God Moves People for Redemptive Purposes First B Jackson 2017-11-12 Automatically transcribed. Where this and the recording disagree, the recording is the record. ---- Good to see everybody. Very good to see everybody. What a gorgeous day. How about this? Let's stand to our feet. We, we serve a good and mighty and awesome great God from, Psalm one zero three. This is where this song comes from that we're singing. Bless the Lord, oh my soul, and all that's in with within me, bless his holy name. Shall we do that? Alright. Bless the Lord. Let's sing together. Comes up, the sun comes up. It's a noonday dawn. It's time to sing your song again. Whatever may pass soul, worship his holy name. Sing like never before, oh my soul, Amen. You guys can have a seat and Mike's got some announcements for you. Alright. Well, there we go. So welcome to First Bee. Thank you guys for coming to worship with us this morning. A couple of announcements for us. We're gonna be doing youth announcements a little different. My contact info is this right here, 690-4090. If you wanna know about youth stuff, give me a text or email me, and I will get that out to you. I'm gonna be sending out weekly reminders to let people know what's going on just because it's changing sometimes on the fly. So this week, what we're gonna be doing is we're gonna meet on Tuesday, 06:30 to 08:00. That'll be middle school and high school. Tuesday, 06:30 to 08:00. Also, come and talk to me about Guatemala stuff if you're interested in either coming on the trip or if you need us to do a service project at your house. We've been chopping and stacking wood and doing different projects. So if you have anything like that, come and see me as well. We have a discover class next Sunday that's gonna be in between services at ten p at 10AM in pastor Ray's office. So if you're interested in becoming a member at this church, come and join us in that class. Downstairs, we have the nursery that's going on. We also have children's church. So children's church will be dismissed right after the worship songs and all that'll be going on right downstairs. Monday nights at first b, I believe Nick Stern is talking this week. Yeah. Nick will be speaking. So that's gonna be a meal music and message starting at 6PM on Monday nights. There's also that's paired with Awana, which will be going on in this room at the same time. 06:30 six to 07:30. Also, if we have any veterans, anyone who has served in our armed forces, if you could please stand at this time, we would just like to honor anyone who has served. Alright. Yeah. So let's just give a round of applause for them. Thank you, guys. We appreciate your service. We definitely do. For all the other announcements, just check your bulletins. And if you guys would like to stand up and greet one another, we'll bring you back together with some music. To hunger to see, to thirst. Awaken first love. Awaken first love. Come away and do as you did. And do as you did at first. Alright. Spirit of the living God. Spirit of the living God to overflow. Alright. Let's sing that again. Awaken my soul. Watch our prayer. Awaken my soul. Come away. Amen. May it be true, God. To worship with all your strength. Alright. Let's sing. Spirit, come and fill this place. Spirit, come and fill this place. Amen. God, we ask that. Let your glory. Let your glory be now in the way. Let's sing that Amen. Alright. In Christ alone. In Christ alone, God, those words could not be truer. Thank you, God, for your love, for your gift of righteousness, imputed to us, given to us, because of anything that we've done. The prerequisite for being a Christian is that we're sinners and we've fallen short. And so thank you, God, that you have given. You provided the way to you, and that's through the perfect life of of Jesus. And I pray, God, that that would just be something that's consciously on our minds each and every day, that it's not anything that we've done or we've earned. It's all what has been done for us through you. So again, God, as a church, we pause, we remind ourselves, we preach this to ourselves, we remember what you have done. And thank you, God, that you have overcome, and because you have, we do. Amen. Are you in agreement with that church? I mean, that as we sang that song, those things really really just were setting setting in because they're so true. These truths of the gospel, they remain steadfast, and true throughout every generation forever. Destined to die, poured out for her own man of kind. God's only son, perfect in spot, this one. He never sinned, suffered as if he did. I'm in authority. Power in hand speaking to father's plan, sending sound light Amen. Y'all can have a seat. And I as we move into the the worship through giving here, I want you to know there are actually two offerings this morning. The first one is right now. The second is after Ken and Lori speak. The first one is the general fund. This one is the general fund. The second one will support Ken and Lori McCune as missionaries of in faith. As always, if you have brought one offering, we encourage you to give to our missionaries. They really are important to us. And that being said, I'd like to just pray and give thanks for all God has done here for this first general offering. God, we do, we we give you thanks. You are generous. Generous indeed. There's no doubt about it. We have been. You say we've been blessed with every spiritual blessing in Ephesians, and that's true. And that's because of Jesus. So we we concentrate. We think right now. We meditate on on the work of Jesus. That's why we're here. That's why we're doing what we're doing. Thank you, God, for your power through the Holy Spirit. Thank you, God, for your provision along the way. And, I pray, God, that, you would continue to use first b in Jackson as a light in this community, and thank you, God, for these gifts that you provided. In Jesus' name. Amen. Isn't that great? You know where that comes from? Comes from right here. Hey, I'd like to introduce Ken and Lori McEwen as our kids are going off to children's church. Kent and Lori, will you guys come on up here? So if you know Wes and Katie Clark, they're right over here. Put you on the spot just for a second. This is Katie's mom and dad. So, you know, you can go to this church forever and not realize that people are related. I noticed that. So there's the connection. And their role, Ken and Lori's role, is church planting and cross cultural discipleship. They have planted Hispanic churches in Jackson, Driggs, Big Piney. Currently, now they're planting in Pinedale, but moved by the call to reach locally and spread God's kingdom right here in The US. Does that sound about right? Okay. They say sure. But that being said, would you give them a warm first bee welcome? Okay. Wish we looked that nice. I was supposed to talk about our ministry, but I wanna share with something that missionary buddy of mine named Kirk McKeith over in Western Idaho shared with me. It's been a big encouragement to me because it is not the only perspective of all the immigration mess that's going on in the world today, but it's been an encouragement to me. And so we gotta fly like the wind through this thing. And then we Laurie is gonna share a little bit about what we do. And what does the world look like in this day? What what do we see out there? Well, one in 10 people are like you first b guys. They love the Lord. You're here and you're the Lord is the master of your life. There's another two out of every 10 that say, oh, yeah. I'm a Christian. But, yeah, you you around them while you realize they don't really have a deep faith in the Lord. And then, four out of 10 people will say, yeah, I've heard all this gospel thing. I have my own thing. Thank you. We'll see you around. And then there's three out of every 10 people that have never heard the, full gospel message of the Lord Jesus Christ and his grace and his love for us. First time in my life I've ever preached without a Bible on a pulpit, so we got this thing called PowerPoint. And I wanna talk about the diaspora or diaspora. I don't know how to say it right. But it's the word in the Bible that used to be the sower. Remember in Matthew 13, the sower went out and sowed the seeds. And remember right after the, Noah's flood, the people were commanded as these are the families of the sons of Noah according to their generations in their nations. And from these nations, they were divided or they were scattered around the earth. That was the God's plan for them. Let us make a nation or a name for ourselves, said the people. They didn't wanna participate in this thing. They wanted to build this big thing called Babel, and it had some religious significance, of course. And, so the Lord, he scattered them from abroad and and from there over the face of the earth, and they ceased building the city. He thwarted them by sending them all around the world, and we the confusion of languages. It says, therefore, its name is called Babel because the Lord confused the languages upon the earth, and from there, the Lord scattered them abroad the face of the earth. From language changes become cultural changes, become changes in values, the things that are important to people, and, of course, then there's religious changes that come by that. The scattering of the nations is God's design, like it or not. Then God blessed them and God said to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue that. God pushed people out. And the Lord will scatter you among the people, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the Lord will drive you. What this is about is that Moses led the people out of captivity into the promised land, a land that was supposed to flow with milk and honey, but he gave them this warning that if you or your children or your grandchildren were ever to become unfaithful to me, I am the person that gave you this. I am the person that blesses you. You remain faithful to me. If you don't, I will drive you from this promised place. And he did. Then the Lord will scatter you among all the people from one end of the earth to the other, and there you shall serve other gods which you have never known, fathers have known, wood and stone. He said, I'll let you yeah. If you guys wanna do idols, I'll let you do that, but you're gonna pay for it. There was a warning about you stay faithful to me or I will drive you out. It was meant to motivate people in their passion for the Lord and not to wander off into the service of other gods. Over there in Ezekiel, it says, and then the Lord shall know that I am then they shall know that I am the Lord when I scatter them among the nations and disperse them throughout the countries. The Jewish people were driven all over the world and are dispersed everywhere. It was the consequence of not being faithful to their one true God. Remember in the New Testament, people hated the Samaritans because they were people that had been driven out and been slaves and they had mixed cultures and they were despised. And even the heathen nations also were promised that if you, do evil, that God would scatter them. And the Egyptians, I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them throughout the countries. Then they will know I'm God. In other words, it's part of a humbling process. You guys were big shots before. I'll scatter you out through the world, and then you'll seek me out. You will look for some help but you won't have your pridefulness anymore. Scattering has spiritual importance, spiritual implications. It could be punitive as we just saw here, threats of punitive that you seek the Lord or he is going to ruin your nation, then you're going to have to go somewhere. It also has the purpose of mercy, the God's grace that people have fled from one place of turmoil and trials and nothing works and gone to another place and found great mercy throughout blessing there. And the Lord your God will bring you back from captivity and have compassion on you and gather you again from all the nations where the Lord has scattered you. The Jewish people and others are promised that, hey, you you do what I want. You please me, and I will bring you back. You can have your identity as a nation again. You can have your corporate worship. You can you can have your temples and your centers of worship, and that is a blessing for for many people. The scattering of people is under God's sovereign control and redemptive purposes. I believe that even though the consequences are not what I like, changed the landscape of my world. And it says here that it says, and he has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell in the face of the earth, and he has determined the pre appointed times and boundaries of their dwellings so that they should seek the Lord in the hope that they might grope for him and find him even though he's not far from from any of us. The scattering of people brings pressure. It brings uncomfortableness. It brings emotional stress to all the societies. I grew up in Eastern Colorado, and, there was one family that were not white angle Saxon, Protestants, Catholics in my school, and that family had been in the state of Colorado for four generations. A little different than now. The Jewish dispersion prepared the way from the gospel knowing that Jesus' time, the Romans controlled the world and the Jews went everywhere. They they set up little synagogues. They set up their little cultural worlds and centers and their business, And, it set the stage for the spread of the gospel as we see in the New Testament. And at that time, there was a great persecution against the church, which was at Jerusalem, and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. In other words, in the early church, as they become to know Christ and they were preaching, boom, they were persecuted for that, and it drove them to these other regions. And therefore, those who are scattered went everywhere preaching the word. We love the verse acts one eight, and it's interesting that, part of the impulse of acts one eight wasn't always going voluntarily. It was being driven out to another culture, another place. And those who are scattered after the persecution that arose from from Stephen, remember Stephen stood up and he preached the gospel and boom, it it inflamed them and caused a great wave of persecutions. And they went to Phoenicia, Cyprus, and all these other places preaching the word. But in those, they started out to the Jews first. John one twelve said, you know, Jesus came to the Jews first, but to everyone they rejected him, but to everyone who believed on his name and received him, he gave him the the privilege of being a son of God, including us. They were scattering by those who are pushed. There's always a push and a pull in immigration. We think of right now what's going on in Syria and Africa. People being driven from those countries by violence and hatred and corruption, and they're flooding into Europe. And is it working well? No. It's an ugly process. And here in The US, we see millions being drawn to the hope of a better economy, hope of a less corrupt society, a less violent society, and they're finding here generosity. And, there always is a push and pull of the movement of people. In James, he said he considered himself a bondservant of God to the Lord, and he was scattered went to the those who were scattered to the Jewish people. Peter was one of Jesus' apostles, and so he, went to the pilgrims. Interesting. What is what are we supposed to be? On this earth, we're supposed to be pilgrims and strangers realizing that that I want to emigrate to be with the Lord Jesus Christ. We're supposed to live here in a certain way as if we were being driven out of this world. We don't like what's goes on in this world in a great, measure. And so we are in a way being driven off or called off to live in a different way, a new life in Jesus Christ. How do we respond? And by that, I mean an attitude. What is my attitude when I see people that are different than me? I heard an illustration of a guy who was listening to a guy talking on a cell phone in another language and a guy that was not dressed anything like himself. And he said, hey, what is this guy doing here? That's what he said to himself. And later on, he said, you know, I ought to be asking what is he doing here with that guy. The emotions that we feel here in The United States in these days is nothing new. In Philadelphia, in 1851, they had a riot. Said, we don't want these Germans in here anymore. Get them out of here. I come from Scots Irish roots. My name is McEwen, but we came in about six way early. But remember the Irish people, they were driven out of Europe because of famine. They came to The United States, but, too many of them. They were flooding the world and everybody wanted them out of there. And here's an ugly one on the on the left. There is a the white Anglo Saxon Protestant guy, and he has a WAP on one side and a chink on the other, and he wants to throw them back in the ocean to go back where they came from. And, the other one there, it shows an immigrant. I guess you can't see it. Does it say yeah. It didn't work that well. But it, it says there, anybody who wants, come. You know? And it shows this guy coming with disease and sabbath descreation and all these negative things on his back. We know, of course, in World War two, could we have a nation that's that attacked us and is killing our sons and daughters? And but then people from that culture living among us and talk about something would inflame emotions. There it is. We serve only whites, no Mexicans, Spanish. And now what is the landscape of the world look like because of this impulse, this movement? Here's the world, that crosshatch of people moving everywhere. Laurie and I lived in, Peru and Bolivia for fifteen years. It had and it seems like a lot of our friends have they send us, hey, I'm I moved to Spain. Lot of South Americans are professionals. They have gone to Spain, to Europe, and they get paid better, and they like the life over there better. It's it's more stable. They move everywhere. When I was in college, forty one years ago, I left Bible College. I can't believe that. Our mandate was to go and find the unreached peoples of the world, people that have never heard the name of Jesus Christ. Where are they? In the tribes or they're in a nation that's, we don't know. Go find them and preach the Lord the word of the Lord to them. Where are they now? There's 361 of those identified people groups in here in The United States right now and in other countries around. Laurie and I have had a privilege that ever since we've been missionaries since, I don't know how many years, it's been thirty five, forty years we've been missionaries to Hispanic peoples in Peru and in Bolivia, we've always got to minister to people. I'm not kidding. Half of my ministry friends that are going out now as missionaries don't really get to do much because of terrorism, because of threats, and because of people stopping them from having a ministry. Here in The United States, we're all here. Nobody's gonna beat you up here. Laurie and I went to church when we were in college in l in La Mesa, California, a suburb of San Diego. Last time I went there, you might as well speak Russian because the whole neighborhood is all Russian and all the stores, it's all written in Russian on there. What? That was not that way before. Things have changed. The landscape have changed. The US is the largest multicultural country in the world. The third largest Spanish speaking country is The United States. Two thirds of the population growth in the last twenty years has been through immigrants and their children. 43% of that growth in the last fifteen years is through Latinos. If you can believe it, 2050, there will be no racial minority in The United States. Like I say, I grew up, I never knew any person of color except Benny Gutierrez, who I rode the bus with. One third of the students in the school system speak a language other than English in the home. 150 different languages spoken in the public school system. 50% of students in there are people of colour. The sad part to me is only 4% of the population of America in the twenties are going to church anymore, even though we are the most religiously diverse nation in the world. And Islam and the Mormons are growing faster than anyone else. What do things look like around here? Here we think the 60% is the Hispanic, 3% other, 81% white guys here in town, and it wasn't like that how many years ago, twenty five, thirty years ago? Not at all. How does the church view and respond to the diaspora, this plan to send people, move people, and, around the world. What are we gonna do? Quickly, I just like to show just from the Bible. What is the some of the examples in the Bible. Remember Abraham, he was called, he was pulled by God to leave his family and go to a place you don't know. I'm going to to send you out, and you will do my will. And, he lived as a pilgrim and a stranger in foreign lands for all of his life. Isaac was similar. Jacob was a guy who left his home, went to another country, found a wife there and brought her back. Joseph, you know, was sold when he was 17 years old, sold by his brothers, taken to Egypt and sold as a slave. And, it was interesting. God used that for his redemptive purposes that in a time of famine, he was able to save his family. And, of course, then there was a negative side to that too that his family eventually they they were prospered so much that pharaoh made them slaves. And that brought in a guy named Moses who was raised as a rich kid in pharaoh's house, but then he was driven out to to the desert and lived out there in Midian. Then God brought him back and used him to redeem his people out of that slavery and to send them to the promised land. And it's interesting though, when they went into the promised land, it was a great blessing for them, but also was punitive for those other nations. And God said, I'm gonna drive those guy. You drive them out before you. You take over their lands and all their houses and their crops and everything like that. I'm giving it to you. It was punitive for that other that other land. Let's see. Naomi, you know, they Bible told them not to go to Moab. Don't do anything with these Moabite people. But Naomi and her family, for because of a drought, went to that other country, and she lost her husband and her kids. And, she came back with Ruth, who was a daughter-in-law. She was a Moabitis. And it's interesting though, Boaz, though, he took her on as a wife is the way the Old Testament took care of of one another and didn't have prejudice against them. Daniel, of course, was taken as a slave kid when he was 17 years old, and, he was taken to a foreign land. But in that foreign land, in that foreign culture that was completely ungodly, he maintained his integrity and his faith before the Lord. How do we minister to people of the diaspora? I we wrote these up, value them. We look at people as them. But once you get to know people and realize these are children of God and these people need salvation, these people our job is to minister to them, representing Jesus Christ. You learn to listen to their story. About exactly about a year ago, a family, you know, the Michoacan Mexican Mafia was, they liked that the way they maintain discipline is that if you step out of line, they will kill you and your family. And so that is their way of discipline. And so Flavio was going to be killed and his family. So they ran for the border. His kids were born here in The United States, and they turned themselves in as asylum seekers. And so they get they were in an immigration jail. The kids came up to Big Piney. Your church gave those kids the best Christmas they've ever had because they had Christmas presents, and we've been loving on those kids and stuff now. The dad and mom are finally out of jail. They're up here. They do not have work permissions yet, so they're kinda working under the table. And Wednesday night, he told me the story where he he went to his trailer court manager and wanted to pay his lot rent, and he had a plastic bag with his wife's tip money in it where she works at the gas station. So, well, I only got a $125. And the owner of the gas station looked at him and said, what's all these quarters and stuff? Oh, well, that's all I could come up with. I've been digging under the sofa for all for quarters. I said, this month's on me. Come help me split wood Saturday and we're good. And, you know, in others, people are finding grace and mercy. They're finding love here. They're finding people like you that are generous with them. Those clothes you gave them last Christmas, they're all wearing them Friday night at church over there. But once you get to listen to their story, you understand and as a Christian, you have grace and mercy with people's lives, and you they're no longer enemies. Know, how much does this cost to my nation? No. Their people realize that God has brought them here and you're God is blessing them and I wanna go where God's doing it. Serving practical ways. Yesterday, I wanted to work on this. What did I do? I was out, rescuing a car, working on somebody's brakes under a car. If you're not willing to do that, get your hands dirty, helping people, it's it's kind of a sloppy business. I hate to say that. I, I spent a lot of time in jail and fixing cars, and Lori is always in people's messes of, fights and marriage issues and this and that stuff. Americans wanna throw money at everything. People don't need money. They need people with good testimony. People that show that we are we love the Lord by loving other people. Be authentic in friendships with people. I want Laurie to explain a little bit about what we are doing sort of specifically and then we'll finish this off. A Wycliffe Bible translator missionary from Mexico said, you guys keep doing this stuff up there. Because you guys don't realize that everybody thinks of immigrants. Well, half of the people that we've worked with over the last twenty two years of ministry around here have gone back home. They come up here to have money to send their kids to college or to pay off debts and everything like that. Many have gone back. The fellow on the right up there and his family, he was here for, oh, seven or eight years with us, and he went back. He lives in the state of Oaxaca, and they're started a children's ministry. They go to poor neighborhoods and have what we call a VBS there every week, and they feed kids. Andres Tapia on the left there, we we know him. He's one of our good buddies. He came up here, and he kinda picking on me. You if you ever get to hear spirit of God, you're gonna be a you're gonna be a good guy. But until then, you're worthless. You're gonna be a great friend. And he told me he's a pastor now in, Southern Mexico. And he told me this, you know, I learned more about the Bible and how to teach and everything from you than anything. And, like I said, this Wycliffe lady said, you guys keep at it because these people that come back from your churches up there have really, they have the good stuff and they're they're faithful and they wanna serve the Lord. It's not easy. The little church we started in CBC, I think, are real good at, ministering to first generation people who speak only Spanish. Here, your church is good at the one point fives and the two. You understand that this? We have kids that were raised in this culture here, and some of them don't even read Spanish, but yet they love the Spanish culture and everything like that, and it's a little different to minister to. The number two, the second generation that were born here, raised here in the whole school system, they would rather be taught in English. We have to adapt and grow and change. One size doesn't fit all. It's it's a ministry that, like everything else, changes with the times and the cultures and what's going on. In to sum it up, God moves people around. It's for his redemptive purposes. We should be part of that. Watch your attitudes towards things. Love on people. Let's commit that, okay, if God's doing something, we wanna be worth it, and let's go for it. So that's all. Thank you. Okay. This in faith organization we belong to, if anybody's interested in serving with them or something like that, here's some websites that that are involved with them. Alright. Thank you, Ken and Lori. And thank you, First Bee, for pairing with and walking beside. It really is an honor to to do this. And the term that comes to my mind is light to the nations. The gospel is for every tribe, every nation, and every tongue. Would you agree? And we have a great responsibility to join people right where they're at, hear them, learn their stories, get to know them, love them as we love ourselves. That's what we're here to do. And by the grace of God, we'll continue on. Amen? So I'm gonna invite up Ken and Lori again. I just like to pray for them. The elders, elders here at first b, I'd love to to bring you up. Wes and Katie, would you guys come on up here too, please? And we're gonna yep. And their kids, grandkids here. And I'd like to pray, and then after we pray, we'll send the offering plate plates out and sing one last closing song. So Steve, would you lead in prayer? Alright. Would you stand with me? We'll sing one more one more closing song about the amazing grace of God that allows us to do what we do here at Firstbeat. Alright. Who breaks? Who breaks the power that I would be set free. Oh, Jesus is safe for all that you've done for me. Amen. Alright. Who brings lay chaos to order? Who brings our chaos back into order? Who makes the orphan a son and daughter, with truth and justice shines like the sun in all of its brilliance. The king of glory, the king above all kings. This isn't failing love. That you would take my place. That you would bear my cross. You would lay down your night that I would be set free. Jesus is thankful all that you've done for Hey, Blake. Could we go back to the it was second to the last slide of of Ken's. If we could just go there and just let our our minds rest on that here. Here it is. God moves people. He has redemptive purposes. We can participate. Church actively participate, accept it, commit to it, go for it. Amen.