we gave you. But I need your help in creating a movement now, Drew. This is important. You know this. You’ve been a part of different organizations. The publicity stunt starts big. And about a month later, what happens? It crashes its end. But a movement starts small, and it begins to just spread out over time. And a movement starts small, but it ends big. And folks, what we’re doing, we’re just taking what we’ve been doing as a church for the last six, seven years. And we’re just amping it up one more level by starting this movement for Madison County. Now I need your help on three things. The first thing I need your help in.

We want to…

Create COMMON GROUND.

Now, folks, here’s the belief. His lyrics point to what I’m talking about. The belief is that the people who are on the couch, the unchurched people, the people who said no to God, who said no to religion, who said no to God’s grace. Those people, they believe that they have nothing in common with the people who go to Church. They don’t think that we understand their lifestyle. They don’t think that we understand their dilemma. They don’t think we have anything in common. Can you say something to me? All of humanity has just come through a global pandemic together. I mean, what else do we need to have in common? Just think about this, folks. Is everything shut down? We experience that. We experience moving from work and or job sites or offices to working from home. Not only that, we saw our children go home, and all of a sudden, every parent became a teacher because we had to do schooling at home. And not only did all that take place, we were finding an unknown virus that we couldn’t see. Didn’t know how it came about. We don’t know that much still about it. All of that came together and created marital stress, relational stress, financial stress, and home life stress. You can just go on and on. And folks, we have all kinds of things in common with the unchurched, but the unchurched things that we don’t understand them. See folks, unchurch people would say, You know what? We want our schools to be great. Hallelujah. We want our schools to be great. They will go well. We want our community to be great. Hallelujah. We want our community to be great. We want awesome businesses. You know what? We want awesome businesses because most of the people in our Church own a business, whether it’s a business that has a storefront or it’s a home front. Folks, we are for Madison County, and we have way more in common than the unchurched would ever think that we would have in common. But we have to cultivate that. And you know why? The unchurched feel like they have nothing in common with the church people. Because of the church people, we take one of two approaches. When it comes to unchurched people, now, listen to me, Christians, for you that are here. You’re Christians, and when you think about unchurched people, you either take one of two approaches, and I’m not being judgmental. I’m just saying that we had to change. The first one is, is that we get defensive. John. We take an adversarial approach. We become their enemy. We become defensive. And, you know, we just kind of get standoffish. And what happens is that we try to somehow or another defend Christ, make them defensive, and they become our adversaries. Now the other one is, is that we don’t try to win them over. We just ignore them altogether. Folks, we cannot have those two approaches. We have to be for Madison County. And when we create common ground, look what we get to do.

Create CONVERSATIONS.

How do we get to create conversations? Now, there are multiple ways that we can create conversations. But I’m going to introduce to you an idea that I think might work. I don’t know. And for some of you, you’re going. I’m an introvert. How am I going to create conversations and create common ground? This is not going to work. What we’re going to introduce to you an ideal that we’re going to call pay it backward. That’s just what it’s called. Real fancy terminology. When you leave today, you’re going to receive one of these little windshield decals that you put on the back of your car. And when you go through a drive-through, and you go through your favorite coffee shop, you’re going to pay it backward by buying someone’s coffee. Who’s behind you? You can buy their Happy Meal or the Chick-Fil-A or whatever it is. And they’re going to see this sticker that says for Madison County. That’s going to be able to create some conversation, to create some buzz. Can you imagine 600 700 people that are here today? Whatever the number is that we would all have this on the back of our car, the back windshield and we will somehow or another begin to buy and pay for it backward. And people will go. There’s something about that for now, I don’t know what it is, but then it begins to create conversation. You don’t have to pay a lot for it, just a little bit. So then what happens is when you create common ground, and you create conversation, then what happens is that it creates connections that God can show up and show off in. Folks, what I’m asking you to do is help me to do these three things, and for far too long, the Church has been known for what it’s against rather than what it’s for. Now, let me see if I can help you to understand why I’m asking and talking about the why. Here’s the question. The question is this If Eastside Community Church went out of business, I don’t know how else to say it. If we close our doors, if we shut everything down and send everybody home, we say we’re closed. We’re never going to open again. Would the community even notice? Would the community even notice that we were gone? See, folks. It’s my prayer that the community would fight for us to stay in existence. Because we have fought for them for so many years. See, folks, when we’re for the community, the community is for us. And everything that we’re going to do, everything for Madison County, comes back to this principle from Acts chapter 15, verse 19, where James says.

“It Is my judgment, therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God.”

Acts 15:19 (NIV) 

You see, folks, this is the reason why Wednesday night. We did the community prayer service. Chris and Gracie used to attend Church. They were in my life group. I’ve been on multiple vacations with them. We’ve spent multiple months in Guatemala together. But if we’re for Madison County, we have to. Demonstrate it. This is the reason why in your seat, there are tracks for packs. We’re for the hungry in Madison County. We’re for God’s outreach food pantry. My goal personally as the leader of this Church is not for us to raise $30,000 for God’s outreach. My goal is that there be 300 of us that will register and show up, at least 300 of us that will register and show up. And walk and or run the five K. I know I’m going to be there, and I’m going to walk it. It may take me a couple of hours, but I’m going to walk it. Okay, but I’m going to be there, and I want you to be there. If you sign up by September first, I think you get a free t-shirt. The cost of your register basically pays for the t-shirt. But what I want the community to see is that we’re for them, and we can’t be for them if we’re not in the community. This is the reason why we did the backpacks for Daniel Boone. This past week, our team delivered all 450 backpacks to Daniel Boone. Every student at Daniel Boone got a backpack full of school supplies. Do you know why we did that? Because we’re for students. The life group that I’m in, that I’m leading next Monday, we were going do a lot of for stuff coming up. You know our left group is going to do our life group is paying and preparing and serving all the teachers at Madison Central lunch next Monday on the 16th. Because why we’re for teachers for educators. Last Wednesday, we had already bought the food for Inspire so we could serve food and the community would show up. Do you know what we did with the food? It was sandwiches and salad. And we just had a bunch of volunteers come in, and we said, We’re not going to waste the food. Do you know what we did with it? We served it to all the first responders as a thank you for all the stuff that they did the day before with the Hagers in the standoff and just saying we appreciate you. We’re for you. And we are for. Madison County, because Jesus is for us, and we are going to sing this next song, I want to ask you to stand. There’s another in the fire. When you’re going through trials, when you’re going through tribulations, when you’re going through the deep sea, when you’re going through troubles, guess what? Jesus is for you. Jesus is with you. He does not neglect you. He does not walk away. He is there ever present with you. So let’s sing this song because there’s another In the fire.