This teaching will be personal for our churches in Living Fellowship, but I hope the message will resonate with all who read it. I’ll start by saying that my life in the church turned out to be completely different than what I expected when I was a young man. Who knew that the story of God could be so personal in all of our lives. It’s one thing to go to church and hear good teaching and preaching. It’s altogether something else to have God drop His story into your life with a group of people. When that happens, all of you will experience God in a way that is felt to the very core of your being. I can say now that we have experienced different parts of the story of God in our personal life. Stories that we see so clearly in the Bible.
It hasn’t only been knowledge of the word of God that we’ve received. It has been duplicate accounts that the people of God in the Bible experienced, and we have been made partakers of it together. I just wanted to be a preacher at any cost in my early days. Give me a chance to have a ministry filled with good works, powerful preaching, and of course, lots of fame. This type of ministry was always on the to-do list as a young preacher. I was raised to be a pentecostal preacher, so emotion and hype were a big part of success. The louder, the better. I didn’t know God had other plans, but I’m glad He did. What was missing back then was the story of God in my life, or at least the awareness of it.
As I grew up and learned the Bible more intently, I realized that it is one fantastic story that never departs from its course to bring you from the beginning to its grand finale. In our early days, we were taught that picking verses out of the Bible to fit our situation was ok, so we lived our lives without having the context of what the writers were saying. Whatever verse I could find to fit my need, that’s the one I would use to comfort me. This way of thinking never joined us to His story; it just helped us create our own, away from Him, while using His word to do it. Everything in the Bible is joined to the story that God is telling, so what makes us think that our lives would be any different?
God started our story.
Today, looking back at the last 25 years, I can see an amazing story that God has put together for all of us. For those who have hung in there to remain with us, you can testify that God has been faithful through it all. It probably wasn’t what you expected either, but then again, it never is, and that’s good for us in the end—our expectations when serving God as young people are usually always wrong. God has bigger plans for us that we can’t always see. He is the author, which makes Him in charge of our story, which is His story.
Anyone who has a gift to speak and gather people can go anywhere and be successful. Christian people love good teachers. But just doing something for God is easy. That doesn’t make it right, but you can do it just the same. That way is shallow thinking. It usually turns out to be a one-person mission where you stand alone out front while everyone else follows you. That’s how good people fall. You can tell a story through one person's perception, but it’s always better to see it through multiple parts that provide more than one witness. Every perception is essential to getting the whole story. That’s why the Bible is so good at repeating the same story over and over through different people and different situations. The more accounts you have of one story, the more perceptions of God you see.
Being part of God’s story is much greater than a one-person mission. In a story, you have many parts connecting to God. Your life becomes a personal connection with Him and all the other parts. These different parts are people, of course. This connection unifies us together as one story the same way God’s word unifies us together as one body. This connection is joined to Him rather than just thinking of yourself and satisfying your need to be doing something on your own. Just look at the people of God in the Bible. The most valuable to God were the ones that partook of His story and made it a part of their life. Some people today go to church, and that's all they do. They attend and are faithful in a small amount of their life. When you read about Noah, Abraham, Samuel, Hannah, Sara, Daniel, Joseph, Peter, Paul, and many others, they were not just churchgoers; they were part of a story that God was telling through them. It was much bigger than their personal life. They were a part of something great that God started.
Let's get to the heart of what I’m saying.
What about you? Are you part of His story today? Anyone who has stayed close with us over the last 25 years has been in this story that God is telling. He’s using it to teach the children of His heavenly host, using us as His witnesses. Not that we are the only story in the world, God can tell many different stories in different places, all at once. But this story is our story, and we get to live it the way God gives it to us. When you look at what our churches have been through together, we see that this was not random; it was purposed of God. I may not have always enjoyed every minute of it, but looking back now, I am very grateful to be a part of this beautiful revelation. Coming through the tribulation and overcoming the man of sin has been a sweet reward for enduring the reality of this story. It’s a true story that hits home every day. If you were to ask me if the Bible really happened, I would say yes with great confidence. Why? Because I am living it with you, and we are here to tell the story of it. And there is much more to experience before we leave this world.
Some lived a small part of this story but decided it wasn’t for them. They separated from us, but I fear they left God’s story for their own. I pray for everyone whom I have ever loved and rejoice to see a day when I am reunited with them. I have seen many people in our world try to live alone in God’s story. It never works. People bounce from church to church looking for what fits their needs instead of God’s. I hear people say that God is spiritual, saying I can serve Him anywhere. If this sounds like you, you are deceived. You need to be connected with others so the story can continue under God’s guidance.
For us, we must continue together to see this story through to the end. We have seen this story unfold before our eyes. We have been in the garden, innocent and unashamed, only to be seduced to go astray with hasty intent. We left our first love and wandered in pride and exaltation. We have seen the Lord’s salvation in delivering us from the captivity of an oppressive ruler. We have journeyed through the law and discovered our sins and were found wanting. We received the prophecies that called to us to rise from the dead. We faced the fierce king who understood all mysteries and dark sayings and overcame him. We heard the word from heaven that said to sanctify the Lord, and it healed our hearts and restored us to the gospel of Jesus Christ. How much more shall we experience in this incredible story of God before we leave this world? I want to find out, don’t you?
Every part is valuable.
Let’s live in God’s will for the rest of the way. Don’t limit yourself and try to obtain a title of ministry for the sake of having a title. Obtain unto the calling that God has for you in your life. Some are Apostles and Prophets; some are Elders and Deacons; some are Evangelists and pastors or teachers. Because these gifts are spiritual, some may even obtain all of them. The safe bet is to let God be the one to set you apart for ministry. With that said, I also believe that one member of value has been overlooked. It’s the Saint of God. What is a church without faithful saints who know who they are in Christ? Saints bear the fruit of the Spirit and the witness of Christ in their life. They support the work of God with zeal and faithfulness. Through many tribulations, they enter the kingdom without losing sight of their purpose in the story. It is the saints who possess the kingdom. Daniel 7:22, 27. The saints are valuable to God, so don’t overlook your value as a saint to this story.
Who are the mothers and fathers with wisdom and understanding to teach the children? Who are the Pastor’s wives and Elder’s wives who will rise in the anointing and stand side by side with their husbands in the call of God? Who are the future generations that we are to tell what God has done for us? Where this story ends might just depend on our faithfulness to continue in it.
I’m looking forward to what’s next. There is much to learn in the Spirit as we go forth in faith, but it’s going to be an amazing time, that’s for sure.
Let’s conclude with this.
The key is to be faithful to the story He has put you in. What part are you living in this great love story? What is this life without having the story of God as your testimony? We were taught that physical life doesn’t matter to God because it’s all spiritually within you. But that’s not true. Our physical life reflects the words of God that lives in our heart. When the word increases, the manifestation of the word in our life also increases. How could any of us leave the story that God made us a part of? Yes, I’m saying how could we physically or spiritually leave this story after God has been so faithful to guide us to this point?
In our story, we don't always chase after social issues of the world, such as gender identity, race equality, and politics, by talking about them directly all the time. Our story focuses on our love for God and our belief in Jesus Christ. We live for unity and oneness through the Spirit. We learn about the need to cleanse our hearts from sin and overcome the lies that have separated us from God. When the focus is God’s story, the rest of our physical life will fix all these problems in our story with Him. Loving one another won't be a problem in a church that glorifies God.
I know people expect big crowds and flashy worship services in churches today. Add dark rooms, big screens, and bright lights, and you have goosebump heaven. These things are a smokescreen to God’s real story, so don’t let that stuff seduce you and make you think you're missing out on something. Many need that to confirm that God is moving in their churches. But I have found that nothing tops a true word from God that passes by the emotion and reaches the depths of your heart and changes the parable you live in every day.
Our pastor from several years ago was a fantastic parable to learn from, and we were part of the story that God was telling. It wasn’t what we expected, but it was what we needed. It was a true story of heaven that broke free of our religious expectations and followed the story of the Bible to a tee. We have often read the Bible as if it’s an ancient book full of stories that we learn as children and then try to apply to our lives as we get older. But maybe that’s being short-sighted. Perhaps the point is not to use them in our life but to live them out. The best stories told by you are the ones you live. This is why the past 25 years of my life and yours, who have been with us, has been one long story that God is telling through us. It’s not finished yet, and others must come to continue it, but we are definitely in a story, and that story must continue until it's finished.
I will leave the details of these stories for our churches to talk about in more detail. This teaching is to provoke the need for a story in your life. Search for God's story, and if it's not there, come join ours.