This morning, grab your Bibles, turn to John chapter 12. We're going to get there eventually. We're going to look at three passages, three texts this morning as we begin this.

We're going to look in the book of Acts, and we're going to look in the book of Philippians as well, too.

And I just want to say again, I touched a little bit on this last week, but every time I talk to other pastors, when you say, hey, we're going to do a series on stewardship, all of a sudden, attendance drops, okay?

Attendance is going to drop because it's Thanksgiving, okay? We're in the front end, back end, whatever.

I toyed with this idea, I don't want to do this or anything, because half the people, I don't care.

We're doing it anyway. We're doing it anyway, okay? Why? Because I believe this is where God wants us to go, all right?

So we're going to do this on stewardship, and the reason why attendance drops is because everybody says, we're going to talk about money.

Money's a touchy thing. Money is a touchy thing. You know, people don't want to talk about money because it conjures up all sorts of feelings of guilt.

Somebody might have a feeling, I know I don't give as much as the way I should be giving.

I don't want him to talk about money. I'm going to get up to my eyeballs. Last thing I want him to do is start talking about money.

He's trying to guilt me into something. Hmm, okay.

Listen, money is a very sensitive thing. I get that.

And there are those who say, well, you know what? I don't like it when pastors talk about money.

Every time I come to the church, pastor wants to talk about money.

Well, I'm telling you, if the pastor is faithful to the scriptures, okay, they had better talk about money.

Jesus talked more about money than he did heaven and hell combined.

All right? So let's just get that off the table right there.

And I will say that only one of the three messages even deal with money that I'm going to talk about.

And this ain't it today.

Okay. So if you want to miss the other two, there you go. You'll miss the one on money.

So there, you're good. All right?

But you know, if I'm going to be a true shepherd and responsible for discipling you as well too,

money is one of those things that we will touch on. All right?

The pet peeve that I have is many people go into default mode

and represent stewardship as equal to finances.

No, no, no. You've got to get that off the table right now.

It's that's, that's, that's an important element of stewardship,

but stewardship is a broader issue than that.

It's so much broader.

It has to do with terms of how we view our lives.

Okay. Are we the proprietors of our lives?

Do we own our lives or are we the managers or the stewards of something that somebody else owns?

That's really what it gets down to.

When we, when we boil it down, stewardship has, has to do with our, our lives.

And really only, again, one of the three messages we'll even touch on money, but, um,

but we're going to deal with the rather, the broader, the broader, the broader aspect of the stewardship of my life, my, my life.

And so the issue is not the manifestation of your stewardship, the giving of my time, the giving of my gifts,

the giving of my talents and all that, all that stuff.

Okay.

It has to do with, with making the critical decision to give me the giving of me.

I was, uh, Condoleezza Rice was the secretary of state for George W. Bush, uh, part of his, his term.

And I remember reading part of her autobiography and I didn't realize it, that her, on her trajectory,

she was going to be a concert pianist.

She's a phenomenal pianist.

And, but she, as I read that through the, uh, uh, biography, I discovered that that's the direction she was going.

But she gets to undergrad school and while she's there, she starts thinking through all this stuff and it dawns on her.

I really love music and I like music, but it's not an all consuming passion for me.

It's just not, there are other things that are, that are on my heart that I want to pursue.

I mean, athletes get this.

You have a lot of men and women who are good athletes in high school and maybe in college, but at some point in time, you realize, man, this just isn't a pound the table and weep thing for me anymore.

You know, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not doing this, you know, and so, you know, maybe you're there today.

Maybe you're there today and you know, you got a job, you're trying to do it, you're trying to be faithful, but it's not a pound the table and weep thing for you.

And you're struggling because ultimately, intuitively you realize, and I think this is how we're wired, that there's a relationship between commitment and faithfulness.

There's a strong relationship between commitment and faithfulness.

You are faithful to that, which you are committed to.

In fact, commitment is the foundation to faithfulness.

There cannot be any consistent faithfulness apart from commitment.

So the issue is not so much, you know, how do I do something?

The issue has to do with where's my heart or who has my heart?

What has my heart?

What has my heart?

Commitment, focus, and faithfulness usually require two things.

These two things.

Go back to where we began in the arguing. We tend to argue with people. You've got to be a better steward. You've got to be a better steward. You've got to be a better steward.

When what we should be talking about is, what are you committed to? Seriously. Who are you committed to? That's really where it lays down. That's the foundational question.

And the reason why you and I are not better stewards is because you have other priorities and other distractions in your life. That's bottom line, this thing. That's why we're not really good stewards of certain things.

We've allowed other things to become distractions and really be priorities in our life. And so maybe you have other gods in your life. Maybe you have idols in your life.

And that's what's making it so difficult for you to be a faithful steward. This could be an uplifting message, isn't it? Amen.

You guys are going to wake up this morning. I think we're going to step on some toes this morning because I think this flies in the face of cultural Christianity today.

Okay. And the three texts that we're going to look at this morning, they tell us what is primary before we even talk about all these leveraging ways that you can be a good steward.

Okay. And how our lives can be useful. The first step and the big one is to understand we haven't even got to the first scripture yet.

I know this is all leading into this, but here's the first one. We must give our lives. We must give our lives.

It sounds so easy, right? Okay. We're all out the door. Pastors said, we just got to give our lives. That's it. I'm a good steward. I just give my life.

So let me just bottom line this whole thing. In the past, I'd say 20 to 25 years.

There's a lot of us, a lot of us pastors, a lot of us who are in the ministry, who spent a lot of time speaking and sharing and trying to sell people on the fact that Christianity is interested.

Okay. It's interested. So what we've attracted is a lot of interested Christians in the church today.

We get a lot of people who are interested and the truth of the matter is there's a difference between being an interested current Christian and a committed Christian.

And we don't push the envelope enough today in the church today because we don't want somebody to lose.

We don't want to lose somebody out the door. So if you're just interested, that's okay. That's okay.

You're filling the seat. You might be faithful one day. I get that, but I'm going to push you.

I'm going to push you to be a faithful, a faithful, committed Christian. And perhaps some of us fall in that category of just being interested Christians.

We have the presupposition that I control the trajectory of my life and I control what takes place in my life.

Even my walk with Christ, I control that. That's what we think as interested Christians.

And so it's my life and I'm going to pick and choose what makes me feel comfortable, what sells me and what sets me up for what I want.

And we've fallen into that comfortable category of being just interested Christians.

That thing tugs at my heart a little bit. I'm interested in this whole church thing. Okay.

But that's not what I'm talking about here this morning. That's not what I'm talking about.

That's not what the scripture is talking about. This life-changing, soul-enriching, culture-rattling, impact stuff doesn't come from interested Christians.

It doesn't. It just doesn't. Okay.

It comes from people who have given their lives and they understand that they are the stewards and not the proprietors of their lives.

So the first thing that we have to do is we have to give our lives. Okay. What does that mean?

What does it, what does that mean? Well, it means at least three core things that I'm going to give you this morning. Okay.

And we haven't, we're going to get to the scriptures. I promise you that. Okay. All this is setting up for this.

But first of all, you know, first of all, don't, you don't have to worry. I'm going to give them to you.

I'm going to give them to you real quick, but we'll write them down a little bit later on.

But let go of your life. Okay. Give your life to the goal of life. And thirdly, live your life in light of the surpassing value of Christ.

Those are the three things. We'll go over those. Stewardship. Listen, categorically means nothing as a Christian.

It means nothing as a Christian. If it means only money management or only skill management.

Stewardship. Stewardship means nothing in essence, unless their giving of a life takes place.

and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it. And whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must first follow me. And where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. Okay. Under this banner, I think Jesus is making three big statements. And the first big statement is this. Listen. Temporary obscurity.

Temporary obscurity is necessary for visible fruit. Temporary obscurity is necessary to produce visible fruit. We are like a seed. We are small and we are insignificant, but there's life inside of us. Okay. There's life inside of us. And Jesus is saying, you can't have it both ways. You can't be above ground and be fruitful. You can't be above ground. You can't expect to be visible as a

seed and expect to be to bear fruit. Can you? You can't. You have to embrace obscurity and you have to embrace removal of the limelight. You have to embrace that something has to happen to me. I have to be buried in order to produce fruit. The seeds death is the germination for this great crop. You don't get a great crop by leaving the seed on the kitchen table. Look at that great.

We'll just leave the seed there. That's good. We'll eat it one day. No, that's those granola nuts out there at the gym that wanted you to do that. Nothing against that. Okay. Whatever. But I want some corn. You know, I don't want the seed. I want some corn. Okay. Listen, I could go off a lot on this this morning, but we don't have time. I think there are all sorts of implications here because I think we love to celebrate image.

We love to celebrate image and all this image stuff and we want people to recognize us and we even look in that look at Christian service. Oh, that's a career path. Christian service. It's not a career. You're either called to it or not. It's not a career path.

I see so many people that prostitute what God wanted to be holy and righteous. They were never called to it. It's just a way for them to make money. That's a whole different sermon. Wow. I wouldn't get to get off on that. Okay.

But we have this platform. We want this recognition and we sort of homogenize this stuff and put it all in one big view, big stew. We put it all together. And that's the reason why we struggle so much to be effective in the church today. There has to be a willingness to die to self. That's where it starts.

And so, you know, so, so what we're talking about, it's not, you know, it's not about volunteering to serve or being in the classroom. That may be part of it. And that's an important part of it. And I love Josh and Summer's testimony on that. That's a yes and amen. But we're talking about something more comprehensive here. We're talking about how we view ourselves.

ourselves. And Jesus is laying this out. What Jesus is saying here is that death is the way to life. It's the way to life. We don't, we don't have time to cover this this morning, but I want you to go to second, second Corinthians and chapter four. And I want you to read over verse nine and verse 10 and pay very close attention to verse 11, particularly in there, write that down and read that over. But, but Paul shares that, that as an apostle, he's going through all these crazy things and he suffered these things.

He's been beaten down. People are talking about him and literally he's coming to the point of death. Okay. And he says, I'm bearing, okay. I'm, I'm always bearing about in my body, this death, but he doesn't talk about it in morbid terms. It's not morbid terms. He says, I'm obscure and I'm dying, but he says it's necessary. So that that points to Jesus.

So it points to Jesus, that that is the thing that comes forth in my death. Guess what comes forth Christ. That's the beauty of it. We don't talk about that enough that the resurrected life of Jesus is part of our sanctification. It's not just a justification. So, so temporary obscurity is necessary to.

Thank you.

Well, I'm glad you asked. Verse 25. Jesus says whoever loves his life loses it and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Again, Jesus is speaking in hyperbolic terms. It's much like in Luke, I think it's 14 that he's laying, laying the same things out right here. He's not saying that you should have a disdain for this life and despise this life that we have. But what he is saying is that there, that there is a fundamental preference. We don't idolize.

We don't idolize the lives that we have. We don't idolize the lives that we have. We don't make our lives the end game. This isn't the end game. The refusal to make yourself the focus of your interest. Okay? That's what he's talking about in this passage. And I know this goes against everything that you're told today. Oh, it's your personal truth. It's, it's, it's your, it's your, it's your sanctification. And my goodness, I deserve all this stuff. And I should not be put in any situation that doesn't prop me up or

make me feel comfortable or make me feel happy, but I'm sorry that collides with biblical Christianity. It collides with it. Curtis, you are not the center of attention. You're not it. You're just not it. You're a great guy. And I love you. And I've called you and I've said, yeah, yeah, you got a great family. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. You're not the center of attention.

Attention. Jesus is saying here that self-denial is necessary for fruitfulness. If we, if we don't die, we don't, we won't be fruitful. And again, it's not morbid terms here. I'm not, and I'm not speaking about not enjoying your life. But what I'm talking about here is we have to be very careful as Christians in this materialistic society, especially in the United States. Okay.

We have sort of like these parallelisms. We have these parallelisms in the mindset. We do it in the church. We do it. This is my commitment to Jesus. And this is my life. And man, they're just, they're parallel. We just travel this track down together. It's parallels. Parable.

Jesus says, no, no, no. It's mine. It's all mine. It has to all be mine. I'm not talking about, I'm not talking about your, just your spiritual life to die. That's where we miss the boat. We think of the church. Jesus is just saying that stewardship means that my spiritual life, I just death. No, no, no. You're a lie. You, you die. You get in the ground, get in the ground.

You. Man, some of you hear my voice this morning. You've been frustrated and frustrated and frustrated with your life for years and years and years. And you know that there's been something missing in your life. And the reason is, is because you have accepted a set of assumptions that's false.

That's why you continue to be frustrated and frustrated and frustrated and frustrated. And quite frankly, maybe not all together now, but maybe could it just be that you refuse to let God plant you?

You refuse to let him plant you because with that planning comes what? Death. Death to self.

Let him put you. Let him put you in the ground. Because he'll raise you up for his purpose, for his glory.

I would even go so far as to say that I think what Jesus is saying here in this passage as well is that to love your life is a denial of God's sovereignty.

In the sense that to make the central focus your life is a denial of God's sovereignty to make Christianity all about you.

Your best life ever. Your best life ever.

Or to name and claim stuff away so that you'll be happy.

I'll just name and claim all that stuff away just so I can be happy.

Or to present the gospel, a gospel that doesn't include sin.

Just talks about how you can be better and be more fulfilled in life.

Okay. All of that fundamentally denies the sovereignty of God.

Elevation of self leads to idolatry.

Elevation of self leads to idolatry.

Listen.

of your ability, God will bless your life and bless your heart in ways you can never imagine. That's not a prosperity gospel thing. That's a promise from the word of God. Now, not according to the world's standards, but according to what the scriptures say. Man, I hope you guys are getting at least one thing out of this this morning. I know three of you are awake. I hear you. I'm going to start being like Brother Joe. I want to hear you say something now. Come on. Come on. Is that how you did it, Joe?

I'm sorry. Exactly. Exactly. Sorry about that. The third thing I want to say in this as well, too, is that serving Christ means to be honored by God. Serving Christ means to be honored by God. Jesus says, here's the payoff. Here's the payoff. Verse 26. If anyone, if anyone serves me, he must follow me. And where I am, there my servant be also.

If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. The Father will honor him. You will be honored. But let me just say something here. I see guys in the ministry, particularly young guys in the ministry, they'll get involved and they get discouraged because they don't see results. I just not see any results. Or they do see results and they start criticizing other people because they're not as fruitful as they are.

And, okay, maybe they're not, maybe those other people aren't doing some things that they should be. But I always tell them, Ben, be very, very careful with trying to judge someone else's fruitfulness in this life. Be very careful. The truth of the matter is, you know, the fruit may not be seen for generations to come.

You don't know that, okay? And there's, you could be doing a whole lot of good stuff and God can just be saying, you know what? That's good stuff, but I'm going to veil that for right now.

Oh, what do you mean? No, no, no. I'm going to veil that for right now, okay? Because it's up to him.

It's up to him to unveil it. It's up to him to show it when he wants it. He produces the fruit, okay? We're just the seed. Our job is to what? Get in the ground.

Let him plant you. Die to yourself, okay? And so, for me, it's just to be faithful. The main thing is this personal sacrifice.

There cannot be fruitfulness, great stewardship, and great impact without corresponding sacrifice.

It has to be there. Listen, there is a big difference between recognizing people and honoring people.

The scripture says that, and the Father will honor him. We recognize people for what they've accomplished.

And, okay, we should, okay? But my problem is this culture has confused honor with recognition.

The Bible, in the Bible, it says that we honor those. We honor those who have made sacrifices.

And we do that today, okay? I get that. Veterans Day, okay?

We honor those who make sacrifices. Memorial Day, Independence Day, President's Day, Martin Luther King's birthday.

We honor those who have made sacrifice. But Jesus says, hey, so it is here, though. Be honored.

But Jesus says, Curtis, man, listen, don't go making those entitlement speeches.

Don't you start making those speeches. Whose life is it? Whose life is it, Curtis? It's yours.

That's right. Get in the ground. Get in the ground. You get in the ground, okay?

And let me produce the fruit. So we have to let go of our lives. We have to let go of our lives.

But also, you have to give your life to the goal of life. That's the second thing.

We're going to get through this fast, I promise. Acts chapter 20. We're going to read one verse in Acts chapter 20.

And the context of this is really amazing because what's happening here is if you read the book of Acts, you see that Paul's like done this huge U-turn, all right?

He's done this U-turn. He's planted these churches. He's gone on these missionaries' journeys.

He's seen a bunch of fruit. He's seen a bunch of battles.

And yet he senses God calling him back to Jerusalem.

God's calling Paul back to Jerusalem, and he gathers together the leaders of the church of Ephesus just before he's ready to sail back to Jerusalem.

We got to see each other.

Here we go.

Okay.

Okay.

Bye.

Thank you.

But I do not account my life of any value, nor as precious to myself, if only I may finish my course and the ministry that I receive from the Lord Jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of God.

First of all, Paul is saying that there's something more important than my life. There's something way more important over here. And, you know, looking across this crowd this morning,

I know most of you, and I know some of you even better than others, and I would say that there's not a mom, a dad, a grandma or grandpa in this room that wouldn't lay their life down for one of their children in a heartbeat.

Now, past that, I don't know. You know? Past that, I don't know. But what Paul is saying here is that there are some things that are worth dying for.

You thought you understood stewardship? There are some things that are worth dying for. And when he says, I don't count my life as dear or precious to me, he's not saying that I don't value human life, and he's not saying I don't take care of myself or anything.

But what he's saying, and which we need to embrace is this. I'm all in. I'm all in. I am all in. There is a cause, and there is a call that I will give my life for.

Can we say that this morning? There is a cause, and there is a call that I will give my life for. I'll give it.

If they came in today and said, Curtis, you've got to stop preaching the gospel, or we're going to shoot you.

First, they've got to get past Jeremiah. But once they maybe get past him, because they get like 12, okay? And they're just going to have to shoot me.

I'm tired anyway, man. I only had an hour and a half sleep. Shoot me.

I'm the dog on the side. Shoot me. Put me out of my misery.

You know, and that's what Paul's saying. There is a call and a cause worth dying for. Paul's saying, I'm not playing with this.

It's not a culture thing. I'm not just toying around. I'm all in. This is not, this whole gospel thing, it's not some spiritual Advil.

I'm feeling bad. I'll take some Jesus today.

Today. Oh, man. Brother, sister, you missed it. You missed it.

My kids are a mess. I need some Jesus today.

My marriage is falling apart. I think I better go to Jesus today.

Yes, Jesus can help with those things. Yes.

But you've missed it.

You're still, you're still a seed on the table.

And God's calling you to get in the ground.

Get in the ground.

I'll raise you up.

I'll raise you up.

And I'll give you, I'll give you the,

I'll give you the ability to find beauty in simple things.

When Clark Chadwell stood here a few weeks ago and talked about how God saved him from a blowout on the interstate.

Some people are like, that's a big deal.

Clark's been in the ground.

And he can see when God's hand is moving things.

When God's orchestrating things.

And this is what Paul's talking about.

There's something more important than, than, than this life.

In the second part of the verse in here,

and he says, he says that to finish the race,

to fulfill the ministry that we have received from the Lord.

Paul says it ain't over until God says it's over.

It ain't over until God says it's over.

And that's interesting here.

He says, he says that his course is going to take him to some very uncomfortable places.

This course that I'm set on is going to take me to a very uncomfortable place.

And that shatters all the garbage that some of the Christian leaders kind of throw in our face today.

Listen, God will lead you to a dark place.

God may lead some of you to be a martyr.

I don't know.

Why would you, it, God is so.

Um, they're coming for me. You know, he's, he's good. He's going on the chopping block. They're going to take his head off. You know, he, he doesn't understand all that yet, but he knows it's coming. He says, but he says what? I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have fought the good fight and finished the race. Please, please, please listen to me this morning. Please listen. Success is overrated. Did he just say that?

Success is overrated. When you die. And when I die, there needs to be a joy in our hearts. No matter how we check out, no matter how we check out that we did the will of God. I ran the race. I finished the race. No matter what God calls us all the different things. Okay. I did what God called me to do, whether it was visibility or obscurity.

I don't care. I don't care. I was faithful in the race. Now you're starting to understand stewardship. You want to talk about money? Money? Seriously?

Seriously? Paul says we have to be willing to even face death. Why? To advance the gospel. Wow. That's big.

Be willing to face death. Be willing to face death. To advance the gospel. To testify the gospel of the grace of God. You know, Paul says, I don't know what they're coming to do to me. I don't know. I'm not living in some la-la denial. Land of denial. I get it.

But there's something of greater value. Something of greater value. And that is what? The gospel is going to get preached.

In that hard spot that God puts me in, God's going to have the gospel preached to somebody else. Wow.

And Paul says, if it takes my death to bring them life, what a joy. What a joy.

So the foundation for faithfulness and stewardship has to go with letting go of your life and giving your life to the goal of life.

But thirdly, it's to live your life in light of the surpassing value of Christ.

Christ. Turn with me to Philippians chapter 3. We'll wrap this up.

Oh, it's only 1130. We can go on for another hour. I'm sorry. Let's keep going.

Remember, Paul's writing Philippians, the book of joy. Where is he? Book of joy. He's in prison.

He's back in prison. He's knee deep in it. Okay. He's in prison.

And he's in prison. And he's writing stuff like, for me to live is Christ. To die is gain.

That's in prison. Yeah. In prison. In prison. He's writing that.

And we get to chapter 3. And you ever, I don't know if you've ever been around, you ever been around somebody who's in their last moments of life?

Isn't it amazing the sense of clarity that comes over them?

You ever have somebody just speak something that's like so, wow.

They're on their deathbed and they say something that's just like, bam.

They have the ability in that moment to really, to really be able to divide what's really important and what's not.

I've had some things said to me that were just, just really moving.

Philippians 3. I'm going to concentrate on 7 and 8.

But let's just kind of back up a little bit because I love this whole section.

Let's start in verse 4.

Though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also.

If anyone thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I got more.

Circumcised on the 8th day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews.

As to the law, a Pharisee.

As to zeal, persecutor of the church.

As to righteousness under the law, boom, blameless.

But whatever I gain, whatever gain I had, I count it as loss for the sake of Christ.

Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord.

They just can't compare. All the glitter, all the recognitions, all the standing ovations, all the graduation degrees on the wall, none of it compares with Jesus. Nothing compares with Jesus.

In fact, he's underscoring that our identity is not found in what we have accomplished, what we have achieved, but it's found in the person and the greatness of Jesus Christ, our Lord and our Savior.

If you boast more about what you have accomplished than the excellencies of Christ, then your accomplishments have become your idol and have become your God.

If Paul were here today, he would not put people down. He would not put people down for what they've accomplished, that he would cheer for their milestones.

That's not what I'm saying here. But the point being is that everything in life is worthless compared to Jesus.

And we're not going to spend a whole bunch of time talking about when he says it's rubbish, which really means dung, which really means look it up.

I don't have to go into that, okay? It's a manure mess, okay? That's what it is.

Everything is a manure mess when you compare it to Jesus.

What? The marriage of my wife? It's a beautiful thing. I wouldn't trade it for anything.

But it's dung compared to Jesus.

My beautiful children? You say it. It is worthless compared to Jesus.

That new job I'm going after, I'm getting, you're telling me that God's given it to me to provide for my family?

Yes, maybe so, brother. Maybe so, sister.

But it's worthless compared to Jesus.

Are you ready for stewardship yet?

True biblical stewardship?

And by the way, when he says that expression to gain Christ,

he's not doing all these things to work his way towards Jesus accepting him.

I believe he's making two implications here.

By gaining Christ as his passion, okay?

To be Christ-like in his pursuit.

And secondly, I think what he means is like having Christ as Savior and Lord,

that's the prize of life.

Having Christ as Savior, that's, you wanted to know what the prize of life was all these years?

You've been struggling, you've been on Facebook, and you've been Snapchatting,

everybody trying to find the prize.

The prize of life is right there.

It's Jesus.

Not spiritual Advil Jesus.

Jesus.

Straight up.

Full force.

Jesus.

In your face.

Jesus.

24-7.

Jesus.

We have Jesus for you.

You better believe it.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Hmm.

Nothing compares to him.

Nothing we ever accomplished could ever compare to him.

Nothing you have.

Nothing you have is more valuable than him.

Are you there?

Nothing.

Nothing.

Nothing is more valuable than he is.

And that is the, that, that, that surpassing value that you have on Jesus Christ, brother,

sister, friend, that is the thing that should taint your life.

Your life is tainted with that.

Ah.

You walk, you've walked around those people where just, goodness of the Lord just exudes from them.

Hmm.

And you walk with the Lord and then you're like, I just can't help but to give it out.

Come here, let me give you some Jesus.

That's why I like hugging Gene so much.

Gene, Gene just loves him some Jesus.

And he'll give you a big old Jesus bear hug, man.

Do we all get, you always get it right?

Do we, Gene?

No.

But we're, but we're sincere about it, right?

So you let the goal of your life be Christ and you live for the goal of your life and the

surpassing value of knowing Christ, okay?

And, and it means that everything, everything to, doesn't matter how much it costs, you know?

He's, he's the most, he's the most important, he's the most important thing.

And as I read,

century. Adoniram Jetson. He left in the 19th century to go to Burma. He spent 38 years in Burma. And for years and years and years and years, he never saw any fruit whatsoever, ever. In fact, he paid an incredible price. He was married three times. His first two wives died. He had a daughter that died. But he still stayed there, remained faithful to the calling that God had in his life, tried to reach the

folks. They threw him into prison. They persecuted him. They beat him. And yet there are thousands and thousands of churches today in that arena of the world. And you can trace them all back to Adoniram Jetson. John Perkins. John Perkins is probably close to 90 years old right now. Dr. John Perkins, born and raised in rural Mississippi under Jim Crow and all that

craziness. John Perkins. John Perkins, uh, at an early age, the police in rural Mississippi killed his brother. John Perkins left, went out to California. He vowed he would

never go back to Mississippi again. He gets out to California and his son comes to know Jesus through a good news club at school. His son starts coming home and he sees a change in the little boy's

life. And something begins to work in John Perkins life. And in his heart, John Perkins gives his life to Jesus

Christ. And get this, John Perkins gets discipled by a white man. This white man pours into John Perkins' life. God calls John Perkins

back to rural Mississippi. And he founds a ministry called the Voice of Calvary. And John becomes committed to social

justice from a gospel core. John is thrown in jail. John is beaten within an inch of his life several

times. And yet he refuses to hate because of the hope of the gospel. And I'm telling you, any of us, any of us in

this, in this great nation that pastor a church that desires to have any type of diversity or any kind of

racial reconciliation, we stand on the shoulders of John Perkins. What you see happening today is

because of faithful men like John Perkins. I know that. I know that. I think of Bill Bright. Bill Bright and

his wife, Vonette. Bill Bright was a gifted businessman and he had the gift of making money. And all of a sudden,

God gives him this vision of starting this organization that would reach the campus one day and maybe the

world the next day. And his testimony, he talks about how when they first started, he and his wife, they

were pretty materialistic. But they signed a contract. He and his wife got down on their knees

and they signed a contract and they said, Lord, everything that we have is yours. We sign over

everything to you. And because of that, Campus Crusade for Christ is the world's largest Christian

organization today. Because Jesus became the supreme value to these brothers and sisters. Jesus

became the supreme value and to so many others that we could go on and on. But I got to tell you,

there's this thing that's going on and the thing that's going to rock our culture and to rock this

world for the Lord and to turn these things around are not going to be more cute strategies or cute

ideas to do for the church, for the Lord. Okay. But we need to see people who are all in with Jesus,

who have given their lives to the goal of God, given their lives completely, who are living for

Christ as a supreme passion. They're not bifurcated. Okay. They're not living this parallel life,

this parallel universe. That will make a difference in your life. That will make a difference in your

children's life. And that will make a difference in the generations ahead when we get to that place.

Okay. But a call to stewardship is a call to commitment and commitment is a, is a foundation

for faithfulness. I am faithful because I am committed. I am.

God, you have stewarded it because of that stewardship, your relationship flourishes and your relationship continues. Now you starting to get what stewardship means, what it, what it gets down to. And there, there, there are, there are a lot of things that are churning in my heart in these days, but at the core of it is this, this, this one thing. And don't, don't misunderstand me. I, we're not, I'm not, I'm not sinless. We're not sinless. We're not perfect. This old man right here, he's not sinless.

I got junk. I got to go to the Lord with you every day in my life. I got to go to the Lord here and fall on my face, but we have to turn, we have to turn some corners on this incremental Christianity. This incremental Christianity is garbage. You want to know why the church doesn't operate and work without power today? Because they have fallen in love with incremental Christianity. Cause guess what? Incremental Christianity doesn't cost you.

What a disciple of Christ. What a disciple of Christ, the true disciple of Christ costs you. Get in the ground. Get in the ground, church. Bury yourself. Let God bury you as he buries me. We've got to make some choices as a church, as individuals, as families. What's at stake is our lives. What's at stake is the glory of God.

Are you, are you, are you, are you a believer of Jesus? Guess what? You are to reflect the glory of that glory of God. So that's what's, that's, that's what's at stake.

And to be a witness for generations to come.

And as the band comes up here, I'm in the prayer room this morning and something else.

As the Lord just shows me in this passage, in this passage here, come on guys.

John chapter 12, turn back there with me real quick.

And I promise you we're closing right now.

In context, in context again, Jesus says, the passage we read says,

Truly, truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains alone.

But if it dies, it bears much fruit.

Whoever loves his life loses it.

Whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.

If anyone serves me, he must follow me.

And where I am, there my servant be also.

If anyone serves, serves me, the father will honor him.

And we just spent a whole bunch of time just, just kind of dissecting that and laying it all out, right?

And Jesus was saying, we said that Jesus was saying what?

To, for real life, you got to die.

For real fruitfulness, you got to die.

To, to be, to be produced fruit in this world, you got to die, right?

But here's the, here's the, here's the cool thing.

The passage that I left out, there's a verse before that.

Jesus is talking to all of them and it just hit me this morning.

Jesus sets it all up and says, the hours come for the son of man to be glorified.

Oh, hallelujah.

The hours come for the son of man to be glorified.

So guess what?

He's going to ride in on you.

That means you're going to get on a stallion and you're going to kick tail and take some names, right, Jesus?

Jesus, all the time has come.

We've been listening to all these Romans do all this stuff.

We've been losing all of our stuff as Jewish citizens.

You're finally going to take it all back from us.

The, the, the hours come for the son of man to be glorified.

Okay, Jesus, tell us how.

I'll tell you.

Unless the grain of wheat falls to the earth and dies, it remains alone.

If it dies, it bears much weight.

And we're eating at the table of the Lord still today.

Let the Lord begin to spark in your heart a true understanding. But also a true desire for stewardship. To be all in. All in. And that looks different for each of you. It looks different for each of you. Get with the Lord and find out what that means. Get with the Lord and get in the ground. In the name of Jesus. For His name is said and His glory.

Let's stand. Let's stand. Father, we just come before You today. And we thank You and praise You. We thank You and praise You. For Your beautiful Son, Jesus.

And we thank You, Lord, for His faithfulness. And we thank You, Lord, for His faithfulness. His commitment, Lord. To bear and to pay a price we could never pay. To be with You, a holy and righteous God.

Amen.

Amen.

Move in the heart of people today, Lord Jesus. Please, Father. Teach us how to be stewards of that which You put in our hands. Our hands are open and our yeses on the table. You write the check, Lord.

You tell us what it is you're requiring us.

What it is.

Jesus.