My ego says the voices with them But the thing I've needed in each and every season And I really mean it And you won't watch them all If you're holding them all, it's you My escape And you won't watch them Welcome to Ebony's Church Seattle My name is Janice, so glad that you're here with us today I invite you to stand and get ready to get your hearts, bodies, minds, ready to worship And I'm gonna hand it back over to our worship team Awesome, well good morning everyone Ooh, we're still gonna try that again Good morning everyone There we go, oh my gosh, you guys it's sunny outside That's amazing, alright we're gonna start with prayer And we're gonna get into worship Lord, we thank you for this time Lord, we prepare our hearts and our minds before you To stand before you ready and expect it For all that you have for us today Lord, we acknowledge that you are King, you and you alone And we love you Lord We love you and we want to give you all the glory Because you are worthy In Jesus' name, amen We're gonna have fun Nation, our rock, the only solid ground Kingdom's rising full Kingdom's one strong out of shaken We trust forever in your name Name of Jesus Amen Jesus, it's too high up Listen to the show Hey, my name is Peter and this is my wife Rebecca And this is my son, Kason And today we're gonna be, we actually gather Among a bunch of churches And this season of Lent to pray for just our people And the topic is actually the loss in the hurting So there's a lot of us who are lost in hurting right now And so this is gonna be a really good prayer moment So we're gonna gather together and we're gonna pray And Rebecca's gonna read a verse And then Peter's gonna close with that so For us, so, okay, one, two, three, amen You guys good to pray? I'm gonna pray this out Father, we're grateful that we can gather here Or uninterrupted Where there's a lot of places where Gathering in your name would equal a lot of suffering Father, there's a lot of people who are lost A lot of people who are hurting And Father, you said when we gather in your name That you'll be here, Lord, so please hear us God, even amongst our people, Lord, there's a lot of hurting people A lot of people are scared, God There's a lot of, there's war I mean, there's a whole bunch of things That are going on The Lord, you're greater than all of this, Lord, God And Father, you have always been the hope, Lord Regardless of what happens to our bodies, Lord, God, you have been the hope for us and the nations And may the whole world turn to you during this time And know that you are the truth and you are our hope, Lord, God Because you really are God The only times I've actually felt truly full and truly happy, Lord, was when I was with you And when I was deeply connected with you, Lord, may the world also feel that same connection Of course, Seattle, and I pray for our people here in this beautiful state, Lord, God May we just find you, find hope, find peace Finally find peace in the midst of so much anxiety and depression and sadness, Lord We pray for our people, we pray for our church, Jesus, Amen, Amen It was my cross, your poor So I could live in the freedom you died for My life is gone Yours, I will sing of your goodness forevermore Repeat that, it was your cross It was my cross, your poor So I could live in the freedom you died for And now my life is yours And I will sing of your goodness forevermore Worthy is your name Cheat, you deserve the praise It's your name It's your name Cheat, you deserve the praise It's your name My shame is gone I stand to make Your grace goes on and on And I will sing It's your name Cheat, you deserve the praise Worthy is your name It's your name Worthy is your name Worthy is your name Worthy is your name God, we thank you that we get to come and Just scratch the surface of giving you the praise you deserve for your worthiness Lord, we submit our hearts, our gathering to you today, we submit our worship to you Lord, we just thank you for the opportunity and the space to be able to gather as your people and bring you grace today In Jesus' name, amen Alright, thank you so much, worshiped you The rest of you can be seated unless you are a child or a teacher, then you can be dismissed to your class Alright, welcome everyone, so glad that you're here If you didn't hear earlier, my name is Janice, I'm the Operations Director here at ENCS So glad that you've come together with us today Now's your time for fellowship and this is the next part of our worship gathering So if you're new, sitting here at tables and having more than two minutes of conversation with the person next to you might be something different But this is something that we feel really strongly about and is really essential to our identity as every nation church So we sit at tables, we talk, we fellowship, and this is just a small glimpse of what life is like in C groups throughout the week So we're going to take the next few minutes There'll be some questions on the screen, you can chat at your tables, get to know one another and Pastor Perry will be up after that To continue at the rest of our worship gathering, but have fun at your tables and the donuts will be open if anyone is interested in that But yeah, have fun! Welcome to the future Peace and further skies, you can't even begin to speak of your kindness Fire and so far, before I even said sorry You made a way for me, just to try to pull cars, your tests out the ocean, the green pastures So I'll read before I even said I, you made a way for me Oh, testing, are we here? Can you hear me?
Good morning, I know I'm trying to get this mic working out Good morning everyone, let me pull you back from your tables, welcome! Man, welcome to worship this morning, what an incredible time, I just want to thank our worship team man for leading us today, man, you guys killed it Can y'all come to my home every morning early and help me start my day, that would be great I heard them earlier practicing, I told them I said, hey man, can y'all press record and just go ahead and make an album And then we can worship the rest of the week with you guys, so seriously thank you guys for your gifts, it really serves us to just engage Jesus together, isn't it beautiful? To just worship Jesus together anyway, I want to say good morning, welcome, for those of you maybe new, my name's Perry, and we'll be pastor here at Every Nation, it is a joy and honor And the privilege to pastor such an incredible church, an intergenerational, intercultural, and missional church in our city, it is a great privilege And I want to remind you, this week is Holy Week, man welcome to Holy Week, it's the high and holy week of the year for Christians around the globe We kick that off today, today's Palm Sunday, for those of you who did not know, if you're not from the Christian tradition, we did not give you palm branches this morning We didn't have time to go to Florida to get them and bring them, so sorry about that, but we do celebrate, this week is a big deal, we celebrate Jesus beginning his journey to the cross The very thing that saves us and makes us this people and gives us a hope in the future for a new heavens and a new earth and to reconcile the world to himself And we have a great joy to look forward to a future where all evils are eradicated and justice is removed and the full kingdom of God comes on earth And so while we live in between them now and not yet, we live as people of hope, amen? So to celebrate Holy Week this week, I want to let you know that we are going to have a good Friday, gathering here So if some of you want to celebrate good Friday with us, we're going to have a great moment of worship with our team, time of reflection, leading up to the cross, we'll take communion that night And we're going to come back and be a part of us, this good Friday night, I think we're going to kick things off on 630, I think it's right, is it right Friday night?
Good Friday, we think so, okay great, check your email and whatever else that is and let you know, also next week is Easter, it is Resurrection Day We're going to have a great time together celebrating Jesus, we're going to have water baptisms that are going to happen between the gatherings That way both gatherings get to observe them, so if you come to the early one, I just want to remind you now, plan to stick around This is a big deal for our community, there's a big deal for our community, there's a coming to faith in Jesus, go into the waters, be reminded of your own baptism of Jesus what he's done in your life And so we look forward to baptizing people next week, so please plan to stick around for that and also just after Easter, we're going to kick off a brand new study that I'm super excited about over the next several months, we're going to be walking through the sermon on the Mount This is Jesus' famous teaching, from Matthew 5 to Matthew 7, we're calling it living in the Kingdom, because we're very aware that right now we live in the world, it is chaotic, we face war, we face economic uncertainty, we face a lot of things that are threatening, many of us are way of life And we believe this is next season together as a church, it would be really good to look at what does it mean to live as Kingdom citizens in a broken world now So we're going to explore what does that look like, how do you actually live in the Kingdom now? As a citizen of heaven, when we live in a world that is broken and messed up, and how do we do that? So I'm looking forward to joining you with you guys, look forward to that, that will be a series, I want to tell you right now, in a study we're going to do, it'll be great when you invite a friend to, all the way through it every week We're going to be speaking to what Jesus has to say to us as God's people, how we live in the Kingdom and how that matters in the world that we live in And so I want to know it's a great time to bring somebody along that journey every week to be something good for everybody to hear, look forward to that Okay, alright, we're getting ready to get in God's word, but I want to remind you of something we've been doing over the last several weeks, throughout Lent, we've been preaching on belonging in the church, what it means to belong to Jesus and His church And we've been praying for you guys, we've been asking you to pray for three things, those three things are simply this, that you pray that God would give us a bigger and better space, as you can tell, we need some more room And in order to grow and have room for our kids spaces and all that, and we've asked you to set your alarm for 320 every day to pray that God would do that, open the doors, we're looking for space We have one that we're looking at right now, right around the corner, on 45th, it's the old pet co-building, if you've seen that, it's the empty white building around the corner We're currently looking at that, we're exploring what that's going to look like, preparing for negotiations for that, so please keep praying for us, our elder team is we're discerning that and figuring that out So keep that up, and the last thing we've asked you to pray for is just pray about making every nation church your home, your church where you're going to actively be present and participate in growing as a disciple of Jesus So for most of you, it's been around for a while, so if you're brand new stepping in, we're just glad you're here along for the journey and we welcome you to get to walk with us And the last thing we've asked you to pray for is to pray about and commit to supporting your church family with your finances as a monthly financial partner Many of you already give and serve and do all that, but we want to give that opportunity for many of you who've been newer in the last, really last year or so To have that opportunity to join us and say yes to that, so at the end of our gathering they will have a moment for that, for you to be able to indicate that, we're going to walk you through that and explain that at the end, but we want to know what's coming up Okay, now we're going to get rid of it, we're going to get in the word now We have been talking about belonging, yes, everybody say belong, we've been doing this, and what we've been exploring last several weeks has been spiritual habits That actually have the power to reset your sense of identity, your sense of purpose, and your sense of belonging in the church, that it's actually spiritual habits that Jesus gave us that actually make us this church, amen? Yeah, and we've looked at several habits that form us, that actually shape us as disciples in spiritual family, and I want to go over there briefly with you, we talked about devotion, walking with God daily, we talked about fellowship, walking with God's people weekly, we talked about service, of serving God through serving others with our gifts And we talked last week about giving cultivating generosity in our life and what that looks like, and today we're coming to another spiritual habit, the last one we're covering in the Belong study, and it's one that's deeply shaped my own life, and that's outreach It's learning about investing and inviting our friends to know Jesus, and I just want to say today that if you're here today, maybe you're new, maybe you're not yet a Christ follower, you're just beginning this journey, and we know you're going to hear me talk to my people today about what it means to invest in relationships, and to invite other people to come and look at who Jesus is that's changed our life, I just want to let you know that, so I encourage you here today, I encourage you to listen in, because I hope you're going to hear the love that Christ has for the world and that he wants us to demonstrate and show what that looks like, so I'm going to be talking about these two elements and outreaches, these habits called investing and inviting, and I just want to start with my own story In ninth grade, I tried out for a soccer team, and as my school, I went to a private Christian school growing up, I'm from North Carolina if you can't tell by my accent, I've been here 16 years, I don't think it's going anywhere, so you know, every time I introduce myself around the city they're like I hear a hand of an accent, I'm like yeah, it's from the south, but my private school had been bought by a church, and overnight over the summer they turned my private school into a Christian school, and so I knew, going back to school that year, that there was going to be all these Christian people, inundating the school that I grew up in, and I want to be honest with you, that may be the most important thing to do, and I want to be honest with you, that may be the most important thing to do, and I want to be honest with you, and I want to be honest with you, and I want to be honest with you, and I want to be honest with you I was not a Christian, I didn't grow up in a Christian family, in fact I didn't know any Christians at the time, though I grew up in the Bible belt south, and there was a church on every corner, you could turn in my city, I was nervous about it, I didn't know any, I could see Christians going up to church driving to these buildings on my street, and I wondered what they did, I'd see them dressed up going into this building, they come out two hours later, and I was like I don't know what they're doing over there, I was a foul-mouthed soccer player, living my own life, doing things my own way, made up my own morality, and decided what was right for me, and that's just a good secular person I was, and all I knew about Christianity was what I saw on TV, which was televangelist, which I usually made fun of in my living room, most honest, and I was like, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, I'm not a man, honest, that was me, and after multiple practices on the soccer team, I had two people, two friends walked up to me they became my friends and Greg and Dale, after multiple practices they came up to me, and they got to know each other, they took an interest to me, I asked them about my life, they invited me to come to their youth group and that was scary, and I said hey I'll give it a go, I said we could come, we will play basketball, we eat together, we have a big meal, to get free meal, that's good then we're going to have a Bible talk together and we're going look at you, Jesus says we're going to do that, whatever, and hang out after.
I'm going to come check it out. So I decided I would go. Some of you heard my story before. You're going to get here again.
So I went. I was nervous. How are they going to treat me? As a non-Christian who doesn't know their ways and doesn't know the Bible and doesn't know the stuff.
And I went to me and they welcomed me in and I got to sit at a dinner table with families and kids and people all around me and this intergenerational experience. And man, the love that flowed in that room. It was tangible. Like I'd never been in a room like that.
I'd never been around people who were talking the way they talked to each other. They loved each other. Their parents were interacting with their kids. Like I'd never, it was like entering another world experience.
I'd feel and see this love that you could feel and tangibly see. And I did not know what to make of it. I swear. I looked at this.
I'm like, who are these people? Like who are these happy, joyful people who love each other and they're glad to be together? It impacted my life so deeply. So then I hung around, went to the Bible study and began to hear for the first time in my life about Jesus.
And man from day one, I began to hear about this person and all of a sudden my ears perked up and I'm like, oh wow, who is this person I don't know anything about? And I said, I'm coming back. Well, I began to come every week. And I got to sit at a meal and laugh and hear stories and see this love of this community that warmed my heart and opened my heart to Jesus.
Now what my friends did not know at the time when they took a risk and invited me into that space? What they did not know was secretly. Though I would never show it outwardly. I was cocky, arrogant, prideful, foul-mouthed.
They would never know that I would literally lay on my three wheeler out in the woods during the week at night looking up at the stars and asking big questions like, God, are you there? God, are you real? Do you care about me? What's my purpose?
I was asking big questions, but I wasn't telling anybody. They did not know that. They just took a risk and said, hey man, will you come check this thing out? And I went and I went within about three months.
I started reading the Gospels for the first time. I started reading the life of Jesus. I began to be convicted in my life about my trajectory, my ways, my way I acted. All of a sudden I began to feel this thing called conviction and guilt.
Where before that I didn't feel much of that. I had no problem with what I did with my life, how I spoke, how I treated people, had no problem with it. But all of a sudden I began to feel this sense of something's wrong with me. Something's not quite right.
And I'm hearing about this God and I want you to know within about three months time my eyes were opened. I saw I needed forgiveness and a Savior that was a God that loved me and created me and wanted me. Wanted me. It changed my life forever.
I gave my life to Christ, told my family they thought I was crazy, but I began the journey of what it means to be a child of God and walk with Christ. And I want to tell you this and to this day I look back and I thank God for those two friends who took a risk on me, who didn't show any signs of spiritual interest. None. And I want to tell you when I talk about the habit of outreach, I thank God I got to experience it because what they did was they invested in me relationally and they invited me into Christian spaces where I could hear the Gospel.
And I thank God for those two brothers to this very day. And I want to say that's what outreach is always about is investing in people around us relationally and inviting them into spaces. And today what I want to do in the next few moments, I want to walk you through, I'm a super practical guy, I want to talk to you about what it means, what does it look like to actually invest in people and invite them into Christian community. Here's why I'm going to say this because I believe every single one of us in this room, there's at least one person in your circle of influence who may right now show zero signs of spiritual interest and yet God is at work in their heart and they're asking big questions about life.
And I believe that God wants you and I as his people to be the very ones who begin to invest and discover where God's at work and invite them in to come here, the Gospel. I'm curious who that may be in your life, but I'm going to open up in prayer and we're going to dive in. Let's pray. Father God, would you please open our eyes this morning?
Lord, in the midst of a chaotic world, I thank you Jesus that you were able to stay on mission with your father, no matter what was going on in the world around you. I pray that you give us that same grace, that we could be about our father's business right here where we live in Seattle. In Jesus name, Amen. The first thing I want to say this that I learned about Jesus early on was that Jesus is one of his top priorities in life, was investing in reaching people who did not know him, was investing in people who were lost, hurting, lonely.
We prayed about it earlier in our gathering, right? In Luke 15, it was a famous passage where it's gripped my heart for years, we're told that the religious elite of Jesus' day really had a problem with him. And they were really bothered by the fact that Jesus would spend an enormous amount of time and effort and energy and his resources actually gathering with tax collectors and sinners and eating with people who necessarily wouldn't be found in the church spaces. And they took issue with him.
They didn't like it at all. They constantly complained about it and fusted him about it. And like, man, what is this that you eat with people who aren't spiritual, who aren't righteous, who aren't these things. And so he goes into this moment where he tells them three stories to paint the picture for them, to help them get the point of like, I don't think you understand what my life is really about.
So let me paint some stories for you so you know the point and why am I actually really here? He tells three stories of a lost sheet, a lost coin, and a story of two lost sons. Not just one. And in each of those stories, what we find is a consistent theme that Jesus wants people to see.
That consistent theme is something of value or someone of value that's gone missing. And a good shepherd or a woman who's lost her coins, whatever, will actually leave and go on an all-out search to find that one that's missing and bring that one home back to the fold back to the people, God, and then there's rejoicing in heaven. And I want to hear these two stories briefly, we're going to frame what we mean by investing in body. Listen to what he says.
And Jesus told him this parable. Suppose one of you has a hundred sheep and loses one of them. Doesn't he leave the 99 in the open country and go after the lost sheep until he finds it? And when he finds it, he joyfully puts it on his shoulders and goes home.
And he calls his friends and neighbors together and says, rejoice with me. Rejoice with me. I found my lost sheep. I tell you that in the same way there will be more rejoicing in heaven over one sinner who repents than over 99 righteous persons who do not need to repent.
Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Doesn't she light a lamp, sweep the house, search it carefully until she finds it. And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, rejoice with me. I found my lost coin in the same way.
I tell you, there's rejoicing in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner who repents. And then he goes on and tells the third story. I don't have time to go into that one. I tell the father longs and is waiting and looking and watching and waiting for that one to come home and welcome them in.
And he throws a party. All these stories meant to paint the picture that he concludes in Luke 1910 when Jesus points to the truth and make it really clear what am I about? But the Son of Man came to seek and save. The what?
The lost. He came to seek and save that which was lost. I was once that lost sheep and coin and so were you. Do you remember?
Do you remember? Even if you grew up in church, do you remember the moment when Jesus began to really knock on the door of your heart and draw you in to make for you to go, yeah, it's not just my mom and dad's religion. This is mine. It doesn't matter if you come from a religious background, a secular background.
Jesus taught you and me. And I think as we begin holy week, this is a great moment to pause and remember. Maybe perhaps those who invested in us and invited us to come and know who Jesus is. Can you think of that person right now?
There might be one person or more. I want you to pull them in your mind. Who invested in you? Who sought you?
Who reached you? Someone did. I guarantee it. The truth is this is that not only is Jesus on a rescue mission, but man, when he called us to follow him, guess what?
He expected that we would join him in that mission, that we would take on his heart and join in the very thing. He says, I'm going to invest my life in, which is reaching and saving and bringing and rescuing lost people. Think about it. When Jesus told his early disciples that it's meant for all of them after 28, I love this.
He says, hey, I'll have an authority in heaven and earth and give him to me now that he's risen from the dead. He says, hey, I want you now to go. You go. Make disciples of all nations.
And I love that word that word go actually means as you go. As you go about your daily life. As you go about your daily life, would you be on the lookout? Would you just be on the lookout for the lost or hurting the lonely?
Would your heart be open to see them and then invest in their life? Now, the question you may ask and I've asked since I was a teenager was like, well, how do you do that? Let me get practical for a few minutes. I think it begins with us first, remembering our own foundness, how you were found.
But secondly, I think then it means we need to turn and begin to look at who is in our circle of influence right now? Who's in your circle of influence? Every single one of us has a circle of influence that we walk in every week. Let me show this diagram briefly.
When you think of your circle of influence, one way to do that is we can just look at the natural as you go about your life daily, who you interact with, who you see, could be a co-worker, could be a neighbor, could be a supervisor, man, could be a child's teacher, if you have children, could be that barista that you love to get your coffee from on a regular basis could be a friend that's near you or a family member. And we just think for a moment, right now, who in your daily life, right now, in your circle, do you think could be in need of grace and truth of Jesus? Who might that be? I'm here to tell you that I've got to put you in their life for a reason.
You're not there by accident. You were there and got placed to you as God's people in that space. But how do you invest in them? I'm going to walk through a couple simple ways.
I'm super practical when it comes to this stuff. So bear with me for a few minutes. I want to give you some ways you could actually, if you got them on your heart, a way to invest is a simple acronym I like to call BLESS. Simple acronym.
I didn't make this up, by the way. There's an app called the BLESS app that actually is an app you could download. I have it on my phone that actually places you in the neighborhood in a map. You can see where you live and it enables you to begin to pray for the people in your circle of influence and even be able to mark your efforts towards them.
So here's what this comes from. First, begin by praying for them. This is where the beginning starts. Start by asking God to give you his love for the people in your circle.
In particular, maybe the one that got through your heart right now. Ask God to work in their lives to draw them to Jesus and to open the opportunity of the warfare, deeper connection with them along spiritual lines. Begin by praying when I first became a Christian, my number one priority became my family. I began every night getting on my knees by my bed as my mentors encouraged me to do and start praying for your family, my mother, my father, my sister, my grandmother.
I began to pray for my friends in my circle of influence that I was now leaving because I was with a bad crowd. I began fervently to pray for them every single day and I encourage you to begin to make it a habit, a habit of investing begins with prayer first because your heart has got to be moved by Jesus. This isn't something you can just get your arm behind your back and force you to do something no, no, no. This has to be compelled by love.
Paul says God's love compels me to talk about him. Secondly, is listen. Elphur, listen, generally show interest in the people that are around you. What I mean by that is slow down.
We're too fast. We're way too big of a hurry. Trust me, we are. We have to slow down.
Generally show interest in the people around us. Get to know them in their story. Start by asking the questions about their life. I'm getting curious about them.
I'm getting another story. You can slowly do that in little increments. I do that right now in the gym that I go to every morning. I've been praying for months as I walk in that gym that God would help me connect with people who are open to him.
I've begun building connections and getting to know people's stories little by little as we're putting weights on and moving around and I'm getting to know some really cool people and I'm getting to know some really cool people and I'm getting to get my heart as being moved by because I'm praying for them now regularly. That's where you start to begin by prayer but begin to just listen and be curious to be open to people. You'd be amazed, man. People really want to be loved and generally cared for even in small ways.
It really shocks people when you just pause and go, hey, how's your day really going to be amazed? Thirdly is eat with them. You'll hear us talk about this a lot in our church. But I encourage you to grab coffee once you're dinner and invite them into your home.
It's a great way to begin to touch, to level them. I love it. I've got a buddy at the gym right now, man. He saw me the other morning.
He's like, dude, when we gonna grab a beer, hang out, let's go. I look forward to doing that. But that took me a minute to get there, just investing slowly. But eat with them.
That's what Jesus meant the majority of this time doing. When you study the gospels, you'll see that the majority, all of this time teaching imperables, yes, where it was. It was not from a pulpit. It was at a table.
And it was a table with food in the middle of it. That was Jesus's method. I've studied his method. Trust me.
Up and down. And when I look at his method and I watch what he did, I'm like, well, if we imitate that guy, oh, we'd be very wise. Because healing and meals were integrated to where he invested his time with people. Lastly, last two was served.
Bless. Man, look for ways just to serve people. Kindness, proactivity, serving others, it's super powerful. Sometimes in the gym, and I'm looking for people who might need help with their weights or help with something.
It's super simple. It's super easy, right? And that's how I've met a few people. Just look for ways, man.
How can I be a blessing? How can I serve? And you can look at the people in your circle of influence. You can begin to be very intentional with this.
Intentional about praying, intentional about listening, intentional about eating, intentional about how can I serve them? I guarantee you, if you just ask the Holy Spirit this week about one of them and go, God, how can I serve them? He will show you. Promise you.
Because I'll tell you what, Jesus is more eager, more eager to be with those in your circle of influence and get to them than you and I are. Trust me. Give them a chance. And lastly, it's the start of spiritual conversation with them.
I'm going to talk about this back when we preach the beginning of the year. I encourage you to go back and listen to it if you've not become proficient at starting spiritual conversations with a little bit of practice. You'd be amazing how proficient you could become. I think this is one of the primary skills that we need as Christ followers, is learning how to start those spiritual conversations with people.
I have a few questions that I like to ask often, people. I'm prepping right now to ask some of these questions with some of those in my circle of influence. I'm going to give them to you real quick and then we'll go to inviting. Let's go.
Here's one I love to ask people. I'm curious. Do you have any spiritual background? If so, how was your experience with that?
Have you had experience with Christianity or Christians? If so, how was your experience with that? Let me tell you, once you begin to ask questions like this, you have to be ready to listen and care. The last one I like to ask is, where would you say you're spiritually right now in your life?
How is that working for you? Good open doors for conversations just to listen. These are ways to invest. There's a way to think about that.
I pray that as we go into Holy Week, you begin to take these on and think about your circle of influence because God put you in there for a purpose and reason. You are not there by accident. You are there on mission. As Jesus said, you're the light of the world.
You are the light of the world. You're the salt of the earth. I pray that we become salty, salty, salty. Again.
Yeah, not that kind. Salty in making relationships flavorful. And we bring the flavor of love and grace and truth into people's life. That's my hope.
But secondly, is inviting. The habit of outreach begins with investing, but it moves to inviting. The early church community in Acts chapter 2 was all about this. All about this.
Listen to what Luke has to tell us in Acts chapter 2. It says, every day is the early Christians. They would continue to meet together in the temple courts, large group, gatherings, worship, all this stuff. But he said, but they broke bread in their homes.
And they ate together with glad and sincere hearts. Do you see them continuing the misheaja Jesus method? You see it? Jesus's method.
They got it. They understood it. This is how he does it. He eats meals and he invites people into their home or he invites himself into their home.
You can try that one too. That's what he did. Jesus did that. I'm coming your house today.
Right? Often. Right? So go for that.
But he says, hey, they ate together with glad and sincere hearts. Praise and God in enjoying the favor of all the people. And it says this, the Lord added to their number, daily, those who are being saved. What we learned from this single moment, I love this.
That little phrase tells you that man, they understood the power of the Jesus meal gathering in spaces. They were non-threatening and that they were inviting people in. The Lord added to them are daily. They were being invited into spaces where they could come.
They could hear the apostles teaching about Jesus and the way of Jesus and the meal in a place where they saw love active and working just like I did when I went to the first Wednesday night dinners and when in high school. It was the love of the people that drew me to go, you got something I don't have and I don't know what it is. Tell me. What is it that makes you so unique?
What is it that makes you so loving? The early church got it. They caught it. And they continued that mission of Jesus by inviting people into those spaces.
They understood Jesus's command in John 1335. He says, listen, a new command I give you. Love one another. Radical.
Here's the secret of the sauce. He goes, love one another. I have loved you. So you must love one another.
This everyone will know your mind is cycles if you love one another. And all of my life since my early days I would read this text and my question would always be how can they see it then? If the way people are going to know that we're really into cycles that Jesus is real is by our love for one another. And the big question we should be asking is where can we invite them in to see that going on?
They've got to get around the community of faith. Can I envision being a Christian? Can I envision what that would look like? I couldn't envision until I got around them.
I couldn't even understand what Christian Michael was talking about. I see who they were and how they treated one another and lived. And once I got around it enough I was like, oh, oh man, you do have a love I don't have. Please introduce me to the love.
That's how they have to see it. But I want to be honest with you guys, not all environments are equal to invite people into. And I know this. Some folks in your circle of influence are probably spiritually curious right now in your life you may not be aware, like me.
And I guarantee some of those people, maybe one of them I don't know, would probably step into an environment like this. A Sunday gathering, a bigger gathering, something like this. And Easter I'm going to be honest with you is one of the greatest days of the year to invite somebody to something like this. Many people in our culture that were post-Christian in many ways, and secular, there are people in your identity will be open to invite to Easter.
There are some people who are curious about what Easter is about or what that means. It's still in the culture. This idea. I guarantee more people open you think you could invite, this week you could say, hey, what are you doing for Easter this year?
Hey, why don't you join me for church this Sunday? I'd love you to meet some of my friends. Hey, we can go afterwards, we can go grab lunch together. Something to think about.
Pastor Danielle's going to be preaching Easter this week. Next Sunday I'm looking forward to that. I love sitting under the preaching of my wife. I encourage you, she's going to bring it, man.
Come get ready to celebrate Easter. There's another thing that we're going to be doing. Right after Easter, we're joining up with another church here in the U District for an outreach that's going to be on the University of Washington campus. It's a post-Easter thing, but it's centered around the resurrection, and our own very doctor Brian Miller is going to be speaking about the evidence for the resurrection and what that means.
It's going to be on campus that very next week. I want you to know, if there's somebody you've been thinking of or your circle of influence, and you're thinking, man, I love inviting you to something like that. This is your opportunity. This is your time.
This will be a great time to invite somebody to come, hear the gospel, take them out to eat after whatever, and I just want to encourage you to take advantage of this. Easter, and then a post-Easter outreach. We have flyers on our table for that. It's invitations to that outreach, and we love you to take a couple of them with you, and you can use that to invite your friends to come out.
I'm definitely going to be inviting some people in my circle of influence to come and to see Brian Miller, and I guarantee it will be really really powerful. But we also know, let me say, that some people aren't ready for environments like this. It's too much. Right?
It's a big of a step to come into worship. Some people though would, I would say, would step into a smaller setting. Like a midweek seagroup, perhaps, where there's a meal, there's warm up questions, there's spiritual discussion, and prayer. So I might be ready for that, and could be invited in.
My friends chose to invite me into that kind of environment, to an meal first and that. They didn't invite me to church first. I want you to notice that. They were wise, they were smart.
Because I don't know if I'd have stepped in that environment. I would have seen and experienced what I saw at a Wednesday night, meal, hangout, basketball, Bible discussion. Very different, right? It worked for me.
So it's something to think about. Someone stepped into a midweek seagroup. Some there are, however, aren't quite ready for that either. Oftentimes I find people need bridges, a bridge, to walk across into Christian community.
I want to give you a couple examples of that. I think most people accept an invite to a more casual environment. For example, I know some of our secrets do this. I'm encouraging them to think about this often.
It's hosting a time each month, a place where they're doing what Acts do, where they're having meals, they're having fun together, maybe they're going bowling or something like that. I think it's bowling. But thinking, missionally, and creating the space where the group can have fun together, play together, and think about their circling and invite people into that space. I'm thankful for those that are doing that and praying about that.
Because that's a great space to invite somebody into. Hey, come hang on my friends, we're going to have fun. It's a barbecue. What are we going to do?
We're going to hight. How will we do? How will we do you? Well, last year, our evangelism team, the Hawk Leads, along with our campus team, they started a game night that happens here at the hub on the last Tuesday of the month.
They have been seeing, no joke, like every month, it's a game night, they bring food and it's games that are there. Sometimes you'll see them out here on a Sunday morning, out on the street with a table and they're giving away donuts and coffee and they're talking to people out here on the street and touching base with them and sometimes they're praying for them and starting conversations. Well, we've been having people from those street moments coming to our game nights that you may not know about. I'm going to give you one of those right now.
Here we go. Here we go. Hawk shared this to me earlier. There was a young man, they were tabling outside of the sidewalk last month who decided to come in and join the game night along with his friend Jonathan.
They had a great time and when conversation around, basically we're Christians came up, they're about Jesus around the table, we learned that Jonathan was curious about his faith. It was beautiful. We later saw that he was at a campus potluck event and we actually learned that it was actually one of our regular tenders that comes to church here who's not yet a Christian, invited him into Christian community, right? Anybody can get in on that, right?
But what Hawk is saying is every game night, he says we're seeing people who are hungry for community, hungry for connection. And having fun and whether just believing that God's at work is having conversations. This coming to you tonight is our next game night. We have little invitations as well about our game night.
If you want to take one of those, if you want to join us, you want to bring a friend of that, that's something you could also do. All right. How are we doing so far? Let's bring it home.
Last thing you could do, we talk about inviting. Not all spaces are equal. You got to be thoughtful about this. But the last thing, one of the most important things you could ever do is invite somebody to come explore Jesus with you, meaning, inviting someone to come and read a gospel with you and grab coffee.
I've had the chance to do this with several people. Becky Pippert wrote a book years ago called Out of the Salt Shaker, one of the best books I've ever read on sharing your faith. She's got a new one that just came out that I'm called Be Salt. She said one of the most powerful things you could do for anybody is just invite them to come read a gospel of Mark or Luke with you and get coffee and say, hey, bring your questions and let's just talk.
That's a longer journey. Some people aren't ready for a group. Some people aren't ready for a church setting. But they might would meet one on one to talk and go through a gospel or through one to one.
This is the power of outreach and investing I'm talking about. Investing and inviting. Investing and inviting. And these are the training wheels as you heard me say throughout this whole spiritual study that we can begin to learn to put on in our life.
Why? Jesus is on a mission to seek and save off people. And we are his church. We are plan A to that mission.
And I believe there's at least one person in every one of our circles of influence who's asking spiritual questions who is open. And if you were to start that conversation, if you were to bless them and investing, if you were to step into that, I guarantee you you begin to see where could I invite them in. My friends, it's holy week. Super bowl for Christians.
It's happening. You know what I'm saying? That's what they say. Pastors say this all the time.
Now is the greatest time in the year to invest and invite. And my prayer for you is you get on mission this week. That'd be the beginning of you, earning that sense of investing and inviting. Father God, thank you for my brothers and sisters.
I pray that you will. Oh Lord, that you would help us God get out of ourselves, our own world and lift our heads to your mission. Thank you for the people you've put around us, Lord, right now. I thank you that each of us has a circle of influence.
And you've put us there in that place of work where we live, where we play, where we study for a purpose. God, help us see that our life is such a great purpose to join you in this everlasting mission. And of finding that which is lost. Father, would you give us love, your love for the people in our circle?
Those you came and died for gave your life for. I pray Father God that this Easter season is holy, we, you would grip our hearts afresh with your love for those around us. Would you lead us to bless them and invite them in Jesus name, amen. I'd like you just to keep your eyes closed for a moment.
I just want to invite you to reflect on what are your God saying to you today and what is one step you could take this week to invest and invite. Father, we bless us with your love and grace to join you in your heart and mission. To leave the 99 and go after the one in Jesus name. All God's people said, amen to the men.
Thank you. Thank you. This basically concludes the whole Belong study. We're going to prepare for Easter next week.
I want to thank those of you who've leaned in with us over the last several weeks about the spiritual habits and listening what it means to belong, reflecting and praying. We're going to do the next few minutes to close out our gathering. We're going to do some super important for our community right now. We've been talking about Belong, what that means, we've been asking you guys to pray.
We want to give you guys a moment this morning to indicate your sense of belonging to our church family and what that looks like. We're going to walk through in just a minute of a long form that we're going to ask you to look at, to walk through together. I want to say a few things before we do that. I want to say that for some of you, I know this is easy.
It's an easy yes. I want to say something with us as many of you already serve and give and love. That's an easy one for you to indicate. This is my church home.
For others, I know some of you might still be praying. You're brand new. You're just out here and you're like, oh no, I'm too much too soon. I was like, tell me get you.
If you're still processing, you're still praying. Tell me fine. No pressure, no obligation at all. I just want you to know, but if you've got questions about us, about our church, what we believe, those kind of things, we would genuinely love to talk with you.
There's a place in that form where you can just say, hey, I'm still praying about this. I'm just glad to be here. If you'd like to meet with one of our elders, one of our leaders, we'd love a chance to meet and talk with you. But here's what we are asking today.
Because the first part of this form actually is just physical data. It's going to help us make sure our databases is sure and clean and we have accurate email and phone number and your address wide so that we can communicate with you. We love you. We'd love to communicate with you and be able to serve you well.
So this is why we're having everyone to join in on this. We want everybody to fill it out together and walk through that because that's going to serve us well. It's going to give us data to help us know how can we connect you better to our church, how can we put a community group in your neighborhood, your home or your place where you are, just things like that. Please take a moment to do that.
Obviously if you're visiting with us today, we're not asking you to fill that out. We have a connection card on the table that is just a way of getting to know you and you can let us know who you are. We'd love to take you to coffee, get to know your story, and discover where you are spiritually and help you. So that will be you while we fill this out.
If you're new here, we invite you to fill out the card together. And so right now I'm going to invite Jenna. She's going to come up. Our person's right here.
She's going to guide us practically through how we do the form. And then we'll close things up in a few minutes. Thank you so much, Pastor Perry. Yeah.
So as you look at the form, there's going to be a few different sections. So as Pastor Perry said, there's going to be a basic info, contact info section. So that's just to update our records, make sure we have everything up to date. And then there's going to be a section that you can respond to belonging.
And then next is going to be a giving section. So please fill this out based on where you feel like God is prayerfully leading you. And we know that writing something down can feel significant. So don't rush that, please.
But this is a way of expressing what you're prayerfully expecting or planning to give. And if you're not currently giving but desire to start giving, please write that down. It helps us in our planning. And this isn't like a contract with us.
It's not that you're not the number you write down is what we're going to hold you to. But it's a way to write down a commitment between you and God and you're simply sharing that with us. So we can start planning for a potential move and just our budget for that. So this really does help us as a church.
It helps us know how to pass your disciple and build this community in this next season. So the easiest way to fill this out is online form. I know that some of you have already been scanning it. There's a QR code there on the screen.
So if you haven't already invite you to pull out your phones, if you prefer paper, please raise your hand and violet will come around and give you that. But yeah, shouldn't take more than a few minutes to go through. So we're going to take the next five minutes or so to walk through the form. And yeah, if you need more time to take it home, pray about it.
That's totally fine. This form will be open until April 14th. But even if you're not going to fill it out right now, invite you to take it out, look at it, read through it, and process and begin that process. Yeah, so go ahead, take a few minutes and then I'll be back up to close our gathering help.
Right, I'm going to transition us back. If you're able to finish, awesome, you can go ahead and submit that now. If you are using the paper form, you can drop that off at the black box over there by the staircase. If you fill out a connect card, that's also where you can drop that off.
Yeah, if you need more time, that's totally fine. Again, this is going to be open until April 14th. So we can invite you to pray through it and submit it when you're able. Yeah, and this isn't about just filling out a form and letting us know some information.
This is about responding to what God is doing in your life and your heart and how he's calling you to this community. So thank you so much for taking that step with us. As we go, I just want to send us with the scripture. So in John 1334-335, we heard earlier, a new command I give you, love one another, as I have loved you.
So you must love one another. By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another. So Church, as we go from this place, may the love of Christ be with each of us, may be rooted in his love for us as individuals, and the love that he calls us to have for one another. So our gathering is officially done.
But you don't have to rush out of here. You can stay and chat at your tables to make sure the form, make connections, and yeah, have a great rest of your Sunday, and we'll see you in community group this week.