SOAKED IN JOY: part 2

JOY COMES THROUGH FAITH IN JESUS
March 30, 2008
with Adam Waters

Philippians 1:12-26 And I want you to know, my dear brothers and sisters, that everything that has happened to me here has helped to spread the Good News. For everyone here, including the whole palace guard, knows that I am in chains because of Christ. And because of my imprisonment, most of the believers here have gained confidence and boldly speak God’s message without fear. It’s true that some are preaching out of jealousy and rivalry. But others preach about Christ with pure motives. They preach because they love me, for they know I have been appointed to defend the Good News. Those others do not have pure motives as they preach about Christ. They preach with selfish ambition, not sincerely, intending to make my chains more painful to me. But that doesn’t matter. Whether their motives are false or genuine, the message about Christ is being preached either way, so I rejoice. And I will continue to rejoice. For I know that as you pray for me and the Spirit of Jesus Christ helps me, this will lead to my deliverance. For I fully expect and hope that I will never be ashamed, but that I will continue to be bold for Christ, as I have been in the past. And I trust that my life will bring honor to Christ, whether I live or die. For to me, living means living for Christ, and dying is even better. But if I live, I can do more fruitful work for Christ. So I really don’t know which is better. I’m torn between two desires: I long to go and be with Christ, which would be far better for me. But for your sakes, it is better that I continue to live. Knowing this, I am convinced that I will remain alive so I can continue to help all of you grow and experience the joy of your faith. And when I come to you again, you will have even more reason to take pride in Christ Jesus because of what he is doing through me.
INTRO
One of my favorite movies of all time is Braveheart. The movie is extremely inspiring. It is a fictional story based on a historic figure in William Wallace. Wallace, motivated by his wife’s wrongful death, is trying to lead his countrymen to freedom as they fight the English. Wallace is driven by an unyielding passion that his oppressed countrymen cannot ignore. Wallace does not fear men… does not fear death… his belief that he is doing the right thing causes him to perform feats that should not have been possible.

GETTING RID OF WASTE
 We must get rid of the waste surrounding the word faith… so we can find joy there.
 PISTIS (pee-stees) or PISTEOS (pee-steh-oh-s) means belief yes, but also trust, conviction, assurance, a belief in a promise, proof!
 HEBREWS 11:1 “What is faith? It is the confident assurance that what we hope for is going to happen. It is the evidence of things we cannot yet see.”
 JAMES 2:26 “Just as the body is dead without a spirit, so also faith is dead without good deeds.”
 Today, we want you to experience the inner delight of a faith that NO ONE can touch.

As a swimmer, I will…
 SATISFY the Spirit’s leading.
 WIN the battles of the flesh.
 INHERIT the Kingdom.
 MANIFEST the character of God.
SWIMMING LESSON: JOY comes through faith in Jesus
 Faith INSPIRES us to rejoice when we get the chance to share the love of Jesus.
 Faith INSPIRES us to rejoice when others get the chance to share the love of Jesus.
 Faith INSPIRES us to live a life that matters.
 Faith INSPIRES us to hold tightly to our joy, so that we can continue on.

WRAP IT UP: Where is your faith in the freedom that Christ provides? W. Wallace had faith that through belief in each other they could win their freedom from the English. Today, where is your faith? Has it “inspired” you to rejoice? Has it inspired you to rejoice in the fact that our freedom is already won?

SOAKED IN JOY: part 1

JOY COMES THROUGH THE STORY OF JESUS
March 23, 2008
with Adam Waters

INTRODUCTION
• Happy and You Know It (played very sarcastically)
• Do you ever get the feeling that the church has missed the point? That the church has NO CLUE what's going on with your life? How can I be happy-clappy when my life has been so tough this week!!

GETTING RID OF WASTE
 JOY has very little to do with clapping hands, stomping feet and shouts of excitement.
 GREEK: inner feeling of delight (used 18x in Philippians) something that life can't take away
 PAUL: writing about “joy” from prison (odd place if joy means happy)
 JOY is not taken away by our circumstances
 CS LEWIS: it must be sharply distinguished from feelings of happiness or pleasure.
 JOY occurs when all is right between me and God.
 “Joy of the Lord is our strength.” Neh. 8
 The source of JOY is Jesus and friendship with him.
 Matthew Henry describes joy as “The cheerfulness that comes from time spent with our friend.”

LET ME TELL YOU ABOUT MY WEEK...
Ethne was sick
My back went out
I missed work
Corrie has been sick
The basement of the church flooded
Most of the church leaders have been sick
We had lots of car "issues"
It was tough in the middle of it to find joy

Here's what Paul wrote from prison...
Philippians 1:3-11 Every time I think of you, I give thanks to my God. Whenever I pray, I make my requests for all of you with joy, for you have been my partners in spreading the Good News about Christ from the time you first heard it until now. And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. So it is right that I should feel as I do about all of you, for you have a special place in my heart. You share with me the special favor of God, both in my imprisonment and in defending and confirming the truth of the Good News. God knows how much I love you and long for you with the tender compassion of Christ Jesus. I pray that your love will overflow more and more, and that you will keep on growing in knowledge and understanding. For I want you to understand what really matters, so that you may live pure and blameless lives until the day of Christ’s return. May you always be filled with the fruit of your salvation—the righteous character produced in your life by Jesus Christ—for this will bring much glory and praise to God.

2008 is leading us to grow... to swim. As a swimmer, I will…
 SATISFY the Spirit’s leading.
 WIN the battles of the flesh.
 INHERIT the Kingdom.
 MANIFEST the character of God.

SWIMMING LESSON: JOY comes through the Story of Jesus
 Joy causes us to share the story. (1:5) Paul’s joy is overflowing with joy that though he is stuck in prison (still sharing btw), his partners are overflowing the story.
 Joy causes us to grow the story. (1:6) Our relationship with Jesus should be a growing one. It shows that his work on the cross is finished, but his work with us isn’t.
 Joy causes us to defend the story. (1:7) No matter where we are at, our passion for the story of Jesus that we find ourselves a part of should continue in full-force.
 Joy causes us to love the story. (1:8-9) The first fruit of God’s spirit is love. It is the ultimate expression of our joy towards each other because of what Jesus did for us.
 Joy causes us to SWIM the story. (1:10-11) Paul’s emphasis is the same as ours is for the “soaked” series all year long. That we learn to SWIM (tell acronym again). That we learn to grow in our faith. That our intimacy with Jesus comes so close… that we are so soaked in joy (inner delight in Jesus) so much… that we are confident in the story of Jesus so much so that our life echoes it.

As I went through this tough week, I began to ask myself some questions...
**Can people see it in me?
**Can they see the joy of that the story of Jesus brings?
**Am I soaked in the joy of knowing Jesu and his story?

TODAY
**Can they see it in you?
**Is your life soaked in joy?
**Do you want it to be?

WRAP UP
I love ducks. They have the ability to let all the cold rain of this life not penetrate their lives. A sponge on the other hand soakes up (like in the basement after the flood this week) and it's really hard to remove the cold, nasty rainwater.... Do you want to be a DUCK or a SPONGE?

SOAKED IN THE SPIRIT: part 5

SWIMMING LESSON: Urgency
March 16, 2008
with Matt Johnson
Intro:
The summer of 1987 was one of the best summers a kid could ask for. I was six. My dad had gotten tennis elbow in both of his elbows from the repetitive motion of his job. It eventually required surgery on both elbows, so he ended up taking off about six months from work for the surgeries and recovery. My brother and sister were both in high school at the time and were lifeguards for the local community pool. To keep himself from complete boredom, my dad became the pool manager that summer while he was home. Like I said, it was one of the best summers a kid could ask for – spending every day for the entire summer at the swimming pool. There was only one problem – I couldn’t swim.
My parents and siblings all still tease me about how scared I was of the pool. For the first two weeks of swimming lessons I clung to the side of the pool in the shallow end, refusing to let go. Eventually as the summer progressed I became comfortable in the water, and by the end of the summer I was doing back flips off of the high dive.
One of the best memories of that summer was the fourth of July. I remember feeling so special because the pool closed early that day but our family got to stay and swim. We had a big pool party and cook out and sat at the edge of the pool to watch the fireworks there in the park.
One of the family members that was there was my cousin Jason. He was always a squirrely kid. He’s about 6 months younger than me. Our grandparents took us both on a trip to Bush Gardens when we were 8 and Jason was the kid who ran up to the pelicans roaming around and tried to pet them. Consequently, he got a chunk of his forearm bitten out that has left a scar to this day. He was a squirrely kid. You know the type. He’s now a sharpshooter in the military. That makes you feel safe huh?
Anyway, just as the finale of the fireworks show was coming to a close, we all heard a big splash, and looked into the water. There was Jason, 5 ½ years old, in the deep end of the pool – sinking. He didn’t know how to swim, but got an urge to jump, so he did… Immediately both of my siblings, my dad, and Jason’s parents dove into the pool from where they were around the pool, all converging on him to rescue him.
There was an urgency to rescue him.

We’ve been going through this idea of being soaked in the spirit as we’ve talked about spiritual gifts. We’ve focused on the idea of learning to swim.
SWIMMERS
 …are WET because they can swim and they choose to swim.
 SATISFY the Spirit’s leading.
 WIN the battles of the flesh.
 INHERIT the Kingdom.
 MANIFEST the character of God.

Read: 1 Peter 4:7-11.

There should be an urgency to us learning to swim – the end of the world is coming soon…
It’s all “the last days” from the minute that Jesus heart began to beat once again on the third day, a countdown to his return has begun. Only god knows the timing, but the clock is ticking. It’s going to happen. That fact is as real now 2000 years later as it was for peter writing this in the mid 60 ad’s. The end of the world is coming soon. It may be overall, it may be for you specifically, but the end of all things is coming soon.
THEREFORE – Everything following should be understood in light of the preceding statement… The end of the world is coming soon… Therefore - There is an urgency to learning to swim.
Urgency in Swimming calls for:
**Serious Prayer
**Forgiving Love
**Cheerful Hospitality-
**God Empowered Service-
One of the things I remember about Jason jumping into the pool was that by the time adults got into the water and got to him, he had managed to doggie paddle to keep his head above water. It’s interesting how when the options are swim or drown, we usually find a way to swim. I think some of us could use a good dose of Jason’s fearlessness and bravery to jump in and swim. We’ve sat on the edge of the pool getting our feet wet for far too long. It’s time to swim. To get soaked in the spirit. The clock is ticking. It’s time for serious prayer, forgiving love, cheerful hospitality, God empowered service. It’s time to swim.

SOAKED IN THE SPIRIT: part 4

SWIMMING LESSON: Equipping
March 9, 2008
with Adam Waters



SWIMMERS
 …are WET because they can swim and they choose to swim.
 SATISFY the Spirit’s leading.
 WIN the battles of the flesh.
 INHERIT the Kingdom.
 MANIFEST the character of God.

INTRODUCTION
One of my favorite movies of all time is "The Thin Red Line." This movie talks about the soul of the men going through the battles in WWII. In this movie there are starkly different characters of leadership. Nick Nolte plays a brown-nosing colonel, complaining about this being his first war, full of ambition, doesn't care about his men and through the film he is voiceovering his regrets of how he treated his men. He is contrasted with 2 young captains that always looked out for the safety of their men, the health of their men (ex: do we need water), and who looked not only to their mission but to relationship with their men.

Ephesians 4:11-16 Now these are the gifts Christ gave to the church: the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, and the pastors and teachers. Their responsibility is to equip God’s people to do his work and build up the church, the body of Christ. This will continue until we all come to such unity in our faith and knowledge of God’s Son that we will be mature in the Lord, measuring up to the full and complete standard of Christ. Then we will no longer be immature like children. We won’t be tossed and blown about by every wind of new teaching. We will not be influenced when people try to trick us with lies so clever they sound like the truth. Instead, we will speak the truth in love, growing in every way more and more like Christ, who is the head of his body, the church. He makes the whole body fit together perfectly. As each part does its own special work, it helps the other parts grow, so that the whole body is healthy and growing and full of love.

CHURCH LEADERSHIP
1) Ambitious colonels are NOT soaked in the Holy Spirit of God.
2) Passionate and Compassionate captians are soaked in the Spirit... you can tell by the fruit of their ministries.

Getting Rid of Waste through Education
 APOSTLES: an official representative of Jesus
 PROPHETS: specific message, specific person(s)
 EVANGELISTS: one who brings the gospel to a new region
 PASTORS & TEACHERS: this is not an and, but rather a single group. Literally translated as the “teaching shepherds.”
 EQUIP – the setting of a bone – dynamically putting things in order
 BUILD UP – development – the rehab part

Helping you SWIM!
 Your personal swimming instructors.
 Help you navigate the waters of teaching.
 Leading you in Christ’s undertow!
 Healthy.
 Growing.
 Full of Love.
 Leadership’s responsibility is to equip & build.
 You are our responsibility. You are our living letters (2Corinthians 3:1-6).

As a leader SOAKED in God's Spirit, this is my goal! To confidently say that I need no credetials, but just the fruit of our equipping and building evidenced in your lives.

SOAKED IN THE SPIRIT: part 3

SWIMMING LESSON: We belong to each other.
March 2, 2008
with Adam Waters


INTRODUCTION
Are you ready to go swimming everyone? Are you ready for your 3rd lesson?
In the summer of 1995, I was first introduced to the movie Dumb and Dumber. This was an incredibly funny story of 2 guys who completely missed the point.
We DO NOT want you to miss the point of what we're doing here on Sundays.
We are not doing this "year of growth" just to tell you how to swim.
WE ACTUALLY WANT YOU TO BECOME BETTER SWIMMERS!!!

SWIMMERS
n …are WET because they can swim and they choose to swim.
n SATISFY the Spirit’s leading.
n WIN the battles of the flesh.
n INHERIT the Kingdom.
n MANIFEST the character of God.

WEEK #1 ~ We tried to focus you on the SOURCE of the gifts: God's Spirit!
WEEK #2 ~ We tried to focus you on the OUTCOME of the gifts: Love!

Romans 12:1-8 And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all he has done for you. Let them be a living and holy sacrifice—the kind he will find acceptable. This is truly the way to worship him. Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect. Because of the privilege and authority God has given me, I give each of you this warning: Don’t think you are better than you really are. Be honest in your evaluation of yourselves, measuring yourselves by the faith God has given us. Just as our bodies have many parts and each part has a special function, so it is with Christ’s body. We are many parts of one body, and we all belong to each other. In his grace, God has given us different gifts for doing certain things well. So if God has given you the ability to prophesy, speak out with as much faith as God has given you. If your gift is serving others, serve them well. If you are a teacher, teach well. If your gift is to encourage others, be encouraging. If it is giving, give generously. If God has given you leadership ability, take the responsibility seriously. And if you have a gift for showing kindness to others, do it gladly.

TODAY (week #3) ~ We really want you to focus on USING YOUR GIFTS.
12:1 “give your bodies to God because of all that he has done for you.”

Getting Rid of Waste:
n Being soaked in the Spirit requires you to get wet.
n Being soaked in the Spirit requires using your gift is worship.
n Being soaked in the Spirit requires God doing the transforming.
n Being soaked in the Spirit requires belonging to each other. Greek Study: members inside one another. The idea is one of intercourse.

Helping you SWIM!
n We have different gifts.
n We have the ability to do them WELL!
n We prophets must speak out.
n We servants need to get dirty.
n We teachers prepare to teach.
n We encouragers practice building up.
n We with money should let go of it.
n We leaders must take it seriously.
n We who are kindhearted can’t hold back.