Hope Church LV Sermons
The Social Network :: Relationship Status Single
Amen. When God created humanity, He made us with a longing for relationships. It's not something we have to try to do. It's not something we have to learn. As humans, we are hardwired to desire meaningful relationships. That's why we all have such a stirring in our hearts some days when people look us in the eye and say, "I love you," or, "I appreciate you," or, "I'm glad that you're in my life." We have a longing to connect with other people. And our culture has not only recognized this, our culture has figured out a way to make money off of this. Over the past five years, there has been an explosion of social media platforms, ways that people can connect via the Internet. And the most popular by far of all of those social media platforms has been a website called Facebook.com. Facebook.com has 600 million users. Over 600 million people have an account on Facebook. I was looking for some other stats to show just how popular Facebook.com is, and I found this week that there was a couple in Northern Africa who were so obsessed with Facebook. They were so excited to have a tool like Facebook in their life that they felt it was appropriate to name their newborn baby Facebook. Now there's a lot of things that I love on the Internet, on television, but I don't know that I can name my child, Sports Center, or anything in that regard. I found another statistic. The numbers are in from the first quarter for Facebook. Did you know that over the past four months, January, February, March, and April, Facebook has recorded 80 million new users. There's a slide on the screen that makes that a little bit more bite-size. In the first quarter of 2011, there were 89,000 new users on Facebook every day. Every day for the first four months of this year, 89,000 people signed up a new account on Facebook. We have a longing for relationships, and we are looking for ways to express that. And for the past four weekends, we've been in a teaching series where we've been trying to get our heart and head around this reality that all of us long for relationships. And our series has simply been called the social network. And here's the question we've been wrestling with. What is God's perspective on our relationships? All of us have a ton of them. They look different. They feel different, but what does God have to say about all of these different types of relationships? And every week in this series, we've been addressing from a biblical perspective different relationships. In week one, we looked at a relationship with God. What does the Bible have to say about a relationship with God oddly is for us? We believe that one is the most important, but what does God have to say about it? In part one of this series, we laid down a defining statement that has really shaped a lot of the stuff we've talked about in this series. And here was a statement that's going to be on the screen for you. My capacity for loving others is born out of my love relationship with God. My capacity and your capacity, our ability to love other people is born out of us experiencing a love relationship with God and to the degree that you and I walk in intimacy with God. Second is to that degree that we will be able to love the people around us. That's a foundational statement that has affected every week of this series. And it doesn't matter what relationship you're talking about. If it's parents, if it's children, if it's brother, if it's friend, if it's boss, whatever the relationship, your capacity to love in that relationship ties back to your intimate love relationship with God. That was part one. Two, we looked at the relationship status of Christian. What does the Bible say about being a Jesus follower? How do we relate to Jesus? How do we relate to the church? How do we relate to the world and we talked about that in part two? Part three, we talked about the relationship status of parent. And we addressed from a biblical perspective what the Bible says about parenting and about passing on principles to the next generation. And last weekend we looked at the status of being married and pastor Vance walked us through 1 Corinthians chapter 13, most commonly known as the love chapter. And we talked about a biblical perspective on marriage. And this weekend we come to a very significant relationship status and that is the status of single. And I did some research this week just so we could all understand how many singles are actually in this city and around this city and I did Las Vegas. And I know there are people from Henderson and Boulder City who listen, but I want to share specifically in Las Vegas, what is the population of singles? When I put a couple slides on the screen, did you know that in Las Vegas, 55% of people here are married and the other 45% are single. And within that 45% of people who are single, here's a little bit more specific description. 25% of those singles have never been married. 14% of those singles have been divorced and according to Zillow.com, 6% of those singles are widowed. So as you can see from that statistic, we're talking about a very significant part of our population, almost 50% of our city is single. And I want to do my best this weekend in the time that I have to speak to all three of those groups. But if you hear this weekend and maybe you're married, this isn't a time for you just to check out because what we're going to talk about is obviously going to apply to YouTube but would also be great stuff for you to write down because these are principles that is your children go to high school, go to college and become adults. You can invest in their life in the days to come. So take your copy of God's Word and look with me at Psalms chapter 73. For most of us, if we just take our Bible and split it right down the middle, you should land pretty close to the Psalms and we're going to be in chapter 73 in just a moment. I'm going to read for us the last four verses, kind of the conclusion of this chapter in just a minute. But before I do that, I want to paint for you a picture of what we're about to read and what's going on at this stage in the scriptures. This Psalm was written by a man named Asif. Asif was appointed as a leader among the people of God by King David. Asif was a respected man. He was a leader. He was a solid believer. He actually wrote 12 chapters in the book of Psalms. But in this chapter we're going to read in just a moment and look at Asif is wrestling with some really tough stuff. He's asking some questions of God, some stuff internally that he is just wrestling with. And I think it gives us a clear picture into a guy who was a solid believer, like many of you are solid believers. It gives us some insight into a guy who is respected in the church, just like you all are respected in the church. And this guy wrestled with some tough questions. He begins the chapter by saying that he knows God is good. He knows God is good. But then he begins to think about people around him who are wicked, who actually have what he wishes that he had. And he begins to question God and say, God, these people are wicked. These people are mocking you, yet they have the very things that I want. God is it even worth it? Is it even worth following your commands and living my life to serve you? If I'm not going to get to experience satisfaction, and he wrestles with these things in this chapter. And then he comes to the conclusion, he actually goes to a sanctuary and he begins to be still before God. And God begins to speak to him and say, Asif, you know I'm your guide. You know I'm your counsel and you know I'm going to take care of you for eternity. But Asif has been wrestling with these things. So I want to read for us the conclusion of chapter 73. So we're going to put it on the screen for you at both of our campuses so that you can follow along with us. Psalm chapter 73 verse 25 says this, "Whom have I in heaven but you? And besides you I desire nothing on earth. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. For behold, those who are far from you will perish. You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to you. But as for me, the nearness of God is my good. I have made the Lord God my refuge that I may tell of all your works." What I want to do in our time together this weekend is I want to give you two principles that apply directly to singles. People in the room, people who will attend hope this weekend, who fall in the category of single. I want to give you some life application principles that are straight out of this passage that hopefully will give you some biblical perspective about what God says about the relationship status of single. And then I want to come back at the end and give a challenge to our entire church as it relates to singles. Here's the first principle I want us to look at this weekend. Very simple, yet very powerful. The ultimate pursuit of your life is to know God. The highest, the greatest, the most important, you could say the goal of your life is to know God. Look at what Asif says in verse 25, "Whom have I in heaven but you? Besides you, God, I desire nothing on earth, that word desire could also be said, satisfied." Asif is saying that satisfaction is found in nothing except for you. Another word you could insert there is the word delight. Asif is saying, "Lord, there is nothing that delights me like pursuing and knowing you." Another word you could insert there is the word pleasure. Asif is saying, "Lord, there is nothing in which I experience pleasure apart from pursuing and knowing you." He sets a precedent in verse 25 by saying the ultimate goal. The ultimate pursuit, the greatest aim in my life is to know God. Nothing can please us like knowing God, nothing can satisfy us or delight us like knowing our heavenly Father. Well, how does that translate over to a relationship status of single? Well, look at what Tony Evans said in his book, Single and Satisfied. He said, "God wants single people to seek Him, not to seek a mate in the sense that you're on a mission that comes to dominate your decisions and your commitments. You don't need to find the right one. You need to connect with the one who knows where the right one is." I want to read that last line again. You need to connect with the one who knows where the right one is. That's true and speaks right to the heart of the lie that so many singles in our culture have believed, which is that satisfaction is found in something other than pursuing and knowing Jesus. So many singles think it's too simple. So many singles think it's found in something else and what happens is they begin to pursue millions and millions of different things and are left empty-handed every single time. And I love the simplicity of this verse 25 in Psalms where he said, "Look, I have nothing else that can bring me satisfaction outside of pursuing and knowing you because the ultimate pursuit of your life as a single. Is it marriage? It's not relationships. It's not job status. It's knowing God." I want to put a statement up on the screen and it's going to have kind of a fill in the blank. And here's what it says. "I am pursuing blank more than anything else in my life." Now obviously in a church setting, there is one answer that is always right regardless of what the question is. But I want you to think for just a moment about your life because even though many of us may step up today and say, "The answer is Jesus." I don't know if we really looked a little bit closer at your life, if that would necessarily be true. I think there's a community maybe in our church and the way you would feel on the blank, it was something referring to dating. You're a single in this community and the thing that you're really hoping for, that you're aiming for right now that you're chasing faster and harder than anything is a date. That's what you're looking for based on your weekend schedule, based on the way you think and what you do, what you're aiming for, what you're pursuing right now is a date more than anything else. There's another group, maybe some of the single parents or some different people and what you're chasing right now is maybe a job or financial security. And that's what you're running after harder and faster than anything else. There are other people, maybe for you, you're pursuing life experience. You want to see some things happen maybe before you engage in a serious relationship or become married and what you're chasing after more than anything else is life experience. There are others of us and maybe you would feel on the blank with something to do with your appearance and you would say I'm pursuing an attractive appearance more than anything else in my life and if that takes surgery or that takes different things, I'm going to do what I need to do to get an attractive appearance because I believe that's what's going to bring me the real delight that I'm looking for and I know for a lot of singles the way you would feel on the blank is marriage. Based off what you think about or your heart drifts, what comes in the side of your mind when you see a certain group of people together, what you want, what you're pursuing more than anything else is marriage. But here's the reality and here's the principle that the greatest thing you and I can pursue above everything else is to know our heavenly Father because as we know Him, He transforms us and by us being transformed through intimacy with God, all of the other relationships past, present and future are made healthy as a result of our love relationship with God. The greatest thing you can do to bring satisfaction in your life today and satisfaction in your life 25 years from now is to pursue knowing Jesus. And for me, I spent a lot of my life missing that principle. Nobody ever told me that. Nobody ever said, look, you don't have to pursue a mate, you don't have to pursue marriage, you don't have to pursue all these things, your goal, your aim is to pursue Christ. I want to show you a picture from January 30th of 2009. This is a picture of my wife, Char and I on our wedding day. We got married up at Mount Charleston up in the snow in this warm, cozy lodge with a big fireplace, Pastor Vance actually did the ceremony and that night we confessed to each other that we were in it for life and we both said, I do and I got to be honest with you. There was a season of my life where I thought that when I got to that day, I had to do over, that whenever I got to that day where I was actually going to be married, that all the emotional stuff that I struggled with, all of the temptation type stuff that I struggled with and all of the issues in my life were going to be gone. And so if I could just put the right pieces in place to get to the day when I was married, all of that other stuff would go away. Well guess what happened? Much to my disappointment. We got married, we went away on our honeymoon and about a month later, we come back to Las Vegas and I'm sitting there in my living room and all the emotions have worn off and I start thinking, pursuing marriage, what in the goal. Because if I'm ever going to love my new wife, if I'm ever going to lead my family, if I'm ever going to provide for my family, I must, I must pursue intimacy with God. Because in and of myself, that can never happen. The ultimate goal in your life as a single person is to pursue after Jesus. That's what Asif is communicating here. He's looking up to heaven and saying, "God, there's no greater pursuit. There's nothing else that I can pursue that is greater, that is more powerful, that is more perfect than you." And here's what's easy to do. It's easy for all of us to think, "Well, I'll wait to take this area of my life seriously until this other area of my life is in place." We say, "Well, you know what? I'll take a relationship with God seriously. I'll take engaging in a church seriously once I actually have a family. Once I actually become a husband or a wife, but guess what? When that happens, it's too late. We begin to prepare for those relationships now by pursuing our heavenly Father. And then Asif moves from verse 25 to verse 26. And in verse 26, here's what he does. He begins to talk about some of the struggles for him in his pursuit of Christ. Look at verse 26. He says this. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." I think in verse 26, in that same vein of pursuing God, Asif points out three choices that every single person has every day, three very clear choices. And here's the first one. Every single person, every married person for that instance, but every person has to make three choices every day. Here's the first one. We must choose either to pursue purity or gratify our flesh. The first thing he says in verse 26 is this, "My flesh may fail." My flesh is not eternal. My flesh is not good. Paul's J. Stanford, when talking about the flesh says this, "Self is the fleshly carnal life of nature, the life of the first Adam, dead in trespasses and sins, thoroughly corrupt before God, the life in which there is no good thing in the sight of God." Here's what our flesh does. Our flesh tempts us so many days to think. You know what? This time I can put my faith in my flesh. This time I can trust my flesh. This time I can depend on my flesh, but in every instance what happens is we end up realizing it wasn't worth it because there's no delight in it. There's no joy in it. There's no satisfaction in it. But every day we make a decision to either pursue Christ and pursue purity or we choose to gratify the flesh. You know, the words above reproach, integrity are not words we hear a lot in our culture. You don't see those on billboards. You don't hear those in movies or on television, but guess what? This book, the scriptures, those words are all through the Word of God. And I hope today if you're a single, that this is an area of your life that you take very seriously and you don't just assume that everything is good. No, we need to be serious about guarding our heart, about guarding ourselves from the impurity, especially in a city like Las Vegas. But every day we make a decision to pursue purity to guard our heart or we choose to gratify our sinful nature. A book I read several years ago called When the Enemy Strikes was written by a guy named Charles Stanley and he gave some insight in that book that I've never forgotten. He mentions the four most highly potential times that you and I would choose to gratify our flesh, that even though we know the right words, we know what to do, we know what not to do. There are four times that for you and I, when we're caught in these moments, almost every time you and I will choose to gratify our flesh over pursuing purity. And it's an acronym, it's the word Halt, H-A-L-T and here's what he says. The time that you and I are most likely to gratify our flesh is when we're hungry, angry, lonely or tired. And in those moments, we are most likely as humanity to choose to gratify our flesh versus pursuing after purity when we're hungry, angry, lonely or tired. And here's why that's so important for a single person because most of the time, especially younger singles, they're the ones who think at one o'clock in the morning, it's a good idea to go to McDonald's, that they don't have a curfew and they're out all night doing different things and I'm just telling you if that's you and you fall in that category, you need to guard your heart because more than likely in those moments, you are wide open to falling into some type of temptation that would force you to gratify your flesh. You know, going up to high school, I was really messed up when it come to just relationships. I just, I just didn't get it. I thought it was something for me and I could do what I wanted to do and I was introduced to a book that I want to recommend to you if you're a young single or maybe you don't really have a clear idea of what a healthful relationship looks like and it's a book by a lady named Elizabeth Elliot and it's called Passion and Purity, Learning to Bring Your Love Life Under Christ's Control. This was a game changer for me. So much so that when I read this book, I realized just how messed up I was and I spent the next year of my life abstaining from any type of dating relationship. I said, I'm not ready. I need a year of simply pursuing Jesus and not paying attention to any other dating relationship. I'm just going to focus on my relationship with God and so if you're here, maybe a younger single or just want some clarity about what a healthy, pure relationship looks like, this book would be a phenomenal resource for you to check out but that's the first choice that we make every day to choose to pursue personal purity or we choose to gratify our flesh. Here's the second choice that Asif points out in verse 26. The second one is to believe the truth or to follow our emotions. He says not only my flesh may fail but he says my heart may fail. What goes on inside of my heart is not the truth. What goes on inside of my heart is not eternal. He says every time I've looked and thought that I could depend on my heart and the emotions that were going on inside of me, I have been wrong and every day when you and I wake up, you make a choice either to believe the truth that we know in the scriptures or to follow the leading of our emotion. Now we are emotional people and where there's nothing wrong with being emotional, there's something wrong and very dangerous when we choose to believe our emotions to be the truth. Because people will do crazy stuff when they're wrapped up in their emotions. Stuff that we would never normally do if we're thinking straight when we get wrapped up in our emotions every single time we do things outside of God's design. But every day we make a choice. We make a choice to say I'm going to stand upon the truth that I know in the scriptures or I'm going to make the choice to believe my emotion but listen, kingdom living is not based on your emotions. Everything in the context of the kingdom of God, pursuing a relationship with Jesus is not built around our emotions, it's built around what's true and I pray as you make the choice every day that you'll choose to disregard and understand that your emotions, your heart will lie to you but that you can trust and believe the words of God. But there's a third choice that Acef gives us in verse 26. Not only the choice of purity or gratifying the flesh. He also mentions believing the truth versus following our emotions but the third choice that he gives us here is to trust God or to doubt God. The rest of the verse says this, "My flesh and my heart may fail but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." Every day you and I make a choice to believe that God is in control and has our best interest at heart or he's not in control and he's just doing his own thing. Speaking of this last word portion, C.H. Spurgeon said this, "This is a metaphor taken from the ancient custom among the Jews of dividing inheritances whereby everyone had his allotted portion. As if he had said, "God is not only my rock to defend me but he is also my portion to supply my necessities and to give me the fruition of all good." That's what the Scripture speaks here when it talks about that God is our portion. God is going to give us what we need when we need it and all of us have the thoughts that say, "You know what I'm discouraged or I'm scared or I don't understand or this doesn't make sense." Pastor Vance gave us a principle a couple of weeks ago that I want to put on the screen and if I was guessing some of the people who have a very hard time really embracing this principle are singles because in most cases singles have a lot of questions. They have a lot of things that they don't understand. Let's put that slide up on the screen and here's the principle that Pastor Vance gave us. God has a plan for my life and it's a good plan. I want us to read that out loud both here at Silverado and also in Boulder City off the screen. One, two, three, God has a plan for my life and it's a good plan. That's true. In the Scripture in verse 26 says very clearly that God wants to give us our portion. He has a good plan for us and I know in my life the times that I doubted that the most is when I felt like God was withholding from me. I would look at the people around me and say, "Well, God, they have that. Why can't I have that? God, they're experiencing this. Why can't I experience this?" I felt like my Heavenly Father was withholding from me. That's what I've come to understand on the other side. The whole time God wasn't withholding from me. God was protecting me. God was protecting me from myself. He was protecting me from my own fleshly desires and as we navigate through life, every day we will make a choice either to trust God's plan or doubt God's plan and I pray that by faith on a regular basis, you can believe this principle that God has designed something for your life and it is a good plan. The first principle that I want to speak to every single in the room this weekend is that the ultimate pursuit, the ultimate aim of your life is to know God. Above pursuing marriage, above pursuing career, above pursuing anything else, the ultimate aim and chase and goal for you is to know God. Here's the second principle I would love just to share with you this weekend. Your singleness can be leveraged to impact God's kingdom. The season of life that you're living in right now is a single. It can be leveraged. God can use it to expand His kingdom among the nations. There are some people who would say that if you're married, you have a greater likelihood of being used by God than a person who is single. That in no way aligns with the scriptures. I had people tell me that I was ordained into the ministry at 21 years old and the night of my ordination service, someone said to me, Travis, God is using you in a great way. But God's going to use you in an even greater way once you get married. That was a blessing. I think sometimes we begin to operate as if God can use a married person, but God can't use someone who is single and that is just not the truth. Tony Evans says this, "You're calling as a single person. It's not just the current status you happen to be in. It is a part of your divine calling. The problem today is that many singles have differentiated their status from their calling. This creates trouble because it can lead them to focus their energies on trying to change their marital status while missing their calling as singles. If you're a single, your singleness is not just where you happen to be right now. It's where God has you right now. And there's a world of difference in those two outlooks. Your singleness can be leveraged to impact the kingdom of God. Look at what he says in verse 28. Asaph says for me, "The nearness of God is my good." You could also translate that as best. God being near me means my best. He says, "I have made the Lord God my refuge that I may tell of all your works." Jesus does a link here between God being near and us sharing in his activity. And for every single in the room, I would love for you to embrace this weekend that as you pursue God, as you pursue Christ and he presses his life out through you, you will be used in the context of the kingdom of God regardless of your relationship status. Here's what I believe God is hoping for you. He's wanting you to get to a place that even though there's emotions, even though there's flesh, even though there's a lot of stuff going on inside of you, you can truly say in your heart of hearts, "God, regardless of where you lead me, Jesus, I believe you are enough." That's a big moment. A lot of people aren't ready to say that. But I believe as we find ourselves there saying, "Jesus, apart from the status or the relationships or the dating or the job or all these other things that I'm being tempted to pursue Jesus, I believe you're sufficient. I believe you're enough. We will see God take those people to a new level and use them in his kingdom. Two ways I want to share with you that God wants to leverage your singleness to expand his kingdom and we're going to be finished. Here's the first one. God wants to leverage your time. God wants to leverage your time as a single individual to impact his kingdom. In most cases, those who are single have more time to serve, more time to invest, more time to get involved in what God is doing than those who are married. There's just more time available and here's what I hope. I hope that if you're a single and you do have that amount of time that you're not wasting it, that you're not spending that time doing things for yourself, spinning your wheels but you are conscious and maybe even tonight begin to ask God, Lord, how can you use the abundance of time that I have in my life right now as a single person and leverage it to expand your kingdom? Here's the second way God wants to use you. God wants to leverage your opportunities. There are people in your life right now because you're single that if you were married, wouldn't be in your life. I hope for you as you navigate through the circles of influence that you have that you're constantly asking the question, "God, I know you want to use me. I know you have a good plan for my life. Who around me do you want me to begin to invest in? Do you want me to begin to love and care for who is in my circle of influence right now?" God wants to use the opportunities you currently have as a single person to expand his kingdom. The goal of your life is to know him and he wants to use this season, this time of singleness to expand his kingdom. So with all that being said, I want to ask every person in the room a question. And I hope this is a question that challenges you. I hope this is a question that maybe makes you re-evaluate how you've been operating for the past season of your life, specifically if you're in the room and you have a family and you're married or maybe you're older, here's the question. How is God leading your family to serve the singles in this church? There are people sitting all across this room who are single. You know what they would love to see? You know what I would have loved to have seen when I was single? More people step up and say, "You know what? I want to show you what a healthy family looks like. I want you to come over this weekend." And let's just hang out. Not a Bible study, not talking spiritual, just hang out with me and my family and I want to show you what a healthy family looks like. Maybe God would lead you to serve and you would say, "You know what? Once a month, I'm going to find a single in our church and I'm just going to take them to lunch." And I'm just going to encourage them. I'm going to ask them about their time with God. I'm going to ask them if they have any questions just about life in general. Maybe for you, we'd begin to invest through writing cards or sending emails or giving phone calls to people who live in the context right now of this city, a very transient city. And just say, "I want to encourage some people." There are a list of ways that you can begin to serve singles in this church who are longing for someone just to walk up and put their arm around them and care for. Maybe God would put in your heart to begin to really invest in some single parents who quite honestly are struggling. I have no idea how God might prompt your heart, but I want to challenge you tonight as we move to a time of invitation in just a moment to ask God, "Lord, how would you use me? How would you use my family to serve the singles that come to this church weekend and week out?" If you're single here, I hope for you, your ultimate pursuit is knowing Him. I hope that you recognize God desires with great passion to use you in His Kingdom. Not tomorrow, not next year, but today. And I hope for us as a church, we can begin to look around us and see how we can serve people, singles right here in our fellowship, that desire a deeper level of relationship, that desire people to care for them, to mentor them, to walk with them.