What On Earth Am I Here For?

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By Pastor Greg Byman
St Joe Community Church
​April 22, 2018

What on earth are you here for? What person are you to marry? What children are you to raise? What vocation are you to occupy? What mission are you to join? Whatever God may have in store for you, that calling will fall within the parameters that his word provides for all believers in Christ. This week, Pastor Greg Byman takes a look at Romans 8:28-30 to learn about God’s big ideas for your calling. This week we’ll consider how God necessarily is calling every Christ-follower according to God’s plan. Next, your calling necessarily requires that you increasingly become more like Jesus. Finally, your purpose necessarily will involve helping people. Pastor Greg Byman delivered “What on Earth Am I Here For?” on April 22, 2018 at St. Joe Community Church. 

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​What on earth are you here for?
By Pastor Greg Byman
St. Joe Community Church
April 22, 2018
 
Well I sing along and I listen and I hear the words and how many of you sing a song and you forget you don't really think about what it is saying but you're just singing it and and we shouldn't do that but we sometimes we just enjoy the song and we're singing it but sometimes those words just smack right at you and hit you and I needed that last song he he will make a way wherever he leads you he will make a way his promises are true and I'm resting my life on the promises of God that if he doesn't come through I'm done because that's it I've rested my His authority is over me I don't always act like it I am still learning to live under it but but I trust it I trust his authority and I trust what he says in His word from stem to stern from Genesis to Revelation and some I said from the time table of contents to the maps I believe it all and I want to add to it and I won't take away from it and the last thing I'd ever want to do is deny it or turn it into a sham while I'm talking about it I tell people all the time I'm a plagiarist I plagiarized the Word of God although I give him total credit but the only thing I have is not original with me it was original with God when we talk about why I'm worth I'm here we have to have a basis for why we exist on this world so many people are asking the question with suicide among teenagers at an all time high with depressants going off the shelves like candy with people seeking counseling like never before with self-help shelves stocked with loads and loads of of material people are searching for answers but as that old country song says they're looking for love in all the wrong places God has a plan for all of us. Why on earth am I here because God has called us to Himself and I want to talk to small orning about a passage of Scripture that helps us to see that God has called us to this purpose there are many different ways that people try to find their purpose in life there are many ways in which people are seeking to find the answers to these answers some would say the naturalists to say well we've just got to find it in the earth we've got to find out that we're part of all of creation we are just as important as the trees are just I'm so important as us are just as important as animals and bugs and fish in the sea and we all are part of the tapestry of nature which means that humanity isn't more important than anything else and that's why it's just as important for people who would say we want to save a tree would be just as fine with killing a baby in the womb they just go back and forth to say we're no better or worse than any other thing in the earth that even the dirt on the ground is just as important as the person walking on top of it and there's nothing sacred about human life other than we're just part of the bigger picture you know that's not getting people very far and it really doesn't solve the answer of what happens when this life is over the philosophers say look deep within find it within yourself and yet some of the most famous philosophers will say I'm done looking because I'm tired of finding nothing we look for things in all the wrong places we look within ourselves because we think somehow we have some sort of authority or ability to come up with the purpose and meaning of life and yet I can come up with my purpose and meaning of life and then you come up with yours and what if they're opposed to one another then we have a war and we fight over territory and we fight over land we fight over money why if my truth is just as good as your truth and I decide that my truths says that everybody gets to give me your wallet right now because I want all your money well there's nothing wrong with that. Because as a philosopher I've decided that within myself my purpose in life is to take everything from everybody and you and I know that that is nonsensical thinking and yet the philosophers are telling us look within yourself and you will find the meaning of life materialist will sake success is what it is success we must find success and you'll be successful and all you do hard work get are done get all you can he who has the most toys in the end gives them away when he dies I mean gets the wind right we win if we have more things and why is it that America seems to be the most oppressed nation in the world why isn't the Japan who took our model of what success was and turned it into a wonderful thriving economy on the other side of the world after World War two we didn't give him God We gave them all the almighty dollar they were begging for missionaries to come but because of our prejudice against Japan because they had bombed and we had been at war against them American missionaries wouldn't go to Japan and give them the good news of Jesus Christ and so instead of taking the God the One True God that made all things we gave them what God made and that's money and they learned very well what our God in America was and they've made it even sometimes better than we make it financially and they have industries and excellence and such a great successful way that we model some of our factories after what Japan is doing and yet Japan is no happier today than they were after the war in fact they're sadder than ever and the meaning of life in their in their own culture is diminished in great ways and suicide rate is at an all time high in Japan as well hedonist say well feed your hunger is get all you can get all you want if it's if it smells good taste it eat it smoke it do it whatever and yet disease is an all time rampant for those who are sexually promiscuous. There is an all time high of of of problems associated with with addiction to whatever it is you name it and people are trying to get off it they go for a certain point because the Bible even says scent is fun for a while and then the consequences of those actions begin to build up and I can't imagine that any hedonist that has lived his life for his or her self only and nobody else it's all me myself and I It's what I think is good for me and I don't care what anybody else says when it's all said and done they don't look for a beer or a toke or something else to put around themselves at their deathbed they're looking for people and many times a person that lives that way their whole life finds very few if any to mourn their loss if anything they say in spite of them I'm here today hedonist don't seem to have it figured out I already mentioned the self-help industry we have volumes of books on how to find the meaning of life but you know what they all say pretty much the same thing I'll save you the trouble Rick Warren says this I'll save you the trouble of getting all these self-help books because they all say the same pattern dream a big dream you dream and follow your dreams you want to be an M.B.A. basketball star dream it dream it live it just think it and then pursue it with all your passions just go after it work really hard get people around you that will cheerlead you for it and just deny all the deniers great you can't be a basketball player why you don't even have a perimeter shot to save your life you don't have any kind of a shot at all. I'm not going to believe those people I'm going to people around me that agree with me and then I'm going to start reading all kinds of books on how to be a great N.B.A. star going to study the N.B.A. stars and I'm going to get around them so for the rub off on me make me taller men eat what they eat and drink with they drink and the commercials tell me what the drink so I'm going to do that and then I'm just going to work really really hard and I'll be successful. Well you know quite honestly that formula does work in the business world in other places if you have a general amount of talent hard work beats talent in many apps opportunities hard work can be smarts smart person can can't do anything unless they work hard at what they're smart at so there's a lot of truth to that but that's about success not meaning and purpose it's about finding success in life well then go get all those books and go learn how to be successful and relatively speaking in America to many other parts of the road you can generally do those things and generally find a measure of financial and maybe even popular success but at the end of the day you're still stuck with what is the prove purpose of my life is it to build a a company that then just gets squandered by somebody else after I leave it is that mass all this money only to give it away to places and other people and and yet I have so much I don't know what to do with and I just keep doing this and is this really the meaning of life again success is sometimes blurred is sometimes substituted for meaning and purpose what on earth am I here for all these attempts fail because they try to find purpose within ourselves instead of looking stupid someone above ourself in Romans chapter eight verses twenty eight thirty God gives us a picture of what he's trying to do for our lives he's calling us to himself he's calling us into a better way you see if we want to find the purpose and meaning we ask the Creator what he thinks about our meaning and purpose if you want to find an invention and you see somebody you see that invents uses what do you do that for what set for how do you use that you go to the inventor to ask how they did it and why they build it and what it's used for. I went online and looked up john wall to misname just to see if there's anything out there that that was had his name attached to it and you and I talked about this we you were an inventor is an engineer it is that magnet wire Phelps Dodge and it felt. There is a patent two or three of them too and one of them is a patent that he created a product in invention that keeps the spool of wire from bunching up and it keeps it nice and thin as it comes out the out the line so that it goes on the spool without bunching up he never told me that when we when we met and I bet you that if I saw that machine I would say have to say what in the world is that machine but the inventor can tell you that it's meant to make productivity go up and to not waste wire that gets bunched up before it gets pulled up is that I get that kind of right I'm not an engineer I got it right all right so if you want to know how that invention works yes John fast forward and if you want to know what the meaning of life is and where joy and purpose comes Yes John because as he stands here today as he sits here today his life what he told me he wanted from his house as he moved on to his next chapter of this week only thing he wanted was Bible and to make sure that people his church family was around him and we went to some close. That's important when it comes right down to it what we invent how successful we are how big our pension is how many countries we have attend they've gone to and even as a minister of the gospel and I am one of those as well how many places you've been and how many people you've touched in the past it's how have I lived my life for God and the promises that he's given me to live out my life today I'm resting on the promises of God and the reality is that if God's word is sort of right then which of it is any of it right. I didn't put on the list there it's on the list but we'll go back to it but there's a lot of man made religion out here today they like to pick and choose what they like in the Bible they like the parts they like and they don't like the parts they don't like and they say well we don't have to pay attention to that but we will pay attention to this this part's good and that part's not good and we'll just do our pick and again this is a religion that's based on what I think is true not on what something higher than me my authority thinks is true and so I just say this this church we believe that God's word is God's word and we stand on it and while we have similar different things where we're going to debate till Jesus comes on certain things there are particular things that we know are true and that is God is God he's our creator but at some point in time we we blew it it started the very beginning of time and we've been blowing it ever since and we all have this sin gene this thing that keeps us from being perfect and we're separated from God and we needed a Savior and that savior Jesus came into the world two thousand years ago he died on a cross he came back to life three days later and he promised us that everyone who puts our trust in him will never be put to shame and that's my story and I'm stickin to it and it's God's word and that story for my life started before eternity past it started before time began and in Romans Chapter eight The Bible is clear that God was calling me long before I even existed let me read for us let's stand one more time and let me read this passage Let's talk about it just a few moments and they were going to say what are we going to do about it as we leave today we know that all things work together for the good of those who love God Those who are called according to His purpose. For those he for KNEW he also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son so that he would be the first born among many brothers and those he predestined He also called and those he called he just also justified and those he justified he also glorified may be seated live your calling live your calling God is calling each and every one of us to a purpose and a plan God is calling us out in a way that will give us meaning and joy and satisfaction joy that no other place has to offer joy that only God our Creator can you imagine this this this is it disposed my mind that God makes us he says here's my perfect plan for you and then we say. You know you can you hire somebody you have somebody comes into your workplace a fellow employee there brand new all the benefits free coffee would be one I would like to see maybe a donut once in a while wonderful day to day and you have a you know for a one K. You have all kinds of health benefits and they say I got to do is show up on time do your job end of story and yet that person decides and I don't want to do my job I don't want to do everything the boss tells me in fact I think I can be better than that boss over there and on time really time is overrated how long will that employee last no no the boss comes and says oh oh I know you like to sleep in I'll let you just stay there for awhile you know just come in when you want to just do your own thing hit the mark a few times if you can just get if you can hit the bottom line maybe once a quarter we'll be happy for you and then you can still have all these benefits and all the opportunities of being an employee at our company no they'd Faria you'd be gone in a heartbeat that's it ninety days and they don't have to pay anything buddy they'd be looking for as soon as they could figure that employee. And yet we think God has all this plan for us he has all these things in store for us and then we say Oh God. And I don't want to do it you want me to do but I want all the benefits of being your child and we you and I know that we've blown it and like no other boss in the world would ever do he says you know what I've got a way to get you out of the jam so that you're no longer fired so that you're no longer permanently unemployed an eternity of hell I'm going to give you the free gift of eternal life and I'm going to let you be completely wiped away clean of your shame and your sin and I'm going to offer you in spite of the fact that you just turned your back on me I'm offering you to make a U. Turn and come back to me in a fresh way and that's what he's doing with all of us this morning he's calling you and he called you out before eternity past and he's calling you out right now in your very moment of need in this very hour that we are he's calling you to a purpose he's calling you to something bigger than yourself one before you were born God planned you out you're no accident you're not an oops baby you're here for a reason and God made you for a purpose and then be somebody didn't plan on you being here but God did maybe somebody was surprised you showed up but God wasn't he made you in His image and he made you for a reason God Doesn't Make an accident and if you're even thinking I don't know I'm going to try one more time I'm going to try one more time to find meaning and purpose in life that I don't that's it my brother in law was in a dormitory it Ball State University he had gone down the front of a church three different times to tell them he needed to find purpose and meaning in Jesus Christ and that church that he went to in his little town here in Indiana didn't even know what to do with this young man as he came down begging for help. And he was sent away saying oh you're just a good boy you're good enough you can go on you don't need any help from God you're good enough already but he wasn't he was a center say that he needed forgiveness he needed to the shame wiped away he needed a Savior Jesus Christ and they didn't know how to tell him what to do and he went to college and he put his name on a thing that said I need to find out more about how to become a follower of Christ and later on he went back to his dorm and he just said you know Lord if I don't find an answer any time soon I'm outta here and he was going to end his life and he got a call on the phone from one of those campus workers from Campus Crusade for Christ and he said hey I saw you filled out a card you want to hear more about Jesus Christ and I love come talk to you about it when are you available he says right now it would be they were just planning for an appointment later in the week and he finally got an appointment with David which I knew David when I was on campus there five or six seven years before that and David came to his dormitory and they had a house got together for a little bit and open the Bible and he said you find purpose and meaning by developing a relationship by starting a relationship with your Creator God through faith in Jesus Christ and on that day my brother in law found passion and purpose and meaning and ever since he lived for Jesus later he go on to marry my sister he's lucky a lucky man and he's living for Jesus and that's his story and he's sticking to it he found purpose not in going to school not him being a good boy not in going to church not in walk on an island people patent on the head say you're a good kid he found purpose by surrendering his life to Jesus by finding forgiveness for all that he'd ever done that was wrong and sinful and God was calling him long before he ever found that worker that would come and share with him the Gospel of Jesus Christ. God is calling you and he called you before the foundations of the world what it say there in that last verse it says and those he predestined He also called there was a there was a moment he knew in advance he knew what was happening he knew long before you were born and he called you out for that and he for new he gave you a purpose and a meaning the firstborn of might and those he called it justified in those he justified to glorify he had a plan long before you ever even accepted it he's got a plan long before this day before you've even accepted it if you haven't accepted that call in your life and trust in him personally you say is that just for the few people that are going to get saved I don't know the mystery of that I know this that it's also squared with the Bible in John three sixteen that says For God so loved just a few people that he died on the cross for just the ones that would love him so that those who would trust in Him would not perish but have everlasting life is that what that Bible verses know the Bible says For God so loved the world everybody you and me the mystery of the Bible is that God knows and yet he gives free will to choose I know this you must decide whether you're going to follow Christ or not is not just an automatic robot the situation that's just made for you before you were ever born you've got to decide whether you're going to put your faith in Jesus Christ for God so loved the world you got to decide whether you believe God loves you or not you got decide that it's true but do you believe that Jesus did die for you but do you believe it and are you going to trust it I think there's a door of that kind of the my my way of thinking kind of reconcile that God knew and God's in charge and God's calling and God's aware but God gives the opportunity for you to choose is there is a door that says Whosoever will make come whoever calls on the name of the Lord will be saved and we walk through that door we go I'm I'm choosing Christ today I'm going to put my faith in Jesus Christ and when we get to the other side of that door we see you were chosen before the foundations of the world you were predestined to be my child that mystery is sort of in the middle of of those two. Motifs that I just don't understand are collided in the Bible and that is one of those things that will probably debate till Jesus comes back the mystery of free will vs God's sovereignty all I know is that God is calling you so who's God calling Do you hear it you're called. Are you sensing God's doing something in your life he's calling you he's wooing you he's walking you bringing you to himself are you getting the love letters from God When you open the Bible he's calling you he has a relationship waiting for you a personal relationship not just some formal religion but a personal relationship that he wants you to have not just sitting in church sitting and soaking in souring but sitting among a body of believers to stand in soar and sing the praises of God God has a plan for you he's calling you do you hear all there's a lot of people that have excuses for ignoring the call some people say well life's not fair Life's not fair so how could God be calling me out that life's not fair and I say that in this room that's the F. Word we're not allowed to say at our house. I'll show you not fair no I don't do this. It Life isn't fair wake up smell the roses if there's any in your garden you might not get any roses I'm reading Frankel Victor Frankel's meaning of life a Jew that survived the Holocaust psychologist or psychiatrist that that studied human nature and he began to observe human nature throughout the entire process of living in the in concentration camps living on the shadows of crematoriums were smoke was billowing into the sky with the ashes of those that just through the fate of the system that they were living under were taken away on many occasions he could have lost his life oh life isn't fair and the people that said that in the concentration camp and kept shaking their fists and saying Life's not fair most if not most if not all of those couldn't even make it another day and perished very soon after because they did and they found no meaning or purpose in their life that they were living there you know that if you read the stories of believers even people that were not God fears but they found purpose and meaning beyond themselves beyond their own inner self. Those are the ones that most often survived the Holocaust that slaughter of millions of Jews life isn't fair well you can use that excuse all you want but you'll never find meaning and purpose you know find true satisfaction if you're going to use that excuse for ignoring the call of God on your life Christians are mean you've said it I heard someone say this even last night I think it our party sheep bite I know that God calls the church people sheep right sheep bite and some pastors joke about that yeah I've got a scar. That's from all your dogs that bite me that's not from sheep OK Some dogs do like me but some of yours don't OK Christians are mean well guess what I am a hypocrite in recovery I'm still working on being what God wants me to be and if you're going to use the excuse of all the frailties and and and short fallings of the people in this room to not follow Christ well get in line you there's plenty of people plenty of us to pick out today I hope we're not mean I hope we're not mean but I mean we can be sour occasionally because we're still growing into our relationship with Christ the way we're supposed to be and if you want to use that as an excuse you can all you want but that's not going to change the fact that you're not finding purpose and meaning and you're actually going to use a lot of people and some people that are calling themselves Christians might not even be Christians and you're labeling them that and Husing the Christian faith of being a sham because of people who really are a sham and they're just using the name and they really aren't and then we can say well I thought that once you followed God There's that we have a problem free life really I don't know about that rain falls on everybody the floods rise on everybody's house God did not say the Christian homes don't get flooded in New Orleans they all got flooded the good the bad the ugly it all happens to everybody and then you have this pattern you have a painful experience and you go out. And then you go you know what the only person you can trust is yourself then and you end up simply finding no answers still and then you go into this spiral of deep despair because you keep using excuse after excuse to ignore the call that you know God is putting on your life and you're refusing it and the more you refuse it the less you have any meaning at all I pray that you're not ignore it this morning and then you'll hear God's calling live out your call hear it number two God has a purpose for you to fulfill God works through all or experiences what does it say in this verse we know that all things work together for the good of those who love God Now some people say God all things work together to turn out good no he says they all work out for the good of the people who are experiencing those things I don't enjoy illness in any of your guises lives I don't like being sick myself I don't even like a paper cut OK In fact sometimes a paper cuts worse than a deep wound I mean it just it's annoying but God has a purpose I don't like people cutting me off in traffic I don't like people hitting my car when I'm just standing there sitting there I don't like bad things happening to me but I know that whatever does happen God works it out for my good he changes me and makes me better and I can choose you've heard me say it together I can either get better or better I can get better or get better people I've said this before too I'm going to use all the cliches this morning so says some new people you've never heard I'm OK There's some people there like sandpaper in your life don't pay they rub you the wrong way right you can either get changed by them or you can smooth out your rough spots with them you want to know how selfish you are get around someone who's incredibly selfish and you'll figure out where your line of selfishness begins. When they start taking advantage of you and you say well I love everybody and they start really taking advantage of you I mean you put your food in the refrigerator their work and they help themselves really that was my peanut butter sandwich I mean I NEVER GET SOME my work so excited about a leftover sandwich as when they put in a refrigerator and a coworker takes it I mean I get hot but I'm here to serve everybody really use let somebody not be mean to you and you figure out where how much your service comes and goes and you can either let that person make you a better servant or turn you into someone who's more selfish your choice so I don't wish that on anybody in this room but God's master plan is bigger than yours and sometimes God's master plan allows rain to fall in our lives it was at Mercy me this is bring the rain if that's what it takes and I've actually been singing that song in the car and I wait a minute I don't I don't want God to rain all my life. I don't really want the rain I want sunshine and thank God he gave it to us just eating it was sunshine it was up there somewhere but no rain right that was awesome in our party yesterday but God has a plan for you bigger than yourself and he works it out for us good he has a purpose for you to fulfill and sometimes we say well it's a hurt will God's not going to waste that hurt I can't help that you had a parent that abandon you I can't help that you have a spouse that said they don't longer wanted to be with you I can't help that you had a child die and you had to bury a child instead of your child bearing you I can't help that I wish I could and I've done funerals for the young and I've done a few news for the old and I've done films for people that have a long life ahead of them but a debilitating illness took them out I've watched miracles of God answering prayer and bringing young people back to life and bringing healing and I've seen it where it hasn't happened that way but I've also watched people walk through the fire. And turning to jewels of blessing and other people's lives because because God doesn't waste the hurt he doesn't waste the pain that you've been through and he redeemed it for His glory and his honor we have people in this room one particular says I just blood that passes that says I restore to you the years of the Locust took from you and I'll give you many more years of blessing from even the few years that were destroyed because of your own life God has a pant plan and a purpose for you and you're not changing your past and you're not changing what happened in the past God wants to use your past to be a blessing for the future and in spite of what you did or in spite of what your family upbringing was in spite of all the failures that you have experienced over the years whether self-inflicted or inflicted by others God has a purpose for your life beyond that his calling takes you above those things and brings you and sets you on a higher plane and a higher opportunity than you'll ever have on your own you see God wants you to become like Jesus the only perfect person that walked on this earth was Jesus Christ and he says to be conformed into the image of the Son Yes he wants you to look like Jesus this person that everybody adores them and thinks is awesome and wonderful and always want to follow him but they like his teachings right this one that split time in half B.C. and a D. This one who died for you and for me greater love has no man than this that he lay down his life for his friend you are my friends those of you that listen to the call Juris friends and he's lay down his life for you I want to be like that I want to know how to lay down my life for my friends we honor those who lay down their lives for us Memorial Week in this coming where memorializing the death of those who made it possible for us to have freedom in this country and we're thankful for what they did for us because unknown people that never even knew my name went to another land to secure my freedom long before I was even born. I'm grateful for that and in human terms if we can say that's a wonderful thing how much more grateful that one would die for the entire world and that's Jesus and God says My plan for you is I don't want you to be like that man I want you to be like my son and I don't know about you but I've looked in the mirror once was it there's no way that God's God's got his work cut out for me because I don't in those days I wake up and I don't want to think about Jesus you say you're the pastor you're right it's sin stop it and I feel shame to tell you that but there's days that I just kind of want to be me and that's why I hang around the body of Christ that's why I am I have a my wife I married a Christian woman because I need help one sometimes and hopefully I'm there for her when she needs help I need a lot more than she does and you know that but but I get her I have a small group that I go to because I talk out the things that I'm struggling with and I hear other people talk about there are things that they're struggling Oh I'm not alone I'm not the only one that thinks this crazy way I need help and that's where the body of Christ helps me and that's why the Small Group else me and that's why being around the right people helps me and that's why reading God's word on a regular basis helps me because he helps me to figure out a bigger plan and yes he does want me to be like it and it is possible and someday when I get into heaven I'm going to be exactly like Jesus because that's his plan that's his long term goal for me is to grow into the likeness of Jesus Christ and he uses all of our experiences to get us there the Good the Bad and The Ugly and the last thing I want to say this morning about this passage is that God is doing this because he wants us not just to be ourselves but he wants us to help others in the process was he say here that we might be the first born of many brothers What's that that we might be the first born so that he would be the first born among any brothers that Jesus first of all set the pattern he sets the pattern where the brothers then the next brothers sisters two by the way it's a generic term and it goes on and on and on again Jesus set the pattern that he started out that he was a firstborn he started it out and he starts the ripple across you'll never know. The impact of your life living for Jesus until you get to heaven and until this world is over because the ripple of your life will go on and on and on and on and on and my great grandmother was a follower of Jesus Christ she spent one year at Moody Bible Institute and when her younger brother died in a as a teenager in the back alley of Dayton Ohio she came back home because that's what the single daughter does when the mother is going crazy because she's lost a loved one lost her child the other two sisters are married and so my grandma Evelyn went back home to be with her mom she never went back to Moody Bible Institute she at later married gave birth to my mother through the complications of that she was never had children again but I remember that that was the home that I would go to but I'd play church I'd use her a little she used to have a little make up table and the little bench like a piano bench and I remember these and that bench was my pulpit and her double bed that was actually sort of the my dad or grandpa was tall and his feet would always hang over when he slept at night that's just what you did back in those days and my great grandma and my grandma and my mom would sit there and let me sing the songs I knew read the verses I knew I could read I was five years old and play church and my grandma would giggle and my great grandma would grab her leg is a star I didn't know this my mom was tell me she grabber legacy you be quiet. Church. It's the silliest thing when I think about it the annoying floor is similar to the floor out here in the in the room that was their bedroom floor and a little piano bench that was not and it was a make up bench about my height I guess still today and and it and it was my pit was my it was my pulpit. Little did I know when I flew into the ministry for all about that whole image of my grandma said I knew he was going to be a preacher she had a plan and a thought because God got it shown or some things and one of the worst days of my life was when my grandma lost her mind and I realized she was no longer my pearl warrior she stopped praying because you know how to pray because she lost her mind and she lived another five or six years after that we got to got to do her funeral when she was ninety one ninety two somewhere in and that's the heritage that God gave me and she started a ripple but turned into a ripple that allowed me to for some reason I tell you one of the reasons why I didn't do as bad as I did a lot of bad things in college OK and not to be proud about and I'm not here to try to boast and give you stories that match yours but you know one of the reasons I didn't do some stories because I didn't know how to face my grandma when I went home and it wasn't because she's going to beat me to death she was too frail to do that it was those it would been this. And have been that disappointment that I had not lived up to the call that God put on my life to follow Jesus we need people like that in our lives and the people in your lives people need that in you you need to be that Grandma Evelyn you need to be that Grandpa that you say man I'm a young kid you're going to be someday by God's grace have a family raise them up and they need a heritage out of you that says God's worth it they need to have some image in their mind of a person like you that says I don't want to go home to them because I know that I don't want to disappoint them because they love God I love God and sometimes God isn't as tangible as when we see it in someone else I'm praying that you will listen to the call of God in your life that you let Jesus come into your life that you will start living for his purposes so that he can make you like Jesus so that you can be a blessing not just to yourself but to multitude others that go beyond beyond you. Let's stand our feet the small inning the question is are you going to live your call or you just going to let it set I have not asked the wardens of the prisons here in Indiana if this is true but I know it's true in some states that when someone is given a pardon by the governor to spare their life from the electric chair or the gas chamber that it is Nolen void if that person who has been spared does not receive the pardon and accepted in this room you've all been pardoned by Jesus he died on the cross and he paid the price for you and I so that we might live eternity with Him be forgiven of all our sins you've been pardoned this morning and the governor is calling you that Governor is God and he said you are pardoned you're solely set free you no longer have to live in the misery of your sin forever in eternity in hell all you've got to do is take it and just as you got that bulletin and God let us give you that bullet in this morning all you have to do is take it all you got to do is say I received a pardon I'll let Jesus into my life the worst they can be is for you to take apart and put in your back pocket and go to the death chamber and will see the punishment that is no longer needed because your punishment is already been paid for I pray this morning you use this yellow card to commit your life to Christ let us know about it we're going put John and Gene up here in the front and I wonder who's going to go back just whoever it is has gone to the back yes Jerry's back there and if you want to just move forward and put your faith in Jesus Christ and learn what that means receive the pardon hear the call heed the call receive the call Father God the smore to help us all to move forward in our faith whether is to trust you the for the first time or to continue to renew our faith in you in fresh ways show us what all we need to do in Jesus' name.