Every[thing]

Good morning. It’s good to see all of you. And to hear you sing with all of your might. That was absolutely incredible. I love the fact that we’re a singing church. And yes. And I want to welcome you to Shepherd’s Gate. Maybe this is your first time with us. My name’s Tim. I get the privilege of being one of the pastors here. And maybe you came today because we were at your house last weekend for this annual, mission outreach that we do called Step Out and Serve. And so if that’s you this morning, whether you’re here in person or maybe you’re streaming in online for the very first time, welcome to Shepherd’s Gate. We’re so glad that you’re here. Can we give them a hand for being with us this morning? After the service, we hope you can stick around. I’ll be out in that west lobby. We do have coffee and refreshments, and I’d love just to shake your hand. And thank you for being with us. If you’re streaming in online, there’s people in the chat that can connect with you as well. But before we get into the message today, I just want to remind you that next weekend is that is incredible.

I love that you all know it’s Father’s Day, and it also for us, means it’s the start of our outdoor services here at Shepherd’s Gate. And so again, if you’re a guest, maybe you’ve never been with us before next week, we’re actually not going to gather in here. We’re going to gather on the other side of this wall, which is our west lobby, or our West, not lobby our west lawn and bring camping chairs if you don’t have any. We do have some that you can use as well, but it’s going to be an absolutely incredible day. We’ll sing out there. We have a guest speaker coming. We’ll have food afterwards and it’s baseball themed. And thanks be to God, the Detroit Tigers are tearing it up. They’re the best team in the MLB right now. I know some of you were like, all right, let’s keep this short because they’re playing today. Right? So we’re going to beat the Cubs. We’re going to sweet. We’re going to not sweet but we’re going to we’re going to win this series and continue to cheer them on. So make sure that you bring your tigers, hats and t shirts and all of your stuff.

If you are a Cincinnati Reds fan, you can just stay at home, okay? You know, I’m just kidding. Just kidding. We’re whatever baseball team you root for. Kids, students. If you play for a baseball team and you want to wear, your team’s jersey or your team, you even want to get dressed up in your whole baseball outfit. You’re more than welcome to do that. But it’s just going to be a great time gathering together. So make sure that you make plans for that. It’s one service at 10:00 next week. So this last weekend, was kind of a huge, huge weekend for us as a church. And I want to start by just reminding us of why we do what we do here at Shepherds Gate. And it all goes back to what we believe God has given us as our target, the reason that we exist, and we believe that we exist here at Shepherds Gate to impact the world with the love of Jesus. And so everything that we do as a church and our kids ministry, student ministry, adult ministry, care ministry, small groups, the social groups, everything that we do within our facility, as well as everything that we do outside of our walls by going into our local community and serving or even putting people on planes and sending them halfway around the world.

If God opens an opportunity for us to do international mission work, all of it is through this one lens. Will this impact the world with the love of Jesus? And that is the heartbeat of a church. That is what drives everything that we do here. Now. What makes churches unique are then their vision statements. And the vision statement is our unique expression of what we believe. God has called this local church in Shelby Township to do. And so you say our vision statement with me. We will value everyone we meet. We will influence everywhere we go, and we will live generously with everything that we have. And so we have been in a sermon series where we’ve been walking through explaining what these words mean and why they’re in brackets. And so two weeks ago, we looked at this whole idea of what does it mean to value everyone? That means if we call Shepherds Gate our home, that we have a responsibility, that every person that we come in contact with, whether we agree with them or we look like them or we sound like them, whatever the case, it doesn’t matter.

We will value every single person that God allows us to interact with. Last weekend, if you didn’t know, we actually didn’t gather for worship and we do this every single year. Instead, we forego the gathering, the formal gathering of a worship service, and we send our people for 150 plus people out into the community over a three day weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday to go and to serve and to give their most precious resource their time to be able to do things for others that maybe they can’t do for themselves. And so the reason we do that is not because we want to go and help people improve their landscaping at their house. Did you know that we don’t go because Samaritan House needs another coat of paint on their building, or because Compassion Pregnancy Center needs, a room painted or Abigail Ministry needs something done at their facility. We go. Everything is connected through figuring out how we can share the gospel and help other nonprofits that we’re partnered with share the hope that we have in Jesus. And so, literally, that’s what took place just this last week in which you’re going to hear more about. And so today we’re going to conclude our sermon series by looking at this whole idea of everything.

What does it actually mean to live generously? Not with just some things. But to live generously with everything that we have. And I want to start by going to the Old Testament, to the book of Deuteronomy, where the leader of God’s people at the time, his name was Moses. He was about to go into the Promised Land, which is the land that God had given them. And people had been wandering around in the wilderness. But yet people still had their material possessions that they had taken out of Egypt, where they had been enslaved for hundreds of years. And so imagine having the possessions that you would consider most dear to you. You’ve been basically circling a desert for all of these years, and finally you get to settle in the land that God told you. You get to settle in. And this is what he tells him to tell the people right before they settle in the land. If among you, one of your brothers should become poor in any of your towns within your land, that the Lord your God is giving you. So don’t forget, God’s the one that has given you this land. You shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother. Now, this is kind of fascinating, isn’t it? Because think of the world that we live in. Think of the exposure that we have to to people who are poor or homeless or that have fallen on hard times and so often it’s easy to judge those people, isn’t it?

Do any of you happen to drive down M50 three and you go south and you get off on M50 nine, and whether you’re turning left or right, you always seem to get the traffic light right, no matter how fast you drive and no matter how much you try, it seems like you always get stopped at that traffic light and there’s always some kind of person that’s right next to the traffic light begging for money. Yes. And when you see that person begging for money, what instantly does your heart tell you to feel about that person? To be honest, this morning. Scammer bum. Unmotivated. Go get a job. What’s your problem? I’m not helping you. And usually what comes out of our mouth as a result of what’s in our heart. And it’s usually cursing instead of blessing. And maybe we don’t have something to give them physically or. Or you’re like, there’s no way I’m giving them money because we just assume they’re going to spend it on what, alcohol or drugs? Isn’t that interesting? It’s always that attitude of the heart. We never think that maybe they are starving, or maybe there’s a mental health issue, or maybe they grow up in a in a terrible home and didn’t really have loving, caring parents.

And that’s the reason that they’re in the situation that they’re in. And look at what God is doing with his people. He’s telling them, listen, when you go into this land and you guys all figure out where you’re going to settle, if there’s people among you that don’t have means, this is what you’re going to do. You shall. What does it say? is that always the hardest thing to do? Why is it hard for us to open our hand to others? Greed. We feel like we’re enabling. We’re selfish. You and I live in a society in a time when we are literally taught to care about ourselves, to do everything that we can to create this life on this earth. Even people that go to church, you can go to church, you can post on your Facebook, you can tell everybody else that you go to church. And it’s part of maybe, you know, one of the things that you do because you’re creating this image, but yet deep down in your heart, your fist is like this. You don’t give, you don’t serve everything that you do and that you work hard for is for yourself and your selfish needs and your family. And what happens oftentimes is people will even hide behind their kids.

Well, I have to buy my kid this, or I have to put my kid in this program, or I have to do this, this and this. And obviously there’s a priority. There’s a there’s a need to make sure that you take care of your immediate family. But God is also called those who are followers of his. To open your hand, to see the other brothers and sisters that are among you, that maybe have fallen on hard times. And instead of judgment, we give grace. Instead of cursing, we give blessings. He says this there, there will never cease to be poor in the land. So that true 2025, is that still the case? It’s interesting because Jesus actually picks up on this and he repeats this in the gospel. He he actually quotes this passage, you’re always going to have the poor among you. And then he says this. Therefore I suggest to you, therefore, if you have time, therefore, if maybe you have a little extra money at the end of, you know, buying that, you know, 100 pair of shoes or that, you know, pairs of shoes or, you know, you got everything else taken care of in your life and you got everything that you could possibly want.

No, he says, I command you, you shall wide open. Wide. Wait a second. Hold on a second. Here. I don’t want to do that. I’d rather keep it all to myself. Why do I have to help this bum or this woman or this child? Why don’t you go get a job? Why don’t they figure it out? Why don’t they go get the help that they need? We got government programs in every direction. Why do I have to be involved in helping other people that I see and know that are right in front of me? Why would God command this? What is that? What is. What is he really getting at? He’s getting at the nature of our hearts. He’s poking at the very thing that we will fight against our entire existence. Because at the root of every single sin is pride and God knows this. It started in the garden with Adam and Eve, and it’ll carry out until we are no longer on this earth. Or Jesus comes back and brings his church to be with him for all eternity. This is a daily struggle. This is a daily battle of opening our hands.

And let’s be honest, there’s some people in our church that still haven’t figured this out. They’re still struggling. Their hearts are still hardened. They haven’t figured out how to just give just a little bit. And at first comes in this fashion. It comes in the fashion of our physical being. Our most precious resource is not our pocketbook. It’s actually our time. And asking people to give up a weekend or to give up a weekend, especially in the summer when we only have so many minutes of beautiful weather. We. Winter is on the way, folks. Now’s a good time to get your snowblower worked on. Okay, if you wait till the last minute. Everyone else we. So last minute you won’t have it for the first snowfall. And to ask people to give up a few hours on a weekend. Who would do that? You have to be crazy to do that. Do you realize that? And that’s what I love about this church. We’re not. Oh, go ahead, you can clap for yourself because you’re with me on this. You have to be crazy to follow Jesus, by the way. And I don’t think we talk about this element of it enough. I think we have just in a church in America in particular. We have just made it too comfy and cozy. And can I just say professional or it just seems to polish and so church just becomes all, well, I go there on Sunday morning and that’s what I do.

And that’s the image that I want. That’s what I do with my family. So I can check a box. And that’s not really if you read the scriptures, you go to the book of acts and you read what it says in the book of acts. Those guys lived on the edge. Those guys were constantly going out on daily mission trips and figuring out who’s the next lost person and who’s the next lost version. Oh you’re lame. I don’t even have money to give you. But what I do have is Jesus. And that’s the most important thing that you and I can give people with the time that God has blessed us with on this earth, it’s being among people. It’s giving up our time. But yes, there’s also this element of opening up our pocketbooks, opening up our purses and wallets and saying, God, I want to fund what it is that you’re doing. I see the work that this church is doing, and I want to be part of that. And again, it always goes back to the to the pride and the breaking of a person’s heart, their attitude. And the only person that can break that is God. You see, serving others breaks the stronghold of selfishness in your life. Now, what’s so interesting is I love the weeks leading up to step out in serve, and then when we finally get to the weekend and hearing the conversations that take place and, one of the one of the individuals at my site, she came up to me and she said, Tim, you’re not going to believe this.

Like she’s like, this weekend. It’s tough for me. It’s tough to be here because I don’t even do my own landscaping at my house. Like literally next week I’m paying a company to come and do the wood chips. We pay a company to come more grass because God has blessed us and we still support the church. But we don’t have to worry about all of those things. And she says it’s crazy because here I am, and now we’re going to do this project for this neighbor of which I haven’t done landscaping in over ten years. And then on Monday, you’re going to want me to pull out my checkbook and write a check to the church. Even though we didn’t have church on Sunday. Yes, that’s what I want you to do. I want you to do. It. Doesn’t make sense. I want you to do something that’s going to push you out of your comfort zone. I want you to live in such a way that your generosity just spills over in your life, because you can’t comprehend what it is that you’re actually doing.

And those that have figured out this secret, those are have figured out how to live generously with everything that they have. I’m telling you this, it becomes a way of life. It becomes something that that just flows in and out of you because you realize it has no effort on your own. You can’t do this in your own strength. You will always resort to selfishness. The only reason that you can live at that level is because God is doing that deep work in your heart and in your life, and causing you and compelling you to live completely different than everybody else on the planet. The reason we do step out in service, because physical acts of kindness actually open the door for spiritual conversations. That’s why the majority of the projects that we do are at people’s homes. And if you’re here because of that, we love you. And the most important thing that we can share with you is not fixing your landscaping. The most important thing we can share with you is the hope that we have found in Jesus. And so the reason we do that is to open that door, to say, you matter to us because you matter to God.

And again, we’re so glad that you’re with us today. Two weeks ago, I read you this passage and it was Jesus interacting with a guy. And he said this. He said, when you give a dinner or banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or your rich neighbors, because all they’re going to do is just invite you back and that’s all you’re going to have. You’re just going to stay in that little circle, and that’s going to be your tribe or your network, and you’re never going to move out of that, and you’re just going to get fat and happy, and that’s going to be the rest of your life. But when you give a family a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind and by the way, when you invite those people, that’s when you’re going to be blessed. And the reason you’re blessed is because they can’t repay you. Imagine every day if you woke up and you just said, today, I want to find somebody I want to bless, somebody that I know can repay me. I want to do something for someone that I know will never have the means or the ability to repay me again.

Living a life of generosity. He goes on to say, you’re actually going to be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous. And I don’t even know why. Scripture tells us that. I don’t even know why there is even a reward on the other side of eternity. Why is it that God rewards us? Why did Jesus say, lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven? What does that look like? We’re not really sure, but that is definitely not the motivation for what we do. We’re not doing these acts of service. We’re not going out and serving our community because one day we’re trying to build up a bank in heaven. We’re doing this out of the outflow of the love and the grace and the mercy that God has given us. Because again, this passage in the proper context, when you read it through the proper lens, you and I are the poor. You and I are the crippled. We’re the lame and we’re the blind. We were dead in our sins. God Almighty looked down from heaven and he knew that we would screw our lives up. He knew that we would be prideful.

He knew that we would be selfish. He knew that we were withhold sharing our resources and live our lives with our hands, fists clenched like this. And he said, I love those people anyway, so I’m going to send Jesus down there and I’m going to have him model his life, and then ultimately I’m going to throw him on a cross and I’m going to let everyone sins hang upon his body. And when he’s ready, he’s going to breathe his last breath and give up his spirit. And in so doing, he’s the one that’s going to pay the price that you and I can never pay. You could never do enough service projects or fixing up landscaping projects. You could do every home in your subdivision. You still can’t earn your salvation. God did everything for you. And when you realize that when you realize that you were lost and you were broken and you were sinful and you were blind, and you’re poor, and your sin, then now you go and you live that life that Jesus has modeled for us, and you go and you serve others. And again, it’s not just our physical being.

God compels us, commands us to open up the resources that he has given us and to share them with others. Because every single time, every single time that you give it breaks the stronghold of greed in your life. One Amen on that. Because it’s tough, isn’t it? It’s tough. It is a daily battle. But here’s the beautiful part. Here’s the beautiful part. When you understand this is that sacrificial giving. When you step out in faith, when you begin to open your hand, and for some of you, that’s the first step. You haven’t even opened your hand yet. Yet. Open it wide. When you open your hand, it actually unleashes spiritual joy in your life. This isn’t something that you can manufacture on this earth. This joy is a joy that comes from God. It’s actually silly joy. Did you know that that the word in the in the Greek, in the text, actually the words used is called hilarious, like you’re giving and it’s almost like, oh my gosh. Like you’re just you’re laughing because you can’t believe that you’re actually sharing your financial resources. Oh my gosh, I’m really doing it like I’m it’s like a kid at a diving, you know, at a pool and you’re jumping off the diving board. You’re like, wow, I’m really going to do this. And then you’re in the air while I’m doing this.

And then you splash and you’re in the water and you turn back around. You look at the diving board, you’re like, wow, I just did this, and I’m still alive and I still have food on the table, and I still have clothes on my back. And yet somehow God continues to provide for you. You know, I read a crazy statistic this week. It, like, shook me completely once again shattered my perspective of how insanely blessed we are to live in United States. You want to hear it? Do you know? That in this world, on this planet, there are more people that go to the bathroom outside every single day than living United States? Do you mean to say it again? How many people living United States? 350 million people. Over 500 million people live on this planet. And they don’t even go to the bathroom inside. Here, let me poke at this. Some of you are bathroom sobs, aren’t you? Some of you refuse to use public bathrooms, and you organize your entire life based on whether or not you’re going to be able to go to the bathroom at your home. You might even have your own bathroom at your house. Some of you, you’re married and you have four bathrooms in your house, and there’s only two of you living there. You can literally just rotate going to the bathroom in a different bathroom.

It’s not. And yet there’s people on our planet that wake up every morning and go and crouch down next to a tree. Absolutely humbling to think of how blessed we are and how much we think, given. And man, when you step out in faith, when you take that first step and you watch not only what it is that God does in their heart, in their life, more importantly, what it is that God does in your heart and in your life, it’s next level. There is a joy that this world will never, ever, ever be able to replicate. So listen to this. Step out and serve is not what we do, it’s who we are as a faith community. And so if you’re checking out Shepherds Gate, maybe you’ve been here since Christmas, maybe you’ve been here since Easter, and you’ve been checking us out the last few weeks. I mean, this is who we are. We want to live on the edge of insanity, just so you know. And when people come and they bring projects to us. And this is the heart of Ron, who’s our local mission coordinator, you’re going to hear from him in a moment. I love his heart because he has a really hard time saying no to people.

He will try to figure out a way if a request comes here, then he just believes that the Holy Spirit must have orchestrated the events to bring that request to us, and he will fight tooth and nail to figure out how we can help that person that’s in need. And not only do we do that with the people that are our community, we also do that with other sister congregations. Now, some of you might remember that just a few months ago in March, our church went and served at a warming shelter in Warren, and it happened to be one of our sister congregations, Trinity Lutheran Church. You guys remember this? What we also did is last October, we spent two weeks there painting and upgrading and helping them get the place ready. They were using the classrooms for the warming shelter because the church was still meeting at this time, and so we spent two weeks helping them get that ready so that they could get people off the streets during the worst months of the year December, January, February and March so that they literally would not freeze to death. And when they had was a rotation of churches when they started that every single week, a different church would come in and provide the meals and support that they needed for the homeless in our community.

Here’s the crazy part. This church right now, today, is having their last worship service. The doors of this church are closing over 100 years old or close to 100 years old, and they just can’t function as a community, as a church anymore. And I don’t know about you, but I hate it. Every time I hear that a church closes its doors. I hate that our denomination is on a decline, just so you know. And I use that word on purpose. I hate that we keep hearing about churches closing. In fact, for churches in Warren now there’s only two left that are sister congregations of ours. Thanks be to God that this congregation voted just last week to hand their keys to campus store, which is one of our local mission partners. And so what they’re going to do is they’re going to turn this church into a mission output, outpost facility. And so camper store is going to have hundreds and hundreds of kids go through this church and stay there who are coming from different parts of our country, to go and go on mission trips into the city of Warren and into the city of Detroit.

And because they’re doing that during the months that they’ll be open, from spring into the fall, into the winter, they’re also going to continue to be able to have the wave project, which is the warming shelter function during those critical winter months. So can we just praise God that that’s going to continue to happen? Now, I told you that we’re crazy, right? Because April 1st, a pastor showed up at the front door of our church and he said, Tim, I need to meet with you. It’s urgent. Said, okay. So we went into the conference room and he said, I’ve just taken a call to a church or to a position in Ohio, and I’m worried about the church that I’m leaving behind. He said they don’t have the funds to pay for a pastor, and he goes, I’m just worried that if we don’t figure something out in the next few weeks, that they’re also going to have to come together and close their doors. Is there any way that maybe there’s something that you guys at Shepherd’s Gate could do for them?

What do you think I said? Do you know the problems I have? I got this corner thing over here. It’s causing all sorts of issues, right? Trying to, you know, tear down our old worship center, build a new one. We had enough of our own issues to do. And I said, well, tell me more. And the next thing you know, I was out at the church and I was meeting with their leadership team, and just this last Sunday was able to go there with one of our deacons, Chris McCartney. And we sat in the worship service, and then we watched as after the service, the members came back and they voted unanimously to live stream our services into their church. And that crazy. Does anybody actually live in an organic? Anybody live an organic? Oh, you do some of you you might want to go visit and go hang out with their awesome people. They’re incredible people. And we are blessed that we have the technology and we have the means, to be able to do this as they as they have to upgrade their equipment and our, our, tech director here at Shepherds Gate, Matt has the ability to know how to make all of this stuff work so that they can continue to meet each and every Sunday for worship.

And so for the next three months, we’re going to give this a try and see what happens. And so you’re going to hear us on Sunday morning, say, hey, if you’re joining us in person or you’re joining us online, or maybe you’re an organic this morning so that they feel loved and we can continue being a blessing to them again, step Out and Serve is not a one time event for us. It’s a life of discipleship. And when we wear those t shirts and we wear the step out and serve. 365 and the front of the shirt, it says every day is a mission trip. Understand this. That does not mean that Shepherd’s Gate is organizing outreach events every single day of the year. The Step Out and Serve 365. The every day is a mission trip means that you are deployed as a missionary, that everywhere that you go into your neighborhood, into the grocery store, on the ball field, every single person you come in contact with is a potential for you to share the hope and the message of Jesus Christ. And I love watching our church be deploying all over the place, and I just believe that God has even more in store for our church in the future. I believe the last 45 years have been incredible, but I just happen to be crazy enough to think that maybe this year could be the next or the best year yet.

We more. There’s someone this morning we do want to recognize and honor that has lived this out to her very last breath. In just a week and a half ago, we actually gathered here at church for her funeral, and we told stories and sang songs and remembered the legacy that she has left in her name. If you don’t know, is Shelly Joyce, and she was part of the Step Out and Serve leadership team for the last eight years. And we love her and we miss her. And she, those of you that knew her, just everything within her wanted to help others. Even if you know her own personal life and the way that she raised her family and the other kids that she brought into her home, this woman truly was a testament of every single day living to her full potential. And so this morning, we wanted to honor and recognize her. So can we give praise to God for Shelly this morning? And now, can you help me and welcome, these two, Ron Kazu and Matthew Murphy, as they come to share with us this time. Ron has actually been our step out in serve coordinator for the last eight years. And, he came on to our staff, in 2020. He actually the first two years you you did it for free, which was awesome. 2018 and 2019. And then you started in 2020. And we went through Covid and God did incredible things in and through you as you came up with creative ways 20 2021, for us to continue to be able to get out and to support those in our community and as faithfully led this, I mean, the system that we have, the well-oiled machine that step out and serve is, is because of Ron’s leadership.

It’s because of his dedication. And we are just humbled and grateful for the eight years that he has given us. So can we give a huge round of applause to Ron to zero? Thank you Tim. Thank you to this amazing church. Thank you to, the Holy Spirit that is here, that is moving us. That is convicting us to just go out and, step out and serve and be the hands and the hearts and the eyes of God. So thank you so much for your support over the years. We’ve been doing this since, 2009. So for the last 17 years, I’ve been blessed to be able to lead this for eight years. But if you think about, you know, even if you just do some quick math with me, 17 years times 400 volunteers, time is, 6 or 7 hours. Think about all those opportunities we’ve had over the last 17 years to just share the hope that we have. So thank you, God. And, you know, I can’t do this alone for sure. You know, the gifts that God has given me, the team that he has blessed us with, especially Miss Kelly, who is the absolute glue to this whole operation center.

And the rest of the team, Kevin Gleason, who has, helped me out over the last couple of years to vet sites to donate to urban, to, Michelle Calzada, to Steve McNair and to Matthew Murphy, who, is going to lead us into the next generation of step out and serve. So welcome to Matthew. You know, Pastor Tim say we have to be a little crazy to be a part of this church. And he was crazy enough to say yes to this, so thank you. Matthew. I love his sarcasm. But more importantly, I love his heart, his grace and his mercy that he has just shown, you know, for as long as I’ve known him. So thank you, Matthew, and welcome. Thank you. Ron. I’m not sarcastic. So to give you some numbers, to kind of give us a better concept of the things that we accomplish this year, Step Out and Serve did indeed have over 450 volunteers. We hit 43 sites. We got a little update on the bikes refurbished. We hit 68. So the bike crew, even after the step out in serve, squeezed out another seven bikes for the kids to enjoy. It’s awesome. We have the 300 essential kits, which we’re going to make sure that you have the opportunity to take, and I know when you walk past it, some of you are going to think, well, I don’t really drive past people that need this. This isn’t my thing. Trust me, you’ll be led to where you need to be. So take it back.

We created under the leadership of Shelly. This was her project that was so near and dear to her. 1300 Care notes to share not only the Word of God, but words of love. We moved 54 yards of mulch, some of that multiple times. 400 PB and J sandwiches for the homeless. And we kept within the budget. We’ll have a little more specific numbers later, but we were budgeted at 21 521,500. And we believe we came underneath that. So all of this accomplished through the grace of the Lord. This was step out and serve. Thank you both. Thank you for your leadership. And we know that God has more in store for our future. So can we give these two guys another round of applause?