June 30, 2025 • 39 mins
In this inspiring message from Flipside Church, guest speaker Jeff Stemple shares a heartfelt and relatable reflection on life’s challenges, drawing from his personal experiences as a husband, father, and long-time staff member celebrating ten years at Flipside. Jeff humorously recounts the overwhelming early days of parenting his two daughters and how those moments led to a season of feeling spiritually and emotionally numb. Connecting his story to the biblical church in Ephesus, Jeff explores the Apostle Paul’s teachings and Jesus’ words in Revelation, emphasizing the importance of returning to our "first love" for God. Through an engaging overview of the Book of Ephesians, Jeff highlights how God’s love, which pursued us first, transforms our motivation for living out faith in practical ways—whether in marriage, parenting, or daily struggles. Join us for a message that encourages repentance, returning to the basics, and remembering God’s initiating love to fuel a vibrant walk with Christ.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Welcome.
I'll go ahead and add my welcomes
to those that have already been spokenthis morning.
Hey, I just want to take a minute and telleverybody who's here this morning.
Good for you being in church,making church a priority.
The Bible talks a lot about,something called the first fruits.
It says it talks about the first fruitsof your time, your talent, your treasure.
(00:23):
And, everybody always talks about Mondaybeing the first day of the week.
Well, maybe the work week,but the first day of the week is Sunday.
And good for you for, giving Godthe first fruits of your time.
I'm confidentthat he's going to honor that in ways
that we could have never imaginedthis week.
As we go about doing, hopefully whatwe're going to talk about today.
(00:45):
If we have not met before,my name is Jeff.
I'm going to tryto adjust this wire real quick.
My name is Jeff.
I'm on staff here at flip Side.
I was thinking, as I prepared for this,today, our time together.
Today, I was thinking about the factthat I'm, This year marks
ten years of me being on staff at flipside.
Crazy. Crazy.
Thank you. I wasn't lookingfor applause, but thank you.
(01:07):
The other
the othermilestone that I'm celebrating this year.
Since I was considering milestones,
is my wife,Jennifer, and I are going to be
celebrating our 25th wedding anniversarythis year.
Couple of months in September.
Yeah. It's crazy.
It's weird.
If you've been marriedfor any significant amount of time.
There's things aboutwhen you got married that
(01:30):
if you're like me,they seem like yesterday.
And then there's things about itthat seem like a lifetime ago.
Like an eternity ago.
And I was just sitting there reflecting
on, specifically that time of our wedding.
We got married in September,
and during our, we have awe had a relatively short engagement.
(01:51):
It was long enough to plan a wedding.
And then we were we're we're married.
But during our engagement,I had happened to me.
What I think happens to a lot of people,especially guys.
There's a lot of speculationabout marriage
in general,but your marriage in particular,
and with guys, it takes the forma lot of of a lot of kind of doomsday
(02:12):
foreboding, like all the freedomsyou're going to lose once you get married.
Like when you get married, no more guitar.
Forget about that.Or when you get married.
No more guys night out.
Forget about that. When you get married,forget about that.
And I remember kind of,you know, hearing this talk
thinking, oh my God,I kind of braced myself for marriage.
(02:33):
It's really kind of unfortunate.
I kind of braced myself for marriage,with all these freedoms
that I'd be losing because I got married.
And then once I got marriedand got a few weeks,
a few months into it,I thought I kind of like being married.
It's kind of cool.
Kind of a sweet gig. This marriage,
but something that nobody prepared me for.
(02:57):
Kids.
Some of youI knew, some of you in this room.
I knew when I was engaged.
And I'm holding this against youfor not telling me about this.
Instead of marriage. Nobody.
Nobody warned me about kids.
At least. Maybe I didn't.
Maybe I wasn't listening.
I don't know, maybe the joyof being married, like, overshadowed the.
(03:18):
I justdon't think anybody told me about it.
They never warned me about.
Once you have kids.
Dot, dot, dot, where do you have kids?
Dot dot dotand then our first, daughter was born.
That in and of itself was a shockbecause my dad's dad, my dad's,
my grandfather, one of four boys, my dad,one of three boys, one of me two boys.
(03:40):
I know the numbers are dwindling, butI just thought, I'm going to have sons.
I know there are daughters out thereand people have them.
I'm just not going to be one of them.
And then this little time,she was so tiny.
You guys, this little girl's born.
And I remember literally holding her like,you know, like, hold a delicate
piece of, you know,
pottery or whatever.
(04:02):
Holding her and telling Jen, what do I do?
I have no idea what to do.
But there was parenting, like it or not.
You're a parent.
And then I don't know what came over us.
Maybe we thought we'll have another one,because the two will occupy each other's
time, and we'll get to somehowgo take a nap.
I don't know where we were.
(04:23):
I don't know what we were thinking,but 16 months later, Ali came around
and I just remember thinking,this parenting stuff is difficult.
I'm not trying to pin anything on Ali.
I mean, everybody knows it's my favoriteanyway, so.
I'm kidding.
I'm kidding. You guys.
The two of them are 16 months apart.
The two of them together.
(04:46):
Was just overwhelming.
I remember thinking to myself, they.
These don't stop.
They come at you all the time. They don't.
Have you ever tried to call a timeoutwhen you're parenting?
There are no timeouts.
Please. I just wanted to call a timeout.
Nope.
Parenting just came fast and furious.
The thing about that is,there was two of everything.
(05:08):
If you have twins,you know what I'm talking about.
If you have kids
that are real close in age,you know it comes in like biblical waves.
There's two of everything.There were two kids on the bottle.
There were two kids in diapers.
There were two car seats everywhere.
My parents,they bought them two of every outfits.
Bottom two of everything. Toys, bottomtwo of everything.
And I just remember thinking,oh my gosh, I can't.
(05:29):
As rough as all that was,
the thing that really wasthe most difficult thing
was when they would get sick together
because they have no senseof personal space,
one would get sickand I knew it would that afternoon.
The other would be sick
because they sneeze in each other's mouthand wipe each other's nose on it.
(05:50):
I just remember thinking,you guys separate now.
They have no sense of personal space.
That was the most difficultwhen they would get sick together.
And I'll never forgetthere was one winter that some sort of flu
ran through the ran through the houseor whatever, but they were both sick.
There was two of them.So we had a man to man defense.
(06:10):
You know what I'm talking about.
You know, whichever parent is closestto the one given the biggest problem that
that's that's my manright there. Pick that pick that one up.
And so I had
Ali in my left armabout 230 in the morning.
And I had Ali and she was screamingin my face, you know what kids do.
They justthey don't have any have any couth.
(06:30):
They just scream right in your face.
She's screaming right in my face.
And I had the bottle here,
and I would feed her a little bitand she would eat a little bit,
and then she just spit the bottle outand scream in my face a little bit more.
And I remember thinking,
oh, I'm going to chuck this spot.
We lived in our old house in Fresno,and they had the single pane windows,
(06:52):
and I thought, I'mgoing to chuck this bottle.
Good thing I didn't chuck the
I'm going to chuck this bottlethrough our kitchen window.
Like the last semblance of controlI had over a situation
that I had no control over.
I'm going to chuck this bottlethrough that window,
and that the days beforerage rooms that'll make me feel good.
And so
I throw my arm back, full head of steam,come forward.
(07:13):
But I extended my arm too farand I hit the side of the refrigerator.
The bottle skidsacross the top of the refrigerator, loses
momentum, lands on the counter, slidesacross the countertop, hits
the lip of the sink, and gracefully landsright side up in the sink
where it should have beenin the first place.
And I was like,I can't even do that right?
(07:35):
Kids screaming in my face.
And I remember that
winter, that night really.
I can laugh about it now, but that night
really began about a two yearperiod, maybe two and a half to three year
period in my life where I was just there.
(07:57):
I wouldyou've heard the phrase phoning it in.
I was phoning it in, I was robotic,I was just going through things.
I wasn't necessarily tired or
what the Bible calls weary,although there were moments of that.
But that long period of time,
something was going on where I was justyou've heard the phrase losing it.
(08:20):
I was losing it.
I was losing the source.
The parenting thing was getting to me,
and I was just numb.
We've been in this serieswhere we're taking a look
at two letters that the apostle Paulwrote to his protege, Timothy.
That's the serieswe've been in for a while.
(08:41):
We actually just startedthe second letter last week.
And Timothy is pastoring in a church.
Anybody remember where he was pastoringthe church?
Ephesus.
Timothy is pastoringa church in a place called Ephesus.
So, if you know that area,the church is back in that day,
we're not necessarily like we havethis church building.
(09:02):
Was anybody herewhen flip side was at the high school?
Just remember that. Yeah.A few of you were.
That'swhen we first started coming to flip side.
And it would basically
it was a set up and a tear downevery week over called church in a box
set up and tear downevery week over at the high school.
Well,the church is back in this first century.
We're like home churches.
And so when it says Timothy was pastoringthe church in Ephesus,
(09:23):
it was the group of Christian followers,Jesus followers there in Ephesus
that were comprised of a bunchof really smaller home churches.
That's where Timothy was, and that'swhere these two letters find him from.
Paul.
So Carl's going to pick back upnext week in second Timothy.
But what I want to do this weekis kind of zoom out from where we've been,
(09:49):
get a broader pictureof what was going on with that church,
because when we take a take a look at itin a general sense, we find out
that the Bible has a lot to say about thischurch that Timothy was pastoring in.
And it has a lot to say to us
it's 2000 some odd years later.
(10:09):
The Bible has a lot to say to usby looking at this church in Ephesus.
So that's where we're going to be today.
It actually goesall the way back to the book of acts.
If you've heard of that,
if you've never read the book of acts,and you think the book the Bible is
boring, readthe Book of Acts reads like an epic novel.
Once I started it,I'm like, I cannot put this down.
(10:32):
But Paulwent on for mission missionary journeys,
and they're all chronicledthroughout the book of acts.
And towards the end, there,
around chapter 1920,it talks about Paul traveling
by land down throughwhat's what is now modern day Turkey.
And he comes to the city of Ephesus.
And the city of Ephesus is comprisedmostly of what's called Gentiles,
(10:55):
basically non-Jewish people.
The Gentiles were not
they were they were polytheistic
with no multiple gods,just to go see the god of the sky.
They were idol worshipers.
They had temples set up for idol worship.
They had people there who wouldmake these idols and they'd sell them.
It was a whole thing, a whole way of life.
(11:16):
And Paul literally walks in
and starts preaching the gospel, startstalking to people about Jesus,
and he
gets this group, this following,who start this church.
And so Paulstays there for quite a bit of time.
There's a, close to a riot there,because people who are selling stuff
(11:37):
aren't really hip to Paul's message,
because he's stealing their businessby preaching this one.
God and Jesus, his son, crucified.
They're not really digging it,but Paul goes through the throes of what
it means to plant a church in a placewhere nothing has been there before.
He's not riding anybody'scoattails, really.
He's starting from scratch, and so hestays there for a certain amount of time,
(11:58):
and he starts this church and it actuallytakes off, starts doing well.
In the midst
of all these struggles and challenges,the church actually starts doing well.
And so Paul realizes, you know,God has called me to this ministry.
I need to move on.
I need to carry out ministryin other parts of the world.
But before he
leaves, he addresseswhat's called the church elders.
(12:20):
And so that's where we're going to be.
If you brought your Bible with you,we're going to be in acts chapter 20.
We're going to start at verse 28.
Paul is addressing before he leaves.
He's that he's talking to the groupof elders, and he's kind of telling them
what to brace themselves for.
Start picking up at verse 28.
He says, keep watch over yourselvesand all the flock
(12:43):
of which the Holy Spirit has madeyou overseers.
Be shepherds of the church of God,which he bought with his own blood.
I know that after I leave,savage wolves will come in
among you, and will not spare the flock,even from your own number.
Men will arise and distort the truth inorder to draw away disciples after them.
Be on your guard, so be on your guard.
(13:04):
He says.
Remember that for three yearsI never stopped warning each of you
night and day with tears.
That's sort of a tough goodbye.
That'skind of like more of a careful danger.
Be beware.
I'm out.
But one of the things we know aboutthe time we've spent looking
(13:26):
at our letters to Timothy isthis is exactly what happens.
This is the exact thing that happens.
Savage wolves will come in among you,and we'll not spare the flock.
Even your own number will distortthe truth in order to draw disciples
away from them.
Paul's letters have been talkingabout beware of false teaching.
Beware of false doctrine.
(13:46):
Beware of these peoplewho are going to come in
and are going to try to tryto distort the teachings of Jesus,
and they're going to come infrom among you, he says.
So it's interesting.
From the very get go,we see that this church is already playing
a substantial part in the growthof people's faith there in that area.
(14:10):
So sandwiched
between what we just read in acts19 and chapter 19 and 20,
and the two letters to Timothythat we had been spending some time in.
Sandwiched in between those twois a letter to the Ephesian church.
It's a letter to the church in Ephesus.
It's not to Timothy,it's not to some other elder there.
(14:31):
It's not, the church in Ephesusactually had other pastors after Timothy.
But this is to the Ephesians.
The church in Ephesus.
So it's very importantthat we take a look at this letter,
because that's what we're trying to dohere.
We're trying to live out church.
(14:56):
So this letter is divided
into two two parts, two halves.
It's chapters. There'ssix chapters in all.
There's chapters one through threewhere Paul gets very theological.
He talks about the spiritual things.
He talks about the gracethat we've been given.
He talks about our standingin our calling with God.
And then he takes chapters four,five, and six, and he goes,
(15:18):
then this is what it looks like.
This is how you walk this out.
This is how this all the stuffthat I'm about to tell you,
this is how it looksas you're living it out.
So real quick this morningI'm going to try to be brief.
I don't want to spend too much time here,
but I want to take a real quick, quick,kind of like a whistle stop
tour of the book of Ephesians,because it's going to help us
talk about what we're whatthe rest of our time this morning.
(15:41):
So you don't need to turn thereif you want to.
You can.
But I'm just going to go real quickthrough the some really kind of,
some meat of the letter to the Ephesians,
especially in the first three chapters.
This is home to some of the mostfamous verses in all of Scripture, really
in chapter one, starting at verse 11,
(16:02):
it says, In Him we were also chosen,
having been predestinedaccording to the plan of him
who works out everything in conformitywith the purpose of his will, in order
that we who were first
to put our hope in Christ,might be for the praise of his glory.
And you also were included in Christ
when you heard the message of truth,the gospel of your salvation,
(16:23):
when you believed you were marked in himwith a seal, the promised spirit.
So Paul's telling these peoplewho have never really gotten a grasp
of this idea of God, he says, you'rechosen, you're included, you're marked.
Here's your standing with God.
This very weightytheological, spiritual things.
In chapter two, starting at verse eight,
(16:46):
he says, for it is by graceyou have been saved through faith.
And this is not from yourselves.
It is the gift of God, not by works,so that no one can boast.
For we are God's handiwork,created in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advancefor us to do.
That's what.
That's a really famous verse right there
that talks about saved by gracethrough faith in Christ, not by works.
(17:08):
If you've ever done any, Bible studyon spiritual gifts,
you camp out a lotright there in that part of Ephesians.
And then in chapter three,starting at verse 20,
he says, Now to him who is able to doimmeasurably more than all
we ask or imagine, according to his powerthat is at work within us.
To him be glory in the church
(17:29):
and in Christ Jesus throughoutall generations, forever and ever.
And the church said, Amen.
And so Paul's just unpacked some deeptheological truths, encouraging stuff,
telling them their stand,their newfound standing with God.
(17:50):
And it's almost like he's reminding them
he's setting himself upbecause he needs to do that
because of what he's about to talk aboutin chapters 4 or 5 and six.
It's a it'sa kind of a setup that he goes through.
So starting in
chapter four, here'swhere the sort of rubber meets the road.
Here's where we get down to brass tacks.
(18:12):
Chapter four, verse 25.
Therefore, because of all the stuffI said in the first three
chapters, therefore each of youmust put off falsehood and speak
truthfully to your neighbor, forwe are all members of one body.
In your anger. Do not sin.
Do not let the sun go down
while you are angry,and do not give the devil a foothold.
Anyone who has been stealing must stealno longer, but must work.
(18:34):
Doing something useful
with their own hands, that they may havesomething to share with those in need.
And then he says,
do not let any unwholesome talkcome out of your mouth,
but only what is helpfulfor building others up
according to their needs,that it may benefit those who listen.
So he stares off into this.
Here's how it looks practically.
He talks about anger, talksabout speech, talks
(18:57):
about lying, talks about stealing, talksabout building other people up.
And thenhe goes into chapter five in verse three.
But among you there mustthere must not even be a hint
of sexual immoralityor of any kind of impurity or greed,
because these are improper for God'sholy people.
So he's talking about sex.
He's talking about greed.
(19:19):
Still, in chapter five, he starts,he uses the word there starting in verse
21, the word none of us like submit to oneanother out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbandsas you do for the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,just as Christ loved the church
and gave himself up for her.
And then he kind of bleedsover into chapter six, verse one.
(19:39):
He says, children,obey your parents, for this is right.
Verse
four in chapter six, fathers,do not exasperate your children.
Instead, bring them up in the trainingand the instruction of the Lord.
And then we could spend a whole hourtalking about this next verse.
He talks, slaves, obeyyour earthly masters with respect and fear
(19:59):
and sincerity of heart,just as you would obey Christ.
Stuff that really gets twisted sidewayswhen you try it.
When you try to think about itin terms of culture.
And then lastly, in chapter six,
starting in verse ten, Paul talks
about what's called spiritual warfare.
He says, finally, be strong in the Lordand in his mighty power.
(20:22):
Put on the full armor of God so thatyou can take your stand against the devil.
Schemes for a struggleis not against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers,against the authorities,
against the powers of this dark world,and against the spiritual spirit,
spiritual forces ofevil in the heavenly realms.
So Paul gives very practical instructions.
(20:43):
At times it's really commandsthat he's giving
for these people who are tryingto walk out this way of life.
Many of them, it'sa new way of doing things.
So you might be thinking at this point,where are we going with this?
Why, why, why?
Look at this.
(21:05):
Why spend time on this?
Here's why.
Flipside I think we have more in commonwith the church in Ephesus
than we'd care to admit.
I think we have more in common withthe church in Ephesus than we'd like to.
Then we'd like to see.
Because this is where
we find ourselves all the time.
(21:26):
There's this.
Here's what I heard in church on Sunday,
where it's 72, in fluorescent.
And here's the stuff
that life throws at me, that I am somehowtrying to marry these two together.
This is where we find ourselves.
This is where the Ephesian church
found themselves,and this is where we find ourselves.
(21:50):
It's so funny.
Whenever I, whenever I talk to like,like friends and even mild acquaintances
who have not put their faithin Christ yet.
Inevitably,the majority of these conversations
get to a point where they say,
this actually used to happen when I wasin, youth ministry all the time.
We had a group of seniors come throughand they were read.
(22:12):
I mean, there were there were thinkersand they were always asking questions.
And we would talk through these,these Bible things.
And it was so interesting.
We would inevitably,on so many of these occasions,
get to a point where they would go,
you don't even need to be a Christianto know that's true.
You don't even need to be a Christfollower to know that's how life is.
(22:34):
You don't even need to sayyou're a Jesus follower to know
that's the struggle.
That's where the Ephesian church
finds themselves,and that's where we find ourselves.
There's the good I know I need to do.
There's the good, I know there's thethere's the things God has told me
about me and about him and about us.
(22:56):
And then there's this.
A lot of times, this crazy environmentthat I've got to go out
and somehow apply this stuff to.
That's where the church in Ephesus was,
and that's where we find ourselvesso many times.
And that's whywhat we're talking about here
today is so importantfor us to get Ahold of.
(23:17):
You guys,
anybody either graduate from college orhigh school or you just moved up a grade.
Anybody in here?
Wow. Got a lot of.
What about job reviews?
Anybody ever get a review at their job?
Sometimes a merit increaseor a raise is dependent on it.
Remember, in school,you get a report card.
(23:39):
If you're like me, they would come inlike a half manila envelope.
And there was like this reallysuspenseful time where you'd be like,
oh, I was talking to my daughter Sydneythe other day.
It's all online now.
There's no suspense anymore.
It's like trying to hang up.
Remember, in the old daysyou could really slam a phone down
when you're you can't do that anymore.
Like the report cards in the old age,they'd come.
(24:00):
And a lot of times you wouldyour parents would have to sign them
and send it backso that they knew that they got sent home.
And somebody significant saw them.
I remember getting that reportcard going, oh,
there was a letter C on there a lot,and sometimes it had a minus a plus.
After it.
Report cards.
So your job reviewyou know you get you go in.
It's time for a merit increase.
(24:21):
There's time for a raise.
And they're like how'd you do.
Let's see how you did get a report card.
What did you get?
Well, how'd you end up this semester?
Wouldn't it be nice
to know how the church in Ephesus did
all we've talked about? Paul, man.
He wrote three letters to that areaset up this year.
(24:43):
Wouldn't it be nice to know how they did,to kind of go back and go.
How did all flesh out for you, Ephesians?
Where do you end up with this stuff?
One of the things I love
about the Bible.
Is we get a report card on the churchin Ephesus.
We get a report card,we get to know how they did,
(25:05):
and we need to know how they did
because we're more like themthan we care to admit.
We need to know because life has a wayof making us better.
Life has a way of making us resentful.
Life has a way of piling up regrets.
We lose sight of purpose.
(25:27):
So we need to know.
Someone once told me, it's a very wiseman who can learn from the mistakes
of others instead of making all,making him all his own.
I learned this, you know,they say, especially with guys.
They say your frontal lobe developssome time in your early 20s.
I don't know if it is that my frontal lobedeveloped or what, but me
(25:47):
during my teenage yearswas me making all my own mistakes.
There were people in my lifethat were like, sometimes literally
screaming at me, stop or go.
And I'm like, no, I'm going to go aheadand make all my own mistakes.
And they're like, they're going.I did like three years ago.
I did what you're doing.
Stop doing that. And I'd be like,no, I'm good.
And then somehow around my early 20s,I'm like,
(26:10):
God has put these guys in my lifethat are like ten years older than me.
Perhaps I should start listening to themand learning from their mistakes
instead of making all my own.
We need to know how the
church in Ephesus did.
So God gives the report card
(26:30):
in the last book of your Biblesin the Book of Revelation.
It's so interesting.
He gives a report cardfor some other churches,
but we just don't have the backgroundthat we have with the church in Ephesus.
There's some other churches thatget report cards there in the first part
of the book of Revelation, but in chapter
two, starting at verse one,
(26:52):
some of your Bibles may say to the church
in Ephesus.
I said, starting in verse
one, starting in verse two,this is Jesus talking.
Jesus is giving the report card.
That's one of the reasonsthis is so valuable.
It's like gold.
My ears are like, please tell me
he's talking to John the Apostle.
(27:13):
John. John is the only one left.
All the other apostles,all the other apostles have been martyred.
And John is exiled onthis island called Patmos.
And Jesus comes to him and says, John,there's some stuff
I want you to write downin. You're in exile here.
So you got all the time in the world.
So grab a pen and write downwhat I'm about to tell you.
Jesus says to the church
(27:34):
in Ephesus, right, here we go.
Great time.
These are the words of himwho holds the seven stars
in his right hand and walksamong the seven golden lampstands.
If you've ever
read the book of revelation, it'sreally big on symbolism and and imagery.
But suffice it to say,Jesus talking about himself, he's
the one with the sevenstars in his right hand.
(27:56):
And he says,
I know your deeds,your hard work, your perseverance.
I know that you cannot toleratewicked people, that you have tested
those who claim to be apostles or notand have found them false.
You have persevered
and have endured hardships for my nameand have not grown weary.
Yeah. Hey,
(28:18):
that's a pretty good report card.
All the stuff that they've been thatthey were talked to about.
This is what you want from your kids,right?
All that stuff that I talk to you about,do those things and they get it.
Hey, he's like, good job, says Jesus.
That's I mean,
hey, if you have one a day from anybody,that's what you want to know from, right?
He says, good job, Ephesians.
(28:40):
Good job doing that.
Didn't tolerate wickedness.
All the stuff that Paul talked about with,false teachers and sound doctrine,
you nailed it.
You nailed it.
You got an A on the final guided people.
But that's not where it ends.
Jesus continues.
(29:03):
In verse four
he says, but I hold this against you.
You have forsaken the love.
You had it.
First, consider how far you have fallen.
Repent and do the things you did at first.
If you do not repent,
I will come to youand remove your lampstand from its place.
So, like I said,
one of the best things about thisreport card is it comes from Jesus Himself
(29:27):
and he says in somewhere along the way
you lost what he calls your first love.
Somewhere alongall of the command, keeping
and the deed doing and the hard workyou lost your first love.
All the instructions,
all the carrying out of the thingsthat they were talked about.
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You lost your motivation for life.
You lost it.
And there's a really important truth
that we need to understand herethis morning,
because when we understand it,it can save us from things like quitting.
It can save us from thingslike hopelessness.
It gives us new perspective on old things.
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That's a really goodto have a new perspective on old things.
It makes difficult situationsless difficult.
If we get Ahold of this,because the fix for the Ephesian church
is the same fix for us,
and it comes in a very short
verse by the same apostlethat Jesus told to write this down.
(30:34):
His name was John,
first John.
There's four letters from John.
It's in the first one,first John, chapter four, verse 19.
He says,we love because he first loved us.
Propermotivation has everything to do with love.
If you've heard anybody ever saythey've lost the love,
(30:56):
that's what they're talking about.
That's what they're talking about.
Returning to our first lovehas everything to do with the fact
that the idea of first didn'tstart with us in the first place.
This whole idea of first.
It wasn't our doing.
We had nothing to do with it.
If God has everything to do with God,if God hadn't made the first move,
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none of the things we try to do with him,none of the things
the Ephesian church was trying to do,none of this,
this marrying between these two things,none of it would be possible.
And none of it wouldhave even been relevant.
So here's where I want to camp out.
This is what I want to hit on hardand look back
at the remainder of our timehere this morning.
(31:38):
When you accept that God loved you first,
it changes the motivationfor everything you do.
When we latch onto the fact that God loved us first,
it changes our motivationfor everything that we do.
It makes it possible
to do the things that Paul was tellingthe Ephesian church to do.
(31:59):
It makes it possible to dothe things that Paul
was writing to Timothy about.
Jesus says, return to your first love,
return to the thing,and let the motivation be the thing
that called you to faithin the first place.
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There's three things that Jesus talkedabout there.
In that last part of revelation. He says,
first thing he says is repent.
Recognize it, ask for forgiveness,confess it, and then turn and go
the opposite direction.
The Bible says it's not God's judgment.
(32:41):
It's not God's justice.
Those things are there, but those aren'tthe thing that calls us to repentance.
The thing that calls us to repentanceis his kindness.
It's his love.
It's the fact that he took the first stepand loved us first.
The second thing the Bible tells us do,
or that Jesus tellsthe Ephesian church to do, is return.
(33:04):
Go back to the basics.
Whether you've been followingJesus for decades,
or whether you're here this morningand you're just considering this idea
of what it means to be a Christian,to put your faith in Jesus,
this idea of the basics.
This will fuelthis will fuel your walk with God.
(33:25):
The things
that are elemental,the fact that God loved me first
while I was still a sinner.
Romans chapter five
verse eight says,God demonstrates his love toward us,
that while we were still sinners,Christ died for us.
I put, I didn't become a Christianuntil I was 27 years old,
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put my faith in Jesus in August of 1997.
And this was the thing
that drew me to that, to that moment.
It was not all the ridiculous
garbage mistakes that I have made.
Those were there.
But this idea that God loved me last year,five years ago
(34:10):
when I was doing that stuffand had no first put God for what?
That even leave me alone?
God still love me.
That idea, that is what drew me to him.
And that is the basic first love that
that Jesus is telling Paul,or that Jesus is telling John about.
(34:30):
Can you
imagine what this would look likeif we got a hold of this in our lives?
Can you imagine what applying this like?
Tomorrow you walk into work,you still got the same desk.
You still got the same chair.
There's a window there.
There's still thatsame jerk. Two cubicles over.
But we recognize both.
First, the fact that God loved us.
First the God.
The fact that God took the first step.
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It changes our perspective on things.
It changes that motivation.
When the girls were little
and I was losing it, what I was not,I wasn't losing my mind.
There were momentswhere I thought that was happening,
but I wasn't losing my mind.I was losing my motivation.
I was losing this idea of first love.
I was just phoning it in. Robotic
(35:13):
Jesus tells
the church in Ephesus,you all have become robotic.
Go back to your first love.
Yeah, you got an eye on all that stuff.
But man, one of the thingsabout those types,
those types of environments isthey're not very appealing.
They're not very welcoming.
None of us want to go, yeah,that's what I want to sign up for.
(35:34):
That's what I want to get involved in.
This could change.
We get this, get Ahold of thisand apply it to our lives.
It could change everything.
When we were out for my mom's82nd birthday
the other day, and,we're at this restaurant,
(35:56):
my daughters were there, and I said,girls, there was there was a conversation
going on a few tables over,and I said, girls, please do me a favor.
Please do not let me turn it.
I've come to the realizationthat I'm getting older.
I've just embraced it. I've acceptedit. It's happening.
Just can't stop it. Embrace it.
I said, girls, please don't let me turninto a bitter old man from your world.
(36:18):
I can't stand it when I said,
girls, pleasedon't let me turn into a bitter old man.
This is the type of thing that keepsthat type of stuff from happening.
Remember your first love
because God shows up every dayand he says, I chose you first.
Let that fuel your walk with God.
If you haven't put your faith in Christyet here today, let that fuel you towards
(36:42):
accepting Jesus as your personal Savior.
The last thing
Jesus says to the Ephesian churchhe says return, says repent, return.
And the last thing he says is, remember.
So we're going to do that here.
If you did not get a communion cup,I'm going to invite
the worship team to come up aswe go through this time of remembrance.
(37:03):
If you not did not get a, a cupwith the elements,
go ahead and raise your handand somebody will bring one to you.
The Bible tells us that,
on the nightbefore he was given up to be crucified,
Jesus had supper with his disciplesone last time.
And it was at that mealthat he took the bread,
(37:24):
and he broke it,and he passed it around to them.
He lifted it up to heaven.
He gave thanks,and he passed it around to them.
He said, take this bread and eat it.
And each timeyou do it, do it in remembrance of me.
So this morning we do that.
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The Bible says in a similar way,Jesus took the cup
and he lifted it up to heaven.
He blessed it and he gave thanks,and he passed it to all his disciples.
And he said, take this cup,
all of you discipleshere, take this cup and drink from it.
This is a symbol of my blood.
It's going to be a newand an everlasting covenant,
symbol of my bloodthat will be shed for that
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for everybody here,so that sins may be forgiven.
And he said, do this in memory of me.
And so we do that this morning.
Let's pray.
Church, you
God, thank you so much for today.
Thank you for your word.
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Thank you that it that it just gives ussuch great instruction
for how to how to walk things out,
how to how to put this intointo application, into our lives.
God, you've called us to be some placesthis week where we already know.
We already know what's in store.We already are.
Maybe we've even written stuff downand and, on a schedule of some sort.
(38:50):
But, God, there's also places
where, we're going to find ourselvesthat we we did not plan.
We had no ideait was going to be a thing in our lives.
There was no playbook for it.
So, God, in those moments,
I pray that we
will let the factthat you took the first step towards us,
you made the first move,that you first loved us
(39:11):
and therefore we can have lovebe the motivation behind everything we do,
whether it's easy or whether it's hard.
Jesus, help us to do just that to you.
Help us to love you more.
And it's in your name we pray. Amen.
Welcome.
I'll go ahead and add my welcomes
to those that have already been spokenthis morning.
Hey, I just want to take a minute and telleverybody who's here this morning.
Good for you being in church,making church a priority.
The Bible talks a lot about,something called the first fruits.
It says it talks about the first fruitsof your time, your talent, your treasure.
(00:23):
And, everybody always talks about Mondaybeing the first day of the week.
Well, maybe the work week,but the first day of the week is Sunday.
And good for you for, giving Godthe first fruits of your time.
I'm confidentthat he's going to honor that in ways
that we could have never imaginedthis week.
As we go about doing, hopefully whatwe're going to talk about today.
(00:45):
If we have not met before,my name is Jeff.
I'm going to tryto adjust this wire real quick.
My name is Jeff.
I'm on staff here at flip Side.
I was thinking, as I prepared for this,today, our time together.
Today, I was thinking about the factthat I'm, This year marks
ten years of me being on staff at flipside.
Crazy. Crazy.
Thank you. I wasn't lookingfor applause, but thank you.
(01:07):
The other
the othermilestone that I'm celebrating this year.
Since I was considering milestones,
is my wife,Jennifer, and I are going to be
celebrating our 25th wedding anniversarythis year.
Couple of months in September.
Yeah. It's crazy.
It's weird.
If you've been marriedfor any significant amount of time.
There's things aboutwhen you got married that
(01:30):
if you're like me,they seem like yesterday.
And then there's things about itthat seem like a lifetime ago.
Like an eternity ago.
And I was just sitting there reflecting
on, specifically that time of our wedding.
We got married in September,
and during our, we have awe had a relatively short engagement.
(01:51):
It was long enough to plan a wedding.
And then we were we're we're married.
But during our engagement,I had happened to me.
What I think happens to a lot of people,especially guys.
There's a lot of speculationabout marriage
in general,but your marriage in particular,
and with guys, it takes the forma lot of of a lot of kind of doomsday
(02:12):
foreboding, like all the freedomsyou're going to lose once you get married.
Like when you get married, no more guitar.
Forget about that.Or when you get married.
No more guys night out.
Forget about that. When you get married,forget about that.
And I remember kind of,you know, hearing this talk
thinking, oh my God,I kind of braced myself for marriage.
(02:33):
It's really kind of unfortunate.
I kind of braced myself for marriage,with all these freedoms
that I'd be losing because I got married.
And then once I got marriedand got a few weeks,
a few months into it,I thought I kind of like being married.
It's kind of cool.
Kind of a sweet gig. This marriage,
but something that nobody prepared me for.
(02:57):
Kids.
Some of youI knew, some of you in this room.
I knew when I was engaged.
And I'm holding this against youfor not telling me about this.
Instead of marriage. Nobody.
Nobody warned me about kids.
At least. Maybe I didn't.
Maybe I wasn't listening.
I don't know, maybe the joyof being married, like, overshadowed the.
(03:18):
I justdon't think anybody told me about it.
They never warned me about.
Once you have kids.
Dot, dot, dot, where do you have kids?
Dot dot dotand then our first, daughter was born.
That in and of itself was a shockbecause my dad's dad, my dad's,
my grandfather, one of four boys, my dad,one of three boys, one of me two boys.
(03:40):
I know the numbers are dwindling, butI just thought, I'm going to have sons.
I know there are daughters out thereand people have them.
I'm just not going to be one of them.
And then this little time,she was so tiny.
You guys, this little girl's born.
And I remember literally holding her like,you know, like, hold a delicate
piece of, you know,
pottery or whatever.
(04:02):
Holding her and telling Jen, what do I do?
I have no idea what to do.
But there was parenting, like it or not.
You're a parent.
And then I don't know what came over us.
Maybe we thought we'll have another one,because the two will occupy each other's
time, and we'll get to somehowgo take a nap.
I don't know where we were.
(04:23):
I don't know what we were thinking,but 16 months later, Ali came around
and I just remember thinking,this parenting stuff is difficult.
I'm not trying to pin anything on Ali.
I mean, everybody knows it's my favoriteanyway, so.
I'm kidding.
I'm kidding. You guys.
The two of them are 16 months apart.
The two of them together.
(04:46):
Was just overwhelming.
I remember thinking to myself, they.
These don't stop.
They come at you all the time. They don't.
Have you ever tried to call a timeoutwhen you're parenting?
There are no timeouts.
Please. I just wanted to call a timeout.
Nope.
Parenting just came fast and furious.
The thing about that is,there was two of everything.
(05:08):
If you have twins,you know what I'm talking about.
If you have kids
that are real close in age,you know it comes in like biblical waves.
There's two of everything.There were two kids on the bottle.
There were two kids in diapers.
There were two car seats everywhere.
My parents,they bought them two of every outfits.
Bottom two of everything. Toys, bottomtwo of everything.
And I just remember thinking,oh my gosh, I can't.
(05:29):
As rough as all that was,
the thing that really wasthe most difficult thing
was when they would get sick together
because they have no senseof personal space,
one would get sickand I knew it would that afternoon.
The other would be sick
because they sneeze in each other's mouthand wipe each other's nose on it.
(05:50):
I just remember thinking,you guys separate now.
They have no sense of personal space.
That was the most difficultwhen they would get sick together.
And I'll never forgetthere was one winter that some sort of flu
ran through the ran through the houseor whatever, but they were both sick.
There was two of them.So we had a man to man defense.
(06:10):
You know what I'm talking about.
You know, whichever parent is closestto the one given the biggest problem that
that's that's my manright there. Pick that pick that one up.
And so I had
Ali in my left armabout 230 in the morning.
And I had Ali and she was screamingin my face, you know what kids do.
They justthey don't have any have any couth.
(06:30):
They just scream right in your face.
She's screaming right in my face.
And I had the bottle here,
and I would feed her a little bitand she would eat a little bit,
and then she just spit the bottle outand scream in my face a little bit more.
And I remember thinking,
oh, I'm going to chuck this spot.
We lived in our old house in Fresno,and they had the single pane windows,
(06:52):
and I thought, I'mgoing to chuck this bottle.
Good thing I didn't chuck the
I'm going to chuck this bottlethrough our kitchen window.
Like the last semblance of controlI had over a situation
that I had no control over.
I'm going to chuck this bottlethrough that window,
and that the days beforerage rooms that'll make me feel good.
And so
I throw my arm back, full head of steam,come forward.
(07:13):
But I extended my arm too farand I hit the side of the refrigerator.
The bottle skidsacross the top of the refrigerator, loses
momentum, lands on the counter, slidesacross the countertop, hits
the lip of the sink, and gracefully landsright side up in the sink
where it should have beenin the first place.
And I was like,I can't even do that right?
(07:35):
Kids screaming in my face.
And I remember that
winter, that night really.
I can laugh about it now, but that night
really began about a two yearperiod, maybe two and a half to three year
period in my life where I was just there.
(07:57):
I wouldyou've heard the phrase phoning it in.
I was phoning it in, I was robotic,I was just going through things.
I wasn't necessarily tired or
what the Bible calls weary,although there were moments of that.
But that long period of time,
something was going on where I was justyou've heard the phrase losing it.
(08:20):
I was losing it.
I was losing the source.
The parenting thing was getting to me,
and I was just numb.
We've been in this serieswhere we're taking a look
at two letters that the apostle Paulwrote to his protege, Timothy.
That's the serieswe've been in for a while.
(08:41):
We actually just startedthe second letter last week.
And Timothy is pastoring in a church.
Anybody remember where he was pastoringthe church?
Ephesus.
Timothy is pastoringa church in a place called Ephesus.
So, if you know that area,the church is back in that day,
we're not necessarily like we havethis church building.
(09:02):
Was anybody herewhen flip side was at the high school?
Just remember that. Yeah.A few of you were.
That'swhen we first started coming to flip side.
And it would basically
it was a set up and a tear downevery week over called church in a box
set up and tear downevery week over at the high school.
Well,the church is back in this first century.
We're like home churches.
And so when it says Timothy was pastoringthe church in Ephesus,
(09:23):
it was the group of Christian followers,Jesus followers there in Ephesus
that were comprised of a bunchof really smaller home churches.
That's where Timothy was, and that'swhere these two letters find him from.
Paul.
So Carl's going to pick back upnext week in second Timothy.
But what I want to do this weekis kind of zoom out from where we've been,
(09:49):
get a broader pictureof what was going on with that church,
because when we take a take a look at itin a general sense, we find out
that the Bible has a lot to say about thischurch that Timothy was pastoring in.
And it has a lot to say to us
it's 2000 some odd years later.
(10:09):
The Bible has a lot to say to usby looking at this church in Ephesus.
So that's where we're going to be today.
It actually goesall the way back to the book of acts.
If you've heard of that,
if you've never read the book of acts,and you think the book the Bible is
boring, readthe Book of Acts reads like an epic novel.
Once I started it,I'm like, I cannot put this down.
(10:32):
But Paulwent on for mission missionary journeys,
and they're all chronicledthroughout the book of acts.
And towards the end, there,
around chapter 1920,it talks about Paul traveling
by land down throughwhat's what is now modern day Turkey.
And he comes to the city of Ephesus.
And the city of Ephesus is comprisedmostly of what's called Gentiles,
(10:55):
basically non-Jewish people.
The Gentiles were not
they were they were polytheistic
with no multiple gods,just to go see the god of the sky.
They were idol worshipers.
They had temples set up for idol worship.
They had people there who wouldmake these idols and they'd sell them.
It was a whole thing, a whole way of life.
(11:16):
And Paul literally walks in
and starts preaching the gospel, startstalking to people about Jesus,
and he
gets this group, this following,who start this church.
And so Paulstays there for quite a bit of time.
There's a, close to a riot there,because people who are selling stuff
(11:37):
aren't really hip to Paul's message,
because he's stealing their businessby preaching this one.
God and Jesus, his son, crucified.
They're not really digging it,but Paul goes through the throes of what
it means to plant a church in a placewhere nothing has been there before.
He's not riding anybody'scoattails, really.
He's starting from scratch, and so hestays there for a certain amount of time,
(11:58):
and he starts this church and it actuallytakes off, starts doing well.
In the midst
of all these struggles and challenges,the church actually starts doing well.
And so Paul realizes, you know,God has called me to this ministry.
I need to move on.
I need to carry out ministryin other parts of the world.
But before he
leaves, he addresseswhat's called the church elders.
(12:20):
And so that's where we're going to be.
If you brought your Bible with you,we're going to be in acts chapter 20.
We're going to start at verse 28.
Paul is addressing before he leaves.
He's that he's talking to the groupof elders, and he's kind of telling them
what to brace themselves for.
Start picking up at verse 28.
He says, keep watch over yourselvesand all the flock
(12:43):
of which the Holy Spirit has madeyou overseers.
Be shepherds of the church of God,which he bought with his own blood.
I know that after I leave,savage wolves will come in
among you, and will not spare the flock,even from your own number.
Men will arise and distort the truth inorder to draw away disciples after them.
Be on your guard, so be on your guard.
(13:04):
He says.
Remember that for three yearsI never stopped warning each of you
night and day with tears.
That's sort of a tough goodbye.
That'skind of like more of a careful danger.
Be beware.
I'm out.
But one of the things we know aboutthe time we've spent looking
(13:26):
at our letters to Timothy isthis is exactly what happens.
This is the exact thing that happens.
Savage wolves will come in among you,and we'll not spare the flock.
Even your own number will distortthe truth in order to draw disciples
away from them.
Paul's letters have been talkingabout beware of false teaching.
Beware of false doctrine.
(13:46):
Beware of these peoplewho are going to come in
and are going to try to tryto distort the teachings of Jesus,
and they're going to come infrom among you, he says.
So it's interesting.
From the very get go,we see that this church is already playing
a substantial part in the growthof people's faith there in that area.
(14:10):
So sandwiched
between what we just read in acts19 and chapter 19 and 20,
and the two letters to Timothythat we had been spending some time in.
Sandwiched in between those twois a letter to the Ephesian church.
It's a letter to the church in Ephesus.
It's not to Timothy,it's not to some other elder there.
(14:31):
It's not, the church in Ephesusactually had other pastors after Timothy.
But this is to the Ephesians.
The church in Ephesus.
So it's very importantthat we take a look at this letter,
because that's what we're trying to dohere.
We're trying to live out church.
(14:56):
So this letter is divided
into two two parts, two halves.
It's chapters. There'ssix chapters in all.
There's chapters one through threewhere Paul gets very theological.
He talks about the spiritual things.
He talks about the gracethat we've been given.
He talks about our standingin our calling with God.
And then he takes chapters four,five, and six, and he goes,
(15:18):
then this is what it looks like.
This is how you walk this out.
This is how this all the stuffthat I'm about to tell you,
this is how it looksas you're living it out.
So real quick this morningI'm going to try to be brief.
I don't want to spend too much time here,
but I want to take a real quick, quick,kind of like a whistle stop
tour of the book of Ephesians,because it's going to help us
talk about what we're whatthe rest of our time this morning.
(15:41):
So you don't need to turn thereif you want to.
You can.
But I'm just going to go real quickthrough the some really kind of,
some meat of the letter to the Ephesians,
especially in the first three chapters.
This is home to some of the mostfamous verses in all of Scripture, really
in chapter one, starting at verse 11,
(16:02):
it says, In Him we were also chosen,
having been predestinedaccording to the plan of him
who works out everything in conformitywith the purpose of his will, in order
that we who were first
to put our hope in Christ,might be for the praise of his glory.
And you also were included in Christ
when you heard the message of truth,the gospel of your salvation,
(16:23):
when you believed you were marked in himwith a seal, the promised spirit.
So Paul's telling these peoplewho have never really gotten a grasp
of this idea of God, he says, you'rechosen, you're included, you're marked.
Here's your standing with God.
This very weightytheological, spiritual things.
In chapter two, starting at verse eight,
(16:46):
he says, for it is by graceyou have been saved through faith.
And this is not from yourselves.
It is the gift of God, not by works,so that no one can boast.
For we are God's handiwork,created in Christ Jesus to do good works,
which God prepared in advancefor us to do.
That's what.
That's a really famous verse right there
that talks about saved by gracethrough faith in Christ, not by works.
(17:08):
If you've ever done any, Bible studyon spiritual gifts,
you camp out a lotright there in that part of Ephesians.
And then in chapter three,starting at verse 20,
he says, Now to him who is able to doimmeasurably more than all
we ask or imagine, according to his powerthat is at work within us.
To him be glory in the church
(17:29):
and in Christ Jesus throughoutall generations, forever and ever.
And the church said, Amen.
And so Paul's just unpacked some deeptheological truths, encouraging stuff,
telling them their stand,their newfound standing with God.
(17:50):
And it's almost like he's reminding them
he's setting himself upbecause he needs to do that
because of what he's about to talk aboutin chapters 4 or 5 and six.
It's a it'sa kind of a setup that he goes through.
So starting in
chapter four, here'swhere the sort of rubber meets the road.
Here's where we get down to brass tacks.
(18:12):
Chapter four, verse 25.
Therefore, because of all the stuffI said in the first three
chapters, therefore each of youmust put off falsehood and speak
truthfully to your neighbor, forwe are all members of one body.
In your anger. Do not sin.
Do not let the sun go down
while you are angry,and do not give the devil a foothold.
Anyone who has been stealing must stealno longer, but must work.
(18:34):
Doing something useful
with their own hands, that they may havesomething to share with those in need.
And then he says,
do not let any unwholesome talkcome out of your mouth,
but only what is helpfulfor building others up
according to their needs,that it may benefit those who listen.
So he stares off into this.
Here's how it looks practically.
He talks about anger, talksabout speech, talks
(18:57):
about lying, talks about stealing, talksabout building other people up.
And thenhe goes into chapter five in verse three.
But among you there mustthere must not even be a hint
of sexual immoralityor of any kind of impurity or greed,
because these are improper for God'sholy people.
So he's talking about sex.
He's talking about greed.
(19:19):
Still, in chapter five, he starts,he uses the word there starting in verse
21, the word none of us like submit to oneanother out of reverence for Christ.
Wives, submit yourselves to your husbandsas you do for the Lord.
Husbands, love your wives,just as Christ loved the church
and gave himself up for her.
And then he kind of bleedsover into chapter six, verse one.
(19:39):
He says, children,obey your parents, for this is right.
Verse
four in chapter six, fathers,do not exasperate your children.
Instead, bring them up in the trainingand the instruction of the Lord.
And then we could spend a whole hourtalking about this next verse.
He talks, slaves, obeyyour earthly masters with respect and fear
(19:59):
and sincerity of heart,just as you would obey Christ.
Stuff that really gets twisted sidewayswhen you try it.
When you try to think about itin terms of culture.
And then lastly, in chapter six,
starting in verse ten, Paul talks
about what's called spiritual warfare.
He says, finally, be strong in the Lordand in his mighty power.
(20:22):
Put on the full armor of God so thatyou can take your stand against the devil.
Schemes for a struggleis not against flesh and blood,
but against the rulers,against the authorities,
against the powers of this dark world,and against the spiritual spirit,
spiritual forces ofevil in the heavenly realms.
So Paul gives very practical instructions.
(20:43):
At times it's really commandsthat he's giving
for these people who are tryingto walk out this way of life.
Many of them, it'sa new way of doing things.
So you might be thinking at this point,where are we going with this?
Why, why, why?
Look at this.
(21:05):
Why spend time on this?
Here's why.
Flipside I think we have more in commonwith the church in Ephesus
than we'd care to admit.
I think we have more in common withthe church in Ephesus than we'd like to.
Then we'd like to see.
Because this is where
we find ourselves all the time.
(21:26):
There's this.
Here's what I heard in church on Sunday,
where it's 72, in fluorescent.
And here's the stuff
that life throws at me, that I am somehowtrying to marry these two together.
This is where we find ourselves.
This is where the Ephesian church
found themselves,and this is where we find ourselves.
(21:50):
It's so funny.
Whenever I, whenever I talk to like,like friends and even mild acquaintances
who have not put their faithin Christ yet.
Inevitably,the majority of these conversations
get to a point where they say,
this actually used to happen when I wasin, youth ministry all the time.
We had a group of seniors come throughand they were read.
(22:12):
I mean, there were there were thinkersand they were always asking questions.
And we would talk through these,these Bible things.
And it was so interesting.
We would inevitably,on so many of these occasions,
get to a point where they would go,
you don't even need to be a Christianto know that's true.
You don't even need to be a Christfollower to know that's how life is.
(22:34):
You don't even need to sayyou're a Jesus follower to know
that's the struggle.
That's where the Ephesian church
finds themselves,and that's where we find ourselves.
There's the good I know I need to do.
There's the good, I know there's thethere's the things God has told me
about me and about him and about us.
(22:56):
And then there's this.
A lot of times, this crazy environmentthat I've got to go out
and somehow apply this stuff to.
That's where the church in Ephesus was,
and that's where we find ourselvesso many times.
And that's whywhat we're talking about here
today is so importantfor us to get Ahold of.
(23:17):
You guys,
anybody either graduate from college orhigh school or you just moved up a grade.
Anybody in here?
Wow. Got a lot of.
What about job reviews?
Anybody ever get a review at their job?
Sometimes a merit increaseor a raise is dependent on it.
Remember, in school,you get a report card.
(23:39):
If you're like me, they would come inlike a half manila envelope.
And there was like this reallysuspenseful time where you'd be like,
oh, I was talking to my daughter Sydneythe other day.
It's all online now.
There's no suspense anymore.
It's like trying to hang up.
Remember, in the old daysyou could really slam a phone down
when you're you can't do that anymore.
Like the report cards in the old age,they'd come.
(24:00):
And a lot of times you wouldyour parents would have to sign them
and send it backso that they knew that they got sent home.
And somebody significant saw them.
I remember getting that reportcard going, oh,
there was a letter C on there a lot,and sometimes it had a minus a plus.
After it.
Report cards.
So your job reviewyou know you get you go in.
It's time for a merit increase.
(24:21):
There's time for a raise.
And they're like how'd you do.
Let's see how you did get a report card.
What did you get?
Well, how'd you end up this semester?
Wouldn't it be nice
to know how the church in Ephesus did
all we've talked about? Paul, man.
He wrote three letters to that areaset up this year.
(24:43):
Wouldn't it be nice to know how they did,to kind of go back and go.
How did all flesh out for you, Ephesians?
Where do you end up with this stuff?
One of the things I love
about the Bible.
Is we get a report card on the churchin Ephesus.
We get a report card,we get to know how they did,
(25:05):
and we need to know how they did
because we're more like themthan we care to admit.
We need to know because life has a wayof making us better.
Life has a way of making us resentful.
Life has a way of piling up regrets.
We lose sight of purpose.
(25:27):
So we need to know.
Someone once told me, it's a very wiseman who can learn from the mistakes
of others instead of making all,making him all his own.
I learned this, you know,they say, especially with guys.
They say your frontal lobe developssome time in your early 20s.
I don't know if it is that my frontal lobedeveloped or what, but me
(25:47):
during my teenage yearswas me making all my own mistakes.
There were people in my lifethat were like, sometimes literally
screaming at me, stop or go.
And I'm like, no, I'm going to go aheadand make all my own mistakes.
And they're like, they're going.I did like three years ago.
I did what you're doing.
Stop doing that. And I'd be like,no, I'm good.
And then somehow around my early 20s,I'm like,
(26:10):
God has put these guys in my lifethat are like ten years older than me.
Perhaps I should start listening to themand learning from their mistakes
instead of making all my own.
We need to know how the
church in Ephesus did.
So God gives the report card
(26:30):
in the last book of your Biblesin the Book of Revelation.
It's so interesting.
He gives a report cardfor some other churches,
but we just don't have the backgroundthat we have with the church in Ephesus.
There's some other churches thatget report cards there in the first part
of the book of Revelation, but in chapter
two, starting at verse one,
(26:52):
some of your Bibles may say to the church
in Ephesus.
I said, starting in verse
one, starting in verse two,this is Jesus talking.
Jesus is giving the report card.
That's one of the reasonsthis is so valuable.
It's like gold.
My ears are like, please tell me
he's talking to John the Apostle.
(27:13):
John. John is the only one left.
All the other apostles,all the other apostles have been martyred.
And John is exiled onthis island called Patmos.
And Jesus comes to him and says, John,there's some stuff
I want you to write downin. You're in exile here.
So you got all the time in the world.
So grab a pen and write downwhat I'm about to tell you.
Jesus says to the church
(27:34):
in Ephesus, right, here we go.
Great time.
These are the words of himwho holds the seven stars
in his right hand and walksamong the seven golden lampstands.
If you've ever
read the book of revelation, it'sreally big on symbolism and and imagery.
But suffice it to say,Jesus talking about himself, he's
the one with the sevenstars in his right hand.
(27:56):
And he says,
I know your deeds,your hard work, your perseverance.
I know that you cannot toleratewicked people, that you have tested
those who claim to be apostles or notand have found them false.
You have persevered
and have endured hardships for my nameand have not grown weary.
Yeah. Hey,
(28:18):
that's a pretty good report card.
All the stuff that they've been thatthey were talked to about.
This is what you want from your kids,right?
All that stuff that I talk to you about,do those things and they get it.
Hey, he's like, good job, says Jesus.
That's I mean,
hey, if you have one a day from anybody,that's what you want to know from, right?
He says, good job, Ephesians.
(28:40):
Good job doing that.
Didn't tolerate wickedness.
All the stuff that Paul talked about with,false teachers and sound doctrine,
you nailed it.
You nailed it.
You got an A on the final guided people.
But that's not where it ends.
Jesus continues.
(29:03):
In verse four
he says, but I hold this against you.
You have forsaken the love.
You had it.
First, consider how far you have fallen.
Repent and do the things you did at first.
If you do not repent,
I will come to youand remove your lampstand from its place.
So, like I said,
one of the best things about thisreport card is it comes from Jesus Himself
(29:27):
and he says in somewhere along the way
you lost what he calls your first love.
Somewhere alongall of the command, keeping
and the deed doing and the hard workyou lost your first love.
All the instructions,
all the carrying out of the thingsthat they were talked about.
(29:49):
You lost your motivation for life.
You lost it.
And there's a really important truth
that we need to understand herethis morning,
because when we understand it,it can save us from things like quitting.
It can save us from thingslike hopelessness.
It gives us new perspective on old things.
(30:11):
That's a really goodto have a new perspective on old things.
It makes difficult situationsless difficult.
If we get Ahold of this,because the fix for the Ephesian church
is the same fix for us,
and it comes in a very short
verse by the same apostlethat Jesus told to write this down.
(30:34):
His name was John,
first John.
There's four letters from John.
It's in the first one,first John, chapter four, verse 19.
He says,we love because he first loved us.
Propermotivation has everything to do with love.
If you've heard anybody ever saythey've lost the love,
(30:56):
that's what they're talking about.
That's what they're talking about.
Returning to our first lovehas everything to do with the fact
that the idea of first didn'tstart with us in the first place.
This whole idea of first.
It wasn't our doing.
We had nothing to do with it.
If God has everything to do with God,if God hadn't made the first move,
(31:17):
none of the things we try to do with him,none of the things
the Ephesian church was trying to do,none of this,
this marrying between these two things,none of it would be possible.
And none of it wouldhave even been relevant.
So here's where I want to camp out.
This is what I want to hit on hardand look back
at the remainder of our timehere this morning.
(31:38):
When you accept that God loved you first,
it changes the motivationfor everything you do.
When we latch onto the fact that God loved us first,
it changes our motivationfor everything that we do.
It makes it possible
to do the things that Paul was tellingthe Ephesian church to do.
(31:59):
It makes it possible to dothe things that Paul
was writing to Timothy about.
Jesus says, return to your first love,
return to the thing,and let the motivation be the thing
that called you to faithin the first place.
(32:20):
There's three things that Jesus talkedabout there.
In that last part of revelation. He says,
first thing he says is repent.
Recognize it, ask for forgiveness,confess it, and then turn and go
the opposite direction.
The Bible says it's not God's judgment.
(32:41):
It's not God's justice.
Those things are there, but those aren'tthe thing that calls us to repentance.
The thing that calls us to repentanceis his kindness.
It's his love.
It's the fact that he took the first stepand loved us first.
The second thing the Bible tells us do,
or that Jesus tellsthe Ephesian church to do, is return.
(33:04):
Go back to the basics.
Whether you've been followingJesus for decades,
or whether you're here this morningand you're just considering this idea
of what it means to be a Christian,to put your faith in Jesus,
this idea of the basics.
This will fuelthis will fuel your walk with God.
(33:25):
The things
that are elemental,the fact that God loved me first
while I was still a sinner.
Romans chapter five
verse eight says,God demonstrates his love toward us,
that while we were still sinners,Christ died for us.
I put, I didn't become a Christianuntil I was 27 years old,
(33:46):
put my faith in Jesus in August of 1997.
And this was the thing
that drew me to that, to that moment.
It was not all the ridiculous
garbage mistakes that I have made.
Those were there.
But this idea that God loved me last year,five years ago
(34:10):
when I was doing that stuffand had no first put God for what?
That even leave me alone?
God still love me.
That idea, that is what drew me to him.
And that is the basic first love that
that Jesus is telling Paul,or that Jesus is telling John about.
(34:30):
Can you
imagine what this would look likeif we got a hold of this in our lives?
Can you imagine what applying this like?
Tomorrow you walk into work,you still got the same desk.
You still got the same chair.
There's a window there.
There's still thatsame jerk. Two cubicles over.
But we recognize both.
First, the fact that God loved us.
First the God.
The fact that God took the first step.
(34:51):
It changes our perspective on things.
It changes that motivation.
When the girls were little
and I was losing it, what I was not,I wasn't losing my mind.
There were momentswhere I thought that was happening,
but I wasn't losing my mind.I was losing my motivation.
I was losing this idea of first love.
I was just phoning it in. Robotic
(35:13):
Jesus tells
the church in Ephesus,you all have become robotic.
Go back to your first love.
Yeah, you got an eye on all that stuff.
But man, one of the thingsabout those types,
those types of environments isthey're not very appealing.
They're not very welcoming.
None of us want to go, yeah,that's what I want to sign up for.
(35:34):
That's what I want to get involved in.
This could change.
We get this, get Ahold of thisand apply it to our lives.
It could change everything.
When we were out for my mom's82nd birthday
the other day, and,we're at this restaurant,
(35:56):
my daughters were there, and I said,girls, there was there was a conversation
going on a few tables over,and I said, girls, please do me a favor.
Please do not let me turn it.
I've come to the realizationthat I'm getting older.
I've just embraced it. I've acceptedit. It's happening.
Just can't stop it. Embrace it.
I said, girls, please don't let me turninto a bitter old man from your world.
(36:18):
I can't stand it when I said,
girls, pleasedon't let me turn into a bitter old man.
This is the type of thing that keepsthat type of stuff from happening.
Remember your first love
because God shows up every dayand he says, I chose you first.
Let that fuel your walk with God.
If you haven't put your faith in Christyet here today, let that fuel you towards
(36:42):
accepting Jesus as your personal Savior.
The last thing
Jesus says to the Ephesian churchhe says return, says repent, return.
And the last thing he says is, remember.
So we're going to do that here.
If you did not get a communion cup,I'm going to invite
the worship team to come up aswe go through this time of remembrance.
(37:03):
If you not did not get a, a cupwith the elements,
go ahead and raise your handand somebody will bring one to you.
The Bible tells us that,
on the nightbefore he was given up to be crucified,
Jesus had supper with his disciplesone last time.
And it was at that mealthat he took the bread,
(37:24):
and he broke it,and he passed it around to them.
He lifted it up to heaven.
He gave thanks,and he passed it around to them.
He said, take this bread and eat it.
And each timeyou do it, do it in remembrance of me.
So this morning we do that.
(37:46):
The Bible says in a similar way,Jesus took the cup
and he lifted it up to heaven.
He blessed it and he gave thanks,and he passed it to all his disciples.
And he said, take this cup,
all of you discipleshere, take this cup and drink from it.
This is a symbol of my blood.
It's going to be a newand an everlasting covenant,
symbol of my bloodthat will be shed for that
(38:07):
for everybody here,so that sins may be forgiven.
And he said, do this in memory of me.
And so we do that this morning.
Let's pray.
Church, you
God, thank you so much for today.
Thank you for your word.
(38:27):
Thank you that it that it just gives ussuch great instruction
for how to how to walk things out,
how to how to put this intointo application, into our lives.
God, you've called us to be some placesthis week where we already know.
We already know what's in store.We already are.
Maybe we've even written stuff downand and, on a schedule of some sort.
(38:50):
But, God, there's also places
where, we're going to find ourselvesthat we we did not plan.
We had no ideait was going to be a thing in our lives.
There was no playbook for it.
So, God, in those moments,
I pray that we
will let the factthat you took the first step towards us,
you made the first move,that you first loved us
(39:11):
and therefore we can have lovebe the motivation behind everything we do,
whether it's easy or whether it's hard.
Jesus, help us to do just that to you.
Help us to love you more.
And it's in your name we pray. Amen.
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