It's in your actions and the things that you're doing, right? She says, I think we could all find ourselves in one of these guilty discharge.
Next thing is this. You were far before you were found. I think it's very important because Paul basically... He's reminding me. Remember the last time I preached, he said, you were dead. You're dead in your sins. This is like the same thing again. Just a little nicer way to say before, hey, you were dead, but now you've been made alive. Another way to say this is, you were far away and I have brought you near. But I think it's very important. It's very important to constantly remember how far away we truly were. And this is across all historical Christian thinkers, Christian followers. Like fathers of the church, they all really did believe the same thing, that we were far, far, far away. That we were dead. In our sins. And that God could only move towards us. You would not find a Christian thinker. Who would say otherwise. That we were good before. That we were dead in our sins. And there's nothing we, it's important to know that because once you, we can fully accept that, then we know that there is nothing we could do to move toward God.
And I love the scripture in Ezekiel. And I'm just going to make mention to it. I'm not going to read all of it. But
Ezekiel 37, the Valley of Dry Bones... Any Pentecostals in the room, you're like, yes, let's preach on this, brother. Some of you are like, I don't know what you're talking about. But
Ezekiel 37 is great. Because it's a valley of dry bones. And I think it's important to like get that visual image. Or a DQ for a second. And you're standing looking over a valley. I think of like a... You know when like Simba and Mufasa are looking over everything and he's like... The elephant girl... Elephant graveyard, right? Get the elephant graveyard in your brain for a second, right? And that's what Indicu was looking at. There's nothing there but just... Have you ever seen, like, real bones? a skeleton of a dead animal? It's just, like, weird. You know it's lifeless. So imagine looking at something like... And nothing happened in there. This is what God says. To Ezekiel, I love like, the hand of the Lord was upon me and He brought me out of the spirit of the Lord. And set me down in the middle of the valley. It was full of bones. The elephant graveyard. And he led me around. Among them, and behold, they were very many on the surface of the valley. And behold, they were very dry. And he said to me, son of man, can these bones live? So what if I was standing beside you? What if God was standing there with you and says, hey, look at these bones, can they live? What would we say? No, they can't live. There's no way. In our brain, it would be even hard for us to imagine something like that because our experience with bones or they're just bones or bones. There's nothing going to happen. Then he said to me, prophesy over these bones and say to them, oh dry bones, hear the word of the Lord.
And thus he says, and look, turn with your Bibles to
Ezekiel 37. We're going to just read. And if you're just listening to my voice. You're gonna space out, I promise you.
Ezekiel 37, I'm on
verse five. Thus says the Lord God to these boldnesses, Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live. And I will lay sin. I don't even know what that is. Upon you and will cause flesh to come upon you and cover you with skin and put blood in you and you shall live and you shall know that I am the Lord. And so I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I prophesied, there was a sound and behold, a rattling. And the bones came together. Bone to its bone. So not just like bones, just like they're starting to come together and they're raffling. You're like, whoa, this is insane. I've never seen anything like this before.
Verse eight, and I looked and behold, there was that word again, and a flash had come upon them and flesh had come upon them and skin had covered them, but there was no breath in them. Imagine that, imagine bondage. Now skin and muscles and tendons are forming. On these bones that were dead. I think your faith would begin to stir. You're like, wait a second. But you know that you, because here's the thing, Ezekiel was just a man, right? He was just. He was just a man and he was obeying the Lord. He was speaking words. But what was, what was putting Vlad? Flash on these bones. God was putting flesh on these bones.
Verse 9, then he said, prophesy to breathe. Propesy, son of man. And say to the breath, thus says the Lord of God, come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe on these slain. That they may live forever. And so I prophesied and as he commanded me. And the breath came into them and they lived and stood on their feet and exceedingly Then he said to me, son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say our bones are the whole house of Israel. They say our bones are dried up and our hope is lost. We are indeed cut off. Those are all things that we just read. We just read in
Ephesians 2. Therefore prophesy and say to them, Thus says the Lord God, Behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves. Oh, my people, and I will bring you into the land of Israel. And you shall know that I am the Lord when I open your grave and raise you from... your grave, O my people. And I will put my spirit within you. And you shall live. And I will place you in your own life. And you shall know that I am the Lord. I have spoken. I will do it, declares the Lord.
I need you to see how far away you really were You were born. In a valley. Those bones didn't do anything to put flesh on. They didn't do anything to get breath in their lungs to become a God's army. Become God's chosen people to become the nation of Israel. They didn't do anything they were just laying there, right? They weren't trying hard. They weren't bold saying, here I am, Lord, use me. I'll be the best bones, right? They were doing nothing. Come on guys, like for real, like how, like, how often do we feel like, yeah, I, I deserve to have the breath of God in me because of what I've done. Do you think those bones ever thought that? If you were to really go back, they would probably remember, like, no, like, bro, bro, I was just bones hanging out in the elephant graveyard. And then I started rattling. And then I just thought like, that's insane. But that's how far away. How far away you were from God. All of us spiritually. All of us. She pilgrim dresses and you... And your parents dedicated you when you were three weeks old. And you've been in the church your whole life. And you were bones too. I can say that because I was one of those little goofy kids in one of those goofy outfits. I've got Hillstone United lyrics on my arm because that's what I grew up in. That's not even tough. My tattoo isn't even tough. That's how churchy and Christian I am. And that's why my heart goes out to those of you who've been raised in the church. You are far off dead bones. Don't hide and think that you're not. You need the breath of God as much as the drug addict who's walking down this street at the same time you're hanging out in this church. That's how much you need. to rely on God. I'm so thankful that you got parents. I don't know why I'm talking. I don't know. You got parents. Thank God this group. Listen to me. William's asleep right now. William, wake up. Look right here. You have parents. I'm looking at all of you. I know you. Your parents raised you in the house of the Lord. I'm so thankful. But your parents. Did not breathe. Into your dry bones. And they never will. They never will. Only God can do those things. They're like, please, God, stop talking to me. I'm going to melt into a puddle. William, go back to sleep. It's all good. This man won a championship last night. He deserves it, right? But I hope you hear me. And it's not just for kids. If you've been in the church for any longer than like 15 years, somewhere along the way we feel, and if you're not, maybe you're a first generation believer and you're raising up kids in the house of the Lord. You know, this is a real temptation that they'll face. That they don't ever realize that they were... That they're born. So it's important for you to remember these things so that you can declare these things to them. Because if not, they will form something in their heart that is so anti-God, but they will never even know that it's anti-God. They are driving. They are dry bones. And the Spirit of God needs to be breathed into them.
So, here's like the promise. The promises of the covenant of Israel. They'd have a covenant relationship with God, right? He would move towards them and He would bind Himself with an oath. But these Gentiles, without the cross, no covenant relationship with God. There was no way to approach God. He had no way. They had no moral law or compass. They had no word of God. They had no ultimate authority in their life. The Jews at that point in time with the Torah, they had a moral compass. They had an authority. They had, at the end of the day, hey, look, this is what the Word of God said, and we've got to hold to these things. They had a tradition that was passed down. They had a way, a standard, somewhere a start point.
In the beginning was God and created the heavens and the earth Possibly quoting Genesis 1:1. And the Spirit was hovering, right? And God was working this thing out in their life. They had a direction they were going that went. That God said through them the nations would be blessed. I think we have that later on. Like there's all these things. Like, hey, we're pulling you down into this story, right? Through David, through his lineage, there will be a king, there will be a dynasty forever. And the Jews are like, yes, we want a dynasty that's forever. But those who are outside of the covenant, if it wasn't for the blood of Jesus, we wouldn't have those things. So no permanent dynasty. Beyond that, no forgiveness of sin. There was no way. that your sin could be forgiven. There's no way. And then there was no resurrection hope. There was no point. in living to any degree because there was no hope beyond life here. And that was the popular belief for Gentiles, that it was a nihilistic view, we lived here, and we died, and we just turned back into just particles, and we just go back into the, back into the universe. There's no hope for a kingdom that is eternal, a life where every tear is, every tear is wiped from their eyes, a life where there's no more sickness and no more pain, Where there's no hope for those things. Why would there be? That's how far away you were from God. It's important to know that.
So what has God done? To the far away, he has brought us near to him.
Romans 11, 17.
Romans 11, 17 and 18 says this. If some of the branches have been broken off cam, you can come up. If some of the broach... The branches have been broken off. And you, though a wild olive tute, have been grafted in among the others... But this is Paul writing to the Romans, writing to more Gentiles. But this is who's reading this, us. We're reading this. If some of the branches have been broken off and you, though a wild olive shoot, have been grafted in among the others and now share in the nourishing sap from the olive root, do not consider yourself to be superior to those other branches. If you do, consider this. You do not support the root. But the root supports you. Now, this is what's important about this. This is us being brought near, okay? This is very common practice. For farmers during this time. I know I'm wearing a camouflage shirt today. But that's as far as any good old boy is in me. If you needed me to, I could probably crank a Weedie. You would not want me to cut your cr- But I understand what Paul is saying here. And I think it's very powerful. And I hope you understand it too. This was a very common practice for farmers. They have trees. They have really strong root systems. But those root systems. Those root systems. Regardless to how strong they are. They still had some branches that were not good branches. There's a message. In and of itself in there. Maybe another time. And they would cut those branches off. There's definitely a message in there. But what they would do is they would go to trees that were producing really good fruit. Other trees that were just like these, they were taken care of. They were strengthened. They had good root systems. They had consistent. Consistently produced fruit. Season after season after season. And they would take a branch, a healthy branch from another tree, and they would cut it off, and they would graft it in to the tree, to the spot where the bad branch was. They would graft it in, and if the tree took to that, then they replaced the base, the bad branch with another healthy branch. And what Paul is saying here is, hey look, the tree my chosen people, This is who I chose from the beginning to be my people. He was telling the Gentiles this. Those who are far away. You know, I chose them to be my people. But they've continually fallen short over and over and over and over again. There's some good that's come here, but there's also some bad. And I've cut off. I've cut off some of the bad. And I'm replacing it. With something else. But here's the thing. Remember what I said? They would replace... Bad branches with good branches from other trees. That's how it works. But what does Paul say?
If some of the branches have been broken off and you, what does he say here? Though a wild olive Possibly quoting Romans 11:17 juice. Not a good branch. A wild branch. So they're hearing this story and they understand how the farming system works. They're thinking, that's crazy. Not a wise thing to do, to take a wild branch and put it on a healthy tree. If you do that, you run the risk of ruining the whole tree. And Paul's saying, yeah. Yeah, in your brain, that's what you think. Because you're trusting in human systems. But God is so much greater than those things. God has taken you, who are far away from him, and he's grafted you in and called you his kid. He's put you in, like hear me now because I know TikTok runs crazy and we're all obsessed with who's God's chosen people and all these other things. Look, God has brought you in. I'm not talking about the nation state of Israel. I'm talking about God's chosen people We are Israel. Those who are believers, we are the church. God has grafted us in. You were far off. But He brought you in. And now you're being strengthened by a healthy, good root system. What is that good root system? If you read the Old Testament, everything you learn about God in the Old Testament, the Testament, the power of God, that there's a God who would fight for you. There's a God who would move towards you. who would bind himself through an oath. For you to be your God so he could call you his. That's what he's grafted. He's grafted you into. We get a new God in the New Testament. It's the same God. We get connected to the story of who God is. We're not looking for little g gods. We get connected. What do we find in this God? We find our purpose. We find our security. We find our hope. We find out everything we need. You don't have to look anywhere else. That's what God has grafted you into. It's not something new. It's the story he's been telling since the very beginning. It brings order into chaos. Yeah, chaos brought into order. If your life feels chaotic, remember, recall, come back to. You were far off. and God brought you in. You were just a wild branch. And God locked you all. And He didn't throw. He didn't throw you in a box. bundle and burn you up. He connected you to a true healthy root system. He changed your life. Get that visual image of you being dead bones. And God breathing life into you. It shows a dependency of how much we really do need God. On a daily basis. We need him. We absolutely need him. Because the reality is we can leave some of these places and we can go into our Monday or our Tuesday and the last thing we're thinking about is how God has grafted us in and breathed life into our bones. If I was bones just hanging out dead and I've been given a new opportunity to be the army of God, do you think I'm going to worry about what was before? my strength and my abilities when I'm literally a living testimony of a miracle of God, of bringing something that was dead, alive, but we'll do it for the smallest of things, guys, the smallest of things. And I hope that we can just shrink the gap a little bit from... from what we think our reality is to the truth. The truth of what God is saying. Look, I know your life can be hard, but you've got to remember how far away you were and how close God has brought you. Because that's going to give you all the strength you need to keep going, to keep fighting, to keep believing. And I'll close it here.
Revelation, because there's an end point. Till now, before we had no start point, no true meaning for example. We didn't have it. But now we do. And like I said, we get connected. We get grafted into this story that God's been telling. Since the beginning. And now we have a clear destination of where we're going. And we just sang about it earlier.
Revelation 7, 9 through 10. If you've got your Bibles, it's a few. It's the very last book of the Bible. We're not reading about dragons today.
Revelation 7, 9 through 10. This is what it says. This is the destination. This is where we are headed. You're gonna hear nothing about passive income. having a house. You're kicking your feet up, all your kids doing all these, you're not gonna hear any of that stuff. At your final destination, your final destination is not Los Ninks. I need you to hear me say that though. Because we are so easily entangled in those little G gods today that we think, that if we're following those little G gods, that is what our destination is. This is our true destination. Every single one of you in the room. Your true destination.
Verse 9, after this I looked. And there before me was a great multitude that no one could count. Imagine the biggest room you've ever been in. A multitude that no one can count. From every nation. Tribe, people, and language. They were standing before the throne and before the Lamb. They were wearing white robes. And were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice, salvation. Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne and to the Lamb. And I'm not emotional. I'm more in a good way reading this right now. I'm more like thoroughful. Because my fear is that that doesn't sound that great to some of us in the room. That if I were to tell you that is the final destination of your life, that you would be let down. And if that is the case, okay, I don't say that with condemnation. I really do hope you are convicted because I'm convicted because there are some days where I'm like, man, that might not be the best. It might not be the best destination. For me, I would rather so much other stuff happen. And if that's you, you really do have to run back what you were before God. Cause you may have thought you had something, but you in reality, you have nothing. We have nothing. But what's so important about this, is it what we read in the Old Testament? We read in Isaiah that it was prophesied that the foreigner would be brought in talking to the Gentiles hey you have now been brought in but we see at the end what did we see? every nation, every tribe, So not just one ethnicity, not just one group, but all groups. This has always been the plan. God had to deal with Israel first. So a Jew at that point in time would see this Jesus come and die on the cross and like, oh my gosh, now we've been made right with God. And that's definitely a vertical thing that happens right there. And the cross vertically does something to your life. God breathes life into you and you now have right standing with God. If you are a believer, if you believe that Jesus was the, was the Son of God, that He lived and died and rose again and paid a price that you could not pay. You have a right standing with God and you have a vertical rotation vertical relationship with him. But what is so awesome about this is while that was happening vertically, there was something happening horizontal. God was including every nation, He was faithful. He was fixing something with one group of people while also solving all of humanity's problem Bringing everyone in.
So what does that mean as I close? That means that... Your vertical relationship with God, it can't just be a vertical relationship with God. The fruit of it is portability. God is calling us. To share the gospel with more people. Not to have cool amounts of people in here. And have multiple services and all this. That is not it. But for people to realize they were far off. But they've been brought in. And God's placed specific people in your life. In your path. For that specific reason. It can't just be vertical. If you live your whole life and you ever lead someone to Christ, you probably missed part of it. That doesn't put pressure on you. I just need to hear you say that. I know I've heard things like that in the past and think, oh my gosh, now it's a pastor fail test on me. No, there's no pressure. But to share the gospel. That is part of it. But if we do not remember who we were before, we were really not inclined to share the gospel. It lacks power if we don't recognize the true power that comes from God. It's not that true power that comes from God. So I want us to remember how far off we were. I think it's important, parent. I want us to remember how important parents you let your kid then on how far away you are from God. I don't mean you start and you expose everything when they're like six years old. Let them know. I got a jacked up path. But right now, my seven-year-old mind, all she can know is, hey, daddy didn't treat certain people right. That he was selfish. Now come back to her as she gets older. Don't let her know how far off Dad was. And how close. God brought me. Parents, this is a great practice for your kids. And mom would just... Bones in a valley. And God, breathe life. So it's important, remember. Remember how far off you were. And how close God brought you. But what has God brought you close to? We've got to remember, what has God brought you into? He has grafted us in to an incredible story. This started way before we were here, and we'll go way beyond our time here, but we have hope that we get to be a part of it forever. Every nation, every tribe, every tongue, confessing Jesus as Lord, declaring you are holy forever. That's what we're brought into.
Count Bray over us. Father, thank you that you have brought us near. God, we recognize there's nothing we could do to breathe life into ourselves. There's nothing, there's no... There's no distance that we could travel in our own strength to get closer to you. But you have brought us so close. Because we know those who are believers, Lord, that your spirit is now in us. That's how close you are. God, I do. I pray for anyone in the room who might feel far away from you. Or even today have realized they are far away from you. But Lord, you have moved. You have moved. And we need you, God. We're nothing without you. We need you. God, for anyone who feels far away, I pray right now they feel the closeness of who you are. Scripture says that we confess with our mouth, believe in our heart that you are the Lord. If you believe that, if you believe, wow, there's a God who's close to me, who wants me, who wants to bring me in. It's just faith and confession right here, right now, in your own way. And Lord, for everyone else in the room, God, I pray that we remember how far we truly were. And we thank you. Thank you for how close you've brought us. Lord, what you have brought us into. God, I pray. That we do not fall back into our old ways, Lord. That we don't worship small Jesus. God, would you remove any idol from our hearts? God, we look to you for security. For comfort, for identity, for worth, for meaning. God, I pray that you would... bring anew to us daily... the power of the gospel in our lives. And God, we pray from that, that we would see the people who are right in front of us who you are longing to bring near to you also. God, I pray against fear of performance. I pray against any fear that we have to do any of this on our own. I pray in those moments, God, that we would remember that we were... we were bones in a valley and you breathe life into us. And it would stir faith in us that you would do it again in someone else's life. God, we ask all of these things in your name.
I have a few announcements for us before. Before we say our sending liturgy. Hopefully we can Have those are cool. First and foremost is the next move card. We have them in the back if you need if you feel like hey God speaking something specific in my heart and there is a move I need to make whether it be hey I want to I want to learn more about this place I mean I'm trying to find a place to to connect and grow in and it would be a great opportunity maybe it's just like hey I just need prayer because I'm realizing that I've got little g gods I'm serving all the time I would love for you to put those things on that card and we would love to just help you make whatever your next move is this week. We also, beyond the physical cards, we have tap back disc on the, on the chairs in front of you. Please use those, right? Next would be Hey, if you didn't know but every one of you probably do know we're having a yard sale today. Because you definitely saw the cars pull up over here earlier. No Zebcos, but it's okay. We might have a few Pokemon cards because we got some of those folks in the room. You can't take them off the screen, bro. I need that. Yard sale, 2 p.m. 2 p.m. today. Come back up here. All of the money from the yard sale is going to our Panama missions trip. Please share it. Tell some people about it at lunch today. Come buy something if you want something else. Replace your junk with other people's junk. Next would be this. Move Kids family event is this Saturday. Hopefully you've registered online for the Move Kids event. We want to hang out with the kids. This is coming up Saturday. It is here. It does not drop your kid off and leave. Crystal wanted me to tell you that. You bring your kids and you stay with your kids at the event. And then finally, know. No Sunday service on June the 7th, okay? That is a week we're just taking off. A lot of our leaders will be. Leaders will be in Oklahoma at the ATI conference. And so we're just taking off that week, all right? So enjoy the day, all right? November, or not November. November, Sunday, June the 7th. Alright? That is all of the announcements for today. Let's say our sending liturgy together. It would be a It would be a travesty to experience God to pray to be encouraged by what God's done in the room today, it would be a travesty. And I use that word seriously. For that to end right here in this room. We should be sent to wherever you're going this week. With the power of God in your life. So let's declare these things and let's mean these things. Say it with me. We are not leaving this place. We are being sent. We are obeying the command of our Lord to go. So send us, Lord, to find you in secret in prayer and devotion to love and care. To love and care for our families. To strengthen and encourage our brothers and sisters in Christ. To faithfully work as unto the Lord in the martyrs. Lord in the marketplace and home. To wisely steward all you have given us. To recognize our place and ability in our community. To witness of your goodness and grace to the neighbors and nations. Send us now in your name. Now in your presence and power. Well, I mean, not in case of mine, but no, that was two sets of circumstances. Oh, oh, oh, oh. It's like 20,000, but I'm a little saving money for that position. So, that would be a new new new So, that's a new new new It's down the line. I wasn't even, I mean, I'll bleed more, but like, I wasn't involved. And I asked them, ah, what is that? I'm a star class, whatever. It's fine with the the rain will burn I think a lot of it is to do with like, but you get a decent, keep good heads on, keep good heads on, keep it. I think after that, like I think one of the biggest issues with this is I think the biggest issues with this is I think it's got to be so I can't keep it even better than black beauty and snow. There's a pork paw makes one that's a little less expensive than that. It's pretty much the same thing. So, I mean, there's companies that have like that snow that you can get by me. That's all in my mind. In my opinion, that's like a bow, once crowd, once a new bar going. I just wanted to say, my smile looks like. I was like, and I think it's been less on the front of the page. But this is... It's been a long time. It's still good. You might have to replace a lug on it if somebody throws it across the room. But it's not like a mic can go. Mic can go. That's a simple thing. What I can do. is I can do it. I look bad. Send me your rights. And there's a company called Seed Seed. I've seen it, but they have really good stuff. I've thought about them. That would be when we just might stay Like that, that's a good deal. Like there was a D.W. That's when I think they have a different scene. I don't know that. VW would match our sound like if you're being super, right? So, the state's bigger than that strange. Like, I don't have a PW match to say I'm not going to have as much, and therefore, I can CC school, but I can't. I like the one with French with their C&C, I think, would be good. Like any of those. We need decent cases. You know, that's brand. But if you just said that, I put that in there like, hey, if you had to buy one from Sweetwater today, they're good. That's a good, you know. That's what DC has on the show, at least I'm saying. I think they had it. I don't know if that was nice to know that more time. I'm also going to reach out to Chris Barr and see if he has, you know, because he's got like bloody heels. See if he has one. He can cut those. Master would be broadcasters, you know, like that was one of my last three, I think. If I could find one of these, I would buy it. They sound a little better. It's kind of like that big band. Yeah, drunk is really what you're, what I think would fit our town. Your pits are 24. Your personal pits. Also, we do... I'll start changing. All right, well let's, is there a box back in and you can put box here. Oh, I have a feeling with the I have a feeling with the
