[00:00:01] Speaker A: Thanks for tuning in to the Met Church podcast. Here at the Met, we are all about connecting people to God and one another. If you have any questions or want more information about what's happening here at the church, then head to our
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[00:00:25] Speaker B: Well, good morning church family. So good to see you. So good to be here. And thank you so much for joining us here at Met Church. We truly hope that everyone had a merry Christmas with family and friends. And this morning as we close out the last Sunday of 2024, that's kind of weird of saying as we're saying goodbye to 2024, I want to make much of our time this morning. So go ahead and grab your Bible or smart device. Follow me to Acts, chapter two. Acts, chapter two. Scroll down or jump all the way down to verse 37. Gonna be reading 37 through 47. After that. I'm gonna pray right after that. I'm gonna give you just some key points about the book of Acts. I'm gonna go ahead and give you some context from chapter one to chapter two. And then I'm gonna give you three targets to aim for for this new coming year. Okay, so That's Acts, chapter two, starting verse 37. And if you're ready this morning, you guys look ready. Let's jump into the text. And this is the Word of God, verse 37. When they heard this, they were pierced to the heart and said to Peter and to the rest of the apostles, brothers, what should we do? Peter replied, repent and be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promises for you and for your children and for all who are far off, as many as the Lord our God will call. With many other words he testified and strongly urged them, saying, be saved from this corrupt generation. So those who accepted his message were baptized. And that day about 3,000 people were added to them. Verse 42. They devoted themselves to the apostles teaching, to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread, and to prayer. Everyone was filled with awe and many words and signs were being performed through the apostles. Now all the believers were together and held all things in common. They sold their possessions, property, and distributed the proceeds to all as any had need. Every day they devoted themselves to the meeting together in the temple and broke bread from the house to house. They ate their food with joyful and sincere hearts. Last verse. Praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. Every day the Lord added to their number those who were being saved. Let's pray.
Lord our Lord, how magnificent is your name throughout the earth. You have filled the heavens with your majesty. Today I'll speak of your splendor, your glorious majesty, and of your wondrous works. I pray all that we say and do this morning that we can make much of who Jesus is, that this morning we can make a big deal about who Jesus is. So I pray that the eyes of our heart may be enlightened so that we may know the hope of his calling. What is the glorious inheritance of the saints? What is the immeasurable greatness of your power towards us who believe all according to the mighty working of your strength? For there is no other name, no name above all names. For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. We ask all these things in the mighty name of Jesus. We pray. Amen. Now, the book of Acts, also known as the Acts of the Apostles, records the birth of the early church and its exponential growth. Now the book begins, and what a way to begin any kind of book. But this book begins with the resurrection of Jesus and ends with Paul in Rome. Now, the title of the book comes from a Greek word, praxis, praxis, signifying action.
And this is important because for this coming year, I want to implore you, I want to encourage you, I want to really point you to this essence of putting some action into your spiritual growth and development. Now, coincidentally, my title here at the MET is Spiritual growth and Development Pasture. So rest assured that I am invested for. For you to, number one, to come to the saving knowledge of Christ, and number two, for your spiritual growth and development. Now, this year, we want you to aim high, not aim low, but we want you to aim high in your spiritual growth and development. So when we say aim high, we're talking about having the ability to set clear, tangible goals and devise a robust route to achieve them. That's just a fancy way of saying that we want you to set some spiritual goals, and we, the Church, we want to help you. We want to support you in bringing those goals to fruition. We want you to complete those goals this coming year. So with that said, let's talk about some context. How do we get to verses 37 and 47 in Acts chapter two? Well, Acts, chapter one, we see the author of Luke, we see the author of Acts, which is Luke Right. He starts off with a recap of the resurrection of Jesus. And he testifies and he says this. Jesus presents himself alive for 40 days with many convincing proofs. And Jesus is talking about the kingdom of God. Let me encourage you this week. Take some time, take to read through. We're not going to read through the whole chapter of Acts, chapter one, but read through that book. At the tail end of this chapter, we see Matthias. Matthias is added now to the new 12. He takes over the vacancy left behind by Judas. Now enter chapter two, the promise of the Holy Spirit. The promise of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. And God decides, he so chooses to represent and to present the Holy Spirit by entering the early church. He fills the early church with power, love and a sound mind. And the church is moving exponentially. The church is growing exponentially. You see the spiritual growth and development because of the third person that we call the Holy Spirit in the triune God. The Holy Spirit starts to move with power and love and a sound mind. And then mid chapter we see Peter, a call to repentance. Now let me just say this. This is not the same Peter we see back in the gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. This is not the same Peter who lived in close proximity to Jesus for three years. And this is certainly not the same Jesus that we see. The same Peter that we see deny Jesus not once, not twice, but thrice. This is 2.0 Peter. This is Peter filled with the Holy Spirit. This is now Peter speaking with such confidence, not confidence that comes from himself, but confidence in this is what God is calling me to fulfill. And he speaks with power, love and a sound mind. And in this chapter I want to highlight two important facets that I believe Peter says. In verse 21, he says, then everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. That word everyone really means in the Greek.
Everyone, right? We can think of it like this. From every race, from every place and space, everyone, no matter high, no matter how low, and in between, no matter who you are and what you've done, everyone who calls on his name will be saved. And then verse 38, Peter says, repent and be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus. That name is very specific. Later on in Acts 4:12, one of my favorite verses that I always use as I pray right, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. And that name is Jesus. Be baptized, each of you, in the name of Jesus, for the forgiveness of your sins. You receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. And we'll talk about the Holy Spirit in just a bit. This Peter is pleading with everyone to come to the saving knowledge of Christ. And so this morning, if you're taking notes this morning, we want you to aim high in your spiritual growth and development. Point number one, or target number one, is aim high for repentance. Aim high for repentance. In 2025, let's look at this aim in two respects. Let's look at repentance in the first aspect. The first aspect of this, when we think of repentance. And listen, I've sat here many of Sunday mornings listening to Pastor Bill explain, right? He's so on point, right? When we talk about repentance, it's having this change of mind.
And this change of mind also causes us to have a change in direction. We would say that we turn from our sin to turn to God. This is where the Holy Spirit, his work, he's not a thing. He is a person. He's the third person in the Godhead. Got the Father, got the Son, got the Holy Spirit. It is by the work of the Holy Spirit that the Holy Spirit convicts us of this change of mind. We understand that the direction that we're heading in isn't. We're far off from God. So the Holy Spirit's job is to convict us.
Deep sorrow inside that my life is headed in the opposite direction of who Jesus is.
This conviction allows me to understand that my thoughts, my words and my actions are contrary to God. So the Holy Spirit convicts me, then the Holy Spirit draws me. Now listen. We couldn't draw ourselves to salvation. It is by the work of the Holy Spirit that we're drawn onto salvation. So now the Holy Spirit convicts me that I am in dire need. My sin, my actions, my thoughts have separated me. I'm far off from God. And the only person who can reconcile or fix my relationship is Jesus, no more, no less. And so he draws me onto salvation.
And then once I make a profession of faith, right? Because Peter says, all who call on the name of the Lord, the name of Jesus Christ will be saved. Romans 10:9 says that if you confess with your mouth, believe in your heart the Lord Jesus, that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. So this understanding of repentance and repentance, that's the first step of, is acknowledging and owning that we are sinners. And aside from that, that we are in dire need of a Savior. The only person that can make us right or fix our relationship with God is Jesus. So when we make that profession of faith, we see the Holy Spirit. Now seal us. The Holy Spirit seals us.
He takes residency in us. He lives inside of us. And now the Holy Spirit guides us. He doesn't control us. He guides us. Juan, stay in this line. Don't turn left. Just stay straight. Keep your eyes on Jesus. Then I have to decide to listen to the whisper of the Holy Spirit, to be obedient, right? So once we come to the saving knowledge of Christ, we confess. Now listen where you're sitting at right now. Maybe some of you have never made this profession of faith, or maybe you need to tell somebody about this profession. And all it is, is where you're at. Sitting there right now is understanding that your sin has separated you. If you've never made this decision, this is the first time I implore you, cry out to Jesus, call out his name. And it's simply just understanding that our sin separates us. That were dire need and that Jesus died on the cross. He took that place on that cross and paid the penalty. And it's all by saying, jesus, come into my life and save me. If you made that decision today, if you're willing to make that decision today, let us know. We would love to catch up with you and tell you what your next step is. Because Peter says, repent and be baptized. Listen Here at the Met for 2024, we baptized 74 four individuals this year. And that's something. Exactly. That's something to praise God about. We had individuals who stepped up who said, hey, I've already made a profession of faith. I want to make a public profession of faith. I want to tell the church that today I've decided to follow Jesus. And if that's you this year, we want to make that happen. You can stop by the info center. You can stop by the. Have we met? And just let us know. If you fill out the card and let us know that I want to take that next step. Now that's the first aspect. The second aspect of repentance is this. Those of us who've already come to the saving knowledge of Christ, like myself, made a profession back in 1993, 31 years ago. Repentance in my life will continually and always be part of God's plan. That's God's plan. The first part of God's plan is justification receiving Christ. We are made just or righteous in God's eyes. The second step is sanctification. This is a process that when we make a profession that we become more and more like Jesus. We want it in our thoughts, in our words, in our actions. So this is where I, in my personal walk, where I ask God, God, help me to be a better husband, help me to be a better father, help me to be a better Christ follower. Help me to be a better spiritual growth and development pastor. This facet never ends.
It never ends until we take our last breath here on earth or until Jesus comes for his church.
And so this year, we have to aim high for repentance. Let's talk about aim number two.
Aim high for. For community. Aim high for community. And in the text from verses 42 to 45, we see a community of teaching, we see a community of fellowship, we see a community of prayer, the community of support. Now, I can. I can say this with much confidence this morning that the Met is a community of teaching. We want you to come to the saving knowledge of Christ, and then we want you to grow in your faith, in your own personal relationship. We also are a community of fellowship. We have different small groups, from Bible studies to small groups to even groups that we call life groups. We have a phenomenal group of life group leaders and life groups that happen on any given day throughout the week. Let me share this with you. Being a spiritual growth and development pastor, part of my job is to recruit individuals to be life group leaders. So my wife, who I think from the get go, is an excellent life group leader, I didn't want her to feel obligated, right? But there was this group of females that needed a life group leader. And so I prayed about it and I spoke to my wife and she's amazing. She's all about community, right? She's all about relationships. And so I prayed, present it to her. She said, absolutely. I trained her. And we launched her life group off with, I think, two or three other life groups. And from the get go, she's already gone through the book of Esther, Right? She's gone through the book of Esther. Not only that, with her group, they planned a weekend with the ladies, right? They went out and had some fun. They had their friends giving, and they had a Christmas party, right? They've already scheduled to go to a conference this coming year. And so when we talk about a community of fellowship, you can experience that here. Community of prayer. Absolutely. A community of prayer. You know, actually we have a 21 days of prayer that you can sign up for. We're all about prayer. Listen, anytime I talk to anybody over the phone or in person, I don't leave without saying, hey, what's one thing that I can pray for you. Because before you leave and you can experience that community, a community of prayer here at the Met and then a community of support. We see that in the text, right? We see others thinking about others and supporting others. And we see that in our Bible studies. We see that in our life groups. But I think the ultimate example is the crc.
We see the support of the community. This is a community where we can support one another. You've heard Pastor Bill up here say, hey, we might not be able to pay for your light bill, for your car, payment for your insurance, but we can certainly help you with your groceries. We can put food on the table for you, the money that you would have spent on groceries. Now you can. Now you can pay your car, your insurance. It's the ultimate example of community.
Now all these points truly sound like the Met Church and it should sound like every gospel centered church.
Community.
Now, when we think about community, community involves the engagement of relationships. No more, no less. Now for some of you, that might be a little bit scary, right? What? Engage in relationships. That's what community is all about. And we wanna encourage you in that. So with that, we wanna give you some steps that you can take in order to experience community. For instance, we're kicking off a brand new churchwide Bible study, Essentials of Faith. Right? I'll be teaching two classes. I'm excited about this Bible study, right? Essentials of Faith. We'll be teaching one class Wednesday morning from 9:30 to 11:30. The second class will be in the evening, Wednesday evening from 6 to 8. We also have financial peace that kicks off January 15th. Grief share kicks off March Courageous Motherhood kicks off in January. I just mentioned 21 days of prayer that you can also sign up. You be reminded to be constantly in prayer January 13th. And then we're also trying to launch some men's group for you guys. We're trying to do that pretty soon and we're working on that. But this year we want you to aim high for community. Let me end with this target. Aim high for worship. And we see this in verses 46 through 47. Now think about this. When you read your Bible, that's worship.
When you pray before your meals, that's worship. When you pray without ceasing, you pray throughout the day, that is worship. When you serve. When we serve on Saturdays at the crc, guess what? That is worship. When you give your tithings and your offerings. In other words, when you give with a cheerful heart, that is worship. When we have those gospel conversations with our coworkers friends and family. That is worship. Worship goes far beyond attending a church service, singing, playing an instrument, lifting hands in praise, and bowing down. These are elements of worship.
What we do from Monday to Saturday is a reflection of how we respond on Sunday.
That's worship. Let me read a quick quote. Worship can be stated as a continual hard attitude. Worship is the heartbeat of the believer's existence, a lifelong celebration of the worthiness of God. To worship is to respond with one's whole being in adoration, exaltation, humble submission, and obedience to God.
Let me share this with you. This summer, I had an opportunity to meet up with one of my old high school buddies. If you remember me speaking last time I mentioned to you a good friend of mine from high school who I told him, you need Jesus. Here's a picture of him. And we got together this past summer. His name is Joey. Class of 93 956. What's up, Joey? Love you, bro. We got together this past summer and we ate breakfast and we were just encouraging and catching up with one another. And then we started reminiscing about who we were before Christ. And some of the things that both. Some of the crew that I hung out with, we did some pretty crazy things.
And we started reminiscing about this one particular aspect that involved our group. And I never really remembered the whole story. I just had bits and pieces, right? Bits and pieces. And so he goes through the progression of that story, of that memory. And I'm sitting literally across from him, and he tells me in detail what happened that night. And I look at him and I literally tell him. I said, bro, I said, joey, man, I shouldn't be alive, man. Like, if you're telling me and what you're telling me is true right now, I should not be here alive right now. My heart should not be beating right now. You should not be having this conversation with me right now. He looks. He looks at me dead straight in the eye, and he says, bro, we both shouldn't be here right now.
And after listening to the details of what happened that night, I really struggled within myself that whole day, just really wrestling with the fact, like, lord, why would you give me another chance? Why would you give me life? Why would you entrust me to anything that I'm doing?
And I really struggled with that heavy. There was this heaviness on me walking the next step and knowing that for that duration of time, we'd be with friends and family, and it should be a joyous time. And then the Lord brought up this verse, 1st Samuel 12:24.
And here we see Samuel.
He's coming to the end of his responsibility. He says in that chapter, I am old and gray. You can look at my track record, there's no blemish. I've done everything that God has asked me to do. It's great responsibility. And I implored you to serve the one true God. Now you ask for a king, and here you go, your king's coming. But let me implore you, encourage you, serve the one true God. Worship the one true God. And then he comes to the end of the chapter, verse 24, and he says this. He says, above all, fear the Lord and worship him faithfully with all your heart. In other words, there should be this reverence. We should be in awe of who God is.
And I'm telling you, that day he could have snapped his fingers and I could have been gone from this existence.
And there was a sense of respect, that I was acting a fool. And yet God still saved me. He still had mercy on my soul. He loved me so much that he wanted to have a relationship that he sent Jesus.
And so fear above all, fear the Lord and worship him faithfully with your hearts. And then he ends with this.
He says, consider the great things he has done for you and I. Literally, that whole day, I considered how great my parents are.
They're amazing.
Love them to pieces.
I have some wonderful great grandparents. I have some great amazing grandparents, which I visited my grandma, who is very frail, and it was almost like saying goodbye to my grandma.
She taught me a lot of things.
My grandpa taught me a lot of things. They treated me like one of their own family.
I'm grateful for. My wife said this many times. I don't deserve her.
I'm grateful for my kids that I don't deserve. And I went through this whole list considering the great things that God has done for me.
And so when we look at worship for 20, 25, we gotta aim high for worship. We can't take lightly what Jesus has done for us on the cross. We can't take lightly the grace and the goodness and the greatness of who God is, lightly. This year, we want you to aim high for your spiritual growth and for your spiritual development.
And I want to do this with you this morning. Many of you are writing some notes. You have something to write with, and some of you have a smart device which has a way of writing notes in your phone. Or maybe some of you just want to sit there quietly and this is what I want you to do.
I want to give you about 30 seconds. It's going to get quiet in here. It's going to get absolutely quiet in here.
I want you to consider the great things that God has done for you. This is what I want you to do. I want you to think of some words, some key words, some key phrases. Could be a verse. I'm gonna give you 30 seconds in just a bit. But I want to show you that in our own personal devotion time, when we worship God, we can add this to our repertoire. We can aim high in simply looking at a verse and simply just saying and considering the good things that God has done for us. I'm gonna give you 30 seconds to do that right now. It's gonna get probably uncomfortable quietly in here, but I want you to consider for 30 seconds. And your 30 seconds begin now.
As we walk into this new year, we at med church, we want you to aim high. We want to help you in this process you your spiritual growth and development. We want you to aim high for repentance. We want you to aim high for community. And we definitely want you to aim high in worship. Can I pray for you, church? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, we praise you and we thank you for the many blessings that you give us as we contemplate, as we consider the great things that you've done for us. Ultimately, probably the greatest thing that you've done, that you loved us so much that you sent your only begotten son to die a horrific death bringing him back to life to reconcile our relationship with you.
And so, Lord, you are so great. You're tremendous. Nobody supersedes you. No one can do a perfect job such as you. No one can come close to you. You never leave us nor forsake us.
And I pray, Lord, that for this coming year, Lord, that we decide to spiritually grow and develop, to know you, to love you, to serve you, and then to tell others about you. And so, as we say goodbye to 2024, Father, I pray a blessing over each and every individual here. I pray, Lord, that you would bless them and keep them, make your face shine upon them and be gracious to them. Lift up your countenance, turn your face and let your approval be upon them in every step that they take. Every step that we take into 2025, I pray, Lord, that we would always experience your sweet peace. For there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved. It's in the mighty name of Jesus we pray. Amen.
[00:30:26] Speaker A: Thank you so much for tuning in today. If you have any questions or prayer requests, please contact us by visiting metchurch.com that we can follow up with you this week. We look forward to seeing you next week.
