Sunday Evening Worship Service

Thank you, Pastor Whitley. give honor to the administration and the faculty of Apostolic Christian School and the Apostolic Kitty Academy. And I'm just honored to be a part of this celebration today. And uh to the graduating class of 2025, congratulations. Everything that you've accomplished to this point is just the beginning of what God is going to do through you. And as Pastor Mcool said earlier, make sure you take the time to express appreciation to everybody who helped you get here because we didn't get here alone. I want to entitle my thoughts to you tonight. Be who you are. Turn to three people. Smile as big as you can smile and say, "Be who you are." [Music] Following World War II, there were more than 200 French soldiers with amnesia who returned to Paris. They had been prisoners in Japanese war camps and had suffered horrible torture. These men had been so psychologically devastated by their imprisonment that they lost their awareness of who they were and where they had lived before the war. Most of the soldiers identities were quickly established through the help of Red Cross and other prisoners. However, after every known effort had been exhausted, there were still 32 men whose existence seemed impossible to trace. The doctors who were were treating these men believed that their chance of recovery was almost impossible unless they were able to reconnect them with family and friends. So someone proposed that they published the pictures of these 32 men in the newspapers around France and they set a meeting place and time to gather as many people as possible who might would know these men to help find their identity. The assigned date was chosen. It was going to be held at the Paris Opera House. And on that day a huge crowd gathered. Every seat was filled and people were lined up outside and the first victim, the first man, the first soldier with amnesia walked into that darkened opera house and looked at the spotlight in his face. He turned around so everyone could have a complete look and he was the first with 31 to follow. They were all instructed to ask one pleading question. Does anybody out there know who I am? Does anybody know who I am? TF Kenny wrote, "We are living in a world with an identity crisis. People simply do not know who they are or who they are supposed to be. We must find our true identity. Knowing it is when we find God's destiny for our lives. And then and only then will we know and become who we were meant to be. We live in a generation that has collectively lost his identity. We live in a world with people crying out in a million different ways every day. Does anybody know who I am? Does anybody know who I am? As a culture, we have erroneously accepted a concept that we can self-identify, that we can declare ourselves to be anything that we want to be, and that that proclamation makes our declaration true. But I'm here to tell you, I can say I'm a 5-year-old girl all I want. I am still a 57year-old man. Of course, this is not all bad because I self-identify as a 150 pound specimen of athletic prowess. And who are you to say that I'm not? A bassad hound can think it's a Siamese twin if it wants to, but I'm here to tell you, buddy, that you ain't nothing but a hound dog. You see, nothing or no one has the authority to determine your identity except for the one who created you. I've come to declare to you tonight that you were created by God. You are not who others say you are. You are who he says you are. You can declare with the song, I am who I am because the I am tells me who I am. I want to bring two things to you tonight. First of all, you must believe that God formed you. In his great book, A layman's look at the Lord's Prayer. Philip Keller tells of the time he had the privilege of watching a craftsman, a potter in Pakistan do his work of making great great works of art. The old master craftsman was thrilled that someone would want to know every step in the process of making great pieces of art. And so he motioned for Philip Keller to walk with him. As he went to the back of his workshop, there was a little shed with a door. And when he opened that door, he said the smell was absolutely nauseating. And then the the the potter got on his hands and knees and he began to fill around in a hole that was in that little shed, filling for the right piece of clay, the right piece of material that he could work with. This was material that he had prepared himself. He had tramped it and had mixed it for hours with his own feet. It reminds me of what Psalm 40 said. I waited patiently for the Lord and he inclined unto me. He heard my cry. We sang about this a moment ago. He brought me also out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay. The potter walked clay in hand over to that huge round slab of stone in the center of his shop. And with meticulous precision, he placed that lump of earth exactly in the center of his wheel. Oh, I think the play on words is so incredible. For that piece of pottery to be right and and be symmetrical, it had to be in the center of the wheel. And for us to be right, it was he who picked us up out of the miry clay. And we must be in the center of his will. W I L Psalm 40 says, "He set my feet upon a rock and established my going." Then potter settled himself on his wobbly wooden stool and he began to work with this piece of clay. Keller says, "It was amazing to me that there was there was a look of fascination that crept across his face. Somehow you could sense that while he was looking at this crude, shapeless fragment of earth between his hands that there was there was a a vision of the form of beauty that it would become. He wasn't just looking at it as it was right then, but he saw what was going to be. His intentions, his wishes, his purposes were for that to become a handsome, useful article like the other pieces of beautiful china that adorn his shelves. You You must understand tonight how much anticipation and excitement fills God's heart when he looks at you as he holds you in his hands. Some people think that God's always out to get him. Oh, no, no, no, no. If he was out to get you, he'd already got you. He He's not out to get you. God is for you. And he looks with anticipation of what he can form you to be. If only his will could be done in your life. A bit of heaven can pre be produced in your life. The potter began to whirl that will. It was operated with a very crude tindle-like device that were moved that was moved by his feet much like an antique sewing machine. It reminds me of the verses in Jeremiah that say, "Then I went down to the potter's house, and behold, he wrought a work on the wheels. Suddenly, the wheel stopped." The potter had detected just some small piece of particle or grit in that vase. His finger felt some resistance to his touch. And so, he removed that piece of of debris. He started the stone again and quickly he smoothed the surface of the vase. Then just as suddenly the stone stopped again. He removed another hard object that left a scar in the side of the clay. Instead of fascination, now there was a look of concern that swept over that age man's face. Would this clay carry it within it other particles of sand, grit, or gravel that would resist his hands and wreck his work? Or would all of his finest intentions and his highest hopes and wonderful dreams come to nothing? Suddenly, he stopped the stone for the third time. He pointed to a deep, ragged gouge that had scarred the vase side. It was ruined beyond repair. In dismay, the potter crushed it beneath his hand. A formless mass of mud lying in a heap upon the stone. Jeremiah said it this way. And the vessel that he made of clay was marred in the hands of the potter. Why was this rare and beautiful masterpiece ruined in the master's hands? Simply because he had run into resistance. Why is God's will his intention to turn out lovely people brought to naught time and again simply because they resist his will? They will not cooperate. They will not comply with his command. But what's the potter going to do? The potter looked up at Keller and said, "It's just going to be a crude finger bowl from this same lump." Now the the stone started to whirl again and shortly there was just a a plain little finger bowl that was created. It would have been a gorgeous goblet that would have been in some man's mansion but instead it was just a little finger bowl because the clay had resisted the touch of the potter. We must understand the sobering and searching question that all of us must ask ourselves tonight is is I am am I going to be a piece of fine china or just a finger bowl? Will my life fulfill what God has planned for me? It really doesn't matter what other people plan for you. But will my life fulfill what God has planned for me or will it be something way less than he had imagined? We should pray often, God, your will be done in earth, in me as in heaven. What your plan was for me when you formed me, let it be done here on earth." The potter lifted up the new piece of of clay and he he put picked it up from the stone and he carried across the room and set it on a shelf. There was just going to be a long time that that that piece of clay had to sit there and cure. And he said, "But the last stage is the fire on the other side. When I put it into the fire, that's when the gorgeous gloss comes out. That that's why everything becomes so beautiful." Hear me graduates. God has placed us where we are. It's not our own. He has placed us there. We must seek to be in the center of his will. Now, believe it or not, it's not always going to be fun. It's not always going to be easy. Sometimes God throws you in the deep end of the pool and that is his will. He is putting you there on purpose. But if somehow in your life you can make sure that you don't resist his will. He says, "I'm still working on you. I'm still working on you. I know I'm not finished yet. It may not look like a gorgeous face just yet, but I'm not finished with you." There will be time that you think you're done and you're just sitting on the shelf. You will think that you've got so much to contribute, but nobody's asking you to contribute. Don't get bitter. Don't run away. Don't Don't get frustrated. Just understand you're on the shelf of life. And God has got you there for a reason. If God ever gives you a dream of where you're going, don't ever try to make it happen. Don't ever crawl off the shelf. Now, prepare yourself. Get the education you need, but don't try to make it happen. If God orchestrated it, he will take it all the way through and he will make a way. And there will be times of fire. There will be times that you don't understand what's going on. But God is not simply satisfied with you being something that doesn't impact the world. But he wants you to be everything he intended you to be for his glory. The old potter said to the author, he said, "The reason this is so important is my name and my reputation as a master potter are at stake." God not only forms us, but he wants to be able to put his name on us. He wants to be able to say, "I formed this." I hold in my hand a $20 bill. It's just paper. It's all it is. It it it's made up of the same elements of of a piece of copy paper. It's just paper. But there's something different about this. There are certain names that are on this piece of paper. You don't even know what their names are. Neither do I. I'd have to look real hard to see who. It doesn't matter. There's a government that stands behind it and certain names that are behind it that make this piece of paper more valuable than just a piece of copy paper. Is there anybody that like this? Just it's graduation. I'll give it away to somebody. You want it? All right. Whenever you come up, which the first one? All right. There you go. All right. All right. Hang on. Before I give it to you, let me let me do some other stuff. You still want it? I All right. You still want it? You still want it? Yeah. You still want it? You can have it. The value of that piece of paper has nothing to do with its condition. It has everything to do with whose name is on it. You are going to go through times in life where people don't treat you right and things are are not going right in your life. But your value is not determined by your condition. It's determined by the name that is upon you. He formed you and he wants to put his name on you. You see, you are not your past. You are not what you did. You are who God says you are. Charles Spurgeon said, "Don't rely too much on labels, for too often they are fables." In their book, More Than a Grasshopper: Cultivating Your God-given Identity, authors Leanne and Joel Alexander wrote, "We don't have to wear any label we don't want to because we wear a name that is greater than any labels." When we are baptized in the name of Jesus, obeying the precedents of scripture in Acts chapter 2, 10 and 19, we receive a new identity. Galatians 3 says, "For as many of you as have been baptized into Christ have put on Christ, no other label matters. Every other identity bows in subjection to the name of Jesus that becomes your identity in baptism. In his book, Alter Ego, becoming who God says you are, Craig Gro Grochelle tells the following story that I absolutely love. Babe Ruth is to this day considered one of the greatest home run hitters of all time. During his career, the great Bambino autographed many baseballs. But he only put his name to seven bats. Seven bats that he hit home runs with. And that made every one of those bats very expensive. The first bat vanished in the into thin air. It was given away to a man who had won a contest after Ruth had knocked a home run. Nobody got his name, address, and so it was lost for many years until it resurfaced in 2006 and the story was discovered. This was a bat that was used in April 18, 1923 to hit a home run against the Boston Red Sox. And as a diehard Yankee fan, any piece of lumber used to hit a home run against the Red Sox is a valuable piece of lumber. For years they had no idea where it was at, but this man kept it in 1988. He became sick. He was terminally sick and all of his family had already passed away. His dearest friend was a nurse who had taken care of him for years. And so right before he passed away, he gave this prized autograph bat to his nurse. For the next 18 years, this bat stayed under her bed. She knew it was sentimental to the man, but didn't think it had any value. But when she retired from nursing, she hoped to open a restaurant in New York City, but she didn't have any money to do that. And so she thought of this bat. She took it to a sports memorabilia shop. And then finally the sports experts were brought in and they determined that this piece of lumber that had rested in the dust under her bed for 18 years was indeed this bat. In 2006 she off auctioned off the bat for almost $1.3 million. And then she kept only enough money to open her restaurant. And she gave the rest to start a a foundation that would help the type of children that Babe Ruth wanted to help in his lifetime. When a reporter asked her why she would give away so much money, hear me, she answered. That bat was valuable only because Babe Ruth's name was on it. Since he made it valuable, the only reasonable thing I could do was something to honor his life. I'm here I'm here to tell you tonight that God formed us. If you've been baptized in the name of Jesus, he put his name on you. He formed you. He put his name on you. And he does this so that we can bring honor and glory to his life. The Apostle Paul wrote in Romans 8:237, "Now in all these things, we are more than conquerors through him who loved us." And that's an interesting turn of phrase that most of us raised in America just quote, "But if you win the Super Bowl, how can you be more than the champion? How can you be more than a conqueror? How can you be more than a winner?" the the little Greek word that appears in various Bible translations as conqueror, winner, victor or overcomer means to win, to be victorious, to gain a surpassing victory. But that is not the word that is used in this passage. The word that Paul uses in this passage that is translated more than conqueror means to vanquish beyond recognition. To gain a decisive victory, to conquer exceedingly. I want you to understand graduates that with Jesus you are more than a conqueror. There is almost nothing as potent and worldchanging as a God-formed, bloodbought, waterbaptized child of God who knows who they are. And so tonight, I challenge you. He formed you. He put his name on you. And so I challenge you as you leave this graduation, go out there and be who you are, who he made you to be, and who he put his name on you to be. Let's give God praise for loving us that much, to invest that much in us.