First Place in Everything, Part 2

Life with JD Greer. Jesus showed the first place in everything the first place in your heart should be the one you love the most. Think about the motives that fear about it about the most should have the first place in your obedience is to be the first place in your priorities means that his agenda should rule your life. What is getting your first and best the Bible. I'm your host Molly, but abets we are in a new teaching series called first, the preeminent Jesus in Colossians looking at how Christ first in all things. If you ever miss any part of this study, you can always find previous messages online@jdgreer.com right now. Keep listening because today Pastor JD challenges that to consider whether we are on the front lines of living all reckless faith or are we kicking back watching the faith of others from the sideline, turn in your Bible to Colossians chapter 1 joint solar chart recently that will really disturb me when I think about our church in light of what he shared with me about another movement and they said was the difference in the first generation and the second generation of a movement.

This is true whether you look at the Bible you look at all the way through history. What you think about first generation second-generation the first-generation is will do whatever it takes.

Second-generation says only do what I'm asked to do and only my fast really nicely and only visually coming in for me and my family the first generation assumes personal responsibility for the mission.

Second-generation assumes here that while the take care of it. The first generation expects personal sacrifice, believing us what is second-generation expects personal comfort. The first generation sees problems and innovative solutions. The second generation sees problems in complaints first generation sees possibilities in dreams about what could be the second generation sees barriers, reasons to quit first generation hears the voice of God firsthand. They own the vision second-generation inherits the vision secondhand and questions every decision.

Why did you do that work for me and my family tomorrow. First-generation steps with bold reckless faith in God second-generation set satisfied in the stability of the institution. The first generation feels privileged to be a part of the movement. Second-generation feels entitled to the benefits of the institution here is the question which of those two lists better describe you and give you a story. Example from the first generation that I think captures it up told the story here before, but for my favorite memories of that first year there was a good mother goddess churchman Tim Jackson who was still here and I started a basketball ministry on Monday nights because the facility we originally and had a gym was opened up forgotten the community come immediately amongst the guys who were more athletic and lot number that showed up but we we Like I let one of them to Christ.

He was 65 the way we his nickname was air they all had nicknames for each other because he could talk like a fool, is another guy whose nickname was money because he never visibly born when got his nickname was free because he was so fast my nickname. I kid you not.

By that my nickname was no don't shoot the sky and his girlfriend and I love them both the faith in Christ and baptize them in our church is far at least as far as I could remember was the first African-American would ever baptize in our church there and he gave some credible testimony about how God had brought him from darkness to light and it was hardly a dry eye.

The place we got done.

And so after the service was over I was on the lobby. One of her older members comes up to me how old members comes up to me and he says sepals beside he's his son is a son. You know I don't like about the changes you make in our church right now, Hazel, like ours is going to look up items and you cannot just stand there for a minute and he's all like choked up to see tears in his eyes any point for the baptistery says that that's what we going to get right there you tell me and for all of that's first-generation faith right there right that first-generation faith is why you're sitting here today. I got a bunch of emails on file in the last 434 years that would characterize second-generation faith. Okay my question is which one better characterizes you because second-generation faith is death to a movement every time we need first-generation faith because God is not finished with this church.

There is still a rapidly growing city around us in their new generations of college students in high school students coming in every single year and are all kinds of children growing up in our children's ministry and there are churches that are yet to be planted and there are people that are yet to be reached and families are still coming here it's can it take first generation faith to reach them. Why I share this with some of our pastors and leaders in and one of them talking recently that I'm realizing now that all the benefits that I enjoy here this church is because of somebody else's bold sacrificial audacious faith is about was reading how Moses when Moses in the Old Testament transition leadership of Joshua. Joshua had to have his own experience of God. Joshua had to hear from God and own this vision for himself in the first-generation faith. He said he had to go to the promised land on his own fate, not Moses. He said that promised land for this church for all these people that God has given us to reach in the new things that he wants us to do.

Moses was faithful. It was awesome is not going to be sufficient to guide us in the promised land to accomplish what God wants to accomplish the wise men. He says this in a quote we need to be the second wave of the first-generation we need to show the same first-generation faith that they showed you listen to me. I believe this is a matter of life and death for this church. I think this is a matter of life and death for this community the faith of the previous generation was awesome. Praise God for it, but it is not enough to take us into the future and into the places God wants for us to let me ask you to consider personally, I want you to consider this personally. Number two questions number one what is getting your first and best what's getting your first investors in the mission of Jesus. Remember, Paul says Jesus should have the first place in everything that means you should have the first place in your heart he should be the one you love the most that you think about the motives that you care about and are passionate about the most. They should have the first place in your obedience. That means that what he wants to be the first consideration in anything that you do these to be the first place in your priorities means that his agenda should rule your life right at this church.

We say that that will express itself in three primary ways. First, he will be first in your time. This Jesus to the first and best of your time you parents you spend more time teaching your kids out of the slider or how to know and follow Jesus. Do you spend more time worrying about climbing the workplace ladder lead to seeking Jesus, knowing his will and living it out or about this of all your weekly commitments when things get tight when things get hard is it your commitments to the kingdom of God. Are they the ones that are the first to go on big things like small group and volunteering in whatever ministry God got you involved in these first three first in your time is the first in your secondly talents, your time, your talents when you think about your talent and your career. Does the kingdom of God.

Get the first consideration God gave you that talent for reason they gave you that talent for reason because your workplace is a mission field. You use that talent to provide for you and your family.

I'm sure you enjoy it, but your talent is a key to get you into a mission field that nobody else can get into and you gotta start seeing your job as a means to get into a place to bring the gospel to people and you're supposed to use the financial benefits of your job first and foremost for the interest of his kingdom and not just your own. Which leads me to the third element in your time first in your time first in your talent first in your treasure who or what is getting the first and the best of our treasures. If you think about what you do with your money. Think about it into categories. One category we got the first and best category and then the other category you got the good enough category and for those of us who have a limited income. Usually we are willing to deal with good enough in some areas so that we can have the best in other areas and that's what we can focus on first. Let me explain what I mean, in case that's unclear. Imagine a couple in their late 20s early 30s there stand outside of the house that a real estate agent has taken undersea that is just a little beyond their price range, real estate agents like to do right now take you to the upper and then just a little bit farther answer here you stand out in front of this house and the conversation goes like this about you had this conversation is among judgment on the evening and you like this house was awesome. We want this house making. Imagine a family. This house it could be said of her family, but it's a little beyond what we are one of you says, yeah, I think we can do this. I think we can do it. But in order for us to do it.

Everything else is going to have to change were not to be able to upgrade our cars the next two years were not to be able to go on vacation.

What we want to go on vacation to stop them out of the time we can get a Starbucks three times a day. We have to cut our Netflix things back and forth reason to screen this is bad okay so it is that we gave you good enough here so that we can go first and best of here is that make sense or picture another couple in their mid to late 40s early 50s maybe late 50s and they just finished the applications for their kid to go to college and they get that tuition bill that there is no other word honestly to describe that than on godlike and are looking at that thing you know, how can they charge that much to go to school and then you like is like the national debt. How can anybody pay this guy and you think well then the conversation happens and sounds like this.

I know it is I really want I really want little Mikey to have the greatest possible launch into life. And if the school can help them get launched in his career. We want to go to the best we can get into any got into this one. So I think we can do this but everything else is going to have to change so were not to be in us, we are not really get that out even looking forward to when you trade it in your minivan and answered right out of you do that right now and will not go to Hawaii next year to celebrate her empty master life that we were always get to do and were not to be able to move into the country club. Whatever it is you put in that category where you can opt to stay with good enough so that our child gets the first and the best known to be very, very, very clear with you right there is nothing wrong with putting something first in your family okay metonymy can feel guilty about that. My question is why we rarely if ever asked that question in light of the kingdom of God.

In light of our giving, we never seem to have the conversation that goes like this.

Now we can do this we can do what we think Jesus is leading us to do in his kingdom. If we do it. Everything else cannot change. We never had the conversation. It seems like instead, what we ask is how much can we afford to give. After all these other commitments have been fulfilled, they come first the kingdom of God comes after after we get the kind of house we want to live in after we go on the vacations that we think our family would really enjoy after we draw the kind of cars we wanted.

After we get the credit close.

We want to wear and after we achieve the lifestyle that we've always wanted to live in after we send our kids to the college as we want them to go to after all these things we ask what can we afford to give. From the left over to God. Paul says Jesus does not deserve your leftovers. He is first he went first the first place and everything is on the left over kind of God. He's a 1st Pl., God invited to somebody's house and they served you leftovers for dinner that ever happened writing you okay man, it's like you mashed potatoes and mornings. Bake in a limp, French fries, you know the food to say no good Aminah macaroni soggy the peas are most of the chickadees I would go rappers delight anybody come on 80s rap is the best retching line over not know about.

Okay, if that really happen you get about is myself dinner and a 30 leftovers how that make you feel you would feel insulted because you knew that that meal was originally first prepared for somebody else and it was only a secondhand thought for you to refer if you had somebody famous come over to your house. My kids and I discussed this in the night, we will lose and I was like okay who's the most famous celebrity that we could ever imagine you inviting your house most of course looking for vendors and Nicolas Cage.

Mike is a no Zac Efron ties because they like the greatest showman like Zac Efron I would just be awesome. Okay, let's imagine a Zac Efron was coming for dinner. Gigi was hurting leftovers, you go through your somewhat overblown either. Some so we did need this we can put that in front of them now. If we want to honor him were going to give him the best millionaire given the first know, let me be clear. Jesus does not deserve your leftovers.

He is first he went first. He should be first in our lives. What I'm trying to say is this. I do not think the season is about you getting to a good enough level of giving her a good enough percentage in your life. Instead, I want you to ask yourself and ask this without apology. I want you as yourself, what is that level of giving that declares unequivocally that Jesus is first and that his kingdom is best in my life that he has the preeminence and I know that some of us are submitter nice to be like this been a member of the church alone, for I was a pastor so I can when churches when they talk about when they talk about money. Let me be very clear to you, God does not want your money.

God does not need your money. God is, after all, a lot more than your money. He's after all, if you and that certainly include your money which is why Jesus talked about money more than any other subject, because he knew that as long as his first is in your life and affect your money than it was all just words and a sham so he would save you really want to know where the rubber meets the road will actually first in your life.

You follow the trail of your checkbook even do that because he needed money. He did that because he knew that what is really first in your heart will show up in that area.

So I'm saying to you in the season, not because God needs money, but because God deserves our heart and our person are best. What does your giving show is the first and the best thing in your life you get really personal to you. I preferred for you for my wife and I as we become processing. This of the last three or four months.

We realize that our giving of the last three or four years has, going to settle in a good enough category only because I think is good enough. I'm not embarrassed by it. You knew the amount due the percentage I would say it's exemplary I would feel good about it. I wouldn't be ashamed and it but we are asking in the season.

Does it still declare that Jesus and his kingdom are first to us. I want something that unequivocally declares to him, you're the best you're the reason we exist, and you hadn't chose to come from heaven to earth to save us us and our kids to be lost and we would have no future. Jesus paid it all holding him I owe Synod left a crimson stain, he washed it white as snow. So were the whole realm of nature mine, that would be present far too small. Love so amazing, so to bind them as my soul, my life, my all I want something that declares that Jesus is not just important to us is not one of our many priorities, but he is first version of the way were thinking about it. I've use this analogy before to capture it when you sit down to a breakfast of bacon and eggs in the morning, but the chicken and the pig had a part in bringing up breakfast for you. The chicken made a contribution, a very generous contribution. The pig pig went all in writing. The chicken is not really change for the experience, but is more a transaction. The chicken gets up the next day and mix another contribution the pig.

However, is fundamentally transformed by the experience of providing your breakfast. My wife and I do not want to be chickens in our giving, we want to be pigs for Jesus.

Okay, had never heard that before. Now you got it. We don't want merely to make a generous contribution. We want to be fundamentally transformed by the experience because we established Jesus as the unchallenged first and best in our lives. Getting therefore the first and best in our finances so we want to come up with a number that unequivocally declares Jesus is first the years. First he went first, therefore, put him first, here's my challenge to you in the season.

Does your giving say leftovers doesn't say Lord now maybe use it now. Right now on your site did hold on a minute where I'm an entirely different place. I'm not thinking about nice close and new cars and expensive colleges for my kids to go to a man I can barely afford to pay the bills. My kids eat cereal with a fork save milk when I go to the park ducks go to park docs through credit me. That's how poor we are family is right. I just lost my job and I think about it is other stuff we offer you. Also there's a place for you to put Jesus first. Jesus says unequivocally in his word that he will seek and prioritize him first and all the rest of the things you need in life. He will provide for you. Matthew 633 seek first the kingdom of God put him in obedience to him first, and I promise I'll be something something.

Best illustration best application of everything that is pastoral rationing.

David Jeremiah who said it was couple in his church who came to him and said hey we really want to obey Jesus in this and give them a personal best which for them was the first 10% of the time and so these are but we can't afford it and there's no way we can make ends meet. If we do this in pastor Jeremiah set a look back at them and I said I'll take what I understand that a single struggle. What if you what you wrote out a check for what the first and the best was the first in their case first and percent with your the checkout gave to me. I'll put it in an envelope a silly envelope and put it in the front desk of my drawer this month. The that the top of my desk and I want to cash until the end of the month and if at the end of the month. You can't make ends meet. If you come back to me and asked me for that because you can afford it. I will get it taken out.

I will catch up you can tear it up and out in the end of that sound fair to you. Yeah, that's that that's regional you said you would trust me to hold that check in US and of course, is a look back at them and I said, shame on you because you just declared you trust your pastor more than you trust Jesus because that's what Jesus said we could do. He said if we give them the first the best he promised to make all these things abundant for us. So my question is for all of your whatever state you find yourself what is getting your first in your best what what unequivocally declares this is first and best of my life. Your second question am I listening to the Holy Spirit came on in my obeying him on the book of acts when the church was growing explosively. All you had was a group of people without any money without any resources.

Just listening to and obeying the Holy Spirit is all that I am even more impressive. You got a look at that original group of disciples and say what I got the resources right there minute. What can I do with that group of people is a group of people who said okay what you want to go.

You don't want us to build a church for you. You want to build a church through us. You can do more with just our obedience and you cope with all the resources in the world what you see in the book of acts is this incredible story of how group of people with no influence and no money and nothing impressive literally launch the greatest awakening the greatest movement in history at all come from saying what you want us to do were blank check. You tell us that one moment. My favorite example this is in acts acts eight you Jesus and told the early church that he wanted the gospel preached in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria uttermost parts of the earth right prickly by the end of act separate gospel still only in Jerusalem. The apostles was hanging on Jerusalem.

They haven't been able to get the gospel out of Jerusalem. There, hanging out small groups and Kumbaya uniting s'mores. That's that that's how their their existence. So the Holy Spirit speaks to our ordinary guy. Not one of the apostles order regarding Philip and removes Philip to go up to the middle of nowhere. This old dusty crossroads with is nothing but a blinking ghetto of flashing light gas station and just tells him he wants them to live their stay there building a life there.

All of a sudden a guy comes along the road a little caravan of chariots that we now referred to as the European Union is giving is reading from the book of Isaiah, and he does note is reading so go get some in the chariot and explained to him. This is all about Jesus reason to faith in Christ and baptizes Eusebius it was the third century church historian Eusebius says that Ethiopian unit went back to sub-Saharan Africa where he was from okay when I sub-Saharan Africa where he was from and he planted a church and launch a church planting movement that is still in existence today, the Holy Spirit, one act of obedience by an untrained unfunded un-resource guide accomplish more for the great commission that all the apostles with all their talent and had been able to accomplish any chapters that talk about missing obedience to the Holy Spirit. You want all of you.

Are you giving me your person. Your best and are you listening to the home is everything and her message today. If you miss anything on Senate night.

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Verse you giving me leftovers. Join us Thursday on