Understanding God's Calling in Your Life

TRANSCRIPT

So now what I'm going to do, flip it from here, and I'm going to talk to you about one of my soap devotions. I'm going to talk it through and teach out of it just to help you understand what, what I think now is a framework to pull all this so far that we've been on this journey together. Now, the soap devotions is so important and it's so, for those of you that may not know, all it is, is we get together with two or three people and we all read the same portions of Scripture.

You'll do one portion of the Old Covenant, which was for ancient Israel, and pretty much you'll learn what not to do out of that. And then you go to the New Covenant, but this has been designed in such a way that, that Pastor Wayne Kidera that created the thing, he worked out what you see here under the Old, you'll get to see what, whether it's mirrored in the New Covenant, which means do, is it for us or not for us?

Does it shift? Does it change? What happens? And so we spend the first 20 minutes just reading together. And then the next 20 minutes is quiet. We're just writing our thoughts down, what we observe, how we're going to apply it, pray. So basically for the first 40 minutes, you're actually being silent.

Listening to God. Isn't that a novel thing? If I don't have this to do, I can listen to God for about 3 seconds. And then I'm back in again. But then we listen, and then we read. What happens then is then we read our devotions to each other. And as we do, we then interact together, and then we move from our personal revelation of something to a collective revelation about God.

It's amazing. But here's the thing. The key thing with this is the fact that you then are conformed to the image of Christ because it is the Holy Spirit on the scriptures that is mentoring you and coaching you. You're not being conformed to the image of a particular leader. Let's face it. One Kevin is enough.

Right? And one cam is definitely enough. I'm just saying, you know, like one of us each is enough, so we don't want everyone looking like the same. That's why if you look at all the way our guys teach and that, they're all different. They've all got their own uniqueness. Then there's no cookie cutter. And that's the power of the Serb devotions.

So the one I want to talk to you about is, I called it the call beyond our call. Because we have, we think we've got a call, but then there's a call beyond it. Now, to give you a little bit of the backstory. Jesus, of course, had this miraculous birth. And then he kind of disappears into nothing for the next 30 years.

All by one account when he's about 12. And he's, he kind of like stays behind when mum and dad visited the temple. And then they go off and about a day later they realise they've lost him. Can you imagine the terror they felt? They only had one job. Look after the Messiah and they've lost the Messiah. Man, that must have been terrifying, the three days until they found him.

So they get back. But that's the only account. And then it says he was sitting there and he was talking to the leaders. And they thought, oh, this guy's amazing. He's got such good knowledge. Other than that, it's just crickets. It's silent. Until suddenly he turns up to be baptized in the Jordan River by John.

And then he gets baptized and then something really freaky happens. Holy Spirit comes down. God endorses him. Wow, this is great. This is great. This is a great start. And then the next thing is the Holy Spirit leads him into the wilderness to be tested by God and tempted by the devil. Well, that's not very fair, but it had to happen.

He's out there for 40 days. What's going on out there? Well, I'll tell you what's going on. God is finding out whether Jesus will succeed where Adam failed. And Adam failed miserably. Sometimes Jesus in Scripture is referred to, you'll see it sometimes called, he's called the second Adam. Better interpretation is the last Adam.

So he, so he had to be tested to see whether he would make the grade. And he passed with flying colors. He was amazing. So now, now what's happening now is now it's time to pick the team. We've got to pick the team that's going to go out and change the world.

We're about to launch the thing that was promised to Abraham for all nations. Promised to Abraham. Never got there with Moses. Never quite got there. Got beyond Israel. But the promise to bless all nations. So this is wonderful. So now he's going out and now he's picking it up. So this is the verse right there in Matthew chapter 4.

This is it. As Jesus was walking beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and a brother Andrew. They were casting nets into the lake for they were fishermen. He said, come follow me, Jesus said, and I will send you out to fish for people. And then once they left their nets. At once they left their nets.

This is very, very important. Now, to understand the culture of the day, the young boys, they, it was the highest, highest thing for them to be selected by a rabbi. To be selected to be discipled by a rabbi. So what would happen is, but these kids, this is good, some of you young ones can do this. By the time they were six or seven, somewhere around there, they had memorized the whole Torah, which is the first five books of the Bible.

Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. They knew it off by heart, by five or six. By the time they were 16, 17, they pretty much knew the whole of the old covenant. And then if they were considered good enough, they would be selected by a rabbi and they would be called and then they would be discipled intensely, apprenticed, and then eventually they would be able to make disciples as well.

It's amazing. So when Jesus said to them, come follow me, they recognized something in Jesus. of a rabbi, of a teacher, even though he hadn't been trained in the rabbinical priesthood of the old covenant. He had this authority. So they just immediately let go of everything. Because what would happen in the rabbinical side is that once they were selected, that's exactly what happened.

They would leave their family, they would leave their business, they would leave everything and they would go into this intense kind of training. So what happens is you see the family and vocation business were trumped. They were being invited into a discipleship process. And that was the call that was coming beyond what they thought was their call.

I'm called to family. I'm called to be in the family business. I'm called to this. And then this call came. But then what Jesus is doing, He's helping them understand that there is a framework by which all the pieces of our lives fit perfectly. And so we become this love letter. So this is what I wrote down as my observation.

I said the Holy Spirit wants us to remember something very important. God's claim and call upon our life trumps both family and vocation and life. His will is for us to be holy as He is holy. His call is for us to be conformed to the image of Christ and then go and make disciples. And that's the reason why we're still on earth.

If you were here last week, you heard Pauline say, you know, like, I can't wait one day to step through the doorway of death and meet this man that sacrificed everything for me. Why? Because there's something, there's something in her because of what God God has done in her that is longing to actually see him, but she's got to stay for a while because there's work to be done.

It's like Paul said, I'd like to go and be with Christ, but I got to stay because there's work to be done. But what Jesus was doing, He was helping them realize that there is a shift. You've always thought the family and the business was everything. That's what it was all about in Israel. No, no, no, no. It's different now.

In fact, on one occasion, Jesus' mother and brothers were coming to see him because they'd heard, he was teaching, teaching some stuff that was a little weird and offensive to the Jews. So they were coming to try and get him. So they, they're there and they're knocking at the door and they just said, Hey, listen, we need to get in here, and we talk to Jesus.

So they come to Jesus and they say, your mother's and your, your, sorry, your mother and your brother's at the door. And this is Jesus' reply, he replied to them, my mother and brothers. are those who hear God's Word and put it into practice.

He said, my mother and my brothers, those who hear God's Word and put it into practice. Now he wasn't dissing his family at all. He was helping them to understand there is a call beyond the call. There's a call that comes that is beyond all this, but this fits perfectly into it if you get it right. He did the same thing with work.

He did the same thing with work.

Let me read this to you, James chapter 4. He said, Now listen to you who say today or tomorrow we'll go to this city or that, spend a year there, carry on business, make money, while you don't even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

See? See? The only thing between you and eternity is a very thin piece of skin that's containing you. That's all it is. And no one knows on this. Like I was thinking about Ashley Good. Remember Ashley Good? See, we forget so fast. A mom walking her baby through a shopping center and a man with severe mental problems stabs her and stabs her baby.

She loses her life, see, she's just a mist. We appear just for a little bit of time. Little bit of time. And you've got to make the most of the time that we have while we're here. But it goes on to say, Instead you ought to say, If it is the Lord's will, We will live and do this and do that. So you see there is a call that is beyond the call.

And that's the one we have to respond to. Because when you respond to that call, everything in your life starts to make sense. So this is kind of what I wrote down as my application. I must remember no matter what family I grow up in, no matter what I choose to do as a vocation or in this world, whatever claim, sorry, God's claim and call for me is in Jesus.

And it's beyond everything else. Because it is tied to Jesus. to Jesus mission from the Father in this world. And that's why we're still here. And it's the call to go make disciples. It's the call to come follow, make disciples. So what was that call that he was saying to them? He was basically saying right at the start there, he says, love God, just love God, because if you love God, then you will follow me.

And if you follow me you will love others. And if you love others you'll make disciples. He was calling them into a framework and saying everything fits in there really nicely. Fits in there nicely.

So your family fits in there.

By the way, Indy's going, yeah, that's me. Your family fits inside there. It's part of the puzzle, but it's fitting in that border of loving God, making disciples, loving others, sorry, loving God, following Jesus, loving others, and making disciples. Now listen, what happens now is anytime something in here makes its way to the outside, it's a problem.

Because that, once it makes its way to the outside, that becomes an idol. And then, if you put your family out round there, all these other pieces are going to struggle to fit together, and it's going to be a tension. Your family is always going to be a tension against business, or a tension church, or whatever it happens to be, if it goes that way.

If business goes out there, if you put yourself out there, You're going to continually be in tension because you're elevating you to the idol status. But if you say, no, no, no, no, everything's part. Everything fits part of that call of Jesus, which is beyond every other call. And then all you've got to do is surrender.

Surrender to His will. Come follow Him. Love God. Come follow Him. Love others the way that Jesus loves us and go make some disciples. It's not hard. But when you have those pieces in there, they fit perfectly together. Because there is a framework around it and there's also a foundation underneath it. I was so excited this morning when, when Nara picked Waymaker.

Picked Waymaker. Even when I can't see it, you're moving. When I can't feel it, you're moving. Why? Because there is a framework, there's a border and there's a foundation that God is continually to work with. Can you imagine how different life would be if every human being found their meaning, purpose and identity in Christ's love and claim and call and mission over their lives?

Wow! That would change everything. It's the reason why this framework is the reason why we can be for the Gold Coast and not get caught up in everything. Some churches they get for something in the context of the community and the next thing you know that's all they're known for. We're batting for this particular team or we have this particular, but that's when you get out, you put it on the outside then and then it starts to be an idol and frames everything.

But because we have this. Oh, it's different. Now we can be for family. We can be for business. Look at that. Look at that. For family. Fits perfectly into this. For business. I'm so jealous. Tom got to meet, what's his name? Jordan Peterson. Thank you very much. They look like they're actually brothers. Wow. For the arts.

Who's this? Alabaster Box.

Hmm. Sport. Retro. Education. Cross linked discussion. One of our politicians. Family. Education. See, all that fits perfectly in the framework. Fits perfectly in there. If any one of those things fits. See, if, if Glenn become, Glenn Tosa say becomes this, it's all about Glenn. If it becomes all about Glenn, then he becomes the idol.

Nothing else fits now. It doesn't work together. Same thing, if the arts comes up there, I'm a great lover of the arts, but art for art's sake is useless. It's gotta have a purpose because God is the creator of the arts. And so how do we use the arts to reach people for Christ? You know? It all seamlessly goes together because loving God with all your heart, mind, soul, and strength, and then teaching everyone to follow Jesus, and we're going to love others the way that Jesus loved us, and then we're going to go make disciples.

See, they're the seven culture shaping agents of society.

And if you remember, if you happened to be around when I first started, I felt like God said, our job is to influence the culture shaping agents of society. I don't believe it's Christians responsibility to lead in these things or control these things. I think we're supposed to be salt and light, the little bit that's in there, that's influencing for Jesus in every area.

When you do this, when you live like this, guess what happens? God gets to be God and you get to live stress free. You don't have to be anxious about anything because it's all within the framework of what Jesus said the call to come about and the foundation of Christ flowing in and through us. Even when we can't see it, even when we don't know it, it's happening.

It's so cool. My prayer at the end of this was, I just wrote, Father help me to remember your call on my life that goes beyond family and vocation, the call to learn, to let you live in and through me. To simply go and make disciples. Go fish for people, help people that are far from God, help people that are lost, try and figure out the truth about life.

Cause that's what discipleship is. Discipleship is helping people move from unbelief to belief in every area of their life for Jesus. And that's what we got to do. So we get to decide, will I continue to put idols out around there? Well, you can, and then you will live a stressed life and eventually the idol does not pay and it actually robs you of everything.

Or you can choose to say, nah, you know what? We're just going to love God with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. We're going to respond to Jesus call to follow him. We're going to go love people in this world, the way that he loved us. And then we're going to teach them. How to follow him, make disciples.

The thing about that verse that stuck out to me when I was, when I was journaling down was the at once, the at once.

And that ties back to why I wanted to pause today is we hear things. God speaks to us about things and we know we should change it. But for whatever reason, we just keep finding a way of kind of like delaying it and delaying it and delaying it. But in the end, delayed obedience is disobedience. I had someone talk to me a little while back and they said, God's not talking to me.

I said, Oh, okay. I said, tell me what was the last thing he said to you? Anyway, they spelled out the last thing he said. I said, so let me ask you a question. What have you done with what he asked you to do? Oh well, I've been busy and you know, this has been going on, the family things are going on.

I said, okay, so what have you done with it? Nothing. So let me say this to you. Why would he bother telling you anything else? If you're not going to do anything with the last thing he told you? Oh, yeah. So you need to deal with it, face it, figure it out, make adjustments. And he made adjustments. Started to walk towards it, made adjustments.

Guess what happens next? God's talking to me. He's talking to me again. Well, he was always talking. You just couldn't hear because you chose to not do what he'd asked you to do. You know what I mean? It's about going and making disciples. So there's this at once. So as we're closing this morning, I've asked the team to come and I want them to sing an old song.

Just a little bit of it called, I Surrender All, because this is really what this is about. This whole three, three months that we've been on is about helping you to figure out, deal with your past. Stop letting your past control you. Face it. And there are things that we've got here to help you.

Emotionally healthy spirituality. Simplify your life. Simplify it. And realize you're here, if you're here at this time in human history, it's very, very strategic. Because you're part of God's plan for whatever he wants to do before he returns. I was actually thinking about it, and I haven't written this in my notes, but I was thinking about Jesus before he went to the cross, and he asked his disciples to just pray with him.

He said, could you just pray with me? Could you just stay awake and just pray with me? And each time he would come along and they were asleep and they came along and they were asleep again and they were asleep. And it's like, oh wow. And I said what are you, what are you sharing with that for? He said, It's not far away approaching when I will return.

And when I return, I will be bringing angels with me. And those angels will go and sort out of the kingdom who's in and who's out. Who are sheep, who are goats, who are wheat, who are tares, who are hares, who are from the evil one. And I said, okay, I get that. I understand that. He said, and then there'll be the final sorting.

He said, I need you to stay awake. He said, I need you to pray with me. Because this, we think that's going to be a great victorious moment for God, and it's going to be full of celebration. Amen. He said, it's going to have an element of grief in it for me because those that have rejected me all along and just continue to reject me, there will be a parting takes place and that will,

that will be devastating for me of everything that I've done and all that I've tried to do to help people connect and they've just refused all the way along. And he said, so I need you to stay awake, need you to pray with me. And I don't, you know, I just feel like that's a word for the church. Now is not the time to go to sleep.

Now is the time to bet the farm, risk it all, do whatever you need to do to allow God to use you. And understand that that call that he's got for you. It's beyond everything else. And it will frame your life, and it will be the foundation of your life. And then you'll be able to walk with Jesus all the days of your life.

And you'll continually be on a journey of surrendering and letting go. So let me pray, and then the team's just gonna sing this for us so we can do business with God for ourselves. But allow God to speak to you, and then determine, whatever He says, You're gonna action it. You're gonna apply it. Father, I just thank you for the way you've led us across this season.

I'm just just amazed that how you put these things together and, and when you stop and you pause and you look back and you realize, wow, this is about dealing with our past. This is about simplifying our life and, and realizing we're here, not for us. We're here because there are people in our city that don't know Christ that need to know that there's a God out there that loves them passionately.

So would you allow us as we just listened to this song, would you create an at once moment in our hearts? That once again, we will just surrender wholeheartedly to you. So we want to love you with all our heart, mind, soul, and strength. And we're committed, Jesus, you lead, we'll follow. And we'll love people as best we can the way that you loved us, which was sacrificing all.

And then we'll make disciples, not disciples of us, but disciples that will follow you into whatever that you've got for them. So Lord, I thank you that. Hopefully this revelation, I've made it clear enough that people understand that every year of our life functions perfectly if it's in that frame and if it has that foundation.

So Father, as we sing, would you just do a work in our hearts, both online and in the room, I pray in Jesus name. Amen.