Pastor Brad DeLong - Change

we welcome you back to midweek as we dive into the word of the lord together and we're going to dive into tonight a topic that i've really felt to focus on of late i've had it surface quite a bit in recent discussions i've read about it in a book that i'm going to reference in just a moment and i believe that we've all lived it in one way or the the other especially in the past couple of years this subject in topic is represented in just one word a word that can often times evoke some pretty strong reactions within us that word is simply the word change change and it's my title tonight it is a loaded word i could tell it's loaded from the chuckles i just heard throughout the room it's a weighty word it's a significant word and concept especially in the season in which we all find ourselves and it has many synonyms if you open your thesaurus with me i'm sure you brought it with you this wednesday night you probably bring it every wednesday night you'll find these synonyms next to the word change the word adjust amend shift modify alter develop innovate revise transition correct grow transform those last two words grow and transform will really define our discussion tonight because their reference all throughout the bible in various places along with the concept and examples of change but to pinpoint what i'm talking about

i want to turn to romans 12 which is one of the most compelling and prominent calls for change that we find in the bible at least in my opinion in this passage chapter before in chapter 11 paul's just wrapped up talking about the grace of god for both the israelites and the gentiles the discussion that represents one of the biggest changes that the early church had walked through we're going to talk about that change in a little while as well but on the heels of all that he says this in romans 12 and one i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god you present your bodies a living sacrifice holy acceptable unto god which is your reasonable service by the way and don't be conformed to this world but be transformed be changed if you will by the renewing of your mind that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of god so we see from from this and from some other places that will mention that the christian life and lifestyle requires transformation it requires change this is the essence of what i want to discuss tonight both on an individual level and on a church-wide level because it's no secret that we've all walked through some change around here of late and especially in the last two years

a case in point i've been asked many times recently what do we call you brad or what do we call pastor williford this is just a snapshot of some of the change that's gone around and it's not the easiest question to answer at times for the record you can call me pastor brad a pastor you can call me pastored along any of those are fine but that's beside the point but i think it's safe to say we've all found ourselves in a season of change we've experienced what i would call some forced change changes that are necessary they're often not optional and then we've walked through some seasonal and intentional changes as well changes that are necessitated by the season and the period that you're in as well as changes that are directed by the holy ghost not only that but also as we begin our our year together this year of 2022 i recognize the beginning of the year is often a time of personal change and reflection the rise in increase in gym membership alone would tell you the beginning of the new year is often a time of change we only hope those changes stick and that they hold true those who sign up for gym memberships at the beginning of the year people like me are not called donators for no reason that's actually what they've called us that's what one guy told me i don't know why he said that to me but he did probably because i was a donator we find ourselves in a season of change both individually and corporately

and you add to that a chapter of brother gary tracy's new book that i've been reading recently a chapter dedicated to change and i was just sensing this direction for tonight as many of you know for some background brother gary tracy uh is the bishop of new life in bridgton missouri he formerly pastored there and that church has walked through a significant change as well he wrote about that process in a book called successful succession and i'm going to reference that book several times tonight in this lesson and specifically his chapter on change caught my attention especially with the backdrop of the changes that we've walked through here as a church family these are the bullet points that he lists about change within the confines of a church and on an individual level he mentioned these these principles of change if you will first of all he says change is difficult can i get an amen on that it's difficult he says change is inevitable change comes with risk he says if we do not change we may become ineffective he said if nothing ever changes something is dying god never changes but the trace he says but his methods do truth does not change but how it's presented does change can bring great rewards change can be amicable and then lastly he says change should always be implemented with the golden rule in mind to do unto others what you would have them do unto you so he presents this very balanced approach on change and i thought it was humorous that as i went to type that word change earlier this week for whatever reason i started to type the word pain instead i'm not exactly talking about pain and i do think that might be an appropriate synonym there but i'm not talking about change uh necessarily but he presents our pain rather presents about those are interchangeable for some reason i can't get them separated but in a subtle way i'm introducing my very first point and he mentions it and that is simply that the principle or the truth the fact that change is hard change is difficult change is sometimes painful we can just address the elephant in the room tonight and say what we all may be thinking we don't really like change okay we don't really like it it's hard it's difficult it's it's often uncomfortable it's awkward it's uneasy unnerving arduous all the words and we have a couple in the room i thought about this that maybe you just love change you're one of the odd ones and you're like oh i love it bring it on every change in the book there may be someone here but i think for the most part we would all agree change is difficult and we would oftentimes rather not change especially with all the changes that we've faced since march of 2020 some of us are tired of change but a lot of change it's just hard okay i saw this firsthand a couple years ago in the youth department i was going to speak on a similar subject on a wednesday night and the lord had just let me know quite a bit before that that i was going to speak on that so i i decided to do a little test in human nature a little uh some of you that were there you probably already know what i'm talking about but i wanted to test a theory that i had and that theory was just the thought that we don't like change and we're resistant to it so for the sake of full disclosure i will admit to you that in order to test that theory every week when i set up for youth service i would change the setup of the seating of the chairs to a new pattern or new arrangement every single week every week you can see i'm grinning that it worked it was a great test it was a case study in human behavior because i cannot tell you how much of a response i got from those teenagers and young adults i've often heard it said that the older you are the more resistant to change you are but i think this case study shattered that entire notion at least at apc my theory was proven true in resounding well you should have seen them when they walked into the room come on are you kidding me where's my seat i sit here you know i mean they could not handle it they were abhorred by the change you'd have thought you know we i mean you thought that there was a hole in the roof they just couldn't handle it and i'd watch some of them walk in and they would take their seat and move it to their old spot and it'd be in no man's land you know in the middle of the room and some of them i know for some of them did it just out of pure you know rebellion no not but others were doing it without even noticing it they're just like okay move and then they get a chair that's close to it and they sit there and i i was dying inside you know the whole time but it reminded me of the fact that we're all creatures of habit we're all instinctual we're repetitive by nature we like our routines and practices that we have ones that we've found will work for us over time and these students prove that and they reinforce the fact that this is the way we were created and that we were created this way on purpose the fact that we live by routines and patterns i don't believe it's a bad thing altogether it's a built-in thing it was given to us by god who himself had regular practices we know from scripture from first corinthians 14 and 33 that he's not a god of disorder but he's a god of order he's a god of peace we can see from scripture and specifically from the law or the torah that he had very specific instructions for things like the covenant sacrifice the sabbath the tabernacle i mean you read through his specifications for the tabernacle and you recognize wow he's got this down to a science even the temple in jerusalem itself he he had it ordered and then we get a closer glimpse into his nature we see him in luke 4 he's walking into nazareth in verse 16 says he went to the synagogue on the sabbath as was his custom or as usual he went to the synagogue he had a routine he had a habit he had a pattern it's pretty incredible to think that the god who is infinite would follow a pattern himself one that he personally established on the sabbath now he could have done that for uh endless reasons there could have been endless reasons for that to be his custom but the fact that he did have that custom shows us there's at least one routine and pattern that he would regularly follow when you think about the fact that we're made in his image you and i are creatures of of habit persons of routine and regular practice it further points to the fact that we can be like him and still be repetitive by nature it's not inherently a bad thing okay it's a good thing that we pray and fast regularly right it's a good thing that we go to work every day it's a good thing that we have healthy habits that we brush our teeth every day for example that one's a good one right we'll keep that one up but to my point earlier when we have to change something as minor as the brand of our toothpaste our instinctual nature opposes it wholeheartedly i had this happen recently i had to switch to sensodyne it's no good all right i want to go back to crest with scope and whitening okay and all you colgate people out there i hear you and i see you that's the one that i've just used okay it's it was horrible when i had to make that switch and so much so that i unwittingly switched back to the other one i just realized today that i did that we fundamentally resist change many times especially change it's uncomfortable we don't like it when our routines and plans are altered we just have this built-in reaction when our patterns are disrupted and there's some parents in the room that know exactly what i'm talking about i'm not trying to belabor the point tonight but what i want to do is showcase our innate response to change so we can recognize it and if needed overcome that response i remember having this moment just after mila was born i was sitting on the couch i think mariah was in the the back room with her me was crying you know what babies do and i thought everything has changed i was having just this crisis all right i said i can't leave the house you know like i need to stay here i'm gonna be changing diapers the rest of my life i'm tired i think what have we done what have we done anyone ever been there some of you yeah okay all right yeah good change okay it's hard it's uncomfortable it's difficult especially when it's forced to change having a newborn is forced change there's just no way around it there's no avoiding that change it's inevitable and escapable you must change in that moment and similarly more recently i would say and this one's going to touch a nerve but covet was forced change no one really saw it coming but it changed everything changed the way we have church services it changed the way we go to work at least for a little while it changed the way we interact with people and the public and the community it changed the way our world as a whole operates in its govern it change our views and our mindset about the world our health and life itself it reminded us of the next point i want to bring out that yes change is hard we all agree on that we're on the same boat on that right we're good but covet among other things also taught us change is inevitable not only is it inevitable but it's also necessary i'll put it to you this way tonight change is as fundamental to life as our resistance to change is fundamental to our nature it is as fundamental to life as our resistance to change is fundamental to our nature as much as we resist change the fact of the matter is it's inevitable and it's necessary so yes it's hard but it's also necessary and this is a tough point i had to grapple with from brother tracy's book a point that he noted over and over throughout the chapter both within an individual life and within the body of christ itself he said change is inevitable and it is necessary and i got to thinking about that in terms of of human anatomy and specifically with regard to my own kids and i know you can tell the stage of life i'm in because every analogy i have is about my kids all right but i love being a dad and they've taught me so much and being a father has taught me so much but i i had this moment last week before service on a wednesday mila came with me she was helping me unlock the building and she's sitting in my office in one of those chairs she's i think watching something and i i looked over at her and i had this dad moment and i thought man i i just i don't want her to grow up i don't want her to change you know her mom had done her hair all up she was looking older than she really is and she's looking so grown up and like no you know i don't i don't want my little girl to change i had the thought i wish she could stay at this age and never change i think the same about wesley even though he's more dependent at this age i i don't always wish he would throw his food at me for the rest of his life but i have these moments that i wish he he wouldn't grow up to be the teenager that everyone's warning me about i get sentimental i like the way things are now see the parallels i like the stage they're at now i'm comfortable with the current setting how things are at this present moment but then i consider that if mila and wesley stayed at the same stage they are now whether physically mentally socially developmentally if they stopped growing and they stopped changing something would be terribly wrong within them if they never grew past this point if they never developed they've never changed we would know something's off something's not right about this if mila stayed three feet tall our whole life and west never got teeth we'd know okay something is innately wrong why because we're built to change we're created for change we're wired for change and we were always intended for change and for growth and that word growth that synonym is what i want to focus on for a little while and it's highly appropriate because growth requires change and growth often equals change how do you grow without changing how can you physically grow without physical change the same goes for every other arena mentally socially spiritually etc growth equals change not only that but the bible has a lot to say about growth and change even within the body

we're going to use this same analogy paul references it he hits it head on in ephesians 4 and this is somewhat lengthy so i i want you to follow along with me and i want you to notice all the mentions and even the impa implications of of growth that he talks about the body he may not say the word grow itself but he certainly mentions it and implies it throughout okay so ephesians chapter 4 verse 11. i'll let you turn there as i take a drink of water i've been talking a lot it says and he himself gave some to the apostles some prophets some evangelists some pastors and teachers for the equipping of the saints for the work of the ministry for the edifying of the body of christ till we all come to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the son of god to a perfect man to the measure of the stature of the fullness of christ that we should no longer be children tossed to and fro about carried about with every wind of doctrine by the trickery of men and the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting but speaking the truth and love may grow up i won't say grow up and all things into him who's the head christ from whom the whole body joining it together by what every joint supplies according to the effect of working by which each part does its share causes growth of the body for the edifying of itself and love sounds a lot like change to me verse 17 this i say therefore and i testify in the lord because you want to grow that you should no longer walk as the rest of the gentiles walking the futility of their mind having the understanding darken being alienated from the life of god because of the ignorance that's in them because of the blindness of their heart we we're not that way anymore we've been changed we're a new creation old things are passed away he said who being past feeling have given themselves over to lewdness to work all on cleanliness and greediness but you've not so learned christ that assumes that you've learned christ that assumes that you've been taught some things if indeed you've heard and been taught by him as the truth is in jesus that you put off concerning your former conduct the old man which grows corrupt the old man grows corrupt the new man doesn't grow corrupt the new man grows in a different way because we're renewed verse 23 in the spirit of your mind that you put on the new man which was created according to god and true righteousness and holiness these are the things we ought to be growing and in other words he's saying be transformed by the renewing of your mind be changed to look like him verse 25 therefore putting away lying let each of you speak the truth with his neighbor for we're members of one another be angry and don't sin don't let the sun go down on your wrath nor give place to the devil let him who stole steal no longer but rather let them labor we're talking about growth here you've been stealing don't steal anymore you've been talking about people are talking speaking evil to people don't do that anymore grow change it says let no corrupt your word verse 29 proceed out of your mouth what's good for necessary edification which is a synonym for improve or growth that it may impart grace to the hearers don't grieve the holy spirit of god by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption so let all bitterness wrath anger clamor and evil speaking be put away from you with all malice be kind to one another tenderhearted forgiving one another even as god in christ forgave you if i could summarize change grow transform let the body be edified and grow he said and again edify means to instruct or to improve a person to help someone grow grow beyond childish pursuits and understanding don't walk like you used to walk allow the lord to teach you these are all in this passage be renewed in the spirit of your mind put away a form of practices habits routines replace them with spiritual maturity with the fruit of the spirit grow in change in order to emulate him and put on christ as individuals and as a church body continue to grow and transform both of which require the dreaded word change and again if i equate this to the human body which was also built for growth and change it tells me bodies are not static and growth is not optional neither is the body of christ static and neither is our growth optional because when a body stops changing the reality is it's unhealthy and it's most likely dead and i recognize the prime years of growth or typically up until early adulthood they say it seems to be all downhill from there and i'm past early adulthood so i could stand with anyone who would say that and i know what i'm saying every analogy breaks down at some point even this one will but if we take even that line of thought you realize we never stop changing physically our ears and our noses are a testament to that they say that they never stop growing i've heard others say that the cartilage changes and it's maybe not that but the point is they don't stop changing and we don't stop developing mentally and emotionally case in point is a life event that happens to me may cause me to buckle at age 29 and age 30. but someone who's been through a similar life experience already multiple times they're not going to buckle quite like i would so we develop and grow as we grow older and as the body grows old in the same way on a spiritual level as an individual and on a corporate level as a church we have to continue to grow to develop and to change even paul himself says this in philippians 3 it's a life verse for me he's writing from prison most likely and it's just more than likely in the last several years of his life which i think is significant considering what he says he says i haven't already attained i'm not already perfected but i press on and may lay hold of that for which christ jesus has also laid hold of me brethren i don't count myself to have apprehended i'm not there yet i haven't stopped growing i haven't stopped changing i i haven't stopped developing and desiring to be more like him but one thing i do forgetting the things which are behind reaching forward the things which are ahead i press toward the goal for the prize or the upward call of god in christ jesus i haven't made it yet even in the late stages of my life paul says so i continue to press on and run the race and he's the same writer who wrote in our text that i beseech you therefore brethren by the mercies of god present your body as a living sacrifice holy acceptable in the god which is your reasonable service that doesn't sound comfortable at all doesn't that sounds hard don't be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewing of your mind well i need my mind renewed regularly anyone else i need my rhyme renewed daily there's some days i need to go into the i need to go in the presence of god and i need to let the lord just change my mind and change my mindset i need change on a daily basis and the presence of god can allow for that change and help me with that change it says be be transformed by the renewing of your mind you may prove what's that good and acceptable and perfect will of god what if the perfect will of god involves transformation and change paul writes to the church in colossus well in colossians 1 9-10 he said i don't cease to pray for you and what do i pray i ask that you may be filled with the knowledge of his will and all wisdom and spiritual understanding that you may walk worthy of the lord fully pleasing him being fruitful in every good work and increasing in the knowledge of god all of this sounds like change to me it sounds like growth sounds like development and spiritual maturity and a call to the church at large to be transformed and change in accordance with the will and the word of god the context of these writings points to exactly that especially when you realize some of the history of the early church some of the people that paul was writing to in and the changes that they went through that they endured and enacted themselves you start to see you know what maybe we're in pretty good company here in 2022 and an apostolic pentecostal church and i want to take a moment to showcase some of those changes in order to illustrate that tonight and i want you to notice the combination of forced change and intentional change that that book of acts church walk through in just a short period of time this is not an exhaustive list but it shows just how much a church can change in a matter of a couple years and while we observe it think about the mindset shift that they must have walked through during this time and many of us really don't have to think about it too hard because we've lived it recently a lot of mindsets changing if that's the case just take comfort in the fact that you didn't have to walk through some of these changes that they had to walk through think about this first of all their leader ascends into heaven for in front of their very eyes acts 1 and 9 says a literal cloud surrounded him and he ascends in heaven and he catches him can you imagine bishop wilford speaking to you on a sunday morning in a cloud at least we'd see him for a good way you know we'd be like what do we do now what just happened that's what i mean they did angel said why are you standing here gazing they were just like you see him it's like when you let a balloon go in the sky and you're like see it and they're like they're just standing the angels what are you doing change you talk about a change of course jesus had given them instruction thankfully so they go off to prayer in the midst of that they select a new member of the 12 disciples or apostles they have a new member of the leadership team and they chose them by lots which is interesting they did a lot of that in scripture but imagine that process today well we need a new director so let's get the dice or the pebbles or the sticks whatever they use there's all different theories on that and we're going to throw them and the lord's going to help us that's what they did so they choose matthias the spirit falls on pentecost they spill into the street peter starts preaching his first ever recorded sermon he may have preached before that but it just wasn't recorded 3 000 people get added to the church can you imagine that three thousand now we rejoice over it and rightfully so but what kind of change would that represent how do we decide how do we teach all these people you know where do we meet do we start a building program but we mean out in the field what if it rains where do we set up the pa system what about the church calendar how do we know when to meet i mean think about the logistics of 3 000 people in no no modern communication change another five thousand believe now we're really changing okay what are we doing here five thousand two of our church leadership team get arrested can you imagine get the email from elvanto pray church they were at the marketplace and they decided to preach and that's what happened they they come back and pray and we decide to preach jesus trouble develops in the church over the feeding of widows a new church program develops and deacons are chosen to oversee it the church is growing so much the apostles devote themselves to study in prayer primarily then one of those deacons is arrested stoned the church has its first martyr see what i'm saying about the change they went through but also notice the change that they enacted not just forced because of growth programs are developed leaders are empowered to serve in the name of growth leaders are added to the team ministry opera opportunities skyrocket uh sharing and giving happens and they go from different house to houses and there's all kinds of change and they're developing structures and they're developing leadership team in the direction of the church and then then

the diaspora happens in chapter eight because of persecution they all scatter we add a little taste to this couldn't come together but they're scattered all over the place and they're being chased and hunted more changed but the church thrives in the middle of it that's a lesson in and of itself it was forced change it's uncomfortable but it spurs growth as the people of god scatter and preach the word of god and the result of this is one of the largest changes the church ever enacted the inclusion of both samaritans and gentiles themselves into the church and into the new covenant i thought about it earlier this week i thank god for that change where would we be if it wasn't for that change you never know what a change in your life could produce a spirit-led change in terms of change this one ranks pretty high it was one of the most difficult changes the church walked through in that period in fact you can see them grappling with with all of it you get a picture of how difficult it all is they're they're pulling councils together they got church board meetings happening they got peter and paul was standing each other to the face and they're you know they're up up in arms over this you see the resistance the change that every church has to grapple with and then you see the process of change that they walk through together and all that points to the fact change is not easy but change is undoubtedly inevitable and it is necessary as individuals as a church body if acts is any indication we have to change but the tracy writes further in his book he said if you don't change nothing in your situation will change nothing in your life will change another author he quotes he said when you're through changing you're through period brother tracy circles back he writes and i'm paraphrasing what he said here he said for a leader in a christian inflexibility or unwillingness to change may be a near-death experience he said i must change myself before i lead or expect others to change so we see from men like brother tracy men like paul the apostle in the early church itself change is inevitable we see from them that it's difficult but we also see it's a natural byproduct of growth within the church family and body and lastly we see from the early church the final point i want to bring out tonight change within the body within the lives of individual members of the body it must be ordered and directed by the head of the body and by his spirit if we're going to have change this year individually and corporately we want that change to be led and directed by his spirit and on par with that we want that change to be founded upon and based upon the foundation of the word of god well tracy mentioned it i'll reiterate many things change methods change approaches and practices change people change and the body as a whole will change but the word of god and the truth of god and this saving gospel will never change this truth doesn't change even when everything around it changes so in all the changes that we face we can be confident that his word will never change instead his word can and should change us along with the leading and the prompting of his spirit

this is the case in acts 15 the jerusalem council meets over the inclusion of gentile believers and the requirements for them to be in covenant and you notice in verse 16 james stands up in the middle of the discussion it says he quotes from the prophets he paraphrases from amos 9 11-12 he quotes this promise from the lord he said after this i'll return and i'll rebuild the tabernacle of david which has fallen down i'll rebuild its ruins i'll set it up so that the rest of mankind may seek the lord even all the gentiles i'm sure he really emphasized that point who are called by my name says the lord who does all these things james and this moment of change pulls directly from scripture and reinforces the authority of the word with regard to this massive change that was going to take place so they weren't just making this happen and this change outside the word in the direction of god especially when you consider jesus told him in acts 1 8 that they're going to be sent to the uttermost parts of the earth to the gentiles himself and if the church was going to change in such a great way it was going to change based upon the precepts and the principles of the word of god and i say tonight that word is still the qualifier of his church we don't want just good change we want god change we don't want change for change sake none of us want that we want change it's based upon the truth of his word we want change it's reinforced by his word and by his spirit that's exactly what we see later in acts 15 as well they made their decision prayerfully with the word of god in mind they write this letter to the gentile believers very important letter says this in verse 24 since we've heard that some who went out from us have troubled you with words unsettling your souls saying that you must be circumcised to keep the law to whom we didn't give such a command we didn't say that seem good to us being assembled with one accord to send chosen men to you with our beloved barnabas and paul men who have risked their lives for the name of our lord jesus christ we've therefore sent judas and silas who will also report the same things by word of mouth for it seemed good to the holy spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things and they go on to list those things it didn't just seem good to us to make a monumental change like this wasn't just our sense and our feeling that cause us to lift a requirement like this one that's central to the law of moses but instead we have relied on the word of god and the spirit of god to lead us to this necessary and essential change so

we don't change just to change we don't change ourselves and change the body in a half-hazard manner or with a careless mindset but if we're going to change let it be because his word dictates it in his spirit direction if we're going to make decisions let them be god decisions and not just good decisions if we're going to transform let's transform more into the likeness of his image and if we're going to grow let us grow in the grace and the knowledge of our lord jesus christ and as paul said in colossians 2 and 7 let us walk in him rooted and built up in him established in the faith as i've been taught abounding in it with thanksgiving if change is inevitable and it is let it be spirit-led change i know there are some changes that are automatic they're no brainer so to speak we've got god given common sense and god's wisdom to help us with that the point is we want his spirit's guidance we need his spirit's guidance even on the decisions that might seem like a no-brainer on a daily basis we need to be led of the spirit

that's why we're spending this time of prayer and fasting you talk about a change how many of you felt change in the past by prayer and fasting it changes us sometimes we do it because we want to try to change god change his decision change his plan what i found is it doesn't really change him because he's perfect it changes me that's why we have these times where we come together and we pray and we fast prayer and fasting lend himself to change and as we walk and commune with him he's going to order and direct our steps and whatever changes come about in our lives whether their force changes seasonal or intentional they will be ordered and directed by his spirit as we walk with him so change is hard it's inevitable it ought to be filtered by his word and ordered by his spirit paul says this about his spirit second corinthians 3 and 17. now the lord's the spirit the spirit of the lord is there's liberty but we all with unveiled face beholding as in a mere the glory of the lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory just as by the spirit of the lord the new living translation says it like this so all of us who have had that veil removed can see and reflect the glory of the lord and the lord who is the spirit makes us more and more like him as we are changed into his glorious image i say it again tonight it's been my rallying cry of late if i'm gonna change let me change to be more and more like him and change into his glorious image this is the kind of change i i want this is the kind of change i want for apc as we continue to be the church his church and his body as we stand tonight the truth is

someday we're all going to change pretty drastically someday we're going to change permanently someday we're going to change radically paul describes it like this in first corinthians 15 51 behold i tell you a mystery we shall not all sleep but we will all be changed in a moment the twinkling of an eye the last trumpet for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised and comfortable and we shall be changed this corruptable must put on incorruption and this mortal will put on immortality we're all going to change change for are you thankful for that change and ready for that one until that time though we have to continue to change to be more like him until that day when all things will be settled and our eternal destination and make up will be fixed and finalized we have to continue to change knowing how hard it is yeah but knowing how necessary it is and this week i had this thought that when that day comes assuming that it's not today when i'm changed forever i want to look more like jesus on that day than i do on this one i want to look more like him change if i have to to be more like him in the intermediate time so on that day i look more like jesus than i do today i believe you all agree a commitment like that requires change and

tonight with that in mind i want you to pray with me to that end for both yourself and for apc as difficult as it might be to pray and commit to change i'm going to ask you to help me do that because we want to be his church we want to be his people and we want to be more like him would you pray with me god we feel your presence here tonight we feel you helping us challenging us stirring our hearts moving us lord if there's something in me that needs to change i pray that you'd help me to know it highlight it lord my times of prayer and devotion my times and your presence i pray that i would change lord that i wouldn't be resistant to it but i would conform to be in your image lord that i'd be more in your likeness that i would put on the new man and put off the former things i want to change and i want to be like you i want to look like you lord i wan i want to interact with others like you and i'm praying that you'd help me to change and along with me all my brothers and sisters and this church family and body we want to be your church a spotless church and a spotless bride without blemish if we need to change in any way oh lead us and guide us by your word and by your spirit lord help us to follow after you even if that following means a change lord even that following makes us uncomfortable even if that following is unnerving help us to follow you and to change if need be and we pray to that end and we commit to that end tonight we commit in it as individuals and as a church to change and to change as you lead and guide us in jesus name jesus name thank you lord thank god for the change he has done in each one of us think about the progress you have made since before you came to know him and he changed you and you were a new creation we're going to continue to change because i know i need it i may not want it but i need it god's going to help us to do that