Built On Belief

Amen. Amen. Amen. Well, good morning, church. Good morning. That song is my message this morning. I'm glad you sang it with me.

And uh we're going to open that up and really look at it together this morning. I uh you guys know I grew up in church and uh not only did I grow up in church, I've spent most of my life involved in church and uh one of the things that I've noticed over the years uh starting with with growing up in New York City in church there, I had friends with me in uh elementary school and in junior high and in high school and so some of of us were were kind of close in church and we were totally involved and others of us were we were there others of our team were there but not really very very close.

And one of the things that at at this age and looking back and following friends from way back then on Facebook that I noticed which is absolutely I think encouraging is the fact that some of my friends who who really were were kind of were kind of not real close in their walk with God.

And some of them even married people who weren't believers.

But one of the things that over the years that I've noticed is they have grown closer by far in their walk with God over the years. The heart of God pursues us e even many of us who are maybe a bit distant in in our relationship with God and not really moving forward the way maybe we think we ought to.

But the heart of God pursues. So, and over the years, I' I've watched friends that o that have just in their walk with God, like so many of us, we came to Christ and he took us in where we were and his work on us began.

And over the years, we've watched our walk with him change us from from who we were when we met him to where we are now.

And we're living our life in that place.

But the other thing that really is clear is stepping down through those years there there at times were people were people who were following Christ and yet at some point they just fell away. and I watch those who are Christ followers and God's work and in our lives and what he's doing and just just nothing but celebration for that yet heartbroken for the ones that I could see that marriages that didn't have what they needed and they broke apart and lives who were following Christ just fell by the wayside.

And this morning, as we step into a brand new series, my heart for our church family as we as we look at what we're going to look at over these next few weeks is that we build we build strength and we build on a foundation that lasts.

So that we're intentional that we stop and pay attention to a foundation and a structure that matters.

You see, everybody believes something. There there are people in our lives who believe in God.

And there are those that we know that maybe that would say to you, "Well, I don't believe in God." And people believe all kinds of different things. There are people still on this planet who who actually think the world is flat. They actually believe that. I understand that before Columbus took his joy ride across the But now to to think that someone could actually believe that is almost staggering.

But what we believe actually shapes us. It shapes our decisions. It shapes our priorities. It shapes our relationships. It shapes our responses to the things that come at us in life. what we believe really really matters.

And one thing that we do know is your beliefs will get tested. It's not a matter of it's not a matter of will they, it's a matter of when will they.

And how many times will they get tested?

And I look at some who've walked away and people fall away from their walk with Christ for different reasons. Some people feel like the Lord has not answered a prayer in their life. Or or maybe maybe they had a disagreement with someone in church and that was a reason to walk away. Or maybe it was hypocrisy. Or or maybe it was an intellectual question that just could not work through or maybe even just disappointment or or a moral failure. Couple of weeks ago, I really landed on a passage of scripture in in Luke chapter 6 where Jesus was challenging us.

And it's almost as if Jesus was swaying if Jesus was saying if if you believe what I say and you do the things that I tell you to do, then then here's what it's like. It's like a man building a house who dug deep down and laid a foundation on a rock. a solid foundation.

And when the flood came, not if, but when the flood came, the torrent struck that house, but it could not shake it because it was well built. My goal in this series is to take us through a process of looking at some foundational issues to make sure that in in all of our lives, our foundation is on something solid and our structure is well built.

And as we walk through this, you know, m maybe maybe you're going through a period where you're not actually building into your life. Maybe you're stagnant or maybe you're not even following Jesus because maybe someone in church hurt you or or their view of what God has to say about you in your life or or they may have a more of a legalistic view and they would say to you, "You shouldn't be doing this. You shouldn't have that in your life." Or and that's that's that's a struggle. Or maybe even this whole issue of of Jesus being the only way to God, you just never able to get past that.

But my desire is that our structure is strong, that our foundation is solid.

And I don't mean just our church. I mean each one of us in our personal relationship with Jesus Christ. You might say, "Well, James, I'm I'm strong. I'm fine.

And that may very well be true.

But here's what I know about most of us. We know someone. There's someone in our lives. There's someone in our family who that's where they are.

And here's what we forget.

God loves them so much that he placed you in their life. Not not someone else. Not not waiting for someone else to not not just praying for them and not being willing to get involved, but knowing that God himself has placed you in their lives.

And I got to tell you, I've seen over the years just enough people walk away that I want to address the cracks in the foundation that could be the structure that needs strengthening.

And I want to look at truths that shape Christianity so that we all know not only what we believe, but we know why.

And not only what we believe and why, but also to know what what it what what it is we need to do and when we need to do it. so that we build a solid structure in our relationship with God and it's on a solid foundation.

This morning I want to look at the Apostles' Creed. For years you and I live in the privilege of of having the Bible which the fourth century is about when that came up.

But before before we had the Bible, what was going on with the body of Christ, with the church, w with w with people who were following Jesus. By the way, the church of Jesus Christ grew in the first century and into the second century in in numbers that have never ever been matched percentage-wise since. It grew like crazy.

And they didn't have a Bible. The only thing they begin to have was was the four gospels as the apostles begin to write those four gospels and then Paul's writings, all thirteen letters that Paul wrote.

And what would happen is they would they would get circulated and when one of the church leaders got a hold of one of them or a couple of them, they would actually stop and literally make a written copy of it.

And that's what happened over and over again.

And that's how the gospels and Paul's writings and Peter, that's how they begin to get circulated.

And as they got circulated and the body of Christ all around that part of the world, what what happened what happened was Christians begin to grow and God's word began to develop in their hearts and this Apostles' Creed was about 150 to to 160 is about AD is about when it came to pass.

But at that at that point, these books had all been circulated all around.

And it wasn't written by the apostles. It was it was written by church leaders who got their information from the apostles. Where'd they get the information? The apostles got their information directly from Jesus. It's Jesus' words down to the apostles, down to the writers, and we had the Apostles' Creed.

And I just really want to look at that with you this morning.

And the Apostles' Creed doesn't tell us everything. It it just kind of lays a foundation and a framework for for the church, for believers, and it it filled its place.

And it's short enough where a child could actually memorize it.

And but not just not just short enough that a child could memorize it. It is packed with absolute truth to the degree that theologians can take it and win arguments and every line in the Apostles' Creed was so intentional. I that's why I believe this morning it's worth stopping and going back and taking a look at it and I pulled up the definition of creed and I just want you to look at that with with me. It's it's a it's from the Latin word credo and it actually means I believe which is where we got our title for this series from I believe.

And what is it? It's a statement of basic religious beliefs, guiding principles that strongly influence the way a person lives. Strongly influences the way a person lives.

And the purpose of of the Apostles' Creed is is to teach new believers. It's it's to it's to build truth.

And remember, there was no Bible. It's it's this foundational structural statement as as books from the New Testament were just beginning to circulate.

And keeping in mind that God himself is building a family. For thousands of years, he's been building his family. His family is going to last forever. We're part of his family. He's designed us, created us to live forever.

The creed is also structured to attack false teachings. In their day, false teachings begin to attack the gospel and the and the apostles writings.

And the creed was meant to attack those. For 2 Timothy chapter 1, it says this. It says, "Hold on to the pattern of sound teaching." You and I want to know that as we walk through life following Christ that the things that we embraced are absolutely true. In in this in these weeks, we'll talk about the Bible. Can I believe the Bible? We'll talk about that. I want to talk about the Trinity, the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. I want to talk about some foundational issues so that so that you and I fully understand what it is we believe.

Purpose also was to unite Christians around the essential truths of God. John 17 says this. It says that all of them may be one. Th this is Jesus. That all of them may be one. Talking about his followers. He's talking about us. Father, just as you and I are one, the heart of Jesus wants unity in his church, unity in his body.

And the example he points to is himself and the heavenly father together. They were one.

And he said, "That's my desire for my followers. That's my desire for the church." church and you and I, we see denominations and as comfortable as can be with that. We have Baptists and Pentecostals who think differently about some theology and gifts of the spirits for that matter and Presbyterians and Lutheran and the spectrum of uh non-denominational and what we have to remember is we are on the same team.

You see, see this creed says this. This is this is the important thing.

The Apostles' Creed says to you and I, I want to make sure that the main thing is what you keep as the main thing. Let's keep the main thing the main thing.

And so he intentionally gave them the Apostles' Creed so that believers could understand the truth of their foundation. You know, last week we had baptism here and baptism for us, we do it different than some do. We do it in the middle of our worship service now because we just enjoy doing that. It's just And we had one gentleman who couldn't even get in in the tank really. So, we had him sit outside the tank and we brought the tank on top of him with a five gallon bucket. I really wish we'd had a big Gatorade jug and really soaked them up.

But you know, it it was this and baptism was so similar for the church back then. They did it in the lake and one of the things that the Apostles' Creed brought into baptism is when someone was baptized back then that they would actually say to them, "Do you believe in God the Father?" And their response would be yes. Do you believe in Jesus Christ his son?

And they would say yes. Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?

And they would say yes.

And then whoever was baptizing would say because of that I baptize you in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

And so similar to what we do, we're a little bit shorter, but that's exactly what we do even today. There's a passage in Acts that it says this. It says they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and they've it goes on to say and worship and serving. They devoted themselves to it. I want to look with you at the Apostles' Creed. It it actually it starts out with these two words.

I believe.

I believe. It's very personal. It It doesn't even make a statement. We believe. Even though that's great in a corporate setting.

And we And we sang that this morning.

I believe. Not my mom and my dad believe.

I believe. Not the culture says this is kind of what not any any religious group says. It says I believe because what you think is important.

I believe this and it shapes my thinking and therefore it shapes what I do because the way we think determines the way we act.

I believe. In other words, I'm going to wrap. This is at a level where it says, I'm going to wrap my life around this. It's not a I'm I'm going to I'm going to kind of lean into this on Sundays. It's No, it's I'm wrapping my life around this statement.

And it goes on, I believe in God, the Almighty Father.

I believe in God our father, creator of heaven and earth.

God the father, not who the culture says. When the disciples came to Jesus, they said, "Well, how how we see you going off and praying and they've watched him do it enough times and they said, "Well, how how should how should we pray?" And Jesus response is our father. Our father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. In a time when Roman gods of their day really fell into two categories. They were either cruel or they were distant. This is our father who wants relationship with us. our heavenly father who loves us so much that he actually wants to get to know us.

Wants us to get to know him. A perfect father. A good good father. That is who he is. May be difficult sometimes for us to understand that especially if our dad just wasn't our our earthly dad just wasn't all that great. This is our heavenly father. First John chapter 3, John writes this. He says, "See what great love the father has lavished on us." It doesn't say, "See what great love God has shown to us what it's like." It's it's so much more than that. See what great love the father has lavished on us. so much that he sent his son to die for our sins that we should be called children of God.

He lavished his love on us so much that he makes us his child. He does everything possible so we could be adopted into his family and that is what we are. See all of this matters because he wants relationship. You can trust God. You can trust his car. There are people in our world who you there are people in your lives who you know you can't trust. Which reminds me of a lady who was pregnant and uh she was expecting twins.

And over the course of a little bit of time, she ended up being in an accident going into a coma.

And while she was in a coma through a C-section, they had to take her twins out.

And when she finally came too, the nurse said to her, she said, "You we you we had to take your twins and you have a boy and you have a girl. You have a son and you have a daughter." And that you were unconscious.

And the only person that was here to name your your children was your brother.

And immediately she thought, "Oh no, my my brother's an idiot. He's the last person I want to name my kid." And so she said to the nurse, "Well, what did he name my daughter?" And the nurse said, 'Well, he named your daughter Denise.' And she thought, "Oh, that's that's kind of nice. Well, what did he name my son?" And the nurse replied, "The nephew." Yeah, I just liked it the first time I heard it. Karen wasn't all that enthused about it, but figured it's one Sunday morning. What have I got to lose?

Right? See the great love the father has lavished on us. You can trust the decisions of your heavenly father. You can trust the decisions of his son Jesus Christ in your life.

And you can trust his holy spirit at work in your life and in my life.

And this all matters. We're we're building our life on a foundation. The almighty powerful God who number one created the universe and was so intentional about you that he calls you individually his masterpiece that he is at work on. Guys, only God could do this stuff.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his son.

And I want to read right through this whole thing with you.

I believe in Jesus Christ, his son, his only son, our Lord. Our our He's not just our savior, but he's our Lord. He's the one that we entrust our lives to who was conceived by the Holy Spirit.

So many of these lines are direct responses to things that were being challenged in the churches that were not true. Who who was conceived of the Holy Spirit, born of the Virgin Mary, and suffered unto Pontius Pilate. Just because that line is in there that he suffered under Pontius Pilate is a connection with history besides church history and it places him in the in in secular history all around that time area.

And he was crucified and he was died and he was buried and on the third day he rose again and he ascended into heaven and he's seated right now at the right hand of God the father. The scripture said Jesus is ever interceding for the saints. That's for you and I. Ever interceding to the heavenly father on behalf of you and I.

And he's seated at the right hand of the father.

And he will come again to judge the living and the dead. His kingdom will have no end. It will go on for it has always been and it will always be. The scripture says he's the alpha and he's the omega. He's the beginning and he's the end. You can try to rationalize an argument and come up with anything you want to and you may formulate something that takes you to a place that you're saying this isn't true.

But by faith, it's impossible to please God without by without faith.

And when when we hear the truth of God and we embrace it in our lives, the Holy Spirit of the living God in our relationship with him just grows us in our relationship and our time with him and creates something that can only be done by God himself. His kingdom will have no end.

And he goes on to say, I believe in the Holy Spirit.

I believe in the holy universal church.

I believe in the communion of the saints. In other words, the fellowship of the body of Christ. In other words, getting together as a family.

I believe in the resurrection of the body, the everlasting life.

I believe these things. We hold these things true. The apostles heard from Jesus, turned around and gave it to the church in in their writings in the four gospels.

And Luke goes on to continue and write Acts.

And usually when the book of Luke was circulated, the book of Acts was right with it because it was just a continuation of Luke and it just went around and the all of these books and Paul's thirteen letters and Peter's and they just were constantly circulating. Many of the gospels and the books were written 50 AD, 60 AD, 70 AD, all of them in kind of in that arena. Paul writes a little bit later and those things just continue to get circulated and all this information and the founding important information of our faith and our lives are built on this.

The scripture the New Testament takes every one of every one of these are a part of the New Testament in numerous places.

We build the foundation of our lives on the truths of the gospel and who God is.

And we're building a life that was designed to live forever. The four gospels, Paul's letters, and in the fourth century, we had the Bible.

But before they had this, they wrapped their lives all of the different groups of follow bodies following Christ that they embraced the Apostles' Creed.

And over the next few weeks, I want to look at the Bible and I want to look at the Trinity.

And I want us to look at these these foundational truths so we come to the place where where we understand what we believe and why we believe it. Danny talked about the Bibles that are out in the store. There's a this I use a mostly a message Bible. Um when I when I a lot of times when I talk up here, we have we purposely have a message Bible out there if that's what you want. We have one for $10. You I would encourage you to place it in your lives.

We are doing this for each for for you guys. We're selling Bibles for for what we get them for, sometimes even less because we just want you to have them. I have had Life Application Bible for about 40 years now. It is my go-to Bible. I just love it because not only do I have the Bible part of it, and I have one on my nightstand, I have one in my office. I've given a number of them away. I ju I just think they are that easy to deal with because you can read the passage and you can read just right down below right there.

You don't have to jump to other pages. You can read some some notes that are commentaries and then you can also read an application for your life for whatever it is you're reading.

And couple of weeks ago, I was reading one of the one of the blocks down on that.

And I came across this line and it's it's so absolutely absolutely true and I just couldn't get away from it.

And so I just threw it up on the screen. I want you to I want you to read this because it said one of the fundamental biblical assumptions is that human cultures distort reality.

You see, when we open up God's word and we hear Jesus or we hear Paul and we hear some of the apostles and the writings and the teachings so often, almost always what they are saying is almost contrary to the culture.

And that's not brand new to our culture. That's not it's not a new thing. It has always been. It started in the garden of Eden. When I read this statement, I one of the fundamental bib biblical assumptions. It it happened in the garden.

And from that point all the way through to Revelation, scripture points this out over and over and over again.

And you and I live in this culture. We live our lives here.

And sometimes we don't recognize that our culture distorts reality. It distorts truth. It's so obvious because for us information is blown to to degrees that we can't even when when I in 1970 I went and bought a Dodge Challenger. Wish I still had the Dodge Challenger. I bought a Dodge Challenger and the only telephone that I was connected with in any way, shape or form was at my parents' home and it was hanging on the wall and it had wires connected to it and the only thing you could do with it was talk to somebody.

That's it. When I think about what our telephones can do now and how different the world that we live in now and the amount of information that true or not true information that is available to us, it is staggering and our culture is actually distorting reality. Think about this. H how often put that up on the next passage up on the screen. How often do you hear Jesus say something like, "You have heard, but I say the culture is telling you, but I say, you may think or or you, but I say over and over and over through scripture." And then he goes on to say things like, "The kingdom of God is like," and then he gives us an illustration and he gives it to us in another way.

And he does it in and over and over again he does this concept of the fundamental biblical assumption is that human cultures distort reality is so true. It was true about the 12 disciples when they begin to follow Jesus. They thought that greatness meant power.

And Jesus said, "No, no, no. Greatness means you serve." It's too They thought that Messiah, they thought it was a political ruler. They thought Jesus was coming to change. No, that's not what I'm here for. The disciples thought that enemies should be destroyed. The disciples actually thought that children were not important. because kids were coming and the disciples were saying, "No, no, no. Go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go.

Jesus is here to do." And then, and when Jesus saw that, he was furious at the TW at the disciples. He said, "No, no, bring me the children." And he would put them on his lap and he would bless them and play with them and enjoy them. Two totally different concepts. It's it's like Jesus was looking out and he's saying to you and I, that's how the culture sees it. Now, let me show you how I see it.

And he does it over and over and over and over again in scripture. So, as you and I take these weeks together, a as as we settle in on this concept of looking at the foundations of our faith. Why? Why? Why? Why do you want to do this? I've seen enough people walk away. I don't want anybody to walk away without understanding the fundamental basics of the gospel of a savior who laid his life down to save us from our sins and bring us into his family and want to spend our entire life working in our lives and on our lives to take us to a much better place and to use our la lives in ways that are so much better in reaching and connecting other people and doing things that are so much more important than than we do.

Stand with me this morning. I'm looking forward to these few weeks together as we do this.

And Lord, we just thank you this morning that you love us that much. Lord, I thank you for our church family here. for our church family that has said yes to you, looking forward to your work and your decisions in our lives and your desire for us and our relationship with you and all the things that you have planned for us. We celebrate that. We look forward to it.

And Father, as we just continue in saying yes to you, Lord, I pray that over these few weeks that for for each of us in the room, there will be such clarity on what you want.

And I pray for the work of your Holy Spirit and your grace in our lives to give us the courage to say yes, Lord. Yes, God. Do it yourself in our lives. we pray. Amen.

And amen.