Real Life Radio

David J: Today on Real Life Radio. There's this sensation that God gives that you finished a course for that day that he ordained.

David J: And it is the best feeling.

David J: This is real life.

David J: Welcome to Real Life Radio with Pastor Jack Hibbs. I'm David J, thanking you for joining us today as we listen, learn, and are challenged by God's Word the Bible.

David J: When it comes to social media, we can either use it for our benefit or allow ungodly philosophies, opinions, and worldviews to bog us down with content that really doesn't come from a place of love and hope. We often fail to realize the influence social media has upon our lives. So if you're looking for a social media source that promotes biblical truth, simply head over to our website jackhibbs.com.

David J: Once you're there, you'll find Pastor Jack's podcasts, YouTube channel, Facebook, Instagram, Real Life Radio programs, and a whole lot more. Our website is jackhibbs.com, and it's there you'll find easy access to all that Pastor Jack has to offer, including our Real Life mobile app for your smartphone or tablet. That's at jackhibbs.com.

David J: On today's edition of Real Life Radio, Pastor Jack continues now with his series called First Samuel and a message titled Church Growth 101 Part 4.

David J: Samuel of the Old Testament was the last judge of Israel and he was the first of its prophets. So here now in chapter 16, we'll continue to focus on the Holy Spirit by referring to Romans 11. In Romans chapter 11, verse 29, the Lord tells us that when God gives someone a gift or calls them for some special purpose, he doesn't change his mind or take it back even when we stumble. God chose the Jewish people and made promises to them. The same goes for us. His promises still stand.

David J: Today, Pastor Jack teaches that there is no greater joy than to be fully committed and right in the middle of God's will. If we are still breathing, God wants to still use us in big ways.

David J: With his message called Church Growth 101 Part 4, here's Pastor and Bible teacher, Jack Hibbs.

Jack Hibbs: I used to at the other church I used to go to. I did it for years. I would walk around in the parking lot with a little nail at the end of my broomstick, and I'd pick up papers. I loved it.

Jack Hibbs: But I don't think that's a gift of the Holy Spirit. It could be a gift of helps, my friend.

Jack Hibbs: I just know this: if the parking lot was filled up with filth, everybody would notice that.

Jack Hibbs: But what if God might want to do something in your heart based upon his gifting that he called you to do, and you happen to be nuts about that thing? For whatever reason, you may not be exercising it.

Jack Hibbs: I want to just challenge you to find out what that is.

Jack Hibbs: I'm going to say something right now that's going to go over like a ton of bricks.

Jack Hibbs: That is for those of us who have teenagers. I know they're so busy, but this applies to them too. They're so busy, some of them, they're more busy than us. They have grades to maintain. They either have sports or cheerleading, or they have other things going on. They're preparing for college, whatever it might be. Those are really good things.

Jack Hibbs: At some point in time, maybe it's twice a year. I think that your teen, my teen, I think they need to maybe get down to Tijuana or Rosarito or Ensenada.

Jack Hibbs: Or, I tell you, over to the Hopi Indian reservation or the Navajo.

Jack Hibbs: And go there for a weekend and help.

Jack Hibbs: And see what happens. Why, why? Is it like a, is this torture for the teen?

Jack Hibbs: No. What if even though they would go kicking and screaming, you would have to rent one of those LA County Sheriff's Department buses?

Jack Hibbs: Once you get them there, this is the greatest thing you could do for a young person.

Jack Hibbs: They don't think so, and they would gripe all the way there.

Jack Hibbs: I have news for you. They'd gripe all the way there, and all the way back, they would say what we've heard them say, "When are we coming back?"

Jack Hibbs: Isn't that funny?

Jack Hibbs: Because they get out there, and they see this, a couple of teenage girls see this little Indian girl, and they start cleaning her up and painting her face with flowers and a happy thing and a little deal and they put jewelry on her and they're giving her the gospel, and they give her the wordless book, have you ever seen how that works? And all of a sudden, kids begin to find out, I say kids, forgive me, teenagers. The teenagers begin to find out, hey, there's more to my life. Gee, I'm deeper than I thought.

Jack Hibbs: I can do this and like it.

Jack Hibbs: How will they ever find that out?

Jack Hibbs: Some of you parents, you would never do that because your kid, if you go home tonight, you're going to say, Pastor Jack said to go to Mexico.

Jack Hibbs: They're going to say, "Well, shine Pastor Jack and that church, I'm never going back there again."

Jack Hibbs: You need to establish your own godly authority. Don't use my name. It'll get you nowhere but in trouble.

Jack Hibbs: Think about it, pray about it, and then, here's another thing. We need somebody in this body to have the idea to, "Hey, man, what God has these gifts in my life."

Jack Hibbs: And I do this, and you can check me out. I'm a safe guy and I'm a legal guy and all this stuff, and what I'll do, I'd love to take the youth down for a day or two.

Jack Hibbs: In fact, we'll swing hammers and saws and get some nails, and we'll go down there and help some people that are at this orphanage down in Rancho Sordo Mudo. You can do that.

Jack Hibbs: And it would take it would be like pulling teeth to get the kids down, to get them onto the bus. But it would change their life.

Jack Hibbs: My wife still talks about times when she went with her with Anaheim First Baptist Church to, I don't know, somewhere out there by the Lake Mead. She says in the middle of summer, and people were melting, but she loved it.

Jack Hibbs: And those things are those things are so powerful.

Jack Hibbs: And, I mean, there's there's there's a way and an opportunity where gifts can be stirred up. Most of the time, the opportunity is how we find out. It's the opportunity that cracks open, gives birth to the very gift that we have.

Jack Hibbs: So we can sit here in an academic sense and say, "Well, okay, I, I took the little exam, I think I have this gift." You can try that.

Jack Hibbs: Maybe some of the gifts, you can try that with and determine that.

Jack Hibbs: But personally, some of them, you just have to step out and go for it.

Jack Hibbs: It doesn't have to be Mexico.

Jack Hibbs: It can be the local hospital here. It can be the bulletins being folded on Fridays here. It could be something.

Jack Hibbs: Every time I say this, I always feel like you don't believe me.

Jack Hibbs: But in fact, I'll say it this way. If you're visiting, take this challenge that I'm about to give you and go home and bless your church.

Jack Hibbs: That's how much of a blessing it is.

Jack Hibbs: It's this: Venture out and see if God is in that area.

Jack Hibbs: And see if God opens the door.

Jack Hibbs: If God opens the door, we're going to have to hold you down. You're going to be like a kite. You're going to be so excited.

Jack Hibbs: And that's when the truest, most wonderful type of Christian growth happens.

Jack Hibbs: It's fantastic.

Jack Hibbs: I had someone, I love it. Years ago, she came to me and she said, "I'm going to do that. I'm going to step out."

Jack Hibbs: "But what if I fail?"

Jack Hibbs: And I said, "Well, number one, you're going to get an A for stepping out."

Jack Hibbs: Number two, you're going to know that that was not your gift. That's a great thing to know, isn't it?

Jack Hibbs: In fact, when I told her that, I told her, "You will know more than what most people who sit in church don't know."

Jack Hibbs: Because they sit around and go, "Hmm."

Jack Hibbs: "He must be talking to someone else."

Jack Hibbs: But when you step out, I don't know.

Jack Hibbs: She goes, "Well, what if it's not it? What if I fail at it?"

Jack Hibbs: And I just told her, I said, "You know what? I'm sure, because I will be, but I'm sure the Lord will be so proud of you."

Jack Hibbs: You'll get an A, you'll know what your gift is not, and in route, you're going to find out what your gift is.

Jack Hibbs: I want to leave this exhortation or encouragement with you this way.

Jack Hibbs: Yesterday my neighbor was mowing his lawn last night in the evening. He was mowing his lawn.

Jack Hibbs: He's got a little boy, his name is Blake, cute little guy.

Jack Hibbs: Anyway, Steve's out there mowing his lawn, and he's got his mower going, and every. I don't know how old Blake is.

Jack Hibbs: Maybe two, close, maybe a little over two.

Jack Hibbs: But every time his dad starts the mower, Blake goes into the garage and gets his little Fisher-Price mower.

Jack Hibbs: Steve's mowing, and his and Blake's behind him with the little and he goes, you know, they'll click, click, click, click, click, click, click, click.

Jack Hibbs: It's great. It doesn't it bring you memories when you hear that, like, "Oh, I had one of those."

Jack Hibbs: Steve's mowing, and this is very cool because as they're mowing, Blake said, "I want to race. I want to race you. Let's have a race."

Jack Hibbs: So his dad gets down there, and they've got the mowers going.

Jack Hibbs: And as they went across the lawn, Steve just stayed far enough ahead of Blake to get Blake to exert his utmost.

Jack Hibbs: In other words, he didn't go, "Okay, son, ready, set, go!" And Steve just stood there and his son runs down there.

Jack Hibbs: No, he didn't do that.

Jack Hibbs: Who would have wanted that? No boy wants that.

Jack Hibbs: He made it a race.

Jack Hibbs: And they're going like this across the yard, and I'm watching this. It's great.

Jack Hibbs: And right before Steve got to the sidewalk, you could see Steve fake a huge, "Oh, my goodness, I'm so tired. Oh, man!"

Jack Hibbs: And Blake just stretches his mower out there and goes.

Jack Hibbs: It's so cute because the kid, the mower makes it to the curb, I mean, to the sidewalk, and he just falls flat on his face on the grass, just and gets up and, "All right, all right," you know.

Jack Hibbs: I can't help but believe that God, God is so much into that kind of encouragement.

Jack Hibbs: He'll do things like this to you and I.

Jack Hibbs: Allow me to just my thing, for you it might be, God will say, "Straighten that chair. Go ahead, you can do it, you can do it. Straighten that chair."

Jack Hibbs: For me, God will say, "Tell him, tell that guy in line, tell him! Come on, come on, come on, come on!"

Jack Hibbs: In my head, he'll say, "I would tell him."

Jack Hibbs: "So you tell him."

Jack Hibbs: "Oh, Lord, come on!"

Jack Hibbs: "No, tell him."

Jack Hibbs: There's always that battle.

Jack Hibbs: Okay. Because that's to be by faith.

Jack Hibbs: If you're some kind of a weirdo, "Hey, everybody," you grab the microphone in aisle 3. "Hey, Jesus Christ rocks! He rolls aisle 3!" Something's wrong with you.

Jack Hibbs: Something's wrong. That's not right.

Jack Hibbs: But if it's a spiritual thing, if it's a spiritual thing, the insecure factor is going to be there. "I can't do this, God."

Jack Hibbs: But you step out, and I think the Lord will so much do it like Steve was doing it with Blake. He's right alongside you, and he's like, "Come on!" And he's going to encourage you along.

Jack Hibbs: And you're going to have that sense, that that victory feeling.

David J: You're listening to Real Life with Pastor Jack Hibbs. To hear more episodes and maybe catch up in the series, just go to jackhibbs.com. That's jackhibbs.com.

David J: For now, let's get back to our teaching. Once again, here's Pastor Jack.

Jack Hibbs: Those of you who are in various ministries, please take this right, all of you.

Jack Hibbs: It sounds terrible, but.

Jack Hibbs: There's no greater feeling on Earth than after you have finished your ministry.

Jack Hibbs: When it's when it's done, it's the greatest feeling.

Jack Hibbs: Those of you who tomorrow night will go out and share the gospel door to door.

Jack Hibbs: You can't wait for it to be over.

Jack Hibbs: Not because you don't like it, but because there is a contentment satisfaction inside.

Jack Hibbs: That you cannot buy, trade for, barter for. You can't find it anywhere.

Jack Hibbs: No one knows what I'm talking about unless you've done it.

Jack Hibbs: Sunday night after service after fourth service on Sunday.

Jack Hibbs: I. That's the time for you to ask me for a lung. I'm as happy as a clam.

Jack Hibbs: Why? I'm done.

Jack Hibbs: It's not that I'm, it's not that I got the next day off. It's not that I have the next day off. That's not it.

Jack Hibbs: It's this sensation that God gives that you finished a course for that day that he ordained.

Jack Hibbs: And it is the best feeling.

Jack Hibbs: I can't I can't stand just having that for me.

Jack Hibbs: Some of you are nodding your head, what I'm talking about.

Jack Hibbs: You all should have that.

Jack Hibbs: You'll never have that unless you find out what God and how God wants to use you, either in this body or the body that you're going home or back to.

Jack Hibbs: I'll end with this.

Jack Hibbs: John Kentork, Pastor John and I were at a men's retreat, well, it was in September, it was September 26th. I don't remember the year now though.

Jack Hibbs: 86 or 87.

Jack Hibbs: That's 1886 or 87.

Jack Hibbs: And we were up at Twin Peaks. Mike McIntosh was speaking that night. And I was doing, it was a men's retreat, a men's retreat. You go there because you're supposed to go there, and then you're also supposed to go there because you want God to speak to you for sure.

Jack Hibbs: You also go there because guys bring a lot of cool and unusual things to eat.

Jack Hibbs: So it's just, Friday's getting underway. It's pretty wild thing.

Jack Hibbs: I don't remember what Mike McIntosh was teaching on.

Jack Hibbs: But he goes, "Okay, everybody stand up." What? Oh, stand up. Okay. We're all standing. It's packed house. Packed. I'm saying like 200. I don't know how many it holds.

Jack Hibbs: He says, "All right, raise your right hand."

Jack Hibbs: "What are we doing?" I don't know.

Jack Hibbs: "Repeat after me."

Jack Hibbs: "I vow." I vow. That's serious. I vow.

Jack Hibbs: "To you, God." What's he doing? What's going on? What are we doing?

Jack Hibbs: "I vow to you, God, to give you my life." Okay, I've already done that. That's cool. That's no problem. Okay. "To give you my life, to serve you." Sure, of course. Of course, to serve you.

Jack Hibbs: "And to go back to the church that I attend and tell the pastor that you're available to be used any way he wants you to be used."

Jack Hibbs: "Wait a minute here."

Jack Hibbs: When you get that many men in a room, though, you have to say it. You may be lying to God, but they're not going to know it.

Jack Hibbs: We drove down that mountain, and I didn't think much about that.

Jack Hibbs: But then Sunday morning, the following Sunday came around, and I had the Holy Spirit say.

Jack Hibbs: I'm not kidding you guys. I don't understand how God does that, but he does it.

Jack Hibbs: And the Lord reminded me, "You vowed me a vow."

Jack Hibbs: "Oh, Lord."

Jack Hibbs: And so I went and I said, "I'll be used any way you want. Just tell me what to do. Anything."

Jack Hibbs: It had nothing to do with that pastor. It had everything to do with me and God.

Jack Hibbs: And I tell you, I am so glad I did that.

Jack Hibbs: My insides were crawling.

Jack Hibbs: But what if I don't know how my life would have been if I would have rejected that moment?

Jack Hibbs: I hate to think what might have come if I would have reneged on that vow to God.

Jack Hibbs: Sometimes God will use us.

Jack Hibbs: Or catch us. Maybe this: Maybe God takes us more seriously than we take ourselves.

Jack Hibbs: Do you know what I mean?

Jack Hibbs: By the grace of God, may you seek him to stir up the gift within you.

Jack Hibbs: Where you're at tonight, you can say, "God, I remember when I was used by you."

Jack Hibbs: And I haven't done or been anywhere.

Jack Hibbs: I rededicate to you my willingness.

Jack Hibbs: I rededicate to you, God, my willingness.

Jack Hibbs: To stand as it were with Isaiah, chapter 6, and say, "Here I am, Lord, send me."

Jack Hibbs: Those people that have done that, I see them walking around this church. They've got smiles on their faces. They're really strange people. The world could be falling down around them, the walls could be caving in. They've got blood on their brow or dirt on their cheek, but what if they've got a skip in their step?

Jack Hibbs: Do you want to know why?

Jack Hibbs: We're all going to get bloody and dusty in this world, but there's nothing like going through this world right in the middle of the will of God.

Jack Hibbs: You have no greater joy than to be doing what you know God told you to do.

Jack Hibbs: Our young people are on the threshold of finding this out. Some of them are, most of them need to find it out.

Jack Hibbs: What about the rest of us?

Jack Hibbs: We're still drawing air, we're still breathing.

Jack Hibbs: That means there's still something that he wants to do with us, and that means there's a gift or gifts that he wants us to exercise.

Jack Hibbs: Father, we thank you for this time.

Jack Hibbs: And Father, we thank you for your love for us.

Jack Hibbs: Please, Lord, let us not rest day or night as a church, unless and until we are so dedicated to life, to you, to being used.

Jack Hibbs: Not being spent in a bomb, but being used unto glory.

Jack Hibbs: What a wonderful Lord you are.

Jack Hibbs: So, Father, tonight, I would trust, I would hope, Lord, that as we sit here, these people, you yourself, you know who you are and what's going on in your life, in your heart and mind.

Jack Hibbs: And you're settling the account with God right now. You're talking to him right now. That's cool. But I pray for everyone in this room right now, including myself, may our hearts burn with a zeal to do what God wants us to do. Do you know what that means? Not what Calvary wants you to do, not what Jack wants you to do.

Jack Hibbs: God tells you what he wants you to do.

Jack Hibbs: Wow.

Jack Hibbs: Oh, you'll have a vision. You'll have a mission. You'll have a purpose. You'll have energy. It's like getting an old dog a new puppy. God will crank you up, and you'll hear a song again. Father, bless us with whatever you want to do in the earth. In the name of Jesus Christ. We know, Father, that you are going to bless this world through a church or churches or movement or whatever. We ask in Jesus' name that you would baptize us into your fresh work. Lord, that you would fill us with a new call and a fresh passion. And, Lord, that you would make this church, even though we'd be in multiple services, one heart and one mind. Lord, that you would remove from this church those that you don't want here and you'd bring those that you would. Father, that you would make this place a church that tackles the world from outside the curb to around the world. Lord, in Jesus' name, baptize us with a sense of reckless abandonment for our God.