Let's turn in our Bibles to Luke 1. Luke 1, we're going to dive in to the Scriptures. How many of you are ready for a Bible study today? We got to get some highlighters out, get some writing utensils, get ready to flip.
I mean, we're going to be in Luke. We're going to be in John. We're going to be in Isaiah. We're going to be in Malachi.
And so I want to maintain expectations here. Everybody say, I'm listening. All right. What we're going to do is we're going to learn about John the Baptist and his storyline and how it's actually to influence how we're going to carry ourselves in our city.
So that's what we're going to do. Some of you, we're going to get into it. And you're going to be like, well, could you just talk about me? You know?
Like, could you just talk about my life? And instead of talking about your life, I'm going to talk about John the Baptist life. But it's going to be a good time. We're going to have a good time.
And we're going to read the Bible. And it's going to be good. And so I want to just maintain your expectations. I'm not going to have a bunch of practical, like, hey, this is how you can implement this tool right now in your life.
I consider this a message more like a prophetic exhortation for us as a community. I just really felt going into today, it was like a prophetic message for us as a people in a house. And for some of you, it might be a little bit of a reminder. But I really believe that it's to call us into our destiny as a people.
And I want it to land. OK? And we're going to have a time where I want to pray for the evangelists at the end of the message. OK?
And I want to believe for God to encounter the evangelists in our community and that they get sent out. All right. So that's where we're going. We're going to start in Luke 1.
And we're starting with Johnny B's dad. All right? Johnny B, his pops, Zechariah, was a priest. And Zechariah was a priest at the temple.
And they cast lots, which is kind of like rolling the dice. And his lot was selected. And that means it was his job to go into the holy place in the temple. And for these priests, they would actually tie bells to them when they went into the holy place, because they knew if the bells stopped ringing, then the priest croaked in the presence of the Lord.
OK? So this is like high stakes. When you go into the presence of Yahweh, you might not come out alive. All right?
And so there's a seriousness. There's a reverence that all of the priests did when, can you imagine, when I show up to the base every day, and it's like, is he going to make it out? You know? Can you imagine?
That's intense. Right? And so today, in this story, Zechariah, in verse 13, all of a sudden, he's in the holy place. And an angel shows up out of nowhere, and it's the angel Gabriel.
And Gabriel starts talking to him. And I would be just very afraid if I was Zechariah. And that's why, and Gabriel knows, he just spooked Zechariah to such a degree where Zechariah is fight flight wherever. And so he says, hey, don't be afraid in verse 13.
For your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you. So this is the first mention of what we're talking about when we're talking about John the Baptist in his life. For your prayer has been heard, and your wife Elizabeth will bear you a son, and you shall call his name John, which means the Lord is gracious. Verse 14, and you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth, for he will be great before the Lord.
And he must not drink wine or strong drink, but he will be filled with the Holy Spirit. Man, I hear Ephesians 5 right there. Have you ever drawn that? You should just look at Ephesians 5 here.
Might as well. This is specifically for some of you in the 530. We didn't talk about this at the 230. So this is a word for some of us.
Ephesians 5, 15. Look carefully than how you walk, not as wise but as wise, making the best use of the time because the days are evil. Therefore, do not be foolish, but understand what God wants. Verse 18, do not get drunk with wine for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Holy Spirit, addressing one another in Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always for everything God the Father in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for the Lord.
Right before that says, awake, I was leaped, rise from the dead, Christ is going to shine on you. I just wonder if that Ephesians passage is harkening back to the call of John the Baptist and that the days are evil and we are to be not drunk with wine, but be filled with the Holy Spirit. This is just a bonus, but I want to encourage you. Some of you are drinking too much.
And some of you are getting drunk. And the Lord just kind of took a detour just now, just at the 530 service, just for you, because he loves you. And I want to call you out of drunkenness. And I want to call you into being filled with the Holy Spirit.
Drunkenness is destroying lives. And you don't think it's destroying your life now, but it will, I promise you, it will destroy your life. And it's, there's the mercy of God. We're just thinking about the mercy of God for an hour.
It's the mercy of the Lord that I am a mouthpiece with the scriptures to actually say, hey, wake, wake up. Drunkenness is going to bring destruction. And I want to just, I just want to infuse this into your soul. Drunkenness will bring destruction.
Beware and instead be filled with the Holy Spirit. Wow, that was, oh man. Yay. Do you know what?
Life in the Spirit is so much better than drunkenness from alcohol. It's so much better than like a high, it's so much better. And some of you are like, well, I'm not getting drunk, but I'm getting high all the time. When, are you real?
You're like, no, but I just, you know, I just smoke weed all the time. It's not a big deal. I just smoke weed all the way. Listen, your brain is actually being brought out of like real coherence.
And you're not in your right mind and you have less self-control. And the Lord's calling and I'm not talking about medical situations, okay? I'm talking about, it's just recreational. And I want to encourage you out of recreational drunkenness and out of recreational highs and into the highs of the kingdom and being filled with the Holy Spirit.
All right, okay, let's get into Luke one. Man, it's a joyful thing to repent. Like you get to joyfully turn. It's not like a heavy handed.
I'm not trying to be heavy handed. I'm trying to show you a different way that's better for you. I'm really caring for you. I'm thinking about you.
I want what's best for you. And that's, and I believe the Lord does too, more than I do. Where are we? We're in Luke one.
Johnny B is not gonna drink wine or strong drink, but he's gonna be filled with the Holy Spirit. He's like an Azerite. And even with his mother's womb, he's gonna be filled with the Holy Spirit. Verse 16, he will turn many of the children of Israel to the Lord.
He's gonna help many of his nation repent and turn to God. Verse 17, and he, John the Baptist, will go before him, the Lord, in the spirit of the power of Elijah. And what Elijah did is Elijah confronted sexual perversion and confronted immorality. And so Elijah carried the message of repentance.
And so that's what John the Baptist is gonna do. And he's gonna operate in that same spirit and power. And he's going to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just to make ready for the Lord a people prepared. I love that phrase, a people prepared.
I want you to turn it in your Bible to verse 76 now, Luke 1, 76. So what's happened is Zechariah, Gabriel says, Zechariah, you're gonna have this baby. And he kinda has the same reaction that Abraham and Sarah had, right? He's kinda like, wait, what?
Are you sure? And then Gabriel is, in essence, saying, hey, you're gonna be mute, you're not gonna talk for the next nine months. And so Zechariah comes out of the temple and he can't speak. And for nine months, there is no words that leave Zechariah's mouth.
Until John the Baptist is born, Johnny B is born, Zechariah is so excited. He still can't say anything. They say, what is his name gonna be? And Elizabeth says John, and then Zechariah says, yeah, it's John.
And right when he says John, then his tongue gets loosed and he's able to speak again. And the first thing that he does after he names his son John is he begins to prophesy over his son. And he's been brewing on what the angel Gabriel said to him for nine months. And so he's got this storm of revelation around his little boy.
And he looks into the eyes of his newborn and he says, this is what's gonna happen. This is who you are, this is your call. And you're gonna hear what Gabriel said laced throughout Zechariah's mess. Zechariah is a priest.
In other words, he understands, he remembers the whole testament. He has it memorized. And so he's gonna be all over the scriptures, prophesying over his son, who's to be like Elijah, preparing the way or preparing the people to meet God, to meet Jesus. Okay, so verse 76.
Are we okay? Man, I know I talked about marijuana. And then I talked about alcohol and all you didn't know what to do. Sorry, I told him.
Why did I do that? That's horrible. That's beautiful, Elijah. Verse 76.
And you, child, will be called the prophet of the most high, he's prophesying over his boy. For you will go before the Lord and you're gonna prepare his ways to give knowledge of salvation to his people in the forgiveness of their sins. Because of the tender mercy of our God, whereby, oh man, I love this phrase, the sunrise shall visit us from on high. To give light to those who sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the way of peace.
I want you to look at verse 76 and that phrase, for you will go before the Lord and prepare his ways. And you can write, if you are the type of person that writes in your Bible, you can write Malachi three verse one in Malachi four verse five. Malachi three verse one, Malachi four verse five. He's quoting those two passages in Malachi here.
Then I want you to look at verse 78, the sunrise shall visit us from on high. Malachi four verse two, if you wanna write that in, next to this verse, the Malachi four verse two. And then verse 79 is a quote from Isaiah nine. If you remember the passage that Jesus quotes when he's at Nazareth.
And he says, those who are sitting in darkness have seen a great light, so it's Isaiah nine. I want us to turn to Malachi actually, we're gonna turn to those passages. I was just thinking for the future, you know, when you're studying your Bible and you're in Luke one, you're gonna see those references and it's gonna be fun because you're gonna cross our friends back and you're gonna be able to read these, okay? This will be this week when you get into this deeper.
Malachi three verse one. This is the prophecy about John the Baptist. Can you imagine having like looking at the scriptures and realizing one of the minor prophets wrote about your life? So John knows this is about me.
This is what I'm gonna do. Behold, I send my messenger before me. The Lord whom you seek will suddenly come to his temple. It's talking about Jesus, God in the flesh, the Lord, will suddenly come to his temple, the messenger of the covenant in whom you delight, behold he is coming and says the Lord of hosts, but who can endure the day of his coming?
Who can stand when Jesus appears? For he is like a refiner's fire, like full or so. He will sit as a refiner and a purifier of silver. He will purify who the priests.
Uh oh, the religious leadership of Israel. He's gonna bring purification, refining them like gold and silver so they'd walk in righteousness. Then you can look over, you can look over at verse 18. Once more you shall see the distinction.
Look at that phrase. You're going to see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked. How many of you know if you're at the party and you're drinking? How many of you know passes the joint to you?
You're an unbelieving friend. But there's not very much of a distinction between you and them, is there? All right. I went back to it.
You're like, I thought we were done. Nope, I went back. Then once more you shall see the distinction between the righteous and the wicked between one who serves God and one who does not serve him. But the day is coming burning like an oven where he's going to come and the evil doers will be like, oh, this is like day of the Lord type language.
Verse two, but for you who fear my name, look at this, the son of righteousness shall rise with healing and its wings. You shall go out leaping like calves from the stall. Look at verse five, he hold, I'm going to send you Elijah the prophet before the great and awesome day of the Lord comes. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children.
It's just an exact quote from the one, the hearts of children to their fathers lest I come and strike the land with a decree of utter destruction. Zechariah knows that he doesn't have what it takes to raise his son, John. He knows, yeah, I'm a priest, but we're talking about like Old Testament prophecies and I'm going to raise up the prophet of the Lord to prepare the people of God to meet the Messiah. And if I was Zechariah, I would be a little concerned because I am old.
Do you remember Zechariah and Elizabeth, they are like way over the hill. This is a miracle, like Elizabeth should have not had born a child. We're talking about they're old, really old, okay? And Zechariah doesn't have the energy that he once had.
And so they're going, how are we going to raise the second coming of like Elijah? How's this going to work? And Zechariah, as he's thinking about this and as he's pondering this, for these nine months, you better believe that he's meditating on Gabriel's words and he's thinking about some priest friends that he knows. He's going, who is going to help me raise this boy?
And he thinks about his network of people. Cause it's like, what am I going to do when I'm gone? What is, how is he going to get raised up when I'm gone? And he's thinking about these priest friends that he knows.
And he's comparing his notes of what Gabriel said, what he's sensing from the Lord. And there's this group of priests that he is in relationship with. And he goes, I know who is going to raise up this prophet of God, my friends, the Essenes. Everybody say, Essenes.
The Essenes were a group of priests that decided, we're done with the Pharisees and the Sadducees. And this whole religious order is so corrupt. We're done with this and we're going to go into a commune outside of Jerusalem and we're going to be like monks separate from the religious order of this first century. Are you hearing me?
So as I got, I know some of those guys and these Essenes were kind of hostile to the Pharisees, the religious leaders of that day. They didn't like them, okay? Because they felt like they were in connection with the Herodians and there's all this Roman empire corruption and they're like, they sold out to the enemy. We've got to be pure before God.
And so the Essenes were this group of zealous, prophetic, passionate scribes, okay? How many of you have ever heard of the Dead Sea Scrolls? Can you raise your hand? The Dead Sea Scrolls, one of the greatest archeological finds in modern history.
There's a guy, there's a Muslim guy that is walking in Israel in 1940s, 1950s. This Muslim guy throws a rock in this region called Qumran, okay? It's about 20 miles east of Jerusalem. And so he throws this rock and he's just, you know, just as a guy, you get it.
I'm just like, hey, there's a rock and I'm gonna throw the rock. All right? And you're like, oh, that looks like a cave in there. I'm gonna throw the rock into the cave.
That's what happened. This guy throws a rock into a cave and he hears something break in the cave. You know if you throw a rock, I have never done this, but if you throw a rock into a piece of glass, it might shatter, right? And so there's like pottery, it breaks.
And he threw it and he's like, he climbs up into the cave and there's these jars that are 2000 years old and they have parchment on them, scrolls on them, and they're from a group called the Essenes that made copies of the Old Testament scriptures 2000 years earlier. This happened in the 1940s and 1950s. And they found like hundreds of scrolls and writings from the Essenes. Now I want you to listen to how the Essenes, they're built different, you guys.
They were so passionate about the Word of God. You don't, you're like, man, I read my Bible, you don't get it, you don't know, you don't understand. This is how, so what they did was they copied, remember they didn't have typewriters, they didn't have computers, it wasn't like duplicate file. They didn't do that, okay, they didn't have that technology.
They had to hand write copy of the scriptures if they wanted another copy of it. So what they did is they were committed to preserving the Old Testament because they're going, all of this corruption, who knows what the priesthood is gonna do in the temple, we're going to actually steward. And they were known for a couple things. The first thing is that they were gonna know the path.
Everybody say, know the path. They were gonna know the Word. That's what that means, know the path or know the Word. And they were gonna walk the path.
Everybody say walk the path. They're gonna walk out the Word. They didn't wanna just be here, remember the book of James, they wanted to be doers of the Word and they took that seriously. We are going to listen to the Word and we are going to obey it, okay?
And so these scribes, I need to just kind of gather a couple people, I'm gonna choose you and you and you, okay? This is how they would write out the scriptures, all right? Here we go, here's Ben. Ben's in a scene with me.
And they were gonna start with Genesis, Genesis 1, in the beginning, right? That's, is that the first words of the Bible, in the beginning? We're gonna start at the start, okay? In the beginning.
And this is how they would write out the scriptures. They would have four guys that would work on this project at the same time. The first guy would be reading the scroll that they have, the record of the scroll of Genesis. And he would say one word, in.
And then Ben would be my guy behind me, also reading it. And Ben would confirm that I read the correct word. And Ben would go, yup. And then Brie would write the word in.
And then Zach would confirm that Brie wrote the right word, the word in. And they would do it over and over again. If I was writing, if I was taking a copy of Genesis, I'd be like, in the beginning, what? You know, it's like, I'd be like full, no, no, no, one word at a time.
Then they would come up to the phrase, yaw way, the name yaw way. They wouldn't just write yaw way, no, no, no, no, no, no. They would all stand up from the table. And they would go get baptized in the mikvah before they would ever write the name yaw way on the scroll.
Any time yaw way's name came up, they would all stand up, go repent, get cleansed, and then come back to the table and write the name yaw way. I'm talking about devotion to the word. I'm talking about radical obedience to God, and they knew it. They knew the Lord.
And they believed, they had this belief, that if they remain faithful and steadfast, and they know the path and they walk it, eventually everyone is going to turn, and they're going to know where to find us. And they're going to come out to the desert, and they're going to repent. And then it's going to prepare, let's look at Isaiah 40. This is what their call was.
I'm just talking about the Essenes a little bit. Isaiah 40 verse three. You're going to hear Malachi in here, you're going to hear, because Malachi was quoting from Isaiah a little bit, you're going to hear Gabriel quoting from this, you're going to hear Luke, John, all in this passage. Isaiah 40 verse three.
A voice cries in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord. Remember that in Luke, John's call is to prepare the people. That's the same, it's synonymous. Preparing the way and preparing the people is the same thing.
Prepare the way of the Lord. Make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be lifted up, every mountain and hill made low. The uneven ground shall become level, and the rough places of plain, and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed.
And all the flesh will see it together for the mouth of the Lord has spoken. Look at verse five, the glory of the Lord shall be revealed. That was the thing that the Essenes were after. We want the glory of God to be revealed.
We want God to come. That was what they were after. I want God. I don't want just good services and a couple of mikvah washes.
I go through the motions, no, I want God. That's what they were after. And they wanted all flesh to see him. They wanted the glory of God to be experienced.
So that's what they were about. Now I want us to turn to John 1. Turn to John 1. Are we OK?
We're just going to keep on tracking here. So I have reason to believe, and some theologians believe that John the Baptist was discipling and raised up under this sect of Judaism called the Essenes. It's not anywhere in the scriptures, but as I put two and two together, I think that we're in the right direction. You don't have to believe that, but that's what I believe.
Let's pick up in John 1, verse 19. Now John the Baptist is not a baby anymore. He's over the age of 30. Is that Gari and Elizabeth are long gone?
And John does something that's very not normal for the Essenes. What he does is he starts, instead of saying, people are just going to come out to us when they're ready to turn, he says, no, I'm going to go to them. That's not very a scene like. The scenes are kind of doing their own thing, and they'll play a mercy of God over all the other people that are wicked, right?
They're the monks that are in rural Minnesota that set up a commune and just hold on for Armageddon. They're called the preppers. How many of you know that phrase, preppers? The preppers are like when you guys, some of you were born after the year 2000, but some of you remember 1999 transition into 2000.
Man, I don't know how early my bathtub was filled. It was at least a couple days, because you didn't know how much, you know, if we're going to run out of water. Some of you still don't understand what I'm talking about. Why 2K?
I'm talking about the end of the world as we know it. Because the clocks were not going to know what to do. Because they were going to go from 1999. That 99 was going to go to two zeros.
And all of technology was going to be destroyed. And especially in the West, everything was going to crumble. And we need to purchase as much dehydrated food as possible. And we got to prepare.
And Remington's stock went up way high, because everybody's buying guns, because we know it's what's coming, OK? It was just like in 2020 when it's like everybody's buying toilet paper, no toilet paper, anywhere at all. So anyways, what I'm not doing is coming at anybody in the room that you're like, well, I'm prepared. And I have a stockpile.
Praise God, you have a stockpile. You want to know why you have that stockpile? So you can give it away. And then the Lord can multiply it.
It is going to be amazing. And if you have a stockpile, I'm coming over to your house. So continue to hold onto that. When things go south, that's like what Joseph did.
He knew that a famine was coming. And he's going to stockpile. And then the nations are coming to him to get food. So I'm not saying that's bad if you're a prepper.
Go on prepping. But anyways, the vaccines we're kind of seeing is crazy, because they're going out in the wilderness, just waiting for the end to come. And the Messiah to roll through and just conquer the enemy. And God bring his kingdom.
So here we are, John 1. You guys, how many of you came in knowing a lot about the Essenes? Raise your hand. Yeah, a couple?
OK, good. All right, I haven't bored you. John 1, John's starting to baptize people. There's a bunch of crowds that are coming out to him.
And verse 19 says, this is the testimony of John. When the Jews sent priests and Levites from Jerusalem to ask him, hey, who are you? He confessed and did not deny, but confessed. We really need to know that he confessed.
I am not the Christ. And then they asked him, what then are you Elijah? And he said, I'm not. That's really confusing if you know the Matthew passage where Jesus is saying that he is Elijah.
And it was prophesied over him by his dad and Gabriel that he would be like Elijah. So that's interesting. But what's happening in this story is there's different opinions among the Pharisees of what the Messiah was going to be. So there was some Pharisees that thought the Messiah is going to be like the second coming.
It's going to be one person, but he's going to be like the coming of Elijah and Moses again. Like in Deuteronomy 18, there's a prophesied second Moses that's going to come. And then we've got these prophecies about Elijah coming again. And so some of the Pharisees thought there was all going to be one guy.
And so John the Baptist is wanting to make it clear, I'm not the guy. I'm not the combo of Elijah and Moses and the Messiah. All right, let's keep on going. And they said, who are you?
We literally walked 20 miles. And our bosses are going to be upset with us if we don't give them a good answer. That's what they're saying. What do you say about yourself?
Verse 23, he said, I am the voice. As Isaiah 40, I am the voice of one crying out in the wilderness, makes straight the way of the Lord, as the prophet Isaiah said. So he's going, hey, I'm the one that is called to prepare the way of the Lord, to bring those hills and those mountains up and down and bring the valleys up. And what does that mean?
Well, when everything's a level plane, you can get a sight line to see. And John's purpose is going, I'm supposed to prepare the way of the Lord. I'm supposed to prepare the people so they all get a sight line to look at God. I want them all to see him when he comes.
So his call is to prepare people to see Jesus. Look at verse 24, now they had been sent from the Pharisees and they asked him, what the heck are you doing? Why are you baptizing? If you're not the Messiah, the coming anointed to king and you're not Elijah and you're not the prophet and John answered them.
I baptize with water and then he looks over out of the side of his peripheral vision and he sees Jesus there and he says, there is one among you that stands and you don't know him. He's coming after me, but I'm not even worthy to wash his feet or take the straps off of his sandals because this one, I just pictured John kind of like looking at them, looking past them at the Lord. He's saying, this one is like the moment where Moses is standing on holy ground and God says, take off your sandals because this is holy ground. But we're talking about one who he himself, it's not just ground that's holy.
It's he himself is holy. I can't even touch his sandals, the unclean part of people during that day. I can't even come close to touching his holiness. He's the second Messiah that Deuteronomy 18 was talking about.
It's him. And so John the Baptist says that and then all these things happen by the Jordan. And as we're thinking about this, I want to draw our attention to how the scenes know the path and they walk the path and they are called to prepare the people. So John the Baptist is called to prepare the people, prepare the way, prepare the way of who, the Lord.
And what I want to call us to as a people is to become a John the Baptist like people. That would prepare the way of the Lord. And I'm not necessarily talking about the return of Jesus, though there is every single day that we live, we get one day closer to the return of Jesus. Is that right?
We get one day closer. And the hour is accelerating. It's just like what's happened in human history in the last hundred years since Israel became a nation is exponential. If you look at all the graphs of society and globalism and the increase of knowledge, it's like knowledge is increasing, like Daniel prophesied about at such an exponential degree, it's insane.
And that's happening in our day and the birth pains that Jesus prophesied about are getting closer and closer and closer and closer. And so I don't blame you if you're a prepper, but I do want to call us into not preparing to be self-focused and in self-protection, but I want to call us to actually prepare people to meet the Lord. John the Baptist is called and he's going, I'm called to prepare them to know him. And there's a strategy that the scene's got and they knew.
And the strategy was we're going to know the word and we're going to walk the word out. And it's actually, and then John the Baptist adds to it and he goes, I'm going to bring the path to them. So I'm going to bring the way to them because they can't get a sight line to see the Lord, because they have only seen religion. They need to see him.
You know what I found is in my, I have a couple of relationships where I've kind of been wondering, are these people ever going to give their lives to the Lord? Do you have relationships like that? Where it's like, why am I even connected to them anymore? But it's just, they just keep on being there.
I have a couple of people I'm in relationship with where I'm their first call, everybody say first call. When everything goes downhill, when everything's hitting the fan, when they want to come back to God, I'm their first call. How many of you are somebody's first call? The Lord wants to raise us up as a whole community of people where it's like, well, I know who to call.
I know someone that knows the truth and actually walks it out. So then when they realize, I want to turn, I want to repent, I want to turn back to God. They don't have to just figure it out by themselves. They don't have to just kind of see how this is going to go.
They actually have somebody on speed dial that they can call and go, hey, I'm coming back. God is raising you up as a first responder for all of those that want to repent. All of those that want to surrender their life to Jesus, that have been going around the mountain and the wilderness 40 years, and they're finally going to go, OK, I guess I'm going to come back to the Lord. All the people that have been in pig slop and they've been just running away from the Father and the Lord's going, hey, they need to get a sight line.
They can't see clearly. They need someone. They don't need me. They don't need Pastor Josh.
They don't need Pastor Ben. They don't need Pastor Alex. They don't need Pastor Nicole or Pastor K. Any other pastor's on staff?
Abbie and Danny, they don't need them. They need you to know the word and actually obey it. And it is going to be a preparing them for the glory of the Lord to come and blast them right in the Jerusalem. And they're going to meet him.
And they're going to know him. And they're going to love him. But only if they have a sight line, only if the valleys go up and the hills go down and they get a sight line and a vision. And the only way that that happens is for you to actually walk out your faith.
The hope for our city is not church services and outreach events and man, can we fill another stadium? Even though I love it and it's catalytic and it's amazing. Let's keep on doing it. That's not the key.
The key is you. You knowing the word, you listening to the word, and you shall mine it. You obey the word. And then as you walk the path, as you know the path, and you walk the path, you inadvertently, all of a sudden, you're not hiding it under a bushel.
Ah, see what I did there? You're letting your light shine. And you don't have to be aggressive about it. You don't have to be preachy about it.
It's just all of a sudden, well, you're different than me. You're different than me. And they're all of a sudden in a moment, they're going, I want different. I need to know somebody that knows the way.
Who do I call? The question is, do they think that you know the way, or is your way just like their way? Is there any distinction between your way and their way? We should ask that question.
That's kind of like a question on fruit. Are you actually walking out what you know, walking out what you believe? There's a sobriety around that, and that's a good sobriety. We should be sober about that.
Because wouldn't it be a shame if they did want to turn to Jesus? And they knew if they really wanted to go out for God, that you would actually be a hindrance rather than a blessing. That you would actually be a hindrance to them giving their lives and their souls fully to the Lord. Zechariah knew what John needed.
Zechariah knew that John needed other people, because he couldn't find his way himself. He needed some other people that were going to follow the way. You can't do it by yourself. This is like a plug that's really random and not profound at all.
But you got to join the Connect Group, this launching at the end of the month, because these things are the best. We have not had this amazing of Connect Groups ever in the history of our church. I'm talking about the best, most incredible Connect Groups ever. You have to be a part of at least one or two.
Because you need to run and go after God with a people that want the same thing as you. Some of us are in so much isolation. First of all, I'm not hating on any other Connect Groups of the past. They're all amazing.
If you let a Connect Group in the past, you're like, wow, he just totally was mean. No, they're all amazing. But what I want to encourage you to do is you can't do it on your own. Do you think John the Baptist would have been able to go after God and fulfill his destiny if he just tried to figure it out himself in the wilderness?
No, he needed a whole group of people that said, in, yep, in, yep, the, he needed a whole people that went, there's a burning passion for the Lord that we have. We want to know the glory of God. I know all of you don't want to be bored. I know that you, sometimes you're a boring person, but God is not boring.
Sometimes we're boring, but God's not boring. And I know that you don't want to be bored in your relationship. And some of us are bored in our relationship with God, just because we're not hanging out with other people that are hungry. We're kind of feeling a little sluggish.
Do you know what you need to do? You need to hang out with people that love God. You're feeling isolated, man, I'm really struggling with it. Are you hanging out with people that love God?
Or are you just kind of going your way, trying to figure out, trying to work on it, stop it. You need people, you need people that are like, provoking you. God is calling us to be a John the Baptist people. John the Baptist was known for his big point, his big pointer finger, his big behold.
The lamp. Right? All of his life was building up to one moment where he went, behold, and he saw Jesus there and he said, it's him, your whole purpose in life is to know him. And then your whole life is this huge pointer finger that is pointing at him and saying, hey, coworker, hey family member, hey neighbor, hey guy that doesn't like his kids at basketball practice.
I know that you're a miserable dad and you need the way. Behold, look at him. There's a new way. There's a different way.
You can follow him, look at him. And it doesn't have to be super spiritual. It doesn't have to be, you don't have to make it complicated. You don't need to do a bit.
Your way. You use words. I'm not saying, don't use words, but I'm saying, just listen in Obey. You show up, you're in the parking lot, your kid gets out of the car, you're late, you're not late.
You're never late. You run in, your kid runs in ahead of you and you just say five minute prayer or two, one minute, 30 second prayer. You say Lord, is there anything you want me to do? Just quick, anything you want me to do or anything you want me to say.
And he says, yeah, just ask this guy questions. And you lend your time instead of watching Instagram for the whole basketball practice and kind of giving a weird side eye and then looking down and just seeing how your kid is doing. You're all of a sudden going, hey, what's up, man? And you introduce yourself and you're just hanging and you're asking him questions, why?
Well, you're just somebody that listens in Obey's because you're a follower of the way. You're a follower of Jesus. That's just what you do. Because you're preparing the way of the Lord because the glory of God is gonna show up into his life just because you showed up and you're gonna listen in Obey and all of a sudden the glory of the Lord's gonna encounter him.
He's gonna start having dreams. Then all of a sudden he hears about you follow God and he was kind of normal. He kind of, I feel like he's kind of a normal person and but he loves God. Only Christians, I've known are weird people that, huh.
I had this crazy dream or I had this coworker talk about Jesus and now the open doors. They're gonna come and I'm not saying that you have to be an evangelist, I'm just saying. You're preparing the way for our city, for people to know him, let's all say it. Yeah, come on Luke 728.
I'm gonna read it. As you stand, I'm gonna turn to Luke 728. I got it here. Oh, come on Scott, that's so good.
Luke 728, you can put it up on the screen if you guys have it. Look at this. Man, this is a preach good Scott. I tell you among those born of women, there's none greater than John.
This is Jesus talking. He says, but yet the one who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than John. Wow, John had the greatest message. He was the greatest prophet of all, greater than all of the Old Testament prophets because his message was a message of repentance and preparation for people to be prepared to meet the Lord, to meet Yahweh.
But Jesus says, I'm calling you, even if you're the least, some of you are like, yeah, I'm the least. Some of you feel like you're disqualified. Some of you are like, I'm for sure not gonna share my faith because I'm not that type of personality. And he's going, hey, the least.
Some of you see yourselves at the least, he's going, even you are greater than the prophet, John the Baptist that Gabriel announced his birth. And he's saying, because why, why, why, why? Why am I greater than John the Baptist? Because I have a greater message.
Because the cross has happened, the resurrection has happened, I have a greater message of hope, I got a greater message of redemption, I've got a transformational message that I'm going to live, and it's the hope of all of the world. And you get to carry that message in your life, in your body, in your mouth, in your voice. This is your destiny as a follower of Jesus. It's not just for the evangelists, even though I'm getting ready to pray for him.
It's for all of us. We were all meant to carry it. I wanna know the path. I wanna walk the path.
And I wanna prepare the way of the Lord. I wanna prepare people to know him and beat him. Listen, you're really called to fulfill the Great Commission. You know what the Great Commission is?
To make disciples of all nations. When you are letting your light shine, you're discipling the non-believer. It's not, the Great Commission isn't make conference into Christianity. The Great Commission is just make disciples.
So show people how to follow him. Are you hearing me? So your goal isn't, they say that the center's prayer. Your goal is whether they've surrendered Lordship or not, I'm still gonna disciple them.
Oh, that's a whole message that Nick Cruz preached many years ago and I stole it and it's so good. All right, so you can let people kind of see your life. You don't have to be weird about it. Don't be weird about it.
Just love him and love people, okay? This is what I wanna ask the Lord. I want you to think about your Monday and I want you to think through your schedule for Monday. If you want to, you can open up your Google calendar and you can look at tomorrow.
You get to look at your calendar tomorrow and I want you to just think about your day tomorrow. All right. You guys got it? Some of you are students.
You got some classes. Some of you are going, man, my calendar is empty. What the heck am I gonna do? It's great.
You can ask the Lord. But what I want us to do is ask the Lord this question. Is there anything that you want me to do? I know a lot, but we know a lot.
We don't want to just be American Christians that know a bunch of information. We actually wanna walk the path. We wanna walk the way. And so we're gonna ask the Lord this question.
Is there anything that you want me to do? Any way that I can obey you? Okay, that's the question. You turn it into your own words.
I want you to whisper it out loud. Just allow it enough for you to say it and hear your own words, okay? Anything that you want me to do or any way that I can obey you tomorrow. Just gonna allow for a minute or two for you to listen.
The accuser of the brethren usually starts piling things on right now. Starts accusing you with about 15 things. So you can silence that voice. You can just say shut up.
And then you can just, you can ask the Holy Spirit again. Say, Lord, what were you saying? What do you think you want me to do? Get out of the worship team actually come up while we're waiting on the Lord.
What I want to do is, it's been sometimes praying for those that are, you feel called not just to lead one or two people to Jesus. I believe that we're living in a time where God's anointing the church to be activated into leading individuals to the Lord that it's like one at a time. And it's so what he's doing, okay? So there's a value in that.
But then there's some of us that have a different unique call as messengers that you're going to disciple and raise up and win hundreds or thousands of people to Jesus, okay? And God is actually calling you as a messenger and evangelist that has like a specific role in calling the body of Christ to bring with beautiful feet the good news in terms of like bigger, more far-reaching message of the gospel going forth. And what I want to do is take some time as we close in worship and as we're praying for them at the front, we're just going to have worship happening and you're going to be free to go. And so I'm going to commission you out.
But I'm going to invite those people and we're going to minister to them. We're going to pray for them, pray in prophesy over them as leaders in the house. And so deacons that are in the room. Or if you've been around a while and you're like, mom and a pop in the house, want to encourage you to come and pray and minister over and pray over these evangelists, okay?
I'm not just talking about young adults that are 20, that are Zellists. I'm talking about like, no, this is a call. And I'm in my sevenies, but I win souls for Jesus, okay? So I'm talking about wherever you're at and you're journey with God, okay?
And maybe you're an evangelist and you're called to equip other evangelists. Yeah, you, I want you to come to the front, okay? So if that's you, I just want, and you can spread all the way to the front, even through up to this altar, I want you to spread out so we can gather around you and we're going to minister and pray and prophesy over these ones. Give another, enough elbow room where there could be three or four people around you to pray over you.
Come on, let's go. And so yeah, we're going to spread out all the way up into the aisles if we need to. You can kind of go single file in the aisles and we're going to need a lot of leaders to begin to activate and start praying over all these. So if you're a deacon or you're a mom and a pop in the house, I want you to come up and just begin to minister and pray over all of these messengers.
And let's just be activated. Ready, set, go. Just start praying over and come up and pray over these messengers. You guys can take a step forward to allow more room.
Yep, and try to get a little bit more elbow room. I don't want us to be like so shoulder to shoulder. Let's kind of stagger with each other so that we can actually get some elbow room and have people come to pray for you. So Lord, we come before you.
You're commissioned out. If you want to go, you're commissioned out and we'll see you in the prayer room. We'll see you in happy Monday. We'll see you at the Honor House opening if you're bringing kids.
Lord, we come before you. Lord, we ask that you would anoint these messengers of the gospel. With a good news message of great joy. Lord, that you would give them a message of power and the word.
We ask that you would confirm their words with power and healings and signs and wonders. Lord, we ask for the third great awakening in America and that you would do it with evangelists and intercessors that you'd raise them up in our day. We ask that you do it in neighborhoods and in workplaces and in North Minneapolis and South Minneapolis and the suburbs and St. Paul.
Lord, do it in our city as we're at the crossroads of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Would you raise up messengers from this house that carry the zeal of the Lord? Lord, raise them up as messengers.
Mark them even tonight. Mark them with passion. Put a fire in their valleys. Put a fire in their bones, Lord.
Lord, we go for the fire of the gospel to set in on their bodies or physical bodies. That's how it's gonna fire.