All right, just being a good citizen up here. Wow, I just want to piggyback off of what Nicole and Ben were talking about with DNA cultures. DNA cultures is really like the 101 of growth. And so if you're new to growth, we want you to be there at DNA cultures on Wednesday.
It's so important to understand the why behind the what for a community and what we're going after. And for you to figure out, am I supposed to plug in here? Am I supposed to call this home? Or is this just not the place for me to actually find a home as a church community?
And so that's great. I don't know if you've seen this, but on our table out in the foyer, we have these handouts that say if we're not the right fit, here's like a list of 10 other churches in our city that you should go and be a part of. Because we want you, we're not trying to build a church. Really, we're not going after a mega church.
That's never been the dream of, man, if we could get to a certain amount of people, then it's a win and we're a success. We're going after we want to actually empower everyday believers, and we have a specific vision and mission. And if that doesn't resonate with your heart, there's other church communities that are amazing. And they have different visions and missions that will resonate more with you.
And the best thing that you can do is join their community if this vision and mission doesn't resonate with you. And so, but if you're trying to figure that out, make sure that you're there on Wednesday and you register tonight. 2020. Here we go, you guys.
I was looking online at what are the things that we didn't have 10 years ago, that we now have, that is kind of like that's part of everyday life where we couldn't even think of doing life without them. Number one, Instagram did not exist 10 years ago. I was praying talking to the Lord, like, Lord, what do you want me to leave behind in 2019? And I had this wondering, like, I wonder if you just said Instagram.
You know, so if that's, I don't know if that's going to be my word and if I'm really going to know, I'm just kidding. But you guys, if that's your word, you should take it and just totally walk away from Instagram for this next decade if you want to. Okay. Snapchat.
You for sure need to exit Snapchat. Just like, get it out of here. No, I'm just kidding. But that didn't exist 10 years ago, you guys.
Tesla. How many of you invested in Tesla, right? No, I'm just kidding. Hey, the iPad did not exist 10 years ago.
And this one was actually surprising to me because we're on it every single day as a staff. Google Drive did not exist 10 years ago. If Google Drive failed, our growth staff, what would we do? Voxer didn't exist 10 years ago either.
Okay. Here we go. But 2020 is a new start and I love evaluating things in the new year, right? It's this natural, okay.
Why was last year so awful? I should probably evaluate things in my life. And the new year is always a fantastic time to do that. How many of you love DTR?
How many of you know what a DTR is? What does DTR mean? Define the relationship. Define the relationship conversations are probably one of the most dreaded conversations for men.
Define the relationship conversations are you might have the special someone, your friends with a person of the opposite sex, and you're kind of just trying to figure things out. You know, you're trying to get to know them and there's this moment where you go, okay, we probably need to have the talk. Like, is this going somewhere or is this not? Are you picking up what I'm laying down?
Are we going in the right direction? And it's really valuable because when you have a DTR, it can either create more connection. That's exciting. Or it can really draw a dividing line.
Or it's like, okay, this is never going to be the same. Right? And so it's really positive sometimes. No, all the time.
It's really great. Now, I want to bring you into the loop of part of our story, Katie and I's story. Over 10 years ago, we had a DTR. And we were in Kansas City.
And we were at this internship together. And we didn't plan to be at the internship together. And God just orchestrated it. He told Katie that she was supposed to go.
And he told me that I was supposed to go. And so there we are. There's 25 of us in this internship. And we're the only ones from Minnesota.
And we're friends at the time. And over the span of the internship, the leaders of the internship, we're noticing that I gave Katie more attention than other people. Okay? And they were...
Yeah. And so I got talked to you about this. And they said, hey, so do you have intentions with Katie? Because you should probably just communicate if you're interested in her or not.
Because if you're not, then you need to stop what you're doing. And I was like, oh, okay. That's good leadership. That's great.
And so it's like a day before the end of the internship, Katie is planning on driving back with me seven hours, two days later. And I sit her down on the curb outside of the building. And I say, hey, I just want you to know that I have no interest in you at all. And I don't ever see that changing.
And I don't... Huh? And I never... Okay.
And I never will. So she's correcting me. And I said, I never will. I said something like, but if I do, I'll let you know.
And Katie was the best because she just played it cool. Like, that's great because I have no interest. Anyways. And so that's awesome because that would have been weird if you would have said that there was something because I don't have anything on my end.
Right? And so very quick on her feet because she loved me. No, I'm just kidding. I'm...
I'm just playing. But what happened is we were doing ministry together and we were really passionate about prayer and we still are. And so we were on our college campus doing ministry all the time together. We had a group of friends that were going after Jesus together.
So I saw her a lot. And we would even be... We were kind of co-leading things together. And about once every two weeks or so, every week, there would be a moment where I would stop and just say, like, hey, okay, so I just want you to know again, like remind you, there's nothing here.
I have no interest. I just want you to remember that. And you know what happened is what was happening in that moment is Pastor Josh. It wasn't a pastor at that time.
But I was... I had feelings for Katie that were developing, but I was trying to stuff them down. And because there was like insecurity there, I just need to hear my own voice say it like, yeah, there's nothing. Right?
Because there's insecurity. And sometimes in our relationship with God, there's an insecurity that we have in our relationship. And something that creates disconnection or can destroy a relationship is to constantly dissect the relationship. And so if in your relationship with God, you're always second guessing, does he love me?
Does he love me not? Does he like me? Does he like me not? And you're constantly being blown and tossed by the wind.
And oftentimes the winds of guilt and the winds of shame. It actually can destroy connection between you and the Lord. It's really important to have the foundation that because Jesus died on the cross, and he rose again from the dead. And because I surrendered my life to him and I gave my life to him and said, I believe that you did that for me.
And I can't do it by myself. I need saved. And I believe and I sent my faith in you. And I give you my whole life.
When you do that, what takes place is you are made righteous before God. You're standing with God is unwavering. You're covenant with God is not second guest. It's by faith that you've believed.
And because you believe now you're saved and you're being sanctified in Christ daily. And you're renewed by your mind and it transforms your life. Can you imagine if in in Kati and I's relationship? If every other day I was like, okay, are we still married?
Like, do you still love me? And there is how draining would that be? First of all. And it'd be taxing emotionally.
And so we have to, before we get into defining the relationship or assessing the relationship with God, we have to get the first things first is if you're wavering and not sure what God thinks about you, even though you've given your life to Jesus, you need to go to DNA gospel. You need to go to DNA gospel because you need to understand who you are because of what he did. If you know who you are because of what he did, there's moments in life where it's really valuable to assess a relationship. And assess our relationship with God.
Now we've already defined the relationship. I'm covenanted to you forever. So there's not like a dating. We're trying to figure each other out, right?
You know, we don't have to sit on the curb with God. And I don't know. But you can, you don't have any more defining of the relationship. It's finalized in him.
Now we have the opportunity to assess our relationship with God when it's appropriate. I'm not assessing every single day with Katie going, okay, how do you feel about me? See, we're not assessing our standing because that's been defined. We're married.
But then the things that you do assess in a relationship are connection and intimacy. How are we actually doing right now? Do I feel connected to you right now? And it's valuable, especially at the start of a new year, the start of that new decade, to assess and go, Lord, where we at?
Like how is our relationship actually going right now? Turn in your Bibles to Revelation to, Revelation to, Apostle John, John the Beloved, is on the island of Patmos. He's imprisoned on an island. And he's writing this prophetic vision out.
And he sees an open vision and sees the resurrected Jesus sitting on a throne. It's just a wild, crazy book if you read it. And he's seen Jesus and all of a sudden Jesus says, Hey, I want you to dictate seven letters to seven different churches in Asia Minor that were in the first century. And so these are real communities of people.
They have real issues in the Church of Ephesus that we're going to read about. There was a temple of Artemis, which is a goddess. And there's temple prostitution. And it was like the epicenter for the worship of Artemis.
And it was a highly sexualized city. There was a lot of philosophies that were anti-Hebrew thought. And so Jesus is writing this letter to the Ephesians, the Church of Ephesus, the small community that's going after God, that actually exploded and expanded very quickly. And this is what Jesus has to say to the Church of Ephesus.
He says, I know your works. This is verse two, Revelation 2, I know your works. Your toil and your patient endurance and how you cannot bear with those who are evil, but have tested those who call themselves apostles and are not and found them to be false. I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my namesake.
You've not grown weary, but have this against you, that you have abandoned the love that you had at first. Remember, therefore, from where you have fallen into the works you did, if not it will come to you and remove your Lamb's mind from its place, unless your repent. Lamb's man is talking about their influence, or remove your influence. Remember, therefore, where you have fallen into the works you did at first.
If not, I will come to you and remove your Lamb's centerpiece unless your repent. You have you hate the works of the nickel Aitons or the Gnostics, which I also hate he who has an ear led him here What the spirit says to the churches to the one who conquers I will grant eat of the tree of life Which is the paradise of God? Okay? There is so much here you guys I am not gonna be able to unpack all of this letter because there it's so rich with things that Jesus is trying to communicate to the specific church But I want to draw our attention to this Jesus is Sandwiching things that he likes about this local church, then it's an area of improvement and then another thing that he likes That's like a really good leadership if you're if you're in the workplace and you're a manager Do the sandwich thing that Jesus just did hey, you're really awesome.
I love this about you. Hey, this is an area for improvement And I really like this about you. Okay, that's for free. I didn't charge for that one at all.
Okay, but listen Jesus is Doing what he's assessing? The relationship He's talking about this church and I want to apply this to us personally as individuals There's moments that is helpful for any relationship for Katie and I as a married couple for us to stop and go Hey, how are we doing? What's going on? Are things are there things that I'm doing that are just causing a distance between us?
What do you like about a relationship? What are you enjoying about our marriage? That's a healthy conversation for a relationship It would be weird if we went about our whole marriage and just never had a face-to-face conversation and said hey How are we actually doing right now? And we just close our ears and we just plow and act as if everything's okay decade after decade after decade here's your opportunity Right now even as a couple if you want to take this concept and apply it to yourselves as a couple That's amazing.
You should do this as a couple But what we're gonna do tonight is we want to assess the relationship and we're not defining anymore We're assessing it and we're going okay. How are things going right now? When I look at the last decade and I look at the last year How are we doing? And we're gonna ask these three questions of the Lord and we're gonna take some time with instrumental music And we're just gonna get really practical and have a conversation with him, okay?
So I want you to write these three questions down Three questions write them down in your phone or in your notes Because you're gonna use these for 15 minutes or so after I'm done sharing This is the first question What are the things about a relationship that you like? What are the things about our relationship that you like or enjoy? We're asking the Lord that and then Because he's a gentleman he's gonna ask you that same question and you get to share too Because you're having a conversation with a real person, right? We have to remember God's a person.
He's not an ethereal idea Or somewhere off in the distance power He's a real person or having a real conversation and we're talking about our relationship And so what do you like about our relationship? What do you enjoy about our relationship and both of you get to answer and I want to encourage you to write what he says down And you can write what you think down and and don't just write it down But actually have like talk to him and say something like I really like that you That you give me your heart for the people that are in my life Or like you've shown me you've given me eyes for my daughter to actually see her the way that you see her I really like that in our relationship. How you do that thing? I don't know how you do it.
Do it I really like that about you in our relationship Real talk like we can have real conversation things that we like all right next question What are the things that you don't like about? Our relationship What are the things that you don't like about our relationship and you both get to answer that question together? What are things that you don't like about our relationship and the last question is what do you want to leave behind? This is kind of a question for both of you to answer together Okay, where you both get to decide this together and you get to say, what do we want to leave behind in this last decade in the tens?
What do we want to leave behind in the tens and what do we want to step into in the 20s in our relationship as Father and son or father and daughter Stephen you guys can come up it and and facilitate Some worship, but what we're gonna do is we're all gonna Get some space and we're just gonna find a spot in the room to get alone with him And so there's gonna be people that are gonna be sitting up here on the platform wherever you can sit in the middle of the aisles You can stay in the pews, but this is our moment that most of the time we don't get life is crazy Is that right and you have an opportunity to sit with him and have some really awesome instrumental music? And you just get to have a time where you get to reflect on your relationship That's a love relationship with God. I want to encourage you to be honest authentic and real and remember that you are his sheep And you know his voice go with the first thing that comes into your brain when you ask him the question What do you like about a relationship? And he says something and you go oh he can't like that about our relationship You got to actually go with the first thing that comes to mind and there's going to be multiple things last service when I was doing This I was bullet pointing all of the things that he said he liked about a relationship And then I shared bullet pointed things that I liked about a relationship So it's not just a one answer, okay, this is a conversation that has dynamics to it, okay?
So let's all stand We're gonna go into a time of connection with him and we're gonna stand so that people can leave and move about the room Wherever they would like to to get space with the Lord just get some space with you in the Holy Spirit Lord, I thank you that this is a moment that you've been anticipating for a long time Where there can be just a real talk conversation about our relationship with you Lord, I thank you that you love taking opportunity to talk about How we're really doing with you Lord, I thank you that we're the only variable connection and us are the only variable in our relationship that you are the steadfast faithful one Lord, I thank you that you have real emotions You have real thoughts Lord, we thank you that you're not a stoic father But that you're a present papa Thank you Lord I just remove all numbness off of people where they felt locked up in their relationship with you Lord, I just declare that there's an opening of the floodgates of tenderness and sensitivity to your heart during this time in Jesus name