The word serve doesn’t typically get a lot of excitement for people because it feels like work. But the truth is that Jesus came for the purpose to save but to do so by demonstrating it as to serve. The term "hupereteo" (or huperetes) from the New Testament is a Greek word meaning "servant", often referring to a subordinate rower in a ship or any other kind of manual servant or minister. In the biblical context, it describes a person who serves, particularly in a subservient or subordinate role, and implies diligent service with one's hands. Using our hands and feet to serve others is ca critical biblical word. There are lots of different ways to do it…why not get at rowing.

Holiness is God’s essential character. The journey of the believer is INTO HOLINESS. It’s about becoming more and more distinct and separate from the fallen condition of this world. The opposite of holiness is “SAMENESS”. To be unholy is to be just the same as everybody else. Our lives should be a stark contrast to those around us who have not come into right relationship with God. From Moses's journey from obscurity to purpose, we will discover the urgency of God's call and the necessity of reverence in His presence. Explore the significance of removing the "footwear of familiarity" and embracing the holiness of encounters with the living God. The need for us to be holy is grounded in the holiness of God. The most central attribute of God is His perfect holiness. Let this message ignite your faith and inspire you to answer God's call with boldness and trust.

These are the last words of Paul in his letter to Timothy.  And after giving quite a few instructions on various church matters, he is now concluding his letter with some wise advice.  Have you noticed when you end up failing to walk in obedience to Jesus’ words your heart stops pursuing God and starts pursuing the things of the world?  Our ongoing pursuit of heavenly things should include guarding the deposit of the Gospel truths entrusted to us by God through his servants.  These truths that you hear today must be entrusted to us by God as a a good deposit and we need to guard it with our life – as parents, as elders, as teachers, as friends.   Our attempts to guard the Gospel reveals a heart that is constantly pursing God and the things of God.  We’re to enjoy the abundant life that God has for us in and through Jesus Christ.

6:1-11 – Have you ever accidentally ruined something?  Have ever  wanted to ruin something?  Your actions are different to these extreme ways of ruining.  I would say that success is spiritual and inward, not material and outward. Verse 6 in our text today says, “But godliness with contentment is great gain.” If you have godliness, you have great gain. You may not have the things the world can afford, but if you have God in your life, you are rich.  This test today a few examples of what can ruin your faith quickly.  Getting on top of them before you need an overhaul is suggested by Paul to his young student Timothy.  Let’s find out what can ruin our faith if we’re not careful.

5:1-16 - Church is a unique experience for a lot of reasons, but one reason that I think church is unique is that it brings people from a variety of backgrounds and life experiences together. Oftentimes, you’ll meet someone who shares similar life experiences, but I hope we’re all here because it’s our heart’s desire to worship the living God and it’s our shared faith in the person and work of Jesus Christ that brings us together.    And that’s the issue that Paul is giving Timothy advice on. He’s addressing how to pastorally handle the various relationships and circumstances within the family of God. Particularly how to say hard things to the various demographics within the church, and to care for the growing ministry towards widows within the Ephesian church.

There are several metaphors throughout the New Testament illustrating the nature of the Christian life and Christian community.  All the metaphors in 1 Timothy 4 are embedded with the need for training, for spiritual disciplines and practices which strengthen faith and promote spiritual health - Muscle training. If you dedicate yourself to these things, there will be no room for entertaining wacky stories which have no basis in truth. Instead, there will be lush spiritual growth, teachable spirits, humble service, supportive beliefs, compassionate ministry, and open fellowship.  The high values of the worthy servant of Christ need to be both used and guarded.  Just as your body  has physical muscles, so the Body of Christ has spiritual muscles. Faith is a muscle which needs to be stretched, exercised, rested, and supplied with plenty of protein and necessary nutrients. Let’s get to working out!

1 Timothy 3:1-13 The church has always needed people who would give themselves for the good of the flock. We live in a time that is all about being a consumer. We just take what we want and need. Sometimes the church is looked at in the same lens. You come and get what you want out of it, whether it be singing, kids bible classes, preaching, the Lord’s Supper, or fellowship.  None of these would exist without all of us giving of ourselves for the good of each other. Paul is writing these things so that we will behave rightly as the church, the people of God. A church desperately needs godly leaders and godly servants. We need more spiritual elders and deacons  and more spiritual ministry leaders in the kingdom of God. We need people who will live their lives ready to step up to the work of leading God’s people in the future.  Who will people come to for spiritual teaching, spiritual help, and spiritual guidance if we are not the ones who become that for the world? We must not go to church. We must be the church! We must be the servants and leaders that God wants us to be. What can you do today to move your life in that direction to fulfill your purpose to be the image of God to the world?

Looking for peace and some order is good.  Praying provides peace for the praying person.  Paul is giving Timothy and each of us some instruction for appropriate worship patterns and prayer  in chapter two.  God wants us all to pray for everyone.   God is looking for godly devotion done in appropriate ways.  The ultimate goal is for for every believer to live a life characterized by peace, order and godliness. 

1:1-20 –What sustains and unites the church is not a pastor or a program.  It’s not worship style or music.  What sustains and unites the church is the perseverance of Jesus coming for those that need Him!  The apostle Paul highlights the role of the law as well as the mercy that God showed him as the “foremost” sinner.  This same mercy in Jesus Christ remains the church’s only hope!  The church is the place where sinners are welcomed so they can be supernaturally changed by the Savior. So, let’s not misunderstand what Jesus came to do, and in our telling of the Good News, let’s not misrepresent what the gospel offers. We to get lost in details and side issues, let’s come back to the center. The cancer the gospel proposes to cure is this: our sins against God!

Acts 6:1-7; Eph. 4:11-13; 1 Cor. 12:14-22. Ultimately we end up pointing to human brokenness – God’s people and our God together makes up Everybody that is found greater than somebody. You end up finding how much stronger you are together than you were alone. Here’s what’s great about Christian community – the more you want from it, and the more you give to it, the more uncomfortable you have to be, and at the same time, the more fulfilled you become. Who doesn’t want to be greater than the somebody you are by joining up with everybody?

Gen. 1:26; 2:18; 3:7-8; Rev. 7:9; 2 Cor. 13:11 – Why do we exist? The very core of creation/humanity is the need to belong - to be in vulnerable relationships that build the framework for community to take place. Before anything was created, we will see that God existed in community: Father, Son and Holy Spirit. The three in one is the source that everything was created and moves. So it stands to reason that whatever is created would have similar identifying makers or DNA Alf the Creator. One of those markers is that nothing was created in isolation and the left in a vacuum. Everything is created in relationship to something or someone else. It wasn’t good for Adam to be alone and neither were you. It’s the ever-present constant of the entire human narrative.

Luke 24:13-35; Deut. 6:4-9 - It’s frustrating when you can’t see something but you’re told it’s there. Does this ever happen to you with the big things in life? Where you’re looking for something important but just can’t see it? How about when you look for God but can’t sense his presence? You look for Him, and you’re told by your preacher and more spiritually attuned friends that “He’s right there!” but we just can’t see him for yourself. Instead of sensing God you feel like He’s gone or like He will talk to anyone but you. When you can’t see God or sense Christ’s presence what should you do? That’s a dark place to be at but it’s similar to where some of Jesus’ followers found themselves Sunday after his crucifixion. When you go back through the Scriptures you can’t help but read them in light of that good news. It’s all about Him! It’s all pointing to our need for Him. It’s all about this coming Savior who is going to pay the ultimate sacrifice. It’s all about Jesus, His suffering, His death, and His life-giving resurrection so that anyone who repents of their sins and puts their faith and trust in Him will one day rise again too. When you can’t see Jesus, look to the Scriptures and to his resurrection!

Luke 18:18-19; James 1:16-18; Rom. 8:12-17 -A perfectly reasonable question to ask of someone like Jesus, one would think, and a decently polite way of putting it. But Jesus’ response begins in typically exasperating fashion: “Why do you call me good? No one is good but God alone.” By asking “Why do you call Me good?” Jesus is forcing the young man to reflect on his own perception of who Jesus is. Unintentionally, this ruler had made a wild—though entirely accurate—claim about Jesus. When Philip first encountered Jesus, it was life changing. He was so excited about his new Master that he went and told his friend Nathanael to come and follow. But Nathanael mocked the idea by saying, “Can anything good come out of Nazareth?”(John 1:46). We could in a sense share that ancient disdain and skepticism: Could Jesus really be the solution? Could He be the One who takes my wicked heart and makes it produce something that’s truly good? You can bet He IS Good!

Mark 4:30-32; Mark 10:13-15 – Jesus thinks about the imagery that best describes the ontology of the Kingdom and its ways – that of the mustard seed( the smallest or the garden seeds). It is common and worked for the imagery of contrast, the point Jesus is making is simple, that “small beginnings can yield great outcomes.” The way of the seed does not fit the logic of the world, it is small and insignificant; unnoticeable when it enters into the ground. Yet with time, the seed becomes the plant so strong and large that birds can perch in its branches and rest from the weariness of their life. The parable point is a simple one. The Kingdom of Heaven will have small and insignificant beginnings; it will be unnoticeable to the world. The Kingdom of God will grow under the hand and by the timing of God, not dependent on those who belong to it or by the works of man, but as the Spirit of God will, so would the kingdom grow.

Luke 12: 22-34; Phil. 4:4-7 - I wonder how many of you are worried right now? You've got an ongoing weight, a burden, someone you love, something you care about, something that you want to change, but you can't figure out how to change. It's a never ending weight, something that's always present with you. If you do, you're not alone. Worry is like telling our omnipotent God the unthinkable: “I don’t trust You.” Yet worry is still a struggle for many who have experienced God’s goodness—even mature believers. Reflecting on Jesus’ words about anxiety, we can think rightly about our troubles when we view them in light of God’s Word. Only then will we trust our burdens to the One who can truly bear them.

God knows you love Him. But, for sure, He wants to hear you say it and watch your love flow for Him. Have you ever seen those bumper stickers that says, “To know me is to love me.” Why would you put that on your car? Every time I see one of those I think, I doubt that. So often the better we get to know somebody, the more we really know them, the harder it becomes to love them. God knows you from the beginning to the end. He knows you inside out. He knows all things, so nothing is going to change His opinion of you or His love for you. Rest in that. Peter had to, so do you.

John 11:17-44; John 20:31; Rom. 15:13 - The question Jesus asks us: “Do you believe I am the resurrection and the life?” “Do you believe THIS?” “Eternal life" in the gospel of John is not only a future thing. It's something you have, and experience, right now. It's a now-and-later thing. This eternal life-- this Spirit life-- that you have with God, will be forever unbroken. Death will not ever be a thing for you; you will always live, in unbroken fellowship with God. “Do you believe this?” Only two answers are possible if we understand the question clearly: yes or no. I stand with Martha and the man born blind and say, “Yes, Lord, I believe THIS!” How about you?

John 9: 1-41; John 3:12; John 5:39-48 - Jesus often used temporary situations to illustrate larger spiritual issues. Do you know that there may be hardships and obstacles in your life that are there so that God will be glorified in them in some way in the end? While many may skew understandings of sin and it's consequences, Jesus does not. Is it offensive to believe that God may allow some complex thing, some painful thing using such to carry out something else that He wants? This is where our trust in God lies, in His ability to know and oversee what we simply cannot. Jesus shows His tenderness to those who have been put out by the elite, by the ruling class, as He seeks out the man born blind when he is removed from the assembly. Jesus is still pursuing those cast out today. He rescues sinners, after all. That's really good news for me and for you, unless you think you see already.

John 5:1-17; Psalm 103:1-5 (Brian) - As Jesus surveys the crowd, He spots a man who had been lying at the pool for a long time, 38 years, John tells us. Jesus approaches the man and asks: “Do you want to be made well?” On the face of it, the question is absurd. Do you want to be made well? You are lying on the brink of healing for 4 decades without receiving it, when this stranger walks up and asks if you want to be made well? Of course, you want to be made well! It is easy to get stuck in pain. It is easy to become mired in our wounds…not because we LIKE the pain and the wounds, but because they are familiar. And because the prospect of going through the healing process is just too overwhelming. Too scary? Why not take your fears to Jesus?

John 1:35-42; Psalm 119:37 – (Drew) – “What are you seeking?” That’s kind of a funny start to a conversation, when you think about it. Jesus apparently doesn’t like small talk. And even the wording of the question is odd. It would seem more logical for Jesus to ask, “What do you want?” But maybe this question cuts deeper than wants. It implies a longing, a searching, a yearning for something. So, “What are you seeking?” “What are you looking for?” Jesus asks you. I’m not talking about when you’re browsing on Amazon or shopping at the grocery store or standing in front of the fridge late at night. It seems there are many times in our lives when we’re looking, but we’re not really sure what we’re looking for. But if you come looking for nothing, I’m afraid that’s what you’ll find. Jesus wants you to look at your soul and respond with honesty – that you seek…Life! “Come and you will see!”