Okay, so today is part three of a four -week
sermon series entitled rewrite we are going verse
by verse Through the book of Romans chapters
one two and three and if you didn't bring a Bible
today I want to encourage you to look at the
screen a little later throughout the service
We're gonna study every single part of this passage
Why because at Southern Hills we study the Bible
verse by verse chapter by chapter through the
books of the Bible and Romans is a letter that
was written by the Apostle Paul to the people
at Rome to explain to them the good news about
Jesus Christ. And he was telling them that they
don't have to stay living the same life and developing
the same culture that has led to such tragedy
and was leading Rome to a great fall. Instead
they could trade all of that which they had.
and receive a new destiny if they repented and
received Jesus Christ as Savior. And so that's
what Romans chapter one, two, and three are really
all about, and today we're in part three of four
weeks. And to illustrate the main concept of
today, I wanna have a little fun with the audience.
If you're new to our church, you've never seen
me do this because we've never done it in this
auditorium, but. when we started the church at
a storefront. And in our own building over here
and across the way, I used to come down into
the audience a little bit. And so I'm gonna do
that today. So if you are freaked out and I walk
by, just go like this and I'll walk right by
you. But we're gonna do that at this time. We're
gonna go out into the audience. And by the way,
if you're one of the hundreds and hundreds of
people who watch week after week online, and
you're used to actually seeing us, but you only
watch online, I wanna encourage you to come out.
be a part of this auditorium. You can actually
come. But follow me, I want to show you a few
individuals that I want to introduce you to and
I want to ask them to participate in something
that's going to help. First of all, marvelous
Mark, give them a round of applause. This is
Mark Camp. Mark, come on out, come on out. All
right, this is Mark, ladies and gentlemen. Many
of you don't know Mark, some of you do. Mark,
Mark, did I talk to you before this service?
Did you know that I was going to ring you up?
okay let's okay no you did not yeah okay well
first of all that is a lie and you don't have
to lie oh I was I was stretching the truth yeah
for the sake of the illustration yes give him
a round of applause ladies and gentlemen he's
a deacon who lies A deacon who lies. No, here
Mark, I did talk to you before but I did not
tell you exactly what we're gonna do. I gave
you a prop and I want you to hold out the prop.
Go ahead and pull it out right now and I want
you to describe... Nope, that's not what I gave
you. Alright, put that away. See, I did not know
that was gonna happen. I don't give money, I
take it. Okay, very good. Alright, what exactly
are you holding in your hand? A Pokemon card.
That's right, and that's not referred to as a
Pokemon card. That's referred to as a... Okay,
is this of your personal collection? No. No.
No. Okay. Do you know who that is on here? No.
Okay. All right. All right. Let me let me grab
this real quick. Can you tell this man who this
is? Who is that? That is Pikachu. Pikachu. Can
you say Pikachu? Pikachu? Okay. Yeah. Pikachu.
All right. All right. I was more of a poker man.
Yeah. He's a poker man, not a pokeball. That's
pretty good. Did you think of that down there?
Okay, here's what I want to do. What I want to
do is I want to find out if you'd be willing
to make a trade with me, okay? Now, you don't
obviously know much about Pokemon, but I would
say that the card you're holding is a good card,
and Pikachu is one of the more famous Pokemon.
I've got in my hand... Can you tell what this
is? What exactly is this? Looks like a challenge
coin of some sort. It's not a challenge coin,
but it does look like that. It's a silver dollar
coin from 2008. And if you've been paying attention
to the economy, it's actually gone... up in value
recently. I won't tell you how much this is worth,
and I'm not gonna tell you how much that card
is worth. My question to you is very simple.
Will you trade your Pokemon card for this Silver
Dollar U .S. Silver Eagle? Will you trade? Whoa,
whoa, whoa, before you answer, how many of you
in this room think he should trade? If you do,
say yes. Okay, how many of you in this room say
no, that's a bad trade? Say yes. okay so yeah
say no if you say don't trade say yes if you
say trade if you think he should trade say yes
how many of you think he should not trade say
no Okay, what do you think you're gonna do? I'm
gonna go with the audience because Human human
nature has told me that when you know nothing
about something that you have to go with the
masses and clearly all these people know about
Love and the mercy of the Lord and Savior Jesus
Christ. Yes. So I'm gonna go with the audience
and not trade He's not gonna trade give him a
round of applause. Ladies and gentlemen, he's
holding on to his Pokemon card and he's having
a seat Thank you very much. We're gonna get have
a seat. Please sit down Sit down. Thank you very
much. We'll put that in the offering plate. Sir,
can you put that in the offering plate a little
bit later? Thank you very much. All right. Give
Mark a round of applause. I still have my coin.
I still have my coin, and I need to trade this
coin with somebody. So I'm going to come over
to this back section over here. I'm going to
see our deacon. This is one of our deacons, Troy
Pollard. Give him a round of applause, Troy.
This is Troy again if you're watching online
as you can see we have plenty of seats still
So you're welcome to come in person next week
Troy. Okay. Now did I talk to you beforehand?
Yes or no? Yes. Okay and good and hold that.
Thank you for not lying like mark, right? Okay.
Now I gave you a also something. It's not a Pokemon
card. What is the thing that I gave you? I want
you to pull it out right now It's in your what
do you what is your problem? It's all your sermon
notes. Oh, it's all Oh, give him a round of applause
Now, what did I give you? Hold it out to the
camera and describe what it is. It's the Taylor
Swift CD. It's not just any Taylor Swift CD,
it's 1989 Taylor's version of Taylor, which holds
the famous song, your favorite, right? It's Shake
It Off. Wow, that was on there? Oh, yes, yes.
Troy goes from construction site to construction
site, constantly singing Shake It Off. He's a
big Tay -Tay fan. Every day. Here's my question
to Troy. Do you already have this CD? No, no,
so you could add it to your collection Yes, I
could I could But I'm not going to Not at all
It's like a dog whistle. All right. Look here.
Let me just say he's very judgmental. Can you
tell? Okay, you have a choice Mark chose not
to trade. I want to ask you this question this
1989 I I just Let me just tell you about this
CD. It's one of her defining CDs. It's become
a collector's item. You don't know much about
it, but you also don't maybe know how much this
coin is worth. Maybe you do, maybe you follow.
My question is, are you willing to trade this
CD, Taylor Swift CD, for this silver coin? Yes.
That was pretty quick. All right, audience, how
many of you? Church, how many of you would say
he definitely should trade? Say yes. How many
of you say no? There's a little girls in the
back over there. You can come get it. That's
right. There's one Taylor Swift fan over there.
Give him a round of applause. All right, very
good. You're gonna need the mic. I've got Taylor
Swift. I need that mic. Give me that mic. All
right, very good. All right, so now I've got
the Taylor Swift CD, and I've got one other person
that I might be able to make a trade with. It's
an individual over here that I gave a skateboard
to earlier. If I gave you a skateboard earlier,
would you stand up? Oh, there he is. John David
Kolish, ladies and gentlemen. We love John David.
This is John David Kolish and John as we look
at this this skateboard Oh, our cameraman's having
trouble. Okay. There he is All right. Now you
have this skateboard. Do you know much about
this skateboard? I do not. Okay, you do not Here's
the question that I have for you. Would you trade
this skateboard for this 1989 Taylor Swift CB?
Yes or no? That's a that's a hard no. Okay. No
No way. I should have picked younger and more
feminine, I think, for this to work. So it's
a hard note. You thought I would trade? You thought
I would? Here's my question. Can you ride this?
I mean, I can give it a whirl. No, please don't.
No, we're not going to do that. OK, that's a
different sermon illustration called Broken Back.
OK, now, he's saying no, he's not going to trade
this CD for that skateboard. That's the decision
that you're making. Are you going to stick with
your decision? How many of you, by the way, think
he should make this trade? Say yes. How many
of you say no, this is a bad trade say no No,
I'm losing my man card if I trade. Yeah, correct
happen a long time ago done. Um It's a joke we're
friends. All right, give him a round of applause.
He made his decision. Have a seat I get to keep
the Taylor Swift CD What a great joy that is.
Okay. All right. So all of these things have
been happening right in front of you. These men
did not know specifically and individually that
I was going to make these trade offers. They
had no idea. Hey, Jordan, good job with worship
today. Give them a round of applause. Jordan.
Okay. Why go around with all of these questions
and talk about it today? Here's why. Because
oftentimes we trade and we don't realize what
we're trading away. Absolutely true that the
silver coin at today's rate, I used to start
collecting them when they were $18 a piece. They're
trading now for $100 a coin. How many of you
knew that? That's absolutely incredible. And
so that was a, that was an interesting trade.
Now I found out today that each and every one
of these items that I talked about today actually
hold an intrinsic value. The coin. $100, the
Pokemon card. The Pokemon card, how many of you
think that was a good trade or a bad trade? You
say, does a good trade say yes? Bad trades say
no. I found out that, yeah, yeah. I found out
that that Pokemon card is worth $17. Bad trade,
bad trade. Then I found out whenever it comes
to this, where was it? We were talking about
the coin or the Taylor Swift CD. Somebody came
up after the service after the first service
said they looked it up. Don't spend your time
do it after the service They said this CD specifically
because of the style of CD it is and Taylor's
version of this with the CD. It's selling online
for a hundred and fifty six dollars Wow, then
I found out that this skateboard this skateboard
because Tony Hawk That's not true. I made that
part up That skateboard goes online for about
a hundred and fifteen dollars They said well,
which one was the good trade? Which one was the
bad trade? Well, we could debate it based on
what you actually like or what you might want,
but I'll tell you the the worst trade The worst
trades that human beings have ever made are all
of them outlined in the Bible passage We're about
to talk about I've been making trades since I
was a child. I traded baseball cards, and now
I like to trade stocks. I love to trade stories,
but I'll tell you what you see in the scripture
here are the top five worst trades that humanity
makes. Here is the problem. We as humans have
a proclivity to trade down because we think We
know the value of something without doing the
research to know what the actual value is. And
the message that I want to talk to you about
today over the next 25 to 30 minutes is this.
Never trade down. And here's why. When you begin
to swap out God's best for lesser things, this
is when life is ruined. I know this to be the
case because I've done it. I have many times
swapped out God's best for lesser things and
I've lived to regret it and so have you. There
have been times in your life that God gave you
something and the thing that God gave you you
did not value so you threw it away and you traded
it for something less than. And all of this can
be traced back to this concept found in Romans
chapter one verses 18 through 20. where the apostle
Paul is speaking to the Roman Christians and
he's telling them, don't you ever wonder how
the world got into the mess that it is? Have
you ever looked at society and thought, how did
we get here? When did humanity arrive at this
place? What happened to our city? What happened
to our nation? What happened to my family? What
happened to my life? What happened to our relationship?
All of the brokenness can be traced back to five
bad trades. Let me list them for you. Number
one, in Romans chapter one, verse 18, he talks
about the first of the five worst trades of humanity.
Number one. We as humans like to trade the truth
for a lie Worst trade number one we trade the
truth for a lie God gives you as his creation
the truth And we like to hold that truth and
the moment we hear a good sounding lie. We trade
it away Look what it says, but God shows his
anger from heaven Against all sinful and wicked
people who suppress the truth by their wickedness
You say I don't like the idea of God being angry
But I actually myself like the idea of God being
angry when you read the rest of the verse The
Bible says God gets angry when wicked humans
suppress the truth How many of you agree it's
a villain who suppresses the truth? How many
of you also agree with the great truth of the
Bible that the truth will set you free? We don't
need less truth. We need more truth in our world
But there are those in our world who want to
suppress the truth. They do it politically. They
do it nationally They do it globally, but we
also do it personally we get truth from God But
because we don't like the way the truth sounds
we Suppress it. Oh, in fact, that's gonna happen
in this room today. There will be some of us
in this room who are gonna hear truths for the
first time. And the moment you hear it, it'll
go contrary to what you've been believing. And
instead of receiving truth, you'll suppress the
truth. And it'll hurt you. And you've always
known the truth because from a child when you
were born, God gave you as your inheritance of
His creation, the truth. But because a long time
ago you traded the truth for a lie, now it's
hard for you to give that lie back up. Look,
it goes on. It says they know the truth about
God. They, who's they? Humans. Humans know the
truth about God because He has made it obvious
to them. Truth number one, there is a God. You
say, how do you know there's a God? Because it's
obvious. You say, some people don't believe in
a God. I understand. Some people don't believe
in a God. You say, why don't they? Because they
took the truth about God that God gave them at
creation, at their birth, and they traded it
away for a lie. See, that's not a very open -minded
way to think. It's a biblically -minded way to
think. The reason some do not believe in a God,
even if it's you. is because you had the truth
about God somewhere in your past, you know there's
a God. You've always, listen, you've always known
there's a God. Inside of you, you know that someone
created you and somebody somehow convinced you
to take a very, very bad thing and trade it away.
A truth for a lie. Look, it goes on. It says,
and they knew the truth about God because he
has made it obvious to them forever since the
world was created, people have seen the earth
and sky. It shows you how you came to the truth
about God. You knew there's a God because the
other truth is there's a creator. He created
you. He made you. You know that he made you.
He created all things and he created you you
say how to how is this so obvious? The reason
it's obvious is because rational logical thinking
would to say if there's a creation there must
be a creator It's illogical to think in any way
that all of this just happens to be here we know
inherently that there is a Creator as it goes
on and it says it says forever since the world
was created people have seen the earth and sky
Through everything God made they can clearly
see his invisible qualities Not only can we see
there is a creator when we look at his creation.
We can learn things about the creator Himself
his eternal power and divine nature so you say
so what's the point so? They have no excuse for
not knowing God Humanity has no excuse for not
knowing God ignorance is not an excuse Willful
ignorance is not an excuse We know there's a
God because the creation shouts there is God
One of the first big mistakes humans make is
They think about God and they think I don't want
somebody telling me what to do So they trade
the truth of God for a lie and That leads to
the second trade the second worst trade that
humans make is they trade the truth for a lie
the second Trade they make is they trade light
for darkness We we trade light for darkness When
you're born God gives you truth when you're born
God gives you light But throughout our lives
Men love darkness rather than light because our
deeds are evil and we don't like the light of
God Illuminating the darkness of our heart so
we prefer to cover up and not allow God to see
us Look he goes on and says yes, they knew God
But they wouldn't worship him as God or even
give him thanks They knew there's a God humans,
but they didn't want to worship. God is the God
that he was and so They began to think up foolish
ideas of what God might be like as a result their
minds became dark and confused Humans naturally
want to worship something We desire it. This
is something that an atheist and a Christian
can agree on something inside of our hearts desire
to worship something and So what we do is humans
according to this passage is God says worship
me and We don't want God because we don't like
what he has to say to us So we say I'll create
my own God and when we turn off the light from
God our hearts become darkened When you reject
the light God is trying to show you all that
does is darken your own heart You've heard the
phrase show me the light. This is the bit God
showed me the light this illuminated your mind
illuminated your heart see that's what the Bible
is talking about here now We all know what it's
like to turn a light on and to turn the light
off You remember as a child does anybody remember
as a child? standing at your bedroom door and
shutting the door and ready to turn the light
off. And you go to turn the light off and you
try to get into bed before it gets dark. How
many of you remember that last week? You remember?
When you turn off the light, darkness comes.
Here's where a lot of humans are. individually,
nationally, globally, as a people group. What
we do is we turn down the light, we say, no God,
no, no, no, and we wonder why our hearts are
getting darker and our society is getting darker.
We trade the light for the darkness. It goes
on in verse 22, claiming to be wise, these humans
instead became utter fools. How many of you have
ever worked with somebody who thought they were
smarter than they really were? Anybody? Yeah,
you're pointing at your husband. Don't do that.
That's not All right Claiming to be wise instead
they became fools and instead of worshiping the
glorious ever -living God They worshiped idols
made to look like mere people and birds and animals
and reptiles Like this is human history Instead
of worshipping God a lot of people say why are
there so many religions? There's not there's
God and then there's human fantasy that has created
a bunch of stories That's the binariness of all
this And God revealed himself to man and man
says, no, we turn off the darkness. But inside
of man, we want to worship something. And so
instead of worshiping the creator, we create
our own little gods. And so we go over to the
stone heap and we carve out a little stone and
it looks like a reptile. And we're like, this
is a God. And we carve a little fish and we say,
this is my God. And this is what we've done throughout
human history. The Egyptians did it the Mesopotamians
did it the Babylonians did it the Persians did
it all throughout history no matter where you
go humans desire to worship something but if
they turn off the light of God in their heart
they become dark and now suddenly they're bowing
down now think about this from God's point of
view God the one who made everybody he's watching
you cut down a tree and then carve out of the
tree a bird and then you bow down to worship
the bird and say give me good crops You say,
you're making it sound silly. It's not silly,
it's stupid. My goal is not to be soft with you
today. My goal is to share truth with you today.
And if you've got to a place where you're so
willing to trade comfortability for truth, you
may not like the rest of this sermon. And by
the way, I don't think you want a church where
all they're doing is trading comfortability for
truth. Can I get an amen? So this is not wise.
Now, a lot of us as Americans, we can be like,
that is so silly. But here's what Americans do.
We don't chop down trees and create gods. We
look in the mirror and call ourselves God. The
God we worship is whatever I want to be whoever
I think I am discover myself and My identity
is what I claim my identity to be I don't even
believe in God except for the one who looks back
at me in the mirror Whatever you want is what
I get and you end up worshiping yourself And
you're no better than any other false Human alive
and neither am I These are the trades we make.
Oh, this is getting interesting goes on the truth
for a lie the light for the darkness Here's the
third worst trade that we as humans make trade
number three. We trade the creator for his creation
We we as humans love the gift of God's creation
We look at it and we're amazed by it. The animal
life, the sky, space, what's happening in the
sea, all the creation that God has made and we're
in love with what he gave us. The problem is
we love what he gave us so much that we begin
to reject the one who gave it to us. It's it's
like loving the Christmas gift that your parents
gave you but hating your parents who gave it
So much so that all you do is spend time with
your Christmas gift and you ignore your parents.
That's not right This is what humans do We elevate
creation above the creator. There are more Americans
today who elevate creation above the creator
They would rather focus on the environment than
the one who created the environment and that's
a problem Look at what the scripture says So
God abandoned them to do whatever shameful things
that are in their hearts that they desired Here's
how it works. If you abandon the light of God
God will abandon you to do whatever you want
We don't like that word abandoned right because
some of us have actually been abandoned by fathers
and mothers We've been abandoned by husbands
or wives We've been turned away from listen to
me very clearly Jesus said I will never leave
you or forsake you But God also says I won't
force myself on you Which means if you turn your
back on God and say I don't want anything to
do with you he Abandons you that is lets you
go your own way and explore your path until you
realize how fruitless it is God is a gentleman.
He will not force himself into your life. Do
you see? He abandons you to go your own way and
do whatever your heart desires by the way Whatever
your heart desires you say that's what I want
I want to just I grew up in the age in the 90s
where we were taught as kids from Disney Just
follow your heart Every movie at the end every
movie you know like every one of my sermons at
the end is like follow Jesus right every Disney
movie the same follow your heart The problem
is I have followed my heart into really bad scenarios
many times. You know why? Because the Bible teaches
us the heart is wicked, desperately evil. It
constantly desires that which will hurt us. We
don't follow our hearts into the truth. We follow
the scripture to God. This is what the word of
God teaches. No, no, no, it goes on, it goes
on, it goes on. It says, as a result of following
your heart, They divide they did vile and degrading
things with each other's bodies That is if you
tell your heart whatever you want today. That's
what you'll get. You'll end up hurting yourself
You have to say no to yourself They traded the
truth about God for a lie. There's the bad trades.
So they worshiped and served the things that
God created Instead of the creator himself who
is worthy of praise and honor and glory forever.
Amen trading the truth of the creator for his
creation. I was at Chipotle. Can I get an amen
and hallelujah for Chipotle? I love Chipotle.
I do, I love Chipotle. I'm going to Chipotle
today. You know why? Because I was thinking about
this sermon all week and I'm like, I need some
Chipotle. This happened like 12, 10 years ago.
I was with my kids. I remember they were little.
I don't remember how long ago it was, but I was
at the Aurora Crossing Chipotle, you know, right
up there. And we were sitting there. It was a
Sunday after church with some friends. We were
sitting there with our Chipotle, and all of a
sudden came through the door, and this is absolutely
true, a Chipotle protest, which I'd never seen
before. And immediately my wife was like, ugh.
And I was like, oh, this is gonna be good. This
is Primo. We've picked the right day. And there
was like seven people in there that came in.
They were all holding signs and there was one
or two guys with cameras and they were gonna
photograph and obviously this was some sort of
a social media thing. And so we're sitting there
and all of a sudden they got in place and they're
holding the signs up and they started chanting.
This is true. Chicken are people, too. Chicken
are people, too. Chicken are people, too. And
my kids, they were young, they were having fun.
They thought it was a show. They're like, this
is great. And I can remember, there's a few signs
I remember. One of the signs, they didn't want
us to eat chicken apparently. And one of the
signs, there was a chicken face and a chicken
head and there was a tear coming down the chicken's
eye. I was like, that is some, that's good. And
then there was another one of like a chicken
like it was kind of bloody like his head was
cut off That wasn't the one I looked at there
was another one. She had a sign on both sides
one was like fried chicken grilled chicken and
like like sauteed chicken on the other there
was multiple other and like it was It was really
making me more hungry, you know, like I was like
I could go her It had the converse effect of
what I think it was supposed to do And they shouted
and yelled and shamed and they're very passionate,
very passionate about saving the chickens' lives.
And then the manager came out and said, okay,
you know, you got to go. This is private property.
We're going to call the police. And they finished
their filming and they left peacefully and they
left out. And I thought to myself, man. Need
another chicken burrito. I that's what I You
say you mocking it yes Because things that are
deserving of being mocked need to be mocked now
hear me now You say people are passionate about
the planet. We as children of God are stewards
of this planet We have a responsibility to care
for our environment and care for this planet
and care for the animals. Yes Yes, we believe
this The problem is not in caring for the planet
The problem is we live in a society that cares
more about caring for creation than we care for
the creator People are dying and going to hell
and we're talking about saving the turtles You
see, you talk about this like you actually believe
that. Yes, that's the point. Don't you understand?
Our society is no better than some ancient culture
that begin to elevate all of creation above the
creator themselves. And as we look down upon
those who follow the things of God as unintelligent,
here's the reality, people are talking about
chickens are people too. There's something broken.
And how did it break? We made a bad trade. We
traded the creator for his creation. We don't
think about God. We worship his creation. By
the way, the more you actually worship the creator,
the more you wanna take care of creation. Properly.
Fourth worst trade. Here's the fourth worst trade
we make. We trade God's way for humanity's way.
The next statements he makes. cut right to the
heart of the way we as humans are. The problem
we have with God is not that God is a problem,
as long as God does what we want him to do. We
want God made in an image like Santa Claus. That's
a God I can believe in. A God who has a list
and checks it twice, but occasionally he just
crosses it out and says, they're fine, give them
a gift. That's the kind of God we want The problem
is that's not who God is God has a very specific
way Life is supposed to live be lived a certain
way every aspect of your life See, I'll do it
my own way The problem is you as a human don't
know how life is supposed to be lived You say
why because you didn't create life Okay, imagine
imagine there was a guy named Steve Jobs who
made the iPhone and He walked into your house
and he saw you had an iPhone and you used it
as a doorstop And Steve Jobs came to you and
said, wait a second, wait a second, you know
that can do a lot more than stop doors. And you
say, who are you to tell me how to use my iPhone?
And he's like, well, I'm not trying to ruin your
life. I'm just trying to say, that can do a lot
more than stop doors. I'll do what I want with
my iPhone. I will abandon you to your own way.
God says, I know how life is supposed to be lived.
How about, listen to me, and maybe your life
will go better than the way you're living it.
Humanity's way versus God's way, look at what
it says in verses 26 and following. That is why
God abandoned them to their own shameful desires.
God allows you to do whatever your heart tells
you to do and it leads to some problems. Even
the women turned against the natural use of having
sex and instead indulged with sex with each other.
And the men, instead of having normal sexual
relations with women, burned in their lust for
each other. Men did shameful things with other
men. And as a result of this sin, they suffered
within themselves the penalty they deserved.
The natural results of doing it man's way versus
God's way is there going to be some consequences
to this. And God says, if you want to go your
own way, do your thing. You do you, bro. Verse
28, since they thought it was foolish to acknowledge
God, He abandoned them to their own foolish thinking
and let them do the things that should never
be done. Happens the same for all humans. God
gives you His best. You take it. And if you're
foolish, you trade away God's best for your way.
It's true in relationships. It's true in sexuality.
It's true in finances. It's true in nations.
It's true in politics. It's true in every aspect
of your life. You can seek your way or you can
seek God's way. And if you go God's way, things
go well because He made life. If you go your
way, this is what we get. And all of that leads
to the worst trade humanity has ever made. Number
five. The worst trade we've ever made. We trade
God's kingdom for man's nightmare. Now maybe
you're absolutely good with how the world has
handled itself. All of humans, we've done pretty
good. How did it get this way? Look at what he
says. Their lives, talking about humanity, became
full of every kind of wickedness. He's telling
you the history of humanity. Sin and greed and
hate and envy and murder and quarreling and deception.
Do you see these things? These things were never
part of the original plan for God's kingdom.
When God made humanity, there was supposed to
be no murder, there was supposed to be no greed,
there was supposed to be no lying and hate and
envy, none of these things were supposed to be,
there was no scams, there was no deception, there
was no lying to each other, that's not what God
had intended. But man said, I don't need you,
I'm doing my own thing. We don't need you as
our king, we don't need you as our God, we're
going our own way and we'll figure it out. They
are backstabbers and haters of God Insolent and
proud and boastful they invent new ways of sinning
and they disobey their parents They refuse to
understand break their promises. They're heartless
They have no mercy and they know God's justice
requires that those who do the things deserve
to die Yet they do them anyway Humans know inherently
deep down that I've done something wrong and
God's gonna judge me for it. And then you do
the thing anyway. Now before you point your finger
at them, how many of you have ever known the
thing you're not supposed to do? And then you
go and do the thing you're not supposed to do
anyway? He's talking about. See, Christians like
to talk about this passage and we're like, see
how they are? Until we realize and really study
it. And it's God saying, yeah, do you see how
you are? And then the last few words I didn't
have on the screen, because I want you to see
them in your Bible. If you don't have a Bible
open, I'll read them to you out loud. Hear the
words. It ends the chapter by saying, worse yet,
they encourage others to do them too. What does
that mean for Christians? It means this. We say
things like this as Christians. We think, I follow
Jesus, I do my thing, but you do you. And we
encourage people to damnation. And we actually
think that that's tolerance and open -mindedness.
It's not that it's tolerant and open -minded.
It's the fact that you don't want to carefully
and lovingly confront somebody you love. Because
you don't want to be uncomfortable So we go day
after day and allow people to trade light for
darkness truth for lies the creator for his creation
my way for his way and Now they live a nightmare
and the entire time you have the truth And we
encourage them no, it's fine. I'm just a Jesus
person Well, then help them How do you help them
How do you help them? Here's how you help them.
Tell them about the trade. See what trade? If
you have been saved, you made a trade. Do you
remember when you traded your whole life for
Jesus? Do you remember? Do you remember when
you were born? Do you remember when you were
born again? Do you remember when you got saved?
Do you remember when you bowed your head and
you admitted you're a sinner, you received the
good news of the gospel, you called upon Christ
to be your Savior? Romans chapter 1 verses 20,
Romans chapter 1, 16 and 17. Do you remember
what it says? You gave your life to Christ. You
traded everything for Jesus. Tell him. Tell him
kindly. Tell him patiently. But tell them why
you made that trade. It's because you figured
out what was actually valuable. I'll end with
this story. It's not a Josh story, it's a Jesus
story. Jesus was talking about making a trade,
just like I was, except His story you'll remember.
Jesus one time said, there was a man who was
walking through a field one day. And as he walked
through the field one day, he tripped over a
box. And he went back to the box and he opened
up the box that was sticking half out of the
dirt, brushed away the brush, the dirt, opened
it up and inside the box was a treasure of great
value. And in Jesus' parable, the man stepped
back and he looked around and he said, does anybody
see me? Anybody? Whose treasure is this? It looks
like it's been here a very long time. What do
I do?" And he closed the box and he went to find
who the treasure might belong to. So he went
down to the county assessor's office and he said,
there's a piece of land, not too far, and he
described it and said, who owns that land? They
said, well, it's owned by the county, but it's
for sale if you want it. How much? Said the man.
The assessor looked and said, well, and gave
him a number that the man could barely calculate.
So he went home and he sat down with a pen and
a pad and he began to calculate, how much does
my farm cost? And how much are my mules and how
much are my goats? And if I were to sell everything
that I had, and he was able to calculate that
if he calculated everything he owned, he would
have enough to buy the piece of land. And so
he did. He spent the next few months selling
everything in his possession, gathered all the
money, went to the county assessor and put the
money on the table and say, I want that piece
of land. You want that old piece of land? Why
would you want that old piece of land? Little
did the county assessor know there was a treasure
in that land that would make everything worth
it. And when he bought, Jesus says, the land,
he got the treasure with it. The point of the
story is obvious. Jesus says, I am that treasure.
And for those who have never given their life
to Jesus, you need to understand what Jesus'
people think. What we've done is we've calculated
everything in my life of value. And we've thought,
you know what? All that I am is nothing compared
to Jesus. I'm willing to trade everything and
give it to Him. And if I get Him, I get everything.
That is the trade of a Christian.