Don't talk about money at church. Anybody want to say amen to that right now?
Man, I'm sure there are a lot of people, maybe even some of you here in the room, you don't want to talk about money at church. I used to think that way. I didn't want to talk about money at church. And I'm a pastor. I mean, there has been so much hypocrisy. There have been so many teachers that have proven to be false because they were in it for themselves. So many people have been taken advantage of in the guise of religion. And I can see why a lot of people wouldn't want to talk about money at church. But tonight, we've gathered together to hear what the Bible says. And there's actually a verse that we're going to look at right now. Romans chapter 12, verse 13, and I want to invite you to open the Bible and look at what this verse says with me. This one verse might help you realize why we're going to talk about money at church. In fact, it's going to give us three reasons that we need to talk about money at church together here tonight. So, the verse is Romans 12:13. This ends our eight week series called “Be the Church,” going through Romans, chapter 12. If it makes sense to you that Jesus gave his life as a sacrifice for you. So, you should offer your body as a living sacrifice for Jesus. Well, then, these verses from Romans 12:1-13 have been telling us how to live out as living sacrifices for Jesus Christ. And this is the conclusion to that thought here in verse 13. So out of respect for God's Word, I want to invite everyone to stand up for the public reading of Scripture. Just one verse. We're going to give it our attention together here tonight. This is Romans 12:13.
Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
That's the reading of God's Word. Please go ahead and have your seat. Now the word there translated contribute, is the Greek word koinoneo, and koinoneo is the word for to enter into fellowship. Some of you might be familiar with the Greek word koinonia, more of the noun form, the idea of sharing the life of Jesus together. Well, koinoneo is now a verb, it's describing an action, we need to share something, we need to partner in something, we all need to be in this together. And what do we need to be into together? Well, here, it says, we need to be into the needs of the saints, partnering, sharing, fellowshipping in the needs of the saints. Now this word koinoneo is going to be used again in Romans, chapter 15. If you could turn over there with me to Romans, chapter 15, verse 25, where he tells us what he's doing when he writes this letter to the saints in Rome. He says in Romans 15:25, “At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints.” And when he says he's bringing aid, what is he talking about, everybody? What is he talking about? Money is what he's talking about. If you know the story, Paul, and he's a great missionary to the Gentiles, he's sent by Jesus out to people who are not Jews; they were from other nations. And he's been going around evangelizing with the gospel of Jesus, planting churches. And now he's gotten a huge collection from all these different Gentile churches. And he's going to take that money back to Jerusalem to bless the saints there, and to help the poor, where the church began in Jerusalem. And that's what he's doing. Look what he says here. Keep going with me in Romans 15:26-29, “for Macedonia and Achaia.” These regions, where there are these Gentile churches, where Paul did his missionary journeys for Macedonia, and they came. I “have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share,” there it is right there. There's our idea, to contribute to fellowship, to partner, “if they have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them” when I get to Jerusalem. And I give them this gift of “what has been collected, I will leave for Spain by way of you. I know that when I come to you, I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ.” So, I'm on my way to Jerusalem to give them this gift because all these other churches want to share, they want to fellowship with.
Now this was something that we've learned at our church before here in Huntington Beach when we were going through the book of Philippians. Okay, if you can flip on over to Philippians with me; it's just a few pages to the right. Philippians 4:15. We went through this, and we got here in October of 2019. And this was the first time we ever saw fellowship, spelled with $ sign, where the s was usually right. This was when I learned this. I've heard about fellowship and sharing the life of Jesus my whole life. What I didn't know is that Paul used that Greek idea of koinonia fellowship, he used that about our bank account, he used that about dollar bills. He used that about financial resources. This blew me away when I discovered this here in Philippians, chapter 4, verse 15. He says that “you Philippians yourselves know that in the beginning of the gospel, when I left Macedonia, no church entered into partnership with me in giving and receiving, except you only. When I went out with the gospel, I only had one church supporting me, partnering with me, and it was you. And that's the word here koinoneo, to fellowship with, to share with. But what is he talking about giving and receiving? And in fact, here he goes on to say, look at verse 19, in Philippians 4. A precious promise to every believer, “my God will supply every need of yours, according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus. To our God and Father be glory forever and ever. Amen.” God's going to meet all of your needs. And when we talk about God meeting needs, what are we talking about? Financial needs, money needs. So, there was only one church that partnered with me, basically. Only one church was helping him have the means to go and do this missionary journey. And it was the Philippians. And the way they entered into fellowship with him was by giving money. And so, we preached that in October of 2019. We looked at those verses, and we said, hey, if we're going to be partners for the gospel in Huntington Beach, like, I don't know what you're trying to get out of this relationship. Some people, they just want to go to church and get out of here. Some people, they just want to take what the church has to offer them and their family. But if you really want to partner together and fellowship together in the Gospel of Jesus, if you really want to strive side by side for the gospel, if we want to be the church here to build one another up in our faith, and to spread the Good News of Jesus, so others can have faith, partnership in the Gospel includes $1 sign. We learned that when you're going to share the life of Jesus with other people, that means we’ve got to also be ready to share even our financial resources, like we're sharing our whole life, our time, our energy, our soul, all that we've got, even our money. And when we preach that you know what people did, people at this church? You know what they did after they heard the Word, they gave more than people had ever given before. And it was awesome to see people do that.
Do you realize like, if you walked in through the cafe, if you saw where the high schoolers are meeting tonight, the whole reason we have that space over there is because back in 2019, people gave a bunch of money, and then we were able to turn that money into that space that we've been using now for years. And that led to people even giving more because we weren't when we were all in that building. If you've just joined us here at our church, you can ask some of the people who've been here from the beginning, we used to fit in that building. In fact, we used to think that building was a very big space. Like, wow, I have been quoted many times about saying about that building. Yeah, there are so many rooms in this building. I don't think we'll ever use them all. Those are like famous last words, right. And so, we started to run out of space. I would start getting pictures of high schoolers and junior highers sitting on the floor and kids ministry doesn't have enough place for kids in the classrooms. And because people gave, we were able to get more space, and the high school and junior high came over here. Kids spread out over here. And then maybe some of you can remember when we started running out of room in that auditorium. And the reason you might remember is one of the kind ushers here forced you to sit somewhere you didn't want to sit. Does anybody else remember those days? We didn't have these luxurious spaces on these nice cushioned chairs back over there. Some people, they were forced to sit in the front row and watch me spit the entire sermon. Right? I mean, there was a time where I met some people that way. “Hey, sorry, I spit on you. Great to have you here at church. So good to see you. I could tell you didn't want to sit in the front row.” Yeah, I saw that guy bring it down. That was rough. Yeah. Because we were running out of room. Right. And you know what happened? People were generous. And they gave, and now we've got this space. So, people have done that here at this church. They've decided, you know, this isn't just something I do. This isn't just something I check out. I'm a partner in this. I fellowship here. And I've been willing, and people have been willing to give money. Now, I'm not talking about money tonight, though, because I've got some building project, or I've got some special care. No.
Go back to Romans 12:13 with me. We want to talk about money together tonight. And we want to talk about just the ordinary work that God is doing among his people all the time. And here's my concern. My concern is, we kind of live in a fundraising culture. So, if there's a special project, if there's a GoFundMe, if there's an immediate and urgent need, then people might seem ready to give. But do people understand why we fundamentally give all the time at the church. That's what this verse is getting to. And I think this verse is going to give you three compelling reasons why we should talk about money at church. And if you have never heard a sermon like this, you should get this handout out and take some notes with us, and write some things down because look what it says. This fellowship, this partnership, that we're going to have in Romans 12:13, it says we're going to contribute to the… what does it say there, everybody? The needs.
Let's get that down for point number one: “Get compelled by need.” Need is why we are going to talk about money, why we would partner together with $ sign attached to it. Because there is a need, okay, need, like legitimate need, not talking about what people just want or what they desire, but what they need to survive. And so, this word here for need. It's used in the history of the church to describe that one of the things the church has always had to do is help people among the believers who are in a place of financial need, where those who have more than what they need have been willing to share, to fellowship with, those who do not have enough to meet all of their needs. So, there's a lot of times that it talks about the needs of the brothers and sisters in Christ.
And let's just review our history as a church. Go back to the book of Acts chapter 2. Let me show you the description of the early church in Jerusalem. There are three times it talks about people in the church having need. Okay? and that's why we need to talk about money is because people have real financial needs. As it starts as the church begins and Acts 2 when the Holy Spirit comes. And Peter preaches the gospel, and three thousand souls are saved on that great day of Pentecost. They get baptized. What an amazing day that was. Well then, in Acts 2, starting in verse 42, gives us the summary statement of what was happening there in the church in Jerusalem. The quote, it says in Acts 2:44-45, in the middle of this report about how there are people being added to their number day by day, and they're all together. They're devoted in teaching and fellowship and breaking of bread and of prayer. But then it says this, look at verse 44, “All who believed were together and had all things in common, and they were selling their possessions and belongings. And they're distributing the proceeds to all as any had…” what, everybody? “Needs.” So, here's what's happening. Three thousand people just came together in this awesome work of salvation by the power of the Holy Spirit, and they start getting to know one another. And there are rich, and there are poor, and there are all kinds of different people coming together in the name of Jesus. And some people over here, I think, and I'm blessed, and I've got more than I need. And as they meet other people, it's becoming very clear, not everybody does have what they need. And so, they start this distribution, where the money is being collected. And then as the needs come up out of this collection, boom, we're ready to meet needs. It gives us even more detail in Acts 4:32. Going over to chapter 4, verse 32, where we get another one of these statements about what life was like in the early church. And it says in Acts 4:32-34; this is after they've been before the Sanhedrin there and they've been bold, and they're going to keep preaching Jesus. Even if they tell him to stop preaching Jesus, they're going to keep on sharing the good news. And then we get this summary statement. “Now the full number of those who believed were of one heart and soul.” He’s speaking of the unity of the believers in Jesus, and no one said, can you imagine this? And “no one said any of the things that belonged to him was his own, but they had everything in common.” Wow. “And with great power, the apostles were giving their testimony to the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, and great grace was upon them all.” Look at this statement. “There was not a needy person among them.” Wow, how can that be that there was not a needy person among them? Here's why. For “as many as were owners of lands or houses sold them and they brought the proceeds of what was sold and they laid it at the apostles’ feet, and it was distributed to each as any had…” what, everybody? “Need”. So, that little way they did this started really working because people were excited. People were like, God's doing something, there's great power, there's great grace, I can see that God is on the move. And people are so excited, they're selling their lands, they're selling their houses, and then they're saying, hey, we'll give it to the apostles. And then as people have need that's being identified by the apostles, boom, they're meeting this need, they're meeting this need, they're meeting so many needs. The Scripture, it can say something like there's not a needy person among them, because the needs are all being met, because people are being generous. They're giving and then it's being distributed to meet the needs. What an amazing positive statement there about the church. In fact, it gives us a specific example, Acts 4:36, “Thus Joseph,” this guy was not your ordinary Joe here, “who was also called by the apostles, Barnabas.” Yeah, our hero in the book of Acts is “Barnabas (which means son of encouragement), a Levite, a native of Cyprus, sold a field that belonged to him, and he brought the money and laid it at the apostles’ feet.” So, when it's giving us this beautiful description of people taking from what they have, and giving it to the apostles, so that it could meet other people's needs, that's when it introduces one of the important characters in the book of Acts is Barnabas. And Barnabas, he's like an example of a guy whose partnership includes $ signs, and he sells this field. And then he's just like, here you go. What generosity to just liquidate what I'm sure was an important asset in his financial portfolio, and then to just give it away. Wow. And then that money is being used to meet real tangible needs in people's lives.
Go over to Acts, chapter 6. Now, it wasn't always flawless how this worked. Yes, there were even problems in the early church that had to be addressed. And it says here in Acts 6:1, “Now in these days when the disciples were increasing in number, a complaint by the Hellenists,” which you will notice, if you’ve got a footnote there, that's the Greek speaking Jews’ right arose against the Hebrews’. So, there's a little bit of tension coming here, “because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution.” Now, is it pure religion to help widows? Yeah. Should the church be ready to help widows? There are passages that even get very specific, in 1 Timothy about what that should look like. So, this is an important thing for the church to do, to help these widows, but there's a tension arising. And it even seems like one kind of widow was being preferred over another kind of widow. So, it's not just that we're not doing a good job, meeting the needs, but there might even be preference being shown to different kinds of women here. And so, whoa, this is a situation and so the twelve, the apostles, they summon the full number of the disciples, hey, we're having a church meeting, we’ve got to go address this right away. This is important, it's a big deal. And they said, “It is not right that we should give up preaching the Word of God to serve tables, Therefore, brothers, pick out from among you, seven men of good repute, full of the Spirit and of wisdom, whom we will appoint to this duty.” Now, if you are taking notes, under point number one, “get compelled by need,” can you write down that in Acts 6:3, the word that is translated duty there is the same word, the Greek word for need in our passage and these other passages and acts that we've been looking at. Hey, we're going to appoint seven guys to go meet this need, like so the apostles, they're like, we need to keep focusing on the teaching. But this is very important, meeting financial needs, helping these widows is an important part of what we're going to do as a church, but we're not able to do it. So, we're going to identify seven other godly men who can go and make sure that this gets done right because we need to meet this need. That's what the apostles are saying. And then they say this in verse Acts 6:4. “But we,” referring to the twelve of them, “we will devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word.” So, there have always been from the very beginning, as people are getting saved, as the church is being built up, as the word goes out of the church, it grows up and more people get saved, more people join the church. And guess what? Some of those people bring with them as they join the church, they bring real tangible financial need. And the church has said, something important that we're going to do is we're going to contribute to the needs of the saints. Now, it's a very important thing. It's a part of who we are as a church. But you can also see these twelve apostles are saying, but there's something, there's kind of a deeper need that we need to meet. There are a lot of financial needs. And then there's like, most importantly, there are material and physical needs. And then there's this spiritual need. And that's why we've got to devote ourselves, we've got to spend our time in and be constant in the Word and in prayer. Okay, so you can see here, one of the things the church is committed to, and they're calling a meeting about it, and they're saying it's important is we’ve got to meet the needs of the people, particularly the widows here in this context. But then you can also see when they have a meeting to say that one of the things they want to clarify is let's raise up these seven guys. And that's where we meet Stephen, the first martyr of the church. That's where we mean fill up the famous evangelists. So, these weren't just any seven guys, these are like, godly men, and these guys, hey, meeting those needs is important. But there's also an ultimate need, that we need to do. And people need to be taught the Word of God, can I get an amen from anybody on that? Like people need it. Let me tell you what people need. People need Jesus Christ. That's what people need. Everybody, every single living soul, every single human being, no matter their race, gender, nationality, everybody walking on planet Earth, right? Now, they need to hear the good news of Jesus. And so they're like, We’ve got to keep preaching. Okay.
So, what I want to do right now is let's just take a moment to think through what are some of the needs that we have as a church here in Huntington Beach? Okay, let's just think this through what if a man loses his job, and in the time it takes him to find new work, he has now a financial need for his family? What if a man gets sick or injured and he is unable physically to work for a season of time? Could that bring about a legitimate financial need for him and his family? What if a wife and her children are abandoned by her husband? And now this lady finds herself, along with her kids, in a place of real financial need? What if there are medical expenses that people encounter as they're going through all the diseases and injuries of life? What if there are medical expenses that they did not see coming that they are unable to sufficiently meet all of those needs? What if there is a widow here at our church? What if she is in financial need? What if she has things at her house that are falling apart? That she does not have the means physically or financially to go and fix at her house? What if somebody dies and their family does not have enough money to go have a service at a funeral home or a mortuary? What if a young couple falls in love and they want to get married, but they don't have the means to get that beautiful wedding venue overlooking the Pacific Ocean, or someplace where there's a lot of beautiful pictures to be taken. Right? What if a young man or a woman comes in here, and they hear about Jesus, and they get saved, and now they realize, wow, the place I'm living in is a very sinful environment. I can't keep living here. If I'm going to really repent of my sin and follow Jesus, I might need a whole new place to live. What if there was a lady that came to this church on Easter? And she heard that Jesus died, he loved her so much that he died in her place. And he rose from the dead on the third day. And if she were to put her faith in Jesus, this lady she could have a whole new life, a new life full of joy, an abundant life, a new life that would last forever, even if she died. And what if she had some faithful ladies here who kept talking to her after Easter? And they kept meeting with her, and they kept going over with her the Word of the Lord, the good news of the gospel. No, this is true that Jesus, he is the Anointed One of God, he is God's Son, and Jesus, he really did die in your place. And Jesus, by the power of his resurrection, you could live a whole different way than you've ever lived before. What if God opened that lady's eyes, and she believed in Jesus, and because she believed in Jesus, she stopped getting drunk. And because she believed in Jesus, she stopped watching all these inappropriate things. And because she stopped drinking and partying and watching inappropriate things, her husband now no longer wants to be married to her. And he takes off, and he leaves her and her children, and he moves far away, because he wants nothing to do with her. So basically, by that lady coming to church on Easter, we just basically ruined her life. Should we help that lady? Should we meet her needs? Should we come alongside of her and say, hey, you may have lost your family, but we want to let you know right now, you gained a whole new family in the Lord Jesus Christ. And we've got your back, because we're all in this together. See, there are needs, these are all real needs that happen here at church on a regular basis. Those are real stories. Those are things that are happening here and meeting those needs. That's an important part of what we do. And when those needs come up, we don't say, hey, let's have a GoFundMe here, hey, well, there's this big need over here with this person. No, we take it out of what has already been given, what has already been fellowshipped, with what has already been shared. Bam, we're ready to meet those needs right away.
Go over to Galatians 6:6, because here's another place where it talks about that kind of fellowship, it talks about that kind of sharing. That's a little bit different here in Galatians, chapter 6, verse 6. And this kind of gets back to man, there's always going to be as people come into the church, as people go through hard times and trials, that people who've been here from the beginning, as they're going through hard times, or as new people are coming in and get saved, there's always going to be specific financial needs that need to be met among God's people. But the most important need is that the Word has to be taught, so the church can be built up, and the Gospel has to be preached, so that more people can hear about Jesus and be saved. And so, the apostles, I love Acts 6 because of the clear example it sets for how we're supposed to think about church. Widows aren't getting food, that's a serious problem. And we need to address that very clearly. But we need to be about the Word and prayer. Can I get an amen from anybody on this? And so, they'll put it says here, Galatians 6, verse 6, I don't know if you've ever looked at this verse before, but it says, “Let the one who is taught the Word, share all good things with the one who teaches.” So, that word “share” there if you want to write this down under point number one, Galatians 6:6, share is the same word translated, contribute in Romans 12:13. So, the idea is, hey, it's mentioned in multiple Scriptures that the worker is worthy of his wages. Do we think we should have somebody set aside for the purpose of the worship? Excuse me the purpose of word and prayer, that somebody should be ready to teach us here at the church. Is that important that we have a teacher? Okay, well, then we need to share with the one who teaches. What if we even want that not to be one guy but a whole team of these men who are elders, who shepherd and oversee the church? What kind of church do we want to have? Do we want to have guys who they can kind of part time shepherd because they're over here working hard doing something else? And then with their extra time they come over here and they shepherd. Or would we want full-time twenty-four-seven shepherds and overseers here at our church? See? So, you’ve just got to start thinking it through. Okay, so now we've got some guys who are here full time. I mean, I don't know maybe you think teaching the Bible is easy, every Saturday night at five o'clock. I can tell you from firsthand experience, you would be wrong if that's what you think. Maybe you think that's all I'm doing all week is just chilling somewhere, coming up with something to say, No, we're here. We're here meeting with people all day, most days. Right. And we're trying to oversee what God's doing. We're trying to be good stewards of everything that God's doing here in Huntington Beach. So, we've got some guys who are elders, but let's think about it. What about the young people these days? Man, wouldn't it be great to have something for the young people? Wouldn't it be great to get a whole bunch of older men and women who would want to come alongside the parents of the church and disciple the next generation? That sounds like a good idea. What about the kids? Do we think it's great that there are all these people over here serving the kids, and they've got their own place to meet, and there are people taking it very seriously to teach our kids the Bible. So you start thinking through, wow, well, if we want these things to happen at the church, we're going to have to share in the resources, because if we want people to be able to give their full time energy to the church, well, then those people still need to be able to provide for their families and live in Southern California, which is, as many of you know, not the cheapest place to live these days. Right. But we get what we pay for around here, right? No, I mean, in the weather, at least, right? Anybody want to say amen to that? Okay. Okay. A few of you. Some of you are considering leaving, I see what's going on.
So, and then, another question is, well, where do we want to gather together when we get together for that teaching? Right? Because our church has a history, maybe more than most churches have outdoor services. And if you've been to outdoor services, they can become complete fiascos very quickly, right? It can rain on you, wind can knock you down. It can be the hottest day in Huntington Beach history when you have the first service of your brand new church. That wasn't a good move. Right? So yeah, we can barely control the climate properly inside this room, you know what I mean? We have a hard enough time with that. So, see, churches have found a benefit in sharing with a staff or sharing so that we can pay for a building and keep the lights on and have air conditioning. So, there's this idea of wow, let's think this through. How do you really do it? People in the church are going to have financial needs. If we want people to have full-time at the church, their needs need to be met. And if we want to have a facility or some kind of location where we can gather? Well, that's going to cost some amount of money as well. So yes, there is no way that you can humanly do church without talking about money. And so, we have to contribute to the needs.
Go back to Romans chapter 12. And let's see whose needs it says that we're supposed to contribute to here. And if you've been paying attention in Romans, you see this one comment. It says in Romans chapter 12, verse 13, that we're supposed to contribute fellowship, share, to the needs of the… who does it say, everybody? The saints.
Okay, so let's get this down for point number two: “When you think of church, think of God's people.” When you think of church, think of God's people. What is your definition of church? I want to challenge you share after this sermon with your fellowship group. This is the end of our “Be the Church” series. This is our last week of fellowship groups before the summer break. A very important gathering, we're going to have this week, I want to ask you, can you please, based on all we've learned in Romans 12, can you write out a definition of “church”? If we're saying be the church, what is your working definition of church? If somebody asked you, what is church? What would be your answer? Because what I'm concerned about is as a guy who's talking to people about church all the time, I could tell that a lot of people when they hear Compass Bible Church, Huntington Beach, what they think is some kind of brand name. They think some kind of institution, some kind of corporation, or Compass Bible Church, Huntington Beach, and they start talking about Compass, like it's its own entity. Another thing that I can tell a lot of people, well, I'll see you at church. What that means is I'll see you right off of Argosy Avenue right off of Bolsa Chica on Revival Circle right here. I'm going to church what they mean is I'm going to this location. So, I hear Church used all the time as like an institution, some kind of entity legally. And then I hear it referred to as this place that we're at right now, these industrial buildings here. And then I hear people say, well, I'm going to church, and what they mean is, oh, it's church time. It's Saturday at five o'clock. So, we use the word church in many different ways. That's why I'm so thankful here that it says the word “saints,” because if somebody asks me what is Compass Bible Church, Huntington Beach? I'm going to tell them what it is. It's you. You are the church. The entity I've been here every day, I've never met the entity that is Compass Bible Church. You leave here you're still the church. It's not Saturday at five. We're still the church. The church is the saints, the saints. Really you should write down if you're taking notes, saints equals holy ones. That's really what's behind this word here. Sometimes, this word is used and translated wholly oftentimes in reference to the Holy Spirit. And so, the saints are those who have been set apart by God from their old life of sin and set apart now for a new purpose that God has for us. Saints are the set-apart ones, God's holy people. We are not just any people, we are God's people. That's what the church is. It's very important that you understand that it's very important that you think that way. When you give to the church, are you giving to an institution? Are you giving to a building? Are you giving to some kind of service that you go do that you like to participate in? Or when you give, are you contributing to the needs, because your money is going to somebody else, that's how it really works. Okay. So that's why it says here, think about these people. These are God's excellent ones. These are God's chosen ones. These are precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of his saints. That's what it is. Good.
Go to Romans, chapter 16. Look at what it says in chapter 16 here of Romans, because he uses this idea that there are saints, he calls them saints throughout. And we've already talked about this, in one of our recent sermons here, as part of be the church that we are all saints, every single one of us who has been declared righteous by our faith in Jesus. You don't have to be some super spiritual, Christian, or somebody who's done some great thing for God. Anyone who believes in Jesus is set apart from who they used to be and set apart for God's purpose. And so, he's been calling these people saints throughout the book of Romans. Look what he says here in Romans chapter 16, verses 1 and 2, as he's going to mention so many different people here in chapter 16, that he cares about so many people that he wants to greet. But then he says, “I commend to you, our sister, Phoebe, a servant of the church at Cenchreae, that you may welcome her in the Lord in a way worthy of the saints.” Like hey, all right, this lady's coming along with the letter that he wrote, the book of Romans, like Phoebe showing up at the same time as this letter there in the city of Rome. And hey, that lady Phoebe, our sister in Christ, when you guys see that lady, you should “welcome her in a way that is worthy of a saint.” So maybe, when you hear “saint,” you think, oh, super spiritual, important person. That's how we're supposed to think about all of God's people, including this lady Phoebe. And look what Phoebe had done, “help her in whatever she may need from you.” Look, whatever this lady's need is, be ready to meet her need. Why? For “she has been a patron of many and of myself as well.” This lady, she's been using her money to support Paul and many other people. This lady is a meeter of needs. And therefore, I mean, you should give her a “welcome worthy of the saints.” So, “saints” gives this idea like, well, if that person is a saint, then there's somebody there important, at least in the sight of God, that person is very precious. And so, Paul wants them to know that this lady Phoebe, she's one of the saints, make sure you welcome her in a worthy way. The church is the people of God; we are the church. And when we give, we're contributing to other people's needs. Because if they're so important to God, that he would love them, and adopt them into his family, and send his one and only Son to die for them on the cross. And God would put his spirit within them, and God would give them a new heart, and God would raise them up to new life, if that's how God thinks of them, that he set them apart as a saint, then how should you and I think about the other people.
Go over to Ephesians chapter 2. This passage, I think, is very helpful in coming up with our definition of what it is to be the church, what is the church, we have to get out of our cultural ways of defining church as a legal entity, building, a service time, and we have to get into the biblical, we need our minds renewed. We've been thinking about giving wrong at the church, we've maybe even been defining church wrong. And so, look what it says here in Ephesians 2:19. I love this. Ephesians 2:19 says “so then you are no longer strangers or aliens,” or sojourners, people from somewhere else, people from somewhere far away, another country, and other nation. At one point, you were strangers, you weren't known aliens, foreigners sojourners coming in from somewhere else, but you're no longer like that. No, now “you are fellow citizens with the saints and you are members of the household of God.” What an amazing thing that, hey, we all used to be strangers. We all used to be foreigners. Now we're a part of the household of God; now, we're saints. And I love this. This is the building we shouldn’t be thinking about when we think of the church. Ephesians 2:20-22. We are “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.” Christ, he's our cornerstone of our foundation, “in whom the whole structure being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him, you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit.” You see how messed up it is when people define church as a physical building, when the church is the people that God is building up as his holy temple? We are the building like Jesus started it, the apostles and prophets, they preached it. And at some point, you heard it and you stranger, you alien, you all got brought in and look at you now. You're living stones being built up on the cornerstone. And as Jesus builds his church, he does it one soul at a time, and you now are a saint, you're a part of the household of God, you are just as much the Church of Jesus as anybody else he has ever saved, you are a part of what Jesus is building. And someday when we all get to heaven, and we see all the people saved by Jesus, all the people, they're worshipping him, all the saints gathered together on that glorious day, in the presence of God, we will say, wow, Jesus was building something so much bigger than I ever imagined. And my little church that I was going to, I can't believe how awesome it is that Jesus would build this with all of his people, the saints. So, you’ve got to make sure you're thinking about this right. I understand why people would be skeptical of corporations and institutions. I understand why people would be skeptical about bad leadership in America these days, I understand that you may have been to a church where things were not done well, and you gave money to that. And you did not like what ended up happening at that church. I understand that. But Jesus is still building his church this very day. And I just want to say to some of you, some of you, there's so much negativity these days among Christians, and how we talk about our nation. And I understand, because I feel that same way myself, like it is very clear, if you've been here in the United States of America over the last forty years or so, we are in a worse place today than we were before I get it. But guess what? We're still here preaching Jesus as free people here tonight. And there is no government stopping us from seeing more people get saved in Huntington Beach. We have actually right now, at this day, at this time, with all the bad things that are happening all around us, with our nation being more godless than ever before, we still have in this very hour an open door for the gospel of Jesus Christ. And you know what we're seeing in 2024, in Huntington Beach? We're seeing Jesus build the saints, that some of you are further away from sin than you've ever been in your life. And even some of you, I mean, people are getting saved, as recently as last weekend at the underground retreat. People are getting saved, and they're being added in to what Jesus is building. So don't get so focused on the news that you miss the good news, that Jesus is doing something amazing. And it's marvelous in our eyes. That's what he's building. That's what you're giving to. That's what you're contributing to. You're contributing not to the needs of some false teachers, not to some the needs of some corporation, you're contributing to the needs of God's chosen holy people. You're helping a brother; you're helping a sister. That's what you're doing. That's how you need to define. Ephesians 2:19-22. That's a definition of the church right there. And I want to encourage you, take that, put it in your own words, make sure you see not a service, not a location, not a corporation. Make sure you see the saints when you use the word church. When you're thinking about what's really happening here. See the souls that Jesus is building. See, that's what we’ve got to get back. We have got to get back to this idea, this very important idea that Jesus has sent us on a mission to make what, everybody? Disciples, people who can learn the way of Jesus with us. And what we want to do is we want to take people who believe in Jesus, and we want to teach them to obey everything that Christ commanded. That's why we're going through so carefully here in Romans 12, because it's commands, its commands for us as disciples, here's how you should live. Hey, “don't be slothful and fall in your zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord,” hey, “rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.” Hey, here's something you should do, contribute to the needs of the saints. Here's something you should do, seek to show hospitality. It says, See, it's telling us as the church what we should do, and as we hear what we're supposed to do, and we get taught to keep the commands of Jesus, guess what Jesus does, he uses our obedience, to build his church, to build up the household of the saints, a holy temple. And when you get to hear the saints, say, “worthy is the Lamb who was slain,” I mean, it will just be majestic. Pure worship. Wow, look what Jesus built, look what he was doing the whole time. And you want to be contributing to that while you have a chance right now.
But if you go back to Romans 12:13 with me, you'll see that this second part here contribute to the needs okay, we've got the needs thought in our head. We've got the saints who are we contributing to God's chosen people the church, okay. But then look at what it says here. Let's think this through, “seek to show hospitality.” Do you know what hospitality is as defined by Scripture? Because I grew up thinking hospitality was what we were doing when we were cleaning up our house, and mom was making a delicious casserole, right? I thought hospitality involved two very important things. Fung Shui decorations and delicious edibles. That's what I thought the hospitality was about. We're practicing hospitality. What are we eating? And we’d better start cleaning up. That's what I thought growing up. I thought people like chip and Joe Gaines. They were in the hospitality business, right? Because they know how to make things look nice. They know how to do things the right way. That's what hospitality is. This is the actual Greek word for hospitality. Let's put it up here on the screen, philoxenia is the Greek word, okay. So, it's a compound word. Xenia is the word we just read in Ephesians 2:19, strangers. Philo goes back to this idea that we've already learned about Philadelphia. Okay, it has this idea of brotherly love. It has this idea of friendship. So, hospitality is actually befriending strangers or loving people that you don't know. That's actually what hospitality is. It's not giving someone something to eat. That could be a part of it. It's not making sure everything looks nice. That's better than it looking messy. Most definitely. But that's not what should come to your mind when you hear hospitality. What should come to your mind when you hear hospitality is, I don't know that person. And they need to be welcomed in like a friend. They need to be treated like a family member. Even though right now, they're a stranger. Now, a lot of us, we have maybe been taught when we grew up, or we have now passed on to our own children. The reality of stranger-danger. Has anyone ever used this phrase with a child before? Right? Am I speaking to anybody right now? Right? We warn our children about talking to people they don't know, especially adults that are asking them a lot of questions, especially adults that are driving white vans with no windows. Right? We have spread this word to the young people. I'm sure you've had these conversations. I've had these conversations, stranger danger, Amen. Watch out, kids. Be afraid kid; be on the lookout kids. Okay. Do you still operate based on a stranger-danger philosophy because seek to show hospitality or pursue hospitality is actually the opposite of stranger-danger. Okay? It's where you are actually on the lookout for people that seem strange to you. You don't know them. Maybe even different than you. I haven't really talked to somebody like that. And then you would pursue friendship with that person. You would seek to show love to that person, and you would want to extend to them the right hand of fellowship and you would want to bring them in. That's what hospitality is. Befriending strangers.
Now, I've been I'm talking to this guy who is just new to our church. In fact, he's pretty new to church. And we were talking in my office the other day, and right away when he could tell where the conversation was going, he's like, “Listen, I don't do new friends.” I don't know if anybody else feels the same way. But this guy, he's so new to church. He doesn't know that sometimes people put a mask on at church, and they don't say what they're really thinking. This guy, he's raw. He's honest. I love talking to honest people at church. And this guy's like, oh, I see what you're trying to do. You're going to try to introduce me to somebody around here. I see whether he knew right? Or he could smell it. He could smell it coming. Like Saturday night dinner. He's like, I just want to say right now, like, he's looking at me, like we're going to throw down right now. Me and you. I want to say right now, “I don't do new friends.” I was like, Okay. The game was on between me and him at this point. It was I mean, first of all, his honesty, his raw honesty, right? I mean, I've been at church all my life. So many fake smiles. So many, hey, how you doing? Not even listening to the answer. So much. Everything's great, but not really trying to reach out to somebody and pull them in. When somebody just flat out says, Yeah, I'm not doing that. I'm like, oh, thank you for your honesty. This is refreshing. Now I know where you're at. Let's go. Right? And I started inviting this guy. Did you know that on Saturday night after the service, we have dinner? It's free. You should go check it out. It's great. And he started coming in, like the first time. He blasted out of here so fast. I couldn't even find him. But then he came back. He was like, “Man, that sermon was so long. Do you always preach that? Wow. I can't believe how long that was.” I was like, “We’ve got to go get food. We’ve got to go get food right now. That's just like the notes he's taken at church. Like we need to get food he's showing him. He's showing them to other people like, somebody rescue us, right? Get me out of here. Guess what happened? Like the third or fourth time? Guess what happened? He stuck around for dinner. Guess what happened? He made a new friend. Get one of you. I didn't set it up. I wasn't like the pastor made a match. Hey, here, here's this guy over here. No, guess what people at this church. They just go up to other people. It's radical, radical behavior for Orange County people. They go up to people they don't know. Even maybe people that don't look like they go to church much. Hey, I want to welcome you. Hey, my name is Bobby, what's your name? Hey, it's good to see you here. Somebody sat down with him the entire dinner. And he's like, wow, I feel like that guy and I talked for like an hour. I feel like he's actually really my friend. Like, that guy's a cool dude. Like, I like talking to that guy. Didn't feel like he was trying to get something from me. He's like texting me. You'll never guess what happened. I made a new friend. And I'll see if I want to. Be very careful how we talk about this, right? Because I'm not asking if you're an extrovert type of personality. I'm not appealing to those of you who might feel like, well, I'm in sales, I can talk to people or I'm an outgoing person, I got to quickly thinking up things to say. That's not what I'm talking about here. Okay, this is not about the type of person you are. This is about how do you fundamentally see other people? First of all, do you see other people? Or are you so focused on yourself that you don't even notice we're in a room full of people right now? And then second of all, how do you see them? Who are they to you?
Go with me to Acts chapter 9. Let's go to Acts chapter 9. Like I just want to make it clear that I'm not asking the friendly people to go be friendly at our church. That's not what it's saying. It's not saying hey, some of you, why don't you put on name tags and go greet people. Now I'm thankful that we have people who do that because we want to make sure that everybody does get welcomed in so it's great to have official greeters. But this is not saying, hey, choose some of the people in the church to go and do the greeting. That's not what the Scripture says. The Scripture is telling everybody here, seek to show hospitality, pursue hospitality. What is hospitality? It's when strangers become friends. It's when you love somebody you don't know. And it's not saying that some of us who are outgoing people should do that. It's saying you should do that. It's saying stop making it about you all the time, and start looking around seeing who's there, even like that person that you're like, oh, I want to talk to that person. That's exactly who you should go talk to? Oh, well, I'm not the kind of person that just walks up to people. That's exactly why you should do it. Because it's not you doing it because it's what you naturally do. It's you doing it because it's what Jesus saved you to do. You do it because you're a new person in Christ, not because of your personality from when you were born. See, I think that this is what happens is, as people mature in Christ, they become more outgoing. They become, especially at church, you know why? Because everybody at church is a what in their eyes, what do they see when they look at every person look at like, like how they would say, the manifest on a ship or the manifest on a plane. Look at how many souls we have on board here. That person, no matter what shape, or color of skin that they are in that person, when they die, they will live forever, and one of two destinies they will be with me praising God in his glory, or they will be in a place of darkness, and weeping and gnashing of teeth. That's how I want to see people. And when I see people like that, I'm compelled to go talk to them. Because it's not about me, and whether I would talk to them. Somebody needs to talk to that person. Somebody needs to let them know, they're welcome here. Somebody needs to ask them, were they able to hear the good news of Jesus here today? And there are so many souls, not just there's a lot of people coming through the church. But have you driven around here? Have you seen how many people live around here? Is it hard for you to get from one place to another around here? Like you're like police isn't really that far away. You could drive there relatively quickly at midnight, but it takes you a long time to get there during the day. Why? Because there are so many souls around here. If we just have a few people at this church that are going to welcome people in, then how are we to reach all the people that need to be arranged. We can't have a greeting team at church. The church is the greeting team. Look what happens here in Acts chapter 9, verse 26. It talks about this guy Saul, that guy Saul who's introduced as the bad guy. He killed Stephen, the first Christian martyr when they stoned him to death. He went to Damascus, persecuting people and he met Jesus on the road. And when Saul “had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all… what does it say there, everybody? They “were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple.” That guy looks like stranger-danger. That's what they were all thinking. Oh, man, you see who just showed up at church? Who is that? Who I think that is? Let me get a look, brother. Yeah, that's him. And that's the guy who killed Steven. That's a guy and threw so and so in jail. He's in charge. What is he doing here? He's probably spying on us right now. And then look what happens verse 27, “But Barnabas,” there he is that son of encouragement. He “took him and he brought him to the apostles. And he declared to them how on the road, he had seen the Lord who spoke to him.” And hey, this guy, when he got to Damascus, he wasn't arresting Christians. He had “preached boldly in the name of Jesus.” Look at that! verse 27, “Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles,” and introduced him he spoke up on his behalf. Now this guy saw Jesus, this guy's a new man, this guy, he's completely changed. He's not against us now. He's with us now. Man, have you ever taken somebody and brought them into the church? That's what Barnabas does. Is anybody here glad that Saul didn't get greeted by nobody and go away home alone, never to return? Is anybody glad that we now know him, not as Saul, but as Paul. And has anyone here benefited from this guy's thirteen letters that we get to read? Has anybody here benefited from the book of Romans that we've been going through for 66 weekends? You want to know why you know who Saul is? Because Barnabas said, welcome. Welcome. I'm glad you're here. I want to start introducing you to the apostles.
See, souls are on the line. That's why you should go talk to people, not because of who you are to go talk to people. You should talk to people because they need somebody to talk to them. They need someone to welcome them. I've been to a lot of churches in Orange County, it is very possible to go to church in Orange County and to leave and to have zero people talk to you, that needs to be impossible here at this church. If we are all seeking to show hospitality if we're all going to obey this command that's being presented to us that you are supposed to pursue hospitality, this word here to seek to show or pursue hospitality is a very intense word. It's sometimes even used in a negative sense to like, if somebody persecutes someone. That's how this word like pursuing hospitality sometimes would be translated, and they persecuted the person. So, think about persecuting, like, that person believes something I don't like. And I'm going out of my way to give them a hard time about what they believe. That would be the negative usage of this word. So, the positive usage is, I'm going out of my way to welcome them into what we believe hospitality, and pursuing it here is the opposite of persecution; persecution is trying to push people away from faith. Hospitality is trying to welcome people into faith. Let's just get very honest, when you come to church, do you welcome people you don't know? Do you greet anyone in the name of the Lord Jesus? Do you a goal where you're trying to get new names and you're trying to get ways to follow up with people? Have you ever once set up a time to get coffee or get In-N-Out, or meet up with somebody outside of church because you met them at church. Look at what it goes on to say, in Acts 9:28, I love this. “So he went in and out among them at Jerusalem, preaching boldly in the name of the Lord.” I get hungry every time I read that verse right there, because it feels like he went to In-N-Out with the bros is what it almost sounds like, right? I didn't know there was a location in Jerusalem, but he went in and out among them at Jerusalem, preaching boldly. Like this worked. This really happened. It's like Saul is the bad guy. Everybody's like, I don't know about this guy. Barnabas shows him hospitality, brings him in. And now he's one of them. Now he's one of the saints. Now he's a part of the family, all because somebody brought them in. Do you realize how many new people come through this church these days? Do you realize how many people there are around you, that would really benefit from somebody talking to them and listening to them, and caring about them?
Point number three, let's get it down like this: “Don't lose sight of the goal: Souls.” The goal is souls; don't lose sight of the goal. The goal that we're here for, the reason we're running this race, the reason we're running to win is we want to see people get saved by Jesus, we want to make disciples, we are on a mission from God, can I get an amen from anybody, right? And what's amazing about what God is specifically building, not talking about this building. But what God Jesus is building among the people here in Huntington Beach, is that there is not only a word of the Lord being preached here at our church, but there is a word of mouth that spreads from this church. Many of you are the reason you're out there telling coworkers, you're out there telling family members, you're out there telling neighbors, you should come to church with me, you should come and see this, you should come and check this out, you should come and be a part of it. And Jesus is using people spreading this word-of-mouth invitation. He is using it to build up more souls, to build us up in our sanctification, like we've been talking about the last eight weeks. And even to bring people to salvation, where then they are getting added to the number and they're getting added to the body of Christ. And so, let's think that through. Let's say that somebody, somebody who doesn't go to church, somebody who's been involved in all kinds of darkness, they've gotten into witchcraft, and demonic things. They've gotten into inappropriate kind of sexual relationships. And then they dare one day to answer. So, their coworkers’ invitation, or their friends’ invitation, and they say, I'm going to go to that church. Do you want to know how nervous those people feel coming into this place? Do you want to know how many people have said to me over the years, well, I can't go to church, the door would catch on fire, like they're joking. But what they mean is like, I would feel out of place at church. That's how it begins for everybody. It begins like I don't belong here until somebody comes and welcomes them and says, no, you belong here. And then when that person is here, they get to hear good news. God loves you. Jesus died for you. He paid for all of your sins. Do you realize that you could be forgiven for all that you have done against the Holy God, and he could wipe the slate clean? In fact, he will declare you righteous because the righteousness of Jesus will be given to you and then you can go and live a new life, and you don't have to be defined by the sin that used to own you. But you can serve Jesus now. And sometimes when we're saying that God opens people's eyes to see it, he like gives them ears to hear it. And it's like a light bulb goes on. It's like, they get it. And they turn from their sin. And they put their faith in Jesus. And that lady that came to church because her coworker invited her, she starts living a whole new way. She's like a single mom, and she starts trying to bring your kids along with her. She wants to get baptized in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, she wants to start going to a fellowship group, and talking with other ladies about how they live for the Lord. And this lady who's now so excited. She's saying things she's never said before, she's thinking totally different than how she used to. This lady, when she was living her life before Jesus, she put herself in a bad financial situation. And so, her sin has been forgiven. But she lives under the burden of debt. And she's come here now to our church. And she's been welcomed in, and she's heard the gospel. And she's believed and she's been here now for some time; she's a part of the family. In fact, she's feeling so comfortable now, she's feeling so loved now, that now she's starting to share her need. And she's got this burden that you can tell she's been wearing around for a long time of some poor financial choices that she made before she came here and met Jesus Christ. Let me ask you a question. Should we help this lady with her need? Or should we say, well, those are the consequences of your sin? You’ve got to deal with that? Or should we say, well, no, you need to prove yourself here at some time before we can really see that you're worthy of our investment? Or should we look at this poor lady who has been saved by Jesus and is burdened by debt, and should we say, we want to give you “a welcome worthy of the saints”? Should we help this lady? What do you guys think you already have, you've helped that lady so many times, you don't even know it. You've helped that lady at least twice in 2024 so far. So, you're helping people all the time if you give to the church, if you contribute to the needs of the saints, you've helped a whole lot of people that you don't even know. You've helped people who are crushed by the burden of financial debt. And now, as somebody who sometimes gets to deliver the finances that are going to meet the need, if you could see the pure joy of these people, when they realize that somebody actually cares about them, somebody actually heard them? Srangers that they don't really fully know, would give money to them. When they thought they were so down on how could they get out of it. I mean, people start crying. People don't know what to say, people literally lose the ability to speak, because they have been loved. They have had their needs met, they have been cared for. And when you contribute to the needs of the saints, when you seek to show hospitality, you're showing people the very love of God himself, the love of Jesus Christ.
So, we're going to take an offering here tonight, and not because we have a special purpose, but because contributing to the needs of the saints is our purpose. And so, I want to encourage you to be generous, I want to encourage you to give. And there's a QR code there on the back of your bulletin if you want to scan that with your phone and give online as I know many of you do. But we are going to end our eight-week series through Romans 12, to the 13th verse. We're going to end it with an offering. And I find that to be very poetic, very fitting, because go back to Romans chapter 12, and look with me at verse 1. And look, let's just remind ourselves, of why we've been for eight weeks trying to figure out how to renew our minds, and how to do God's will, and that we're not doing it just on our own. But we're in it all together as one body, many gifts, one body and we're here to love one another like brothers, we're here to love one another in the truth. Why have we been talking about this? Why have we been paying such close attention to these verses? Because of what it says in Romans 12:1, “I appeal to you therefore brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living,” what? “Sacrifice, wholly unacceptable to God.” There's that word for saints right there, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship where it's the only logical response. It is the reasonable service, like here's what I think Jesus loved me, Jesus gave his body and his blood when he died for me on the cross. It seems reasonable to me that if Jesus offered himself as a sacrifice, than I should offer my body as a living sacrifice to Jesus. Can I get an amen from anybody on it? Like, that's what we're here doing. We're saying thank you, Jesus, for what you did for me, my life is now an offering to you. And as I'm offering my body all that I am, I'm also offering my money. And one of the specific reasons that I'm giving is because I know there are other people who need to have their needs met. And I want to meet those needs, I want to share in that, I want to fellowship in that.
And so, we don't always give reports because we definitely don't want to embarrass anyone who's in need. And if you're in need, and you're a part of our church family, we want to help you. So, I hope you won't be embarrassed, I hope you'll come and talk to us about it. But I want to give you the report here that if you give to the church, you have helped many people. And that's what we're going to do right now as we take this offering. And we give. So let me pray for us.
Father in heaven. I'm so thankful that you've been teaching us what fellowship really is, how we can really share the life of Jesus together. But Father, I pray that you would continue that, as you teach us how to contribute to the needs of the saints. And thank you, Father, for many people here at this church who have given, and I know they've given from their heart to you, they've given generously. And thank you for allowing us with the construction projects and all the things that we've done. And Father, specifically tonight, I want to thank you that there have been people that you've brought here. And when you brought them here, they were welcomed by people, people pursued them. People who didn't know them, treated them like a friend. And they were brought into the fellowship. And then as some of them were brought in, they had needs or even some brothers and sisters who were already here went through trials that brought up needs in their life. And Father, I want to thank you that because people at this church give we've been able to meet those needs. So, Father, I pray that we would be a church that contributes to the needs of the saints, that we would be a church that genuinely seeks to show hospitality, because we are the church and we are offering our bodies to you as sacrifices, because it makes sense to us, because that's what Jesus did for us. So, we pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen.