Basic Training - Red Phase
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Transcript
Service:
Opening
Announcements:
Student night wednesday
Council Meeting Monday 7/18/21
Worship
Sermon
Baptism
Introduction:
Good morning - it is an honor to be here with you today - to worship the Lord with you all.
We know, as a church, our purpose is to most importantly Glorify God, then, to equip saints, and to share the gospel. Last week we started a new sermon series on being equipped saints. To be equipped means to have the things that you need, to be fixed - repaired - and positioned for the purpose that is set before you. Our purpose, as it says in Ephesians 4, is to be equipped for the ministry - the application of - the gospel. We are to be prepared correctly for - giving out and applying the gospel. We want to have the tools for the doing of the things that God calls us to do. And the approach that I am taking to this is one like what a person would experience when joining the military and going through basic training - because of the similarities between becoming and growing as a christian and going through that process as a citizen becoming a soldier. And so I could share that lovely photo of myself last week from the end of my own basic training experience. As a disclaimer, I am using this as an illustration - because it works, not because I need everyone to know that this was something I did or anything like that. It just works for this purpose.
Basic training : Registration, Reception
Culture shock - Hair cut, Uniform, Paperwork, Shots… We went through this phase last week. As believers, this is figuring out if you are a follower of Jesus. So many people, especially in this country, put Christian down on their facebook religious preference, but have no real idea what that means. We looked at what it means to go through the process of becoming a saint - as opposed to living a lie.
the next 9 weeks of basic training are broken up into three phases - called red white and blue, each phase having a different training focus -
Red phase - focuses on the basics, disciplines and values
White Phase - focuses on basic soldiering skills, marksmanship, situational awareness
Blue phase - Advanced soldiering skills, land navigation, first aid
Over the next few weeks, we are going to take a similar approach to becoming saints - who are equipped for the ministry of the gospel. Today - we are going to be in Red phase - Basics, Discipline, Values… Once a person has gotten to that point, they have determined to follow Jesus, confessed that He is Lord Made the decision - What’s next? What does it mean to follow Jesus. We are in Red phase.
Before we get into the word, lets pray.
PRAY.
If you would turn with me in your Bibles to Romans 12. We are going to see what the apostle Paul wrote to the church in Rome, and how it applies to us, and our desire to be effective, equipped saints.
Therefore, brothers and sisters, in view of the mercies of God, I urge you to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God; this is your true worship.
Do not be conformed to this age, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may discern what is the good, pleasing, and perfect will of God.
Therefore - when we see this, it is saying to look at the context around this verse. In this case, Paul has just described how merciful and good God is in the chapters before this one and here he says, Because of all of those things - that he explains at length.
Mercy is compassion or forgiveness toward someone when you have the power and ability to punish or harm. We fall under that category - because we are all sinners. Because way back when, we decided it would be okay to disobey God. He had the ability, under the agreement of our creation - to punish us. We needed mercy.
Mercy is what sent Jesus to be born, to live, to die on the cross.
Mercy allows us to be forgiven - and to be called saints.
Mercy is what allowed us access to the father.
Because we don’t deserve it.
And Paul is saying here - because of that Mercy - therefore - I URGE you to present yourselves as a living sacrifice.
Sacrifices were common during that time. God had set before His people a way to pay for their sins that was not with their own lives - that they would sacrifice, they would kill in ritual, an animal.
So what does it mean to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice? It means to live our lives in a way that we understand that they aren’t our lives any more. That we give ourselves to the cause of the Glory of God.
Therefore, through him let us continually offer up to God a sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name.
We are called to live a life that looks radically different than those around us.
Do not be conformed to this age:
We aren’t supposed to look like the people around us - as we discovered last week, we are a NEW creation - the old has DIED.
What does this age look like?
For the time will come when people will not tolerate sound doctrine, but according to their own desires, will multiply teachers for themselves because they have an itch to hear what they want to hear.
Flying spaghetti monster
New age theology
Live however you want
your life is not a sin
Live to make YOU happy. YOU wealthy. YOUR life easier and better.
Instead - Be TRANSFORMED, by the renewing of your mind.
This isn’t an outward work. This isn’t a diet and work out program to help you fix the outside of your body and make you look better. Its not a timer to help you remember to do the dishes on time.
But a change that starts UP HERE.
Inward. Spiritual. Transformation.
Spending time in the word. Learning and loving the word of God. Letting it actually change who you are. Spending time in prayer, asking God to work in you and in your life.
New motivations - turning from serving yourself to serving the Lord
New goals, new aspirations, new desires.
Through that process - through renewing your mind, becoming spiritually new - you will discern the will of God.
Through renewing your mind, you will discover what God has for you to be doing.
“My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work,” Jesus told them.
Following Gods will - supplies our needs.
While we work out that discernment, it is important that we don’t simply keep living the way that we want until we figure it out…
In the Army, during the red phase, we learn whats known as the general orders of the army. These orders dictate the most simple actions that a soldier should always be taking.
1st General Order I will guard everything within the limits of my post and quit my post only when properly relieved. 2nd General Order I will obey my special orders and perform all my duties in a military manner. 3rd General Order I will report violations of my special orders, emergencies, and anything not covered in my instructions, to the commander of the relief.
Two sections that follow this introduction to this chapter, we are going to skip down to vs 9. Because we are in Red Phase. We want a firm understanding of values - of doctrines, of what it LOOKS like to follow Jesus.
Verses 9-21 - give us a list of instructions on how we can live our lives, in a way that will honor and glorify God. I want to read that to you this morning - as I do, listen carefully and follow along in your bible. These are our general orders. You might say - Pastor, I don’t know what I should be doing.. Do these things. These are enough to keep you busy.
Let love be without hypocrisy. Detest evil; cling to what is good.
Love one another deeply as brothers and sisters. Take the lead in honoring one another.
Do not lack diligence in zeal; be fervent in the Spirit; serve the Lord.
Rejoice in hope; be patient in affliction; be persistent in prayer.
Share with the saints in their needs; pursue hospitality.
Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.
Rejoice with those who rejoice; weep with those who weep.
Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud; instead, associate with the humble. Do not be wise in your own estimation.
Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Give careful thought to do what is honorable in everyone’s eyes.
If possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone.
Friends, do not avenge yourselves; instead, leave room for God’s wrath, because it is written, Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord.
But If your enemy is hungry, feed him. If he is thirsty, give him something to drink. For in so doing you will be heaping fiery coals on his head.
Do not be conquered by evil, but conquer evil with good.
We aren’t always going to understand what God calls us to be doing. He may call us, he may instruct us, he may will us to do things that we might not understand at all.
We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
Our job - our responsibility, is like soldiers, to follow the orders and instructions as they are given to us.
If you and the Bible ever disagree - you are the one who is wrong.
Following Orders We Don’t Understand.
Like this guy, mopping up rain water.
Baptism
When Philip ran up to it, he heard him reading the prophet Isaiah, and said, “Do you understand what you’re reading?”
“How can I,” he said, “unless someone guides me?” So he invited Philip to come up and sit with him.
Now the Scripture passage he was reading was this: He was led like a sheep to the slaughter, and as a lamb is silent before its shearer, so he does not open his mouth.
In his humiliation justice was denied him. Who will describe his generation? For his life is taken from the earth.
The eunuch said to Philip, “I ask you, who is the prophet saying this about—himself or someone else?”
Philip proceeded to tell him the good news about Jesus, beginning with that Scripture.
As they were traveling down the road, they came to some water. The eunuch said, “Look, there’s water. What would keep me from being baptized?”
So he ordered the chariot to stop, and both Philip and the eunuch went down into the water, and he baptized him.
When they came up out of the water, the Spirit of the Lord carried Philip away, and the eunuch did not see him any longer but went on his way rejoicing.
Philip appeared in Azotus, and he was traveling and preaching the gospel in all the towns until he came to Caesarea.