Destination week four. If you're new here, I am excited that you are here today because we get to experience a lot of moments together here at Destination. We get a lot of first moments and it's kind of like when you have a baby for the first time, you get to experience the first smile, the first steps, the first sleepless nights, which , if I'm being honest, this kind of does feel like a baby because I've had a few sleepless nights, let me tell you.

, but there's a lot of really cool first moments that are happening here and you guys get to experience one of them here today, which is we are going to start our first message series through a book of the Bible. , and so for those of you just whether you're new or you've just been here for three weeks, I haven't said this from stage, but the way that our message series will work here at Destination is we will do shorter topical message series kind of like we just did for the past three weeks. We did a series called Lost and Found. If you missed that, go check it out. And then we'll take an extended period of time to go through a book of the Bible.

And we're going to go by verse by verse through this book. And this is so that you guys learn and we learn as a church how to find and follow Jesus. And we don't skip things or cherrypick through the Bible, but we go verse by verse and tackle everything that is in God's word because everything that is in God's word is good.

And so we're going to be opening up Colossians. And what's really cool about this book specifically as we go through this series, it'll take us about six weeks and the five weeks after today to follow the book of Colossians actually follows our five core values as a church. So, it was one of those books of the Bible where I'm like, I really want to start out with Colossians because as you guys learn and grow as followers of Jesus and learn about the church in Colasse, you're also going to learn more about us, about Destination Church and who we are. And so, , I just want to tell you, , even before I have you open your Bibles, just a little bit about Colossians, so that way you can kind of, , just get an idea of where we're going to be for the next couple of weeks. First of all, if you don't have a Bible or a notebook, I want to encourage you to bring one.

And if you don't have one, we got you covered. We got Bibles, we got journals. And I I want you to write some of this stuff down as we study this together because a mentor once told me the shortest pencil is longer than the longest memory.

You're going to forget what I say on Wednesday. I know I'm not that interesting. So, please write some of this stuff down because you'll love to go back to it the next time you read through Colossians.

But Colossians was wrote by or written by the Apostle Paul. And we learned about him last week and his history as kind of a a bad dude. He murdered Christians and he he did all of these really terrible things, but then had this radical conversion and then ended up being the first church planter and starting the early church and helping that launch and then wrote a majority of the New Testament as a result. And so that's where we get Paul. But here's the difference here with Colossians in comparison to maybe some of the other letters in the New Testament is that Colossians the church in Colasse was not planted by Paul.

He didn't go and plant the church and then write to it like he does in a lot of his letters. The the church was planted by a man named Euphrates who we'll learn kind of more about today. And Euphrates what he did is he would travel back and forth from Colasse to Ephesus where Paul was. It's about a 120 mile journey. And so what scholars and theologians believe is that Euphrates kind of traveled all the way to Ephesus, heard Paul give this gospel message and responded, "Yes, I want to I want to follow Jesus, too.

I want to help build the church. " And so he would go back home and start building the church. And then he'd come back to Paul and get some more wisdom and then he'd go back and and apply it to the church. So Paul is just overjoyed. He is so excited because it's the first church that's been planted that he doesn't need to just go and show up at, but he gets to encourage.

And so that's kind of what we're going to see today is that Paul is going to start encouraging the Colossians. But here's the thing about this entire book is that the Colossians were almost kind of teetering a a little bit of a a danger point. They were about to walk into some kind of heresy type things. And now, if you've never heard this word heresy before, you're in good company because I had no idea what this meant when I gave my life to Christ or long afterwards. But heresy basically means that it is something opposite of the truth of the gospel.

And so if we think the the gospel is the good news, then heresy would be something that takes us while we're at the good news and slowly leads us away. And so the Colossians are kind of in danger of having some of their values out of whack. The best way I can think to describe the the context in the culture is kind of like this. I used to hate going on rides.

Anybody else. Like you won't ride a roller coaster. Okay, couple of people in here.

When I was 7 years old, I got stuck on a roller coaster and it was absolutely traumatic. Never wanted to ride one ever again. And then when I was 17 years old, I went on this little trip to Disneyland and some friends of mine, he's he's here today, tricked me into going on a roller coaster.

I should have known that the Indiana Jones ride wasn't going to be a mild ride. , and so I was like, "Wow, that was really fun. " And I rode every single ride there the next day. , and so I was like, "What have I been missing. " So, as I'm later in life dating my now wife, Chelsea, she brings me to Valley Fair for the first time.

This my like real first time to Valley Fair and I'm like, I want to ride every single thing here. Put me on it all. And I loved Wild Thing, Power Tower, like all of those rides.

But there is one ride there that I will never go on again. It is called the Northern Light. Now, you might not know about this ride because it was only made in the last like 10ish years, and it's it's fairly newer, but it's off in the corner.

And what it is, I tried to find pictures, but no picture describes how terrible this ride is, in my opinion. , it kind of goes back and forth in like a halfpipe motion with a little hump in the middle, but you are also on this like skateboard like thing that is turning around and your section of seats is also turning. So, you could be spinning to the right while you're spinning to the left while going up and down and round and round. No, we we can't do that.

, my stomach can't do that. And so I got off the ride and I literally had to have the guy tell me where the exit was like 20 times. I had no idea where I was going.

And I sat down and I felt so disoriented and sick to my stomach that I had to just sit there and get my bearings for a while. And that's kind of what's happening in this culture. They're trying they're being tossed around and turned around by different things that are happening. Does this sound familiar. By the way, this is kind of where our culture is, too.

You can say things just simple phrases like, I don't know, freedom, marriage, truth, justice, love. And depending on where you are or where you've been socially, economically, politically, in your background, you may have gotten spun around so much by the world and what's going on that you yourself feel disoriented. And what happens when we find ourselves in that place is we can be led very quickly into darkness. And so what Paul wants to do is he wants to prevent that from happening. And so what he starts his letter with is looking for a baseline.

He starts his letter with let's see the evidence because the evidence is clear that the Colossians that you guys believe in Jesus. And I just want to reiterate what I see in you. What evidence there is that you believe and love Jesus.

And so let's look at that evidence together. It's on page 1,5 in your Bibles. Colossians chapter 1.

We are, by the way, a church that believes in opening our Bibles every week, not just on Sunday, but throughout the week. So if you don't have a Bible, take that one. It's our gift to you.

And by the way, can we celebrate just for a second. We've given away 80 Bibles in three weeks, you guys. This is so good. I love that. I love that.

, and so here what we're going to see again is this evidence of the of of the Colossians having these values that are found in Christ. Now, as we read it, I want you to think about it this way. Do I see these values in my own walk. Or do I see these values in the life of this church.

Or maybe you're visiting here today or you're going around and visiting other churches. Do I see these values reflected. Okay, we'll get more into that in a second, but let's read scripture.

Paul, an apostle of Christ Jesus by the will of God, and Timothy, our brother, to God's holy people in Colasse, the faithful brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God our father. That's everything I just kind of set up here. And then he launches into this affirmation, this evidence that they have.

He says, "We always thank God for you, our father, and in our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you because we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and the love you have for God's people. The faith and love that spring from the hope stored up for you in heaven and about which you have already heard the true message of the gospel that has come to you. In the same way, the gospel is bearing fruit and growing throughout the whole world, just as it's been doing among you since the day you have heard it and understood God's grace. You learned it from Euphrates, our fellow servant who is a faithful minister of Christ on our behalf and who is also who who also told us of your love in the spirit.

Okay, so this section, let's just pause there. We got more to get to, but let's pause at this section because there's a lot packed in there. But overall, what Paul starts on his baseline to show, hey, Colossians, you are you are playing for the right team. You are on team Jesus with me.

He shows in this evidence that they are living for God. And for us, we also need to see this evidence, the same evidence that Paul is pointing towards in the Colossians is, are we living for God. Maybe you've had this question not only for yourself, but maybe a family member or a friend or somebody where you've questioned like, is there evidence there that they are living for God. And of course, we can't be the full judge of that.

We don't know the full circumstances, but here's just a lens that we can read scripture through. Because when Paul points towards all of this evidence, we can then oursel take this evidence and question, am I living for God as well. So questions we might ask ourselves from this is, is your faith in Christ.

He starts out by saying, "We thank God and we pray for you because we have seen your faith in Christ. " If you believe in Christ, that faith should be evident for people to see. That means when that you've gotten good news, you're saying, "Praise God. It's because of him. " Not, "Oh, I did it all by myself.

It's by my own strength. Or when you get bad news, it's not whatever habit I can get to, whatever comfort, whatever brings me temporary peace. No, it's God, I'm on my knees and I need you.

That's what it looks like to be Christc centered, to have Jesus as Lord of your life. Not just a footnote on your life, but Lord over and before all things, which we'll talk about more next week. He also says, "We've seen your faith in God, your love for Jesus, but also your love for God's people.

" Here's another question. Self-evaluation. Do we love people. And or or maybe I should ask it a different way.

How do we treat people. Oh, it's really quiet in here. I'll get a little convicting for myself. I have to ask myself this question.

How am I treating my family. How am I treating my friends. How are you treating that one co-worker. Okay, if you don't know what I'm talking about, just wait. You will someday, right.

Or how are you treating the waiter or the person serving you coffee or that person that just cut you off in traffic. It gets really convicting really quick if you're asking yourself these questions. But the faith and love that Paul is talking about, he says, is from a hope that you have stored in heaven.

This hope that they have stored in heaven is giving them the ability to have this faith and this love for God's people. I kind of think about it like this. If you went to a bank right now, you could open this thing that we don't really hear about anymore called a a security deposit box.

Do you guys remember these. You'd go into the bank and you could put whatever treasures you wanted to into that security deposit box. So, it was either like money or some kind of treasure and you could keep adding to it and by the end of your life that security deposit box was your inheritance that you could hand down to your children or whoever was in your will, right.

And so when we as Christ followers are are giving our time or giving our talent or giving our money or giving things to grow the kingdom, what it's going to feel like by earthly standards is that we're just throwing something away that oh, I could I could give this money to build God's kingdom or I could just kind of like hang on to it and put it in my safety deposit box. And those things can be really easy to fall into the trap of thinking. I've done it, too, where I've thought, man, why would I give my time, my talent, my energy, all of these things.

Why would I love other people when I can just keep all of that for myself. But you have to remember, when you're doing these things for Jesus, you are actually opening a safety deposit box in heaven. It is the hope that is stored up for you. So that way as you're storing up this hope in heaven, not only is it your inheritance when you get to heaven, but while you're on earth, you it's going to grow your faith.

It is going to help you love God's people when they are difficult because they are difficult. And so this is why we do things like have serve teams and growth groups as we mentioned is it's because we want that hope to be stored up in heaven so that you can love God and love people. And then Paul goes on to say, "Hey, if you're doing all these things, then you're just like all of the other churches that I've been talking to. You are bearing fruit.

" All right, here's an easy question for the room. Are we ready. How do you know if a fruit tree is a good fruit tree. It bears fruit.

All right, cool. So, that's how you know a fruit tree is a good fruit tree. How do you know a Christian is a good Christian.

If they are building the kingdom, if they are bearing fruit for the kingdom, which is Paul is saying that you're doing. Now, look, before we go on to verse 9, I need to tell you and I need to confess here. I have screwed up at every single one of these things. So, if you're in here today and you're like, "Man, I don't know. I haven't had my faith in Jesus for certain things or I haven't stored up hope in heaven or loved God's people.

" Well, me too. And we have good news. But you have to hang in there till the very end of this section of scripture.

So, don't leave. But let's get to verse 9. Verse 9, Paul goes on to say, "For this reason, since the day we heard about you, we have not stopped praying for you. We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of the will through all the wisdom and understanding that the spirit gives so that you may able to be live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way, bearing fruit.

" There it is again. In every good work, growing in knowledge of God, being strengthened with all the power according to his glorious might, so that you might have great endurance and patience and give joyful thanks to the Father. Let's just stop there for a second. And I know there's a comma, but let's just stop there for a second because now Paul is not just saying you're living for God, but there is a deeper sense of this foundation that you've built in Christ.

And that deeper evidence that I see in you is not that you're just living for God, but you're living with God. I see it in your actions that you don't just have a faith in Christ and a love for people, but you are growing in your understanding. You are diving deep into who Jesus is.

So, we need to be people who are living for God, but also living with God. , I think about it kind of like this. , if you and I put together a priority list and I told you put all of your priorities on that list, work, , kids, household stuff, , you know, what social obligations, how long would your list be. Okay, pretty potentially pretty long, right.

, it's a long list. And what happens is that taking time to read scripture, taking time in God's presence, taking time to be around God's people in groups or in church kind of becomes this thing that falls on the priority list. And so we reorder our list based off of what what kind of social pressures we're getting or what we feel is most urgent and needs our attention. But here's the thing is that Jesus is not something to be put on our priority list. He is the list himself.

And so we as Christians have to say that Jesus is before all things, in all things, and through all things. And so he is not just a pri priority on the list, but he is in everything on the list. So, while I value my relationship and my marriage with my wife and I do put date night on our priority list, which is important, I also know that in all the things on the list that she needs to have some involvement in it or know about it or know how it it it works and operates, right.

And that's what Jesus needs is like every single thing that you put on that list, you're not just living for God to be something on the on that list, but you're living with God with everything that is on that list. And so Paul launches into what that looks like. And again, I want to just ask this in a question so we can kind of self-evaluate a little bit.

The first thing he says is, "For this reason, since this day, we have not stop praying for you. Now, I want to pause here because this is now the second time that Paul has said this. And what Paul is doing is he's showing his pastoral heart.

Here's some good news for this one. There's not much that we need to do. There's more so something that you need to know. Destination, I need you to know that we are praying for you.

That myself, our leadership team is praying for you. And so on your welcome cards that we ask you to fill out, there's a spot for prayer requests. That's not just for the first time guest, okay. That is for all of you. If you have something that you need prayer for, we want to pray for you.

I want to pray for you. I have a board at home where I write down the names of of people that I've talked to or pictures if you've been here long enough. And and I pray over this board daily that God would just would continue to grow you in your faith. And this is the same pastoral heart that that Paul has. And maybe I don't really show it on on Sundays because I'm running around and and all crazy, but I can guarantee you on Monday I will be praying for you just as Paul was.

So know that you are being pray prayed for. So that's why it's so important to let us know that you're here. Fill out a welcome card, submit a prayer request, let us know how we can be praying for you.

And so Paul launches into this reminder, and then he says again, let's just read this part again. He says, "We continually ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will through the wisdom and understanding that the spirit gives. " The question here is, are you filled with knowledge through the wisdom and the spirit. Now, let me explain it like this.

You have no shortage of knowledge in 2025. You can Google chat GPT. You can do all of the things to get knowledge.

But knowledge without understanding and wisdom really doesn't hold any weight. I'll give you an example of this. If I came over here and I said, "Wes, I'm going to give you books.

I'm going to give you chat GBT. I'm going to give you Google and I want you to learn how to play guitar. " And I went up here and I stole Noah's guitar and I handed it to you and I said, "Go have at it. " And then I came over here and I came to Julie and I said, "Julie, I'm going to give you all the same tools that I'm going to give Wes, but I'm also going to teach you how to play guitar.

I I've been I've been playing for a little while, about 20 years. So, I think I have just a little bit of wisdom to give. Who's gonna learn faster.

And that's because they both have access to the same knowledge and information, but it's applied differently. It's applied through wisdom and understanding. How do you get wisdom and understanding about God. You get wisdom through two and understanding through two things.

Time with other believers and time with Jesus. And so the marks that Paul is is pointing to, the evidence is in that these people are spending time with each other building each other's faith up, which is by the way what we pray to happen for in growth groups. And and they are spending alone time with Jesus.

They're spending time in the spirit to gain understanding. Now, we don't know about what, but you know about your what. And so, all of the things that you need understanding about why was I treated that way by that person.

Why did I say those things. God, can you reveal to me those kind of conversations. They happen in those quiet places. And so, we get knowledge through wisdom in the spirit. Then he goes on to say, "So you may live a life worthy to God, pleasing him in every way, bearing fruit in every good work.

" Here's that thing again. And I I just want to point it out again that Paul has now said this twice that living for God and living with God is bearing fruit. And we can see that that fruit is working through what. He goes into all of these characteristics. He says, "I can see it working through strength, through the strength that you show, the endurance, the patience, and the thanks.

" And so, we display these things when it's when we need strength and we don't think we have enough, we have Jesus. When we don't think we can go on anymore, we have endurance because we have Jesus. Okay, let's try this again. We have patience when it feels like nothing is going our way because we have We give joyful thanks when it seems like there is absolutely nothing to be thankful for because we have Jesus.

Yes, that was awesome. Now, guess what. If you have failed at all of this stuff, too, you're in good company.

There's been many seasons where I didn't gather with God's people for wisdom or have enough alone time with God or asked for prayer, things like that. But what's the good news about what Paul is saying is found in verse 12 through 14. Let's look at it together. I'll even have it on the screen behind us.

Picking up in verse 12. And giving joyful thanks to the Father who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of his holy people in the kingdom of light. For he has rescued us, each and every one of us in this room, from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

This is the good news of the gospel of Jesus. This is what Paul is trying to lead them towards. Because what can happen is we become so disoriented and confused just like getting off that ride that we feel like all of these things kind of lead us into dark places.

And so the faith that we should have in Christ becomes faith in our own abilities or faith in money or faith in a person to make us happy and feel complete or it's the love for people that instead of loving people we use people and people use us and then a relationship becomes transactional instead of a community building wisdom understanding gathering community, right. And then there's no hope in heaven. There's no fruit.

There's no wisdom, strength, endurance. All of it is gone while we walk to this dominion of darkness. But Jesus, but Jesus, he rescued us from the dominion of darkness.

He brought us into the kingdom by the son he loves, by whom we have redemption. You see, the enemy's tactic and agenda is to take away all the evidence that you show in this world that you love Jesus. And instead, the good news is that even if we are living for Jesus and with Jesus and screw up and don't show any evidence, Jesus still loves you. He still died for you. And he's still saying today, "Try again.

I'm here to rescue you, to bring you out of the dominion of darkness into the kingdom of freedom and redemption and forgiveness. " So, I want to give you a picture of what this looks like. And I want you to visualize this. Can we use our imaginations a little bit this morning. So, I want you to bow your heads and close your eyes here.

I'm going to ask you to use your imagination this morning. I'm going to invite the worship team up and I want you to to picture this. Picture that you are in a courtroom, okay. That you are sitting on trial for all of the things that you've done in your life.

Maybe it's been really bad things. Maybe you know that you've you've done things that you shouldn't have some time in your life. You know ultimately that you are guilty and that you feel that guilt, you feel that shame, you feel that regret that man, I wish I was not sitting up here. I wish things were different. And so as you're living in that guilt and that regret and that shame, it starts to lead you to this dark place of depression and anxiety.

God, I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what's next. I don't know what lies for me beyond this verdict that I know that I'm guilty of. You You are sitting in that place. But from the back of the courtroom enters a man and he walks up to the stand where you sit, takes you out of that chair and sits in your place.

He looks at the righteous judge and he says, "I am willing to pay whatever penalt penalty that you are going to give to him because I love him. That is my son. That is my daughter and I love them.

" And that is what Jesus did for you. That despite the evidence was against us. That despite Romans tells us we are all on the same playing field where we've all fallen short of the glory of God, that we've all sinned, that Jesus still willingly sees us in that place and says, "I'm willing to sit in that spot for them because I love them. " And so maybe you're in this room today and you've never known that Jesus. You've never known the Jesus that that comes down and and sits with you even though the evidence isn't there.

You've been told by the church and hurt by the church or hurt by other Christians that you're supposed to live and look look and walk a certain way to be able to follow Jesus. And I just want to encourage you today that Jesus is here and he's saying come to me as you are. Jesus loves you just the way you are, but he loves you too much to keep you that way. So, he wants to grow you in your faith.

So, I'm just going to pray for all of us at this time. God, I thank you so much that we can live for you, that we can live with you, but God, most of all, I thank you that you sent your son, Jesus, that Jesus died for each and every one of us, that he took the penalty that we so rightfully deserved. And so, God, help our faith in Christ be evident. Help our love for people be evident. Help us store up hope in heaven.

And God, I pray if there is anybody here that needs to take the first step of saying, "Yes, Jesus, I want to follow you. " I pray that they would tell somebody about that, that they would tell me, that they would tell another leader at the next steps table, that they would take their next steps into finding and following you. And God, for all of us who have been following you, I just pray that the evidence would be clear as we go out this week that we would be living a life that values you at the center in Jesus name.