Have you reconsidered your faith? Thought about quitting and going back to your old life? Well, Psalm 73 has encouragement and wisdom that will help you remain in the arms of God.

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OC Church of Christ

Amen?

And it is a pleasure and an honor Wow, I cannot get this thing to work.

I'll just hold it.

There you go.

Um, it is great to be with you guys this morning.

To be able to worship God together.

Amen?

And it's always a pleasure to be able to be with the body of Christ.

To be able to celebrate.

I believe Sundays are an opportunity to celebrate our weeks.

And be able to reflect on the cross and reflect on what God

is really doing in our lives.

Amen?

And so today we get to do that together.

And we get to worship with each other.

Amen?

So, today...

Let's see here.

Today is our final service here in Garden Grove.

All right.

It's a little bittersweet.

Some great memories have been made here.

But I believe God is leading our church on to amazing new things.

The best has yet to come.

Amen.

And so we're going to be moving.

For those who don't know, we're moving over to Placentia, the

Performing Arts Center over there.

It's a few minutes away from Cal State Fullerton's Fullerton students.

I'm sure you're happy about that and it's going to be an amazing time to be able to

be in a new location, a new neighborhood, being able to worship God together.

You guys with me?

It's going to be a great time.

We've been continuing in our worship together, going

through the book of Psalms.

Psalms of the summer, right?

And I know last week, uh, service was unfortunately cancelled due

to what we thought was a hurricane coming to California, alright?

Turned into just a tropical storm, it was raining, but I'm glad

everyone was okay as far as I know.

Um, everyone was okay and so I'm glad.

Everything worked out.

Amen.

Um, so, for those who watched our service online last week, I know

some of you may have seen the sermon, uh, that I had spoken last week.

Maybe some of you didn't.

That is totally okay.

It is going to be out of the same chapter and Psalms today.

Hopefully there's some new things that I've worked on this past week that have

God's put on my heart that I can add and, uh, change here in this sermon.

So if you've already seen it, hopefully there's something

new for you to learn today.

Amen?

Um.

But it is overall, it is a great to be with you guys and I'm

excited to be able to preach.

This is Jasmine and I's final service here in the north because we are going

to be moving down to Irvine and helping with the campus ministry at UCI.

We're still going to be very involved with the campus here in

the north overseeing the whole OC.

And we'll be seeing them every Wednesday and Friday and working together with them.

But on Sundays, we will be meeting down at the Irvine building.

So I just want to be able to communicate that for those who haven't heard yet.

Um, so this is our final Sunday here in the north.

It is bittersweet.

We love you guys, but we're really excited to see what God's going

to do as we build the regional campus ministry in Orange County.

Amen?

Amen.

You know, today, we're going to be reading out of the book of Psalms in chapter 73.

In chapter 73, and I want to start us off this morning with a question.

Alright, let's see if I can get this thing to work.

There you go.

Have you ever taken your eyes off of the Lord?

Alright, maybe you've lost focus.

Maybe some of us have gotten distracted.

Maybe we've been tempted to look elsewhere, right?

Maybe you're wondering, what does it even mean to look at the Lord?

I've never even learned about Jesus himself yet.

This is my first time at church, right?

Whatever it is for you, I want you to ask yourself, have you ever lost focus of God?

I know I have.

Maybe it's you've looked at your neighbors and been like, wow, look at their life.

Look at how nice their life seems.

I wish I had what they had.

Or maybe it's you've looked at a new shiny toy, that new car, or that

new house, or that new dirt bike.

Mr.

Brewster over there, I know he likes riding.

Or a new grill, for the men who like to grill.

Or whatever that new toy is, maybe you've looked at that and you've

just been so fixated on that, that you've lost focus of God.

I don't know.

Maybe it's a new job, a new career path.

Something that can bring some stability or security in your life.

Or maybe it's just the idea, I just want to be successful and achieve things.

Whatever it is for you this morning, I want to just share that I've been there

as well, and I've lost focus on God.

You know, what's interesting about our world is that we sometimes

can look at other people thinking that we wish we had their lives.

However, we have God.

And Satan wants to still tempt you and deceive you into

thinking their life is better.

And so today we're going to be looking at a passage here that kind of

unpacks this idea a little bit more.

But before we jump into that, I want to just be able to highlight what our

society truly is teaching us, alright?

Our society is full of consumerism.

We see it on social media, we see it whether that's on

the TV, through commercials.

It's about consuming, it's getting.

It's all about how we're constantly fed that good is really not good enough.

Right, you have to continue to achieve and continue to attain.

You know, we're told to never settle.

We're told that we gotta catch up, that we're too slow.

We're told that we gotta get hip with the times, that you gotta have the new gadget,

the new toy, the new TV, the new car.

You gotta be with the latest style and fashion trend, right, campus students?

You know there's an acronym out called FOMO.

It stands for fear of missing out.

Sounds like a bad word when you say FOMO.

But it's fear of missing out.

That's the world we live in that you never want to miss out.

If you're missing out, then you're not on the in.

You're not cool.

You're not a part of the inner circle there.

You know, a few years back, Pop artist named Ed Sheeran, many of you know,

made a song called Beautiful People.

Who's heard of that song, Beautiful People?

Okay, a few of us.

And I want to just share some of the lyrics from that song before

we jump into the scriptures.

Can I do that?

All right, let me do that here.

It says, LA on a Saturday night in the summer, sundown and they all come out.

Lamborghinis and their rented Hummers.

The party's on, so they're heading downtown.

Everybody's looking for a come up, and they want to know what you're about.

And the chorus goes, We don't fit in well, because we are just ourselves.

I could use some help getting out of this conversation.

You look stunning, dear, so don't ask that question here.

This is my only fear, that we become beautiful people.

You're probably wondering, okay, beautiful people, what does he mean by that?

I think this next...

Part describes it well.

Drop top, designer clothes, front row at fashion shows.

What do you do and who do you know?

Inside the world of beautiful people.

Champagne and rolled up notes, prenups and broken homes, surrounded but still alone.

Yeah, even Ed Sheeran can see the brokenness of the world.

You know, the world likes to make it seem like life without Jesus is better.

And it's a lie.

We often see these so called beautiful people are totally the opposite.

They're broken.

They're broken people.

And all of us in here, at some point in our lives, we're broken.

So the title of my lesson today is Beautiful People.

Alright, Beautiful People.

You know, the goal is to be beautiful, not in the world's eyes.

but in God's eyes.

Amen.

So let's turn in our Bibles this morning to Psalm chapter 73

as we dig into the scriptures.

I don't have it on the screen, so you have to turn there.

Okay.

I did that on purpose.

Turn to Psalm 73.

We're going to read God's word.

All right.

Psalm 73 verse one.

I'm going to say a prayer as you guys are turning there.

Lord, thank you so much for this morning and this opportunity to be able to read

your word and your Holy scriptures.

With my brothers and sisters this morning, God, I pray that as we worship you,

as we think about you, as we allow the scriptures to convict us, as we allow the

scriptures to mold us and, and talk to us and speak to our souls, that we can

truly be humble to whatever your Holy Spirit is trying to teach us this morning.

God, I pray that you remove me and my words and you replace

them with you and your words.

God, that whatever comes out this morning from your word truly

will impact the lives of our...

Family here this morning.

We love you.

We thank you.

And we pray this in Jesus name.

Amen.

Psalm 73 verse 1.

We're going to break this down section by section.

It says, verse 1 says, Surely God is good to Israel, to those who are pure in heart.

But as for me, my feet had almost slipped.

I had nearly lost my foothold.

For I envied the arrogant when I saw the prosperity of Israel.

of the wicked.

They have no struggles.

Their bodies are healthy and strong.

They are free from common human burdens.

They are not plagued by human ills.

We're gonna stop there for a moment.

So already we're seeing the psalmist is creating this idea, is creating

this, this vision, this picture of what it can sometimes be like

when we're looking at the world.

When we're taking our eyes off of God.

Off of Jesus, he even says in verse three, four, I envied the arrogant when

I saw the prosperity of the wicked.

I don't know if you can relate to that language at all or what, what

he's sharing there, but I know I can.

You know, to be completely honest with you guys, one of, one of my biggest

struggles that I'm wrestling with today, living in Orange County now

for three years, a baby on the way.

You know, leading our campus ministry, but I also have a side business

that I started a few years back.

I don't, for those who don't know, it's a small junk and trash hauling company.

Alright, it's not the most glorious of work there, but it's a lot of fun.

And it's a great opportunity to be able to have some supplemental income, um, that

helps Jasmine and I with our finances.

And I'm very blessed to be able to have that.

Very fortunate and grateful.

And however, sometimes I can often feel this pull.

In my life and this tension to want to spend time focused on making money

focused on how do I build my business, you know, at heart, I'm an entrepreneur.

I went to school for marketing.

I love the idea of building things, building businesses, building

whatever, you know, whatever God's putting in front of me.

That's my gift.

I believe is I love to build and he's given me this gift to be able

to use, I believe for his kingdom, but also to be able to build in the

secular world for his glory as well.

Yeah.

And, but sometimes I can feel that Satan uses that to tempt me into thinking

that that's where I need to spend most of my time, or my focus, or my brain

power, or just my, my, my energy, and my thought, and where I put all of my time.

You know, and I've had to wrestle with this, because I, I don't think it's

a bad thing, right, to, to do that.

I don't think God is, is saying don't do that.

He's saying use your gift for my glory and my good.

But at times I allow it to become so...

consuming for me that I lose focus of Christ.

You know, I've had the thought sometimes, well, maybe if I spend less time around

the church, then I could work more in my business and make more money.

Or, maybe if I just stopped tithing or cut my tithe down a little bit, I

could afford to drive that nicer car.

These are real thoughts I've had, and at one point I even had the thought, well,

what if I just quit the ministry, stop leading, Just kind of sit, you know, in

the back and rarely come to church and just focus on making a lot of money.

What could, what could actually happen?

Maybe I could buy a house one day.

The market's crazy, but if I just focus on making money,

maybe I could actually afford it.

And I've become consumed at times with materialism.

And I've lost focus of God.

Just like the psalmist is sharing here, I envied the arrogant

when I saw the prosperity.

You know, verse two, he also brings up this idea of how his

feet almost slipped, right?

He had nearly lost his foothold, and there was a point where I had almost slipped

and lost my foothold, and I was close to wanting to leave the ministry and go and

just focus on making money, and going back to what I was doing before I got here.

And so I can really relate to the psalmist here in this passage.

I can relate to the temptation of what he's sharing.

And I'm sure some of you this morning can maybe relate as well.

Maybe it's not materialism.

Maybe it's something else for you.

But it's a vulnerable place to be.

You, you feel weak.

You feel distant from God.

And it's easy to be deceived into the thinking of the world.

That's where I was, and that's where I can be tempted.

You know, in verse six, let's continue reading here.

It says, Therefore pride is their necklace.

They clothe themselves with violence.

From their callous hearts comes iniquity.

Their evil imaginations have no limits.

They scoff, and they speak with malice.

With arrogance, they threaten oppression.

Their mouths lay claim to heaven, and their tongues

take possession of the earth.

You see this descriptive language here.

Therefore their people turn to them and drink up waters in abundance.

They say, how would God know?

Does the Most High know anything?

This is what the wicked are like.

Always free of care, they go on amassing wealth.

You know, When we see this descriptive language the psalmist is writing

about, we see a selfish, broken, and evil, worldly lifestyle.

I want to remind us this morning, this is who we were before Christ.

Whether or not you were worldly in the world standards, or just a sinner

in God's standards, you were broken.

You were distant.

We all were.

This is who we all were before we found Jesus.

This was the lifestyle many of us lived prior to becoming new creations.

Prior to the waters of baptism.

Prior to repentance.

Prior to all this, we were broken.

And now that we've been baptized and repented, Satan wants to tempt

you daily into this lifestyle.

He wants to tempt you.

And maybe it's not as in your face as this might be.

Maybe it's not as obvious.

I think it can be hidden in certain ways in our lives.

You with me?

Satan wants to rebrand, repackage, resell the world to us daily.

That is his goal.

And we can so easily be deceived into thinking that the

world is better than Christ.

And it's not true.

Brothers and sisters, life in the kingdom of God, life with Christ, life with the

Ecclesia, the church, it is amazing.

It is a gift.

We've been pulled out of the world and we get to be set free from our

sin, from this broken way of living.

You guys with me this morning?

You know, I know the temptation can be there to look at your neighbor, oh, you

might have a little more money than I do.

Oh, their family looks a little bit happier than we do.

Oh, they might have a better job, more stability, better career.

Maybe they just appear to look happier.

Maybe they don't.

But for some of you, maybe that's the case.

You have Jesus Christ.

You have a family of believers here this morning who want to help each other

get to the ultimate prize of heaven.

Amen?

You know, a couple months ago, I met this guy.

Who, um, was living a lifestyle, he's about probably four or

five years older than me.

He was living a lifestyle that I could very easily see

myself living without Christ.

Uh, I went to visit him.

He, he lived in, right next to SoFi Stadium that just got built.

And that area is getting gentrified.

And he had a condo, a three story condo he was paying over 6, 000 a month for.

And it was no problem for him.

He was driving a Rolls Royce, he had an Escalade, he had a whole studio

for a podcast, and he didn't even have a podcast, he had everything

you could have wanted, alright?

Let me, uh, that's what his Rolls Royce looked like, right?

And I'm, and I was talking to this guy, and very quickly, as I was like,

kind of at first like, wow, he's got a Rolls Royce, that's, I've never

been in one, let me go sit in it.

So I was checking it out and seeing his house, but very quickly,

I just saw right through him.

I saw right through what he was feeling, what he was thinking.

I remember going in his house and some, some girl had just come out of

their room, was cleaning the house.

I could just see how broken he was.

He was living this lifestyle and we started getting into some conversation and

you know, very quickly he, he was sort of revealing to me what, what I Look, what it

looked like to me was, he was just empty.

He moved from Chicago, knew nobody here, was partying in L.

A.

Basically, that whole song you saw.

That was his life.

And, glory be to God, he's currently studying the Bible right now in L.

A., in our church.

I'm praying he'll get baptized, but it's just, I could see that he was broken.

I could see that he was attaining these things of the world,

but it didn't fill him up.

And Satan wants to make us think that that's gonna fill us up,

and it's just simply not true.

You guys with me?

He was so empty, and really he lacked purpose.

Because when we were hanging out, he was talking, I was talking to him about

my marriage, talking to him about our ministry, what God's doing, and even in my

business, I was able to relate with him.

But, very quickly he realized, I need purpose in my life.

And he started coming to church, and now he's studying the Bible.

So be praying for him.

His name is Sean.

I'm really hoping that he can become a disciple and be able to

build God's kingdom with his gifts.

Amen.

You know, we can easily, again, we can easily be deceived.

I don't want us to be deceived into thinking that this world can fulfill you.

It can't fulfill you.

And so I want to ask you a question this morning.

What is Satan using to deceive you?

What is he using?

Maybe it's not this grand lifestyle or this, but maybe it's something small.

Maybe it's just a little thing in your life.

Maybe it's, oh, I just wish my kids would do better in sports.

And then I can, you know, maybe spend more energy and time in that.

And then I can, you know, go and be the cool dad at the sports game.

And get my worth from that, rather than my worth from God.

Whatever it is.

What is Satan using to deceive you?

You with 73.

It says in verse 13, Surely in vain I have kept my heart pure, and

have washed my hands in innocence.

All day long I have been afflicted, and every morning brings new punishments.

If I had spoken out like that, I would have betrayed your children.

When I tried to understand all this, it troubled me deeply.

Till I entered the sanctuary of God, then I understood their final destiny.

Surely you place them on slippery ground.

You cast them down to ruin.

How suddenly are they destroyed, completely swept away by terrors.

They are like a dream when one awakes.

When you arise, Lord, you will despise them as fantasies.

When my heart was grieved and my spirit embittered, I was senseless and ignorant.

I was a brute beast before you.

I'm gonna stop there.

We see sort of this climax to the passage, right?

We see that this, this worldly lifestyle is not going to fulfill you.

And, and we all get that conceptually and logically.

We understand that.

But he says it was hard to understand it all when he was

in the middle of the temptation.

Sometimes when we're tempted with, with things in our lives, it can be so

hard to see past it and see the truth.

You with me?

When we're tempted with whatever it is Satan's trying to tempt you with, all

you can fixate on is that temptation.

But he says, until, what?

Until I entered the sanctuary of God.

Then I understood their final destiny.

The psalmist is writing, It was hard for me to understand.

I couldn't get it.

I was trying to figure it out.

They look so good.

Their life is so much better.

I couldn't figure it out.

It troubled me.

Then I just entered God's sanctuary.

I spent time with the Lord.

I drew near to God.

And He revealed it.

He revealed their final destiny to me.

And so I want to share two observations from this Passage right here that I

think can help us grow in our faith and grow when it comes to this temptation.

Amen.

The first observation here

is that we've got to spend time with God.

It's essential.

Spending time with God is essential.

We must spend time with God as often as we can.

Because when we aren't close to God, That is when we get into being

deceived into the world's thinking.

If we're not close to him, if we're not in step with the spirit, if we're

not reading our word, if we're not close to God and drawing near to

him with the body of Christ, that is when Satan starts deceiving us.

And we start getting distant.

And we start losing our focus on God.

I had a buddy of mine, became a Christian when he was very young.

And the world just overtook him.

He wanted to live in the world.

He wanted to go, he wanted to go sin.

He wanted to go do whatever he could do because he was growing

up in a sheltered environment.

And I remember he left the church.

It was heartbreaking to me.

He left the church.

He was drifting.

He was seeking fun.

He was seeking substances.

He was seeking women.

He was seeking it all.

And after a few years, Him and I and our relationship grew very distant.

But after a few years, I think God was just starting to work on his heart.

And we saw that after a few years, he began to feel empty.

And he decided to start picking up his Bible.

He didn't tell anybody.

He just started reading the Bible.

He was like, I've, I've tried everything.

I've tried New Age stuff.

I've tried crystals.

I've tried science.

I've tried the world.

I've tried atheism.

Nothing fulfilled him.

And so he's like, you know what, I'm just going to read the Bible.

And he read the Bible every day for three months straight.

Didn't tell a soul.

One day he shows up to church.

He says, I want to get baptized.

I believe the first time I got baptized, I never really confessed all my sin.

I didn't repent.

I'm ready to get baptized.

We're like, what?

You've been gone for three years.

What are you talking about get baptized?

That doesn't make any sense.

He was like, I've been reading my Bible every day for three

months and God is real.

God's revealing the truth to me.

I'm seeing clearly that I live in a broken and empty lifestyle,

and I need Jesus in my life.

And that week, he was baptized.

He's my best friend, and it is so encouraging to see how God

is really there with us when we seek him and spend time with him.

Satan wants us to be super disconnected from God in order to deceive us.

That's his plan.

And if I can just get them away from God, then I can get them to be deceived.

The second point I want to make is that the world's way will lead to destruction.

We know that the truth can become evident when we spend time with God.

That the world is a lie and a facade.

It's not all that it's cracked up to be.

When we spend time with God, He softens our hearts.

Whether or not we're receiving a bunch in the moment, I believe God, when we

spend time with Him every day, that God is using that moment to keep our

hearts soft for the point at which He will reveal something new to us.

In those moments, we may not be learning a ton, we may not be receiving a

ton, but it's keeping our heart soft.

Because He wants to reveal the truth to us.

And He wants to inspire us to be able to make change for this lost world.

You know, God wants us to be able to see past the facade, take off the mask, and

be authentic and genuine for who we are.

God wants us to be close to him, and the psalmist then closes out

the passage here with this view of how life is when we're close to God.

We're going to close out in verse 23, and we're going to read how it is

when we set our hearts with Christ.

Verse 23 says, Yet I am always with you.

You hold me by my right hand.

You guide me with your counsel and afterward you will take me into glory.

Whom have I in heaven but you?

And earth has nothing I desire besides you.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength for my

heart and my portion forever.

Those who are far from you will perish.

You destroy all who are unfaithful to you, but as for me, it is

good to be near, be near God.

I have made the Sovereign Lord my refuge.

I will tell of all your deeds.

Brothers and sisters, let's be close to God.

Amen.

He promises so much, and He wants to give us so much.

He wants us to be with Him.

God is our strength, and it's good to be near, near Him.

Amen?

It's important to remember the times when we're close to Him.

When we're near Him.

When we're thinking about Him.

When He's been there for us in the darkest of valleys.

And how He's walked us through that.

We can't forget that.

You know, like I shared earlier, I just want to share this briefly here.

I'm an entrepreneur at heart.

I love building God's church.

I love building God's kingdom.

I love partnering with you guys to build God's kingdom together.

Amen.

That is my desire.

That is my dream.

You know, my dream is to build something great for the glory of God.

Not for me.

Not for success on this earth.

But I really want to build God's church for His glory.

And I'm so grateful to be able to be a part of a church that desires unity, that

desires to build true discipleship and build true disciples for God's glory.

Amen?

That's what we're a part of.

We can't forget that.

We can't allow the deceiver to make us think that life is better

without God, because it's not.

When we're with Christ, when we're working together, God is amazing.

He does amazing things in all of our lives.

My prayer is that we can save many souls, that we can draw closer to each other,

that we can help one another, deepen our, our faith in God, that we can become

mature and complete, like the scriptures say, and I'm so grateful to be able to

have a team of people on this earth that want to glorify God in a unified way.

Amen.

So let's tell this world full of beautiful people that are

broken about all of God's deeds.

Amen.

At this time, we're going to go ahead and take communion.

I'm going to go ahead and say a word of prayer.

And as we're taking communion, let's reflect on the cross.

To reflect on what God has done in our lives and how we can spread

that to our new communities.

Amen?

Let's pray.

Lord, thank you so much for this morning and this time to be able to

come before you to be able to reflect on your amazing gift of grace that we

received when Jesus died on the cross.

We received through the waters of baptism.

God, I'm so grateful to be able to be a part of a church, to be a part of

a family that wants to glorify you.

And God, I pray that we can tell of all your deeds, that as we move to

Placentia that our church can make a huge impact in that new community.

And I pray that the cross will inspire us, that it will be an overflow in our heart

of joy that compels us to want to spread the love of Christ to many other souls.

Lord, I pray that as we reflect on your great name, as we reflect on Jesus and

the sacrifice he took up for us, Lord, I pray that it'll humble us, that it'll

motivate us, that it'll help us to have a clearer picture of who you are.

Lord, we love you, we thank you.

Help us to draw near to you and be close to you, so we

will not be deceived by Satan.

We love you and thank you in Jesus name, amen.