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This conversation centers around the vision to be a church that make a lasting impact in our community by building relationships with all kinds of folks, helping people know and live like Jesus together.

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Message Summary

HeavenEarth Pastor Ross Stackhouse, and guest Amanda Ott lead a community-centered conversation exploring everything from affordable housing in Johnson County to the deeper meaning behind the phrase “born again.” The episode weaves together practical challenges facing local families, the role of the church in social issues, and powerful reflections on spiritual transformation.

After welcoming the audience, Ross Stackhouse outlines the five core values of HeavenEarth Church—meeting people where they are, focusing on Jesus, experiential learning, blessing the community through partnerships, and responsible stewardship—which frame the day’s discussion 00:40. Emphasizing the church’s commitment to community impact through partnerships, Ross and Amanda dive into the pressing issue of housing insecurity, revealing the practical and personal obstacles many neighbors face, even those with steady employment 03:15.

Ross Stackhouse and Amanda Ott share the story of “Spaces for All,” a nonprofit launched by the church to provide affordable housing and break down barriers to secure leases. Amanda explains the successful subleasing program that helps residents build rental history and eventually transition into stable housing, underlining the organization’s growing demand and transformative impact 07:25.

The discussion then transitions into spiritual territory, where Ross Stackhouse invites the congregation to share their candid reactions to the term “born again,” highlighting both positive and negative associations 12:22. Through open dialogue, the group explores how baptism and spiritual rebirth should be seen not as an endpoint, but as a starting point for lifelong growth 21:36. Drawing inspiration from the dramatic transformation of Saul (Paul) in the New Testament, the episode calls listeners to embrace the ongoing and communal journey of growing up in faith.

Three Key Takeaways

1. Affordable Housing is a Community-Wide Challenge

Through Amanda’s firsthand experiences and local data, the conversation brings to light the stark reality: many working individuals in Johnson County simply cannot afford safe, stable housing. The wage gap and lack of affordable inventory place significant strains on families, forcing impossible choices between essentials like medication, food, and shelter 03:15–05:18. “Spaces for All” combats this by directly intervening with innovative subleasing programs and community partnerships, offering both immediate relief and long-term hope.

2. Spiritual Growth is a Lifelong Process, Not a One-Time Event

The episode reframes “being born again” as the beginning of a journey, not a spiritual finish line. Drawing parallels to childhood development, Ross Stackhouse emphasizes that baptism and conversion are departures into a new life, not arrivals. Real transformation—like that seen in Paul—unfolds in ordinary moments, community support, and consistent openness to growth 22:05–34:18.

3. Transformation is Possible for Everyone—and It Happens Together

Through examples ranging from biblical narrative to the church’s own values and programs, the episode champions the possibility of radical change for every individual. Whether change comes as a sudden awakening or a gradual process, the podcast encourages listeners to “reclaim the beauty and power of being born again,” continually growing and maturing with humility, hope, and community 35:20–44:59.

This episode is a must-listen for anyone passionate about faith in action, social justice, and the real, messy, and hopeful work of transformation—both personal and communal.

Good morning, everybody.

Good morning.

That was nice.

Y'all are awake today.

Love that.

Good morning, everyone online. My name is Ross. I'm one of the pastors here. So glad you came to Heaven & Earth Church, especially if you're new to us. We hope that you experience a warm welcome today with us. We're going to kick off today with a conversation between myself and Amanda Ott. For which we've prepared zero.

But that's—

hey, isn't that wonderful that we're so authentic here and wonderful? Give Amanda a round of applause, would you? So, the reason we're doing this is because the way we do our— we have 5 core values here. Let's run them real quick. Number 1 is we want to meet people where they are and see them as God's masterpieces. Number 2 is we want to fix our eyes on Jesus and live by his Spirit. Number 2 is we want to— or number 3 is we want to learn through experience or practice. Number 4 is we want to bless the community through partnerships. Number 5 is we want to be responsible and grateful with everything we're given. Those are the 5 sort of guiding principles of Heaven & Earth Church.

But today I want to talk from the vantage point of the 4th, which is blessing the community through partnerships.

Amen.

So our church is very intentional about partnering with folks in the community so we can sort of expand our impact or deepen our impact. And this year we've had different focus areas throughout the year to even, you know, sort of guide our work even more. So in the spring, our focus was mental health and recovery. So we had Upstream Prevention here to talk. And then in the summer, we were focusing on food insecurity, so we had Peggy Kinsey from Interchurch Food Pantry. And August and September, our focus is on housing, and so that's why we have our own Amanda Ott here, who is the director of residential programming for Spaces for All. So if you don't know where that— what that has to do with our church. Spaces for All is a 501 nonprofit that was started by our church in 2021.

And what we do is we create affordable spaces for nonprofits and families. So again, Amanda is the director of residential programming. What's up, dude?

Hey, man.

Yeah, you're good. Your mom's right there. Yeah, Courtney, it's fine. It ain't no thing, man. This is normal here. That's a normal occurrence. So Amanda, a conversation we haven't prepared for at all.

Why is housing—

why, why do we have to focus on that so much? Why can we not just let the market fix it? What's going on?

Ross loves this I do.

Well, that's not where I was going to go with that.

Go wherever you want to go. Just ignore my question.

Ross would say the market's broken, and it really is. The reason we need to worry about it is because we just have a large group of our neighbors, right, in Johnson County that really just can't afford housing no matter what they do. Our wage gap is just too much. So the reality of it is, I mean, I was looking for— this is anecdotal, but it is what it is— I was looking for a client a room this week. She works at Endress+Hauser, right? Am I saying that right?

Yes.

Indenhausen. Decent job and works 40 hours a week. She's in her 30s, and we were looking for something Under $1,000, a studio under $1,000. And the only thing I could even begin to find was like a hotel room. It's not in a hotel, but it was in like a, for lack of a better word, a big house that had been split into apartments. And she was going to be paying roughly about $900 a month for that hotel apartment. with some utilities. And the reality of it is that was like at the top of her budget.

So at Spaces For All, or in the sort of affordable housing landscape, we think about affordability as just 30% of your income. So Courtney's affordability is going to be different than Josh's, it's going to be different than Ross's, right? It's just 30% of your income. And so that was—

Which includes your utilities.

Yeah. And so that was really going to be sort of way above what she could afford, and she wasn't even going to get a kitchen. So the reality of it is, is it's just the inventory is not there and the wages aren't there. And, and so that gap is just too large for the normal market to just sort of work itself out, so to speak.

The market has been getting worse. So when we went to speak with folks, and so you think like, why should the church care about this? Well, Jesus always fed people's physical needs as well as their spiritual needs. And so increasingly in our county, for people who are employed, it's just a great challenge because just think about it, if you're a single parent, And say you're a teacher, right? Say you make— let's say you make a— like you're an all-star salary earner at— for a teacher, so you make $60,000. Wouldn't— would that be an all-star salary, Melissa? Several years of experience. So take that, 30% of that is what your housing can cost for the year. That does not exist in our county. There's not transitional housing in our county. There's not emergency housing.

So do we want to build a community where everyone can thrive, or do we just want to kind of go, ah, they'll figure it out, right?

So—

And what I like to say is housing touches everything. That's kind of why I started volunteering for it. So like, if they had affordable housing, the reality of it is, is they might not have to make a decision about whether to get their medicine or not that month, or they may not have to, you know, go to the local food pantry that month, you know. So the reality of it is, if that affordability was there, that would affect sort of every aspect of the rest of their life, not only just their life but also their financial life.

So Spaces is doing several different programs to help people have a place. One, we consult with people. So just last week, we were consulting with a group of people in Edenton trying to start recovery housing. So, we're telling them like, hey, here's some next steps for you. So, sometimes we're doing that. We're empowering somebody else in their sector to do what they do, but we are also leveraging housing opportunities. So, Amanda, tell folks about the subleasing program for just a second.

Okay. The subleasing program is probably our most in demand. Basically, the idea of our subleasing program is that we lease a rental unit. And then we sublease it to someone else. And we do that because we're trying to get rid of that barrier of not being able to get a lease. So, for instance, some clients, they have no credit and they have no one to sign for them, so they just can't get a lease. Some of our clients might have past eviction records where they've maybe made a poor choice several years ago and it's coming back on them Still, they can pay the monthly rent. They don't really need their rent subsidized.

They just cannot get the lease. They can't get a property owner to sign a lease to them. So we've— we have a waiting list now basically for our subleasing program. But the reality of it is then what happens is they pay their monthly rent on time. 12 months, and then we go to that property owner and say, hey, here we have a record, they've paid for 12 months, you know, would you sign that lease over to them? And so that's the, the purpose of the subleasing program. And we get 2 calls a week for the subleasing program. So also, if you know any property owners that want to be a part of it, I would be happy to sit down and have coffee with them. Because we're always looking for new property owners to work with.

So right now, Amanda and I, our load for Spaces, our workload has gone through the roof, which is a beautiful thing. We're having conversations about how to scale Spaces, and Amanda has made this organization like fly. So I'm very thankful that she's currently our only staff member for Spaces. I'm the president of the board for Spaces for All. If you want to know more about what Spaces does and how you can be involved, talk to one of us. But that's another way that our church helps to partner and make a lasting impact in our community. Thank you, Amanda. Appreciate it.

So one of the ways— I won't have any other announcements except for this today. So the way that your giving works So, 5% of what you give to day-to-day operations, we automatically designate for local impact. So, we give 5% to local organizations throughout the year. So, we've given money to Upstream this year. We've given money to Interchurch Food Pantry, and now we're giving money—

To the church.

to Spaces for All. Another 2% of what you give automatically goes to our Neighbor Assistance Fund. So that is to people who have like emergency needs with rent, utility, so forth. In September alone, in September alone, we gave out over $2,000 for neighbor assistance. Folks are feeling the crunch. The affordability crunch. And so, and anybody can be there, right? Any of us could be there if a couple of things break the wrong way, right? And so that's why our church wants to be present for folks. And then we give another 6% to the state and global initiatives of the United Methodist Church.

So that's how your giving, giving works. And then the other stuff goes to the rest of the budget. That's enough on that. Are you still with me? Did I put you to sleep today? Okay. Let's pray and then we will have our Sunday conversation. Lord, help us to wake up, to be reborn into Your Kingdom, Your way of life, to grow in seeing things with Your eyes, learning how to talk and walk and think And act according to your love. In Jesus' name, amen. So I'm gonna, I'm gonna do what we do sometimes in here.

I'm gonna say a phrase, 2-word phrase, and I just want to hear your, your, your sort of uncensored reaction to that phrase. Okay, so last week we did it about judgment. By the way, we are thinking about— Ralph had given feedback about expanding on what we talked about last week. We're thinking about how we can do that well, because it stirred up some good things. But we're going to keep going with the finale of our series today, and then probably come back to that. So, are you ready? I want to hear what comes to mind for you, whether it's positive, negative, neutral, whatever. Okay, here we go. Born again.

I saw a face. So, let me hear, what does that make you think or feel when you hear the phrase born again? You think of Nicodemus, Nicodemus, the story where Jesus says that phrase.

Go ahead.

New beginning.

New beginning.

So far, we've got a pretty neutral. It's just about the story. Then we have a positive.

Brad?

Skin crawl.

So you hear it and your skin crawls.

Okay.

Yeah. No, I just repeated what you said, Brad, is all. Hey, online folks, let us know you're there. When you hear born again, what do you think? What do you feel? What else? Go ahead, Jim. Didn't know what it was. Didn't know what it was. Okay, in your traditional background. Okay.

A new identity. Go ahead, Bridget. You think of baptism. Yeah. I don't know yet. I'll tell you by the end. I just want to hear how— because, okay, so here's why I do this. Very few people are quote unquote unchurched anymore.

We have some impression of the church, whether it's from our experience or through the experience of somebody we know. And so a lot of these phrases that come up in the Bible and the church, They have baggage with them. And so I'm always listening for like, where are you all at with some of these phrases before we talk about them? Go ahead, Tucker. What was it?

Hope.

Okay, Melissa. So Melissa shared that multiple times throughout her upbringing, she prayed She asked God into her heart because she wasn't— she didn't think it took, and she didn't know if she was actually born again. And that question, which is popular in a certain sect of Christianity, if you died today, do you know where you're going?

So remember what we talked about?

Let's go back to last week for just a minute. What you think about the end affects what you think and believe and act in the middle, right? So if you're walking around all the time like, where am I going when I die? How's that going to affect how you treat other people?

Right?

All right.

How about born again? Go ahead, Debbie.

Apocalypse coffee.

Yeah. Wonderful saints like Kenneth Copeland and Jim Bakker, right? And Jesse Duplantis. They're buying their next jet, man. Right? That's what you think of. Jim Bakker literally sells Apocalypse Coffee.

What?

Yeah, we're—

by the way, I'm going to come out with a better brand, better taste. It's going to be good. Anyways, what else? Born again. I think that's a hand from Heather Harris?

Required.

Required, right? You felt a sense of requirement. You felt a sense of pressure because other people are doing it from a very young age and you didn't feel there yet. So is there— so maybe you felt like, is there something wrong with me?

Yeah.

Okay. Fundamentalist, dogmatic.

Adam?

Mystery and process. Anybody else want to chime in? Joanna? So we've been in this series— hey Tucker, can you throw up that image? I don't have my phone today, I left it at home, so Tucker and I are going to be Stockton and Malone today. Like, we're gonna try to be. There's a Where's Jesus slide in my sermons. I know I have 800 slides in there. Tucker, give Tucker a round of applause, would you? God bless him. It's in there somewhere, Tucker. It's not in there? Okay, don't worry about it then, fella.

You know what, it's not in there. I added it to the stream, not to my slides. So, we're in the finale of this series. We've been talking about Where's Jesus? It's in the last week playlist, Adam, if you can find it. Not this week, but the week prior. It's in that playlist. Where we've been talking about finding Jesus, finding and following Jesus when much of Christianity doesn't look like him. Finding and following Jesus when much of Christianity doesn't look like him.

And we're ending here because today My honest hope is to reclaim the beauty and the power of that phrase, born again. It really is a beautiful image, reality, that gives us sort of—

look at that.

Look at these guys in the back today. Thank you. Appreciate you. It's this idea that this was inspired by a younger person in our church who's kind of like, I can look in every direction and see Christians, but I can't necessarily see Jesus. And so I think some people—

you heard it— some people have positive feelings and views of born again.

Some people think of Apocalypse Coffee and Jim Bakker, right? And so like today, I want to help you maybe experience some hope and energy and beauty around this, this, this phrase that Jesus does use when he's explaining it to somebody, like what this is all about. But it makes me think of this. I hope Juniper will forgive me for this because she's not old enough to say, yeah, Daddy, you can say that in a sermon or not. But right now, my daughter Juniper is 2.

And what do they call the 2s? What is it? The terrible 2s.

The terrible 2s. Well, that's exactly what we're experiencing right now. So yesterday out in the garage, this is my fault, I had the oil filter that I had changed from my car sitting on the floor.

And I was doing some mulching around the side.

And then Beau comes around and goes, Daddy, Juniper got her hands in something.

And she comes around and she looks like she's been in the shop all day. And her Minnie Mouse dress looks like it's been in the shop too, right?

And I'm explaining to her like, honey, Minnie Mouse dress is ruined now. And how do you think that went?

I'm telling— I'm trying to explain to her rationally, rationally, that I need to take the dress off and try against all odds to fix the dress.

Which, how did that go?

Horribly. It's done.

It's cooked.

You need to give it to the wrong guy.

Yeah, I need to give it to the man back there and let him work on it. But I mean, this was an ordeal for a good 20 minutes. And it wasn't like a calm ordeal. It wasn't until we went upstairs and I was like, do you want to wear this? I'm like, my hair is on fire. I'm like, please just stop crying. And I give her that. And finally she's like, I'll wear my Christmas dress, I guess. And puts that on.

And she wore that the rest of the day.

But sometimes here's what I think of. What does this have to do with born again? Developmentally, can Juniper at the age of 2 process her big emotions and really sort of work through them and talk through them and use like self-soothing techniques?

Can she do that developmentally yet?

No.

How is Juniper, say, with empathy right now at 2 years old? It's maybe starting to come online, right?

Because so like the other day, Angela said sorry to her for something and she said— what did she say?

She said to Angela, these things—

she said, these things happen sometimes. You know?

So, we can see this developmentally in children, right? Where they're not yet. And if I am expecting her to do something developmentally that she's not ready to do yet, is that her fault or mine? That's me, right?

Yes.

Well, I think the problem in Christianity right now is that I don't think it's that we don't have A lot of people who are born again.

I think there are a lot of people who have, say, surrendered their lives to Jesus, or they've decided like, I want to give my life to Jesus.

I want to follow Him.

But in a lot of Christianity, when you get baptized, is baptism more of an arrival or a departure?

Here, what do we teach, Dave?

Is it an arrival or a departure?

No, the other one.

Departure.

Yeah. Who thinks it's an arrival when you get baptized?

What do you mean by that?

That question's confusing. Strike it from the record! Here's what I mean.

I think I confused y'all.

Let's act like that—

let's take that off the record, okay? Here's what we mean. Sometimes Christianity is taught once you're baptized, you're done.

You've arrived.

You're saved. You're born again.

You're in, right?

Where one of the things we talk about here is baptism is more like if you're going to the airport and you get to decide, is this arrival or departure? Baptism is departure. Like that, you're starting out on a journey, right? That's what Dave and some other folks have been talking about, right, Dave? We've been talking about how like this is—

we're not finishing the journey, we're starting it. And I think what's happened is We have a lot of Christianity that's taught that, like, the minute that you get saved, you've arrived. And so how important is development from there? So I think what we have is a lot of terrible 2 Christians running around. Did I make the connection for you?

Yes.

I think we have a lot of Christians who haven't hung out with Jesus long enough to know what to do with their big feelings. And they're getting into stuff that they really shouldn't be getting into. And how good are they at empathy? Not so great, right? Because if you think that being born again is like, I've arrived, I'm saved, I'm done, how important is development going to be to you? How much, how much of Christianity is, is confronting people's egos, right? So that's why I want to show you today that, like— can you flash up the one thing there, Tucker? It's a big paragraph of words.

It's really not a one thing. It's like a lot of things.

What I think of is, like, if we give ourselves fully and daily to Jesus's invitation to trust him and follow him— notice I said fully. If we give ourselves— can you read those next 3 words? If we give ourselves Notice I didn't say like if we give ourselves to Jesus one time and get dunked and someone like smacks us on the forehead and says, saved! Nah, man. If we give ourselves to him fully and like moment to moment, we can expect a dramatic inside-out transformation that impacts how we see everything. Because it'll be like we're born again in a new household. in a new kingdom. How many of you find yourself sometimes when you're in an argument, right, and your rational thinking goes down, your anxiety's up, your insecurity's getting triggered, and you find yourself arguing like one of your ancestors? Anybody ever argue like an ancestor? And especially you're like, you're like, I didn't You never maybe wanted to be like that, but you found yourself— because we are, we're patterned, we're shaped in our family of origin, right?

Right.

But with this, it's like we are born again in a new household, in a new kingdom, learning to talk, walk, eat, think, act like the head of that household, like the ruler of that kingdom. And that's what I think Christianity is missing when Like, it's like we— John Wesley saw it like truly like, like being a Christian is like going from new birth to like adulthood.

So think about it.

Like, if we go after Jesus and we experience this new awakening, this new birth, so like we're woken up to like, oh my God, this Jesus thing is real. He is Lord. And maybe we start to have some little glimpse of that. It's like we're born, but do we know how to eat on our own? Do we know how to talk yet? Do we know how to crawl even? No. And so like, I think that's where perhaps the gap is. And I want to show you how for one person like this happened, how it was such a beautiful reality. It wasn't this pressure. It wasn't like this ultimatum, either you're born again or you're not.

Remember, how we think about the end affects how we act and think in the middle. If salvation is to us, remember, you guys are going to get so used to me doing this.

Jesus sitting up on a throne and y'all are lined up, right? Remember it? What's judgment in the end?

Left, left, right, right. Right.

Left.

Oh, you thought you were right.

Sucks for you. Left. Get over there right now. Left.

Right? How is born again going to be affected by that?

Right?

That's going to affect if you even think you need to grow up genuinely.

Right?

But if salvation is really about a new creation, that Christ has come to start a new creation on earth, And each of you is a new creation, then the goal is not just for you to be born again and like once saved, always saved.

How many of you heard that phrase before?

Once saved, always saved. Silly expression. Not even a debate worth having. I want to show you a guy who like, he experienced this dramatic transformation from the inside out. It's my favorite letter in the New Testament. And I want to walk you through practically how beautiful this is.

Some of you can guess where I'm going. It's no big shocker here.

Go ahead and go to Acts, the Acts passage, if you will, Tucker.

You all knew where I was going, some of you. It's the most dramatic and beautiful transformation that we get to see live in the Bible.

So this is the—

there's 4 gospels, 4 accounts of Jesus's life. Say them with me: Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.

John. And then there's a— Luke wrote a second volume. Did you know that? Did you know Acts of the Apostles is Luke part 2?

It's about what happens after Jesus leaves the earth and the apostles take over.

Well, this is in the 7th chapter right here. So, in this story, they've appointed some new people to go out and carry the message. Stephen is one of those guys. He gets apprehended. He gives up and gives a speech, and he's a little bold in his speech. What happens to poor Stephen? Everybody, let's get stoned. Well, Stephen was the first, first martyr. In Greek, that's the word, martyr.

It means witness, but literally they thought if they gave witness, it might mean they die.

So they dragged him out of the city, Stephen, and began to stone him. And the witnesses laid their coats at the feet of a young man named Saul. While they were stoning Stephen, Stephen prayed, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.

Keep going.

Then he knelt down and cried out in a loud voice, Lord, do not hold this sin against them.

Whoa.

Do you think if you think of born again as an arrival, and you've stopped growing? That's a grown-up Christian right there.

That's an adult.

Stephen's not a baby anymore. He's grown up. When he said this, he died. Keep going, Tucker,, pretty please. Ooh, read that first sentence there.

He is the Holy One of God.

Y'all need to do a little better than that. Say it one more time.

He is the Holy One of God.

That day, a severe persecution began against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout the countryside of Judea and Samaria.

Keep going.

Devout men buried Stephen and made loud lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church by entering house after house, dragging off both men and women. He committed them to prison.

Is Saul a good— a guy you want to hang out with if you're following Jesus in the first century? But then about a chapter later, he has an encounter.

Saul does.

And Jesus says, Saul, why are you persecuting me?

Remember, we've talked about this.

Was Jesus being persecuted? Paul, I don't think Jesus put Jesus in jail, or Paul put Jesus in jail, did he?

Oh yeah, remember Matthew 25? If you do it to one of them, it's like you're doing it to me. Remember that.

But what now? Now you're in for some whiplash. Let's go to this letter that Paul wrote while he was in jail. Now Paul's the guy in prison and he's writing a letter to some people he helped follow Jesus.

So go to Philippians chapter 1 if you would, Tucker.

Man, Tucker's on it. Do you see that? Stockton to Malone.

Boom.

Paul and Timothy, servants of Christ Jesus. This is the same guy, the same fella. He's the one writing this letter. He's in prison because he's given his life to Jesus. He has been born again.

Say it with me.

Paul has been—

Born again.

Do you think Paul treated it as like, you know what, I'm saved, I got my golden ticket now, I'm just gonna chill, I'm gonna try to not be a jerk Christian, but you know what, if a little bit of that slips, it's okay. I'm gonna run around and just decide who's going to heaven and who's going to hell. That's gonna be my life now.

No.

You don't write something like this if you're a little baby Christian who's still in your terrible twos. This dude has given his life to Jesus and he is growing up. He's born again.

He's had a new birth. He's made it through his terrible twos. I think he's pretty much a mature adult at this point.

Look at this transformation. To all the saints in Christ Jesus who are in Philippi with the bishops and deacons, grace to you and peace from our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Grace to you.

This is the guy who is ravaging the church, going house to house.

He says, that guy says grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ. Listen, if you think that you can't experience radical transformation, may this letter be a witness to you. Keep going, Tucker. I thank my God for every remembrance of you, always in every one of my prayers for all of you, praying with joy. Keep going, Tucker. For your partnership in the Gospel from the first day until now.

I am confident of this. This is the guy who was throwing people in prison.

I'm confident in this, that the One who began a good work in you will continue to complete it until the day of Christ Jesus.

It is right for me to think this way about all of you because I hold you in my heart.

For all of you are my partners in God's grace, both in my imprisonment and in the defense and confirmation of the Gospel.

For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the tender affection of Christ Jesus.

And this is my prayer—

Listen to this.

We're not hearing it, I don't think. We've heard, we've heard the Bible too much.

The guy who was going house to house and throwing people in prison is now himself in prison, and he's spending his time in prison happy and joyful, saying, and this is my prayer, That your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight. This guy's not just born again like this. He has been. He got born into a new household, a new kingdom. He has a new ruler. He's learning a new way of life from a new head of his household.

Keep going, Tucker.

To help you determine what really matters. Do you feel that?

Don't you wish in your day-to-day life you could be able to determine what really matters? When you're working and one of your lovely coworkers is being a jerk, or maybe when a family member is doing what they do, or maybe you're just feeling worried and afraid and lost, wouldn't you love to be able to determine what really matters so that in the day of Christ you may be pure and blameless? He doesn't mean that you'll make no mistakes. He means that you'll be refined like Christ was, glorious like Christ.

Transformed.

Can you believe this? What does this make you think? Do you think this is still possible today? Do you—

or you're like, I've heard this story before?

Let's be honest for a minute. Does this energize you at all? Are you like, eh, not really?

Go ahead, Teresa.

Every day I can become better.

I can become better every day as long as I'm following him. Okay.

What else?

Does this energize you or you're like, boring, I've heard this story before, that's old news, that's an old letter? Go ahead, Lucy. It's not— so it's for you, it's not like a should do it, but it's like a want to do it. It's a— there's a new desire. Okay, I don't have to. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I get to. Okay. What else? Do to me what you must and do through me what you will.

Okay.

What else? Oh, Courtney, go ahead. Damascus is always this— for you, it's always that image of like how possible like this beautiful, glorious change can be. And part of what I want to say to you today is like, don't let— please, if you've been harmed in church, harmed by Christians, and by the way, if you've done some harming— I have, I, I definitely have, God have mercy on me—

don't, please don't let that steal the beauty and power of born again.

It's a beautiful reality, a beautiful invitation to be reborn and to grow into the things of Christ, the glorious good things of Christ. What else? Anybody else here? Go ahead, Dave. Ooh, yeah. Dave says he thinks about knocking down the walls. Yeah. And instead of being like, what we have to do, let it happen. Jesus says the Spirit is like the wind. You hear the sound of it, but you don't know where it's come from or where it's going.

So it is with everyone who's born of the Spirit. It's something that we allow to happen. Like, we just let the Spirit work in us and through us and let us grow into the things of Christ. I saw another hand somewhere. Bridget, go ahead.

How do we know we're doing our job?

I love your question so much. We have core values here. I know it's a little confusing. We also have discipleship essentials, 5 of those. If you can have the heart that Bridget has when she asks that question, we're all going to be in a good place.

She just said like what the discipleship essential is: humble, hungry, willing.

HHW mindset.

We got— do we have any experts in this place today?

Heck no. We're all, we're all just trying to grow up in this thing.

She said, what changed for Saul?

How did he have this radical change? It's partly what Courtney said. I left out Acts chapter 9 after he was cool with the killing, Bridget. He was walking along the road and all of a sudden he had— he felt like he had this vision of Christ risen. right in front of him. He had this vision of Jesus, and Jesus goes, hey Saul, why are you persecuting me? And then he went blind, and he didn't eat or drink for 3 days. And then somebody, a kind Christian to whom Jesus spoke, said like, hey, I want you to go meet up with this Saul guy, lead him by the hand and help him. And that guy, I think his name was Ananias, goes, Who?

You want me to help who? That guy?

And Jesus is like, yes, that guy. He leads him by the hand.

Paul gets humbled.

3 days, doesn't eat, drink, can't see. But this community of Christians— it's called enemy love. The first century church was astoundingly great at what we call enemy love. They love their enemies. You hear it right here in Stephen. Stephen says, don't hold this sin against them. We'll know we're becoming adults with Jesus when we genuinely start to have enemy love. So Saul has that experience and then slowly starts to eat again like a little baby, drink again, see again.

He's a little baby boy. And then he starts to walk it out and grow up until he writes something astounding like this. This is his Moonlight Sonata, in my opinion. So beautiful. Go ahead, PT. Go ahead. What time is it, by the way? I don't have a phone. 5 o'clock.

Okay.

Okay.

Yeah, that's a good point.

Yeah.

Yeah. So even Billy Graham, who was doing all this saved, born-again talk, right next to him was somebody who did not have this dramatic one time. We're all different. Absolutely. We are all— we all have different entrances. Absolutely. For some people, they have that Like boom! Some people, it's more like a dimmer switch, right? What is it? 10:37. Time to shut up, Ross.

Okay. Oh, what do we end with today?

I got a big old list here of things.

Let's chuck it?.

Let's not do any of that.

Go ahead, Adam. Yeah, you go ahead.

Take the sermon. I don't know what to do next.

Hey, everybody.

Yes. Yeah, let's end with Philippians 3, then we'll be done. Go to Philippians 3, if you would, Tucker. Chapter 3, verse— that's 2. Let's go to 3. If it's somewhere in there. There we go. What I want to hang on to what Adam said, we maybe we will have this extraordinary awakening at some point.

I can think of one time where I did. But a lot of it has just been very ordinary moments in little rooms, or at the stylist, or at a dinner table, like just moment-to-moment experiences where I was trying to be aware of Jesus and the Spirit in the place. And slowly just growing up over time. And because of that, like PT said, Paul is maybe, you know, a couple of decades into his journey and allows him to now have this perspective. It's so beautiful. God, it's beautiful. Keep going to verse 2, if you would there, Tucker. First, he has this.

He's like, hey, y'all, there are some dogs out there. By the way, Paul knows what a dog looks like in this case because he was one. But But this gets very little, very little attention in his letter. That also is a sign he's growing up.

If a lot of your energy and attention is given to your resentment, that may be a sign that you still have some growing up to do.

Okay, his energy does not go to this stuff. Keep going there if you would, Tucker. Keep going.

He's saying like, hey, there were people coming through town and they were like, hey, you need to go through this conversion process. You need to— like very religious fundamentalists— like, you need to do this first to become religious like we are. And you need to look like this and sound like this. And Paul's like, look, I had all that stuff on my resume. Paul says, I have more confidence than anybody on my religious resume as a Jewish man.

Go on, Tucker.

If you were Jewish, you were circumcised on the 8th day. He's like, I'm a member of the people of Israel. I'm of the tribe of Benjamin. I'm a Hebrew born of Hebrews. As to the law, a Pharisee. He probably had most or all the first 5 books of the Bible memorized.

That's your homework for next week. I want you all to have Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy memorized.

Yes!

He had all that. Keep going. As to zeal, you saw in Acts, as to zeal, a persecutor of the church, going house to house, ravaging the church. As to righteousness under the law, blameless. I followed the rules. to the letter of the law. Yet—

read this with me. Ooh, read it.

Yet whatever gains I had, these I have come to regard as loss because of Christ.

Keep going, Tucker.

More than that, I regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I regard them as rubbish.

in order that I may gain Christ and be found in him.

Not—

listen, look at this— not having a righteousness of my own that comes from law, but one that comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God based on faith. So here's my hope for you.

I have written in Church Center some practice, 2 practices for you this week.

If you go to Church Center, one is I'm inviting you to read this chapter a couple times in a couple different translations. Read it not to gain more knowledge, not to be smarter in faith, but just pray, God, help me to hear Your heart as I chew on these words. That's a great way to read the Bible.

Lord, help me to hear Your heart as I chew on these words.

So read that. And also there's a journaling exercise or a meditation exercise I invite you to.

Tucker, man, he's fast on the draw. He put up the church center QR code.

Thanks, dude. I pray this week that you would reclaim, rediscover the beauty of being born again, growing up and maturing in the things of faith. Let's pray. Lord, I pray that You would guide us in the week to come in the ordinary experiences. Help us to hear You, see You, to learn to walk and talk and eat again. Heal us, Lord, where we have maybe been hurt by religion. Help us to reclaim again the beauty and power of the good things that you have to give us. In Christ's name, amen.