"I Never Knew You”

Amen On your way to your seat. Won't you tell them: you got to be devoted, You got to be devoted. He devoted himself to you by sending his son, Jesus, to die on the cross and rise from the grave. He is now seated at the right hand of the Father and at some point in the day of the Lord, every knee will bow and every heart will proclaim.

Every tongue confess that Jesus is Lord, Lord Requires all our devotion.

No, it doesn't require it. It requires simply an acceptance of the reality that Jesus died for your sins and raised to walk as an affirmation of that act. But it anticipates all of our devotion. What else you going to devote yourself to anyways?

It's not worth it.

In comparison. What does Paul say? Oh, I always look at my wife when I'm about to quote a Scripture just to make sure I get it right. You know what I'm saying.

Paul says that our reasonable act of worship would be to devote our whole lives as living sacrifices, holy and acceptable to him, Reasonable, Not radical.

I remember reading a book called Radical when I was younger. It was by a guy named David Platt. He went to the same seminary as me. He was way smarter than me, though, Finished his post-doctoral work way quicker.

Whatever, I didn't finish it, I washed out.

But he wrote this book called Radical, and I read it and I'm like "Oh, my gosh, this is what faith looks like". No, Like reasonable, faith is everything. I don't know what radical is, maybe there's not even a category for it, because reasonable is everything. And what I'm learning is: it's not that Jesus requires right, Like.

He's not sitting up there in heaven, stressed out because you didn't give him every ounce of your being, But he's God.

He's not like. He's still God, regardless of whether you're obedient. He's still author and perfector of all of eternity, regardless of what you do about it. I don't want you to.

Sometimes I think we think we serve an insecure God who needs you.

He doesn't need any of us. No, he offered us life, like physical life, and then, during our life, we sinned and separated ourselves from him, and the inevitable outcome of a life without him is an eternity without him. So, because he loves you, not because he needs you, he sent his son, made him flesh to dwell among us. He died on the cross, thus breaking down the dividing wall that sin caused between you and me and our creator, And now, because he made himself accessible, we get to spend eternity with him.

That starts with all of our devotion, Man, he didn't need your devotion.

Devotion is a result of a life that has been conquered by our savior, and, and it's interesting because we live in a culture where we talk to God, we sing to God and we interact as if God needs us And he just. It is a blessing that he created us, And it's a even greater blessing that he sent a Passover lamb, Jesus, to cover us with his blood, so that we don't spend eternity paying for what our sin caused. Anyways, that was a thought I was having just in this moment And I felt like I probably shouldn't share it. I did anyway.

So welcome to my thought life.

We're in a new series called facts F, A, C, T, S, facts that Jesus spoke. I think we like to quote the Scriptures that make us feel good, Or we like to quote the Scriptures, that make us feel better about not living the life that God called us to live. It's like: "Do not judge, lest you should be judged. Take the log out of your own eye before you judge the speck in somebody else's".

Oh, we love to judge.

We love to quote that one. It's very common. How many of you, just to be honest, have you have you heard that Jesus said: "Do not judge"? Raise your hand.

If you've heard that before, Okay.

If you haven't heard that, you're in a great place. Today We're going to start talking about the Scripture. It's a very common thing that Jesus or that people quote from Jesus, And he did say it. He also says to the woman who was caught, or about the woman who was caught in adultery: , "If they didn't condemn you, neither do I condemn you".

There are a lot of gracious words that Jesus spoke.

We forget about the next part of it, where he spoke something clearly as well After the woman. What does he say? He says: "Neither do I condemn you, Go and sin no more". That's a.

We don't quote that part.

"Neither do I condemn you. Go and sin no more". That's a. That's a statement.

Jesus were to tell me that directly, I'd be stressing out about it, I'd be living my life in devotion to him, trying to figure it out, And I want to talk to you about some of the things that maybe sometimes we overlook that Jesus spoke.

I'm thinking about the stuff that he says, and you're kind of like, "Jesus probably should have said that differently, you know". Like the elder comes up to me after a service and like, "Probably could have said it this way instead of that way". And these are those statements from Jesus where his disciples would have been like: "Yo bro, Like you're going to lose people that way. For example, he says to a guy who's asking about following him, but he needs to bury his dad first.

He says: "Let the dead bury their own dead".

Whoa Jesus, Come on, man, That's intense. He. He says so many just intense statements. He's calling Pharisees and Sadducees whitewashed tombs.

He tells the Pharisees that the tax collectors and prostitutes, they're going to make it into the kingdom before they will.

Whoa, man, It's intense Why you got to be so hard. Jesus says so many things that you've been overlooking, And so what I'm doing for this series is I'm just taking you through some of those statements- I think I've got 30 in a list- from the Gospel of Matthew, which is your first Gospel in the New Testament. I could have done Mark, Could have done Luke, Could have done John. It's kind of arbitrary, to be honest with you, I just chose Matthew cuz I felt like it.

All of it's good.

Amen. It's the Bible, Of course it's good, Don't care what you think, It's super good. And so I'm going to be talking through some of the facts that Jesus spoke, And I'm going to start strong. Today We're going to be in Matthew, chapter 7, which is where Jesus is finishing up his most popular sermon.

We call it the Sermon on the Mount.

That's Matthew, chapters 5 through 7. Very important sermon. He starts off with what we call the Beatitudes. Blessed are those who are meek, for they shall inherit the earth.

Blessed are those who are pure in heart, for they shall see God.

So my wife and I were dating. She wrote me a letter. Who wrote the letter? Did you write it?

Write it first or did I write one first?

I wrote it first, See. I See I'm a good dude. Anyways, I wrote her a letter and I cut it up into little bits and had her put it together like a puzzle. I'm not that romantic anymore Now.

I got you now.

So what you going to do, Divorce is a sin. I'm just just kidding guys. But then she wrote me a letter back and she started it with a Scripture And she said: "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God". And she knew that I don't know what I'm thinking, feeling, doing.

I can't sing very well and I can't act very decent.

So she's like: "But you're pure in heart". You got that at least. At least you, you love the Lord, and they shall see God. And I've always remembered that That's how Jesus starts.

He starts with the Beatitudes of encouragement.

He says: "Blessed are those who mourn, who mourn, for they shall be comforted". And then he finishes it with a series of direct statements from about Matthew's 7:13 through the end of the chapter. And I want to, I want to give you our first Scripture, cuz this is the main Scripture. It's going to start in verse 22.

And it's just two verses.

Here's what Jesus says: "Many will say to me on that day: 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, And in your name drive out demons, And in your name perform many miracles'. Then I will tell them plainly: 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers'". There's a situation happening for me and my, my family right now.

I'd ask you be in prayer for my father-in-law, Hannah's dad, .

A couple years ago, about 3 years ago, he got diagnosed with prostate cancer. He's got a PSA of about one, if you know what those numbers mean- And so they don't know exactly where the cancer is, so they're just kind of letting it sit until it be it reveals itself. And then recently they found a mass on his liver and they biopsied it and about 2 weeks ago they found out that it was liver cancer of some sort. And then during that season, right before the biopsy, he had had thrombosis, which is a blood clot in his leg around the femur area.

And then this week he found out that he's got something in his ankle or foot and he thinks it might be spondylitis, but the podiatrist seems to think it might be something more significant, potentially even- you know the prostate cancer- that they've not been able to find.

All that to say, there's a lot going on, and it's so interesting cuz I know I said 3 years, but we're in this stage which feels like it just it's all coming out of nowhere. And when I was reading this passage most recently, I feel like many of us are going to live our entire lives doing for the Lord or around the Lord or learning about the Lord. He says. He says prophesying in Jesus' name, performing miracles in Jesus' name and casting out demons in Jesus' name.

This isn't just people with with some spiritual gifts that they're utilizing.

This is people who did more than, like, I can even comprehend. I don't come from your, your super charismatic tradition. I'm not saying that I've never done any of those things- but I tend to have this tradition where I'm like, "Well, maybe that was prophecy, but I just like to call it discernment so people don't think I'm crazy". You know what I'm, You know what I'm talking about.

So it's like sometimes I'll see something and I'm like, "I think this is true.

Let me go validate whether it's true". Could be prophecy. When I speak it could be some way that God's using me. But I come from a background where I don't just naturally think about casting out demons, prophecy and healing or performing miracles in the same way.

I believe it's possible.

But what Jesus is talking about is people who are executing at the highest levels. I mean, I mean, some of you might have those spiritual gifts, You might, But he's talking to all three of them, People who are doing ministry at a level that in some ways I've not comprehended, And he says they're going to do that And when they get to the day of the Lord, he's going to look at them and said, "Behold, I never knew you" For them in that moment I'm thinking about how it was like when he received his cancer diagnosis. It's like everything feels like it's good, Everything feels fine, But in the innermost parts there's something corrupting the entirety of it And I don't want you to get to that place in eternity and look and realize that you spent your entire life about God but he never knew you. And I know this is heavy.

This has been one of the most scary verses in Scripture for me.

I don't know about you. Maybe you guys are just crazy confident or you never read your Bible. It's one of the two. And if you feel fine about this and it's never stressed you out a little bit, then I want to.

I want to stress you out for a moment.

I want this to land like a ton of bricks onto your soul right now: that many people who have gone to church their entire life but because they never surrendered the innermost parts of their being to the Lord, are going to spend eternity separate from God because they never knew him and he never knew them. Yo, that's, That is stressful. For years. I would?

I would be.

I would be looking at this verse in my reading time, cuz Matthew's always at the beginning of a Bible reading plan. Right, I'd be looking at this verse and I'm like I'm hyperventilating, I'm going to need, I'm going to have a cardiac arrest thinking about this verse because cuz I'm like "Lord, do you know me". Do you know me? And for me, I'm one of those guys who likes to research, And so my interpretation of the text I have learned is not always the best starting point.

Sometimes the Lord is good to me and he helps me immediately interpret a text.

So what I do- and this is a pro tip- I'm not a. I'm not, I'm not. You know what, I am a pro. And here's a pro tip: when it comes to interpreting Scripture: Go, look at what we call the history of interpretation.

It's going to change your life if you do it.

I know most of you won't. I know it's trends. You- just 10% of you will do it maybe, But I hope all of you do it. You go and you can look up.

What did people think about this verse throughout human history, or throughout since the Scriptures have been put together?

And I went back this time around, because I was struggling with this verse and I'm like God. What is, what is? What do you mean by this? That I can prophesy, that I can cast out demons in your name, that I can do just about anything in ministry and get to the end of it and realize that I wasn't one of your own?

And some people want to talk about that.

Well, God just chooses. There's something that happens in Scripture where God chooses. I don't know the full extent of that, but that's not what I think this Scripture is explicitly talking about. What I think this Scripture is talking about is the reality that you can behave your modification your way into hell.

I see it.

Look at our culture. We can say the spiritual things. We can carry the holy elements. We can show up at church.

We can do all of the things.

We can do it so well that we look to others as if we're holy. Some, some preachers. I know- and this was maybe me at certain points in my life- where we have a spiritual gift to say something in a clearer way than somebody else. So I could preach to you.

I can take the Scriptures, I can find the practical value of the Scriptures, I can even interpret the Scriptures And I can deliver them to you And the Lord can use it, because God is kind to you.

But that doesn't even inherently mean that the Lord knows me. John Chrysostom in the 4th century AD, maybe 5th century- I'm blanking on it right now- But they call him the golden tongue preacher. He was in Antioch. He's a church father.

He gets what we call Saint John Chrysostom.

Anyone ever heard of Saint John Chrysostom before? All right, good. Well, I'm going to teach you something new today. St John Chrysostom is probably one of my favorite early church fathers In the first 500 years after Jesus.

He's probably my favorite And some of y'all.

Like St Augustine. I like this dude. He didn't write a whole bunch of literature, but he did write a lot of homilies and he preached them at his church in Antioch. I don't know how many churches existed in Antioch at the time that he was preaching, but we know through history he was at the most influential church in Antioch.

Now, you didn't know this many of you, but there were three main seats to the Christian church in the first couple of centuries.

They were in three different locations, One of them familiar one. Where is the where? Where is? Where is the Pope live.

What city, Rome.

There was a seat in Rome- Had heavy influence in the church. There was a seat in Alexandria, Egypt, A heavy seat of Christianity in the ancient world. Alexandria, Egypt. Very educated people.

This is where you hear about some scholarly or heresy debates between Athanasius and Arius.

Right, This is all in Alexandria. And then you have Antioch. Now Antioch, historically, is known in the early church as one of the more significant and influential of the three. They were more, orthodox than the others initially.

Now, Rome ultimately had the seat of power in the end of it, but during this season, when John Chrysostom was there, he was the most significant preacher in the most significant seat in the Christian church at the time And he would preach constantly.

And so I went back and I was like "What does this guy think about this". And I'm going to be honest with you, I owe a lot of the stuff I'm going to give you today from what he said, Because he interpreted this passage, this entire passage, from 13, verse 13 to the end of the passage, in a way that it just it spoke to my soul, The Lord was talking to me, And then I went and I was reading through it and it. It felt like John Chrysostom from 1,700 years ago and I were in sync in a moment And I feel like, for the first time in my life, the Lord is giving me discovery of this passage in a way that is helpful. And here's what he indicates.

He indicates in a similar season to us, where we've got people preaching everywhere, casting out demons, doing all of these spiritual gift things, But we've also got people doing the very work of God but have never let God do the true work in the deepest parts of them.

Let me say it this way, this is the way that he says it: They've given him the outer courts, that's behavior modification, But you've never made it to the Holy of Holies in your walk with God. And he broke down the dividing wall of hostility so that you could not be just behavior modifying But you can actually be fully transformed by the person and work of Jesus. And in this passage, while it stresses me out, if you take it through it helps you understand something deeper about who God is. I'm going to take you back to verse 13.

And then I'm going to walk you through the passage just a little bit.

I'm going to be honest with you. The Lord has been forming me through this And as much as I like to give you a prim and proper sermon, I did that for the AI series. I felt like I felt like I gave you fully formed messages. I'm just going to let you know: today the message is a little bit deformed, but that's because the Lord was giving me stuff all the way to this morning.

I'm pretty sure I added two pages in the hour before I preached it the first time, So just bear with me today, but the Lord has been really speaking to me.

Here's what he says in verse 13, . Still Matthew, chapter 7. Enter through the narrow gate, For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. And in verse 14, but small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.

Now, this isn't the main statement.

The main statement is: I never knew you. That's my sermon title. I never knew you. In quotes because I want, I want you to see it when you go watch this again.

If you do that, You should, It's totally awesome.

I'd be impressed if you did go watch it again. But he says: "I never knew you". And this- this verse 13 and 14- is another hard statement And- and we refer to it- You ever heard somebody say, "You got to follow the narrow road"? Anyone?

Yeah, you've heard it, Laura.

You got to follow the narrow road. We, the narrow way is a narrow road that leads to life. You got to go through the narrow gate. I don't know if you've heard the gate part.

We always like the narrow road because we, we, we like to quote it when it makes us feel better about the reality that not everyone is going to go with us.

And so when someone persecutes us, I put it in quotes because persecution in the United States is a little bit different than we're seeing in, like, I don't know, Nigeria right now, right, So. So when we get persecuted, we like to say: "Well, it's a narrow road, Not everybody's going to go down it". We like to use it to feel better about ourselves. But I was wrecked this weekend Because what he says is: "The road is narrow and few find it", And the broad way that leads to destruction.

Many find it.

And we live in an interesting age. At least in the United States, We got tons of Christians. It's almost popular to be a Christian these days You notice that It's kind of popular. I'll go through the gym and, I'll look around and I'll see the merch Fear of God- Fear of God- Great brand, super cool.

And I'm not telling you that you shouldn't wear that, It's totally fine.

But I've seen enough people wear the Fear of God shirt and then live a life that doesn't look like they fear God, And I'm kind of like I mean, yeah, But don't, don't get rid of the shirt. It's a great shirt. Just live the walk that you say you're walking when you wear that shirt. Also, I know how much you spend on that shirt too.

That's expensive stuff, man.

I, I get Shein and Temu- That's that's where I get my Christian shirts. But I look at this Christian culture and it's like it's popular In a lot of ways. It's popular to follow Jesus and it feels weird to me when Jesus would say that narrow is the road that leads to life. Few will find it And the way that leads to destruction is broad.

Many find it And I just I feel like we live in a culture where people are comfortable to come to church, Which means to me, if the culture is comfortable, coming to church, living in whatever way they decided to, regardless of whether the word supports the way they're living or not.

It seems to me that there's something wrong with the way that we're doing church. I don't think the church in general does a good job pushing the narrow road. It's, It's tough, It's tough. I, I want as many people as possible to come to the saving knowledge of Jesus, And so, if we have 7,000 people come to an event, I want 7,000 people to come to the saving knowledge of Jesus.

But there's a, there's a like, a constant, a consistent reality that happens, juxtaposed to my desire to see people saved.

And it's the reality of what Jesus says here: Enter through the narrow gate. Small is the gate and narrow is the road that leads to life. And here's what that means in the ancient world, because a lot of us don't understand what happens. I don't see a lot of you bragging about your gates.

Anyone bragged about how big their gate is before.

I know you RV owners always like to brag about your gates. So why? But in the ancient world, every city would have a wall around it for protection, And now, if you have a wall around it, you've got to enter through somewhere and you would enter through a gate. Some of the gates are large, some of the gates are small, And at your own household a lot of them would be protected by a wall there as well.

And the richer you were, the wider the gate.

Why? Because you're hosting people, And when you're hosting people with full caravans coming to party and bring all the stuff that you're going to slice so you can have this big Luke 15 style party for your prodigal son, they got to make it through the gate And so the gate would be wide, Whereas Jesus flips that. In that culture it was good to have a big gate. I don't know what you brag about that you have, but when Jesus says the narrow gate is the one that leads to life, it conjures up in people's minds in the ancient world this very thing.

I can't take everything through it.

I got. I got to check some stuff at the gate. I can't bring. I can't bring all my stuff.

I don't get to bring all my friends.

I don't get to bring all my family members. I don't get to bring every single thing. Let me take it a little farther. I don't get to bring my rights and my wrongs, the record of them, I don't get get to bring the list of the things that I did well for the Lord.

I don't get to bring the list of my accomplishments.

I don't get to bring all the things that I did to prophesy, cast out demons, preach or heal for the Lord. I don't get to bring that stuff. This is what Paul says. He says: "I consider all rubbish in light of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus".

Paul gets that the gate is narrow and he can't take anything with him.

The only thing that he gets to bring with him into eternity as he passes through those gates is his connection with God. And so what Jesus is saying to these people, before he even says it, in verse 13 and 14, he says: "The gate is narrow". And they're going to hear like: "I can't bring my cattle, I can't bring my record, I can't bring the stuff, I can't bring all of my family members". What does he say?

He says: "Let the dead bury their own dead".

He says: "Sell all that you have and come follow me. I can't bring it all with me". No, There's one thing that matters to Jesus, There's one thing that gets you into eternity with God, and it is to be known by Jesus And the only way to be known by Jesus is to give yourself fully to him, Offer your body as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God. But it's like "But, but I did this, But I did this, But I did this".

Behold, I never knew you Well, but, but I'm rich, I got a lot of stuff, All right, But I prophesied, But I preached, But I spread the Gospel to the ends of the earth.

But I, But I, But I innermost part, it is dead. Jesus isn't about the behavior modification, cuz anyone can do it. You can fake your way into church, but you can't fake your way into heaven. And I know it sounds so intense, I feel so bad about it, But John Chrysostom says it really effectively.

He refers back to the book of Numbers And in the book of Numbers there's a story that I'm not going to give you all the details.

Long story short, there's a prophet that is being dense and dull and God uses a donkey to stop him in his tracks. I need you to know God used a donkey to prophesy, But at the end of it was still a donkey. And what John Chrysostom says is so helpful. He says: someone like me who preaches, God can use you to carry the holy things.

God can use you to preach.

God can use you to prophesy. A donkey's still a donkey at the end of the day, though, And so you can do all of these things. You can be the donkey that carries Jesus in his triumphal procession into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday. You could be that donkey.

That's the donkey you want to be.

It's that donkey You know I'm talking about. It ain't never been ridden before. Then Jesus is strolling. I'm that donkey, And that's how we walk through life.

We walk through life.

The Lord used me. Well, that's a donkey noise. Anyways, The Lord used me. The Lord sat on me.

It's the donkey term.

You don't say that, Or maybe you do, I don't know. I served the Lord. I showed up at church, I joined the small group and learned to be a little bit vulnerable. I did all the stuff.

Yeah Cool.

Did you know him? Did he know you? Did you subordinate every aspect of your life to him? Did you shift your posture in such a way that you dropped everything to walk through the narrow gate?

Here's what he says, Verse 15.

Watch out for false prophets. They come to you in sheep's clothing, but- and here's the important word that we always skip over. But inwardly they are ferocious wolves. I know we just read over.

It makes perfect sense.

Oh yeah, sheep clothing. Inwardly they're wolves. I want you to think about the word inwardly for a second and remind yourself of the fact that just John Chrysostom actually tells us this: That it is your interior life that actually matters to God. I know it sounds so basic, but let me help you understand from his perspective for a second.

Here's what he says.

It and I believe it's a direct quote. You know they translated it. He spoke Greek and so it's. You know it's tough to figure out some of the stuff, but here's what he says.

Many come to church, Many hear the sermon, Many sing the hymns.

Again, most influential church in Antioch at the time, The house is full, and I'll tell you that the fullness of the house does not fill the soul of one person, Doesn't fill the soul of one person in it by one measure. The soul is filled by a different means entirely, By hidden discipline, by the secret prayer, by the inner room opened and surrendered to God. Of the many in this building, I do not know how many have entered that room, But I know that the number in this building tells us nothing about it. We've got pulpits full of preachers- I'm not talking about us, about all of them.

I know so many who are strong in their inner room- But we do have pulpits full of preachers who have not let God into the innermost part.

We got churches full of people who have not let God into the innermost part. I don't say that as judgment. I say that as reality. Jesus said it 2,000 years ago.

St John Chrysostom said it 16- 1,700 years ago.

It is a reality And you got to make a choice. Do you want to be a donkey who carries the holy things, behavior modification, being told to do certain things and you end up dead and separated from God? Or do you want to be a disciple, one who says "I submit fully to your will"? You got to understand.

I struggle with this so deeply Because we do this thing at the church.

We call it the five G's. Cuz people were asking us. They say, "Hey, how do we connect with God". And so that I didn't sound overly complex in the way that I described how to connect with God, we said: "Let's simplify it down to what we call it a discipleship paradigm".

And we actually go further.

We're super creative. We say we make space for people. Or, and we also say, that we want to provide satellites for people to access their creator. Isn't that so clever?

Gather, grow, group, give go.

We say: if you, as you, do these things, it helps you apprehend the nature of God. But what I failed to say sometimes- and I try to articulate it effectively, but I'm going to say it so abundantly clear now- These are a results of your inner sanctum being shifted by the power of God And they provoke a greater connection in the innermost parts with God. Let me say it more clearly: You can do these things all day, but unless the inner sanctum is saturated with the presence of God, they mean nothing to God. It's just doing stuff, And it breaks my heart that we create this vibe for people and I don't even know what to do about it sometimes, Because I think you should serve.

But I care more about the innermost part.

He says: the road's narrow, So you got to sacrifice. He says that there false prophets. Those are the people who do all the stuff on the outside, but on the inside they're ferocious wolves. I don't think wolves know or have an intent to be evil.

I think wolves are just wolves.

They do what they do, And that is many of us. We try to modify our behavior to fit into a specific church type of culture, but inside we keep doing what we do. It takes Jesus to radically shift our entire posture, And then he says this in verse 16, : "By their fruit you will recognize them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles?

Likewise, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit.

A good tree cannot bear bad fruit and a bad tree cannot bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus, by their fruit you will recognize them" How stressful is that? Yeah, So I think I'm producing good fruit.

No, Just a donkey delivering a message, and I care about these people.

So I want to make sure that your stupid message is saturated with the presence of God. Now, I don't think I'm a donkey, I think I'm a disciple, But nothing you do is actually special except this one, And you've got to move from a posture of behavior modification to shifting your posture altogether. And a lot of us. We want to be in good standing with God and we think the way to do it is to do more.

But the only way to be in good standing with God is to actually shift your posture from standing to kneeling before God.

Again from John Chrysostom. John Chrysostom actually builds out this theology way before. Someone kind of codified it in her work called the. What is it called?

Oh my gosh, The Interior Castle.

Her name: St Teresa of Ávila. About 1,000 years after St John Chrysostom, she developed this and talks about the outer room, the inner room, and then the innermost room. Right, She's talking about how do you develop a devotion to God that is saturated with his presence and how do you become known by God at the level that Jesus is talking about here? This started in a lot of ways with John Chrysostom and he gives you a couple characteristics, cuz I know what you're thinking.

You're thinking, "Well, I do this.

If I don't do this stuff, then what do I do? Because I don't know how to understand Scriptures. I don't know how to talk to God. I've never done it before.

You keep talking about a prayer life in the innermost sanctum and the innermost part of your life in the holy of holies that God resides in.

What in the world is all that stuff, Pastor". I, I, I know It sounds tedious, But if you can understand first that it's a shift of posture, where you're relying on God for everything, then you can look at different sets of metrics, Like, think, think about the metrics that we talk about most. I'm so, I'm so angered by the Oh why, why do we do what we do? I'm so angered by it.

It's like, It's like "Oh, I feel, I feel like I needed to tell you that there were 7,000 people there last week".

Who cares if there were 7,000 people, if none of them got saved, Right? Like, So we have, we have 6,600 people at Easter, but they didn't show up. This week We didn't have 6,600 people. That was somebody else in my text group.

But like, who cares?

Oh, we had 40 baptisms. Did they show up 60 weeks later? I, I, just, I don't care about the behavior modification. You can dip in the tank 50 times and if your innermost doesn't get shifted, you're just as dead as you were before you got wet.

And it just stresses me out so much because it's like: what are we, what are we doing here in the church where, where we look at metrics like attendance and metrics like baptism.

And before you think it's just cuz I feel bad that we're doing phenomenally, We grew by like 30% last year. Who cares? Who cares how big we are if we're 10% saved or 10% giving God everything? I'm just done with that stuff.

Here's the metric.

Did you give him your innermost, Have you donated your life fully over to Jesus? If you haven't done that, then you're still at at at the gate and unwilling to pass through it. Now the beauty is Jesus has become accessible to us. Like you're not stuck on the outer court, like we used to be as Gentiles.

You can actually enter in boldly.

Before his throne He broke down that dividing wall of hostility. This is Ephesians, chapter 2. And by his blood shed on the cross, he has bound us together, close to him. We can approach him, We can access him.

We can knock at the gate, We can.

So here's some. I got to close this off pretty quickly. Here's some practical metrics that St John Chrysostom talks about, and I'm paraphrasing whole homilies for a moment, but here are a couple things that he says. If, if it's not church metrics- like showed up, got saved, served this many times this month, and all this- If it's not those metrics, what are they?

How do you gauge the innermost metrics?

Here's what he says. It's three specific things. He gave five, but I'm not going to talk about the other two today. I'm going to talk about three.

That's all you can carry.

You can't carry five bowling balls. These are bowling balls. You got three: The quality of solitary prayer, Quality of solitary prayer. Here's essentially what he says.

Again, this is paraphrase.

Tell me not how long you pray, but what happens in the prayer when no one is listening and nothing is being accomplished. Tell me what the prayer feels like at the 45th minute. Do you hear that? Did I say the 5th minute?

No, I said the 45th minute.

I mean, I know most of y'all never prayed 45 minutes in your life. You might be sitting there like thinking for 45 minutes or texting people cuz you feel stressed out and you trying to find someone desperately to make you feel better about the life. That you're doing. You ain't prayed.

Prayed for 45 minutes diligently.

He says: "Tell me where you are. At the 45th minute, when the eloquence is gone and the feeling is departed and there's nothing left but the bare will turn toward God. That is where the interior life is built. That is the metric that matters This.

This is literally that simple.

It is beat on the gate until he opens it In your innermost. Like you, you go home, You might not have a prayer room. I finally, at 38 years old, turned one room in my house into an inner sanctum, a meditation room. Right, I finally got to do that.

Most of you don't have that.

You need to find a closet, You, You, You need to go into your like man cave. You sit in the bathroom for a second. Let people think you're using the bathroom. But you're.

You're in there talking to the Lord.

Stand in the shower about 45 minutes and talk to him. Sit in the car when it's cool outside. Roll down your windows, Turn the AC on, Waste your gas. It's worth it to apprehend the nature of who Jesus is.

I don't care how expensive it is.

You've got to find a place, go to it and remain there until you connect with him. And then you think, "Well, what do I bring with me". Here's what John Chrysostom said. It's so interesting because he spoke and preached in a time where most people were illiterate, meaning they couldn't read or write.

I found myself thinking, "Okay cool, I have some biblical education, so I can grab the Bible and I can read it and I can comprehend it at a deeper level.

All of us can- better than they did back in the day". And so when he's telling people to develop an inner life, an inner thought life with God, what he tells them is: "Hey, we've got creeds". He's talking to fully uneducated people. And I'm talking to you.

You're way more educated than any of these people.

You have more access to the word than anyone in human history. You don't have to default to this place, but you can. You say: "Well, what are the creeds"? You got a couple.

Go grab a couple of the creeds that are already present in Scripture.

He made him, who knew no sin, to become sin on our behalf, that we might exist as the righteousness of God. Second Corinthians, chapter 5. He said: "Therefore, do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind that you may prove the acceptable right and good will of God. Finally, brethren, whatever is true, honorable right".

You can go back to the creed you all memorized, whether you were in a Catholic church or you played on a football team.

Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our trespasses, as we give forgive those who trespass against us.

What St John Chrysostom, 1,700 years ago, tells us is: he says: "Re- Repeat those, Recite those, Beat on the gate until he opens, and it may be just a creed, It might be the most elevated theology you've ever encountered, but you go into that place and beat your head against the wall until he opens the door.

That is how you become known as you remain in him. He says: 'I am the vine and you are the branches'". So stop being a branch that thinks it does something without a root. Jesus talks about the fruit.

It's like that: you'll know the tree by its fruit, and we keep practicing: fruit, fruit, fruit, fruit, fruit, Serve, serve, serve, Give, give, give, go out there, be nice to people, preach the Gospel, do all of this other stuff.

He doesn't care. He wants you to do it, but he wants you to do it as a result of being tied in manay, abiding in the vine. And the only way you do that, seek him where he can be found, and he will be found by you. Go into, go somewhere, Look at your neighbor.

Tell them real quick, Just cuz I got to get your interpretation for a second.

Look at them. Look at, Look at your neighbor. Look at your neighbor. Don't look at me.

Look at your neighbor.

Go somewhere In prayer. You got to pray. You're not going to be good at it. Who cares?

You'll figure it out.

This is me. If it's 5 minutes and then the Lord talks to me, great, It might be 50 minutes and the Lord didn't say anything. I'm waking up the next day and I'm going to do the same thing. Martin Luther says: "I've got too much to do in my busy day not to wake up and spend 3 hours in prayer".

He says the 45th minute.

We haven't even been giving him 5 minutes and we expect to be changed radically. You will not be changed radically And I'm going to tell you this. It is the most bold statement I'm going to make today and it scares me a little bit cuz we're still set up, tear down as a church. You can gather, grow, group, give and go your way into an eternity separate from Jesus if you don't deal with the innermost part and become known by Jesus.

So if you're serving 6 weeks in, 12 weeks in, and you're dead tired and you hate it.

You got two options: You can quit or you can figure out why that is by going into the inner room, By giving him every aspect of who you are. He says the second thing is your response to failure. You're going to learn. Your response to failure indicates as a metric where you are in the inner room.

And I've learned that when I fail, when I am weak there, he is strong.

And so there's this weird, crazy, unfathomable joy and peace that comes over me when I am in the peak of failure, Like the worst moments of my life is when I see him. I wish I saw him in the successful moments, I just don't. I wish he would shift that about me, but I don't. But here's what John Chrysostom said: "Hey, your response to failure.

You wish to know whether a man is truly formed by Christ.

Don't look at what he does when he succeeds. Look at what happens in his soul when he fails epically. Does he press deeper into God or does he press harder into the work to recover his standing? Does he kneel Or does he try to strengthen himself?

He says: "That's going to be an x-ray to the inner room".

He didn't say x-ray 1,700 years ago he didn't know what that was: The depth of self-knowledge. And this is so beautiful. Ask yourself not how much have I accomplished, but how well do I know myself before God. For the one who is genuinely formed by Christ knows themselves with increasing clarity.

The closer they come to him, the more they see.

And what they see does not make them confident in their standing. It makes them dependent on his mercy. If for years of ministry have produced increasing confidence in your own spiritual standing, he says that he said: "I say to you gently but directly: you've been measuring the wrong thing. The older I get, the more frail I feel.

And it's not a physical thing, It's a recognition that I can stand up here all day and be but a donkey before you, but I want to be a disciple who is reliant, contingent, on Jesus Christ.

So when you leave here- and I'll close with this- I'm not going to close with a prayer for you to accept Jesus, cuz it's one of those metrics. I we'll do it again, But it's one of those metrics. It's like "Oh you, have you raised your hand". Have you given God your life?

Have you taken up your cross and followed him?

Raising your hand is amazing. Looking at me in the eyeballs is amazing. Jumping in the tank next week is amazing. But you need to go home today And you need to be like that man who didn't know how to pray, but he beat his chest and he said: "Woe is me".

Go home, Wake up in the morning, Don't start with 45 minutes- You're not ready for that yet- But spend 5 minutes separate from everybody And say "Lord, speak to me".

Open up your tablet, open up your laptop, start typing to God, write in your journal to God, audio, message the Lord and send it to nobody. Do whatever you got to do to beat on that gate until he opens it. And when he opens it, he's going to reveal to you the sacrifice you must make And leave it all at the gate, Because that's the start of your road to life, And the road is narrow too.