Folks, so glad to see you here tonight, and it's been good to have some friends of ours. I was going to say old friends, but just friends from a long time ago. Back in when I was a youth director in Divernon, and they've just come up from Florida for a visit, and I'm so happy they could stop by here tonight. And if you're visiting with us for the first time, I trust you've already received a warm welcome and a visitor packet. And if you haven't gotten one of those yet, I have some men in the back that would like to bring one to you. If you would be so kind as to raise your hand, they'll bring one down to you. And if you've already received one, then you've already seen it, no doubt. A little white card on the inside. Please fill that out for me. Place that in the offering plate here in a little while, and the men will see that I get that. By way of announcements, I did want to remind you again of our Bible study this Thursday afternoon at Park Glen. And all are invited to that. It is at one o'clock. And then Saturday morning, the men will be meeting at eight o'clock in the morning for our prayer and Bible study time. That'll be this Saturday at eight o'clock. And how did the meeting go after church this morning for the ladies' retreat? Do we need any follow-up on that? Okay, so that's all good to go. Don't forget our Family Fun Day, August 30th. And it's kind of our, Family fun day. We have to make up for getting rained out at Bible school day. So we'll have all of the inflatables out here for that as well on that Sunday afternoon. And then there will be an afternoon service that day instead of the evening service. And also I wanted to thank you all for all of the ideas that you've submitted. for our building project and last Friday we did meet the building committee and we kind of went through all of the ideas we heard every single one and we categorized them as far as things that we want to tackle now and things that are maybe going to be a part of a project down the road. And of those that we're going to address now with this current program, those that pertain to structural issues. And then there were a lot of ideas, probably most of them were just internal design issues that we'll address as the project moves forward. But we appreciate all of them, many good ideas that were submitted. And we've already passed along those structural revisions, you might say, to the architects. And so the drawing that you see in the lobby there is in the process of getting changed right now. And Lord willing, we'll have another meeting here in a week or so with the architects so we can begin nailing down exactly what it is we need to get quotes on. And then we can start formulating how cheap this is going to be. Not how expensive, but how cheap. Is the glass half full or half empty, right? But we're sure excited that we find ourselves in this position. This is a nice problem to have where we have to have more room. And thank you very much for all of your ideas. Let's go ahead and bow for a word of prayer and we'll begin our worship time. Heavenly Father, God, we thank you for your immense love for us. I thank you, Lord, for Everyone that is a member of this church the one another's that we considered this morning and so many people Lord are required to do many little things most of them are behind the scenes and I so appreciate the their efforts that they put forward and Lord I'm so thankful that they do them and for your honor and glory and not for theirs and we're just I'm just so thankful Lord as a pastor of the great spirit of Unity that exists here and as we come here tonight Lord, we pray that our hearts and our thoughts Would be focused on you as we worship you tonight in Jesus name. Amen. I It's time It's silent forever I am. Eternal security in that chorus. It's silent forever I am. And our God is rich. This chorus reminds us of that. He owns the cattle on a thousand hills. you. I'll ask our men to come forward. You may be seated. We prepare now to worship through our giving tonight. And Tim, would you lead us in prayer, please? Very positive. Thank you for bringing us here to your house. It's important. It looks like you've come back to earth. It's great. It's great. Great. We have a tuning point for What a day break that'll be. Thank you, David. And let's stand again as we say praises to our Savior, our God, our King. It's amazing. It keeps me saying Are you Thank you. We'll be seeing it. I hope you keep singing though. Keep singing every day you go. Worthy is Jesus Worthy is Jesus Praise to our God Who did send His only Son Sent up our voices to praise to the Lord. Worthy is Jesus, Lamb that was slain. Worthy is Jesus, come praise His name. Tale of His power, let praises ring. Glory to Jesus, conquering King. Worthy is Jesus All right, let's take our Bibles tonight and turn to Colossians. Now we're up to chapter 4 in Colossians. Looking at those first few verses there. Colossians chapter 4 and verses 1 through 6 we'll be considering here tonight. As we look at communication that counts, as Paul addresses that here to the letter to the church of Colossae. As you're turning there, Christ said in Matthew chapter 12, in verse 35, he said, a good man out of the good treasure of his heart bringeth forth fruit. bringeth forth, I'm sorry, good things, and an evil man out of the evil treasure bringeth forth evil things. But I say unto you that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give an account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned." My friend, a spirit-filled Christian not only lives a new life, but he talks a new talk as well. Never underestimate the power of speech. And I don't know if you'd ever considered this before, but a judge says a few words And a man's life is saved or condemned. In fact, there is great power in words. Consider this, for every word in Adolf Hitler's book, Mein Kampf, for every word, 112 or 125 people lost their lives in World War II. But there's a lot of power in words. The power of speech, as we just started looking at last Wednesday night, is a gift from God, and it must be used according to God's Word, because it's from Him. By the way, every good gift and every perfect gift, what does James say? It comes down from the Father of lights. We shall give an account for every word that we say, even every idle word that we say. Now, for me, an idle word, that's one of those words that I mutter under my breath when I don't think my wife is listening, okay? But I've been married 25 years. I know just how sharp that radar is, right? But we all do that, don't we? Every idle word. And by the way, does it have to be spoken to be a word? We're running words through our minds all of the time. will give an account for every idle word. So, we should make our communication count for Christ. Communication that counts is speech that is directed, as we'll see here in this passage, directed to our Savior for our Savior and speech that is like our Savior. The Apostle Paul, he gives specific advice in these three areas here in verses one through six. The first one is speech directed to our Savior. Now look with me at verse two. Paul writes, continue in prayer and watch in the same with thanksgiving with all praying also for us. Prayer and worship are perhaps the highest uses of the gift of speech. Paul wasn't ashamed to ask his friends for their prayers, even though he was an apostle who at one time, as we saw a few weeks ago, was able to do miracles. and he was asking his friends to pray for him. He needed the support and prayers of others. If a Christian like Paul felt he needed prayer support, how much more do you and I need the support of prayer? How much more do you and I need that kind of spiritual help? Here, Paul describes the characteristics of a spiritual prayer life. Let's look at just some of those. In verse 2, we see that our praying must be faithful. Continue in prayer, he says. Now, what does that mean? It means to be steadfast in your prayer life, to be devoted. In other words, don't quit. Scripture commands regular praying. Ephesians 6, 18, praying always. 1 Thessalonians 5, 17, pray without ceasing, it says. In Luke 21, 36, Jesus said, watch ye therefore and pray always. And in Acts 6, 4, it says the apostles gave themselves continually to prayer. Now, how in the world can we always be praying all of the time? Isn't that impossible? This doesn't mean that we are to walk around muttering prayers under our breath constantly. We don't have to be verbally praying all of the time. It means that we are always in constant fellowship with God. Now, hopefully we're going to see here tonight that there are some things in our lives, when we're doing them, we cannot be in fellowship with God at the same time. Praying continually means we constantly have that open door with God, constantly in communion with Him. When we see something good, we praise God for it. when we see something bad, we ask Him to change for it, change it all throughout the day. Like when the car breaks down, what's the first words that come, never mind, don't go there. What's the first words that maybe come to some people's minds, okay? Oh man, this again? Like when my transmission went out back here a couple of months ago. The one that I just put in a year ago? No. The one that I put in 14 months ago, which was now two months out of warranty? That one? Yes, that one. All I was saying is, oh Lord, please help me get back home. I was two hours away. The word continue in prayer, it means to endure. It's the idea of perseverance. Paul is talking about a strong commitment to prayer. He's telling us, don't give up. Don't quit. Jesus, in fact, he told a story to illustrate this. It was the parable of the unjust judge. We find it there in Luke chapter 18. It says, and he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray and not to faint. Well, stop right there. Men ought always to pray and not to faint. That's what he spoke a parable about. So he says he spoke a parable and he gave us the sum of it, before he even spoke the parable. Now, we'll keep that in mind as we go through this parable. Verse 2, saying, There was in a city a judge which feared not God, neither regarded man. And there was a widow in that city, and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. And he would not for a while. But afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man, yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me. And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith. In other words, did you hear what he just said? Then Christ says, and shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them? I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? When Christ returns, will he find us faithful in praying, persevering in prayer? not get all pumped up about prayer because we heard a message, or we got convicted about it, or we read an article or something, and then we, okay, we're gonna pray every day, and then a week later, we're done. And it just kind of falls by the wayside. No, being constant, persistent in it at all times, devoted to it. God delights in answering prayers, my friend. But sometimes he delays answering them in order to increase our faith and devotion. Second characteristic of a spiritual life, a spiritual prayer life, is our praying must be watchful. We see that there in the second verse. We are to watch and pray. That word, watch and pray, it's used often in the Bible. And we find it in the Bible when Nehemiah was beginning to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem. Watch. and pray. Jesus said it, and so did Paul. Watch and pray. Folks, this is not a lifeless, dead, routine, dear God, thank you for my food, amen, type of prayer. This is, the key word there is watch. Alert. as you can picture yourself on the wall, rebuilding the wall of Jerusalem, and the enemies are out there, and they're trying to stop you. But you've got a job to do. You've got to build the wall. And Nehemiah said, watch and pray. Be alert to what's going on around you. And Jesus said, watch, be alert to what's going on around you and pray. Paul said, watch, be alert to what's going on around you and pray. Real praying. It demands a spiritual energy and alertness from us. It's not just praying through our prayer bulletin. or praying for missionaries, praying for so and so, bless their life, and checking things off. No, it requires us to be spiritually alert. That's the watch part of it. You have to be spiritually in tune, moms and dads, you must be spiritually in tune to what is happening to you, what is happening to your family, what is affecting your children, where they're at spiritually in order to pray for them. You must be alert to that. Otherwise, how can we pray for them if we don't know what's going on spiritually in their lives? Watch and pray. Be alert to spiritual dangers. The third characteristic that Paul gives us is that our praying must be thankful. Now, too many Christians, myself included, I think we ask God, but we very seldom thank God. We ask God for specifics, and we thank him for generalities at best. Thanking God is the best way to express a heart of gratitude. I believe giving thanks is a key to having a contented spirit and a joyful attitude. You can't complain and be thankful at the same time. That goes back to the the very beginning being in tune as we're praying always continually in tune with God We can't do that when we're complaining You can't complain and be thankful. You can't say God. Thank you so much for this car. I wish it had air Thank you for my home I wish it was different Thank you for my job. I sure wish I had a different one. I It's either one or the other. Imagine you doing something nice for someone and they showed their thankfulness to you. You make them a nice meal. And you even throw in some dessert. And they come back to thank you. Thank you for that wonderful casserole you made me. Next time, don't put beans in it. Now, do they really appreciate what you did for them? No, and we wouldn't take it that way. So we cannot always be thanking God if we're complaining about something that we don't like or it's not the way we want it to be or we think it should be. We can't be doing both at the same time. It's either one or the other. And then the fourth characteristic, Paul says we need to pray with a purpose. In verse three, he says, pray for us. Pray with a purpose. It's easier to say, and you would agree with me, it's easier for us while we're praying to just say, God bless all the missionaries. But it's more helpful to pray with purpose when we're praying for our missionaries. God, help Joey Tacon and his wife with their language studies there in Italy. And please continue to help his wife with her medical issues that she has as she waits for surgery later on this fall. God, please help them with that. And help the co-ops find a newer place for this church they're starting there in Korea. A building that will meet all of their needs. Elevator access, perhaps, and bigger space. God, please help them with that. That's a whole lot different. That's praying with a purpose. Or maybe help the freels as they minister there to the gypsies in Romania. That the heat that they're experiencing right now would not keep the gypsies from coming to their meetings. By the way, a couple of us, Jim and I, have been there. Their buildings are just a concrete block building with no windows. That's where they meet and what's hot outside It's hot inside and and God we just pray that you would help those gypsies to still come even though it's hot in that building and give them Good fruit from their upcoming vacation Bible school that they're having see that's praying with a purpose It's easier to pray in generalities Than it is to pray in specifics Now Paul gives us a second area of advice about our speech. In verse 3 it says, with all praying also for us that God would open unto us a door of utterance to speak the mystery of Christ for which I also am or I am also in bonds that I may make it manifest I ought to speak. Here's the second piece of advice speak a speech that is directed to our Savior It's directed. I'm sorry for our Savior. You guys can see my notes You just tell me what I'm supposed to say. All right speech directed for our Savior now notice this when Paul wrote this letter to the Colossians he was under arrest in Rome and He didn't ask for the prison doors to be open. Never once do we see him asking God to release him from prison or asking him to move in his captor's heart, to let him go. He didn't pray for this midnight earthquake that Peter got when he was in prison. He didn't pray for any of that. He didn't pray that his prison doors would be opened, but he did pray that the doors of ministry would be opened while he was under arrest. That's amazing, folks. Because so many times when we go through life and we all experience life, the good, the bad, and the ugly, When we're in the good, we're praying, God, please keep giving it. Bring it on. Give me some more good. When we're in the bad, we're like, I got to figure out a way out of this. When we get into the ugly, we're like, God, please take it away from me. I can't take it any longer. Remember what Paul said? He said, I have learned whatever state I'm in to be content. And because he realized that God had a plan for every phase of his life, every event, the good, the bad, the ugly, he could be in the ugly and pray that God would just open some doors of ministry. You see, God's in control. We all realize that, don't we? Our Sunday school answer would be yes, God is in control. God is sovereign and everything is planned out. So when I'm stuck over here in the ugly, God planned it. Okay, so as long as I'm here, I might as well do something good with it, right? God has allowed it, and as Paul did, Paul prayed that he would just open doors of ministry so his speech could be directed for the Savior. It was more important to Paul that he be a faithful witness than a free man. It was more important that he be a faithful witness than a comfortable. It was more important that he be a faithful witness than a well-rested man or a stress-free man All of those things that we pray for It didn't matter to Paul his focus. He just wanted to be a witness for Christ No matter how uncomfortable or misused and abused he was, no matter how tired he was, no matter how stressed he was, his speech was directed for our Savior. When John Bunyan, the preacher that wrote Pilgrim's Progress, when he was arrested for preaching illegally, and when he was put into prison, he was told that he would be released if he promised to stop preaching. Do you know what he said to them? He said, if I am out of prison today, I will preach the gospel again tomorrow by the help of God. Could we say that? Would we not perhaps run back if we get out? And say, okay, I gotta figure out a way to do this undercover now. I gotta figure out a way that I can kinda keep God happy and not get people here upset with me. And you know, there's too much of that going on today in churches across America. They're trying to give credence to God's word and not get anyone upset with them. We ought not to be worried about that because my God's bigger. My God's bigger than any man or woman in the White House. My God's bigger than any Supreme Court. God says, go, let's just go. Let's just do what he says to do. Every Christian needs to pray to be a bold witness. Don't we need to pray that? Can I just be honest with you? I am not naturally a bold witness. I don't get up in the morning and walk out and see that person walking down the street and say, hey, hey, hey, hey, come here, I gotta talk to you about something. It doesn't happen that way. When I was a youth director back in Diverning, you guys remember TJ, I took them out knocking on doors one Saturday morning, okay? Now, I wasn't really experienced at that. It was probably way too early, Saturday morning, I wasn't thinking, people sleep in. and it was maybe 8.30, 9 o'clock, and I had TJ, he was all pumped up, he was ready to go, he's gonna lead someone to Christ right now, whether they want to or not. And we get up there and he knocks on that door, and this girl, high school maybe, She, well, he knocked more than once because she didn't wake up right away, okay? And she comes to the door and her hair's all a mess, and she opens the door, she says, hello? TJ, right away, he says, hi, we're from First Baptist Church in Divernon. If you were to die right now, do you know if you'd go into heaven or hell? Whoa! Goodbye. That's boldness. I don't know that I have that kind of boldness, okay? I know I don't. Do you? We need to pray that we would be a bold witness. Not the kind of witness that most of the time we are, where we shy away, we shrink away. from someone that we know God is leading us to go and talk to, a bold witness doesn't do that. Acts 4.31 it says, and when they had prayed, the place was shaken where they were assembled together. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost and they spake the word of God with boldness. These are the same people that just days before ran when the soldiers came and arrested Jesus. And now they have this boldness. Where did they get that from? The Holy Spirit. The same one that we all have inside of us right now The same exact power is there. What is the evidence of being filled with the spirit? It is speaking the word of God with boldness. And if we can't do that, we are not filled with the Holy Spirit Because that is one of the proofs right there and You say, well, that's not my spiritual gift. No, but it is your commission. We saw that this morning. The great commission was not given to the church. The church hadn't even begun yet. It was given to individuals. Evangelism and teaching others to grow spiritually. That's our commission. And God says he would not ask us to do something that he wouldn't equip us to do. We have the Holy Spirit. We can speak boldly. We need to pray for boldness. God wants us to pray that we would be faithful witnesses. And he wants you, he wants you to be a faithful witness. Also, every Christian needs to pray for the preaching of the Word of God. I think that might go without saying. The power to change our lives comes from God, His Word, and His Spirit. God wants every one of you to have a part in calling down power from heaven through the preaching of His Word. Visitor at Spurgeon's tabernacle in London was being shown around the building by Charles Spurgeon He asked him. Would you like to see the powerhouse of this ministry? And he showed the man into a lower auditorium beneath the main auditorium He said it is here that we get our power for while I am preaching upstairs Hundreds of my people are in this room praying Calling down power from heaven So in our new auditorium, we're gonna have a basement, folks. Or at least a crawl space, okay? Folks, you can assist me in preaching the word of God by praying for me and for the word of God to have an open heart to receive it every time it's preached. Never say, the least that I can do is pray for you. My friend, that's the most you could do, is pray for me. Now Paul gives us a third area of advice for our speech and that is speech that is like our Savior Verse 6 let your speech be always seasoned are always with grace seasoned with salt that you may know how you ought to answer every man born-again Believers are called what? Christians right Christians a Christian is a follower of Christ. It is one who believes on Christ for salvation, that's important. Not believe on Christ for a better life, for meaning in life, for peace, for happiness. And I say that because there's a lot of people that believe on Christ for those things, not necessarily for forgiveness of their sins. Only Christians have their sins forgiven. Only Christians will go to heaven. Only Christians can truly live like Christ. No, not Christians live like Christ. Let me change that. Only Christians can truly live like Christ if they choose to. It comes down to our choice, our free will that God has given us. As a Christian, we are to talk like Christ. The chief priests, they had sent officers to arrest Christ earlier in his ministry, but they didn't. When they returned, the priest asked them, what's going on? We told you to go arrest them. And do you remember what they said? Never man spake like this. How did Jesus speak? Well, we see there in our text, he spoke with grace. Psalm 45 says about Christ, grace is poured into thy lips. Folks, even when he was dealing with sin, he spoke with grace. We are to speak in such a way that we minister grace to those that are hearing us. The words that we say and how we say them need to serve grace on a platter to those that are hearing us. But we can't do that unless we have grace in our hearts. Our mouth think of your mouth this way our mouth and not just think of it this way Do that because that is the way this is our mouth is simply a messenger for our heart What's in a heart comes out here if we have bitterness and a critical spirit in our heart it's gonna come out here We can't hold it back If we have grace in our hearts That too will come out of our mouth. Christ not only spoke with grace, but he spoke words seasoned with salt. In that day, salt was used as a preservative as well as a seasoner. And when salt gets into a wound, it stings, but then it heals. That's an interesting characteristic about salt. Our speech, folks, needs to be a purifying, wholesome, cleansing influence on those that are hearing us. The words that come out of our mouth need to, if we could visualize their soul, their spirit, it needs to lift their spirits closer to God. Kind of like the Indian guy with the little horn. Little flute he's playing and the and the snake comes out of the basket as he's playing and we could picture someone's soul Someone's spiritual center as we're speaking and though by the words that we're saying we're lifting them spiritually That's what edification means That's what edify means to build up but I'm afraid many times our speech to the hearer pulls them down and Critical speech does that complaining does that murmuring does that? All of you I'm sure have experienced this before you're in a good mood and then you get around something Yeah, and then you go home. You're like man. Yeah. Yeah, what a terrible day Can't believe this maybe your bio co-worker and all they did was complain all day about the boss You kind of liked him Until that day now you can't stand on The speech pulled you down not facts not truth not reality Just that speech it pulled you down ours our speech as a Christian needs to be like salt purifying Seasoning if you will It should be gentle Gracious thoughtful and Sometimes it does need to sting For the purifying to effect to take into effect Our words folks should always be pure and beautiful adding seasoning and flavor to our conversations that we are involved in with saved or unsaved alike because we're representing Christ and And then also Jesus spoke the right thing to the right person. It says that ye may know how ye ought to answer every man. When the Greeks used the term salt in reference to speech, they gave it the meaning always of charm and wit. Wit is the ability to say just the right thing at just the right time. Don't you wish you had that? We are to have just the right answer for just the right time to just the right Person that's the the picture that's painted for us in Proverbs boy. If we could do that, that would be a beautiful thing, wouldn't it? husbands to know exactly what to say and how to say it when you've messed up. And just by what comes out of your mouth, it just kind of smooths things over at home. Or vice versa. That's wit. That's what Proverbs talks about. A word fitly spoken is like apples of gold in pictures of silver. The right word, the right time, the right person. So we have to ask ourselves tonight, what comes out of our lips? Is it prayer, speaking to the Savior? Witnessing, speaking about the Savior? grace Speaking like the Savior folks those three elements. That's what needs to be the makeup of our speech So we have to ask ourselves Does that describe my speech? and if not if not, then we have an obligation tonight to make it so and You see, God says in his word, to him that knoweth to do good and doeth it not, to him it is sin. So because you've heard this truth tonight, God will hold us accountable now for how we change our speech moving out of here tonight. Would you first confess any wrong speech to God? When we do that, God says He forgives, He restores, He cleanses us from all unrighteousness. He gets it out of there. That's a good thing. And then we commit to God to do things the way He's outlined for us here tonight. Let's bow our heads, please. Heavenly Father, as we prepare to close our service here tonight, God, I pray that you would give each person a moment here to just focus on themselves. God, give us a moment of realness with ourselves. Just what is our speech like? Would it fit into this formula that you've given for us here in Colossians? May we choose tonight to commit to align our speech with this formula. In Jesus' name, amen. Let's stand please with our heads bowed and our eyes closed. I'll ask the instruments to play. Let me give you a moment here with heads bowed and eyes closed for you to make that confession, that commitment to Christ. You choose what you're going to do here tonight. Will you choose to honor go into our communion service here, Lord, that our hearts would be right with You. And, Lord, we just thank You for the privilege we have tonight of observing this command that You've given to us as a church. In Jesus' name, amen. I'm going to ask our ushers, or my deacons, if they will come, please, and make preparations. The rest of y'all may be seated. observing communion is...