“Thinking on Our Ways, Turning Our Feet” (Psalm 119:57-64) | 12/29/19
Psalm 119:57-64 | 12/29/19 | Will DuVal
Typically this last Sunday of the year, is one of the most sparsely attended services in ANY church, between holiday TRAVELING, many of us - myself included! – fighting illnesses this time of year, and frankly, because the church has in some ways acquiesced – we sometimes jokingly call this “Associate Pastor” Sunday, because of how many lead pastors take this Sunday OFF each year. But when Thad asked me if he should plan to stay in town to preach, I said, “NO WAY! You go visit family; this is one of my favorite Sundays of the YEAR to preach!”
New Years is my favorite holiday. I LOVE celebrating new beginnings. That’s why I love BAPTISMS so much! Maybe we’ll just make this BAPTISM Sunday going forward, and that’ll help with attendance – b/c we ALL love the idea of new beginnings, don’t we? Born-again Christians especially do! 2 Cor 5:17 – “if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.[b] The old has passed away; behold, the new has come!”
Jesus wiped our slates clean, when we turned to him in faith – we read on in 2 Cor 5, and Paul says: “in Christ, God was reconciling[c] the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them” (v19) – Colossians 2:14 says Jesus “cancelled the record of debt that stood against us... nailing it to the cross.” And just like Jesus wiped our SPIRITUAL slates ETERNALLY clean, I like the idea of an annual SLATE-CLEANING at new years. 2019 is soon to be over. Behind us. No matter how AMAZING, or how TERRIBLE a year 2019 has been for you, in either case, it’s soon to be in the PAST. And we have a unique opportunity this morning, to spend some time reflecting together ON the past, but more importantly, taking stock of the PRESENT, as we look ahead to the FUTURE and the year to come, 2020 - both individually, personally, in your own life, as well as collectively, in the life of our CHURCH, together here at West Hills.
That’s what we see David doing in our text for this morning, from Psalm 119. David says “When I think on my ways, I turn my feet to God’s testimonies”. So often, ESPECIALLY around the holidays, we get so caught up in the hustle and bustle and the busyness of life, that we don’t take time to PAUSE for half a minute, and “think on our ways”. Take stock of life. Do some self-reflection. Get our bearings and course correct as needed. We’ve all heard the sayings – if you’re 1 degree off from L.A. to Hawaii, you end up in North Korea or something! We all know about the importance of pausing to “sharpen the axe” from time to time. But amidst the demands of our busy schedules, we sometimes get stuck with our heads down, chopping away and we forget, don’t we? To stop, and come up for air every once in awhile, so we can “Think on our ways”, and “turn our feet” accordingly. So this morning, we’re gonna spend some time taking stock, sharpening our axes, and setting our collective sights back on the Lord together.
-
Would you stand with me... do a little different: READ IT ALOUD TOGETHER!
SCRIPTURE: Psalm 119:57-64
“The Lord is my portion;
I promise to keep your words.
58 I entreat your favor with all my heart;
be gracious to me according to your promise.
59 When I think on my ways,
I turn my feet to your testimonies;
60 I hasten and do not delay
to keep your commandments.
61 Though the cords of the wicked ensnare me,
I do not forget your law.
62 At midnight I rise to praise you,
because of your righteous rules.
63 I am a companion of all who fear you,
of those who keep your precepts.
64 The earth, O Lord, is full of your steadfast love;
teach me your statutes!” This is the word...
This morning, I’m gonna use Psalm 119 as more of a LAUNCH point, and our exposition will actually center more around 5 groupings of OTHER passages, that are all UNIFIED around this theme in v59 of thinking on our ways, and turning back to the Lord. But Let’s first CONSIDER Psalm 119. This BEAUTIFUL passage of Scripture. Psalm 119 is the longest chapter in the entire Bible. 176 verses! And the entire thing, is devoted to praising God, for the GIFT of His word. For Scripture. David says “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” (v105) He says “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” (v11); “I hope in your words” (v147), “your word is truth” (v160), “my heart stands in awe of your words” (v161), “I rejoice at your word, like one who finds great treasure.” (162). On and on and on, every verse, declaring the MAJESTY, of God’s WORD.
We see it in the excerpt we just read – vv57-64: “(Because) The Lord is my portion;
I promise to keep your words.” God – you are my PORTION; you’re ENOUGH for me. Your word is SUFFICIENT for me; so I commit myself to KEEPING it.
v58: I understand that it is only BY keeping your word, that I can “entreat your favor with all my heart; (that I can ask you to...) be gracious to me according to your promise.” Psalm 5:12 says “you bless the righteous, O Lord; you cover him with favor as with a shield.” By contrast, God promises in Prov 11:21 “Be assured, an evil person will not go unpunished”.
Therefore, David says in v60: “I hasten and do not delay
to keep your commandments.”
Regardless of my circumstances, he says: “Though the cords of the wicked ensnare me,
I do not forget your law.” There is NO excuse for ignoring God’s word.
Moreover, V62: “At midnight I rise to praise you,
because of your righteous rules.” When was the last time you set your ALARM, so you could wake up in the middle of the night, just to squeeze in a few more songs of PRAISE for God’s RULES?! If you have EVER done that, please don’t tell me, cuz I’m supposed to be the pastor and you would absolutely be putting me to shame. Talk about 2020 goals!
v63: “I am a companion of all who fear you,
of those who keep your precepts.” David says, “Furthermore, I’m gonna go out of my way to hang OUT with people who ALSO keep God’s word, who encourage and spur me on to love God more. Why?
Because v64: “The earth, O Lord, is full of your steadfast love;
teach me your statutes!”
All too often in Christianity we bifurcate those 2, don’t we? God’s LOVE and His LAW – we pit them against, and view them in opposition to one another. We do it with so MANY of the most difficult but essential paradoxes of the faith. I think of the famous Charles Spurgeon quote about God’s sovereignty, when Spurgeon was asked, “How do you reconcile human free will with God’s sovereign election?” And Spurgeon replied, “You don’t have to reconcile friends.” Similarly, when it comes to God’s LOVE and His LAW, we’re so quick to fall off the horse on either one side or the other – we either become LEGALISTS, and we become obsessed with the Law for its OWN sake, and NOT as an expression of God’s love; we try and USE the Law to self-justify, “God, teach me your statutes... so I can look down on others who DON’T keep them and feel better about myself, and unconsciously seek to EARN your love and approval by MY OWN righteousness,” and we turn into 21st c. Pharisees... OR we fall off the OTHER side of the horse and become ANTINOMIANS. Literally, we become ANTI- law. We oppose God’s law, THINKING we do so in favor of his love instead. But we ignore Jesus’ reminder that “Whoever has my commandments and keeps them, he it is who loves me. And he who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him.” (John 14:21) Because God’s love and his law are 2 sides of the same coin.
There is a DIRECTION to the “Love-Law” relationship, biblically. Love ALWAYS precedes Law, biblically. That’s why we always want to center on the GOSPEL here at West Hills. We GLORY in the truth that it is NOT our ability to keep the Law that EARNS us God’s love, but rather, Romans 5:8 “God showed his love for us in this: that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.” And that truth plays out all throughout Scripture: God chooses Abraham, in love, before he calls him to make the covenant in obedience. God, in love, RESCUES the Israelites from slavery before he delivers the Law on Mt. Sinai. In love, God sends us JESUS before he challenges us to keep his commandments and love him back. But even though love always precedes law, we will miss the mark, as a church, if centering on the gospel means we only EVER TEACH the gospel on Sunday mornings. If we disregard Paul’s exhortation in Acts 20:27, to declare the “FULL counsel of God”. On the contrary, we want to be a church that is SO grounded in the gospel, that we are able to build ON TOP OF that foundation, and challenge one another to better RESPOND to God’s love with our OWN love, as evidenced, John 14:21, by our keeping his law in obedience.
And so I’ll warn you in advance: this morning may feel a little heavy on the “law” for some of you. Those of you with a tendency towards legalism, and gonna LOVE it; you’ll be tempted to turn this sermon into “5 steps to getting God to love me more” [BUZZER sound], but you antinomians will be tempted to write the whole thing off and send me an angry email tomorrow about how Christianity isn’t a list of to-dos; it’s all about GRACE. Ephesians 2: “It’s by grace that we’re saved through faith.” Yes... AND, v.10 continues: “We were created in Christ Jesus for good works”. God’s Love ought to LEAD us to lovingly keep his Law.
So I want to give you 5 spiritual disciplines this morning that are worth your RESOLVING to keep in 2020. We just wrapped up our Advent series “Tis the Season”; well, New Years “tis the season” for making RESOLUTIONS, isn’t it? A lot of people have become JADED and skeptical these days with the whole idea of making new year’s resolutions. Listen: the problem isn’t with MAKING them. It’s a great idea to RESOLVE to do something that’s worth doing. It’s a BIBLICAL idea – “think on your ways, and turn your feet” accordingly! The problem isn’t with resolving; it’s with resolving then not following THROUGH! If you don’t like the idea of New Year’s Resolutions, I’m guessing you never had a problem MAKING them; I’m betting you never followed through and KEPT them, so over time you just gave up altogether. You got sick of paying $70 bucks a month for the gym membership you never used, so you decided the gym was STUPID and you QUIT! It’s not the GYM’s fault; the gym was a great idea. The problem’s not the resolution! You got tired of throwing away entire heads of kale when inevitably you couldn’t bring yourself to eat them, so you stopped wasting your money. The problem wasn’t the decision to BUY the kale! Actually, that’s a bad example – cuz buying kale WAS the mistake. Kale is disgusting! Don’t resolve to eat more kale in 2020 – life is too short.
The apostle Paul encourages us to “Train yourself for godliness; for while bodily training is of some value, godliness is of value in every way, as it holds promise for the present life and also for the life to come.” (1 Tim 4:8) Sure, train your body – resolve to work out more. And DO it. Eat kale, if you have to. Train your MIND – resolve to put down your “smart” phone and pick up a book in 2020. But if you wanna invest your time and energy in the coming year in such a way that you reap ETERNAL rewards, then you gotta train for GODLINESS. And for that, you gotta turn to the spiritual disciplines. There are DOZENS throughout Scripture. But I just want to focus on FIVE this morning. And with each, I wanna do 3 things:
1) Impress upon us the importance of the discipline, biblically.
2) Offer you a few different possible applications and specific ideas for implementation of that discipline in your daily life. Nothing’s worse than a preacher telling you to go do this, this and this, without giving you any tangible direction or guidance for how to actually accomplish it. I wanna try and make this really PRACTICAL for you.
And 3) Speaking of tangible, I want to give you a hopefully helpful tool for ongoing self-evaluation throughout the year, so you can pause at various points throughout 2020, when you inevitably get off track, and you will, that’s why we can NEVER get too far from God’s grace, because we’re in constant NEED of it. So we’ll KEEP coming back to the gospel, but I want us to ALSO be able to return to this morning’s resolutions, and RE- “think on your ways” and turn your feet back to God’s word when you need to.
One of my favorite mini-series my predecessor Pastor Gary, did hear at West Hills was entitled “15 Reasons Why you should be with the Gathered Church Every Sunday in 2018”. And he passed out little notecards and had us all think and pray on it and physically write down a number, resolving that “I will be in church ___ Sundays out of 52 this year.” And then he encouraged us to leave the cards in our Bibles and revisit that commitment throughout the year and let it motivate us on those Sundays we’re tempted to hit the “Snooze” button.
I heard from so many of you how impactful that series was, and that pledge card in particular. So I figured, “Why stop with corporate worship; let’s build on it and shoot for FIVE spiritual disciplines in 2020!” Here we go:
Church is a good place to start: Resolution #1 – Be with the church. Notice I don’t say “Come to church”; church isn’t a building. I don’t say “attend” church; church isn’t a meeting. I very intentionally encourage you to BE WITH the church. The church is any gathering of God’s people for the expressed purpose of corporately worshipping Him. And according to God’s WORD, it’s really really important:
Hebrews 10:24-25 “let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, 25 not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.” That’s the Day of the Lord’s Return, that we just studied in November, with Mark ch.13, and remember: things have to get WAY worse before Jesus returns and makes them way better; all the more reason to commit to gathering weekly with God’s people. God’s collective LIGHT, in an otherwise increasingly dark world. A world that sometimes seems to chew Christians up and spit us out 6 days of the week. But we get to gather once a week for ENCOURAGEMENT, Hebrews says, to be “stirred up to love and good works” – Sunday mornings are a PEP rally!
And I’ll just quickly STEAL FIVE, we don’t have time for all 15, but I’ll give you 5 of the biblical reasons Gary offered us, for why we should be with the church every Sunday:
1- Jesus modeled it. Luke 4:16 “And Jesus came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. And as was his custom, he went to the synagogue on the Sabbath day.”
2- The early church practiced it. Acts 2:42-47 “And they devoted themselves to the apostles' teaching and the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and the prayers... And day by day, attending the temple together... praising God and having favor with all the people...”
3- The love of God compels it. Jesus gives us this new commandment in John 13: “just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. 35 By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.””
4- Our new identity assumes it. Eph 2:19 “you are no longer strangers and aliens,[d] but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God” I used the analogy last week: we’re no longer REFUGEES, without a country; Paul says Christ has made us citizens of heaven. And the church is now our EMBASSY, an outpost for us as we walk this earth as foreigners in exile. The church is our home away from home.
5- The Spirit within you yearns for it. 1 Cor 3:16 “Do you not know that you[c] are God's temple and that God's Spirit dwells in you?” And yet God’s spirit that is within YOU, individually, YEARNS to be with God’s spirit that is within US, collectively, in a fundamentally different way, when we gather corporately in His name. Ephesians 2:22 “In Christ you are being built together into a dwelling place for God by[e] the Spirit.” Because Jesus promised in Matthew 18:20 “where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I among them.” in a DIFFERENT kind of way.
And friends, there are AT LEAST 10 more great reasons just like those. But I’ll just remind you of the one other I mentioned in my Advent sermon on “Joy” – it’s FUN! Church, for the believer, is fun. Where else would you possibly WANT to be when the doors are open? If it’s not fun, you’re not doing it right. Something’s off. Because Jesus said he came that our JOY might be made FULL, John 15. And when we come together we get to celebrate HIM in ways we simply can’t on our own.
So for your tangible application point on being with the church, I’m not gonna get too creative: Nike said it best: JUST DO IT. Just be here. Drive a stake in the ground; let Sundays be non-negotiable for you. When have you EVER regretted being here? I mean, seriously, if that’s a thing, I need to know, cuz maybe I’M doing something wrong, if you’re walking away thinking, “Well THAT was a waste of time; I wish I would have just stayed in bed!” I doubt that happens often. I hope and suspect you’re always glad you came. And I KNOW we are. I can say definitively that West Hills is better with you. If you don’t do it selfishly for you, do it for me. I feel your absence when you’re not here. I’m not saying that in a guilt-inducing, or a creepy big brother kind of way. But like if Polly and I sat down to eat family dinner and Ellery wasn’t there. We’d MISS her. We MISS out, when you’re not here. Those of you watching online later this week – we MISSED you this morning. We get it – vacations are important. Biological family time is important. But so is your SPIRITUAL family time. So hurry home! Don’t deprive us of YOU. Same goes for your LIFE GROUP during the week, your Bible studies and discipleship groups: make gathering with God’s people a priority in your life in 2020. I GUARANTEE you’ll be grateful you did, and be better for it.
So 3) Your resolution: “I commit to worshipping together with God’s people ____ Sundays out of 52 in 2020.”
Resolution #2 – Study Scripture. CONSUME God’s word regularly. We’ve already examined what Psalm 119 has to say about the importance of this spiritual discipline, of routinely FEASTING on God’s word. Many of you will know the other classic texts:
2 Timothy 3:16-17- “All Scripture is breathed out by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work.” Overlooking God’s inspired word, literally, his “breathed out” word, will leave you an INCOMPLETE person. That is a POWERFUL description of the importance of Scripture: we can’t be WHOLE without it.
Joshua 1:8 “This Book of the Law shall not depart from your mouth, but you shall meditate on it day and night, so that you may be careful to do according to all that is written in it. For then you will make your way prosperous, and then you will have good success.” To a certain extent, all your other resolutions hang on this one – “making your way prosperous, having good success”; that’s what we all want in 2020, right? Success - How do we get it? You Internalize God’s word. Meditate on it, such that you can LIVE by it. Obedience over time becomes your DEFAULT setting.
And there are DOZENS more passages we could highlight. But I think most of us KNOW we ought to be studying Scripture; so if we aren’t, perhaps the breakdown is with...
Our failed attempts to put this discipline into PRACTICE. So let me hit some practical tips for your Bible study, in the new year.
Don’t bite off more than you can chew. If you’ve never read all the way through the New Testament, start there before resolving to read through the entire Bible in a year. If you’ve never finished a whole BOOK of the Bible, make THAT a goal before reading the whole NT. Don’t set yourself up for failure by loading the barbell with tons of weight when you’re new to the gym. Start small. Get a win or 2 under your belt, finish a few shorter books, and build momentum that way.
Secondly, Read books at a time. Devotional resources have their place. Where you’re reading a few verses of Scripture, and then a lot of flowery commentary on it. That’s fine, but you may find over the long haul, it’s actually more difficult for you to stay committed with that kind of devotional study, because they’re constantly jumping around all over the place, and it’s tough to keep your attention, if you’re at all A.D.D. like me. There’s not the consistency you get with sustained study of an entire book of the Bible at once. Plus, you’re getting less of the MEAT of SCRIPTURE with a devotional. And one of the best ways to develop an appetite for Scripture is simply to STUDY it. Not in tiny bites, but in whole MEALS. Dig in.
Third tip: learn to discern the difference between passages that are best SKIMMED, vs those that deserve a full READ, vs. those deserve to be MEDITATED ON. I’ve said it before – I love God’s word as much as the next believer, and I believe all of it is God-breathed and useful, but that doesn’t make every part of it equally MEANINGFUL. The genealogies are important, and they’re there for a reason. But that doesn’t mean I’m memorizing them. That’s a skim for me. Listen, I’m the pastor, and if I try and meditate on certain passages of Scripture, I’m giving up. That’s not what some of those sections are THERE for. I shared my reflection in our Christmas Eve service on John 3:16 – without a doubt, when you’re studying through the Gospel of John and you get to ch3, v16, it ought to stop you in your tracks. You oughtta lay your Bible down and just pray and ponder for a good long while. But when we study Genesis together next year, we’ll see: there are big chunks of Genesis that are simply readable, if not skimable. Now, what you’ll FIND is that the more you STUDY Scripture, the more you begin to discover new passages that you used to BREEZE over suddenly seem worthy of deeper reflection. That’s the beautiful thing about God’s word: it’s so simple my 3-year old can grasp the basic story and MOST of the stories WITHIN the story for that matter; yet it’s so complex and awesome that the most brilliant minds in history have studied their entire lives and never uncovered all the Bible’s depth and meaning and beauty.
#4 - Read in community. Both for accountability (some of you don’t need to drop your gym membership; you need to invite a friend who will call you out when you’re tempted to skip out on leg day!). But also, studying in community increases our understanding. Our life group is reading through the NT together this year. My discipleship group will start the OT together next week. Every single week, without fail, they’re picking up on things in the text that I have NEVER seen, in 10 or 15 times having read through the Bible now. It’s remarkable. But you miss out on that if you simply resolve to read alone.
Lastly, have a plan for your Bible reading. There’s not a one-size fits all plan. I’ll give you the one I’ve used, and we’ve used collectively here at West Hills, for a few years now. It’s called the 5-day plan. I like it for a lot of reasons. For starters, you read 5 days a week. So they account for procrastinators like me who need a day or two to catch up occasionally. I also like that it gets you through the entire NT in a year, reading 1 chapter a day. That’d be a great, realistic goal for some of you in 2020. Others may be ready for the Bible in a year – they’ll give you the OT chapters to read each day as well, so you’re reading both at once. And they ALIGN OT and NT. So you read Leviticus while you’re reading Hebrews, for example. It’s very good, I highly recommend it - I printed plenty of copies for you at the Info Bar; stop by and grab one on your way out today.
Your resolution? I encourage you to set a realistic, tangible goal this morning: “I will study ____ books of the Bible in 2020.” 66 – study through the whole thing? 27 – the NT? Maybe just 4 – do an in-depth study of the 4 Gospels this year. Join a Bible class, like Steve Johnson and Mark Henderlong’s, who are in the middle tackling the 4 gospels as we speak. Hop right in! But prayerfully consider this morning, how the Lord is leading you to draw closer in your relationship with Him this next year, as you listen for His voice in your study of His word.
And SPEAKING of prayer, that is Resolution #3 worth keeping: PRAY CONSTANTLY. Pray constantly. I thought about saying “regularly”. “Frequently”. Even “faithfully”. But they all fall short of the mark GOD sets for us when it comes to prayer.
1 Thessalonians 5:17 “Pray without ceasing”
Romans 12:12 “be constant in prayer.”
Ephesians 6:18 “Pray at all times in the Spirit, with all prayer and supplication. To that end keep alert with all perseverance, making supplication for all the saints”. Pray all the time.
So to that end, my first practical tip for perhaps rethinking your prayer life in 2020 is
Don’t bow your head, close your eyes, and fold your hands nicely in your lap. Throw everything your Sunday school teacher taught you growing up out the window! Kids – your pastor gave you permission! ☺ I’m overstating the point a little for emphasis. It’s great to assume “prayer position” at those certain set aside times when you want to minimize distractions because you’re intentionally, exclusively focusing on speaking with the Lord. But that’s all prayer is, right? Talking with God. So obviously if Paul’s gonna exhort us MULTIPLE times throughout his letters to “pray constantly”, we either have to conclude that Paul was over-exaggerating, which is dangerous, when we start picking and choosing which commands of Scripture to take seriously, or that Paul actually MEANT it, but that prayer doesn’t always HAVE to be intentional & exclusive to be prayer. Some theologians refer to it as “God consciousness”. Prayer is a constant awareness of God’s presence and activity within your life. If you’re a believer and the Holy Spirit really lives in you, it’s an awareness that He’s always there, along for the ride. So constant communication in some ways just makes the MOST sense, if God’s truly omnipresent, and lives within you.
He’s THERE, So TALK to Him. Maybe that’s another practical tip: don’t be afraid to appear crazy. You remember the guy in Braveheart who everyone thinks is crazy cuz he’s constantly in the middle of on ongoing, out-loud conversation with “the Almighty”. That guy GETS it! Alright, your conversing with God doesn’t have to be out loud – but whatever works for you. A few more practical tips that have helped me:
Be reminded of God’s call to pray at certain regularly recurring intervals throughout your day. When you wake up – talk with God FIRST thing in the morning before you even step out of bed. CERTAINLY before you check your phone. Just make that a DISCIPLINE. While you’re doing mindless tasks that don’t require your conscious thoughts – brushing your teeth, showering, using the potty, basically ANYTHING in the bathroom – let that be extra time spent talking with the Lord for you. When you’re in the car by yourself; turn off the radio sometimes – there’s nothing good on it anyway – and talk with God instead. All the old tried and true prayer habits: before meals, before you go to sleep at night – don’t just find, but MAKE, carve OUT, set aside times that you resolve to spend time consciously drawing your focus back to the Lord.
Another prayer tip: I always encourage the A.C.T.S. model – Adoration, Confession, Thanksgiving, Supplication. There are different TYPES of prayers we find in Scripture; discipline yourself to reflect that in your own prayer life.
Last tip here is probably the most important: put down the phone! Nothing has done more to KILL the prayers of God’s people in the 21st c. than the smart phone. I could and probably should preach a WHOLE SERMON on that one, but I’m already running out of time this morning.
So resolution 3) “I resolve to carve out ___ min/day, or occasions per day, to intentionally spend time with the Lord in prayer.”
Resolution #4 is GIVING. I’ve broken giving down into 2 sub-categories, financial stewardship and active service, volunteering. Talent AND treasure, as we say in the church world. Because I’m out of time and recently preached on BOTH of those, specifically, I’ll simply refer you back to my message from November 17 entitled “How NOT to Give” from Mark 12, the Widow’s Mite; and from July 7 entitled “6 Reasons to Serve”. Those sermons will lay out BOTH the biblical reasons as well as some practical tips for your giving and your serving. But I still encourage you to resolve this morning: how much do you commit to GIVE in 2020, to SERVE in 2020, both inside the church, volunteering in a ministry here, as well as OUTSIDE – the food bank, the homeless shelter, your elderly neighbors next door who need extra help. COMMIT to that now.
And finally, Resolution #5: PREACH GOD’S WORD. Brothers and sisters, you ought to appreciate by now, with all the emphasis we’ve been putting on it lately here – go back and listen to the message “Nothing But Leaves” from October 20, the “Costs of Discipleship” from September 8 – our benediction every single SUNDAY here at West Hills; we’re constantly finding ways to drive home the point that I’m not the ONLY one called to preach around here. Amen? Ephesians 4:12 – you pay me to equip the saints for the work of ministry; Y’ALL are the real preachers. Hear the words of your Savior this morning: Mark 16:15 “Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation.” Matthew 28:19 “Go and make disciples of all nations”. Make 2020 the year that you get serious about doing that. Drive ANOTHER stake in the ground this morning – RESOLVE today:
“I will tell ___ people about Jesus in 2020.”
“I will disciple ____ people in 2020.”
Evangelism and discipleship. Telling people who don’t know about Jesus, and growing the ones who do up more in His love and truth. That’s what He LEFT us here to do. Let’s make 2020 a year that is radically characterized by that. By all FIVE of these disciplines. For our edification, but most of all for GOD’S glory... Amen. Let’s pray. And before we do, we’re gonna do something this morning... USHERS...