← Red Rocks Church Weekend Messages
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Come on, Red. Rocks. You guys excited for a good day at church? Would you help me welcome every single one of our Denver based locations? Austin, Texas, Brussels, all the men and women at all the correctional facilities and everybody joining us online from all around the world. Listen, listen, listen. We are a bunch of broken, imperfect people who are here to pursue a perfect God. Which means you are welcome here exactly as you are. We've and praying for you to be here and we can't wait for church today. Now, by way of introduction, if we haven't met, some of you at Littleton are looking at me like Doug looks a lot better than he looked last week. What is going on right now? I'm not Doug. I'm not Doug. He is my older brother and my best friend, though, so I'm obligated to make that joke. My name is Ryan and I get the task of ending week six of Kiss the Fire. Have you guys been enjoying this series so far? Anybody grateful for Pastor Sean and his vulnerability and authenticity to give us this book? Man, Kiss the Fire is such a gift to the world. Now, we've covered a lot of ground, but we've got one more sermon to go and so I'm going to say a prayer, then we're going to dive into it. Father God, I thank you for this time, Lord, at every single one of our locations. We ask now, as we open your word, that you would speak to us, Holy Spirit. We don't just need information, we need revelation, because revelation leads to transformation. So as we renew our minds through your word today, would you change us? We pray in Jesus name and everyone said amen. You can take a seat. Today I want to talk about the Bible. Now, we talk about the Bible every single week around here. But today I want to zoom out a little bit and answer some questions like what is the Bible and can we trust the Bible and how do we study the Bible? Because here's the deal. We all face fires in life. We all face trials in life. And the world, if you've noticed, has some recommendations for how we should face those fires. Like the world will tell you. Just bring a distraction with you to the fire. Like if your relationship is falling apart, just work 80 hours a week and kind of hope that the fire just goes away or just get a good hobby and kind of just hope that the fire goes away or the world will tell you. Just bring your vice with you to the fire and just smoke your way through it or swipe your way through it or shop your way through it and just Kind of hope the fire goes away. But this series is not called just kind of hope the fire goes away. This series is called Kiss the Fire. And for the final sermon, I want to preach a message called bring your Bible to the fire. Bring your Bible with you to the fire. And so let's go. Ephesians, chapter 6. At the end of Ephesians, Paul is talking to us about how we arm ourselves for battle. Like John, like Jesus says in John 10:10, the enemy may come to steal, kill and destroy, but he has come that we may have life, and life to the full. But Paul is reminding us, but you got to get ready. You got to get ready for the battle. And so he talks to us about having the belt of truth, and he talks to us about having the sandals of peace. He talks to us about having the breastplate of righteousness. And then we'll pick it up in Ephesians 6, verse 16. In addition to all of this, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. So we have an enemy who is shooting flaming arrows at us. That's the bad news. The good news is Paul tells us that we can take up the shield of faith. And then he continues, Verse 17, take the helmet of salvation. How many know the mind is a battlefield? Is that just me? I'm so grateful, man, for the helmet of salvation. And then here we go. And the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. Paul tells us that your Bible is your sword. It's your weapon that you can take with you into battle. And yet, so often, too often I would argue that we just have the enemy in our ear whispering lies to us while our weapon, while our sword is collecting dust on the front or on our bed. Stand right beside our bed. And so what I want to do today is I want to teach us how to take the Bible with us into the battle. How do we make sure we. Or how do we figure out a way to bring the Bible with us into the fire? Four things, if you're taking notes, here's what we got to do. We gotta trust it, we gotta study it, we gotta memorize it, and then we gotta live it. So some of you are looking at me like I don't even trust the Bible. So how do I. How could I take it into the fire with me? We're gonna talk about why we can trust the Bible today. And then after that, we're gonna talk about what it looks like to study the Bible. Now, if you are new to this whole experience and trying to figure all this out. This is the perfect message for you. I want to teach you how to study the Bible today. But I feel like there are a bunch of us, a good amount of us in the church today. And I promise there's no condemnation or shame with what I'm about to say. Who, if you're just being honest, would admit, you know, I used to study the Bible like I used to do that, but I kind of got it down now. And so now I've kind of just been on cruise control. And what I want to do today is invite us to re up on our commitment to study the the Bible all throughout the the book of Exodus. While the Israelites are wandering through the wilderness. There's this theme that happens where God gives them manna from heaven every day. It's just bread from heaven. And they try to save it, right? They try to save it for the, the next day. And what God keeps teaching them is, hey, I'm going to bring you new manna every single day. Or to use Jesus's language, you're going to have your daily bread. And what I just feel like is it's very easy for us to go. I used to study the Bible and then what happens is we end up trying to get by on yesterday's manna instead of being alive and alert to what God wants to speak to us today. And so today we're going to re up on studying the Bible together and then memorizing. Anybody else feel like their memory is getting worse? I last week I was trying to sign into an account and it gave me like a six digit code, you know, like 162896. I was like, no problem. And I turned and started typing 16289. Like, what's wrong with me? Like I can't even remember six digits anymore. Our phones just remember everything for us and so I feel like our memories are getting worse. Well, one of the ways to combat that is to get back to the lost art of memorizing scripture, of learning to bring it with you into battle. And then of course at the end we got to live it out. Like imagine if you were a general in an army and you were about to enter into battle and all of the soldiers came up to you and they said, you know, I just feel like the enemy's too powerful. They've got weapons. Why don't we try fighting without our weapons this time around? The general would be like, what are you talking about? Like, that is the worst strategy in the history of warfare. And yet so often as Christians, we fall into that trap and we make that mistake. So today we're going to learn how to bring our Bibles with us into the fire. And so from the top, we gotta learn how to trust it. We gotta start by trusting scripture. Question that we're really asking is, is the Bible just a series of good stories or is it actually something different? Is it actually the word of God? Because if we're gonna trust it enough to base our lives on it, we better know that it's the word of God. And so to start, the Bible claims to be the word of God. That's really important. Let's go. 2 Timothy 3, 16. All scripture. All scripture is. I love this phrase, God breathed. And it's useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting, and training in righteousness. I love how the psalmist says it. Psalm 119, verse 86. All your commands are. Are trustworthy. And so make no mistake about it, the Bible claims to be the word of God. The Bible claims to be God breathed. The Bible claims to be trustworthy. But now the skeptics at every location are going, oh, great, here we go. A classic Christian telling us you can trust the Bible because the Bible tells us that we can trust the Bible. Right? That's circular reasoning. Like, like anybody can say anything, anybody can declare anything. Just because Michael Scott declares bankruptcy as Oscar reminds him. Still, that's not anything. If you didn't get the office reference, let's try a sports reference. 1932 World Series, Yankees versus Cubs, game three, tied game, fifth inning, Babe Ruth is at the plate. Count is two and two. And as the legend goes, he points to the center field wall as if to say, you give me that pitch one more time, I'm putting it over the fence. He declares it. He calls his shot. Very next pitch, home run over the fence. The Yankees go on to win the World Series, and we haven't stopped talking about it since. Why? Not just because he called a shot, but because he backed it up. Now, 2014, this is Nick Young, guard for the Lakers, who's great. Love him, love watching him play. Had a great career. One unfortunate moment that he laughs about to this day, steps back, takes the three, feels real good about it. And so he turns around and he calls his shot. He declares it. That's going in. Unfortunately, it rattles around the rim and it bounces off, creating an unfortunate picture for him. But a very fortunate picture for the Internet Quickly turned into a meme. So he declared it. But he didn't back it up and we laugh at him. But if you declare it and you back it up, we lean in and we listen. Okay, here's what I love about the Bible. It doesn't just claim to be the word of God. For 2000 years, it's been backing it up. Now I'm going to give you the five minute version of this if you want to dive deeper. This week, Pastor Sean preached a message called why can I trust the Bible? A couple of years ago. And it's the 40 minute version of this and it's absolutely brilliant. And so go watch that this week, but for the next five minutes, why do we know we can trust the Bible? Let me try to be as helpful as I can. Biggest critique that I get when I'm meeting with people about the Bible is they'll usually say something like this. I just don't feel like I can trust the Bible. It feels to me like this giant game of telephone. I was at a coffee shop about a year ago and those were the exact words that a guy. I had my Bible out, I was studying, getting ready, and a guy walked by and he was genuine, he was sincere, he wanted to be able to trust the Bible, but he's just like, I just don't trust it. And that. Those were his words. I feel like it's this game of telephone and what he means by that. So he goes like, like take the, the events in the Gospels, for example. Like, maybe those happened, but then those stories got passed on to the next person. And those stories got passed on the next person. Those stories got passed on to the next person. And then eventually they were written down, but they were written down in Greek. And then by the time Latin became the popular language, it got translated to Latin, but then German became the popular language, so it got translated to German. So by the time you have your English Bible, it's a translation of a translation of a translation of a story that got passed down from generation to generation to generation. And so what skeptics will often say is it's just a game of telephone. Remember that game when you were a kid? One person whispers something in the first person's ear and then by the time it gets to the end, it's just completely changed. He says that, and my goodness, it's like he just teed the ball up for me and handed me the driver. Like, why don't you take a seat, right, let's talk through this. Because here's the deal, that's not how it happened. So there's this guy named Matthew who wrote the Gospel according to yeah. So he was a tax collector who Jesus called and brought with him for all three years of his ministry. And he got to go everywhere with Jesus. He got to hear everything that Jesus said. He got to be an eyewitness to all of his miracles. And then he sat down and wrote it down. And then there's this guy named John who wrote the Gospel according to. So John was a fisherman who got called by Jesus and then for three and a half years got to go everywhere with him, was one of his closest disciples. And then one of the leaders of the early church. He saw everything that Jesus did and listened to everything that Jesus said, and then he wrote it down. This guy named Mark who wrote the Gospel according to Mark was all throughout the book of Acts. He was a traveling companion of Paul. We think he was also a traveling companion of Peter. So he got to. To be an eyewitness and talk to eyewitnesses about everything that Jesus did. And then there was this guy named Luke who wrote the Gospel according to oh, let's go. And he was also. He wrote Luke and he wrote Acts, by the way. And he's all throughout Acts. Sometimes in Acts, it moves from from third person to first person. So it's like Paul went here, Paul went there. And then all of a sudden it's like. And then we went. And you're like, oh, Luke, you were with him. That's like one of the most subtle flexes of all time. The point is that Luke was there and he got to interview these guys. That's why I love how Luke begins his Gospel. Luke chapter one and verse three. Since I myself have write this down, carefully investigated everything from the beginning. Not heard a story from a story from a story from a story, but carefully investigated it, I too decided to write an orderly account for you. The, the point is, this isn't a game of telephone. These are eyewitnesses who wrote this down. Now, the second half of that equation is fair, that it was originally written in Greek, eventually written in Latin, eventually written in German, and eventually written in English. But. But what people who are trying to deconstruct on TikTok fail to mention is that when, when the scholars who sit down to write English translations of the Bible, like the NIV that we're reading from today, they're not going through a translation of a translation of a translation. They are Greek and Hebrew scholars who are going back to the original text and they're going, what did the original writers write? Down. So it's not a game of telephone to be more accurate. It would be like going to the first person in line of the game of telephone going, hey, what did you say? Because I want to make sure that I get this accurate. The point is we can trust the word of God. Now, we could talk all day about the amount of copies that we have of these early manuscripts. You want to go on a fun rabbit trail? Look up how many copies we have of, of the original manuscripts compared to literally every other historical figure. It's laughable. The New Testament just blows everything else out of the water. We can talk about archaeological discoveries like the Hittites. It was a group in the Old Testament and for hundreds of years we couldn't find anything about the Hittites. So Bible critics would always just be like, yeah, they're just making that up. But then in 1906, we discovered the Hittites and we discovered a whole bunch of writings from them. And archaeologists being the good archaeologists and scientists that they are, they see the evidence, they're like, oh, the Bible was right about yet another thing. I love this quote from a 20th century archaeologist named Nelson Glueick, guy who devoted his life to this. He said it may be stated categorically that no archaeological discovery has ever controverted a biblical reference. Throw up the next quote as well. Norman Geisler says there's more evidence that the Bible is a reliable source than there is for any other book from the ancient world. Red Rocks. We can trust the Bible not just because it claims to be the word of God, but because it backs it up. Now, for me, in my life, the thing that really has brought the most confidence for me was the moment somebody explained to me that when you read the Bible, you're not just reading a book, you're reading a library. It's 66 books written by 39 authors over the course of 1500 years from three different continents. And like, this is before Google Docs, you know, like, they couldn't just talk. And yet it all weaves together to tell one unified story that all points to Jesus. In fact, there's a beautiful picture of what we call hyperlinks in the Bible. This is the Bible referencing the Bible. So all the way from Genesis to Revelation over 63,000 times, the Bible references itself. And leave that up there for a second as we read Luke 24. This is Jesus after his death and resurrection. He's on a walk this road with a couple of disciples. And it says this. And beginning with Moses and all of the prophets so Moses at the beginning, all the prophets towards the the middle there he explained to them what was said in all the scriptures concerning himself. Jesus goes, you see all of this? This is all pointing to me. This is all here to, to. To tell the story of a God who so loved the world that he sent his one and only son. Pay the price for our sins that we may go free. Listen, there's a long list of reasons why I trust the scriptures. One of them is because I trust Jesus and Jesus trusted the Scriptures. It's one of them church. We can trust the bible. Now that's 30,000ft. Again, go watch Pastor Sean's message. Why can I trust the Bible? If you want to dive a little deeper and then if you really want to get into the weeds, there's a book called Evidence that demands a verdict by Sean and Josh McDowell. Now it's 800 pages. I'm just going to tell you that right now. Or 45 hours on audible if you're wired like I am. But if you want to take a deep dive, especially the first part, Part one is all about evidence for the Bible. We can trust Scripture. Now, once you trust it, you got to actually start studying it. I read a stat this week from a 2021 Barna study that said 87% of households in America have a Bible. I love that stat. Also said that 11% of them interact with the Bible daily. Not a big fan of that stat. Right? It's not enough just to have the Bible. We actually got to open it up. We actually got to study it. Like, imagine you are that general and you finally convinced your soldiers to have a sword, to have a weapon, but then they just leave it in their house every single morning. And you're like, wait, but you're not training with the weapon. Like, you're not using it. What good is this? And they're like, actually, I have three of them. One of them's leather bound, you know, one of them's in Greek. I can't understand it, but I have it. It's like, it's not enough just to have the Bible. We gotta dive in and study the Bible. In the world that we live in, attention spans are going down and it's getting harder and harder and harder for us to sit down and study Scripture. It's also why you see stats on the rise of more and more, what I call self centered spirituality practices on the rise. Like I read a study that 70 million Americans read their horoscope every day. Day. Which is a bummer because only 63 million Americans read their Bible every day, which means more Americans are reading their horoscope currently than their Bible. And I have a lot of thoughts about why. I think the primary reason is because we have put self back at the center of our spirituality. And modern day astrology is just the natural outworking of that. Where we used to look up in the night sky and marvel at how amazing God is, now we look up in the night sky and wonder about ourselves. It's like Psalm 19, verse one. Here's David writing, Three thousand years ago, the heavens declare the glory of God. The skies proclaim the work of his hands. When David looked up in the night sky, he was moved to awe and wonder at the God who hung the constellations in the night sky. When we look up at the night sky today, we go, I wonder if I'm compatible with someone who was born in October, you know, or whatever. Or like, okay, so My birthday is February 22nd. So it's 2, 2, 2. I've had multiple people come up to me over the years and go, two, two, two. That's powerful. Okay? No, it's not. It's not. With all due respect, it's not. It's just a date and it's just. It's just numbers. And here's why I, like, I don't mean to be snarky right now, I really don't. But, like, what's powerful is that Genesis 1:27 says, I'm created in the image of God. Psalm 139 says that I'm fearfully and wonderfully made. Ephesians 2, verse 10 says that I am God's handiwork. That's where the power is at. And church, like, listen, you're going to face fires in life. You just are. And when the fires hit, like the real fires, 222 is not going to help you. Okay, but have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be afraid. Do not be discouraged. For the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go. That'll get you through a fire. So don't bring superstition to the fire with you. Bring the word of God to the fire with you. So how do we do that? That's Joshua 1:9. And we'll get back to that in a second when we talk about memorizing Scripture. But let's read the verse right before. This is Joshua 1:8. Keep this book of the law always on your lips. I love this. Meditate on it day and night. Don't just have a Bible Study the Bible so that you may be careful to do everything written and then you will be prosperous and successful. That's the type of church I want us to be. A type of church that doesn't just have a Bible, but studies the Bible so we can bring the Bible to the fire with us. So how do we do that? Two simple steps. Have a place, have a plan. Have a place, have a plan. I have a chair in my room and every morning when my alarm clock goes off. And yes, I have an old school alarm clock because my phone is plugged in on the other side of the room because I'm going to the word of God and hearing God's truth before I hear other people's opinions. When my alarm clock goes off, I go to my chair and I read for about 30 minutes. I have a place. That place is where I study the Bible. Now some of you young parents are looking at me like your first 30 minutes of the day are quiet. What's that like? I get it. Depending on the season of life that you are in, have some grace for yourself and get creative. Like it may be at night when, when the kids go to bed. For some of you right now, your only shot is your car on the way to work. But have a place where you are studying and then secondly, have a plan. So many great Bible reading plans out there. And it's helpful, especially in the, the days where you're not feeling it, to have a plan that you are going through. If you need one, let, let me give you one. We just talked about how Luke wrote Luke, the Gospel of Luke and the book of Acts. So Luke is the story of Jesus, Acts is the story of the early church. Which means if you read both of his works, Luke and Acts, you get the whole history really of the New Testament now. 24 chapters in Luke, 28 chapters in Acts 52 total. There are 52 days left in 2025, meaning if starting today you read Luke 1 and then tomorrow you read Luke 2 and then Luke 3, you will get all the way through really the story of the New Testament by the new year. And I'm telling you, you'll be ready for what God has for you in 2026. Have a plan that you are going into it with somebody. Take me up on that and tell me how it transforms your life when you start to study Scripture. If you've read Kiss the Fire yet, you know, it's such a beautiful story of, of Sean letting us into his journey and everything that he's learned in this fire that he's facing. Really, though, the unsung hero of the book is Pastor Jill. She's the one right from the first page who's with Sean every step of the way. In fact, she's there in the doctor's office when he gets the diagnosis. If you've read the introduction, you know, they go out to the car, and Sean's just losing it, of course, he's just crying. Meanwhile, Pastor Jill grabs her Bible and starts reading scripture. And Sean looks at her and like, what are you doing? And she says, well, I'm not going anywhere. I'm not afraid. And it sounds like we need a miracle, so I'm going to the Word of God. I love that part of the story because Pastor Jill brings her Bible with her to the fire. And I was hanging out with Sean and Jill last week, and I asked her, I said, pastor Jill, do you. Do you remember what passage you read that day? She goes, well, I could find out. I was like, what are you talking about? You can find out? And I realize it's because she has a plan. And she's had a plan for years and years and years. And so she goes back to the date that that happened. She goes, well, that day I was in Isaiah 22, and I was in Psalm 66. And I probably read something from what I had read that morning. And so she gets her Bible and she starts going over to Isaiah 22. Now, I love Isaiah also. Like, it's long, you know, and yet every single page, every single page, just highlight, highlight, highlight, underline, underline, underline, note, prayer here, turn the page, highlight, highlight, underline, underline, note, prayer here. She gets to Isaiah 22, and it's just packed full of all these prayers that she's praying. Then she turns over to Psalm 66, and same thing. Highlight, highlight, underline, underline, pray for. Prayer for her family, prayer for her friends, prayer for the church. And I'm just sitting there watching this, going, that's what I'm talking about. That's the example right there of somebody who studies their Bible and takes studying the Bible seriously. That way, when the fire does come, she just naturally. I don't even think about it. She just naturally goes back to it. And so can we just thank Pastor Jill, by the way, for being such an amazing example of what it looks like to study Scripture. You gotta trust it. You gotta study it. The third step is to memorize it. Now, I don't know about you, but every once in a while, God's promises make a lot more sense. During my morning quiet time than they do when I hit rush hour traffic, you know what I mean? Or when I have that 3pm meeting that doesn't go well and makes me question my calling. It's a lot easier to remember that God is with me in the morning when I'm reading than little harder for me to bring that with me. And that's where memorizing scripture comes into play. So let's again this absurd hypothetical situation. You're a general and you finally convinced your soldiers to. To not just have a sword, but to train with the sword. But then imagine the battle day comes and they all run to the battle and you go, well, where is it? They go, oh, well, we left it. We left it behind. It's like you guys are the worst soldiers in the world, right? It's not enough just to stand study the Bible. Like we gotta memorize it so that we can bring it with us into the fire. I love how the psalmist says it in Psalm 119 and verse 11, I've hidden your word in my heart that I might not sin against you. I always think of Dwight Schrute in the office where you find out in one episode that he's just hiding weapons all around the office so when the enemy attacks, he's ready. Don't do that. I'm not telling you to do that. But I have hidden Bible verses in my heart so that I'm ready when the enemy does attack. And by the way, this isn't our idea. This was Jesus's idea. Jesus in the wilderness. Matthew 4 says this. Then Jesus was led by the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. After fasting 40 days and 40 nights, he was hungry. The tempter came to him and said, if you are the son of God, tell these stones to become bread. It's pretty good temptation for someone who's been fasting for 40 days. Look at what Jesus says. It is written. And then Jesus recites scripture back to the enemy. Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God. Jesus brings the word with him to the fire. That's how he fights back against the enemy. And we got to learn how to do the same. Same thing in Kiss the Fire, Sean calls it killing the lies. And he gives us Bible verses to to memorize. Because there's the diagnosis and then there's the devil. The diagnosis is real. The devil is going to whisper lies in your ear. Try to make it 10 times worse. When we memorize scripture, that's how we fight back against the lies. So here's what I want to do. At every location we're going to, we're going to try this together. I'm going to give you three verses. Now, I don't need you to memorize all three. Just this week, I want you to start with one verse. One verse that, that. That you're gonna memorize. Whichever one of these sticks out to you the most, and I want you to commit it to memory. I want you to preach it to yourself over and over and over again. Memorize it in your head until it sinks into your heart and becomes a part of who you are. Verse 1. Romans 5, 8. If you need the reminder that you are loved, then here you go. But God, I love this word. Demonstrates his own love for us in this. While we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Need to pause there? That's true about you. To the person who feels like they have to sit this week out because they feel like they're too far gone, and maybe, maybe next week, if you string together some good behavior, then God will love you. I've got really good news for you. It's not once you clean your life up. It's while we're still sinners. God goes, no, I love you. I love him. I love her so much that I stepped out of heaven to go to the cross to pay the price for your sins. Church, you are loved. Second one is this. You are God's handiwork. If that's you. If you've ever felt unworthy, you ever felt like, well, if God had just made me a little bit more like this or a little bit more like that. Ephesians 2, verse 10. It is your verse. For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Church, you are God's handiwork. Then the last one is this. And this has become an anthem for us throughout the course of this series. The Lord is with you. You. The Lord is with you. It brings us back to the verse we talked about earlier. Joshua 1 and verse 9. Get this. Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Don't be afraid. Don't be discouraged. For the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go. It's really good news. I need that reminder. That's one of the weapons that I bring with me to the fire. Here's the truth about me. My whole career is very ironic. The fact that I'm standing on this stage is Very ironic. I spent my entire life being terrified of public speaking. And I'm not just talking. Like, everybody gets nervous. No, I was terrified. Like, my least favorite class all through high school was public school speaking. There was a day I had to give a speech. How to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. Like, something that doesn't matter. I didn't sleep the night before. I got up and just stumbled my way through. All my classmates were looking at me like, are you okay? It's okay. You can just take a breath. Just never felt like I was good at it. I. When I was in first grade, every Tuesday and Thursday at 1pm I would leave the room and go work on my speech at a speech class. I couldn't say my Rs, which is a bummer when your name's Ryan and you work at Red Rocks, you know? And along the way, I just internalized that, man, maybe I'm just not good at this. And so I was just always a really quiet kid. Plus, I was a big introvert, and I just still am, and I'm just quiet. Sixth grade, last day of class, we were doing the superlatives. Know you. You know, most likely to become president, most likely to play in the NFL. We get to the very last one, and I get quietest kid in class. I'm like, that. That's not even, like, the rhythm, you know, that's not even the formula. Like, at least they most likely to not speak up. You know, like those titles, like, they stick with you. And so I just sort of internalized, like, well, I'm not good at this. Like, I fell in love with the spiritual formation part of ministry long before I realized that public school speaking came with it. Like, I love to create. I love to write. I love to sit in coffee shops and come up with ideas. But then God was like, yeah, and then sometimes you're gonna have to stand on stage and, like, express those ideas. And I'd always just be like, no, that's all right. And as I look back, I've had. I could tell you story after story after story of me just spiraling before getting on a stage. And then one day, I was reading Joshua 1:9, and it struck me that he doesn't say, joshua, be strong and courageous because you're awesome. He says, be strong and courageous. Why? Because I'm going with you. Think about Moses in Exodus 3. He There's a tree that's on fire. And God calls him and says, hey, I want to. I want you to go and lead my people to the promised land. And what does Moses say? He goes, no, not me. He literally says, I'm not a great speaker. And I love Exodus 3, verse 12. God just says, yeah, but I'm going with you. Like, you would think, like, the modern version of that would be. God would go, no, Moses, you're awesome. You got this. I'm gonna hold up a sign and cheer you on every step of the way. Instead, God just goes, yeah, no, you're not that great, but I'm coming with you. And so you got this church. The Lord is with you. And. And over the years, I just started to realize, like, oh, this isn't like me having to figure this all out. This isn't me, like, having to perfect this crap. This is just me realizing that the Lord is coming with me. So this isn't a performance. This isn't something that I'm going to get graded on. This is just me pointing people to the best news of all time. That God loves you, that God has a plan for your life. And by the way, the Lord's coming with me every step of the way. And what's. Just, like, it's important at every location that you get this, like, what I'm doing right now, this isn't difficult for me. I. I always say this. Public speaking does not come naturally to me. It doesn't. But it does come supernaturally to me. And that's what happens when you start to bring the word of God with you to the fire and you start to declare God's truth over your life. You start to be reminded that the Lord is coming with you, which means you really can face this fire in front of front of you and walk away whistling. And so to end this series, I want you to think right now, this fire, that. That the Lord is calling you to face the fire that the Lord is calling you to kiss. Maybe some of you have been putting it off for. For the last six weeks, but, you know, deep down, there's something that the Lord is calling you to do. As we sing this song one more time, and as we're reminded that the Lord is with us every single step of the way, I want you to start to realize at every location, at every campus that because the Lord is with you, hey, it may not come naturally to you, but it will come supernaturally to you, because the Lord is coming with you. So to the one who just desperately wants and desires a. A healthy marriage, God's way, but for whatever reason, it hasn't worked out for you yet. And now you're just feeling like, yo, I'm just not good at this. This just doesn't come naturally to me, maybe, but it will come supernaturally to you in the name of Jesus, because the Lord is coming with you. You can face this fire. To the one who's stuck in an addiction and is just feeling like, I've tried everything and I keep falling down, I'm falling down over and over and over again. Maybe sobriety doesn't come naturally to you, but in the name of Jesus, it will come supernaturally to you because the Lord is coming with you. So don't you dare give up. You get back up, you keep repenting, you keep confessing, you keep getting help, you keep pushing forward because the Lord is with you. Hey, to the one who has a God sized dream in their heart and right now you're overwhelmed. You're like, I don't even know how we're going to be able to do this. Can I remind you that God sized dreams only sound big to us? To God, he goes, oh, it's about right. And when you chase after God sized dreams, the most beautiful part about it is when it does come to pass, you don't give yourself any of the glory. You give God all the glory because it's just so obvious that he's the one coming with you. So to the one who's chasing down some God sized dreams and you're, you're worried right now. You're anxious right now. You're trying to figure out your next steps. Hey, the Lord is coming with you and so be strong and courageous. Hey, can we stand up at every single one of our locations? I want to ask two questions as we pray and then we're going to worship and we're going to start facing some fires together. So let's bow our heads and close our eyes. Father, we love you so much. And hey, right now, for the person who is facing a fire, for the person who knows that it's time to kiss the fire, but they're a little scared. Maybe it's a financial situation, a relationship situation, maybe it's a career decision, maybe it's a move. It could be any number of things. If that's you and you need to just remind yourself that the Lord is coming with you, would you just raise your hand right, right now at every location, God, you see, every hand and I pray that you would remind each and every one of them that you are going with them, that they can walk through this fire. Not because they're awesome, but because you're awesome. And you're going with them in Jesus name now at any location. If you've been listening to this, maybe you heard Romans 5, verse 8 earlier, and you go, wait. God loved me while I was still a sinner. Oh, my goodness. Today's my day. I need to repent of my sins. I need to put my faith in Jesus. I need to walk away from the way that I was living, trying to build my kingdom, and I need to become a kingdom builder. I want today to be my day of salvation. Would you just boldly throw your hand up in the air at every campus, and as you do, just say, jesus, I want to make you the Lord of my life. I'm trying. I'm tired of trying to do this my way. I put my faith in you, Jesus. Would you be the king of my heart? Now at every location, can we make some serious noise? Because heaven just got more crowded. Church, listen, you can kiss this fire in front of you because the Lord is going with you. He's going before you. He's with you every step of the way. So you're gonna kiss this fire, and we're gonna walk away whistling. Amen. All right. Let's worship the Lord together.