City Awakening Church

What are we giving our lives to—and is it worth it?

Jesus didn't mince words in Matthew 5:13-16. He told his followers, "You are the salt of the earth... You are the light of the world." Not "you could be" or "you should try to be." You are.

Salt preserves and seasons. Light illuminates and guides. And Jesus has placed each of us—right where we are—to do exactly that for the people and places around us.

Consider this: In the ancient world, salt was so valuable it was used as currency. Yet salt sitting unused in a cabinet has no impact. The same is true of our faith. A faith that never leaves the church building, never enters our workplaces, neighborhoods, schools, and relationships, is a faith that's losing its saltiness.

And light? As Martin Luther King Jr. once said, "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that." Jesus echoed this truth long before: "I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life" (John 8:12).

We shine not for our own glory, but so that others "may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven" (Matthew 5:16).

 Who is the "one" in your life—someone close to you, but far from Jesus? How is God calling us to be salt and light in their lives this week?

Your time tells a story. What is yours saying?

James 4:13-14 reminds us: "Yet you do not know what tomorrow will bring—what your life will be! For you are like vapor that appears for a little while, then vanishes."

We spend so much energy managing calendars, watching the clock, and trying to fit everything into our days. But what if our biggest problem isn't that we don't have enough time? What if it's that we're trying too hard to hold on to it?

Here are three truths to consider about how we steward our time:

1. Steward today instead of trying to control tomorrow. When we think we can control our time, it ends up controlling us. James says we should hold our plans loosely, saying, "If the Lord wills, we will do this or that" (James 4:15). That's not passive living — that's humble trust.

2. Do the good we know we ought to do. James 4:17 is sobering: "So it is sin to know the good and yet not do it." Agreement isn't obedience. Knowing we should trust God with our time and actually doing it are two very different things.

3. Don't let good things crowd out the best thing. In Luke 10:38-42, Jesus gently corrects Martha — not because her work was wrong, but because her busyness had pulled her away from the one thing necessary. Mary chose to sit at His feet. That choice, Jesus said, would not be taken from her.

Perhaps the goal isn't simply to reorder our priority list — it's to stop treating Jesus as just another item on it. As Paul writes in Acts 17, "In him we live and move and have our being."

What does your calendar reveal about your heart today? 🙏

#SomethingToGive #TimeRevealsTruth #FaithAndLife #ChristianLiving #SundaySermon #CityAwakening

Option 2 (Medium-length, Story-driven)

🫙 The jar. The rocks. The pebbles. We know the illustration.

Put the pebbles in first, and there's no room for the big rocks. Put the big rocks in first, and everything else fits around them.

We understand the principle. The problem? We don't always know what the big rocks should be — and even when we do, we still struggle to give them the right place.

In Luke 10, Martha was doing something good. She was serving Jesus. But Jesus said to her, "Martha, Martha, you are worried and upset about many things, but one thing is necessary. Mary has made the right choice, and it will not be taken away from her" (Luke 10:41-42).

The "one thing necessary" isn't the first item on the list. It transcends the list entirely.

When we hold on to our time and try to manage it ourselves, we drift from Jesus — and the further we drift, the more anxious we become. Martha didn't have a smartphone or a packed calendar, and she was still overwhelmed. Sound familiar?

The invitation today isn't to add something new to the schedule. It's to ask: Who is Lord over the schedule?

"Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you." — James 4:8

What needs to change in your week to reflect that truth?

What have you been giving your life to this past week?

It's a question worth sitting with. We wake up every morning and sacrifice the one resource we can never get back — our lives. And yet, we don't always pause to ask if the things we're giving our lives to are actually worth it.

Here's what's remarkable about Jesus: he paused. He looked at a broken, sinful world — a world that didn't deserve his love — and he chose to give his life for it anyway. For us.

John 15:13 says, "No one has greater love than this: to lay down his life for his friends."

The cross is not only our salvation — it's our example. We are called to love as Jesus loved: sacrificially, generously, and with eternity in mind.

As C.T. Studd once said, "Only one life, will soon be past; only what's done for Christ, will last."

Have you ever been swimming in the ocean, only to look up and realize you've drifted far from where you started? 

That's exactly how spiritual drift works. It doesn't happen all at once. A cold relationship starts with a drift. A broken family bond starts with a drift. And a life where God is no longer central — that starts with a drift too.

In Nehemiah 13, we see a people who made great promises to God, only to slowly drift away. They didn't reject God outright. They simply let other things take His place — productivity, profits, relationships with the wrong people. Sound familiar?

The invitation today is simple but powerful: Close the gates on whatever is running your life, and make room for God to be central again.

"Whoever confesses and renounces their sins will find mercy." — Proverbs 28:13

In Nehemiah 10-12, we see a people who knew what it meant to live far from God. They had walked through exile, brokenness, and ruin. But when they returned to Him, everything changed — their families, their rhythms, their priorities, their worship. Why? Because a renewed life leads to a new way of life.

This is the promise of the gospel. Jesus said in John 3:16, "For God so loved the world that whoever believes in him will not perish, but shall have eternal life." That's an open invitation — to walk away FROM the old way of life, TO a new way of life with Him.

We don't have to keep living like archaeologists, digging up the past. God is offering something better — new mercies, a fresh start, and a life that moves forward with Him.

In Nehemiah 9, we witness an entire nation come before God — hungry, humbled, and wholly dependent on Him. They fasted, wore sackcloth, and placed dust on their heads. Not because God demanded a performance, but because their hearts had been broken open by His Word.

"Stand up. Praise Yahweh your God from everlasting to everlasting." — Nehemiah 9:5

Generation after generation, Israel strayed. And generation after generation, God never walked away. He kept the manna coming. He kept the cloud moving. He kept the fire burning through the night.

What does that tell us? That God's faithfulness is not contingent on our consistency.

The same God who guided Israel through the wilderness is the same God pursuing us today. He hasn't abandoned us — He's standing with open arms, calling us back to the freedom found only in Him.

The world tells us that surrender is weakness. But Scripture tells us something different. True freedom is not found in independence — it's found in complete surrender to the One who created us and knows us fully.

Three invitations from Nehemiah 9 for us today: ✅ Approach God with humble confession and worship ✅ Remember that we stray, but God remains ✅ Bind ourselves to Jesus — completely, not halfway

Are we living as people who are truly awake? Or are we still wearing the chains the world told us were freedom?

The joy of the Lord is your strength." — Nehemiah 8:10

The people of Jerusalem didn't just rebuild a wall. They experienced something far greater — a revival of their hearts. And it didn't begin with a new strategy or a clever program. It began with a deep hunger for God's Word.

After 10 years of God's faithfulness, the question before us isn't whether God has been good. He has — abundantly. The question is: Are we still hungry?

Are we hungry enough to seek revival in our lives, our marriages, our families, and our city — or have we quietly settled for survival?

The wall led to survival. God's Word leads to revival.

Let's keep seeking. Let's stay hungry.

The opposition didn't stop when the wall was almost finished. It intensified.

That's one of the most important lessons from Nehemiah 6. Sanballat and his allies couldn't break through the wall — so they tried three other strategies:

Distraction – "Come meet with us." (Sounds harmless, right?) 

Lies – Attack the reputation. Spread rumors. Create doubt. 

Fear – Make him afraid enough to abandon the mission.

Nehemiah's response to all three? 👇

"I am doing a great work and cannot come down." – Nehemiah 6:3

A great work isn't necessarily something impressive or public. It might be a marriage, raising children to follow Jesus, caring for an aging parent, or faithfully serving where God has placed us.

And here's the deeper truth: Nehemiah's story ultimately points us to Jesus — who was also falsely accused, mocked, and told to come down. He could have. But He didn't. He stayed until the greatest work in history was finished.

God doesn't always remove opposition — He strengthens us through it.

What is trying to pull you away from the great work God has given you? 

Nehemiah was a man with power, resources, and the legal right to use them for himself. But he didn't.

Instead, he fed over 150 people at his own table every day (Nehemiah 5:17). He refused to burden the people he was called to serve. Not because he had to — but because he feared God more than he craved comfort.

"Remember me favorably, my God, for all that I have done for this people." — Nehemiah 5:19

That's not a prayer of entitlement. That's a prayer of trust. Nehemiah did what was right and then released the results to God.

What would it look like for us to live that way — not asking "What can I get away with?" but "What will honor God and serve others?"

The question isn't only, "Is this allowed?" The better question is, "What is this doing to me? What am I becoming?"

God cares more about who we are becoming than what we are accomplishing. And because of the finished work of Christ, we are free to be faithful — even when faithfulness isn't the fastest path.

When the walls feel like rubble and the enemies are closing in from every direction — from the North, South, East, and West — it's easy to lose the strength to keep going. 

That's exactly where Nehemiah and the people found themselves in Nehemiah 4. Surrounded. Mocked. Exhausted. The text says it plainly: "The strength of the laborer is failing."

But Nehemiah didn't give up. He looked up.

He reminded the people of three things we can all hold onto when our strength runs out:

Pray — Before responding to the obstacles, go to God first. 

Remember God is greater — The God beside us is always greater than the obstacles in front of us. 

Take action — Prayer and action are teammates, not competitors.

The question isn't if we'll face obstacles greater than our strength can handle. The question is: what will we rely on for strength when that happens?

If Jesus conquered our greatest obstacles — sin and death — on the cross, then he can carry us through any obstacle we face today.