Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church Podcast,
where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
My name is Pastor Josh, and I want to thank you for listening to
this podcast.
I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen
you in the word of God.
Now, come along.
Let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today.
All right.
Well, I asked on Sunday, I believe it was, maybe it was a couple
Sundays ago, what if anyone had any Christmas traditions, But
I was wondering if anyone had any New Year's Eve or New Year's
Day traditions.
Does anyone have any of those that you guys do?
We don't really have any of those, but does anyone have one that
you guys do?
What's that you're in bed by?
So that's a tradition of getting in bed by 10:00.
Okay.
So one of the things that Micah and I did yesterday is we sat
down and we just talked about 2024 and the things that God blessed
us with.
And it was kind of an exciting time to.
To go back.
Sometimes you don't realize how much God has really done in your
life until you actually go back and recount all the things that
that have actually happened.
And so hope that you've had a wonderful 2024.
And hopefully we're going to be praying for God to give us an
even better 2025.
And we don't know what the future holds, right?
I mean, 2025, it's fresh, it's new.
But obviously by looking at the news, things aren't any better
just because the calendar turned over.
Right?
But what we do know is that God is still in control.
And we do know that through God's word, he has given us promises.
And one of the promises that I wanted to go through here this evening
is a promise of newness.
And as we start out the new year and we think about that, we're
new and fresh, and maybe some of you even have some New Year's
resolutions.
Now, those can be a little bit dangerous because what happens with
New Year's resolutions usually is that we're really excited about
it for a little bit of time, and then they kind of pass away.
And so instead of calling them New Year's resolutions, let's call
them New Year's goals.
And I think we should set goals in our life.
I think we should set personal goals, maybe if you're in the professional
world, professional goals.
But I think most importantly, we should have spiritual goals in
our life.
I think that we should look towards moving forward in our spiritual
growth and in our spiritual disciplines.
When I use the words spiritual disciplines, what am I talking about?
Well, I'm talking about prayer, Bible reading, Bible study,
witnessing, teaching, growing, all of those aspects of the spiritual
walk that help us grow in all our walk with Christ.
So with that being said, even before I get started tonight, if
some of you have ever done this before, you'll know that it's
a beneficial thing.
But I would challenge you to read through scriptures this year.
Read through the Bible from.
From day one all the way to day 365.
We have a Bible reading planned for you out in the lobby.
I printed out 25 copies.
I didn't know how many people would be here this evening.
If you'd like to take one of those with you.
It's a plan that helps you read through the Bible day by day.
There's some breaks in there, but it kind of guides you through
Scripture.
And I.
I would encourage you to grab one of those.
If we run out, just let me know.
And I would love to make sure I get enough copies for everybody.
Well, where do we start when it comes to the new year?
I thought about that and I said, let's start at the end.
So let's get our Bibles out and let's look at Revelation chapter
22.
If you know anything about Scriptures, that's the end.
You say, how are we starting out at the end?
From the beginning?
Right at the beginning of the year.
Well, I want to take you to a passage of scripture, Revelation
chapter 22, and it speaks of God making all things new.
Revelation chapter 22.
We're going to start in verse number one, and we're going to look
at the first five verses here in the last chapter of the Bible.
And I know that's a different place to start out when you're talking
about the beginning of the year, but I think that it'll make
sense once we start looking at this.
And, and I think that one of the things that helps us understand
the hope that we have in a new year is understanding the hope that
we have in Christ.
You know, I think a lot of times for me, I get so excited about
an event that's coming up that I wrap up all my expectations in
that event.
And when that event doesn't go the way that I expect it to go, or
maybe it goes really well, but it's over.
There's somewhat of a letdown.
I don't know about you guys, but, you know, looking forward to
Christmas and having family.
It's all great.
But then, you know, days go by and people leave and the food's gone
and, you know, all, all your new gifts wear out and they're newness
and, you know, you're kind of back to the mundane and there's that
letdown.
And so many times, I think as believers, we have these expectations
that are set in the world.
And when those things fail, which they inevitably will, we get
that letdown, we get that disappointment.
But when we keep our eyes fixed on the true hope that we have
in Christ, we are able to keep our eyes fixed on that newness of
life.
And so Revelation chapter 22, this is @ the very end, right?
This is the Apostle John here kind of explaining what he sees that
is to come.
And he says, here, and he showed me a pure river of water,
of life, clear as a crystal proceeding out of the throne of God
and of the Lamb.
Now, now we understand these descriptions, but we can't ultimately
wrap our minds around exactly what he's talking about.
We can do our best, but he's speaking of this beautiful place,
this pure river, water of life, clear as a crystal.
And then he says in verse two, in the midst of the street of it
and on either side of the river was there the tree of life,
which bear 12 manners of fruits and yielded her fruit every
month.
And the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
And so this speaks of the unification of all the believers
of all time coming together and finding healing.
Says in verse 3, and there shall be no more curse.
Aren't you excited for that day?
What is he talking about here?
He's talking about no more sin curse on us.
As of right now, in 2025, January 1st, we are still cursed
with sin.
This earth is cursed with sin.
Now, many of us, hopefully all of us tonight, have trusted in Jesus
Christ as our Savior.
So no longer are we defined by that curse, but we still feel the
effects of that curse.
What's the effect of that curse?
That's the sin nature.
That's the flesh.
That's the old man.
And we see the world, a broken world.
There's still death, there's still disease, there's still hate.
There's still murder.
And so the Bible says that we are still living in that curse.
But the Bible says one day right here, there will be no more
curse.
And that day that we're longing for is the day that when
we are with our Savior, there's going to be no more sin.
There's going to be no more pain.
There's going to be no more suffering, there's going to be no
more disease.
There's only that newness of life forever and ever.
It says, but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it, and
his servants shall serve him.
This speaks to the perfect plan of God.
We are in his presence and we are serving Him.
I know.
I've heard a lot of people say over the years, what's heaven going
to be like?
We're just going to be sitting on a cloud and playing a harp and
singing forever?
I don't think so.
I think there's more to it than that.
Are we going to be singing?
Yes.
I don't think all of us are going to be playing the harp.
Maybe some of us will be.
But the truth is, is that we will be not only worshiping him by
singing and praising him, which we will, but it also says that
we will be there serving him.
And serving is worship, right?
We know that eternity means that we are going to be worshiping
God.
But in that comes service.
In that comes us being used by God still.
And we see that we're not done with our work.
Then verse 4.
And they shall see his face and his name shall be in their foreheads.
This speaks to our identification, our identity in Christ.
And then it says, verse 5.
And there shall be no more, no night there.
They need no candle, neither light of the sun, for the Lord giveth
them light.
This is going to be that point in time in which we can see truly
the light of the world.
And I'm looking forward to that day.
And then it says here, and this is the last phrase that I want
you to see there.
It says, for the Lord God giveth them light, and they shall
reign forever and ever.
What an amazing thing that is.
So how can God do this?
How is God going to work this all out?
Well, we go back and we look at verse one of chapter 21.
It says, and I saw a new heaven and a new earth.
And for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away,
and there was no more sea.
And I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down
from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her
husband.
This is a beautiful picture.
This is the culmination of everything.
This is the culmination of God's promises.
This is the culmination of the gospel.
This is the culmination of the kingdom.
And it says, verse three.
And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, behold, the tabernacle
of God is with men, and he will Dwell with them, and they shall
be his people.
And God himself shall be with them and be their God.
We see that it's the presence of God that brings this newness of
life.
It's the presence of God that brings this perfection.
Verse 4.
This is one that I'm excited for.
I don't know about you, but it says, and God shall wipe away all
tears from their eyes.
It's not until this moment that all the tears are wiped away.
I know that there's a lot of misconceptions about what happens
after death.
But what we can see here is at this very moment is when God wipes
away all the tears from their eyes and there shall be no more death.
This is exciting, right?
This is.
Death is abolished.
No more death.
Death is a painful thing.
We.
We just saw there's a terrorist attack down in.
In Louisiana.
We've seen shootings, we've seen people get hurt in.
In car accidents.
We've seen people die of.
Of different illnesses.
But what we can see at this point is that there's going to be
no more death.
Death, where is thy sting?
Neither sorrow nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain.
For the former things are passed away.
Folks, if you live with pain and if you live with suffering and
you live with sorrow, the Bible says all of that is going to
be wiped away.
That's what we're looking Forward to.
Verse 5.
And he sat upon the throne and said, this is what I want you to
think about.
This is the thesis of the lesson tonight.
This is what God says to us.
He says, behold, I make all things new.
The original language in the Greek.
It's not just that he makes things new then.
It's this.
It's this continuous.
That he's making things new.
From the moment that we trust in Jesus Christ as our Savior, he
is making things new in our lives.
And this is the culmination of that.
This is it.
This is where he says, I've been working in your life, making
you a new creation, and now you're seeing it come to pass.
And he said unto me, write.
For these words are true and faithful.
So God says to the apostle John, write this down.
I happen to think about what John's thinking.
He's going through this like man.
What will it be like to have no more death?
What will it be like to have no more sorrow, no more pain?
God's making all things new.
And God wakes him up and says, john, write this down.
They need to hear this.
And that's what he's Saying here, He says, make.
Make note of this, because these words are faithful and true.
And that excites me.
I don't know about you, but this world is a painful world to
live in.
There's suffering, there's sor.
There's loss.
But what God says here, and I want you to think about that phrase,
he says, behold, I make all things new.
Now for some of us, we're like, well, I'm longing for that
day.
When is that day going to happen?
I've mentioned this quite a bit in.
In my speaking is.
You know, as I get older, I'm more excited to be with my Savior.
When I was young, I was like, lord, don't come back, Lord, I want
to live for a long time.
I want to experience all these things.
But as we experience this world, there's a song that says,
and the things of earth will grow strangely dim in the light of
his glory and grace.
And so the more we rest in Christ, and the more we see how beautiful
and perfect and holy he is, and then we see how evil and terrible
and painful this world is, the more we say, these things are not
what we want.
We want to be with our Savior.
So how is God making things new in our lives right now?
Because that's.
It's.
It's not here yet.
That.
That part right there is not here yet.
There's still pain, there's still sorrow, there's still death,
there's still loss, there's still tears.
But how is he working out that plan in our lives right now?
I want you to go with me to another passage in the New Testament,
and that is found in Romans, Romans chapter.
Actually, let's go to second Corinthians first, and then we'll
go to the Romans passage.
Let's just go to second Corinthians, chapter five.
Most of you know this passage of Scripture.
The, The.
The beginning of God making our lives new is salvation.
We can't experience newness of life without that transformation,
without God indwelling us.
And so the hope of newness, the hope of perfection, the hope
of eternal life can only be found in an individual who has trusted
in Jesus Christ as his or her Savior and has experienced that transformation.
Second Corinthians, chapter 5, verse 17.
You guys know this passage.
Therefore, if any man be in Christ, that's the disclaimer.
That's the factor that makes someone have this new life.
It says, if any man be in Christ, what does it mean to be in
Christ?
It means to have our identity set in him, to Put our faith in Jesus
to trust in his work of salvation.
So if there, if any man be in Christ, he is a new creature or a
new creation.
So that's the.
That's the rebirth.
It's.
It's the rebirth that's talked about in John chapter 3.
Remember when Nicodemus comes to Jesus in the middle of the night
and he's scared, and he's like, we know that you're from God
because of what you're doing.
And he says, you know, how are you doing these things?
And Jesus explains them well, you got to be born again.
And that blew Nicodemus's mind because he's like, how can I be born
again?
How could I go back into my mother's womb and be born again?
I can't understand this.
And that's what Jesus is teaching.
He's teaching this new creation, this new creature that
comes through a life in Christ.
And he says, old things are passed away.
Behold, all things are become new.
And it works down and talks about reconciliation.
It talks about now, our job as ambassadors for Christ and explains
how that can happen through Jesus's sacrifice for us.
In verse 21, he who knew no sin became sin for us that we might
be made the righteousness of God in him.
And so God gives us a new life.
He gives us a new creation.
He gives us a new righteousness.
What is new righteousness?
Well, righteousness before we were saved was what we tried to do
in our own strength.
I tried to be a good person, and I tried to say the right thing.
I tried to do the right thing.
But ultimately, we all know that we will fail in that.
We all know that we can't do enough.
We all know that we can't earn our way to heaven.
So God gives us a new righteousness, and that righteousness
is found in him.
That righteousness is found in Jesus Christ's righteousness.
And so we go to Romans chapter five.
Let's go to Romans chapter five.
And it speaks of that walk after salvation.
So.
So the new life starts at the moment of salvation, but it doesn't
end there.
God then starts working in this newness of life.
And so we're that new creation.
Old things are passed away.
Folks, if.
If an individual says, you know what?
I was saved, and there was no change in my heart.
I was saved and I had no new desires.
I was saved.
And I don't feel any different.
I don't think any different.
Folks, there's a challenge there.
The challenge is, let's look at what Scripture says about salvation,
what does it mean to be in Christ?
Now, I'm not here to judge someone's profession of faith, okay?
I don't walk around and go, well, I look at your life and I don't
believe you're a Christian.
I don't believe you meant it when you prayed that prayer.
That's not my job.
My job is to point people to Scripture to say, this is what a
new life looks like.
This is what hope in Jesus Christ looks like.
And it's for the individual to inspect his or her own life and say,
you know, what is this?
Me?
I don't know if anyone's ever come to you and said, well, I'm.
I'm doubting my salvation.
I don't know.
I don't feel saved ever.
Don't raise your hand, but just most of us have probably heard
someone say, I don't feel saved.
And, and I'm going to be honest with you.
There's going to be days where I've gotten up and I don't feel saved.
But what do I do?
I go back to what I know about Scripture, and I would point someone
to First John chapter.
Well, all of First John read the book of First John.
The book of First John is a biography of a believer.
And, and so when we read First John, we say, okay, I'm not perfect,
but First John is something that can characterize my life.
I'm.
I'm walking in the love of Christ.
I'm walking in this newness of life.
If you read First John and it's foreign to you, I would say
it's time to inspect the truth of the Gospel in your own life.
And so we get to Romans chapter 5, and we see we're justified
by faith.
Verse 1.
We have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom also
we have access by faith into this grace wherein we stand and rejoice
in the hope of glory.
And not only so, but we glory in tribulations, knowing that tribulation
worketh patience and patience experience and experience hope.
And he goes on to talk about the Holy Ghost, which is given to
us.
Verse 5.
The.
The way that we understand God working through our life is the Holy
Spirit moving in our life.
And, and then we get to verse number six, and he says, what shall
we say then?
Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound?
So we he explains grace in Romans chapter five.
He says, you have been given grace.
You have been given forgiveness.
But then what he says, is this the challenge for many people who
don't understand what God has done to say, well, you know what?
If God is going to forgive me, then I can just keep sinning.
I can abuse grace.
And he goes, no, no, no.
He says, what shall we say then?
Should we continue in sin that grace may abound, God forbid.
How shall we that are dead to sin live any longer therein?
Know ye not that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ
were baptized into his death, Therefore we are buried with him
by baptism into death.
So this is talking about the identification being in Christ, okay?
That like as Christ was raised up from the dead by glory of the
Father, even so we should walk in.
There's our phrase of the evening newness of life.
For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death,
we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection, knowing
this, that our old man, that's the old way, that's the sin nature.
Our old man is crucified, killed with him, that the body of
sin might be destroyed.
And henceforth we should not serve sin.
For if, for he that is dead is freed from sin, meaning when we are
dead to our sins, we are freed from the bondage of that sin.
And so yes, as Christians, we don't live sinless lives, but the
Bible says that we are striving to be pushed forward in
the Holy Spirit so that we can live more and more righteous lives
for him, not in our righteousness, but his righteousness.
That's how God is working newness of life.
He's working that change out in our life.
So, so what it would look like practically is someone walks in here
and they're characterized by sin.
They're maybe not evil people, but we all know in reality all of
us are evil outside of our righteousness in Christ.
But anyway, they walk in and maybe they don't break the law, maybe
they don't break the rules, but they come in and they're defined
by their sin.
And then they trust in Jesus Christ as their Savior, they're justified.
Then there's that change, there's that newness of life, there's
that transformation, there's that repentance.
Repentance is that about face.
And so that is the miracle of God working newness in our life.
So when we see a changed Christian, when we see a person changed,
that is the miracle of the newness of life.
That is the beginning of it.
And God eventually is going to bring that to pass at the end.
The culmination of all of that will be when we are restored to him,
when we are reconciled completely to Him.
The theological term for that is glorification.
We're glorified when we're with him in his presence, when we're
walking with him forever and ever.
That's when newness of life will be completely imagined and seen
and lived out.
So the question is today is how can we say that God is making
all things new when we look around at this world?
Well, we know that in the beginning, God created the heavens
and the earth.
We know that he pronounced everything good.
Genesis, chapter one.
But what happened?
Well, we sinned.
The curse.
Remember the curse.
The curse came.
So mankind sins and marred creation.
And so the world is no longer good.
If I've heard recently someone said, well, my faith in humanity
has been restored because they helped this little animal off the
ice.
And like, well, you know what they were.
Don't have faith in humanity, okay?
Humanity will fail outside of Jesus Christ.
We cannot have faith in humanity.
Humanity is broken and is marred.
And so what we can see here is that from Genesis, chapter three,
okay, all the way, all the way to Revelation, okay?
All the way to the very end, we understand that this is a world
that is defined by sin.
But something will change at the great white throne.
Judgment.
So after God judges sin, he promises a new heaven.
He promises a new earth where suffering, pain, death will all cease.
And so what we can see here is that.
And we go back to Revelation and we think about what John is.
Is bringing to us here.
He sees this beautiful city.
He sees God.
He sees all of the people serving him and praising him.
And so he's understanding that this is what God is promising us
from the very beginning.
It's.
It's what believers have longed for.
It's what all of us should be longing for.
The.
The book of Romans, Romans, chapter 8 says that they're Romans.
Chapter 8, verse 19.
For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestations
of the sons of God.
Meaning this.
If we are children of God and we are working properly in his path,
in our life, and we're following his will, we should long
for the day of that unification.
I think it's.
It's summed up well In Galatians, chapter 2, verse 20, I
am crucified with Christ.
This speaks of that identification.
Nevertheless, I live.
Yet not I, but Christ liveth in me.
And the life which I now live in the flesh.
I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself
for me.
And so there's this idea that God is making all things new in our
life only when he takes control through salvation.
And the Bible speaks of all of this.
The Bible speaks of Ephesians, chapter four, putting off the old
and putting on the new, not walking in sin, but walking in newness
of life.
And so the Bible tells us over and over again that this is the path
that God wants us to have it all of creation, Romans chapter 8
says, is groaning for this restoration.
So how can we look at 2025 through the lens of a human seeing
all the news and seeing all the pain and still hope in the newness
of God?
It's looking towards the promise at the end.
It's, it's believing in faith that God is keeping his word and
will keep his word to make all things right now.
Now, partially he is making things right now by the sense that
he has saved us and he's changing us and he's working it out
for us and he's working out his good in our life and he's working
out our good in our lives.
But what we can ultimately see is that though there is pain and
suffering now, the promise is that God is going to take this all
away.
And so we live in light of that with hope.
So, so what happens tomorrow when we get bad news?
Well, I'm not living for tomorrow.
I'm living for eternity.
I'm not living for 20, 25, I'm living for eternity.
And, and that will help us in many different ways.
I think it'll help us in understanding all the things that
God has given us in the newness of life.
So he's given you a new life, he's given you a new hope, he's given
you a new name, he's given you a new identity, he's given you a
new righteousness.
Jesus says, I've given you a New Testament, a new promise, a new,
a new commandment.
And that's the beauty of the so.
So prior to Jesus right there.
And well, even today, I mean, it's not just prior to Jesus, even
today, people believe that they have to keep the law to be saved,
to see God there, there, you know, 613 laws that these folks follow
and they stay right on the path as best as they can, even though
none of us could keep the law perfectly.
But now we have a new covenant, we have a new promise.
And it's not this.
It's, it's not, hey, keep all these laws and then maybe I'll give
you Greece.
The Bible says, hey, there's a new commandment.
Love God with all your heart, soul, mind, Strength.
After that, love your neighbor as yourself and all of that, the
law and the prophets, everything is hanging on this.
So you say, well, how can I love God with everything?
Well, you, you love him in everything.
By trusting in him, by committing to him, by saying, you
know what?
I'm going to give my life over to Him.
You know, it's a hard thing to do that.
It's a hard thing to go all in.
It really, really is.
And, and for me, I, I, I know that even in my life.
Am I all in?
That's a good question.
I don't know.
I, I really don't know.
Because we can't ultimately know that answer until we are tested.
Like right now, theoretically, I'm all in, right?
There's nothing that could change my mind.
But that might change tomorrow when pressures come.
And that's a challenge that all of us have to think about.
Like, what will happen if this is challenged in my life?
What will happen if my expectations aren't met in 2025?
You know what?
I remember what it means to not have expectations fulfilled.
We, we were driving up to the hospital.
It's almost been a year now, and we had Micah and Nora, and everything
went smoothly.
We were like, I, I, I, I was like, okay, we're gonna go in.
Everything's gonna be the exact same way.
And I remember that night, it did not go the way that we expected
it to go.
And there was a lot of fear, there was a lot of concern, there
was a lot of confusion.
And, and my expectations were not met by, by any stretch of the
imagination.
But looking back on that with, without telling the whole story again,
looking back on that, we understand why God allowed certain
things to happen in our life.
We know that now.
I mean, every time that I look at Silas, I understand now.
God more and more through not, not, not.
Silas isn't the instrument of that, but he's the reminder of God's
faithfulness.
He's the reminder of God's provisions.
He's a reminder of the conversations that I have with the
Lord that evening.
And, and I will tell you that those are the realities in life when
we are tested, where.
Where are we going to turn?
And I don't know what 2025 holds for all of us here.
I don't know.
I really don't know.
I don't know what the political climate will be.
I don't know what the international climate will be.
I don't know what the financial climate will be.
But what I do know is that God is still good What I do know is God
is still in control.
And when we look at the, the chaos in this world so many times,
it's easy to get our eyes fixed on that and our expectations
aren't met.
And when our expectations are met, we start turning to things that
are not scriptural.
So, for example, okay, we all would say we believe God is in control.
I hope, I hope that's what you would say.
We all believe that God has promised that he's never going to
leave us nor forsake us.
We all believe that God is love.
We all believe, hopefully, that we love God with all of our
heart, soul, mind and strength.
We love him with everything.
And we love our neighbor as ourself.
But the true test is like, when things don't go the way that
we want them to go, are we willing to say those same things
about God?
Are we willing to say that he's there with us when we don't
feel that?
And, and what I would say, and the best advice that I ever had given
to me was don't.
Feelings are good, emotions are good.
God gave us emotions and we should embrace those emotions.
But our emotions should not dictate to us our truth, right?
So if I'm angry or I'm upset or I'm let down or I'm fearful, I
can't let those emotions dictate my truth about what God's
word says about him, about me, about salvation, about newness of
life, about the hope that we have in Him.
But what I can do is allow my emotions to be dictated and controlled
by what I believe in, the truth of God.
So it's my faith that brings me to the point where, yes, I know
that this is a bad circumstance, but I know that God
is good.
I know that he loves me.
And, and so you go back to what you know.
And so your emotions are dictated by your truth instead of
vice versa.
And that's helped a lot in my own life because I'm going to tell
you, sometimes fear.
The.
The Bible says that the fear of man is a snare or a trap.
And so it's the fear of man that sometimes pulls us away from
doing what we need to do.
And God has wonderful plans for you.
I know he does because he has a plan for all of us.
But, but the plan that God has for us sometimes makes us stretch
ourselves.
It sometimes takes us out of our comfort zone.
It sometimes takes us to a place that we don't expect to go.
But what I would say is that go back to when, when Those trials
of life come.
When those success successes of life come.
When the confusion comes, just go back to say this.
God is making this all right.
God is doing what he said he is going to do.
And he is going to ultimately conclude this by saying, hey, we're
going to be there one day.
And I think the apostle Paul says it this way.
One day when we get to heaven and we're with our Savior, we're
going to say, that was it that little temporary pain for this glory.
And I long for that day because there's days where I don't
feel that there's days.
I'm going to tell you there's days where I'm like, what is going
on?
And you say you're allowed to say that as a pastor.
I don't know if I'm allowed to say that or not.
But I'm going to tell you there are some days where I don't
know what God is doing.
I don't know what his plan is.
I don't know why he would let this happen.
I don't know why he would work it this way.
But all I say is that, lord, I trust you.
And that's by faith.
It is.
Hebrews, chapter 11, verse 6 says, it's impossible to please him
without faith.
So.
So I would take a step to say it's impossible to love him without
faith.
I can't love God without faith.
It's impossible.
Because for me, if I love God, I believe that he's going to keep
his word.
I believe that he is good.
I believe that he is in control.
And for.
For many of us, including myself, I will say that until things
look like they're going bad, then I go, well, we're losing.
Christians are losing.
Faith is losing.
God's gonna be wiped away from the map, folks.
God is not going to be wiped away from the world scene, okay?
If you read the Book of Revelation, if you question that
God is coming, okay, he is coming with.
With.
With righteous indignation, okay?
This world will be judged.
And I'm not trying to scare you, I don't know when it's going
to happen.
It could be another 50 years.
It could be another 5,000 years.
It could be another 50 minutes.
But we know that ultimately God is going to make all things new.
He's going to restore us and he's going to vindicate us.
Because the Bible says, vengeance is mine, I will repay,
saith the Lord.
I look at things in the news and I say, wow, I want to make this
right.
And some of you have that sense of justice in your heart.
You want to do that too, right?
Protecting the innocent.
There is innocent blood that is being shed in this world.
We know that.
So does God care about that?
I believe he does.
Why isn't he doing something immediately, right now?
Completely.
Because he is long suffering, because he's patient, because he
wants more folks to come to him.
So what does that mean for us?
We have to get busy in proclaiming the truth of God to this
world.
He saved us and he's equipped us and he's challenged us and he's
commissioned us to go proclaim the truth of God in this lost and
dying world.
And so you say, well, I don't know if I can do that.
You can.
I know you can.
It's not easy.
But the Bible says that people like, think about guys like Elijah.
We say, well, he.
He was different.
He was a special, like, special character.
He had like, an extra measure of.
Of glory on him.
The Bible says in the book of James, he was just like everybody
else.
He was.
He was a human being.
Yeah, Paul, you think about Paul, you think about John the Baptist,
right?
Man, Jesus said John the Baptist was the greatest prophet
to ever walk.
I mean, John the Baptist was a human being.
Now, I'm not saying that.
Hey, you're.
You're John the Baptist, okay?
What I am saying is that you have been equipped by God to do what
he has called you to do in the time that you have.
And, and so this is.
This is the goal.
So for me, you know, when I get down in the dumps and I start
feeling bad about things is when I start focusing on myself.
Like, I start really inspecting my own life.
And I go, you know what?
I'm not really smart enough to do what God has given me in my life.
I'm not really equipped enough.
I'm not really.
And I start.
And if.
Let me be honest, if you look into your own life, you're going
to find flaws.
If you're honest, we can find flaws in each other.
Like I could.
I.
If you follow me around for a week, you find a lot of flaws in
my life and probably vice versa.
But when we take our eyes off of ourselves, because.
Because that's really an egotistical, prideful thing.
Like, well, I'm just so worried about how I'll come across.
I'm going to be really worried about how people like what people
are going to say about me.
The moment we stop worrying about what people say about us when
we live for Christ is the moment that we can be used by God.
And so what I would say is this.
Romans, chapter 1, verse 16.
For I am not ashamed of the Gospel.
Like, are we ashamed of the Gospel?
That's a question that I want to ask.
It's a question that I'm asking myself.
And I would encourage you to think about this year in 2025.
What's my spiritual goals for.
For some of us, our spiritual goal should be to, to start reading
scripture because you, because you might not know all of the promises
of God.
You might not understand what God has said because you haven't
read it.
You haven't studied it.
And you know, all of us need that study.
All of us need to get into the word of God consistently and faithfully
and read.
But not just read, study, meditate.
And the word meditate just means to dwell on.
We all know what it means to dwell on something negatively.
So let's dwell on something positively in His Word.
It might be a prayer life.
You might need to grow in your area of prayer, communicating with
God.
Right?
Any relationship is based upon communication.
All of us that are married understand that.
All of us that have worked in a workplace understand that communication
is key.
And the way that we communicate with God is number one.
We hear him through His Word and we speak to him in prayer.
There's other spiritual disciplines, service within the church.
There's.
There's areas of, of witnessing evangelism, there's areas
of fasting and, and sacrifice and being allowed to be focused on
Him.
And the list goes on and on.
So what are your spiritual goals for 2025?
For.
For us, last year, it was to institute a specific time in which
we had family devotions.
And the busyness of life has pulled us a lot from that.
And what we have to do is we have to recalibrate and say, okay,
what matters, what's important?
For, for me, I'll just, I'll be real.
I, I have no reason to put up a front to you.
For me, my goal for 2025 is to pray more, pray more, always pray
more.
Someone asked me recently, how, how much should I pray?
And I answered more.
Like, what does more mean?
Well, if you're praying five minutes, pray six minutes, pray without
ceasing.
Biblically speaking, have a constant communication with God.
How much should I read more?
I'd encourage you to read through scripture.
I would encourage you to take that Bible reading plan.
And if you don't pick that one, there's plenty of great ones
on different apps that you can go through.
And I would encourage you to try to do that.
So what are your spiritual goals?
I don't want you to answer me right now, but I want you to pray
about that for the next few days.
Be praying about what your goals are.
Because if you don't set goals, what's going to happen?
Well, you're just going to kind of drift, right?
And I'm not saying that we should be checklist oriented as a
Christian because we know that it's more than that, but.
But all of us should put some sort of plan down that we say, you
know what?
This is what I'm going to strive to do in the power of God.
I'm going to ask him to give me strength to overcome the distractions,
to overcome the difficulties and say, you know, I need to do more
of this.
Maybe for you it's exercising in your spiritual discipline.
Maybe for you, you know, as we studied the spiritual gifts, you've
really narrowed down.
You know what, I'm a teacher or I'm a.
I have the gift of ministry, the gift of helps.
I have the gift of mercy.
How can I dive deeper into that spiritual gift or spiritual
gifts this year?
And it doesn't have to be within the confines of Middletown
Baptist Church.
It could be within your community, it could be within your
home, it can be within your workplace.
But I would encourage you to be thinking more and more about how
God is going to use you in 2025.
And so I would say a practical thing to do would be to write down
a list of spiritual goals for 2025 and then say, okay, how am I
going to go about doing these things?
Maybe you say, you know what?
I want to read my Bible more and I want to read some.
Some spiritual books.
Well, it's very easy to get started, get a book, start reading.
Okay?
You got to get started.
That's the biggest thing.
Maybe it's church attendance.
Now I'm speaking to a crowd that came out on a Wednesday night
of New Year's Day.
So that's really cool.
I'm glad you guys are out.
But maybe it's just being church.
You go, I need to be in church.
I need to be around other fellow brothers and sisters in Christ.
Maybe.
Maybe you need to.
Here's one thing I was hit with last year.
I was challenged with friendship.
You know, like, how many make meaningful friendships do I have
in the Lord?
You know, and.
And like, we get busy.
You know, my wife's my best friend, but there is an element of
iron, sharpening iron and being able to be around folks that
are of, like, faith, and.
And I think we need more of that.
And so, you know, maybe for some of us, you don't think about
friendship as a spiritual thing, but maybe for some of us,
we want to pursue more of what it means to be a godly friend and,
and grow in that regard.
Maybe it's parenting, maybe it's grandparenting, uh, maybe it's
in your marriage.
I don't know what it is.
But.
But maybe God has some spiritual goals for you as a.
As a couple, as a husband and wife, to say, you know, we're going
to do this together.
Maybe you have some goals within your workplace.
Maybe you say, I want to share the gospel with at least one person
this year.
You know, that's a.
That's a.
Sounds kind of trivial.
One person over a whole year.
But you know what?
If everyone shared the gospel with just one person in the year,
there would be a lot more gospel presented.
I'm going to tell you that.
And so I would encourage you, maybe think about someone in your
life and it doesn't have to be a complete stranger.
I think a lot of times we think about soul winning and evangelism.
I'm going to walk up to the scariest guy at the store and walk
up to him and give him a confrontation, and that might be
you.
That's fine.
Go for it.
But what I would say is that there are people in your life that
you probably have a relationship with that would hear
you out, that would understand you and know your life and say, yeah,
you know what?
I'll hear you out.
I respect your faith, and you might have an opportunity to share
with them why the Bible says on First Peter, chapter three, verse
15, give an answer for the hope that is within you.
And so people see your hope, give them an answer.
Give them an answer in Jesus Christ.
And so our spiritual goals in 2025 need to be individual goals.
But just as much as there's individual goals, we need to have
corporate goals.
We need to have goals within the church.
And for the next three Sundays, for the next three Sundays,
we're going to be going through three goals that I believe
this church, Middletown Baptist Church, should strive after.
In 2025, we're going to go through three goals.
On the third Sunday of the month, we are going to be launching
our church vision, and it's going to be one of those goals, and
it's going to be a really big thing.
We're really excited for it.
And I wouldn't.
I wouldn't say It's a reason to be afraid.
But it is going.
If, if we cooperate, if our church says we believe in this goal,
and I think it's a scriptural goal, I think it will stretch us.
It will stretch us.
It'll put us in a place that we might say, hey, I've never done
this before.
I've never gone and done something like this before.
But I guarantee you, as God stretches you, that's the way that
we grow.
Growing isn't always easy.
Actually, it's more difficult than we would expect it to be.
Sometimes there's growing pains.
And I would encourage you to be praying about how God leads you
this year.
How can you walk in newness of life?
And so I want you to think about what Revelation chapter 21,
verse 5 says, that God's going to make all things new.
How is he making things new in your life?
Are you noticing the newness of life?
Are you allowing it just to be like, well, you know what?
Same old, same old.
For me, I've been really challenged with walking differently
so many times as we've been saved for so long.
Many of us, most of us have been saved for a very long time.
We get so complacent.
We get so used to the gospel that we miss the grandeur and the
miracle of what the gospel really is.
And the gospel is everything.
The gospel is every.
Why.
Why do what we are doing without the gospel?
Right?
You could go, you know, you could join a social club and have
your friendships there.
You could join a sports team and go get your athleticism.
You could.
You could even join a charity and give food to the poor and needy,
which is a great thing.
But you can do all of those things and not have the gospel.
So.
So why are we doing what we're doing?
The gospel is the heartbeat.
The gospel is the root.
The gospel is the centerpiece.
And we say, okay.
Everything that we do is centered in the gospel.
It's centered in the gospel.
And so that's what we're going to be talking about here for the
next three weeks at church is what are our goals?
And so I'm not going to check you.
I'm not going to say, hey, as you head out tonight, I want a list
of all of your goals.
But if you would like to say, hey, Pastor, I've.
I've got a few goals that I would like to accomplish this year.
I would love to say, like, well, let me hear them.
Like, if you.
If you want to share them with me, you can.
And if you want to Say, like, hey, how can I accomplish these goals?
Like, like, I, I feel like God is calling me this way.
How could I get there?
And, and maybe, just maybe someone within the church has something
going on the same way, and we can get people together and we can
start working and collaborating and getting some of
these goals accomplished.
But I would say, hey, maybe you're like, I, I want to read some
more books on a different topic.
Maybe it's the topic of, I don't know, prayer or, or whatever,
heaven, and you want some reading materials.
I would love to point you in that direction.
Okay.
The, the purpose of the pastor is not to get up and just give you
content on Sunday morning.
That's one element.
The Bible says in Ephesians, chapter four, equipping the saints
for the work of the ministry.
So it's my job to give you every tool that you can, scripturally
speaking, to do what God has called you to do.
And so I want to help you in that.
And so let's, let's collaborate, let's get together,
let's talk.
Don't be ashamed of it.
Don't say, well, it's embarrassing, folks.
There's nothing more exciting for a Christian.
There shouldn't be anything more exciting for Christians to get
together and say, like, how can we talk about God working in
our life?
It's an exciting thing.
I love to get together with pastors sometimes and just say, hey,
what's your church doing?
And it's not about competition, it's not about jealousy.
It's like, hey, I want to see what God's doing at your church.
And then I'm just going to give you a little bit of a hint.
Hey, whose kid is that over there?
That's my kid.
So I can say that.
But one of the things, I'll give you a little, a little hint
and then we'll be done.
One of the things that we're going to be doing is collaborating
with other churches.
You've already seen us kind of do that already with, with our Christmas
Eve service.
And some people start getting nervous.
Whoa, collaborating with another church is that, that, that's
our competition?
Well, if they're a Bible preaching, solid church that we agree
with, there's nothing wrong with helping them out.
Okay.
The Bible says to go to Jerusalem, Judea, and to the uttermost
part of the earth.
And then it all.
I, I skipped one there.
Samaria.
Samaria is a place that we're not comfortable going and sometimes
going to another church and helping another church that might
need some help is, is a difficulty.
We go, well, if we help them, how we're losing that.
No, we're all part of the kingdom of God now.
We don't go to, we're not ecumenical.
We don't go to a church that doesn't believe the gospel.
We don't go to a church that practices things differently than
we practice them.
But we go and we help and we support other fellow brothers and
sisters.
Hey, we might even have opportunities to go outside of our
confines and support people in other countries.
We already do in our missions and giving.
You know, one of the things that I've been really challenged
with is sometimes we're willing to write a check, but we're
not willing to take a step.
And I think sometimes it might be that some of us that are able,
maybe we're not able to write a check, but we're able to go and
help.
That might be something that we can think about for our goals
in 2025.
And so I will stop there and save the rest for this Sunday.
Hope that you can come back for that.
Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church
podcast.
I hope that this sermon has been a blessing blessing for you.
You would like to find out more information about our church
or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org
or find us on Facebook or YouTube.
You can also email me directly at Josh Massaroiddletownbaptistchurch
dot com if you've enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe and follow
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Thank you so much.
God bless.
Have a wonderful day.