Marcel Hall: We're in a season right now, which we're calling the season of
the Lord's Favor, in which we're trying to, we're on a journey and we're trying
to grow and experience collectively.
As a North OC Church family, the Lord's favor.
And so we studied out, uh, the Jubilee principles that God established
for his kingdom back under the Old Covenant, and see how Jesus is
the fulfillment of the jubilee and how he proclaims the Lord's favor.
And so we even have some things that we're doing in September.
Still in the middle of our prayer and fasting chain and those who have,
uh, participated or will participate.
Thank you so much.
Uh, I saw a couple of people signed up twice, uh, this month to go ahead
and pray and fast, and if you haven't already signed up, you still can.
And that's the QR code to sign up there.
Next month we'll have a time to release to reconciliation night, and
then a gratitude wall and service project, which we're excited about.
And so we have a theme scripture.
For our sermon series, and this is it right here, Luke four, verse 18.
It says, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He sent me, he has sent me to proclaim freedom for the
prisoners and recovery of sight.
For the blind to set the oppressed free to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor.
That's found in Luke chapter four, verses 18 through 19.
And so, uh, we know that the Lord's favor encompasses a lot of things and
some of it, it encompasses what we see here in, uh, um, uh, what we call rest.
Uh, and reset and also having release and restoration.
And so last couple of weeks we've talked about having a reset
in our relationship with God.
And in two weeks ago we talked about having a reset in our relationships,
how we view and how we treat people.
And today we'll be talking about having a holy reset.
Let's go ahead and let's go to God in prayer.
Father, thank you so much already for the time that we've had of worship.
Uh, so inspired, so encouraged, uh, hearing Jane's story,
how you changed her life.
And Father, it makes me think about the ways you have transformed my
life, the opportunity we've already had to encourage one another.
So cool to see Jack here and connect with him.
And memories start to come to my mind.
And, uh, father also being able to worship you.
In song and in prayer.
God, we are blessed and we are so grateful for these opportunities that we have.
We pray right now that as we want to experience more and more collectively
and individually, your favor guide our time in the scriptures here today.
Help us to have the reset that you want us to experience in Jesus name.
Amen.
All right.
Did you guys know that on Wednesday, uh, it was Constitution Day.
Yes.
One person knew.
I didn't know either, but yeah, it was, we, it was Constitution
Day on Wednesday, September 17th.
There's always constitution, I guess it was established many years ago, but it's,
it's becoming bigger and, uh, this year is really big because it's kicking off
really this, uh, uh, lead up until July 4th of next year, which will be, what
do you guys know what it will be 250 years that America will be a country.
So, 17 76 20 20 26 there.
Right.
And so, uh, so here we are coming up.
So there's a lot of things that are building up.
And so Constitution Day was bigger this year than maybe it was in the years past.
And there's a big emphasis on, on the Declaration of Independence and,
uh, you know, in the Declaration of Independence, we're all
familiar, uh, with it, aren't we?
Yes.
What.
What another, what?
No, we're familiar with it.
We might not know all of it, but we do know a couple of things that
was written in Thomas Jefferson.
We know that there's a, a promise for every American to have life,
liberty, and what the pursuit of the pursuit, it's on the screen.
So there you go.
But we know that, right?
We have, right, we have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Now this phrase, it still shapes how many people in America view success.
Yes.
Now, let me ask you this.
What comes to mind when you think about the pursuit of happiness?
Let, let's get one or two people.
Yes.
Oh, and Danny Barron is back from San Francisco.
Come on, this is Reunion Sunday.
Let's go.
All right.
There you go.
Well, why are you back?
Is everything okay?
That's what we need to ask.
You just went two weeks ago.
All right, so, uh, but go ahead, Danny.
What, what, what, what, what comes to mind when you think
of the pursuit of happiness?
Will Smith he thinks of.
I appreciate that he said Will Smith.
There was a movie, the Pursuit of Happiness.
I think they use a Y instead of a i in happiness.
Right.
Okay.
Alright.
So he thinks of Will Smith.
Okay.
Others.
What do you think of what comes to mind when you're in pursuit of happiness?
I can't see.
Who is that right there.
Anything's possible.
Okay.
If I want this, I can go after it.
Okay.
Others?
When I'm pursuing happiness, what comes to mind?
Yes.
Contentment.
Okay.
Yes.
New things in life.
Okay?
Yes.
You have to go after it.
Okay, so I get to go after whatever makes me happy, right?
When you think about, there's all these things, but these things
that come to mind a lot of times are the pursuit of happiness.
What makes me happy?
Money, success, possessions, uh, comforts.
Security.
Right?
And, and this is what kind of comes to mind for most people.
When we think the pursuit of happiness, I get to pursue those things.
I have the right to pursue those things.
And as Americans, we enjoy these privileges, these freedoms, these rights.
Uh, and there's so much that's good in of themselves and we appreciate it.
But here's the thing with Jesus is that Jesus hits a reset on
our perspective and our pursuits.
Jesus hits a reset and says that we are not called to pursue happiness,
but we are called to pursue holiness.
Jesus says, yes, all those things might be good in the right context, but he
calls us and he redirects us to now pursue holiness over pursuing happiness.
It's a holy reset.
And so now let's ask the question, okay, well what is holiness?
Because if we are called to pursue it, it'd be important for us to make sure that
we're on the same page with God intends.
Now the word holy appears over 900 times in the Bible, so that's a big concept.
Would you agree if something is mentioned over 900 times,
God is trying to communicate.
Something.
And in this we understand that it's also an old and under the new covenant
in the Old Testament, new Testament before Jesus', life on earth and
Jesus' life on earth and afterwards.
But you can define holiness as this.
It means to be set apart, in particular, set apart for a particular reason, in
this case, set apart for God and God's purposes to be sacred, to be righteous.
To be divine and of God.
And so being holy means I'm separate.
I'm set apart.
To be holy means it's sacred.
Like, like we saying earlier, the the holy water, like our baptism was holy water.
Not because the water was put particularly special in itself,
but because what God was doing in the water made that water holy.
You get what I'm saying?
And so we have the Holy Bible.
Many Bibles say that, I know we don't, we don't a lot of times buy
physical Bibles, but you can see that.
Why?
Because it's holy.
It's sacred.
It's divine, it's of God, it's righteous in his message to us.
And the thing I always like to do is, uh, you know, it's kind
of like, uh, green Skittles.
Alright.
I always like to give this analogy here.
So if you had a whole bunch of Skittles together and you separated
all the green ones, right?
Green, Marcel, 'cause green's my favorite color.
Alright, so if we separated all the green Skittles and we put
them to the side, they are holy.
Now because they're set apart, they're, they're for a different reason.
They're, in my opinion, they're divine vine.
But God calls his people to be holy, like these green Skittles.
And so holiness means to be divine, to be sacred, and be righteous to be of God.
And so again, here, God calls us to pursue holiness.
Well, why?
Why does God want us to pursue holiness over pursuing happiness?
Well, let's, let's go to, uh, let's go to Matthew chapter six here, and I will
say this, uh, a couple quick things.
Um, man, I was feeling it yesterday.
All right, so here you go.
So if you use the YouVersion Bible Lab.
They should have a little note that popped up if you, if you subscribe to
like you're part of our church or fan.
I'm not sure how that works.
Again, what's the correct terminology?
But the sermon notes are in the YouVersion app under North OC Church today.
You know what I'm saying, brother?
Trying to stuff his game up.
All right.
There you go.
Don't expect that every week.
Okay.
But it's in there today.
Okay.
And then also, uh, I think that we're gonna have a part two to this.
I think we either we'll have a video in the week, or we'll do something
because this is a, this is massive.
This is so cool, so encouraging, and there's so much here.
We don't have enough time to really drill it all the way home.
So I think we'll have some form of a version, uh, part two.
Now we're gonna take it over to the, to what is called the Sermon on the Mount.
This was Jesus', go-to sermon wherever Jesus preached and wherever he went.
The way we see from the scripture, this appears to be his go-to sermon,
he would go there and, and, and adjust the sermon depending on the context
and where he was, his environment.
But this was his go-to sermon.
And in this sermon, Jesus reveals what the kingdom of God is like.
What does it mean?
Because he's the king who's ushering in God's kingdom.
And so he reveals what the kingdom is like and what it's like to
be a citizen in God's kingdom.
And in this sermon, it's actually a reset sermon because he resets
our values through the beatitudes.
What we value is reset, bless R, and then he resets our lifestyle.
That it's more than uh, uh, uh, being a citizen in Kingdom.
God is more than an outward appearance or outward religion.
And then he also resets our focus.
He says, don't worry.
Don't worry about food, drink clothes, don't even worry about tomorrow.
And then he sums it up with the reset verse.
In Matthew chapter six, verse 33, I'm gonna read from the NET version,
and here's what Jesus says, he says, but above all, pursue his kingdom
and righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.
Jesus redirects our pursuits.
The world tells us to chase happiness.
Money, comfort, security, success, maybe even fame.
But Jesus calls us to pursue God and righteousness.
And what is that?
That's a call to pursue holiness.
When I pursue God's kingdom, that's his reign, his rule.
I'm pursuing God.
And not only am I pursuing that, but I'm pursuing his righteousness,
which again is his holiness.
He redirects our pursuits, calls us to have a reset in not only what
we value and what we prioritize, but what we pursue in our lives.
And so why reset?
Why reset our pursuit from happiness to holiness?
Well, number one is because God is holy.
God is holy.
You know, several times in the Bible there's times where we
get a glimpse of what it's like at the throne of God in heaven.
And these heavenly beings, these heavenly creatures, say something.
And we wanna look at two verses here real quickly.
In Isaiah six, verse three, it says, and they were calling to one another.
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord Almighty.
The whole earth is full of his glory.
And then in the Revelation four verse eight, it.
Each of the four living creatures had six wings.
It was covered with eyes all around, even under its wings, day and night.
They never stopped saying, holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty,
who was and is, and is to come.
It's interesting, these holy beings, these beings that stand before or
worship before the throne of the living God, what they do is they go around
and they say, holy, holy, holy is God.
Yeah.
Not just holy, but we gotta say it three times.
God is not just holy, he's holy, he's holy, and he's holy.
And he keeps saying it's, you.
See, holiness is who God is.
It's his character.
It's his choices, it's his relationships, his thoughts, his desires.
Holiness is who God.
Is God doesn't have to choose to be holy.
God is holy.
And then not only is he holy, but here's what's crazy, what's radical.
What's so cool for those of us who are children of the living God, meaning we
made a decision to follow Jesus as his disciples, is that God makes us holy.
So not only is he holy.
But then he goes, man, if you follow me, you make that decision.
You are opinion, you get baptized.
I make you holy through Jesus and through the Holy Spirits.
And let's look at a couple scriptures.
But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified.
These are fancy names.
Meaning that, that, that you are holy and that you are no longer guilty of sin.
In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, and by the spirit of our God, one
Corinthians 6 11, 2 Corinthians chapter three, verse 1318, and we all who with
unveiled faces contemplate the Lord's glory are being transformed into his
image with ever increasing glory, which comes from the Lord, who is the spirits.
What happens through Christ and the Spirit, we are made
holy in our status before God.
We are washed.
We are sanctified, we are justified.
Our relationship and status before God has been transformed.
Why?
Because we are now forgiven and we are now his beloved child.
We went from creation to child of God.
And so now we are made holiness.
We have a new identity, and this is so cool.
When we receive the Holy Spirit on the day of our baptism, we now share in
Christ's holiness so Christ is holy.
And then when he indwells in us with it by through the Holy
Spirit, guess what happens?
We now are holy.
We share in this spiritual DNA of Holiness.
You go, well, I don't feel too holy.
I know you don't, but because we still have a choice in how we live.
You get what I'm saying?
But God now looks at us.
He doesn't see sin Center, center, center.
He sees my son of my daughter who are holy.
You share in my DNA.
How incredible is that?
I like being a part of my family, but boy, oh boy, nobody looks at my family
and says, oh, that hall family is holy.
But I had the living God, Jesus somehow.
Hey man, it's so hard to wrap around somehow.
Jesus is my brother and and, and His holiness is upon me.
Hallelujah.
And this is how God views you.
You don't need to view yourself as, I'm just a safe sinner.
Yes you are.
But God never says, I just loved all my safe sinners.
No, he calls us his children.
He says, you share what I am.
I'm holy.
So guess what?
You have holiness within you.
We are transformed into Christ's image and this Holy Spirit now empowers us.
To do what?
Live Holy Lives.
You see, we still have to make a choice.
You see, God is holy.
He transforms us into being holy.
Now, what are we called to do?
Live holy lives.
You get what I'm saying here.
We still have to work in conjunction with our Holy Father
and live according to who we are.
Not something we are, but live according to who we are.
And so again, why does Jesus redirect us from pursuing
happiness to pursuing holiness?
Because God is holy.
God has made us holy through the, the, the spirit in Jesus, and now
he calls us to pursue holiness.
And so here's the question, brother and sisters, what am I pursuing?
Ask yourself, what am I pursuing?
Am I pursuing the American pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness,
or am I pursuing the kingdom pursuit of God and holiness?
Let's, let's, let's go back and let's compare and let's contrast the pursuit of
happiness versus the pursuit of holiness.
You see, the pursuit of, of happiness leads to, it's really what self-centered.
Why?
Because it's all about me being happy and I'm pursuing, I'm going after
whatever is going to make me happy.
So what It's self-centered and what does that lead to?
When I'm self-centered, it could lead to what a whole bunch of stuff can't it.
But we know it leads to, and it definitely can lead to selfish ambition.
Ambition isn't wrong, but selfish ambition is.
It leads to envy.
It leads to anger, it leads to bitterness.
It can lead to hatred.
I can hate people who are disrupting my pursuit of happiness.
I can even point my hatred toward God or my bitterness toward God
because God has somehow interrupted or prevented me from having my happiness.
So now I'm mad at God or I'm mad at you.
I'm mad at my mom.
I'm mad at the man.
I'm mad at the, the, the commercial.
I'm mad at everything because you interrupted it.
You stopped me from getting my happiness.
And ultimately it can lead to sin 'cause I'll do whatever it takes and discard.
Or disregard so that I can have my happiness.
But now when we contrast that with pursuit of holiness is, first of all,
God-centered because I'm pursuing God, I'm pursuing his righteousness.
And what does that lead to?
Peace, comfort, compassion.
Not only receiving these things, but having these things toward other people.
Forgiveness perspective.
This is the incredible thing is that when we pursue holiness, it gives a
perspective because now I have a different perspective about those around me.
Yes, I see them as image bearers, but I see, I can even see challenging
or difficult people or difficult situations, not in, ah, I hate
this, but I can see, you know what?
God allows this so that I can actually become more holy through this.
I have this challenging situation.
That, yes, it's not making me happy, but guess what it's calling me to do.
It's calling me to persevere in my faith.
It's causing me to pray.
It's causing me to not react and respond the way I would naturally,
but to take it to God and to fight to have a holy response.
And so now I can see these negative situations or even negative
people as pathways to holiness.
One of the things that CRE and I have a strong belief about is that even
marriage, God designed not just to make us happy, but to make us holy.
My marriage has refined me.
Amen.
Because God keeps saying, boy, you gotta change because there's a mirror now.
And I get to see, yeah, there's some good, but boy, oh boy,
there's some ugly up in here.
And he is like, you gotta change this.
And then he blessed me with kids, and then there becomes another opportunity
for me to become holy because I wanna react and act in a different way.
And God's like, don't you dare, or, okay, you messed up now, but you
messed up and I need you to see that.
We need to get this part out of you.
Marcel, I never knew how selfish and prideful I was until I got married.
And then I still, I didn't realize I was still selfish
and prideful until I had kids.
I'm like, how did you get rid of all of this guy's?
Like, Nope.
And he's still working on me.
So what God is doing in these situations, he's making me
holy and I have to pray a lot.
God, you are making me holy through this.
But it leads to resilience.
When I'm pursuing hol, I'm gonna be resilience.
When leads to transformation, it leads to righteousness and
it leads to becoming like Jesus.
So I don't know about you, but I'm so grateful that Jesus redirects
my pursuit because I don't want that column on the left side.
I want what God wants, and I want what's on the right.
I wanna have peace.
I wanna have comfort.
I wanna have compassion, forgiveness, perspective, resilience,
transformation, righteousness, and I wanna be like the Lord Jesus.
Don't you too?
But it only happens when we have a holy reset and we pursue holiness.
See, again, the pursuit of happiness focuses on self, but the pursuit
of holiness focuses on God.
And so the holy reset is this, Jesus redefines what's worth
chasing after Jesus redefines.
What's worth chasing after?
Is it really happiness?
Or what's worth is holiness.
And so what should our response be to this?
I believe it's simple.
Pursue holiness over happiness.
To pursue holiness over happiness.
Let's go to Matthew chapter six.
Again, this has been our main text.
Brothers and sisters, are you still with me here again?
Let's read it again, but above all.
All above all, that means this is a priority.
If I told you, go to the store, buy some milk, some chicken,
some eggs, some cheese, but above all, get my green Skittles.
What are you gonna get?
Those green Skittles.
Sorry, Marcel, I forgot everything else, but I got you those green Skittles.
Why?
Because it's important.
It's a priority.
He's helping us understand where it should be in the pecking order above all.
But then he tells us this, what?
Pursue his kingdom and righteousness.
You see, holiness is a priority, but it's also also our pursuits.
Many times we can think it's just a priority.
I just gotta prioritize his kingdom and his righteousness.
And a lot of times in our fellowship, we, we, we focus in on the kingdom part.
We don't focus on the righteousness part.
No.
We pursue righteousness.
We go after righteousness.
When you pursue something, you do what?
Sit back and wait till it comes.
No.
That's not pursuing at all is it?
You pursue, think about when you pursue a relationship.
Maybe it's a friendship or a romantic relationship.
What do you do?
You go after it, right?
You, you try to learn.
You go after connecting.
You try to learn about the person.
When I was, when I was, uh, pursuing Carina, we were, uh, I was liking Carina.
Uh, I, I, I was pursuing her.
Uh, you know, I was stopping by at random times.
Oh.
Just happened to be an area,
you know, there's a text, there's a call, whatever.
Actually, we didn't do text back then.
That's how old I am.
I'm 44.
Okay.
There you go.
And then when texting happened, you couldn't afford text.
It was like, don't you dare text me.
Why did you text me?
Man, I'm gonna get charged for that.
You know what I'm saying?
Sorry.
All my old people, y'all know what I'm talking about.
All right.
We were like, hallelujah.
Free texting.
Alright.
Sorry.
You're getting sidetracked.
So when I was pursuing Karina, I went after it.
I even made her a little, a little, this is, this is, again, I'm aging myself here.
I made her a little cd.
Oh yeah.
Remember that?
We didn't have Spotify playlists back then, so I went over there and had some
songs she liked and put in a couple of my songs and girl, here you go.
Oh, smooth Operator.
You know what I'm saying?
I was pursuing her.
There you go.
I was pursuing.
I'll give her a little thing there.
She was fired up, obviously, 20 plus years.
It worked.
Hallelujah.
Right?
But I was pursuing her.
When I was pursuing a career in, in sports, in sports entertainment.
I went to school.
I went to college.
I tried to learn.
I studied, I was blessed.
I got an internship.
I was practicing.
I was volunteering for certain things so that I can get my craft.
I was speaking, I was trying to do things to enhance my skillset so that
I can achieve what I was pursuing.
And you do the same where you're going after a job, where you're
going after a certain achievement, you intentionally do things.
So when we pursue holiness, what should we do?
The same thing.
We pursue holiness, we go after it.
We're intentional.
We make decisions that will align with what's being holy.
We study it out, we learn.
We ask God, God, help me to be holy.
Help me to see this.
And then when holy or a lack of holiness is exposed, we don't just
say, well, that just is what it is.
No, we make a decision to get rid of what's unholy in our lives.
We also make a decision to get over hurdles that prevent us from being holy.
So we make decisions about relationships, about media consumption,
about where I spend my time.
Should I really be doom scrolling at this time or not?
We make decisions because we're pursuing God, his kingdom, and his holiness.
So we get very practical.
Church, are you with me here?
We get advice.
We ask, we go to the scriptures.
We don't just sit back and wait.
We choose righteousness over convenience, and we fight because we know it's
a spiritual battle and it's tough.
And then we get back up when we fail because we often do fail, but we get
back up and we fight and we persevere because we're pursuing holiness.
Again, here's the cool thing is that when we pursue holiness,
we actually receive joy.
We can think that there are opposite ends.
There's happiness and there's joy.
Ah, I guess I just better be disgruntled, sad and bitter
and, and have this holiness.
No.
When we pursue holiness, what God provides is joy in the presence, but eternal joy.
That supersedes and is even greater than fleeting temporary happiness.
It's a joy in the midst of a challenge.
It's a joy in the midst of a struggle.
It's a joy in the midst of a bad phone call from a relative or discouraging,
uh, comment or call from the doctor, or when something sad or bad happens,
or we have a struggle, there can be a joy in the midst of all of that.
Because we have the holiness of God, and God provides even more
than we can ever ask or imagine.
And so holiness is the pursuit that resets our lives.
Let's get real practical.
Church, are you still with me here?
All right, some of y'all still tripping off the cd.
Alright, here we go.
Let's get real practical here.
Let's have some action steps for the week.
This is just for the week.
Again, you can try to do this afterwards, encourage you, but let's
do this for the next seven days here.
All right, number one, real simple.
Pray each day this week for the next seven days.
You include this day here.
Let's make it eight here.
Okay, for the next eight days here, pray something along the lines Here, God
reset my, my, my pursuit to holiness.
God, help me to pursue holiness.
Help me to value holiness.
Help me to pursue, not just can you give it to me?
Help me to pursue holiness.
You guys get what I'm saying here because we need divine helping this
because it is a spiritual challenge.
And then number two here, choose one area in your life to pursue holiness this week.
Just one area in your life.
Let's crawl, walk, run.
Hey, there's that area.
I know God's been gnawing at me.
He's been saying, choose one area in which you were intentionally.
Pursue holiness this week.
Right now we're gonna take communion and we have the emblems,
the juice, and the bread, which represent Jesus' body and his blood.
That was sacrificed for our opportunity as salvation and communion.
Today is such a great opportunity as a time for us to remember that
we are made holy through Jesus.
This eternal gift of a reset of holiness is only available through Jesus' life.
Death and resurrection.
And we read here in Hebrews chapter 10, verse 10, we have been made holy through
the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ.
Once for all.
Let's pray.
Father, thank you so much for Jesus.
Thank you so much for, uh, your spirit.
Thank you for your word that refined us, that sanctify us, that,
uh, continually, uh, uh, wash us thoroughly and allow us to be holy.
God, I'm so humbled and I'm so grateful.
The fact that, uh, we share your holiness, not because we are are
righteous in and of ourselves and that we're perfect by our decisions, but
because Jesus is holy and your Holy Spirit dwells within us, and God, we
don't wanna grieve the Holy Spirit.
We wanna be in step with the Holy Spirit.
And so we pray that you enable, you, empower you, strengthen
us to have a holy reset today.
May it not just be a sermon that was preached, but God, may you transform us.
Today to have a reset in our relationship with you.
Have a reset in our relationship with others.
We'll view and treat others the way you want to and then we pursue you.
Your kingdom, your righteousness, which is holiness.
Thank you Jesus for staying upon the cross.
Thank you for resurrecting and thank you Holy Spirit for dwelling with Dennis
and empowering us to live holy lives.
We pray this in your son's name.
Amen.