Facing Rejection

Hey, Church, how's everyone doing today? Great.

For those of you who don't know me, my name is Jacob. I'm with Icon Church. And it's truly, truly a great time to worship with our brothers and sisters, sisters today. And it is truly an honor also to lead us into a time of scripture reading. And so today's scripture reading I will be doing what we call it, icon style.

So for those of you that don't know what it means, at Icon Church, we strive to be a gospel centered church that is multilingual, multi ethnic and intercultural. And one of the beautiful ways we get to express that is to read his Word in multiple beautiful languages. And it is a privilege that I get to share with that with you all this morning as I will be reading this passage bilingually in Mandarin Chinese and English. And so if you are able to, would you please stand from your seats? And if you have your physical Bible or electronic Bible, please flip to the book of Luke.

We will be reading from chapter four, verses 14 to 30. If you don't have a Bible, don't worry, the passage will pop up on both screens, my left and right. And I'll be reading out of the ESV version. So again, it's going to be the book of Luke, chapter 4, verses 14 to 30, verse 14.

Tajai Koh Tani Jiao, Shinran Joy, verse 16. Yes, Shensh, verse 22. And all spoke well of him and marveled at the gracious words that were coming from his mouth. And they said, is not this Joseph's son? And he said to them, doubtless you will quote to me this proverb.

Physician, heal yourself. What we heard you did at Capernaum do here in your hometown as well. And he said, truly I say to you, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown. But in truth, I tell you, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah, when the heavens were shut up. Three years and six months and a great famine came over all the land.

And Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath and the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a widow. And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of prophet Elisha, and none of them was cleansed, but only Naaman the Syrian. When they heard these things, all in the synagogue were filled with wrath. And they rose up and drove him out of the town and brought him to the brow of the hill on which their town was built, so that they could throw him down the cliff. But passing through their midst, he went Away.

Brothers and sisters, this is the word of God. You may be seated. Thank you, Jacob. Good grief. I can't believe I witnessed a miracle today.

I experienced one because I was hearing Mandarin and suddenly I was hearing English. I don't know if you all experienced what I did, but it's got to be a work of the Lord. Otherwise I don't speak any Mandarin. But I'm going to try now to speak in Mandarin for about the next 10 minutes. Are you ready?

I will not do that. And it is. It's really fun to see you here this morning. And Icon Unity Point, folks. Thanks for being in the room with us today.

I know you've been meeting down the hall, but we wanted at least once this summer to be together. And I know it's a little out of your zone, but thank you for being here.

So let me do this. I'm going to pray and then we're going to real quickly do some things. You can see it's already a little different. I'm going to pray. I'm going to just show you a couple of things in the passage that was just read.

Jake, thanks for that. And I'm going to invite Dave and Daryl to join me on stage. We're gonna have a conversation today. So if you would just bow your head and pray with me. Father, we pray that your word would speak to our hearts and Holy Spirit, that by it you change our lives and that we would never be the same again.

In Jesus name, amen. All right, let me ask you this. How many of you have been in a position where you have felt rejected because of your faith, not because you are weird? We are all weird. Period.

Full stop. Some of us become aware of our weirdness and we accept it. But how many of you, because you have a relationship with Jesus and the implications of walking with Jesus, have felt yourself at some point, relationally or socially, in a position where he. He wasn't accepted? You felt rejected because of your faith.

Have you felt that way before? You have, all of you have. I got a couple of hands, some heads. I know everyone has, and here's how I know it's because none of you live here. And I checked the security footage to make sure over the last week and none of you are living in this building, which means all of you are leaving here.

And it's great to be here. It's amazing to sing with you, to share our faith together, to cry out to the Lord, even from pain and hurt together. Because everybody here loves Jesus, or at least is leaning in to a relationship or to faith with Jesus. But if you don't live here and you go out there, it's a different thing to be in a position where other people don't share your affection for Jesus Christ and to have to face that in relationships at work or kids. I know you're in the room at school to be a Christian and then to go into a school where maybe kids don't believe the same as you believe.

There's a pressure on us in that way. Today what we want to do is talk about how Jesus faced rejection. We said it in the passage, it was just read for us. And how if we are Christians and we're living out there, then absolutely it's going to be normal for us to experience pressure and rejection in our lives. Because if Jesus faced rejection and we're walking in his ways and we're seeking to follow after him, then it is normal and ordinary that we will experience rejection in our lives.

I want to catch you up just a little bit before I look at this text to where we have been if you have not been in our study of Luke. In the beginning of chapter three, Jesus comes for baptism to his cousin John the Baptist. And so it's a little different because everyone else coming for baptism was coming for the baptism of repentance of sins. They were going one way and John was saying to them, you need to turn this way so you're ready to receive Jesus when he comes. When Jesus came for baptism, it wasn't a repentance from sins because he had none we saw last week.

And it's in the beginning of chapter four. He was tempted in all ways as we are, but he resisted temptation and he did not sin. Jesus came as a baptism of fulfilling the hope of humanity that every one of us have in us some brokenness, some hurt, some pain, things that need to be healed and restored in our life. And Jesus came signaling, I am all in for the plan of God to bring about salvation to humanity. That's the chapter three, chapter four.

Immediately after his baptism, amazing things happen. This is one of these really beautiful moments that we get a few times in scripture where we get a picture of the fullness of the Trinity. All in the beautiful self glorifying dance. Father, Son and Spirit, God who's three in one. Because Jesus comes out of the water and the voice of God.

How many of you have heard the audible voice of God? Probably not. Never here, but in this moment. He comes out of the water and the Father says, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased. And the Holy Spirit, the invisible God takes on a visible form, not just to be there, but to signify.

I affirm everything that Jesus has come to do on this earth, Father, Son and spirit. Just this beautiful, powerful moment of how it has always been for the God who is Trinity. And after affirmation, he goes to the wilderness and it's temptation, which is how it often happens in our lives after affirmation or good things with God happening than temptation. And the funny thing is Satan immediately goes after the identity. Jesus just heard from his Father, this is my beloved Son, in whom I'm well pleased.

And then immediately he goes to the wilderness and Satan says, if you really are the Son of God. And he attacks his identity and he attacks his purpose on earth. And he is seeking to undermine everything that Jesus has come to do before he even really gets started. But Jesus resists that temptation. And Satan, it says, goes away for a time, right?

He goes, I lost this round. I'll be back. Now in chapter four, where we're here and read today in Luke, he jumps straight into this moment where Jesus moves into Galilee, into his hometown in Nazareth. But what it says is that fame about Jesus had already spread. And so for us, if we're only reading Luke, we go, well, what happened?

Last thing I heard was he was in the wilderness dealing with Timothy temptation. So you go to the other gospels and you find that a lot of things were happening in between. In John's Gospel it says that Jesus had begun going to individuals and saying, will you come and follow me? And it wasn't just like walk behind me, but it was, will you become like me in my affections and in my purpose on this earth? Will you follow me?

Will you become my apprentice on this earth? He called his first disciples. We get the wedding of Canaan story. Remember the water to wine miracle that happens before our text today? There's a moment where he goes into the temple and he clears the temple.

Do you remember the story? He says that my Father's house is to be a place of prayer, not a place of personal gain and profit. Which is a good reminder even for churches in 2024 that the church, the called out people of God are here to commune with God and one another, not for personal gain and fame and profit. So he clears the temple and so he's healing, he's doing acts of mercy, he is calling disciples, he is teaching in synagogues. All of this is happening before we get to verse 14 in Luke chapter 4 and get to 14, it says he returned to Galilee in the power of the Spirit.

And news about him. This is the news that had spread all throughout the surrounding district, all these things that were happening. Verse 15. And he began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all. So the news about Jesus, this miracle worker who is gaining following because he's saying, he's talking in ways that no one has ever spoken before.

And they're going, you guys got to know about this guy. And now he's coming to his hometown, Nazareth, where in his humanity he grew up. Verse 16. He came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up. Now, I want you to imagine this.

Imagine you're Nazareth at this time. You're the hometown crowd for Jesus. And there was a saying back then, could anything good ever come out of Nazareth? And it was derogatory. The idea is, nothing good comes out of this poor, broke country town.

And now they're going, yeah, there is. Have you heard about Jesus? It's Jesus of what? Nazareth. He's our guy.

And one of our boys is coming home. And so there's this enthusiasm about, look, one of our guys went out in the world, and he has made something of himself. He's been doing good things. He's famous out in the region. He's teaching.

People are respecting him. People are following after him. And so there is a measure of enthusiasm when Jesus shows up and he comes to Nazareth and on the Sabbath, just as would be his traditional habit, he enters into the synagogue and it says, the attendant or the associate pastor says, jesus, would you read Scripture for us today? Jesus goes, of course, I would absolutely grab the scroll that has Isaiah written on it. And so the guy collects the scroll, brings it to Jesus, and he unrolls it and he finds the place which is Isaiah 61 in our Bibles.

And he reads, really just verse one and half of verse two of what is Isaiah 61. And as he reads it, the people are so pleased. Our guide, look at him, he's all grown up. People listen to him. And he's from where?

Jesus of Nazareth. And so he does this reading, and I'm sure he reads it with more heart and more conviction and more understanding than any rabbi ever had in the synagogue. And it says in verse 20, closed the book. He gave it back to the attendant. And he sat down.

This is the posture of a rabbi. He sits down. Now they're all listening, so they can hear his explanation of the text. And all the eyes of the synagogue were fixed upon him. And he began to say to them, today, this Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing.

Okay? And all of them were speaking, well of him, and they were wondering. They're wondering at his gracious words. They're falling from his lips. He's kind of is amazing.

But now there's some confusion. Isn't this our guy, though? I thought this was just Joseph's son. And there's some confusion. What did he just say?

All of this prophecy has been fulfilled in your hearing. What does that mean? And two things that Jesus has said in verse 18 and 19 that he's lifting from the prophecy. He is saying, this is about me. The first thing is in verse 18, he talks about the Lord God in heaven.

Yahweh will send an anointed one. It's another way in the Old Testament of saying a Messiah, or in the New Testament, Messiah or a Christ. He'll send a Savior who will be the one who will come and restore all of the broken things. He's the one who will bring healing. He's the one who will lift the oppressed.

He is the one who will turn the whole world over again. And Jesus says, guess what? It's me here. The anointed one has come. Not Joseph's son, the one sent from above who left the heavens and entered into the earth.

And then in verse 19, a second thing that he lifts from the prophecy, it's about the. The day of the Lord's favor. And another word for that is the year of jubilee. It's a callback to Leviticus 25. Do you know Leviticus 25?

Do you know the year of jubilee? Have you heard of this before? All right. In the Old Testament, there is, in this moment, kind of an order that God puts into his people, into the way that they live. Every 50 years, somebody say, 50, you're awake.

Every 50. Am I in Mandarin or in English right now? Okay. Every 50 years, all of the wrongs that have been done in society, all the debts that have been accumulated against other people, all people who have lost land and lost position and. And found themselves in place of oppression, and they're broken.

Every 50 years, there would be a year where all things were made right. All debts were canceled. If you lost land and property, it was restored to you, and everyone took a year. Not to be resentful that someone who had fallen low gets a second chance, but they would be jubilant that the Lord, in his grace and his mercy, gives new starts, right? It's the year of jubilee.

And Jesus said, in my coming, I am the anointed one. And My coming is like the year of jubilee, but it's not a year. It's forever. If you turn to me, doesn't matter how far you've gone, it doesn't matter what you have done, it doesn't matter how low you have become in your life, I will bring you up and restore you if you only turn to me. All of this has been fulfilled in your hearing.

Now, these people hear this, and the problem is they don't believe him. Right. They believed that a guy out of Nazareth could go out and make a name for himself. They believed that he could be eloquent and full of grace and mercy. But when he began to talk about who he really is and what he's really come to do, they don't believe him.

They believed his words, but they did not believe that he was the Son of God. Does that make sense? I like your reading. It's very pleasant. But I'm not okay with you being the Son of God.

And there's a hand sign, a signal for this in life. It goes like this. Can you do this? Has someone done this to you? The feeling is, hey, come on.

I want to. I want some more of that. Come with me. But then they go, mmm, too much. And I think what Luke is doing is trying to help us to understand the situation here in his hometown of Nazareth.

Because. Because it's not unfamiliar for any Christian walking into any community in which they live. There's a sense at which for most people, it's not a problem that there's a God out there. Okay, that's fine. That's great.

And for most people, it's not a problem that God has grace and he desires to give grace to people. Sounds good. But the problem for some people is when that grace begins to push their ideas of how that grace should be used in this world, or it begins to challenge the control they think they have over their ideas and their relationships in society. That's when these people go, enough. Come on and read.

Be Jesus the miracle worker. Wait, you're the Son of God. I'm supposed to turn to you. You're going to restore all people, no matter how far they've walked away from God, Full stop. That is not okay with us.

And I think that's. That's true in our lives as well, that there are people in our lives who don't have a problem with. There's a God out there they might not have a problem with. Jesus is loving and gracious and wise and has good things to say, good lessons to learn. And should we emulate him and his kindness and his justice in the world?

But when we begin to say, and it demands a response because he. He's not only a good guy, he's the Son of God, they go, stop. And this is what happened here in Nazareth. They were excited to have him reading, but they rejected him when it came to him being the fulfillment of all the prophecies. I want you to imagine hometown crowd, meaning when Jesus was born a human and lived his early human life, he was among these people.

Some of these people watched him grow up from childhood. They had to. I mean, they had to have thought, what a remarkable young man. I've never seen someone so gracious like he's. Other kids are acting a fool over here, but he's like, it's not that he's a goody goody, he's just good.

What is this about this guy? And he's super wise beyond his years. I mean, he's just a kid, but remember the story about him being in the temple at 12? And he was speaking there as if someone who was learned, someone who had all this life experience and really understood God. And they're going to.

This is the Jesus that they had been around, and now he's gone out. And they have heard stories everywhere. He's becoming famous in the region for his grace and his acts of mercy. And this guy just speaks in a way no one else does. They know all of this about him, but when he comes to them, he says, hey, the deal is you need to turn to me and surrender to me so that you might experience the full power of God at work in your life.

You surrender to me and you experience jubilee, not for a year, but for eternity. They get mad. They go from. From like, I'm interested, I'm kind of admiring you, to not just antagonizing, but I want to kill you. It says that they went to throw him off of a cliff.

I think this is why St. Augustine said this. They love truth when it enlightens them, but they hate truth when it accuses them. Does that make sense? When he said, you have to turn to me now to receive, it broke through their religious facade, or in our day, we might call it our cultural Christianity.

It all came crumbling down at that moment because it wasn't about, do I like life to be like this? And do I like the words? It became about, who do I bow before, who is king and will I truly trust him? So it says that they went to throw him off a cliff, right? And a crazy amazing thing.

Verse 30. But passing through their midst, he went away. Guys, I don't know what it looks like. It's one of those great mysteries. You go, how does this happen?

And I don't have an explanation for how the power of God worked in this moment, but I know this. God is sovereign and his plan will not be interrupted. And it was not Jesus time to die at this moment. Period. Remember, in John 10, Jesus said, no one takes my life from me, but I what I lay it down, right?

And it was not his time to die. Little reminder for all of us that God is sovereign. Remember in the Old Testament, teach us, Lord, to number our days. God is sovereign and he has numbered our days. And he knows the whole timeline of our lives.

He knows everything that we will face at everything that we experience. And he knows the day that we will be relieved from the brokenness of this world and enter into no more sickness and no more pain. He knows it. And until that moment, I heard a pastor say this. I am immortal until the moment God says, now's your time.

That's true of Jesus in this moment. It was not his time. So I want to do this. I want to invite my friends Dave and Darrell, pastors of Icon and UnityPoint, to join me. And we're going to talk a little bit about this rejection Jesus faced.

Really move into the rejection that we might face in our faith. Because if we're walking in his steps, it is normal that we will face rejection for our faith. Second Timothy says, all those who desire to live godly will face persecution. In John 10, Jesus said, they hate you. They hated me first, right?

He said, they persecuted me. So if you're following me, guess what? They're going to persecute you. We know what's happening. We know what's going to come.

So how do we face it? That's what we want to talk about today. And few things on earth are as powerful as the fear of rejection. And knowing that it's coming, maybe there's some things that we can do to face it well. So, Dave, Darrell, you guys say thank you for coming in.

Yeah, thank you. Pastor Kevin and Legacy Church and Pastor David and Icon. This was something that was in the making for about a month now, you know? And what I really love about us doing this together, having a service with three different body believers, it really shows the kingdom of God. And as pastor of Unity Pointe Church, my wife and I, she was up here singing I Surrender All Great job to my lovely wife.

Pastor Kevin already mentioned my name is Pastor Darrell Vang. God called us to plano and in 2018, we have been here and planted in 2019. And we all know Covid hits but God has been good, God has been gracious, and we continue to push forward. And just to share very briefly, when we came out here, we. We felt compelled to be intentional about the kind of church we wanted to plant.

We have been a part of a mono ethnic church with our ethnicity, just our Hmong ethnicity. We've been a part of various churches in the international church. And when God put it in our hearts, come and plant Unity Point Church. We had a desire to really be a church that reflected the community, to be a church that was intentional about gathering with all people, groups of all walks of life. And we began talking about names of a church and God quickly put it on our heart after several moments of prayer.

And we realized that the only true thing that is able to unite all of humanity is Jesus Christ. So we said, man, like, what statement? Jesus Christ is the one point that unites all of humanity. And Unity Point Church was formed. It's been tough, it's been difficult, but it's been a great journey and a pleasure to be here with everybody.

Dave. Good morning, church. Three churches, y' all are just church. We're family. Gonna spend eternity together.

Whether you're like me today or not. Talk about rejection. Even if you reject me, we're gonna spend turning together. You're stuck with me. All right.

My. So I'm the pastor of Icon Church, and we've been here, honestly just been blessed for over a year now. Time has just flown by. Our church has just been blessed by your generosity, by your ministry here. I know church planters, we often, you know, we're constantly sharing vision.

But today I just want to share appreciation because you have been a tremendous part of our story. And also scripture talks about honoring your leaders and especially those who lead well in character and in Christlikeness. And so I just want to give God a hand. Praise for Pastor Kevin, Pastor Patrick, Wayne, the rest of the pastoral staff. He did not all, you know, it's all right.

It's good and right to honor leaders and. And so just grateful. Just a quick update for us. We're on the verge in August of moving into downtown Plano. That's where we feel the Lord has called us.

East Plano, downtown Plano. There you go. There's Icon people right there. And so we're just getting ready. But really, we wouldn't be here in this point in our journey without you guys.

And so just grateful to. Thank you, Legacy Church. Thank you, Unity Point. This is just tremendous to do this together. So three pastors on stage.

If you guys start the clock, we're going to do two hours and you can start the clocks now. I move super quick through that passage. Like, I know there's a lot that I left on the page. As you've sat and kind of reflected on this moment in Jesus life, is there anything that God just kind of moved your heart towards as you read it this week? Yeah.

You know, when I look at this passage, especially in verse 18, right. I. I think of this scene. Some of you may have seen the movie Braveheart at the end where William Wallace is just. He screams that famous line, freedom, you know?

And if you've seen that movie, like it, it moves you to some degree because we all in this room realize what it feels like to be in a place where you don't feel much freedom in your life. I think of what Jesus is reading right, in verse 18, where he says, the spirit of the Lord is on me because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to set free the oppressed.

My mind just goes to that, that in and through the life of Jesus Christ, as he's standing there in the synagogue reading from the scroll, from Isaiah, he's reading about himself and he's fulfilling prophecy for us in 2024, this still is relevant. How many of us in this room have felt some form of oppression in your life, some form of bondage your life? I mean, even beyond that, like, we know so many people who are struggling with things. And for me, as we work through this text, as we look at this text, it's a reminder that Jesus Christ is not just some normal person, but he is a real person, as the Son of God who came to bring deliverance and to set the captives free. And when I think about that, and it just causes me to be convicted that my life is not my own.

And that in and through Jesus Christ, as I submit to him as Lord and Savior, I can be a part of what God desires to do through all of us. Thanks, Darrell. I think for me, the observation that I had was there tends to be three ways people tend to respond to a message you give them. Right? And here it's the message of the kingdom, right?

This is Jesus sharing the message of the kingdom through the book of Isaiah. And there are the three ways I see is people can just either receive it outright, which doesn't, you know, happen most of the time. They're like, why? Who? They have questions.

They can retool it. This passage, and especially in Isaiah, fun fact has been used in going, okay, if Jesus is all for freedom of the oppressed, which is great, people kind of simplified it down to just physical needs. So they retool it to what we call liberation theology, where it kind of nullifies then the spiritual reality of what Jesus is talking about, because they have retooled that text and retooled the message. So that's the second way people can respond to a message. The last thing is just to outright reject it.

And the question then is, in this passage, we're looking at, what were they rejecting? If you're a Jew and you're coming from that background in Nazareth, this is the idea here that Jesus points at, is the idea that the kingdom of God is not just for Jews, but for all peoples, right? And that anybody of faith, whether it be a Cydonian woman, right, or Naaman, that the gospel is for everyone in that culture where people took so much of their identity based on their ethnicity, that was offensive to the point where they would kill the hometown kid, right? And so I think the reality for me, when I see that you can either receive it, retool it, or reject it. There's a part of all of us here in this room where the Gospel offends us.

Something about God offends us. Something about just doesn't sit right. Right with us, that it's not always palatable or PC. And that's okay, that this is Jesus just sharing the story of what it is and inviting us into a deeper intimacy with him, to trust him, even when we don't understand everything that there is to know about it. The gospel is going to offend every culture in different ways, you know, throughout history.

I think that's kind of what we see here in this text as well. And the just for your notes, the Elijah Elisha moment, that's the call out there. The Elijah is the story where Jewish widows were in need and Elijah met the need of a Gentile widow. And then the Elisha story, there was a plague of leprosy and legacy. Looked at this story recently.

Naaman, who not only was a Gentile, but was a conquering of the Jewish people. Gentile is the one who gets healed. And that's what offended them. So it pushed against their idea of what could belong to the kingdom of God and what the grace of God could do. And it made them incredibly bad, I think.

I wonder this. I've been thinking about this this week in our lifetime because we're all a little myopic. We think about only in terms of what I've experienced. But has there like, has there been a more contentious time to have a steadfast faith and walk with the Lord than 2024 right now or the last five, growing over the last five years? And maybe there has, certainly in other places in the world in different times, but it just feels like it's not going the other way and it's not going to turn around is the field.

And if that's true, then more and more we should expect that there's going to be this pressure against our living our faith or walking our faith in our life. And so when we come to that, I want to think about how you experience this type of rejection. Not that I'm weird rejection, we're all weird. But because I'm faithful to Jesus, rejection in your own life, or it could be how your church, or just maybe Christians, even in the west today, how are we experiencing this kind of rejection? How should we expect to experience it?

What do you guys think? All right, I guess I'll go first again. You know, this one's pretty personal for me. I grew up in the church, but I wasn't in a place where I had really understood who Jesus Christ was. We labeled this born again believer.

I would be just what you call someone who grew up in the church who understood basics of who God was, who understood that Jesus was a person. And I didn't come to a place in my life until I was 23 years old where I fully understood who Jesus was and I submitted my life to him and accepted him as Lord and Savior. And when this happened in my life over the years from 23 to, I would say even now, I've lost a lot of friends. I don't know if any of you in this room have ever experienced the losing of friends or relationships because of your faith, but I lost a tremendous amount of friends because of my faith in Jesus, because my commitment to him supersedes my commitment to my life and how I think I should live it. And you know, even as we think through this text and talk about this text as why would Jesus allow himself to experience rejection?

It just makes me think of the simple thought that Jesus understood that in the midst of him facing rejection, there would be many who would come to the faith. And it's hard being that person who feels like no one gets you because of your faith, who feels like you're losing friends because of your faith. But I just want to challenge and encourage you brothers and sisters, if you're in a place of feeling like that right now, continue to press into the Lord, continue to go to him and ask him to reveal things to you. Ask him how to love those in your life well, even as they reject you. And it's not an easy thing to do.

I think your testimony, there's some things that are very common for maybe a lot of you here in the room. You grew up in church and there were some things about the Christian way or genre of life we'll call it. It fit and you were fine with, but there was a difference when you were 23 and it was a breaking of just kind of a Christian culture into a personal relationship with Jesus that changes everything. And that seems like that's the big hive that's happening in this moment is in this country, whether you identified as a Christian or not. There was a bubble of where at least kinda agreeing upon the rules of life and society.

But the bubble burst. And now the question isn't, you know, am I a part of this Christian genre of life, it's have I bowed before Jesus or not? And that's kind of your testimony is where I think a lot of the pressure today is coming. Because cultural Christianity, it's a good thing, it's being torn down because what builds up in its place is actually a life giving relationship of Jesus. That's where there's a lack of understanding right now for a lot of folks who have grown up in that culture.

I think you have one of those where it's beautiful, boring testimony. And honestly I'm fortunate. My parents were both first generation Christians in Korea, they were Buddhists, grew up in Buddhist families. So I can't imagine what my life would have been like if they never said yes to Jesus and how things would have been so different if that didn't happen. And so I think it's a blessing to have that beautiful, boring testimony.

It's an amazing testimony of God's faithfulness and goodness. For me though, growing up mostly here in Texas, I didn't even realize, you know, culture is one of those things where you don't really even realize something is cultural until you're in a different culture. Right? So I'm here and then I'm like, I'm going to New York, right, for college. And when I go to New York, it was so different.

What I thought was normal to be a Christian to Go to church. All those things were now all of a sudden kind of taboo or frowned upon, right? And it was kind of a weird experience that I remember one of my classes was an international relations major class that had nothing to do with religion, but it was in one of these classes. This is like the orientation. We're going through the syllabus.

And my professor, who's a tall Dutch man, stands in the front with a towering presence and a large booming voice, and he's like, hey, if you are a creationist, if you believe in God, you're just ignorant and you probably shouldn't even be in the school, right? And so I'm going. And then on top of that, he says, hey, if you are Christian, a. Or if you are one of these guys, raise your hand, did you? Come on.

But it was just like, I had it. That wasn't a reality. And I thought that was, you know, and part of me was like, you know, people going, hey, I want to work with you. I don't want to befriend you, whatever. So then we can fall into this kind of like this victim's mentality.

Little bit about, about that, right? But then, you know, but when I compare what I'm going through, what I've gone through, and this, like, honestly, this is kind of first world problems. Like, this is not that, that that big of a deal in comparison to like, you know what, My wife, who's Chinese, I'm Korean American, by the way, my wife, who's Chinese from overseas, what she has had to experience in terms of becoming a believer in the first one in her entire family to be a believer, honestly, what I impales the comparison, what I've gone through is really nothing. And what I'm realizing throughout this whole thing is this, like persecution and suffering and rejection is normative. It's normal for the Christian faith.

This is not an exception. This is actually normal. And we're just actually experiencing normality as God's word says you will. Can I say it in a way that's a little inflammatory? Like if you're not experiencing the pushback, then you might not be either living in it or you might not be walking with Christ at all potentially, if it's to be normative.

Does that mean every day? I mean, it depends on maybe where you live and when you live. But if there's none ever, then maybe it's time to look at, Lord, what is my relationship with you today? So whether it's, you know, how you raised your hand like this in the classroom or you know, when I was bivocational and I was working for construction company and they knew I was a pastor, and I'm like, I mean, kind of a pastor. I mean, am I really, though?

You know, there's a fear in front of us of the experience of rejection, which is probably one of the most powerful fears we have in this life, is that in what ways have you personally been challenged to maybe compromise because of that fear of rejection, your faith, or to. To hold back, maybe a brighter light that you would love to shine? How have you dealt with that? I'll go first. You know, I keep talking to you.

Yeah. I think, you know, it happens in the most subtle ways. Right. So, like, for. For us, we, you know, we've been doing outreach in downtown Plano, and I'll get into some of these conversations where, by the way, like, around 75% of people don't believe in Jesus in downtown Plano.

Okay. So this is right here in the Bible Belt, right? And so as I'm talking to people, you know, I'll ask like, hey, what do you think of churches? What do you think of Christians? And, you know, part of the thing that I'm doing is kind of gauging their response, right?

And then there's these moments where there's a lot of hurt, there's a lot of anger. There's a lot of, you know, these different kinds of emotions. And for me, it's just like, I just kind of don't really want to deal with that. You know, I don't want to, you know, be rejected. I don't.

I. I care often care too much about how people perceive me, even just, you know, on social media, little things that, like, there's some people who, like, go over the top and post, like, some, like, some stuff. I'm like, I'm not sure if that's even biblical, but it's, you know, it's Christian culture stuff. I'm not talking about that. But if it.

For me, sometimes it's even just like, the nervousness to post anything. Then when it comes to my faith, like, that's where, you know, I'm just. All the daily subtle things that we're kind of going through and even easy to excuse myself out of it or to rationalize in that moment, you know, like, I don't want to be perceived as that kind of. Yeah, there's two kinds. You're going, I don't want to be lumped in with something that.

That's not me. Walking with Jesus. That's another thing. Right? And I don't want to get caught up in that because of this.

Right? Yeah. I don't want to be, you know, I don't want to, you know, know, manifest what my professor says Christians are, you know, like. And so there's this moment trying to be more palatable, that sometimes you focus and then you lose focus on what really is important, and that rejection is inevitable. That's helpful.

Thanks, Darrell. How about you, man? Yeah. You know, when I think of my faith over the years in regards to how I compromise because of this fear of rejection, it makes me think of one of the earlier moments when I became born again. I realized that even at work, I need to act like a believer.

I should be good to the people I work with. And one day, this guy comes in, regular guy, who comes in probably three times a week dropping off stuff, and he's like, hey, man, I see you all the time, and you're always smiling and happy. Like, why? Why are you smiling and happy? And like, this is, like, this should be like my go to.

Like, oh, it's because I love Jesus, you know? And I sit there and I'm just like. In my head, I'm saying it. I'm just like, because I'm a happy guy, you know? And when I think about how I compromise because of the fear of rejection that I might have because of my faith.

Right. I realized that ultimately what's happening is a disobedience on my part to the Lord.

I say this often to our church family and to friends and people. I get to speak life into that, that every day we have an opportunity to live out our faith. And God desires for every one of us in this room to be a part of his kingdom. And every day we either say, yes, God or no, God. And if I'm honest with myself, I oftentimes say, no, God, because of the fear of rejection, because of what I think people will think about me.

And ultimately, the scripture teaches us that all we have to do is to be faithful, to share our faith. And the reality is that when we do, God does something with that. In our obedience to the Lord, in our faithfulness to him. In that one conversation where you feel like the Spirit is prompting you and leading you to say something, to share something, something even as small as, hey, can I pray for you? Can I pray with you?

God just takes that and he begins to do something that we could never imagine. And that's where life change happens, I feel like. Because we as believers oftentimes say no to God, we don't see life change happening because we compromise and we fail to obey God and what he calls us to. You began leading into the next question. We'll do a speed round on this just for clock's sake.

So knowing it's normal, it should be normative for us. What advice or what tip would you give on how do we face it? Well, what helps you get over the hump on that fear of rejection and to not compromise. What's your best advice? I think first thing, I mean, just from this text, right?

I think this text does it really well. So really quick, two things. First, it says in the passage over and over again throughout the book of Luke Acts that it's as the Spirit led, as the Spirit empowered. So it relies not upon your ability or your energy or your creativity, charisma, but it's really reliance upon the Lord that He will do what he's going to do. So I think that's incredibly important that we do that.

First, second thing, this is a leadership axiom that we go by. We lead at Icon Church. We say we lead out of conviction, not convenience. We lead out of conviction and not convenience. I think what we see here with Jesus is he goes, hey, it's really convenient in that moment to just pump up the crowd and be accepted and loved and enjoyed the moment.

That was convenient. But his conviction about his call as a messiah, that's what eventually led him to do what he did. I think one of the things that, for me, that I realized in doing outreach and that hasn't always been my story, by the way, and I can share tons of stories of how I failed in that, but for me, it's that in that moment I started asking myself, hey, when I'm nervous to talk to this person, is it because is my love for this person and the love that I have for God greater than the love of how I want to be perceived? Right? It's like I'm so convicted about making sure that this person receives the love of Jesus that I'm willing to be embarrassed and rejected for that sake, right?

And if I think about things from a greater perspective like that, then it's worth the cost. Because everything in life has a cost, an opportunity cost. Every decision, you can't avoid it. The question is, what cost are you going to pay? Right?

And so for me, it's conviction over convenience and dependence on the Spirit. That's a good thing. How about you, Darrell? Yeah. This makes me think of my time in the Marines.

Often whenever we would go and do stuff, I'd have to prepare myself mentally, you know, to say, oh man, we're gonna go on a 20 mile hike. Okay, gosh, I need to start preparing myself mentally. And it makes me think of the word preparation. Jesus, before he started his ministry, he spent 40 days fasting because he was preparing for the ministry. He oftentimes went away to be alone to be with God.

He was preparing for his encounters. I would say for us as believers, one thing we have to do is to prepare ourselves mentally for the hard conversations, the conversations where our friends and our family might reject us, might say no to us. Because then when it happens, we've already prepared ourselves. We know that even Jesus himself says, right, hey, they're going to reject me and they're going to reject you. And when we're able to come to a place and approach it with that mentality, like, man, it begins to change things.

And I would say part of that is we don't like it when people reject us because we take it personally, especially when it comes from a friend or a family member. And I want you all to begin to think that. Don't think of it as a personal matter, but a spiritual matter. Okay, these are like two very mature and thoughtful answers. Mine, like, I have one, and now I'm feeling insecure about it.

I may be rejected for it. I'm gonna push through. It's like when I was a teenager, I had absolutely no fear when it came to talking to girls and trying to get phone numbers. Like, that came with time, but I had no fear then. And it was all about a numbers game for me.

Like, if I go to the mall or Six Flags, I go. I can walk up to anybody and be like, hey, you look cute, can I get your number? And I'm gonna get rejected. I'm accepting of that in advance. But I might get one.

You know, I might get 10 no's, but I might get a yes. I might. And if I could get the one yes, that's one yes I didn't have before. I got a phone number to call tonight. And so, like, on some regard, like, one thing that helps me, and I'm struggling with this in my life, like, it's having the odds going.

If I'm never going to share it at all, then I'm not going to get the one number. You know what I mean? And if I knew if, like, I knew if I share the gospel with this guy, he's going to receive it, no problem. Of course I do it. And it's not just about, like, Roman road or something like that.

But it's about. About inviting them into the kind of relationship that changes everything for me. You know, I do that, but if I don't get over that fear and just go. I'm just gonna. I'm just gonna.

I'm gonna be open with my life. I'm gonna be open with my faith. Then there's no way that we can impact the world if we're just gonna be stopped when we get to it. So it's not quite as mature as the spirit of God and the word of God. Mentally prepare yourself.

But, like, go get the. Go get the phone number is like, my advice. Go get the number, because you're not going to get it otherwise. Right. I admire Lindsay.

Yes. She puts up with a lot. I mean, the biggest difference would be also the fact that this is, you know, picking up girls in that case is about you and your own insecurity. Sure. Right.

This is not about you. This is about Christ. This is about them. I think it's just the motive and the why matters. Was that a Jesus juke?

I just want to get it, like, is that a Jesus juke? Where you putting me in my spot? No. Okay, I'm gonna make sure because, like, I'm keeping account. Oh, I do want to juke it, though.

Very, very last thing that I just want to ask you, actually, what are. I want to hear from you, you know, because we've been, you know, you've been sharing the stage with us and allowing us to share as pastors. But what are some, like, blessings and benefits that you see from, you know, going and sharing your faith, being rejected? Are there any hidden, maybe surprises? Lemonade out of lemons?

There are a couple of things. Probably the deepest one for me would be, I never feel closer to my Lord and to who he has called me and made me to be, than when I am living outside the bounds of what I feel like I can control. Did I say that? Does that make sense? When I step out in dependence on the spirit of God and the word of God, doing things, things that I just am afraid to do, you know, whether it's.

It is sharing the gospel with a friend or going to Uganda and going, I'm not going to write a sermon. I'm just gonna. I'm gonna open up my heart. Patrick's laughing at me. He's seen it.

He's like, you should do that more. You're better when you don't do that. You know, there's never. I never feel closer and more dependent on The Lord and I feel like he never shines brighter than in those moments. And in some ways, it's kind of like we went to the Rangers on Friday.

Get the wind column on Friday night. O' Rangers, you don't know how to play baseball until you pick up a glove and a ball, right? You can, in theory, you can watch it, but you don't know baseball until you play it. Before I was a dad, in theory, I knew what it meant to be a father, but not until I had kids did I understand what it means to be a father. And I don't know that we're going to know what it's like to be a Christian or to be someone who is an apprentice to Jesus until we actually step out and walk as he walked and do as he did.

And in Luke 4, what he did was he opened his life and he spoke truth. And the great thing is what. What he was saying was so hard for them. But John 10, he says all of these things I'm giving to you that you might be made fully alive, and in John 15, that my joy would be in you, and your joy would be made to the full. And that's why he would come to this moment and he would say, it's about me.

Turn to me, and I'm building a kingdom like you don't even understand. And it's going to be amazing. And I don't even think I understand really who I am in my identity or in my purpose on this earth until I began to actually overcome that fear and live my faith in the open as Jesus did. That's when I know what it is to be a Christian. Probably lemonade on the.

Out of lemons there. That's good. Anything from you guys on that, I'll wrap us. Yeah. Because I hear the kids saying it's time.

Okay, so I think a cool way for us to end today. And I'm going to ask you to do this, Darrell. I don't want to simply pray that we would understand these words, but would you pray a prayer of commissioning over over three congregations, but one church? That we would be a people who would not by our strength or our smarts, nothing we could earn or learn by his spirit and His Word hidden in our heart, that we would be bold in our faith not to get our way. But as your verse 18 said, the captives would be set free and the oppressed would be lifted up.

Would you pray over us? Yeah, I would love to pray over that and over the three body believers. And so let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father God, you're so good and you're faithful in all of your ways, God. Oftentimes when we live our lives, Lord, we.

We can get so wrapped up, Lord, in the busyness and the stresses of life and all the needs that we have, Father God, in the disappointments and the broken relationships in light of our faith in you, Father God.

And so, Lord, I pray for every individual in this room, from the youngest to the oldest. I pray, Father God, what a beautiful picture that you've given us. To be able to gather as three body of believers, Lord Jesus, with one mission in mind, and that's to proclaim your son, Jesus Christ as Lord and savior and to make him known as Lord and Savior. And so, Lord, I pray, Father God, for every person in this room who's sitting, who's here, Father, that you would work and you would move in their hearts and their lives and you would challenge us and convict us, Father God, to live in such a way, Father, where we realize that our obedience to you, Lord, is greater than the desires of our own hearts. And, Lord, I know it's difficult to do this.

So for the person in this room, Father God, who may be struggling with their faith, for the person who's sitting in this room, who may not even know you, Father God, who. Who may not even have a relationship with you, I pray, God, that you would draw them to you, that you would draw all of us to you, Father God, and know that you love us and you see us. And it is because of your son, Jesus Christ, that we can have a newness of life, a freedom, Lord Jesus, from this broken world that we live in. And so, Lord, I pray in the name of your son, Jesus Christ, and lift up every person in this room. Help us, Father.

It's in the name of your son, Jesus Christ, I pray these things. Amen. Thank you, guys. Appreciate you. Love you, guys.

Before we stand and sing, we have just an awesome moment where we get to celebrate baptism as three congregations in one church. And Justin is coming from Unity Point. Daryl's going to baptize him. I just want to remind you, or if you don't know the reason we do. Baptism is one.

Because Jesus called us to do it as he left this earth to ascend. Before he will return again, he told his followers, go teaching them to obey everything that I've commanded you. Baptize them in my name. And he said, I'll be with you always. The meaning of baptism is this.

There's no power in this water. It's a little cooler than it was earlier. I wish it was a little warmer, Justin. It's good. There's no power in this water, but it is an outward symbol of an interchange that's happened in his life.

And as he goes down into the water and comes out, he is declaring from head to toe, every bit of me is in with Jesus. Not part of my life, but I trust him with my entire life. And it symbolizes how Jesus makes all things new. Romans 6 says, we bury in death with Christ, and we're raised to walk in the newness of life with Christ. And so we're celebrating that today and we're excited to stand with you too.

Thanks, Darren. You know, I just want to share really briefly. I know that some of you are probably ready to get out, but this is my friend Justin and his wife Chanel. God is so good. We couldn't have planned this any better.

This day, this text rejection. I met Justin four months ago from a long weekend of going to youth camp. And my wife was getting sick and we were needing to return our rental. And I was like, hey, you want to. Are you good enough to drive us so I can drop this off?

And she's like, no, I'm not feeling good. So, you know, as a good husband, I'm like, all right now. I said, I guess I'll just get an Uber, you know, hoping to prompt her. She's like, yeah, get an Uber. I was like, all right.

So I get off there and I feel like I just need to share this detail. I get the Uber. The first person picks up the call, he drops it over, that is. And Justin picks up the second. He's a second person.

Pick up my Uber. He picks me up, you know, and we eventually start heading home. It's. It's like literally a six minute drive. I'm sitting there and I'm like, because of the fear of rejection, because of xyz, right?

I'm like, I'm not going to talk to this guy at all. And as I say that, the Holy Spirit's like, you're not going to do what? You know. And in the span of six minutes, I get to know Justin. We eventually exchanged numbers.

And this is his wife, Chanel. And the Lord has been working a miraculous thing in their life in the face of rejection. When someone does say yes to your conversation of sharing your faith in Jesus, that next step has to be a moment that you decide, hey, I'm going to invest my life into these people. It's been a roller coaster but Justin has made a profession of faith in Jesus. About a month ago.

They got married this last Sunday, and he's. He's making a public declaration of his faith. Justin, is there anything you want to say, brother? Just that I'm excited to, you know, publicly accept Jesus in my life and thank everybody for all the applause.

My brother, because of your public declaration of your faith in Jesus Christ, I'm all baptized. You, my brother, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit, buried with Christ, raised in newness and blood.

It.