Gateway Church's Podcast
You Be You
If you have your Bibles, turn with me to Genesis chapter 1 and Psalm 139. The message today is entitled, "UBU." UBU. Today I want to share with you two spiritual truths that have absolutely changed my life. Two spiritual truths that have set my world on fire. And I have been so excited and anxious just to come and share this message with you. Some of you know that I was raised Catholic and a good Catholic family of one of seven children, because in my Catholic archdiocese, if you didn't have at least five kids, they didn't consider you Catholic, really, and I remember as a small child, because I was an altar boy for all of those years and I remember going to Catholic school and Catholic school as a first grader. One of my first real images of God was formed and several times during the week we would have mass as part of our school day, and remember as a six-year-old sitting in this grand cathedral at Holy Ghost Catholic Church with the marble and the gold and the incense and the candles and the statues and that tall ceiling, several stories high, and on that ceiling, the size of at least this ceiling was a painting around mural and it was a portrait of God. And God was there in his long white flowing robe as it blew in the wind and he had long white flowing hair and it too was blowing in the wind. And he had his foot on top of the earth, which was very small at his foot. In Isaiah 66 and verse 1, the Bible says that the earth will be his footstool. And so he had this image of God in a long white flowing robe and long white flowing hair with the earth as his footstool and as a small child, a six-year-old, I had two thoughts. The first thought was I didn't know that there was wind and outer space. That was an instrument. The second thought I think was perhaps a little more profound. I thought to myself as a six-year-old, I thought if God is that big and the earth is that small, I mean, if God is really that big and the earth is that small in comparison to God and I know I'm what a spec on that earth, then there's no way that God knows who I am. I mean, there's just no way God knows me. I am utterly insignificant if God is that big and the earth is that small. And then as I progressed in age when I got to be about age 12 in the Catholic faith, you go through confirmation and during confirmation you entered a time when you need to go into the confessional box to say your sins to the priest and our Catholic Church, there were two confessional boxes and then the priest box in the middle. And there were very small little boxes, smaller than the smallest closet you could imagine. And when you entered into the confessional, it was pitch dark in there. You could not even see your hand in front of your face, very intimidating to a 12-year-old. And I would sit there on the kneel, I would kneel, and I would wait my turn and then finally the wooden window would open and through the scrim the bright beautiful light would shine from that priest box into that now lit confessional box and you would say these words, "Bless me father, for I have sinned." It's been way too long since my last confession or whatever you would say. And for the next few moments, you would tell that priest your deacon's darkest sins. You would share all the sins that were within you and the reason why I had to do that was because I didn't, I knew this, God didn't know who I was. I couldn't tell God my sins because God didn't know who I was and I was begging on the fact that he knew who the priest was, or I was in serious trouble. But that's the image I had of God, all the years when I was growing up. And then when I was 18 years old, of age, I went away to college in the first semester of my freshman year, December 14, 1980. This Catholic kid, for the first time in his life, walked into a non-Catholic service. It was a Pentecostal church. And let me tell you something, it was Pentecostal. And on December 14, 1980, on that Sunday morning, first time in a non-Catholic mass, I walked in aisle and I gave my heart to Jesus Christ. It was a defining moment in my life, changed my world forever. And in the days that followed, I began to realize something I'd never realized in all of my life. For 18 years, it had been hidden from me, but I began to realize that not only does God know me, God loves me. Not only does he know me, he cares for me. Let me ask you this question. God image of God is painted on the canvas of your heart today. Who are you in God's eyes? Do you know who you are? Because God knows you. God loves you. The Bible says God made you. My first point today is this, you were created in the image of God. Not only does he know you and he loves you, God made you and catch this. He made you just like him. That's how incredible you are today. That's how special you are. It took me 18 years to realize that simple, scriptural truth. But as I read Genesis chapter 1 for the first time, I came across these words in verse 26, because let me tell you something today, you matter to God. You are an incredible person that God has made and you are made in the image of God. In the Genesis story of creation, this is what it says in verse 26. The Bible says, "Then God said, 'Let us make man in our image.' He's talking to the spirit and to the sun. In our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air over the livestock, over all the earth and over all the creatures that move along the ground. So God created man in his own image. In the image of God, he created him, male and female, he created them." You may have read that a hundred times, but I want you to capture it not just in the understanding of what the Bible is saying, but a captured in your heart and your spirit today. You are made in the image of God himself. You look like God. He knows you and he loves you deeply. That's what it says in Psalm 139, Psalm 139 verse 1 says this, "Lord, you have searched me and you know me." And then verse 13, skip down a few verses, this is what it says in verse 13, "For you created my inmost being, capture this. You knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Your works are wonderful. I know that full well. My frame was not hidden from you when I was made in the secret place. When I was woven together in the depths of the earth, your eyes saw my unformed body." Notice this, "All the days were day for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." Isn't that incredible? I mean, think of this, God, the creator of the universe, paid so much attention to you that God Himself was the one there, actually forming and knitting you together in your mother's womb. That's how well He knows you. He's known you from the very beginning and the Bible says that even before you took your first breath, God had already ordained every one of your days for you. So not only does He know you, not only does He love you and care for you, not only are you made in His image, but you are made with the purpose, and He has a specific plan for your life that He wants for you to fulfill because your days have been ordered of the Lord and you are incredible in the eyes of God. That's good news today. That's good news. Bible says in Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 10, it says, "For we are God's workmanship created in Christ Jesus to do good works which God has prepared in advance for us to do." You weren't God's workmanship. The Greek word there for workmanship is the word poema. And the word poema means workmanship, it also means artwork or a piece of work. So in a very biblical sense today, let me tell you something, you're a piece of work. I just want to let you know that. You're a piece of work. In fact, could you do this for me, would you turn to the person you're left and right and would you say this to them, say, "I'm a piece of work." Just tell them that right now. You want to know the funny thing from my vantage point, I could tell which one of you were married to whom. Because you would say to that what your spouse would say, "I'm a piece of work." And I could see him saying, "Oh, I know you're a piece of work. I've been living with you for 20 years." You don't have to tell me you're a piece of work. It's not a revelation. Have you ever been around someone that just had a newborn baby? I'd love to watch adults, grown people around small children, especially a newborn child because they sit there and they digress into baby talk. And they sit around and try and analyze and figure out who this baby looks like. Does it look like the mother or the father? I know I think he has your eyes and her. I remember when our daughter Megan was born 16 years ago today. In just a few moments, not more than an hour after, Megan was born, we had some friends that were there and they came into the room and it was maybe only 20 minutes after she was born. And you know, they're just a brand new baby and they were trying to figure out who she looked like. And the bad child was like 20, 30 minutes old and they say, "Oh, Penny, she has your eyes." And they say, "Oh, John, she has your nose." I'm thinking to myself, "Her nose is all pushed in from the delivery. She looks like you just went 15 rounds with Rocky. I sure hope that's not the nose she ends up with." They try and figure out what that baby looks like. In fact, it was just a couple of weeks ago, they had a couple and they don't attend gateway with the some friends of ours and they had a newborn baby, it was her first child. And they were showing me the pictures from just shortly after the delivery, those first baby pictures. And I'm going through it, I'm flipping through picture after picture. And these parents, first child, are beaming with pride, you can just see it just oozing out as they're sharing what happened and as I'm looking through the pictures, I just had this thought. I didn't share this, but I just had this thought I thought, "That's the ugliest baby I've ever seen in my life. Don't get self-righteous with me. You've seen ugly babies before, sitting in church and getting self-righteous." And I look at those pictures and I thought, "That's a cone-head blotchy red, and it's going to get better, but that's an ugly baby." But see, not in the eyes of those parents, see in the eyes of those parents, they saw the most beautiful child in the world, because that baby looked just like them. That baby was made in their image, but one day that child will look like them, eventually we end up acting like our parents and sometimes smelling like them too, but that's another thing. The child, the perspective is different. In my eyes, I saw a baby and their eyes, they saw the most beautiful child in the world. I have this vision of heaven. You don't have to agree with the vision, but just let me have it. See, I know in heaven there's the pearly gates and streets of gold and mansions, whatever. But there's also this. I didn't know if you realized it. In heaven, there are hallways after hallways, as long as the eye can see, hallway after hallway after hallway in heaven. You say, "Well, why John do they have so many hallways in heaven?" Well, it's simple. When you have those baby pictures, when you have those pictures of your children, what do you do? You put them in the frame and you stick them on the wall. Well, God is a very proud father, you see, and he's got a lot of children. Biles says in 1 John chapter 3 and verse 1, it says, "How great is the love the Father has lavished on us, that we might be called the children of God." And that's who we are. You see, in heaven there's hallway after hallway after hallway, because God has a lot of children. And on the hallways of heaven, somewhere on one of the walls of heaven today hangs a picture of you, a child of God. But it's not the picture that you see of yourself. I mean, when was the last time someone took a picture of you and you were thoroughly impressed with what you saw? It doesn't happen very often. You pick out, because you know the faults and the flaws and the hair and the makeup. You know the imperfections, but let me tell you something today. In heaven this morning, in heaven today, there is a portrait of you hanging on the hallways of heaven, and God framed it himself, but it's not a picture of the way you see yourself. It's a picture of the way God sees you, and when God looks at that picture of you hanging on the hallways of heaven, he's a proud father. He looks at you, and he has a smile on his face, because he remembers the day when he knit you together, and your mothers won't. And you're a piece of work. God made you just the way you are. So here's my point. You be you. You be you. See, the problem we face so often is an identity crisis. People who are not sure who they are, and you need to hold on to that image of who you are in God, and that picture that hangs on the hallway of heaven, because Satan's going to come up, and he's going to attack you, and he's going to tell you that you're not all that, that you're not what I've said you are, what the Bible says you are, that you're not that special, that God doesn't know you, he doesn't know your problems, he doesn't hear your prayers, and the enemy's going to come against you and say, listen, you don't need to listen to that, because that's not who you are. And there are so many people who spend their whole lives searching for their true identity. And at the end of the day, they're frustrated because their pursuits fall empty because they're looking in the wrong place. They've bought into the lie of the enemy. They don't understand what it means to be made in the image of God. And some of you are here today, and you know exactly what I'm talking about. Some of you here today, you've been searching to find your identity and your self-worth in the wrong places. Maybe it's been through the affections of someone or through the approval of others or your appearance, the way that you look. And don't get me wrong, there's nothing wrong with being mindful of your appearance. I mean, several of you may comment, I've been losing weight over the last several months. In fact, since the first of the year, I've lost now 60 pounds. I have 20 pounds to go, pray for me, the last 20 is proving to be harder than the first 60. I didn't do it, but for some vain reasons, I did it for very simple reasons. I wanted to be alive to walk my daughter down the aisle one day. I wanted to fulfill everything that was in my divine destiny, so I wanted to live a long life to serve God and others. And I didn't want to stand in front of people and talk about how they need to be self-disciplined and have them look back at me and say, "Well, when are you going to start?" So there's some reasons why I think we need to be conscious of our appearance. But if your appearance is what defines you, if you find value or worth in how you look or the clothes you wear or the title behind your day, let me just tell you something. You're looking in the wrong places. If the opinion of other people is more important to you than the opinion of God, then let me just say this. We have the wrong opinion. This is what the Bible says in Proverbs 1, chapter 29 and verse 25. Verse 29 and 25 says, "The fear of human opinion disables. Trusting in God protects you from that." What's shaping your sense of self-identity and self-worth today? The opinions of others, the voice of the enemy, you desire to be loved or liked by someone? Were you more concerned about how God sees you? See, I think it's important for some of us today to start listening to what the Bible says and understanding who we are through the words of Scripture and not be so concerned about what the impression or image or opinions of others are. And as I was thinking about that, I asked the Lord in my time of study and preparation. I said, "Lord, who am I through your Word? Help me understand from your Word, who am I today and who are the people of gateway?" And in just a matter of 10 minutes or so, the Lord gave me a whole list of scriptures that came flooding back to my mind. I want to share with you today, let me tell you who you are today from God's Word. You are born of God and the evil one cannot touch you, 1 John 5. You are a child of the most high God, John 1, verse 12. You are complete in Christ, Colossians 2-10. You are free forever from all condemnation, Romans 8, chapter 1. You are strong and mighty in His strength, Philippians 4-13. You are marked with the seal of the Holy Spirit Ephesians 1-13. You are God's greatest creative expression, Genesis 1-27. You are a citizen today of heaven, Philippians 3-20. You are inseparably loved by God Himself, Romans 8-28. You are a royal priest in the spiritual house of God, 1 Peter 2-9. You are more than a conquer through Jesus Christ, Romans 8-37. You are set free to live free, John chapter 8, verse 36. You are bought with the price and you are blood washed, 1 Corinthians 6-20. You are completely justified by faith, Colossians 2-16. You are the unmerited recipient of God's amazing grace, Ephesians 2-8. That's who you are today. That's who you are. And the next time someone tries to tell you anything different, you just get in their face and you tell and you say, "I know who I am and I know who I am and I'm a piece of work." We just tell them that. You be you. You be you. In all of our lives we have defining moments, times in our lives we have to make a choice. Are we going to believe what the world says we are, with the enemies of God say we are, or are we going to believe God? All throughout Scripture we see this truth coming out. I think of Samuel who was commanded by God to go to the house of Jesse to anoint the new king. And it was going to be one of the sons of Jesse. So Jesse lines up his sons and Samuel goes in line one to the other. None of them were the ones God was going to commission as the new king. And Samuel says, "Is this all Jesse? These are all your sons." He said, "Well, there's the shepherd boy, the youngest David." He said, "Go bring him here." He said, "He's just a shepherd boy." He said, "Bring him, I'll wait." And when David shows up on the scene, God says to the prophet, he says, "This is the one to anoint. This is the new king. My hand is upon him." You see where David's father saw a shepherd boy. God saw a king. And they changed David's life because David now embraced who he was through the eyes of his God. You see this throughout Scripture, I think of a woman of the well. Others saw her as a reprobate sinner, someone who was a disgrace to society. But one day Jesus showed up and he saw a child who lived in God. And when he told her who she was, it changed her life because she saw herself not through the opinions of everyone else, but through the eyes of God through her Savior Jesus. The same is true with Zacchaeus or Peter who was fishing with his father and his brother. And Jesus says, "Come and follow me." Changed his life because time and time again, whether it's Esther or Gideon or memories in Scripture, there was a defining moment in their lives when they had a choice to make. They could either continue to see themselves through their own faults and flaws or they could choose to see themselves through the Word of God and the revelation of God because they were fearfully and wonderfully made. And God has an incredible plan on your life and you are special and we tell you something. You're a piece of work. God has made you just the way you are. Not the way someone thinks you should be, not through what some society magazine tells you you should be, not through some television program, but the way God sees us. You be you. You be you. You say, "God, why are you so passionate about this? Why are you so excited to share this message? Let me tell you why." It's because I know if I can just help you see yourself today through the eyes of God the way God sees you, it's going to change your world. It's going to set you free to be. Everything God has made you to be. Because you've been called and saved and set free and delivered and empowered and gifted of God to be everything God has made you to be, if you will just be you. I love the way that Stuart Brisco, pastor and author, he writes in one of his books and he says this, "If we spent more time teaching people who they are in Christ, we would not have to spend as much time telling them what to do." See, you matter to God, but here's the question I ask you today. How much does God matter to you? You matter to God. You're made in his image. My second point is this, you are called to become like him. You are called to become like God. You are called to become like his son, Jesus Christ. You are called to become a disciple of Jesus and that's more than just attending a Bible study or even reading their scriptures. To become like Jesus is the mark of a true disciple. In the days of Christ, a disciple was one who would follow after a rabbi. Usually a boy would be 15 years old or 16, he would have completed his formal education and have got it really empowered him in a special way. He would approach a rabbi with authority and he would say, "Rabbi, can I be your disciple?" The rabbi would look him up one side and down the other because what that meant was that young boy. If that rabbi accepted him, that boy would leave everything. He would leave his family, he would leave the family trade, he would leave his home and from the next 15 or 16 years, he would follow in the footsteps of his rabbi because the number one desire of his heart was that he would be a disciple of that rabbi. And the goal of any disciple in the day of Christ was that after time spent with the disciple with the rabbi, that disciple would begin to think like their rabbi thinks. And then after time that they would begin to act like their rabbi acts, would this supreme goal in mind that every disciple, the disciples of Jesus would become one day just like their rabbi, that was their ultimate goal. I don't know if you've studied this or not, but just kind of a side note, studying one day and over the last several months actually how Jesus called his disciples and so often we get this image in our mind that the disciples of Jesus were middle aged men and sometimes older men, you look at some of the portraits and paintings and these guys were some years older than Jesus. And when you go back and dig into the history, that's just probably just not true. It's much more likely that the disciples of Jesus, those early followers, those twelve disciples, average age, probably 16 or 17 years of age, your typical sophomore junior in high school. I don't give you many reasons why, let me give you just a few reasons why we can look at that and see through scripture and history that Jesus followers, those who were called to become like him were mere boys. It would be highly unusual if not remotely possible that any man in his 30s or 40s would begin to follow a rabbi who had authority. It just didn't happen. Like I said, the average age was 15, 16 years of age. Also in that day, young men married about the age of 20 and girls would marry about the age of 13 or a few months after they blossomed into womanhood and that's one of the reasons why there's so many widows in the Bible is there's such an age difference in the way marriages took place in the time of Christ. Well, in scripture, you're going to find among the disciples that there's only one that's mentioned who was married. Peter. In fact, the passage is shared in scripture where Peter brings Jesus into his home in Capernaum and when they arrive at Peter's home, his wife is there and his mother-in-law is there, but she's ill and as Jesus enters in and finds Peter's mother-in-law ill, he heals her, which is just a good move on many fronts, by the way, she gets up and serves them. So we know Peter was married. We have no reference of any of the other ones being married and if he's still not convinced that that still doesn't interest you, one of the things we've got to keep in mind is among most scholars, the book of Revelation, written by John the Apostle, John the Beloved, was written about 95 or 96 AD, it's pretty late. And we find in Matthew chapter 17 an interesting story, kind of seals the deal for me. We find in that passage where Jesus and his disciples, all of them, are entering into Capernaum and in that day there was a temple tax that was due according to Leviticus, every young man, 20 years of age, every man, 20 years of age or older, had to pay a temple tax of two drachma. Every male, 20 years of age and older, had to pay the temple tax, two drachma. Jesus enters into the city and a few of the tax collectors come to Peter and say, "Hey, doesn't your master believe in paying the temple tax?" And Peter said, "I'll ask." So Peter goes to Jesus and Jesus says, "I know what they're asking. Do this Peter. I want you to go down and I want you to go fishing, but take the very first fish." In Matthew chapter 17 and verse 27 this is what it says, "Jesus is talking to Peter and these are his instructions. He says, 'Go to the lake and throw out your line. Take the first fish you catch. Open its mouth and you will find a four drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my temple tax and yours." What about the other disciples? Were they just on their own? Were they only ones that needed to pay the temple tax, the only men of age, Jesus and Peter? Now that's not going to change anyone's world today, but what I want you to get is a mental image, a picture of what it really means to be a disciple because these young men gave everything up, their families, their livelihoods, and they were following their rabbi Jesus. And their supreme goal, the goal of any disciple is to think like your rabbi things, so that you can learn to act like your rabbi acts, so that you can become just like your rabbi. In fact there was a saying in ancient times, the times of Christ, because these disciples every day would follow literally the footsteps of their rabbi wanting to soak in all of his teachings and they would get covered with whatever the rabbi was walking in. And as they would enter into the town for the evening to bed, it was very customary for town people to give a blessing over the disciples as they would enter in and become popularized a little today. But here was the blessing that they would give, as these young disciples would enter into town they would say this, "May you be covered in the dust of your rabbi." May you be covered in the dust of your rabbi. In other words, may you be so close to your rabbi, may you listen so intently to his teaching and follow his leading and walk in his footsteps that you are covered and consumed by your rabbi. Let me tell you something today, as disciples of Jesus Christ, the call of God in our lives is to become just like our rabbi Jesus. I don't we made in his image. God calls us to become just like his son. And in order to become like Jesus, we need to be comfortable living in what I call the illogical logic of Jesus. Because Jesus teaches us this, he says, "If you want to be rich, then you need to become poor. If you want to be first, be last. If you want to be happy, mourn. If you want to be strong, become weak. And if you really want to live, if you really want to live, then you need to die." That's the teaching of Jesus Christ. So the disciples of Jesus understood that to be like Jesus was the supreme call on their lives. And this is what Jesus says to you and I, you and me, as he says it to his disciples Matthew 16 verse 24, "When Jesus calls us to follow him, friends, being a disciple of Christ is more than what this world makes it out to be. We need to die to ourselves." Jesus says this is his charge to us in Matthew 16 verse 24. Jesus says, "If anyone wants to come after me, if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. If whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will find it. Deny yourself, take up your cross, follow me." I know taking up our cross is not a popular message, it wasn't popular then, it's not popular now. But Jesus did not come to be popular, he came to change the world. And I've heard many people kind of explain what it means to take up my cross, what's my cross to bear? Let me just set the record straight today. Your cross to bear is not your spouse, and it's not your boss, and it's not that co-worker that you struggle to get along with, and it's not that neighbor who allows their dog to leave deposits on your front lawn. It's not your cross to bear, do you want to know what your cross is to bear? Your cross is this, it's to become just like Jesus. That's your cross. That's my cross. I love what Paul writes to the Philippian Church in chapter 3 and verse 10, this is what he says, "capture this." He says, "I want to know Christ and the power of His resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in His suffering. Capture this, becoming like Him in His death." Isn't that your prayer today? Becoming like Him in His death, that's not a very popular thing. The death of crucifixion was not an easy path. The Romans knew two ways in which to kill people. They knew the cheap and easy way, the fast way, and they knew the painful, difficult, costly way. Cheap and easy way, they did often, usually by the sword. The costly, painful, expensive way was by crucifixion, and they would take a criminal who had been condemned, and first they would flog them or beat them within a half-inch of their life, and then they would take that bloodied body, that bloodied back that they had just beaten, and they would place a cross beam on it, and their effort was to try and do two things. They wanted to inflict maximum pain on the criminal, and they wanted to inflict maximum shame, and so they would parade Him through the city streets, and then finally out to His place of death. That's what they did to our Savior, Jesus. He who knew no sin became sin for us. He took our pain, and He took our suffering, and He took our sin on His back, and literally as He walked through the streets of Jerusalem, He took on that suffering for us. And Jesus Christ showed us what it was to be a woman or a man of the cross, deny yourself, take up your cross. Not a pretty picture, but that's the life that Jesus calls us to today. I have this question for you. Are you a person of the cross? Are you? Have you given your life to God and said to the Lord, "Take my life, whatever you do with me, Lord, take my life." I deny myself. I just want to love you and serve you all the days of my life. Are we people of the cross today? Galatians 2 and verse 20, this is all Paul writes, and it summarizes this whole point. Paul writes to the churches and the region of Galatians, and he says, "I have been crucified with Christ, and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I live in my body, I live my faith in the Son of God who loves me and gave Himself for me." Listen to me, if you really want to know what it is to live today, if you want to live in the fullness of God, the pathway is not an easy one, but it is very clearly marked out. In order for us to really live, we've got to be willing to die to ourselves. What is it today that you need to die to so that you can really live? Let me tell you something, you're a piece of work. You are made in God's image. You are fearfully and wonderfully made. You are special today and don't let anybody tell you anything different, but you are called to a life of selfless sacrifice. You see, the cross today is not the sign of simple suffering and pain. The cross today is the sign of selfless sacrificial love. It's a sign of victory for us today. If we will embrace the cross and become like Jesus and be covered in the dust of our rabbi, would you bow your heads with me, please, close your eyes.