Learn God's Word
Why Is It Important To Understand God's Word And The Bible?
Paul Basden
Oct 10, 2021 37m
Join us this Sunday as we lean into why it is important to understand God's Word and the Bible. God's Word is a gift to us! You speak to God in prayer, and He speaks to you in His Word. Video recorded at Frisco, Texas.
TranscriptionmessageRegarding Grammar:
This is a transcription of the sermon. People speak differently than they write, and there are common colloquialisms in this transcript that sound good when spoken, and look like bad grammar when written.
This is a transcription of the sermon. People speak differently than they write, and there are common colloquialisms in this transcript that sound good when spoken, and look like bad grammar when written.
Paul Basden:
Every time Jim and I stand before you to preach God's Word, we always think it's a privilege. In fact, we know it's a privilege. But I feel like it's a special privilege today that I get to talk to you about what it means to learn God's Word. And by that I mean what it means to learn and live in and find out how to trust and how to obey God's Word, the Bible, scripture.
Paul Basden:
My life was changed as a teenager when I began reading and applying it. Over the years it's formed me in more ways than I can count. It's equipped me to be a husband and a dad, not perfect husband, not perfect dad, as Denise or Kerry, or Christian, they've got all sorts of stories just like everybody that knows you has stories of imperfections and big flaws. But let me tell you, it has helped me get it right much of the time, and for that, I'm grateful. It has equipped me to face loss, loss of some of the most important people that gave meaning to my life. It's equipped me to confront my demons. I won't name those today, I've named those in the past on different weeks as I've talked to you. But let me just say that by the power of God's Word and the power of the Holy Spirit I am seeking to have every one of those demons, every one of those bad habits, every one of those unaddressed issues of pride and fear addressed and kicked out of my life, exorcized.
Paul Basden:
It's helped me become a pastor and a shepherd and a preacher and teacher, so I can give you spiritual food so that you can actually grow up in fullness in Christ. It has saved me from some foolish decisions. When I think of the right turn or left turn I could have made many times in my life, not every time, but many times, if I had not heard God's voice, if I were not interested in listening to God's voice, I guarantee I would not be pastoring today, and I likely would've forfeited the opportunity to be a spiritual leader. I may have lost my marriage or my kids or any number of things. But above all, God's Word has helped me know Him, love Him, serve Him more and more and more.
Paul Basden:
So, today, what a privilege for all of us to learn about God's Word, why we need it, what the big story is that's contained in it, and how we can find our own place in that big story. So let's start with the obvious, God's Word, what is it? Well, when we start talking about God's Word, here's how I would say it, I'd say God's Word is what God says to us, revealing His thoughts and intentions. Did you know that anytime you speak you are revealing your thoughts and intentions? A little bit scary at times, isn't it? "Really? I didn't know I was thinking that." "Well, you said it." So whether you meant to or not, that was your thought and your intention. So every time a parent says to the rest of the family, "Hey, it's dinner time or breakfast time or whatever," you have a thought, you have an intention and therefore your words follow.
Paul Basden:
If a guy says to a girl, spouse, or date, "Hey, let's go to dinner and a movie," there is a thought, there's an intention, and then the words express that. That is just the way life works. For me, the first time I ever encountered God's Word in such a way that I heard it and thought, "Wow, that's different than anything I've ever heard in my life," was when I was 16. Now, it was quite unexpected. I grew up in a Baptist pastor's home, wonderful dad who lived out the faith, did not preach one thing and live something else, he lived it out. Wonderful mom who loved Christ, wonderful big sister who loved Jesus. And they all loved the Lord but for some... I guess the most obvious thing to say it didn't take with me. Wasn't it I hated Jesus, but like The Doobie Brothers used to sing, "Jesus, hey, He's just all right with me. Just fine." But nothing that was meaningful, nothing that was dynamic, nothing that was anything like Christ being Lord.
Paul Basden:
I was baptized at 10. That didn't seem to help much. I went to church so often I think you could say that I was actually practicing churchianity and not Christianity. But at 16 I encountered Jesus in a rich, deep way through other people who were telling me about what Christ meant in their lives. And I heard Christ say to me, not audibly, I've never had that gift, if you have, that's great, but I sensed it throughout my being, "Paul follow me." And I said, "I don't know how to follow you." And the answer was, "Read my Word." And so, the Word I began to read was this Living Bible that had just come out the year or two before. That paraphrase of the New Testament and the Old Testament was about like people today reading Eugene Peterson's The Message. I mean, you just can't believe that's really what the gospel meant. It makes sense, and it made sense to me for the first time.
Paul Basden:
In fact, it was so alive living just like the title says that I highlighted everything that was making sense to me. I heard Jesus say something, I'd underlined it. I'd read something from the apostle Paul, I'd underline it. Then I'd want to go back and find the sentence I loved, [inaudible 00:05:19] the whole page was underlined that I didn't know what to do. But for the first time I was learning the mind of God. You see, God's Word comes to us in three forms. When I say that, I want you to understand the depth and the richness of the phrase, "The Word of God." Before Jesus came, God's Word was spoken. God spoke to individuals. Think Moses, David, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Samuel. When God spoke to them, He spoke to them so they could speak to His people, the people of Israel. And the scripture formula for that is, "The Word of the Lord came to... " this person, or, "Thus says the Word... " through this person.
Paul Basden:
The Old Testament, then, is simply the record of everything God said to Israel and everything He did to prove that what He said was true. Of course, a certain point in history God said, "I've got to make my word more clearer because people aren't getting it." And so, when Jesus came, He was God's living Word. He was God's Word in the flesh. It wasn't just something you heard, it was something you saw and interacted with. As John's gospel says in the opening words of the prologue, "In the beginning, the Word already existed. The Word was with God. The Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created at everything through Him, and nothing was created except through Him," and now for the bombshell, "and the Word became human and made His home among us." That's Jesus. The eternal Word, the eternal son of God, the eternal expression of God's intent and thoughts became a human, a baby, a kid, a teenager, a young adult, an adult. He experienced all of life that we would experience from simply being human. This is Jesus of Nazareth.
Paul Basden:
You've had that experience, haven't you, when you want to tell somebody about your new boyfriend or girlfriend you met or tell about your new baby or about a great vacation? You keep describing it, and finally you just grab your phone and say, "Oh, I can't describe it. Here's the picture." Because we all know that a picture's worth a thousand words. Well, God said a picture, a still photograph, doesn't capture God. And so, God said, "I think a human is even better than a picture." So God, so that people could understand His Word, sent a human, and Jesus was that human. Jesus taught God's Word, and Jesus lived God's Word. And He was God's Word.
Paul Basden:
Then after He was crucified for our sins and raised for our righteousness and ascended to be with God so the Spirit could come, then the third type of Word, after Jesus, God gave us His written Word in the New Testament. Now, as a kid, I'll be honest, I didn't think much about the Bible or God, but the few thoughts I had were these: I'm guessing Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were sitting around with a pen and pad, and when Jesus said something, they said, "Would you repeat that? I want to get it right?" And I assumed that's how the gospels came about. Now, I learned later that they didn't write those gospels while Jesus was alive, they wrote their stories years later based on all the things they saw and they remembered, and they were very good historians.
Paul Basden:
Here's how Luke, who wrote one of the gospels, talks about the way he did research to make sure he got the story right. Luke says, "Many people have set out to write accounts about the events that have been fulfilled among us." That is Jesus. "They used the eyewitness reports circulating among us from the early disciples. Having carefully investigated everything from the beginning." That's historical research. He didn't just sit around and say, "Once upon a time, there was a man named Jesus. Now, how can I make this fictional?" No, no, this is real life, real humans in real space and time.
Paul Basden:
And so, Luke writes the story, "... from the beginning. I also have decided to write an accurate account for you." So, Luke wasn't the first gospel, there were several gospels around. Matthew is probably around. Mark was around, not yet John. And so, Luke wrote based on those things that he had seen and the people that he interviewed and talked with. Now, that means that for followers of Jesus, the New Testament is our lifeline to God. That is how we know what God is saying to us and how He is speaking to us today. That doesn't mean the Old Testament's unimportant, it's just incomplete. It points to the New Testament. And so, when I say the ultimate authority in our faith is the New Testament, I mean the ultimate authority of our faith is Jesus, the living Word whose story is told in that written Word, the New Testament.
Paul Basden:
To summarize all that, God's Word was first spoken, prophets in the Old Testament, then came to life in Jesus, and then it was written down in what we call the New Testament. So when I say learn God's Word, I mean learn holy scripture, learn the Bible, learn the New Testament, above all, learn Jesus. Why do we need to learn it? Learning God's Word, why is it so important? Well, let's start with what I think is a foundational reason, a very deep philosophical reason for all of us. The foundational reason is that God's Word answers the crucial questions of life. And when I say crucial questions, I mean the questions that keep people awake at night, that cause people to leave the faith, that cause people to come to the faith.
Paul Basden:
Here are the big questions I think that people ask in life. Question one, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" There didn't have to be something. I mean, there could have been nothing. Our only experience has been that there's something, that we live in a material world, and we eat and we drink and we work and we play it and we love and we laugh. But it didn't have to be that way. So why is there something rather than nothing? And the only answer the Bible gives, and it's wonderful, is because God wanted to make a world of people whom He could love. It's not like God was somehow lacking and so He made humans to complete Him, is that God was overflowing and so He made humans so He could complete them.
Paul Basden:
Question two, "Why do I exist? Not just why is there something, but why am I someone? Why in the world did I come into this world?" And I'm not talking about nine months before you were born or anything like that, about human decisions or human anything. I'm talking about a deeper question, why do I exist? The answer, because God wanted me to be born. And that's you. God wanted you. Put your name in there. God wanted you to be born. Your life is not an accident. Your birth is not an accident. Doesn't matter what you've heard anyone say, you're a very intentional purpose of God. Question three, "Is there a God? And if there is one, what is this God like?" Once again, the New Testament teaches us that there is a God, and He is one God, and He is just like Jesus.
Paul Basden:
And then the fourth question, "What does God want from me, and what does God want for me?" The answer there is God wants to know me in an interactive relationship. Again, put your name in there. God wants from you and for you an interactive relationship with Himself, an easy, talking relationship in which all day long you are walking with Him and Ge is walking with you. That is what God wants. Therefore, the Bible is a love story about God's love, sometimes unrequited, for us, the human race.
Paul Basden:
But it's not just a philosophical, foundational reason that we need to learn God's Word, there's a very practical reason. And that's because we are absolutely lost without a Word from God. Without a Word from God, we all do stupid things. For parents, when you tell your kids stupid is the wrong word, you're right, but right here, it's perfect. Foolish is what I'm getting at. Without God speaking to us, we're empty, we're lonely, we're misguided. Without God speaking to us, we listen to other voices that are speaking to us. The problem, of course, is those voices lie. And when we follow the voices that lie, they take us in the wrong direction. And as the old country crossover says, "It ends up with us looking for love in all the wrong places, looking for meaning in all the wrong places, looking for salvation and rescue in all the wrong places."
Paul Basden:
Let me just ask you something very personal. Have you looked for love or meaning or salvation or rescue in any wrong place in your whole life? If you have, I'll tell you why you have. Same with me. It's because you were listening to another voice and that voice said, "Oh, come over here for meaning. Oh, come over here for some love. Come over here to be rescued." And we go there and we go down this pit that we didn't even know was awaiting us. It's not like God wasn't speaking, He was speaking the whole time, we just weren't listening. God is always speaking to you and me for the purpose of allowing us to hear His voice so that it can replace the other voices in our mind. God speaks truth to get rid of the lies in our mind. God wants to give us a new soundtrack in our heads, and that soundtrack is His Word.
Paul Basden:
No wonder the biblical writers describe God's Word with such exulted language. Just listen to how David can't even turn off the faucet of praise as he talks about God's Word in Psalm 19. "The instructions of the Lord are perfect, reviving the soul. The decrees of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The commandments of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are clear, giving insight for living." What a phrase. "They're more desirable than gold. They are sweeter than honey." Man. And when you think about the Word of God as that exulted and how powerful it is when He speaks to us, you might be remembering that a few weeks ago I talked on the importance of a daily prayer life with God motivated by scripture. And I call that message or we call that message Worship Daily. That's part of grow.
Paul Basden:
If you're wondering how does a relationship with God through prayer connect to a relationship with God in growing and learning the word, well, here it is. Learning God's Word is the flip side of pray. You speak to God in prayer. He speaks to you in His Word. That's how it works. He speaks, we respond. He speaks, we respond. So you open your Bible, you're reading in one of the gospel, God speaks to you, you pause, you respond. You don't have to wait to get to the end of the chapter to talk to Him. You can interrupt. God lets you interrupt. It's like a kid, you don't have to give a long lecture to a child. In fact, if you do, they generally want to interrupt and understand more and talk to you. It's okay to do that with God. He loves it. He says something, we say, "Help me." He says something, we go, "Oh, now I see."
Paul Basden:
You don't want just one or the other. In this conversation, you don't want something that will make it a monologue. You don't want just God's Word because if all you have is God's Word, you'll... Well, eventually his voice will sound like... Because you're never responding. You'll get tired of it. But if all you have is prayer and never have God speaking to you, well, pretty soon you won't even know who you're speaking to or what you're supposed to say or who you are. So we need both at all times.
Paul Basden:
I've already said it, but let say it again, God's word, at its heart, is this love story in which He speaks to us and we respond. So, let's get to God's big story because that's a heart of scripture. What is it? Well, let me say it in several different ways. First, God's big story is the story of God rescuing and reclaiming all that is rightfully His. You do know that you were made in God's image, right, and that before you were ever a sinner you weren't a sinner? And so, you were His before you ever rejected Him. And so, God's not going out looking for people He's never met, God's on a rescue operation, a reclamation operation of all of us in this whole world who are rightfully His.
Paul Basden:
Another way to say what God's big story is is this. Like all good stories, it has vibrant characters, incredible biblical characters, and are they ever earthy? Be careful when you read the Old Testament with your kids. Seriously, if they're little... In a dynamic plot, ups and downs and ups and downs, and a great story arc. The first summer we were in this building, the summer of 2015, Jim and I preached probably what is our most enjoyable and favorite series of all time called God's Big Story. We looked at the scriptures and said, "We believe that from Genesis to Revelation, from beginning to the new beginning, there are eight big chapters to that story, eight big acts in that play. Each chapter has a character. Each chapter has a piece of the plot." Three years ago, we were very surprised and thankful that a publisher, Christian publisher, asked us to turn that series into a book. Actually three books, one for adults, one for tweens, preteens, and one for little ones, 2, 3, 4, and 5-year-olds.
Paul Basden:
Well, it's been a long time since Jim and I have really understood either preteens or little ones, so we reached out to Jim's son, Tyler, who, although he's 40, is really a big kid. He took our book, and I don't know if this is a real word, but he tweenirized it, he made it just right, with video game references and everything for 9 through 12, 13-year-olds. Then we reached out to my daughter, Kerry, who has written two children's books, and we said, "Kerry, would you take this book and drop 95% out of it, and just have two little pages for each story." And she did. Well, we're very grateful that the first of those, for tweens, preteens has been published. It has been published just six weeks ago.
Paul Basden:
Just so you know, here's what the cover looks like. And that's the concept, finding your place in God's great story. Right? So you got Adam and Eve, but you got the skateboard, right? And you got Jesus, I hate to put them together, but you got a pizza and a bicycle. So that's the one for tweeners. All right. Now, in that book, as in all books, there are eight chapters. We put this as part of the story arc, and here it is. God's big story really has eight big sections to it. The first is God creates, story of Adam and Eve. Next, God promises, the story of Abraham, promising a land, a nation, and that all nations will be blessed through him, which we have been through Christ, his descendant. Rescues, god using Moses to rescue the people out of slavery. Blesses, king David. Warns, God sent the prophet to warn the people because they had disobeyed so terribly. Saves, of course that's a highlight of it all, Jesus. Sins, that's a story of Paul the apostle, but of course it really should be sins because it's all of us. And then one day God will come back and God wins.
Paul Basden:
Believe me, this is not down into the right, this is up, up, up, up, up to the right. And that's how to make sense of all the Bible stories you've ever heard. Otherwise, you'll think of 10 Bible stories. If you had to, in an hour's period of time, you could think of 10 Bible stories you've heard and you don't know how they're connected. You got Jacob wrestling with an angel over here and Judas betraying Jesus. Where do those things fit? They fit in one of these chapters of the story. Another way to say what God's big story is is this: it contains several recurring themes that you need to know. What I mean by that is if the story art goes this way, the themes go this way. They kind of crosshatch, and they help you find anytime you read the scripture, "Oh, this is what it's talking about." And now you don't feel so lost.
Paul Basden:
So let me just tell you what I think are the big themes. First, God is creator of all, everything there is. And when you think about that, you think, "You mean even stuff like the Hubble Telescope found?" Yeah, even stuff like the Hubble Telescope found. In fact, yesterday I was listening to a wonderful podcast by James Bryan Smith. It's called Things Above, set your mind on things above. And the title of the little 12-minute podcast was Be Happy For God. So don't be sad for God because He sees all the evil and injustice in the world. Be happy for God because God sees these kind of pictures and everything you can imagine on every square centimeter or millimeter on this earth and beyond this earth and under this earth. God sees that all all day long and it just fills Him with joy. So be happy for God. God's a great creator. And that's one of the basic themes of scripture.
Paul Basden:
Second, humans are made in God's image, but we have rebelled. And the result of that rebellion is alienation, alienation from God, from one another, from this good earth, and from ourselves. Now, when you take a look at people's favorite pictures, you really can't tell there's any alienation going along. There you go. That's a nice family reunion. If you look at some of their faces and who they're turning to and what one mom's saying to everybody else there, you get the idea that this might not have been the first take. But is it family reunions and Christmas celebrations and family vacations and Thanksgiving tables and weddings and funerals that sometimes our fallenness and our alienation comes to the surface most quickly? Because no matter how good we look on the outside and we were made in God's image, we have been alienated because of our own sin. That's a big theme in scripture.
Paul Basden:
Third, Jesus is the perfect God-man sent to redeem the world. You've heard that, but let me tell you, you've never seen and heard it like you will if you will watch this multi-season series called The Chosen. This is Jonathan Roumie who plays the character of Christ. He gets it. He's not Jesus, he's just an actor, but, man, does he get the human... The men in my mans group, here's what they say after every week when we finish watching an episode, "I had no idea Jesus was that human. I just thought He was an angel in a body."
Paul Basden:
Fourth, the Holy Spirit helps us follow Jesus. It's hard to understand the Holy Spirit, but His role is to help us do what Jesus told us to do. And Jesus described Him as the wind because the word Spirit means breath, which means wind. You can't see the wind in this picture, but you see the effects on the back of this woman's parka and on the back of her hair. You see the effects of the wind. And you can't see the Spirit, but you can sure see the fruit of the Spirit; love, joy, peace, and patience in someone's life when it's happening.
Paul Basden:
Fifth theme is salvation, salvation from sin, which is initial and ongoing. In other words, as Jim said in his message a few weeks ago, "You say yes to Jesus the first time, that's initial salvation. And you say yes to Jesus the next time, and for a lifetime that's ongoing." The truth is once we're saved, we're always saved, I believe, but we don't always live like we're saved. And so, we can get lost easily because we do dumb things and foolish things. In some sense, I feel like we're always a little bit just like the people that are looking at those windows hoping that someone from the Coast Guard will come rescue them because the waters have risen high because of a hurricane. We're always stuck in something like that. We say, "Please come save me." And the Holy Spirit's right there to pull us out and to help us one more time make an ongoing decision for salvation.
Paul Basden:
Six, the church, it's the people of God and the body of Christ. Much of the New Testament is about the church. Most of Paul's letters are. And here's my favorite picture of all time of Preston Trail Community Church. Yeah, not the building, all those wonderful people and all the ones who aren't in this picture.
Paul Basden:
The last theme you'll find in scripture over and over is just simply what we've already called the end, where God is victorious and we will share forever in His glory. Now, you need to know that while this is the end of the chapter of the book that we know called human history, it's not the end of all of God's work. Because as the prophet says and the apostle Paul repeats, "Eye has not seen and ear has not heard, nor has it ever entered into the heart of a human being what God has prepared for those who love Him." That's the eternity we look forward to.
Paul Basden:
Now, you need to know these themes so you can understand where you are in the Bible. Because every time you read the Bible, it's going to be about either God or humans or Jesus or the Holy Spirit or salvation or the church or the end. And if you know where you are, you don't get lost. Now, you know as well as I do that the purpose of learning scripture is not so that you can pass some kind of Bible quiz and make a hundred and wear some extra special star are on your shirt. The purpose of learning God's Word is so you can find your place in God's story. Your place in God's story, do you know it?
Paul Basden:
You see, God's story is the most important story in all of history. Without it, you would not have any story of your own. But by God's grace, He has actually reached and called you to be a part of His story. And you're saying "Me?" Yeah. I just estimate that 105 billion humans have lived on the face of this earth since the beginning. Six billion now, 105 total. And out of all that, God looks at you and says, "I got a place for you, you, in my story." So how do you find it? How do you find your place in God's big story?
Paul Basden:
Well, first, accept your role. Accept your role. You see, God decided where and when you would be born and live. You had no vote. God decided what gifts and talents and abilities He would give you to serve others. You didn't get to choose those. And yet, some of the most miserable people I've ever known are those who wish they were someone else, who wish they lived at another time, born to different parents, married to a different spouse, taller, shorter, darker, lighter skin. But listen, friends, contentment is simply accepting the role God has for you in His story. As always, no one says it better than Dallas Willard, here it is: "We will never have the easy, unhesitating love of God that makes obedience to Jesus our natural response unless we're absolutely sure that it is good for us to be and to be who we are."
Paul Basden:
Just pause. Do you know that it is good for you to be? Do you know that? Do you know that it is good for you to be born? That this is not bad, this is not a mistake, this is not some cosmic error, user error from God? This is God's purpose. It is good for you to be, and it is good to be who you are. Willard continues, "This means we must have no doubt that the path appointed for us by when and where and to whom we were born is good. And that nothing irredeemable has happened to us or can happen to us on our way to our destiny in God's full world."
Paul Basden:
Your role in God's big story is going to bring you joy and peace, yes, and suffering and hope. Don't think you just get the joy and the peace without the suffering and the hope. You get it all together when you follow Jesus, whose life was a life of joy and peace and suffering and hope. How'd you find your place in God's big story? Second, practice and live out grow and go. Literally. I mean, say yes to Jesus the first time, the next time, and for a lifetime. Worship Him daily. Connect with a group. Serve the body. Learn God's Word. And there's more to come. By the way, don't see these as ironclad legalistic rules. No, no, these are gracious guidelines that will plant you in the fertile soil of God's Word so the Holy Spirit can grow you up and send you out. And as you grow and go, you will be living out your part in God's story.
Paul Basden:
Third, get ready for surprises. In the conclusion to our book, Jim wrote these words, and I just love them. He said, "God surprises. Here's what we mean. In every chapter, all eight chapters of God's big story in His word, God chooses and uses people in circumstances that we normally wouldn't expect. He turns things upside down. He flips the script. He taps people on the shoulder, the 'wrong' people, from a human perspective, and invites them to be the lead in a crucial part of the story." If you've ever felt like you're the wrong person that God's reaching out to, if you've ever felt like God is saying something to you that you simply are not qualified to do because you have a past, you have a life, and it doesn't feel very much like God was in it, you haven't listened to His voice although He was speaking, if you've ever felt that way, you're really going to identify with Gwen's story. Hope you're ready for it. Let's watch.
Gwendolyn Lau:
I come from a very loving, well-meaning but broken family of origin. I was in church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, and yet, again, this toxic idea about God came to me, or at least my interpretation of it was that I could lose my salvation and I could spend a lifetime learning and loving God and get to heaven and not make the cut. Growing up, because I was a girl, there were certain things I could do or couldn't do for God. Whether it was nature or nurture, the theater was really where I felt safe, and I could be other people, and I didn't have to be me. I didn't know who me was because, ultimately, I felt like who I was to God was either a mistake or was disappointing. And so, I didn't like my story, and I had a very specific view of what God's story was.
Gwendolyn Lau:
I got married and had the great hopes and the great excitements and all of those things, but life got really hard really quickly. And so, Dustin and I were separated for a period of time. At my very lowest, I didn't know I was suicidal, but I know that I wanted to disappear and that there was very little purpose to who I was, and everything that I touched seemed to fall apart. I remember one night, I just cried out to God. I said, "If you're real, you're going to have to fix this. And if you are real and you love me, like this book says you do, then I need you to show me that you're real. I need you to show me how to get out of this hole that I'm in."
Gwendolyn Lau:
And so, I went home and Dustin and I started the very difficult and beautiful journey of reconciliation. I got a great counselor, and I started learning things about myself and about God that were different than what I had learned. When I was bugging Paul and Jim weekly to teach me and teach me more and I couldn't get enough, and they're like, "Gwen, we think it's time for you to go to seminary."
Gwendolyn Lau:
I got this weird idea that God wanted to not just redeem my brokenness but to use it for good and that it was maybe on purpose that I was made a super nerd and that my love for God's Word and learning about theology could actually help someone else. I was at seminary, and Dustin was like, "Why are you going to seminary?" I was like, "I don't know, it just feels like obedience." And then residency started at Preston Trail. So I led residency for two years, and then we opened it up to the whole church through a program called Equip, where I get to spend my life helping people grow in both grace and knowledge of their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, a truth that has fundamentally changed who I am. God doesn't waste pain, and so to share what I've learned in any way to help someone else is redemptive to me. That is, if not anything else, a girl, pastor, and prodigal all at the same time. God's sweet.
Paul Basden:
You heard Gwen say she was an actor. She played lots of different parts. We might not get paid to be acting, we might not be very good at it according to the critics, but we're all actors. We play our parts because we don't believe God has a part for us. So how did Gwen find her part? She began studying God's Word, she began knowing His story, and then she got, for crying out loud, "Lord, you're so good, you've given me a place in your story, one that my background told me I couldn't have,. But surprise, you gave it to me."
Paul Basden:
And today, if you don't know your place in God's story, I want to tell you that I have a very practical suggestion for how you can learn it, because there's no better way to learn it than simply by knowing the story of Jesus. And so here's my challenge to you today if you're ready to accept it. The next step, the very obvious next step if you really want to know God's Word is I challenge you to read the Gospel of John in 21 days. Read the Gospel of John in 21 days. Well, why did I choose 21 days? I'm a genius. There's 21 chapters in John's gospel. Chapter a day, any of us can do that. And you may be thinking, "Paul, you don't know me, I have a hard time finding time for God every day." Great. Sit down and read a chapter of John every day. "Paul, I don't really know how to get into God's Word. It feels so mysterious to me. It's so hard to understand." Great, grab John's gospel and read a chapter a day.
Paul Basden:
Jason Kanapkey, our groups' director, loves to say that if you want quality, intentional time with God every day that is meaning-filled, you need a time, a place, and a plan." Well, I can't give you a time that's customized for you. I can't give you a place that's customized for you. But if you don't have a good plan, here it is, read John's gospel one chapter a day for the next 21 days. I know that the Holy Spirit will speak to you. And I can tell you right now that Jesus Christ will walk right up to you. I've never seen Him, but I've been confronted by His Spirit so many times I might as well have seen Him. And when I read the gospels, He's right there and He's talking to me, and I respond. Feel free to interrupt Him. He's very patient. He wants you to understand what He's saying. I hope you'll say yes to this. If this is God's next step for you, say yes to encountering Jesus for the next three weeks. Since some of you I know want to say yes to this, and others of you're still thinking, I want to give us a chance to process it in prayer, so would you please pray with me now?
Paul Basden:
In the spirit of prayer, I just want to ask a question. If you have a sense in your own heart and mind that you have not placed a priority on God's Word, that you need to, and that you want to learn it more, that you can truly follow Jesus, and you think the next right step for you is to read John's gospel for 21 days, I just want to ask you, would you slip your hand up and just make that commitment to Christ now, if you're ready to spend 21 days? Thank you. Thank you. Keep your hands up. Thank you. 21 days in John's gospel. Thank you.
Paul Basden:
And now Lord here we all are. Some of us are already in rooted groups. We've got plenty to read every day, don't need that. Others of us are in small groups with good friends and we have something that's daily keeping us in contact with you. Others of us are still working through the Worship Jesus daily from the website, from the app on our phone. That's okay, but for all those who said today, "I want to get into John's gospel and read it," oh, Christ, please meet each of us and call us to follow you. We're listening. Speak, Lord, we're listening. Through Christ we pray. Amen.
Recorded in Frisco, Texas.
Every time Jim and I stand before you to preach God's Word, we always think it's a privilege. In fact, we know it's a privilege. But I feel like it's a special privilege today that I get to talk to you about what it means to learn God's Word. And by that I mean what it means to learn and live in and find out how to trust and how to obey God's Word, the Bible, scripture.
Paul Basden:
My life was changed as a teenager when I began reading and applying it. Over the years it's formed me in more ways than I can count. It's equipped me to be a husband and a dad, not perfect husband, not perfect dad, as Denise or Kerry, or Christian, they've got all sorts of stories just like everybody that knows you has stories of imperfections and big flaws. But let me tell you, it has helped me get it right much of the time, and for that, I'm grateful. It has equipped me to face loss, loss of some of the most important people that gave meaning to my life. It's equipped me to confront my demons. I won't name those today, I've named those in the past on different weeks as I've talked to you. But let me just say that by the power of God's Word and the power of the Holy Spirit I am seeking to have every one of those demons, every one of those bad habits, every one of those unaddressed issues of pride and fear addressed and kicked out of my life, exorcized.
Paul Basden:
It's helped me become a pastor and a shepherd and a preacher and teacher, so I can give you spiritual food so that you can actually grow up in fullness in Christ. It has saved me from some foolish decisions. When I think of the right turn or left turn I could have made many times in my life, not every time, but many times, if I had not heard God's voice, if I were not interested in listening to God's voice, I guarantee I would not be pastoring today, and I likely would've forfeited the opportunity to be a spiritual leader. I may have lost my marriage or my kids or any number of things. But above all, God's Word has helped me know Him, love Him, serve Him more and more and more.
Paul Basden:
So, today, what a privilege for all of us to learn about God's Word, why we need it, what the big story is that's contained in it, and how we can find our own place in that big story. So let's start with the obvious, God's Word, what is it? Well, when we start talking about God's Word, here's how I would say it, I'd say God's Word is what God says to us, revealing His thoughts and intentions. Did you know that anytime you speak you are revealing your thoughts and intentions? A little bit scary at times, isn't it? "Really? I didn't know I was thinking that." "Well, you said it." So whether you meant to or not, that was your thought and your intention. So every time a parent says to the rest of the family, "Hey, it's dinner time or breakfast time or whatever," you have a thought, you have an intention and therefore your words follow.
Paul Basden:
If a guy says to a girl, spouse, or date, "Hey, let's go to dinner and a movie," there is a thought, there's an intention, and then the words express that. That is just the way life works. For me, the first time I ever encountered God's Word in such a way that I heard it and thought, "Wow, that's different than anything I've ever heard in my life," was when I was 16. Now, it was quite unexpected. I grew up in a Baptist pastor's home, wonderful dad who lived out the faith, did not preach one thing and live something else, he lived it out. Wonderful mom who loved Christ, wonderful big sister who loved Jesus. And they all loved the Lord but for some... I guess the most obvious thing to say it didn't take with me. Wasn't it I hated Jesus, but like The Doobie Brothers used to sing, "Jesus, hey, He's just all right with me. Just fine." But nothing that was meaningful, nothing that was dynamic, nothing that was anything like Christ being Lord.
Paul Basden:
I was baptized at 10. That didn't seem to help much. I went to church so often I think you could say that I was actually practicing churchianity and not Christianity. But at 16 I encountered Jesus in a rich, deep way through other people who were telling me about what Christ meant in their lives. And I heard Christ say to me, not audibly, I've never had that gift, if you have, that's great, but I sensed it throughout my being, "Paul follow me." And I said, "I don't know how to follow you." And the answer was, "Read my Word." And so, the Word I began to read was this Living Bible that had just come out the year or two before. That paraphrase of the New Testament and the Old Testament was about like people today reading Eugene Peterson's The Message. I mean, you just can't believe that's really what the gospel meant. It makes sense, and it made sense to me for the first time.
Paul Basden:
In fact, it was so alive living just like the title says that I highlighted everything that was making sense to me. I heard Jesus say something, I'd underlined it. I'd read something from the apostle Paul, I'd underline it. Then I'd want to go back and find the sentence I loved, [inaudible 00:05:19] the whole page was underlined that I didn't know what to do. But for the first time I was learning the mind of God. You see, God's Word comes to us in three forms. When I say that, I want you to understand the depth and the richness of the phrase, "The Word of God." Before Jesus came, God's Word was spoken. God spoke to individuals. Think Moses, David, Jeremiah, Isaiah, Samuel. When God spoke to them, He spoke to them so they could speak to His people, the people of Israel. And the scripture formula for that is, "The Word of the Lord came to... " this person, or, "Thus says the Word... " through this person.
Paul Basden:
The Old Testament, then, is simply the record of everything God said to Israel and everything He did to prove that what He said was true. Of course, a certain point in history God said, "I've got to make my word more clearer because people aren't getting it." And so, when Jesus came, He was God's living Word. He was God's Word in the flesh. It wasn't just something you heard, it was something you saw and interacted with. As John's gospel says in the opening words of the prologue, "In the beginning, the Word already existed. The Word was with God. The Word was God. He existed in the beginning with God. God created at everything through Him, and nothing was created except through Him," and now for the bombshell, "and the Word became human and made His home among us." That's Jesus. The eternal Word, the eternal son of God, the eternal expression of God's intent and thoughts became a human, a baby, a kid, a teenager, a young adult, an adult. He experienced all of life that we would experience from simply being human. This is Jesus of Nazareth.
Paul Basden:
You've had that experience, haven't you, when you want to tell somebody about your new boyfriend or girlfriend you met or tell about your new baby or about a great vacation? You keep describing it, and finally you just grab your phone and say, "Oh, I can't describe it. Here's the picture." Because we all know that a picture's worth a thousand words. Well, God said a picture, a still photograph, doesn't capture God. And so, God said, "I think a human is even better than a picture." So God, so that people could understand His Word, sent a human, and Jesus was that human. Jesus taught God's Word, and Jesus lived God's Word. And He was God's Word.
Paul Basden:
Then after He was crucified for our sins and raised for our righteousness and ascended to be with God so the Spirit could come, then the third type of Word, after Jesus, God gave us His written Word in the New Testament. Now, as a kid, I'll be honest, I didn't think much about the Bible or God, but the few thoughts I had were these: I'm guessing Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John were sitting around with a pen and pad, and when Jesus said something, they said, "Would you repeat that? I want to get it right?" And I assumed that's how the gospels came about. Now, I learned later that they didn't write those gospels while Jesus was alive, they wrote their stories years later based on all the things they saw and they remembered, and they were very good historians.
Paul Basden:
Here's how Luke, who wrote one of the gospels, talks about the way he did research to make sure he got the story right. Luke says, "Many people have set out to write accounts about the events that have been fulfilled among us." That is Jesus. "They used the eyewitness reports circulating among us from the early disciples. Having carefully investigated everything from the beginning." That's historical research. He didn't just sit around and say, "Once upon a time, there was a man named Jesus. Now, how can I make this fictional?" No, no, this is real life, real humans in real space and time.
Paul Basden:
And so, Luke writes the story, "... from the beginning. I also have decided to write an accurate account for you." So, Luke wasn't the first gospel, there were several gospels around. Matthew is probably around. Mark was around, not yet John. And so, Luke wrote based on those things that he had seen and the people that he interviewed and talked with. Now, that means that for followers of Jesus, the New Testament is our lifeline to God. That is how we know what God is saying to us and how He is speaking to us today. That doesn't mean the Old Testament's unimportant, it's just incomplete. It points to the New Testament. And so, when I say the ultimate authority in our faith is the New Testament, I mean the ultimate authority of our faith is Jesus, the living Word whose story is told in that written Word, the New Testament.
Paul Basden:
To summarize all that, God's Word was first spoken, prophets in the Old Testament, then came to life in Jesus, and then it was written down in what we call the New Testament. So when I say learn God's Word, I mean learn holy scripture, learn the Bible, learn the New Testament, above all, learn Jesus. Why do we need to learn it? Learning God's Word, why is it so important? Well, let's start with what I think is a foundational reason, a very deep philosophical reason for all of us. The foundational reason is that God's Word answers the crucial questions of life. And when I say crucial questions, I mean the questions that keep people awake at night, that cause people to leave the faith, that cause people to come to the faith.
Paul Basden:
Here are the big questions I think that people ask in life. Question one, "Why is there something rather than nothing?" There didn't have to be something. I mean, there could have been nothing. Our only experience has been that there's something, that we live in a material world, and we eat and we drink and we work and we play it and we love and we laugh. But it didn't have to be that way. So why is there something rather than nothing? And the only answer the Bible gives, and it's wonderful, is because God wanted to make a world of people whom He could love. It's not like God was somehow lacking and so He made humans to complete Him, is that God was overflowing and so He made humans so He could complete them.
Paul Basden:
Question two, "Why do I exist? Not just why is there something, but why am I someone? Why in the world did I come into this world?" And I'm not talking about nine months before you were born or anything like that, about human decisions or human anything. I'm talking about a deeper question, why do I exist? The answer, because God wanted me to be born. And that's you. God wanted you. Put your name in there. God wanted you to be born. Your life is not an accident. Your birth is not an accident. Doesn't matter what you've heard anyone say, you're a very intentional purpose of God. Question three, "Is there a God? And if there is one, what is this God like?" Once again, the New Testament teaches us that there is a God, and He is one God, and He is just like Jesus.
Paul Basden:
And then the fourth question, "What does God want from me, and what does God want for me?" The answer there is God wants to know me in an interactive relationship. Again, put your name in there. God wants from you and for you an interactive relationship with Himself, an easy, talking relationship in which all day long you are walking with Him and Ge is walking with you. That is what God wants. Therefore, the Bible is a love story about God's love, sometimes unrequited, for us, the human race.
Paul Basden:
But it's not just a philosophical, foundational reason that we need to learn God's Word, there's a very practical reason. And that's because we are absolutely lost without a Word from God. Without a Word from God, we all do stupid things. For parents, when you tell your kids stupid is the wrong word, you're right, but right here, it's perfect. Foolish is what I'm getting at. Without God speaking to us, we're empty, we're lonely, we're misguided. Without God speaking to us, we listen to other voices that are speaking to us. The problem, of course, is those voices lie. And when we follow the voices that lie, they take us in the wrong direction. And as the old country crossover says, "It ends up with us looking for love in all the wrong places, looking for meaning in all the wrong places, looking for salvation and rescue in all the wrong places."
Paul Basden:
Let me just ask you something very personal. Have you looked for love or meaning or salvation or rescue in any wrong place in your whole life? If you have, I'll tell you why you have. Same with me. It's because you were listening to another voice and that voice said, "Oh, come over here for meaning. Oh, come over here for some love. Come over here to be rescued." And we go there and we go down this pit that we didn't even know was awaiting us. It's not like God wasn't speaking, He was speaking the whole time, we just weren't listening. God is always speaking to you and me for the purpose of allowing us to hear His voice so that it can replace the other voices in our mind. God speaks truth to get rid of the lies in our mind. God wants to give us a new soundtrack in our heads, and that soundtrack is His Word.
Paul Basden:
No wonder the biblical writers describe God's Word with such exulted language. Just listen to how David can't even turn off the faucet of praise as he talks about God's Word in Psalm 19. "The instructions of the Lord are perfect, reviving the soul. The decrees of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The commandments of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are clear, giving insight for living." What a phrase. "They're more desirable than gold. They are sweeter than honey." Man. And when you think about the Word of God as that exulted and how powerful it is when He speaks to us, you might be remembering that a few weeks ago I talked on the importance of a daily prayer life with God motivated by scripture. And I call that message or we call that message Worship Daily. That's part of grow.
Paul Basden:
If you're wondering how does a relationship with God through prayer connect to a relationship with God in growing and learning the word, well, here it is. Learning God's Word is the flip side of pray. You speak to God in prayer. He speaks to you in His Word. That's how it works. He speaks, we respond. He speaks, we respond. So you open your Bible, you're reading in one of the gospel, God speaks to you, you pause, you respond. You don't have to wait to get to the end of the chapter to talk to Him. You can interrupt. God lets you interrupt. It's like a kid, you don't have to give a long lecture to a child. In fact, if you do, they generally want to interrupt and understand more and talk to you. It's okay to do that with God. He loves it. He says something, we say, "Help me." He says something, we go, "Oh, now I see."
Paul Basden:
You don't want just one or the other. In this conversation, you don't want something that will make it a monologue. You don't want just God's Word because if all you have is God's Word, you'll... Well, eventually his voice will sound like... Because you're never responding. You'll get tired of it. But if all you have is prayer and never have God speaking to you, well, pretty soon you won't even know who you're speaking to or what you're supposed to say or who you are. So we need both at all times.
Paul Basden:
I've already said it, but let say it again, God's word, at its heart, is this love story in which He speaks to us and we respond. So, let's get to God's big story because that's a heart of scripture. What is it? Well, let me say it in several different ways. First, God's big story is the story of God rescuing and reclaiming all that is rightfully His. You do know that you were made in God's image, right, and that before you were ever a sinner you weren't a sinner? And so, you were His before you ever rejected Him. And so, God's not going out looking for people He's never met, God's on a rescue operation, a reclamation operation of all of us in this whole world who are rightfully His.
Paul Basden:
Another way to say what God's big story is is this. Like all good stories, it has vibrant characters, incredible biblical characters, and are they ever earthy? Be careful when you read the Old Testament with your kids. Seriously, if they're little... In a dynamic plot, ups and downs and ups and downs, and a great story arc. The first summer we were in this building, the summer of 2015, Jim and I preached probably what is our most enjoyable and favorite series of all time called God's Big Story. We looked at the scriptures and said, "We believe that from Genesis to Revelation, from beginning to the new beginning, there are eight big chapters to that story, eight big acts in that play. Each chapter has a character. Each chapter has a piece of the plot." Three years ago, we were very surprised and thankful that a publisher, Christian publisher, asked us to turn that series into a book. Actually three books, one for adults, one for tweens, preteens, and one for little ones, 2, 3, 4, and 5-year-olds.
Paul Basden:
Well, it's been a long time since Jim and I have really understood either preteens or little ones, so we reached out to Jim's son, Tyler, who, although he's 40, is really a big kid. He took our book, and I don't know if this is a real word, but he tweenirized it, he made it just right, with video game references and everything for 9 through 12, 13-year-olds. Then we reached out to my daughter, Kerry, who has written two children's books, and we said, "Kerry, would you take this book and drop 95% out of it, and just have two little pages for each story." And she did. Well, we're very grateful that the first of those, for tweens, preteens has been published. It has been published just six weeks ago.
Paul Basden:
Just so you know, here's what the cover looks like. And that's the concept, finding your place in God's great story. Right? So you got Adam and Eve, but you got the skateboard, right? And you got Jesus, I hate to put them together, but you got a pizza and a bicycle. So that's the one for tweeners. All right. Now, in that book, as in all books, there are eight chapters. We put this as part of the story arc, and here it is. God's big story really has eight big sections to it. The first is God creates, story of Adam and Eve. Next, God promises, the story of Abraham, promising a land, a nation, and that all nations will be blessed through him, which we have been through Christ, his descendant. Rescues, god using Moses to rescue the people out of slavery. Blesses, king David. Warns, God sent the prophet to warn the people because they had disobeyed so terribly. Saves, of course that's a highlight of it all, Jesus. Sins, that's a story of Paul the apostle, but of course it really should be sins because it's all of us. And then one day God will come back and God wins.
Paul Basden:
Believe me, this is not down into the right, this is up, up, up, up, up to the right. And that's how to make sense of all the Bible stories you've ever heard. Otherwise, you'll think of 10 Bible stories. If you had to, in an hour's period of time, you could think of 10 Bible stories you've heard and you don't know how they're connected. You got Jacob wrestling with an angel over here and Judas betraying Jesus. Where do those things fit? They fit in one of these chapters of the story. Another way to say what God's big story is is this: it contains several recurring themes that you need to know. What I mean by that is if the story art goes this way, the themes go this way. They kind of crosshatch, and they help you find anytime you read the scripture, "Oh, this is what it's talking about." And now you don't feel so lost.
Paul Basden:
So let me just tell you what I think are the big themes. First, God is creator of all, everything there is. And when you think about that, you think, "You mean even stuff like the Hubble Telescope found?" Yeah, even stuff like the Hubble Telescope found. In fact, yesterday I was listening to a wonderful podcast by James Bryan Smith. It's called Things Above, set your mind on things above. And the title of the little 12-minute podcast was Be Happy For God. So don't be sad for God because He sees all the evil and injustice in the world. Be happy for God because God sees these kind of pictures and everything you can imagine on every square centimeter or millimeter on this earth and beyond this earth and under this earth. God sees that all all day long and it just fills Him with joy. So be happy for God. God's a great creator. And that's one of the basic themes of scripture.
Paul Basden:
Second, humans are made in God's image, but we have rebelled. And the result of that rebellion is alienation, alienation from God, from one another, from this good earth, and from ourselves. Now, when you take a look at people's favorite pictures, you really can't tell there's any alienation going along. There you go. That's a nice family reunion. If you look at some of their faces and who they're turning to and what one mom's saying to everybody else there, you get the idea that this might not have been the first take. But is it family reunions and Christmas celebrations and family vacations and Thanksgiving tables and weddings and funerals that sometimes our fallenness and our alienation comes to the surface most quickly? Because no matter how good we look on the outside and we were made in God's image, we have been alienated because of our own sin. That's a big theme in scripture.
Paul Basden:
Third, Jesus is the perfect God-man sent to redeem the world. You've heard that, but let me tell you, you've never seen and heard it like you will if you will watch this multi-season series called The Chosen. This is Jonathan Roumie who plays the character of Christ. He gets it. He's not Jesus, he's just an actor, but, man, does he get the human... The men in my mans group, here's what they say after every week when we finish watching an episode, "I had no idea Jesus was that human. I just thought He was an angel in a body."
Paul Basden:
Fourth, the Holy Spirit helps us follow Jesus. It's hard to understand the Holy Spirit, but His role is to help us do what Jesus told us to do. And Jesus described Him as the wind because the word Spirit means breath, which means wind. You can't see the wind in this picture, but you see the effects on the back of this woman's parka and on the back of her hair. You see the effects of the wind. And you can't see the Spirit, but you can sure see the fruit of the Spirit; love, joy, peace, and patience in someone's life when it's happening.
Paul Basden:
Fifth theme is salvation, salvation from sin, which is initial and ongoing. In other words, as Jim said in his message a few weeks ago, "You say yes to Jesus the first time, that's initial salvation. And you say yes to Jesus the next time, and for a lifetime that's ongoing." The truth is once we're saved, we're always saved, I believe, but we don't always live like we're saved. And so, we can get lost easily because we do dumb things and foolish things. In some sense, I feel like we're always a little bit just like the people that are looking at those windows hoping that someone from the Coast Guard will come rescue them because the waters have risen high because of a hurricane. We're always stuck in something like that. We say, "Please come save me." And the Holy Spirit's right there to pull us out and to help us one more time make an ongoing decision for salvation.
Paul Basden:
Six, the church, it's the people of God and the body of Christ. Much of the New Testament is about the church. Most of Paul's letters are. And here's my favorite picture of all time of Preston Trail Community Church. Yeah, not the building, all those wonderful people and all the ones who aren't in this picture.
Paul Basden:
The last theme you'll find in scripture over and over is just simply what we've already called the end, where God is victorious and we will share forever in His glory. Now, you need to know that while this is the end of the chapter of the book that we know called human history, it's not the end of all of God's work. Because as the prophet says and the apostle Paul repeats, "Eye has not seen and ear has not heard, nor has it ever entered into the heart of a human being what God has prepared for those who love Him." That's the eternity we look forward to.
Paul Basden:
Now, you need to know these themes so you can understand where you are in the Bible. Because every time you read the Bible, it's going to be about either God or humans or Jesus or the Holy Spirit or salvation or the church or the end. And if you know where you are, you don't get lost. Now, you know as well as I do that the purpose of learning scripture is not so that you can pass some kind of Bible quiz and make a hundred and wear some extra special star are on your shirt. The purpose of learning God's Word is so you can find your place in God's story. Your place in God's story, do you know it?
Paul Basden:
You see, God's story is the most important story in all of history. Without it, you would not have any story of your own. But by God's grace, He has actually reached and called you to be a part of His story. And you're saying "Me?" Yeah. I just estimate that 105 billion humans have lived on the face of this earth since the beginning. Six billion now, 105 total. And out of all that, God looks at you and says, "I got a place for you, you, in my story." So how do you find it? How do you find your place in God's big story?
Paul Basden:
Well, first, accept your role. Accept your role. You see, God decided where and when you would be born and live. You had no vote. God decided what gifts and talents and abilities He would give you to serve others. You didn't get to choose those. And yet, some of the most miserable people I've ever known are those who wish they were someone else, who wish they lived at another time, born to different parents, married to a different spouse, taller, shorter, darker, lighter skin. But listen, friends, contentment is simply accepting the role God has for you in His story. As always, no one says it better than Dallas Willard, here it is: "We will never have the easy, unhesitating love of God that makes obedience to Jesus our natural response unless we're absolutely sure that it is good for us to be and to be who we are."
Paul Basden:
Just pause. Do you know that it is good for you to be? Do you know that? Do you know that it is good for you to be born? That this is not bad, this is not a mistake, this is not some cosmic error, user error from God? This is God's purpose. It is good for you to be, and it is good to be who you are. Willard continues, "This means we must have no doubt that the path appointed for us by when and where and to whom we were born is good. And that nothing irredeemable has happened to us or can happen to us on our way to our destiny in God's full world."
Paul Basden:
Your role in God's big story is going to bring you joy and peace, yes, and suffering and hope. Don't think you just get the joy and the peace without the suffering and the hope. You get it all together when you follow Jesus, whose life was a life of joy and peace and suffering and hope. How'd you find your place in God's big story? Second, practice and live out grow and go. Literally. I mean, say yes to Jesus the first time, the next time, and for a lifetime. Worship Him daily. Connect with a group. Serve the body. Learn God's Word. And there's more to come. By the way, don't see these as ironclad legalistic rules. No, no, these are gracious guidelines that will plant you in the fertile soil of God's Word so the Holy Spirit can grow you up and send you out. And as you grow and go, you will be living out your part in God's story.
Paul Basden:
Third, get ready for surprises. In the conclusion to our book, Jim wrote these words, and I just love them. He said, "God surprises. Here's what we mean. In every chapter, all eight chapters of God's big story in His word, God chooses and uses people in circumstances that we normally wouldn't expect. He turns things upside down. He flips the script. He taps people on the shoulder, the 'wrong' people, from a human perspective, and invites them to be the lead in a crucial part of the story." If you've ever felt like you're the wrong person that God's reaching out to, if you've ever felt like God is saying something to you that you simply are not qualified to do because you have a past, you have a life, and it doesn't feel very much like God was in it, you haven't listened to His voice although He was speaking, if you've ever felt that way, you're really going to identify with Gwen's story. Hope you're ready for it. Let's watch.
Gwendolyn Lau:
I come from a very loving, well-meaning but broken family of origin. I was in church every Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night, and yet, again, this toxic idea about God came to me, or at least my interpretation of it was that I could lose my salvation and I could spend a lifetime learning and loving God and get to heaven and not make the cut. Growing up, because I was a girl, there were certain things I could do or couldn't do for God. Whether it was nature or nurture, the theater was really where I felt safe, and I could be other people, and I didn't have to be me. I didn't know who me was because, ultimately, I felt like who I was to God was either a mistake or was disappointing. And so, I didn't like my story, and I had a very specific view of what God's story was.
Gwendolyn Lau:
I got married and had the great hopes and the great excitements and all of those things, but life got really hard really quickly. And so, Dustin and I were separated for a period of time. At my very lowest, I didn't know I was suicidal, but I know that I wanted to disappear and that there was very little purpose to who I was, and everything that I touched seemed to fall apart. I remember one night, I just cried out to God. I said, "If you're real, you're going to have to fix this. And if you are real and you love me, like this book says you do, then I need you to show me that you're real. I need you to show me how to get out of this hole that I'm in."
Gwendolyn Lau:
And so, I went home and Dustin and I started the very difficult and beautiful journey of reconciliation. I got a great counselor, and I started learning things about myself and about God that were different than what I had learned. When I was bugging Paul and Jim weekly to teach me and teach me more and I couldn't get enough, and they're like, "Gwen, we think it's time for you to go to seminary."
Gwendolyn Lau:
I got this weird idea that God wanted to not just redeem my brokenness but to use it for good and that it was maybe on purpose that I was made a super nerd and that my love for God's Word and learning about theology could actually help someone else. I was at seminary, and Dustin was like, "Why are you going to seminary?" I was like, "I don't know, it just feels like obedience." And then residency started at Preston Trail. So I led residency for two years, and then we opened it up to the whole church through a program called Equip, where I get to spend my life helping people grow in both grace and knowledge of their Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, a truth that has fundamentally changed who I am. God doesn't waste pain, and so to share what I've learned in any way to help someone else is redemptive to me. That is, if not anything else, a girl, pastor, and prodigal all at the same time. God's sweet.
Paul Basden:
You heard Gwen say she was an actor. She played lots of different parts. We might not get paid to be acting, we might not be very good at it according to the critics, but we're all actors. We play our parts because we don't believe God has a part for us. So how did Gwen find her part? She began studying God's Word, she began knowing His story, and then she got, for crying out loud, "Lord, you're so good, you've given me a place in your story, one that my background told me I couldn't have,. But surprise, you gave it to me."
Paul Basden:
And today, if you don't know your place in God's story, I want to tell you that I have a very practical suggestion for how you can learn it, because there's no better way to learn it than simply by knowing the story of Jesus. And so here's my challenge to you today if you're ready to accept it. The next step, the very obvious next step if you really want to know God's Word is I challenge you to read the Gospel of John in 21 days. Read the Gospel of John in 21 days. Well, why did I choose 21 days? I'm a genius. There's 21 chapters in John's gospel. Chapter a day, any of us can do that. And you may be thinking, "Paul, you don't know me, I have a hard time finding time for God every day." Great. Sit down and read a chapter of John every day. "Paul, I don't really know how to get into God's Word. It feels so mysterious to me. It's so hard to understand." Great, grab John's gospel and read a chapter a day.
Paul Basden:
Jason Kanapkey, our groups' director, loves to say that if you want quality, intentional time with God every day that is meaning-filled, you need a time, a place, and a plan." Well, I can't give you a time that's customized for you. I can't give you a place that's customized for you. But if you don't have a good plan, here it is, read John's gospel one chapter a day for the next 21 days. I know that the Holy Spirit will speak to you. And I can tell you right now that Jesus Christ will walk right up to you. I've never seen Him, but I've been confronted by His Spirit so many times I might as well have seen Him. And when I read the gospels, He's right there and He's talking to me, and I respond. Feel free to interrupt Him. He's very patient. He wants you to understand what He's saying. I hope you'll say yes to this. If this is God's next step for you, say yes to encountering Jesus for the next three weeks. Since some of you I know want to say yes to this, and others of you're still thinking, I want to give us a chance to process it in prayer, so would you please pray with me now?
Paul Basden:
In the spirit of prayer, I just want to ask a question. If you have a sense in your own heart and mind that you have not placed a priority on God's Word, that you need to, and that you want to learn it more, that you can truly follow Jesus, and you think the next right step for you is to read John's gospel for 21 days, I just want to ask you, would you slip your hand up and just make that commitment to Christ now, if you're ready to spend 21 days? Thank you. Thank you. Keep your hands up. Thank you. 21 days in John's gospel. Thank you.
Paul Basden:
And now Lord here we all are. Some of us are already in rooted groups. We've got plenty to read every day, don't need that. Others of us are in small groups with good friends and we have something that's daily keeping us in contact with you. Others of us are still working through the Worship Jesus daily from the website, from the app on our phone. That's okay, but for all those who said today, "I want to get into John's gospel and read it," oh, Christ, please meet each of us and call us to follow you. We're listening. Speak, Lord, we're listening. Through Christ we pray. Amen.
Recorded in Frisco, Texas.
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