Transcribed by Beluga AI.
Thank you for all the testimonies. We are a cozy church, but we definitely have a heart for God, a heart for people, a heart for missions, and I thank God for every one of you.
Just throwing this out there: maybe we should change our focus here a little bit. Tell me after the service if you’d be open to doing a Saturday night service geared for young people. Sunday would be more of an unofficial gathering, maybe a small group.
But our focus is going to be the next generation, young people, on Saturday nights, when I think there’s more availability where it’s not conflicting with other churches. I think we can actually reach more people that way if we target Saturday night. It’s when people want to hang out anyway, and we leverage that.
So just something to pray about, something we just started praying about yesterday in our family, and we’ll see what the Lord does. And Sunday would be a little bit different.
And if we, if we move our main service to Saturday, I think it would be nice to not have anything tied down on a Sunday. It would allow us to visit churches.
I got to meet the SPCC pastor at the basketball league. He said, “If I, if I had known you a year ago, I probably would have rented our building to you. I just didn’t know you.” And so I thought I should, I should get out there more. The best time to meet pastors is on a Sunday at their church. But I’m stuck. I can’t visit anybody, and I think it’s to my loss. But I want to kind of expand, and maybe partner with people, get to know what other churches are doing in the Southern Cal area. So that’s another kind of reason why I wanted to move to Saturday. But let’s ask the Lord to confirm because I think there’s a growing momentum for missions and wanting to invest in the next generation.
Okay, let’s begin with the word prayer, and I’ll just share briefly.
Father, we’re so thankful for what you’ve already done in this service. Thank you for the heart that you’ve given to every single person here from youngest to oldest.
Thank you for Stephanie. Even as she is recovering from her own trial, she is thinking about other people. And Lord, isn’t that the Christian life? Even as we go through challenges and trials and difficulties, you want to conform us to the image of your son and to care about people, to serve other people, and not care about what’s happening to ourselves, and to consider others more important than us.
So Lord, help, thank you for examples in our midst that we can see Scripture and the truth of your word coming to life. Thank you, Lord.
We pray that you would have your way as we close out this service. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
If you could turn with me to Romans 8, I’ll just read a few verses, and this is somewhat of a continuation of what I shared yesterday.
Romans 8:22.
22 For we know that the whole creation has been groaning together in the pains of childbirth until now. (Romans 8:22, ESV)
If I could sum up my life before Christ, it’s captured in this one verse. Groaning. Before you knew Christ, you knew something was not right. You were not fulfilled. You were struggling and straining to find your place in this world. And you tried. And even if you achieved something, you just felt like the glass is half empty. The emotional state of me and my childhood, to my adolescence, to my early 20s, was just this angst, this groaning, just something is not right.
All of creation is subjected to this groaning. As we read on in verse 23,
23 And not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. 24 For in this hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what he sees? 25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. (Romans 8:23-25, ESV)
And so now we move to something more specific to the believer, the first fruits of the Spirit. We are now as believers, groaning in a different way as we struggle with our sins. Something that just didn’t bother us before we knew Christ. You were a sinner, but you reveled in your sin. You were numb to the fact that you were sinning left and right. You were just comfortable in the darkness.
But now, as we’ve been born again, as we follow Jesus into this kingdom of light, now as we’ve been reading Romans 1 through 7, especially Romans 7, Paul is groaning. This body of sin that is taking me down, that is that I’m wrestling with, is a groaning of a Christian trying to live a righteous life, trying to be holy, trying to repent and to turn to Jesus and to be transformed and to conform to the image of Jesus. This is the groaning of a believer.
But there’s a third type of groaning, the next verse, verse 26.
26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. 27 And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. (Romans 8:26-27, ESV)
And I don’t know if this is a familiar experience for you, but you’re at a crossroads. Maybe you’re just struggling with your own sin and you’re in prayer and nothing comes out except groaning. You don’t know what to pray. You don’t know how to fix yourself. You don’t know what to do. You don’t know what decision to make.
And the experience of prayer is just this: I, I’m stuck. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know which way to turn. I don’t know what, what decision to make.
And we partner with the Spirit of God. the Spirit himself is groaning. He can’t even put into words, but we sense this groaning of the Spirit. And when the Spirit is groaning over the believer, I think what is happening here is we are praying one way and deciding and perceiving and have our perspective in this one direction. And the Spirit of God says, no, that’s not right. This is what you need to focus on. This is the area you need to deal with today.
And it’s the groaning of the Spirit.
And when the Spirit and Jesus, who sits at the right hand of God, when they’re interceding for the saints, it’s a perfect prayer.
Wouldn’t you love to know what that prayer is for you right this moment? Like we have our prayer topics. Can you heal this? Can you give me this job? Can you do this for my, for my children? Can you provide for me? Here we have our list of prayers. And the Holy Spirit, who is groaning for us, has a different set of prayer requests. If we can only know what that is.
But I know the Spirit’s ministry is a spotlight ministry. The Spirit wants us to turn to Jesus and doesn’t necessarily care for that we have a smooth sailing life here. But the Spirit is concerned about full redemption, full salvation, endurance, all the way to the end, with joy. And the Spirit’s job is to get us there step by step, to repent, to turn to Jesus. And all the other prayer requests, let it fade into the background. This is a fundamental thing the Lord wants to deal with.
And let’s start with how is the Spirit groaning for me today? Let’s tune our ear to that. It’s not easy to perceive. Many times, it’s not natural to our flesh. Our flesh just wants pain to diminish, wants an easy way out. The Spirit says no, stay there. I got something for you. There’s something here for you. Don’t, don’t give up. Don’t change your circumstance. There’s something here for you. You need to overcome this. This sin has to be broken. This is a God-given trial that you’re in.
The Spirit’s prayer for the believer is so different than ours. We just want smooth sailing. We want comfort, pain-free life. The Spirit, He’s conforming us to the image of his Son. He wants us, not saved today. He wants us saved on our final day.
29 For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers. (Romans 8:29, ESV)
And that means there’s a lot of character building, a lot of trials we must go through. It’s not going to be easy. The whole world is going to hate us and persecute us. But if we’re the last man standing, last woman standing, will we be faithful to Jesus and never turn our back on Him?
That’s the, the kind of groaning. The Spirit, He’s trying to prepare us for glory. And so let’s lean into that groaning.
Okay, let’s pray.
Father, we are, we, we ask that you forgive us. So many times we groan over the wrong things, we’re frustrated over the wrong things. Help us to shut out all the noise, to change our perspective, to repent and turn to you and find out what is on your heart. What is the will of God for me right this moment? How are you groaning for me? Because we just can’t get it. We don’t perceive it. There’s a different work you want to do in us and we’re focused on surface level things. When there’s deep soul level things you’re trying to fix and get right.
Lord, we want to end this service just leaning into the groaning of the Spirit. Where are we today? What kind of fresh touch do we need from today? What kind of change in our, the rhythm of our life and structure and system of how we approach our day?
What do we need to change fundamentally so that we can have more time to be still in your presence, to perceive the groanings of the Spirit?
There’s so much noise, Lord. Help us, help us to shut out the noise, to just groan in your presence, just to lean into what you’re, what you’re speaking over us so that we can perceive it.
Pray for the missionaries that will be leaving here. More than building a house, we know there’s an inner work you want to do things you want to uproot, things you want to fix, things you want us to change fundamentally, our approach to life.
We’re not just gritting our teeth, enduring. There’s much more joy.
There’s a generation of young people who are being lost that you want us to have a heart for.
So Lord, help us, Lord. We want to, we want to pray according to the perfect will of God, the groanings of the Spirit, the intercession of our Savior over us in this generation. Please help us to perceive all that you’re doing. Please minister to us as we close out this service. Thank you, Jesus, for dying on a cross for our sins. We’re here because of you, all that you’ve done.
We receive the work, the finished work of Christ. Thank you. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.