You show up. You do your part. And somewhere underneath it you're not sure anything would look different if you weren't there. Somebody else would cover it. Somebody else already is. So you keep whatever you've got to yourself, figuring it's too small to be worth offering. Most people never find out they were wrong about that. This message is about a group of people two thousand years ago who had no money, no power, and no reason to expect any of it to last, and about what happened in the room where every one of them stopped sitting out.

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(0:00) Good morning, family

(0:45) What I've noticed about this church

(2:53) The quilt they made while I was out

(3:41) 150 people in two years

(4:19) Kicking off Unstoppable

(4:45) Why are you standing there looking up

(6:07) Three thousand from one sermon

(7:06) The healing that got them in trouble

(7:12) How most of us answer a threat

(8:05) They lied and it cost them

(8:39) A united church is an unstoppable force

(9:03) Acts 5:12-16

(10:05) Six months sober and looking for a church

(11:20) I tried to evangelize a pastor

(11:49) Who changed your life

(12:43) They were all together

(13:41) Presbyterians love their meetings

(14:23) What was actually holding them together

(14:42) You have to follow the rules to be in

(15:59) Or do whatever you want

(16:27) There's a third way

(17:32) People are watching you now

(18:05) Nobody dared to join them

(19:24) It's the clear parts that bother me

(19:39) They watched, and they came anyway

(20:01) It was never the shadow

(20:50) It spread past Jerusalem

(21:28) If it's of God you can't stop it

(22:09) Two things that break a church

(22:41) The hive that empties quietly

(23:24) I see the ones who are tired

(23:51) Using your gift for yourself

(24:34) My kingdom of one

(24:47) Joshua, you're not ready

(25:16) The job I didn't want

(26:32) Edging God out

(26:41) The six years I almost missed

(28:10) You have something

(28:35) Ask what you can do

(28:47) Find out your why

(29:30) This is your invitation

(30:06) Why any of this is possible

(31:04) The prayer

There is a person you have decided is not getting your forgiveness, and you have good reasons. What they did was real. Nobody would blame you for holding onto it. This message makes an uncomfortable case that the holding is doing more damage to you than to them, and that letting go was never going to start with feeling ready. It also asks the harder second question. Once you forgive them, can you actually sit next to them?

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(0:50) A schoolhouse in Pennsylvania

(2:34) Thirty of them went to his funeral

(3:56) The gospel upends our expectations

(7:40) Two things he is being asked to do

(8:31) What a runaway could expect under Roman law

(10:09) A beautiful idea until you have to do it

(10:56) You do not need more faith

(12:40) It is obedience, not feeling

(13:32) Pushing a door marked pull

(14:22) Remember the debt you could never repay

(16:53) Just as the Lord has forgiven you

(17:48) The class I taught for twenty years

(19:28) I told the pastor this is stupid

(20:19) Those memories don't bother me now

(21:08) The side of the room you sit on

(21:58) Forgiveness was only half of it

(23:45) How this letter blows up injustice

(25:20) I still hate rap

(26:13) The doorbell I ignored on Thursday

(28:44) The fresh start he had no right to

(31:17) Charge that to my account

Church has a reputation for telling people what to do. Rules, expectations, a list you are already failing. That reputation is why plenty of people never walk in. This message argues the opposite, and it does it by pulling back the curtain on how this church talks to people on purpose. Nobody is going to make you believe anything. That turns out to be the entire point.

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(0:48) They burned it in the street at 2 a.m.

(1:39) I don't. But the church does.

(4:08) A runaway who crossed an empire

(4:57) The worst place to land

(7:20) How does this guy have any authority

(8:08) The first authority he doesn't use

(9:45) The second authority he doesn't use

(12:08) The third authority he doesn't use

(12:58) Command is outside. Appeal is inside.

(13:47) Isn't naming it the same as using it

(15:23) Why he doesn't just free him

(17:00) Nobody took his life from him

(17:51) Narrow, and you still have to choose

(19:29) Have to eat dinner, or get to

(20:16) Pulling back the curtain

(21:53) The verse that terrifies pastors

(24:18) Why nobody up here commands you

(26:49) The only thing that changes anyone

(28:27) Wait until the Holy Spirit asks

(29:50) The complaint that became an assignment

(30:53) I was so unqualified

(35:01) One sentence about nutrition

(36:40) I can't teach you by removing your choices

(38:19) Thirty-nine hours a week

(40:46) Leave here with a name

You know the tank is empty. What you have never worked out is what actually fills it. So you try the usual things. More sleep, a weekend off, pushing through until the season lightens up. None of it puts anything back. What fills it was never something you produce on your own, and it isn't a matter of trying harder. It comes from knowing the one who actually fills it, and from getting close enough to people to see him doing it.

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(2:22) Two weeks at UCLA

(3:19) The seizure nobody could stop

(6:40) A letter written under house arrest

(8:55) Not a personality, a fruit

(12:27) I wrote this sermon three times

(14:57) What are you known for

(15:37) Full tanks overflow

(17:37) Sitting alone in that room

(19:03) Thank you for the fourteen years

(22:07) What outweighs everything on the scale

(22:56) When it falls apart, who do you call

(26:40) The guy in the golf section

(27:50) Why people never actually serve

(28:38) You can't give away what you don't have

(29:45) The ship looking for the lighthouse

(32:08) A lighthouse doesn't make its own light

(33:52) We almost skipped small group

(34:58) Six months sober tells the guy at one week

(35:36) Before you leave today

Most weeks you get a message. This one is different. The whole room prays together instead, out loud, through one passage of Acts, in five movements. Praise. Thanksgiving. Surrender. Boldness. Expectancy. Communion in the middle of it. If you have ever wondered what a church sounds like when it stops performing and just talks to God, this is that.---(0:00) Call To Worship(1:12) It Really Is Amazing Grace(5:05) Welcome & Intro(9:20) Grace Alone(12:48) Movement 1 - Awe & Praise(20:48) Who Else(25:31) Giving Section(28:18) Lord I Need You(31:57) Explain Open Mics(33:41) Movement 2 - Thanksgiving(46:40) Communion Teaching(53:08) Movement 3 - Surrender(56:42) Congregation Invited To Get The Elements(58:46) Communion(59:55) Movement 4 - Requests / Boldness(72:32) Movement 5 - Expectancy(81:28) Need To Know(83:46) Prayer Of Benediction

Somebody asks how you're doing and you say fine before you've even thought about it. Not a lie exactly. You just left the part out. There's a version of you other people are carrying around that's a little better than the real one, you've stopped correcting it, and now you're the one keeping it alive. Nobody made you do that.

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(0:00) Is America a Christian nation

(1:38) Congress is more Christian than us

(2:13) Are you one because you say so

(2:48) Start in the church, not the Capitol

(6:19) That's an awkward story

(7:22) We fail when we fake it

(8:16) You're right, we are hypocrites

(12:18) Whatever you count you'll chase

(12:25) The number on your phone

(19:22) Nobody made you do this

(20:09) Pretending to be more spiritual than you are

(22:57) One degree off course

(23:45) Checking attendance like a scorecard

(30:50) I'm not really lying

(33:31) God doesn't have shelves

(33:53) Everything's fine. That was a lie.

(37:00) The Titan and the Titanic

(39:21) Dreaming about being famous for it

(41:34) Who Isaiah was actually looking at

(45:06) Putting on the church clothes

There's something in your house you'd never offer a guest, and you've never once said that out loud. Maybe it's smaller than that. An hour you won't give up. A grudge you're still holding. You'd swear you were a generous person, and mostly you are, right up until something asks you to prove it. So what have you quietly decided is yours?

(0:00) Ordering pizza during lockdown

(0:35) We pulled our masks down

(1:20) What makes anything great

(3:31) What's in your heart shows in your hands

(5:29) A hundred pianos, one tuning fork

(6:13) The rival who became my brother

(8:44) The grace we hand our kids

(11:01) Jose needed a kidney

(11:53) A one in 100,000 match

(12:43) What it actually cost him

(13:28) The surgeon who isn't a believer

(16:31) The sodas I hide from guests

(17:15) I gave more when I had less

(17:57) I asked my wife where I hold back

(18:49) The answer I wasn't expecting

(19:28) Mine, mine, mine, mine

(23:05) Easier to give everything than this

(28:12) The gap between wanting and doing

(29:00) Nothing fits in a closed fist

There's a thing you keep meaning to say, and every time the moment comes, you talk yourself right out of it. You tell yourself you'll be braver next time. The kind of person who just says the hard thing out loud. That person keeps not showing up. What if you were right that you're not brave, and that was never the problem?---(0:00) Too scared to ask her number(1:41) What if. What if. What if.(2:37) She had to text first(3:23) Bold people aren't born brave(5:20) Backs against the wall, praying(6:03) Where's your heart when you pray(7:30) The one who answers to nobody(8:54) Your story, already on the page(10:15) The worst day, planned as best(12:15) The song the kids kept singing(13:00) The Christmas party where I froze(14:26) They asked for boldness, not escape(15:47) You bring posture. He brings power.(18:22) I know Jesus. Who are you?(19:52) Wanting what he does, not him(20:45) The coward praying to be brave(22:45) Boldness came last, not first(28:43) Fourteen years praying for a wife

You've gotten good at keeping the peace, staying quiet, not making it weird, and it mostly works. You pick the comfortable option almost every time. The easy conversation. The version of you nobody looks at too closely. And it feels like safety, right up until you notice how little you actually feel anymore.(0:00) The pastor's kid who ran(1:04) Why the shadows feel so safe(2:00) The cling of comfort will kill you(4:34) Narrow doesn't mean wrong(6:46) They spoke like free men(9:01) They only had a GED(11:53) The before and after of Jesus(13:26) A debate met by a testimony(13:54) 850 prophets against one man(15:24) Maybe your god is on the toilet(15:49) Drench it, then watch it burn(18:37) Stop healing, it makes us uncomfortable(19:44) The billionaire you wouldn't want to meet(26:02) Guarding your own little kingdom(27:15) Dragging you down like an anchor(28:32) We can't stop talking about this(30:16) Worth looking like a fool(33:48) The thing that keeps you quiet

There's a moment you still replay, the one where you knew the right thing to do and stayed quiet instead. You promised yourself next time you'd be braver. Stronger. The person who isn't afraid. What if brave was never about not being afraid at all?

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(0:00) The customer who closed my door

(1:17) The bribe I didn't see coming

(2:43) Choose courage. He chose you.

(5:40) The sermon that got interrupted

(6:17) Five thousand, and still counting

(7:46) The FBI shows up mid-conversation

(10:54) People died to read the Bible

(13:27) When God wants to move

(15:03) They saw it and still refused

(17:21) It was never an evidence problem

(19:39) The trap set for two fishermen

(22:22) Brave isn't the absence of fear

(23:25) Peter's PhD in cowardice

(24:03) The diner I ran out of

(25:46) He makes cowards brave

(32:28) The deal I gladly lost

(33:10) God's best work through cowards

(34:48) He chose you first