Main Thing Podcast
This podcast encourages others to love God and people by leading them to know and follow Jesus’ truth.
Main Thing Podcast
Loving God
We explore our church's mission statement—love God, love people, and lead others to do the same—breaking down what it means to truly love God with all your heart, soul, and mind.
• True worship means loving God with every aspect of our being
• What matters most in worship is not the style but the heart
• People are always our business—changing lives and eternal destinies
• Where your treasure is, there your heart will be also
• Your entire life should be offered as worship to God
Covenant Church
Thank you for reminder for us to recall in today's divisive and dark culture, from foundational truths and scripture to the hot topics of today's culture. Allow this podcast to inspire and motivate you on your faith journey. Well, hey, pastor, steve, good morning, good to be with you again, good to be here. We are on episode 17 now rolling through. The next four episodes will be about our mission statement and discipleship and really just how we walk people in our own church through discipleship, and I'm excited about this one. So the main idea, our mission statement, is love God, love people and lead others to do the same. It's simple, but, as you say, what God calls us to do is simple, and so that's the heart behind it.
Speaker 1:The first passage I wanted to look at is Matthew 22, 37 through 38. That says you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment and just doing a quick word study there, heart means the source of life, the soul means breath of life and the mind means understanding. So I like to rephrase that. And says you shall love the Lord, your God, with all your life and with all your breath and with all your understanding, Just paints a clear picture about that.
Speaker 1:And so John 4, 23, 24, says but the hour is coming, and now is here, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in the Spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship Him, and worship means complete dependence on God Spirit. You know Jesus is establishing here, at the woman at the well, that God is spirit and he doesn't have to be worshiped on the mountain Now. He has access available, all people in every place, through Jesus Christ. And, of course, one of my favorite scriptures, hebrews 10, 25, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the day drawing near. So whenever the writer says the day drawing near, what does that mean, pastor Steve?
Speaker 2:As we would typically call it, the return of Christ, the second coming. That is the goal, the moment in history we look forward to it's when Christ calls his children home. So yeah, we look forward with that with great anticipation.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, I remember during the COVID years, you know this scripture was the heartbeat of every church.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, come back, come back, come back, come back.
Speaker 1:Yes, and you know the scripture says, you know why are we commanded to meet together? And Paul writes to encourage one another. And I think it's important to remember this was written during a time of persecution, something we don't quite understand. And I was just meeting with a friend who does some underground church work with the Chinese government.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And he told me a story about a pastor just recently. Yeah, and he told me a story about a pastor just recently. There were some sleepers in his cell group and they were discussing where to meet each week because they have to change locations and they were telling the CCP where they were meeting and so people were getting in trouble and all that. And so the pastor stood up one Sunday and this is a true hero of the faith in my mind. He stood up and said you know what? We're going to get rid of these guys. He said let's all pray about where to meet the following week and not tell anybody and just show up where the Holy Spirit leads us. Do you know? Every single one of those church members showed up at the same place that next week. That's awesome, and I think about that and think us in America. We can't even fathom depending on the Spirit like that.
Speaker 2:No, no, no, no. We're too blessed, right yeah?
Speaker 1:Right. And so to dig into these a little bit, pastor Steve, what does it mean to truly love God with all of your heart?
Speaker 2:soul and mind. Well, I think, to really get that, you got to understand the background of that passage. That you got to understand the background of that passage, the Jews, in their well-intentioned thinking, followed the letter of the law, the biblical mandates, the Ten Commandments. And so in that passage in Matthew, it's a lawyer specializing in the scriptural text that's asking the question and what the Jews had done. If you count the Ten Commandments, the letter, each letter, there are 613 letters, and so they then devised 613 additional laws divided into positive and negative statements for the people to follow Now in their defense.
Speaker 2:Moses is the guy who went up on the mountain and God handed him the Ten Commandments. Moses is the guy that saw God face to face. Moses is the guy that God used to lead the people out of Egypt and deliver them, so rightfully so. They held Moses and the law given by Moses in the highest place of authority. That's right. So they could not conceive anyone challenging the position of Moses and the authority of Scripture. And so Jesus was not doing that. As we know, the Bible tells us he came to fulfill the law, right, not to eliminate it or change it. But what's happening in this particular place? His interpretation of the law is different than theirs. He's taken all of those laws and he's rolling them up in one neat little concise statement and he's saying hey, you either love the Lord or all of this is a waste.
Speaker 2:You know, so his interpretation was so different than theirs they couldn't comprehend it. I try to teach this to our team all the time. You got to love people and one of the ways we talk about that around here it is in human personality to want to make rules. Yeah, and so we love to make rules, oh no. A church member wants to do something on a Saturday afternoon in the sanctuary? Oh no. You church member wants to do something on a Saturday afternoon in the sanctuary? Oh no, you can't do that. Our rule says, you know? Or somebody wants to use the church? Well no. The rule says the rule that I try to follow in my life is what's loving?
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:What's loving. So worship in its simplest form is our love expressed toward our Savior right. So I think what Jesus is doing? He's boiling the whole thing down, just like Paul did in 1 Corinthians 13. And he's saying look, it's all about you having a pure love for Jesus and the people Jesus created.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know Paul, 1 Corinthians 12, he gives us all those gifts and we got a lot of people who love to celebrate gifts today. But then we forget the next chapter, chapter 13, which we call the wedding chapter, the love chapter, and we totally miss what it is. It's Paul's explanation that those gifts are worthless if you can't love people. So what Jesus is doing is driving home the truth that I think the greatest example of Christ in one's life, the expression of one's worship to Christ, the expression of who you are to other people, is found in your ability to love.
Speaker 1:And I think about that ability to love. The only reason we had that is because God first loved us Exactly, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2:He gave us Exactly, yeah, exactly. He gave us the example of how to love people. And the truth is, even in the Christian church, very few understand this truth. Very few understand this truth. You know, we have all these worldly processes and thoughts that we apply to our Christian life, but the bottom line is you got to love God, love him how? With your heart, soul and mind, every fiber of your being, and love your neighbor as yourself. Now we probably live in the most self-centered time in my lifetime in America. If we love Jesus like we love ourselves right now, man, we'd be doing good yeah.
Speaker 1:That's right. Yeah, absolutely. I think it's also difficult because of the position we're in. We're constantly in front of people, helping people, loving people, and if someone's not doing that on a regular basis, I think it's hard for them to realize the importance of it, Because we see the hurt, we see the healing, we see what walking with someone through those situations takes. Yes, For others it may be well we can't do this because it's a rule, but we see it as this is a relationship and we want them to know Jesus. That's the ultimate goal. Yes, You've always said people are our business. That's right. People is what we're in this for.
Speaker 2:Yeah, why don't we do what we do to see people come to the Lord Jesus, to see their current destiny and their eternal destiny change course Right, you know I mean and to hopefully help them come to a place where they can help others do the same thing.
Speaker 1:That's right. That's right. So, in our relationship with God, you know, you just said that worship is with every loving God, with every fiber of our being loving him and worshiping him. What are some practical ways that we, as a church, provide opportunities for people to worship here?
Speaker 2:Opportunities to worship here. Opportunities to worship Well. It begins with what we call the worship service on Sunday, when Nathaniel and I talk routinely. Our goal is not to provide entertainment, but to try to create a service that is tailored to help people enter into a deeper worship with the Lord Jesus. You can't create that.
Speaker 2:You can't make that happen, but to facilitate as best as we can the environment so that it can be a worshipful moment for individuals. You know I try to teach that our worship is far greater than what we do in an hour on Sunday morning. How you do your work is worship. How you do your recreation is worship how you do your family relationships is worship.
Speaker 2:It is so much bigger than an hour on the weekend, and so we try to teach our people routinely that your entire life is meant to be offered as worship to your Savior. It's not a compartmentalized journey, you know. It's an all-inclusive journey.
Speaker 1:Yeah, amen, amen, amen. So we have what we call covenant class, and, goodness, I can remember when I started back in 2013, I think we were calling it maybe the 101, 102 class at that point, basics yeah. And I know before that, even before Brent came, you were doing something. I'm sure you did something like that at the other churches that you pastored. So why is that important when someone visits our church?
Speaker 2:Well, number one a lot of churches today, especially the ones that practice what some would think is questionable worship practices, they try to keep who they really are kind of secret until they get you in. We don't want to trick anybody. So let's say, a Christian's coming from another church. They're already saved, they know Jesus. Maybe they've been a Christian 20 years, it doesn't matter. We want them to understand our core beliefs because we don't want them to come into this body and then go six months later. Oh wait, y'all believe that I would have never joined here if I believed that.
Speaker 2:So one purpose is for those who already know the Lord and that they know what we believe. The other one is for a person who is maybe new to their faith or considering coming to Christ. Is that we're teaching them those same basics, but maybe they're hearing them for the first time. You know, what do we believe about salvation? There's soteriology. How does a person come to Christ? What does that mean? What is baptism? What is the importance of it? How do we practice it? Why do we practice it the way they do? What do we believe about Scripture? And so we want to begin to put that foundation under them. That'll help them succeed.
Speaker 1:Amen. I know it helped me personally, coming from the Catholic Church. Yeah, because I had a lot of questions about church practices. Yes, the practicality of church. How do you do church? What does it look like? Why do we not take the Lord's Supper every week? Simple things like that that, through the years, I see as very simple and foundational, but for some people it's big stuff that they're seeing for the first time.
Speaker 2:Big stuff. I'll tell you a true story, because if you go, do what we do every week and you're in the Word of God and you're in deep study and I've been studying now 50 years the Word of God and you make the mistake of assuming a lot of things. I had an individual who has been a Christian for many years come up to me recently and say I just need to be clear Now, jesus was God's only son, correct? Now where I am in my walk, that almost knocked me off my feet Like are you kidding me? You didn't know this, but it reminded me of the importance of not trying to impress yourself when you're preaching with your knowledge.
Speaker 2:Communication only happens when you encode a message and send it out and it's decoded the same way you send it out. That's the only time communication happens. So we have to be mindful, as preaching and teaching the Word, that we've got people that are at every spectrum of the journey and we don't need to believe our own press. We need to remember to keep it simple, teach the basics and never assume that they just know. Right, right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Amen, yeah Amen. And especially here, because I feel like Steve, God has especially placed our church where it's at and what you've done through all the years. We uniquely reach adults who are coming out of the Catholic faith.
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 1:A lot of our baptisms. I haven't looked at the numbers, I'm just judging by what I see on Sunday morning the baptisms we have. There's a ton of children, but there's also a lot of adults, yes, and when you go to the country churches in the Bible Belt it's predominantly children at your normal average church.
Speaker 2:The average church in America, the largest percentage of their baptisms every year is children. We have been accused by the Catholics of practicing infant baptism, because we baptize so many children.
Speaker 2:They're like what's the difference in a baby and a four-year-old right? And there's some validity to that criticism. And so this is what I've been told the whole time I've been here. It's not an arrogant statement. I say it in all humility because I'm just a country preacher. I'm educated beyond my means and I just want to preach Jesus and help people get to Jesus. I just want to preach Jesus and help people get to Jesus. But God gave me a gift of taking the complex text and putting it in a way people can grasp it.
Speaker 1:Yes, you have. I would compare with that.
Speaker 2:On the farm. We would call it putting the fodder, the food, down where the calf can get it. Right, right, okay, it doesn't do you any good to have the food where only the mama cow can get it.
Speaker 2:The calf needs food too, and so I had a couple tell me just two weeks ago in their 70s. We came here seven years ago for a funeral and we thought this is the first preacher we've ever understood. Wow, and they're coming now to join after seven years. Yeah, they're coming to become a part of our church family, our home, and so if there's anything God uses me for for any good at all, I thank him for the ability to make things simple.
Speaker 1:Right, it just brought up a memory. I remember when you walked through Hebrews years ago and you got to chapters six and seven, which are highly tense chapters, but I remember as a young believer and a young preacher at that time. I still have the journal writing it down because you were able to help me make sense of a lot of those tense issues.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And you do it in such a way where there's a congregation filled with children, young adults, old adults, all walks of life. But there's no doubt that the Lord has given you that gift. I can concur with that for sure. So one of the things that one of the questions I'd like to touch on is there's obviously some barriers that people bring in the worship service, they bring in their work, they bring in their hobbies and I've heard this from many people they feel like they don't experience God and they feel like they are not obeying Him and serving Him. What could some of these barriers be in people's lives that's hindering them from experiencing the Lord, loving the Lord and serving Him the way that he's calling them to serve?
Speaker 2:Yeah, basic human nature, our sin nature.
Speaker 2:I don't care if it's their recreation, their work, their home life, whatever it is.
Speaker 2:The bottom line to me is this I don't care what I do, I don't care what the worship pastor does, I don't care how hard we work at setting up the environment. If you don't come in to a worship service with the intent that you're coming to worship holy God, your creator, the one who saved your soul, the one who changed your direction from hell to heaven, the one who, in many cases, forked your family tree right, changed the destiny of your family story, there's nothing we can do for you. It boils down to a willingness to submit oneself to Jesus in that moment of worship, whether that's in corporate worship at church or in personal worship. As a general rule, in our sin nature, we don't want anybody else controlling our life. We want to control our lives and that's our biggest barrier right there to come and honestly just lay yourself before the Lord as an open book and say here I am, do with me as you will. That's a concept the average Christian cannot begin to comprehend that.
Speaker 2:I would do that, and it's manifested in things like I want God to use me, but I can't give him more than an hour a week. I want God to use me, but if he calls me to do something, I'm not moving away from here. I want God to use me, but if it costs me anything, I'm not interested in that.
Speaker 2:So, we set up all these barriers and then we wonder why we don't experience God in a deeper, closer fellowship. I think that's what many are saying when they say I don't feel it. I don't feel it. Now, feelings is a legitimate part of worship. I don't feel it. Now, feelings is a legitimate part of worship. Okay, right.
Speaker 2:But it's got to be more than that and for you to have the feelings you've got to get past that sin nature and that selfishness and open your life totally to the Savior, and then you'll have feelings, but there'll be some concrete foundation that'll come with them.
Speaker 2:I heard Johnny Hunt say one time you can raise your hands and worship all day long, but at some point, if you really want to worship, you got to reach in that back pocket and pull that wallet out and give. Well, that sounds manipulative on its face, but what did Jesus teach us in Matthew 18? You got a problem with your brother. Go to the altar, leave your offering and then go get it right.
Speaker 2:Why does he say that If you look at Scripture Old and New Testament you don't dare come before the Lord without an offering, right? So we know that 70% 80% of the people in any church in America never give a dime to the Lord, and so they've automatically drawn a line in the sand and said here's a place I won't cross. Well, then they sit back and wonder why they don't experience God better. Right, see, it's not about the money, because what the money says is I trust you, right, I know you're going to take care of me if I honor you with what you've blessed me with. And the average Christian just cannot get a hold of that concept.
Speaker 1:One of the things me and my family have found through the years is that the Lord has always taken care of us, and I've heard people say it. I was just speaking to a new Christian not that long ago and he was like, yeah, I still just don't like it when the pastor speaks about money and I love this because it's an opportunity for me to share and I always say well, if the pastor you're listening to is not teaching you about money, he's not properly preaching the word to you. That's right, because that's part of growing, that's part of discipleship. If you're not giving, then where's your heart? Because where your money is, that's where your heart is.
Speaker 2:It's what Jesus said right? Yeah, that's right. That's what Jesus said right? Yeah, that's right. And since he designed us, he probably knows that's right.
Speaker 1:Exactly yeah, exactly yeah.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:It's amazing, steve, to think about that only 20, probably less than that percent of people in every church is giving. I mean, can you imagine we probably would have reached all four corners of the earth by now? Absolutely, you know.
Speaker 2:Our church is a little different. We got about 35, 40% that are givers. It's amazing, but they're not tithers, they're small givers. So our per capita these people that study all this stuff our average gift is $38 per individual and the average when you get up into the Bible belt is $78 per individual.
Speaker 1:So you know a family of Per month or per week. Per week, Per week, 38 a week Per worship service yeah.
Speaker 2:So you got you know a family of four here giving $40. A family of four in Jackson Mississippi, birmingham Alabama, giving $150, $200.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And so we're blessed here. We were able to do ministry and pay the bills. But if we could just get our people to become obedient and to give even at the national average not even exceed that we could do so much for the kingdom of God. Because it takes money to do ministry. That's just the reality. But that's not the end, all to be all. The main thing is you're not going to experience deep worship if you're holding on to the dollar with a clenched fist. God will not bless that kind of life.
Speaker 1:That's right. I think it was in one of your sermons recently with the last few weeks. You brought up where Jesus said you can't love both. You either love God or love money. That's right, and so there's zero tension. It's either one or the other.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, yeah, and look, it's been said that you don't have to be rich to be generous, you just have to be generous to be generous, right? I know families that are what we would classify in America as the working poor, and they're very greedy. They don't make a lot of money, but what they make, they're very greedy about it. I know rich families the same way, and likewise I know rich families and poor families that are very generous, and so it's a hard issue. It's not a money issue, it's a hard issue, right.
Speaker 1:It's not a money issue, it's a heart issue. Yeah, yeah, amen. So last question is how can we encourage others to make worship a priority in their life?
Speaker 2:Well, they've got to understand they were created to worship holy God. Your number one purpose as a believer on planet earth is to worship Holy God. All this other stuff we do in church is a byproduct, and so I think when you understand what first place in your life, first position, ought to be, it all begins to line up and make sense. So if they can understand, if they can grasp that God created you with a purpose, that purpose is to give Him honor and glory. You are His greatest creation and so you're to point back to Him in every way and give him honor and glory. That's your purpose. So if you can understand that, worship will become so much more meaningful for you. That's that whole discussion.
Speaker 2:Church has been fighting over music for 20 years now, and it's so sad, because what makes Christian music is not the musical arrangement, it's the words of the song, is what makes it Christian music, and so we get people with all these preferences. Well, I don't care if you're singing hymns or choruses or chanting like an old school monk, it doesn't matter. What are you saying, right? What are you saying, and are you saying it with your heart and an open life when you do it? That's what matters, and so we are so superficial in the modern day church. We go to church because we like what they do, right, and I think that's what's created a generation of believers that are about a half inch deep and four miles wide, right, you know. So, yeah, you got to understand your purpose, your purpose. You are here, first and foremost, to worship your creator.
Speaker 1:Amen, amen. Well, I appreciate you being here. Pastor Steve, happy to be here. Thank you, we'll see you guys on the next one.