In this message, we wade into the depths of what it means to answer a deeper calling, where the act of surrendering and the embrace of a supportive faith community become the backbone of our spiritual lives. As we reflect on the disciples' own search for direction post-Ascension, we uncover the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit and the church's pivotal role in shaping us to walk as Jesus did.
Embracing the inclusive nature of Jesus's discipleship, we extend a heartfelt invitation to all who seek to become His followers. In our discussion, the challenges of shedding personal baggage are laid bare, alongside the immeasurable rewards of daily communion with God.
In this message, we wade into the depths of what it means to answer a deeper calling, where the act of surrendering and the embrace of a supportive faith community become the backbone of our spiritual lives. As we reflect on the disciples' own search for direction post-Ascension, we uncover the empowering presence of the Holy Spirit and the church's pivotal role in shaping us to walk as Jesus did.
Embracing the inclusive nature of Jesus's discipleship, we extend a heartfelt invitation to all who seek to become His followers. In our discussion, the challenges of shedding personal baggage are laid bare, alongside the immeasurable rewards of daily communion with God.
So I'm going to title this short talk today. I'm going to title it called A Deeper Calling A Deeper Calling. Who in here has ever who in here, hasn't learned how to swim? Who in here took a long time to learn how to swim? So I didn't learn how to swim until like 20 something years old. He's actually currently learning Now.
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When I was a little kid, we used to play, me and my brother. We lived on Virginia Beach. Even though I say that to people, they think, oh, you live by the oceanfront. No, I did not live by the oceanfront, but we used to play this game and we would go to the oceanfront, we'd run to the shore and then run back. Run to the shore and run back. You never want to get too deep because I couldn't swim. And so there's this one particular time, though, that I did. I got a little too excited and I ran deep, and then a wave came, knocked me over and I was like the water's got me, I can't swim, and I thought in reality I probably was right by the shore, but in my head I was like this is it. This is over, game over. And then I couldn't get out. I couldn't get to my feet and then, out of nowhere, this light parted and this hand came through and grabbed me and I said Jesus, is that you? It wasn't Jesus, it was Isaiah, it was my brother and he grabbed me and picked me up and I ended up being okay.
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And I share that story because sometimes going to the deeper calling can be kind of scary, sometimes going to the deeper end can be scary. And now sometimes people say, man, jacob, is your teaching deep? And I'm like what do you mean? Like deep, like as in using a bunch of greek and hebrew, or I mean I guess I can teach like that. But when I talk about deep, having deep teaching, I mean deep application. So, so, because what is it, what good is it to hear the word if you can't apply it to your life? That's right, and, and so what I want to do, what I want to kind of challenge us in this interest, in Pentecost Sunday, when we're in this room together, here you go.
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This is what happened on Pentecost Sunday Jesus was crucified, he was resurrected and then he ascended to heaven. And now what was left for the disciples? They were in a room trying to figure out what is our next step. What is our next step. And, it's interesting enough, when I got that call from the school, I felt this first kind of moment of like frustration. I'm like man, I wish we were in our own facility, I wish we were just in our own spot, we didn't have to worry about all this stuff. And then after I kind of like that was a short-lived frustration, because then after that I said you know what, lord, we're going to have a service because you're calling us to a deeper level of intimacy with you. You're calling us deeper.
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It's not just about the facility, it's not just about the location, it's about the people of God gathering together. And so that's what the disciples did. They gathered together, and the book of Acts tells us that they were praying. And when they were praying together in a room, the Holy Spirit came. The Holy Spirit came, and from the power of the Holy Spirit I want you to get this from the power of the Holy Spirit came their next clear steps. It was when the Holy Spirit came on them, their clarity and their next steps came. And so what I want to say to us, lbc, I want Jesus to give us clear next steps. You want to know what our next step is. You're going to laugh at me when I say this.
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Our clear next step as a church is this we exist to help everyday people learn how to become Jesus followers. That's it. It's not fancy. It's not like give me a divine moment, lord. It's no. Our calling as a church is to help everyday people like you and me. Look around this room. We're just everyday people, man. We got everyday problems, everyday things, everyday ups and downs. We're just everyday people and our church's mission is to help everyday people learn how to become Jesus followers. And the way that everyday people become Jesus followers is by taking them into the deep end, by deep application, meaning how can everyday people learn how to follow Jesus? It's helping them be with Jesus, become like Jesus and do the stuff that Jesus did.
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If you want to flourish in your life, if you want to flourish as a Jesus follower, it's not just going out. God, show me something big to do. It's be with Jesus in your personal life, become like Jesus. God, give me a heart like yours, and then you got to start doing the stuff. You got to start doing the stuff. What is doing the stuff I'm talking about? It's time for you to start praying for people. It's time for you to start speaking positive with people. It's time for you to be the light in the world, and that's a beautiful thing. And that's what I want for our church is for people to be with Jesus, to become like Jesus and do this stuff. I'm going to bring this down. I'm going to bring it down real fast. Be with Jesus. Jesus has him, and to follow him you have to what Surrender to him. You've got to live a life of surrender.
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Mark says like this he says Peter talks. He says then he called the crowd. So he had people hanging out with him listening to his stuff and he called them the crowd and they were already with him. But then he calls them to a deeper level. And maybe some of us are like, well, well, I come to church, I'm here. I believe God wants to call us to a deeper level and this is what he says. Then he called the crowd to himself with his disciples and said this he says this Whoever wants to be, notice what he says.
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Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves, take up their cross and follow me Now. Notice the depth of what he is calling us to, for whoever wants to save their life will lose it. Whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. Then he takes it even deeper. What good Is it for someone to gain the whole world? What good is it if you got the car you wanted, the spouse you wanted, the house you wanted the stuff you wanted, but you're still empty? But you're still empty. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world yet forfeit their soul? Or what could anyone give in exchange for their soul? If anyone is ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, the Son of man will be ashamed of them when he comes in his father's glory with the holy angels. And I want you to get to notice the depth that he took the crowd to. And this is important about Jesus.
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Jesus didn't just have like, oh, this person's good, that person's good, I don't know about them. No, he talked to the crowd. There's thousands of people and as a rabbi in that culture, you had your disciples and this rabbi, jesus, did something crazy. He said all of you, all of you crowd, you can be my disciples, everyone can. And in that crowd this is the best part in the crowd are women and children. In the crowd that Jesus is talking to is people that were previously excluded. That's right. And the crowd that Jesus is talking to is people that were previously excluded. That's right. And so his invitation is to all people.
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See, first thing is you got to surrender your life to his will and his way. When we really think about salvation, when we think about what does it mean to be saved? It means to be surrendered. I'm surrendered to you, I'm here, I'm surrendered to you. And that's not what does it mean to be saved? It means to be surrendered, say, yeah, I'm surrendered to you, I'm here, I'm surrendered to you, and that's what I'm going to encourage us to do. So that's meaning we need to surrender to the Lord.
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And the second thing that we need to do to be with Jesus is to spend daily time with God. Man, I will preach that until my last day. Spend daily time with God. If you hang out with me long enough, you're going to hear it. You're going to say man, jacob's going to say it, jacob's going to finally say it. I know Jacob spent daily time with God. I hope I didn't drive him nuts with that, because it is vital for your life to spend daily time with God, because LBC this is what I want us to get LBC.
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We don't want to be a church that people are just so pumped about church and they just love their church and they got their church banner and their church sticker. For the moment, something happens at that church. They don't believe in god anymore. Come on now. We want people in our church to connect to jesus and so that they can have a heart for jesus. Yeah, so when life complexities come, they have a relationship with who Jesus Like. That's what we want to do. Okay, that's my heart for you. So I'm going to be up front with you. The best life that you have, the best life for your life, is a life where you spend daily time with God and you connect to Jesus.
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Number two become like Jesus. I'm going to fast, but everyone stand up. People's knees are starting to get weak All this way. God like Jesus. Another way to put it is be made new by Jesus. Be made new by Jesus. Here's one thing Even if you say yes to Jesus who knows?
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Even if you say yes to Jesus, you still have baggage. Come on now. You still got stuff, not everything Sometimes. God works in that way. He'll heal people Not everything. Sometimes God works like that. He'll heal people.
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People have addictions, but for me it didn't work that way. For me, I still had baggage, I still had stuff, but then I knew who I was becoming like, I had a mission, I had something I was going after, and in the book of Philippians the Bible says we have to work out our salvation. That's why spending daily time with God is vital to your growth, because, no matter what, even if you give your life to Jesus, you still got your past. You still have pain, you still have problems and guess what? You still got new people, the people that drive us nuts.
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And this is what I love about being a Jesus follower, because we aren't trying to get over stuff. I want you to get this. We are in training, that's right. We're in training, and some of the biggest battles that we face in our lives are some of our best avenues of training. God is using those things to train us to become more like Him. I want you to get that, guys. I want you to get even your struggle, even some of the struggles that you have.
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A lot of times we pray God just take this struggle away from me, and that is a good prayer, but the better prayer is God. What are you trying to teach me in this struggle? What are you trying to reveal to me? Even when we were worshiping, right then it was getting like good, and then I could hear all the kids and I was like man, I need to shut that door. And then I was like, wait, god, what are you trying to teach me here? What are you trying to teach me in this moment and when you know he taught me in that moment he loves the sound of the next generation. Don't get me going up in here. He loves the sound of the next generation and I pray LBC will be a church that is open for the next generation. Come on, come on. This is where freedom comes from. This is where freedom comes from. This is where freedom comes from when we say I want to become like Jesus.
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I'm going to give you guys a little sample of something Starting this fall we're going to do a private, small group called Freedom, and Freedom is going to. The purpose of Freedom is to help you find freedom from yesterday's hurts so that you can live out tomorrow the way that God has for you. It's going to be a private group. We're looking at 7 to 10 men and 7 to 10 women to do it. If you feel like there's some stuff in your life, you got baggage, you got things and you want to find some freedom for it, I want you to join us in this small group. You can talk to Isaiah right after this in this small group. Okay, you can talk to Isaiah right after this. He has all the info for you.
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But I believe that God wants to take our church through freedom, this program and freedom. I think there's too many Christians living with baggage, there's too much baggage, and we forget that we have access to God, who frees us. The Spirit of the Lord is there. There's freedom. That's not just a nice thing to put and tweet. It's our exit. Is it X? Now Twitter, not no more Threads. Do you TikTok it? There's something I don't know? No, tiktok, but there's freedom, okay, and so I encourage you to do that.
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But this is what I want to say to you guys. This is what I want to say about freedom. This is why freedom is scary, because freedom means you've got to run towards the thing that is most scary to you in order to find freedom from it. So you've got to face it, you've got to go after it. You've got to go after that thing that hurts. You Say, no, I'm going to face that thing, I'm going to find freedom. So I want that because when we become like Jesus, we find freedom. Because the kingdom of God has come here on earth, guys, that means your life has freedom and victory in it. So, lbc, we're going to go for it. Okay, here you go. Last thing I'm going to say right here is this Do the stuff that Jesus did.
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Do the stuff that Jesus did and this is important for me and our church okay, because what can happen very easy in church life is that we become insider, focused Meaning. We have our group, and our group is great and I love our group and that's awesome, but we can never forget about the people who haven't come in yet. You know, we have to think about what you can use the term the outsider People who are looking for hope and freedom. And so when we do the stuff that Jesus did like, just take the time, take time to read the Gospels and watch what Jesus did, watch how he strategically placed himself in areas where he could meet people who were previously excluded, people who didn't have a chance. He said, no, you have a chance. He calls the crowd. He calls the crowd and guess what? He wants his church to still call the crowd. He wants his church to still call the crowd.
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That's why we are doing this campaign called Audacious. We're going to try to reach more people. We're going to do a big marketing campaign come the fall, because I believe deep in my heart that there's people in our city who need to experience the love and the freedom that Jesus offers. And why not be us? Why not be our church? Why not be our church to help everyday people learn how to become Jesus followers and so, church.
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I want to kind of share this last thing with you on this Pentecost Sunday. That's why the Lord is saying you matter, your life matters, what you have to offer matters, and God wants to use you. Can we pray church? Does that sound good? Come Holy Spirit, and God wants to use you. Can we pray church? Does that sound good? Come Holy Spirit. God, jesus, holy Spirit. We come to you and we say have your way, have your way, lord.
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God, I pray for freedom in our lives, lord. Freedom in marriages. Lives, lord. Freedom in marriages, lord. Yes, lord, freedom in career choices, lord, healing in Jesus name, physical healing, lord, mental, emotional man. That's why the Holy Spirit is saying the spirit of the Lord is there is freedom. Mental, emotional man. That's like the Holy Spirit saying where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom. Yes, when you spend daily time with God, you're inviting that Spirit to be with you. Thank you, so there's freedom there, god, we live surrender to you. Take us to the deeper level, lord. Take us to deeper application. Lord and God, we pray for the next generation. We pray for the next generation, lord, that our church will be a vibrant spot for the next generation to come to know you, lord, and that we, as everyday people, learn how to follow you, not just for ourselves, but for those coming after us. Help us leave a legacy, lord. So, god, we love you, we need you and we want more of you. In Jesus' name, amen.
