NewCity Orlando Sermons

The Nicene Creed: One Church (Advent)

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Listen to this week’s sermon, The Nicene Creed: One Church (Advent) preached by Director of Students Peter Young from Ephesians 2:18-22.

Rev. Benjamin Kandt:

Hello everyone. This is Pastor Benjamin. You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City, Orlando. At New City, we long to see our Father answer the Lord's Prayer. For more resources, visit our website at Newcity Orlando.com.

Joshua Esquivel:

Please join me in reading the prayer of illumination. Gracious God, full of life and truth, by your word and spirit, give light to our lives. Through Jesus Christ we pray. Amen. Our scripture today comes from Ephesians 2. For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord. In him you are being all you are also being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. This is God's word.

Peter Young:

All right, you're awake. I love it. Good deal. Well, man, thank you, Ben. This is either going to be awesome or the worst ever. But I'm so excited to be with you this morning. I'd like to start off. I'd like you to travel in my shoes. No DeLorean needed. We're going to 2004. I've already lost some of you. You're like, Peter, I wasn't born yet. Hang in there, Chef Riddle. So here's what we're doing. We're going 2004, and I'm a high school student. I've talked with my parents and said, hey, uh, my buddy Henry can get me a job at the Kingfish Grill at the Bay Point Marriott in Panama City Beach. The tips there are legendary. So I'm excited about stacks of greenbacks, getting the cold, hard cash, and being able to spend it on whatever I want. My parents have said, hey, you can have it, but you have to be home before 10:30. You got to be home, you got to get rest. You're a student. All right. Well, that's the setting. Here we go. If you've ever done fine dining in a restaurant, you know you're there a long time after close. I didn't. I'm wearing crisp black and white. I look like I'm prepared to serve at the Oscars, but instead I'm I'm bussing tables. I'm moving plates by the mountain load. I'm pushing slop and I'm wiping down tables like it's a calling. We're at the end of our day. It's a long day. The doors are locked. I had to learn to roll silverware, so that's a thing. I know how to do it. But my curfew at this point is absolutely toast. At this point, I have what you call the shift haze. Your feet are sore and tired. Your mind is void of any good thought. And the only emotion I can muster is please tip out. I need to get home. But the manager comes out saying, Everybody, let's get back to the kitchen. And so we all scurry back, and one of the things he brings to our attention is someone has come into the restaurant. Well, the doors are closed. And this person is asking for our nicest steak. The grill is off. The kitchen has done their job. They are grumpy. They're kitchen people. They know what they're doing. They're ready to go home. But here's the deal: the name came. Stephen Colbert. Stephen Colbert has come in and he's asked for a steak. Now, some of you might want to throw the steak at him. But at this point, he was actually pretty funny. And so we gave him a steak. But here's the deal. Stephen Colbert's celebrity was the key, accessing a closed kitchen. And that's what I'd have us think on this morning. There are places you and I cannot go. We do not have access. We need a door opened to us. Whether it's backstage at a music concert, you don't belong if you don't have a backstage pass. You want to go to a penthouse at a condo, well, you've got to have the code. You need access. White House, you can't go in. You need access. You cannot just stroll in. So if you don't have your Bible open yet, open it up, Ephesians 2, 18 through 22, or get your devices out. What we're going to learn this morning is God's word in no uncertain terms states that by nature we do not have access, that our sins of omission, forgetting to do the things that the Lord has commanded us to do, neglecting them, or forgetting to do what is right, our sins, they separate us from God. We're made by God for God, but we are cut off from him because of our sins. And yet God, in his mercy, not by our doing, has made a way. So today we're finishing up the Nicene Creed series. And if you look here at your worship handout, you'll see it in there. I believe in the one holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. Ephesians 18 through 22 is going to help show us what God is doing to make this confession both real and true. He brings separated sinners, and he builds us up into his dwelling place. Alright, so here's what I want you to hear. We're going to follow Paul's movement. Jesus is going to bring us in, and then he's going to give us access and belonging, and then the Holy Spirit builds us up with a foundation that is in Christ and makes us a beautiful dwelling place. So let's get started. Verse 18, would you read with me there? For through him we both have access in one spirit to the Father. The word access, what does that assume? There's a locked door. Maybe it's to a kitchen, maybe it's to heaven. But Paul says that we don't have access, we didn't naturally have it, and that's without Christ. Paul has told us earlier, we're in chapter two. What I'd like you to do is look at chapter 1, 3, and 12, and I'm just going to cursory look at a couple of those things. So would you do chapter 2, verse 1, take a look at it with me? There it says we're dead in trespasses and sins. Looking at Ephesians 2, verse 3. By nature we are children of wrath, made by God for God in his image, and yet our sin condemns us. And so we are set apart from him, not in holiness, but in condemnation. We carry the worst title. You would never want to put on a resume. I'm a child of wrath. Verse 12. It says, separated from Christ without hope and without God in the world. Our natural state is one of depravity. We are in dire need. So it's not that we're a little lost. We are spiritually dead. You cannot save yourself. It's not that we're occasionally maybe a little selfish or imperfect, but we're under God's wrath because of our sin. And it's not that we're a little distant. Peter, I'm one who maybe on occasion might roam. No, we're without hope and we're without God. That's why access matters. Dead people don't walk into a throne room. Children of wrath don't stroll into the presence of a holy and living God and begin to ask for help and for promises and privileges and protection. The outsider doesn't find welcome in God's covenant, protection and promises. So then in verse 19, Paul gives us a picture. Would you look with me there in verse 19? So then you're no longer strangers and aliens, which means that's exactly what we are without Christ. Strangers, no belonging, no home. We're Eden exiles, wandering. We're aliens, there's no standing, no inheritance. You might know the king, you might know where his kingdom is, you might be a fan of him, but you have no right, you have no privilege, there is no belonging. So when verse 18 says, Through him you have access to the Father, the question is unavoidable. How can the dead come in? How can the wrath bearing come near? How can the outsider become family? Verse 18 answers it in two simple words through him. Not through our efforts, not through Peter Young's great improvement. I'm gonna try to be more honest, put more effort into being a good person. Here, Paul assumes something massive about God. He says, it's through a person, Jesus. The Nicene Creed safeguards a simple joy. It's God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Ben talked about it. Men fist fought over this at the Council of Nicaea. Notice the shape of salvation through the Son and the Spirit to the Father. That is not advanced doctrine, church, family. It is the living shape of the saving gospel. Jesus says it with razor-sharp clarity in John 14. I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me. Jesus is not confused about who he is. His message is very clear, and it's deeply offensive to the human soul should you love your sin more than his lordship. You must yield. Access then is no longer a method, a self-help book. If you're coming to a new city, you're going to get the unadulterated gospel. There is no chicken soup for your soul here. There's only the person of Jesus. He's the mediator. It's not a staircase of self-righteousness, it is a savior. So how do we have access through the Son and the Spirit to the Father? So Christ opens the way, not by moral improvement or religious effort, but by his blood and his righteousness. Jesus takes on our deserved sin. He bore our curse. He pays our debt. If you remember or recount, maybe you're familiar with God's word, Jesus takes on our estrangement. He is distant from the Father of all the things Jesus suffers at the crucifixion. One of the most painful that we just cannot understand and relate to is that Jesus is separated from the Father. A breaking of a timeless relationship bound in love. Jesus experiences it for our behalf. But he rose again three days later and he takes up his life. He takes authority over sin and death, breaks the bind it has on us, should we put our trust in him? And even right now, as you sit here this morning in your chair, he sits at the right hand of the Father in one. And you have access to the Father through Jesus, should you lean in, not on your own understanding, but on him, trusting in him. And for as long as Jesus reigns at the right hand of the Lord, in that seat, you have access. Jesus, folks, is not tired. Lean on him. Now in the Spirit, the Spirit unites us to Christ. It's so interesting. I used to do college ministry with my lovely wife, and we would go to Flagler College. There were different places we'd go. In all my time doing college ministry, students would say, Well, the Trinity's not in the Bible. I'd say, Well, sure it is. You're just not reading it. Jesus is not confused. He's not confused about who he claims to be. The Pharisees aren't either. They hate him for it. They want to crucify him for it. The Holy Spirit has a unique role to play. It's in John 146 through 22, pulpit check. I don't know. But anyway, I'm not a pastor, so we'll keep moving. The point is, Jesus is talking to the disciples, and they love him. They followed him, and he's speaking with them, and he's saying, Hey, I'm going to go be with the Father at the right hand, right? But they say, Well, can you show us the Father? He says, Guys, I'm in the Father. The Father's in me. Believe it. And then, yeah, but it'd be so good if we could just see the Father. Jesus is so patient. Jesus is so patient. So what he says, he goes, Let me meet, you're down here. Let me meet you down here. He says, you know what? Just believe me on the works that you've seen. You don't understand the Trinity, that's all right. But understand we are connected because I have the power to bring dead people back to life. The Spirit does a unique work. The Spirit binds us. He doesn't just stir our hearts as Josh and the others led worship. Thank you. And great job. He stirs our hearts, our emotions, our feelings, but he connects us to Christ. The union with Jesus exists because the Holy Spirit comes. Jesus says, I will send you a counselor, a helper, the one of wisdom and knowledge. Why? Jesus says, I'm leaving, but I will bring you one, the good counselor, who can continue my ministry in my name. Who has equal footing with Jesus, the Son of God, our living Savior? The Holy Spirit. So through the Son, in the Spirit, to the Father. I wasn't a congregant or a member yet. For some reason, there was a buddy of mine, Kyler Howard, here, and he was getting married. And I met this pastor guy here at New City. His name's Benjamin Kent. Benjamin said, Let's go to Jimmy Hula's. So I go to Jimmy Hula's. Ben loves Jimmy Hulu's, I've come to learn. I'm sitting across the table from him. And through our amazing conversation, I'm like, man, Ben's weird like me. We both love Jesus. We're about making disciples. I think I like this church. Um, one of the things became really apparent. When Ben was talking to me about my personal relationship with the Lord, one of the things he said is maybe the reason you're struggling to see the Father as your father is because you're not coming to him as a child. Fighting back tears and trying to keep it cool. I went later in my car and cried my eyes out. Because that's what guys do. But the father receives you as a child, not on your record, but on Christ's merit. You come as the beloved Son, and in him, therefore you are received. This is why the Trinity is not trivia. This isn't something perfunctory, and I'm going to keep this to myself when I'm sharing Christ with my neighbor, and eventually we'll get to Trinity, but right now I just need you to understand Jesus really loves you. If you are not careful, you might commit what our faith fathers have tried to protect us from. You might alter the image of God. The Trinity is not a barnacle on the bottom of a boat to sandblast off, to remove from, to make our faith more appetizing or understandable. It is the essence of our faith. It is the main course, it is the reason we live. Jason gave me this book, Delighting in the Trinity. It's by a guy named Michael Reeves. And he distills this so down uh really well, and it really blew me away. God is love because God is Trinity. I've never thought that his Trinitarian nature is what dictates his love. But if you try to simplify God, if you try to manage the nature of God, you don't become more spiritually savvy, more appealing to those who do not yet follow Jesus. You just become irrelevant. Prayers then kind of turn into a fog, and your access that I've already talked to you about a little bit, it, you know, just turns into striving. But the gospel is gloriously specific in this way. Through the Son, in the Spirit to the Father. Now, John Calvin did a really good job, so quote guys that are smarter than me. If Christ remains outside of us, he says, all he has done remains useless. It is the Spirit who unites us to Christ, so that his righteousness becomes ours, his sonship becomes our adoption, his access becomes our access. So watch what access can produce. In verse 19, would you look with me? For you, our fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. Do you feel the move? We're going, access becomes belonging. A locked door becomes a family table. The outsider joins a household. God doesn't just rescue individuals, He sets sinners into a household. One of my deep convictions I've developed in the last couple years, and I guess New City has been a part of it, is I've been in many churches. And I tell you, I have come to see some of the guys up the block of life of me a little bit, a little older, a little more experienced. I see them as like older brothers. I've had the great privilege of calling other men kind of faith fathers, but they're very few and far between. Men, we need you. But one of the things it's such a bummer is that so many of us will take what we have in this room and we'll think this is like a religious thing. I'll come in on Sunday, passing the peace can be awkward for some people, I get it. But you'll leave without having a conversation and being known. You come here to be known by the living creator who has made you. And then you leave not known at all. If there is a place that you are welcome, I love it. They say it here at the table. I can't do it yet one day. This is the place that you should feel most welcomed. Do not shortchange yourself and leave without telling someone your story. Or, maybe it's a little awkward, I just want to hear your story. Maybe that's easier. But you are no more welcome than you are in the household of God. But we take this church congregation thing and we don't see it as a family. When I have a hurricane coming and I am in a brand new house, I have no life skills. What happened? A deacon came over. The deacon. Drew West came over with a bunch of extra wood, and he put together a thing to protect my window. And he did it in the rain. That's church family. My kids are sick, my wife is sick. I don't have any more margins. I am burning out. Here comes Raquel West with a meal. Now, not all of us feel so welcomed in this church, but we can't stop. We have to lean in because Jesus has purchased for us a family and a household. Once you're in that household, but here's the deal, hear this church. God doesn't leave you as you are, he starts building. He takes that family and makes it a dwelling place so that the question then shifts from can I come in to what is God doing at this place called New City? And what role do I have in it? Takes us to point number two. Paul keeps going. He takes his household language and he presses in deeper. Verse 20, look with me there. Built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, verse 21. In whom the whole structure being joined together grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in verse 22. In him, you also being built together into a dwelling place for God by the Spirit. Paul moves from family to building to a household. This is a big deal. Temple. Why? The triune God is not content to keep you at arm's length. If you guys remember, we did a series on Numbers or Into the Wilderness, as the cool kids say. And we were hearing about how God sought to dwell amongst his people, but he had to make sure that it was observed the correct way. Things were built intentionally, that his glory would be able to live with sinful people without wiping them out. Is that his problem? No, it's ours. But he is gracious and he seeks to draw near to you. The triune God is building a temple. This is not a stuffy museum that ought to stay quiet. Bring your loud kids in this room. It's not an empty, expensive religious shell of a building. It's a living home. It's joined together. It's growing and it's being built. He adds to our number every day. This is where the creed's words begin to glow, church family, because Paul is giving us the architecture of the church. He says apostolic means rooted, rooted in the once and for all gospel of Jesus, his teaching, his death, his resurrection. It's enough. There's no need for reinvention. We don't need to bend to the sensitivities of our culture as that continues to change about every other week. Paul says it is built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets. That foundation is laid once, and it is not changing. Christ is the same today, tomorrow, and forever. I was asked at a dinner table with some family, someone who has good intention said, Peter, well, if the church doesn't start ordaining certain kinds of people who are not traditionally ordained, you know, won't the church become irrelevant? Won't it die? I had my little kids, not all of them were born then, and I'm sitting here trying to figure out this is a sensitive spot. How do I show Christ's love and like speak the truth here? Um, so I erred on being gentle. But I said, no, I believe we don't conform God's word to our sensitivities, but we conform to it. And I'll say this now: whether this building stays here or we ever move to another building, the only reason New City Church will continue is because the foundation is laid on Jesus and we have faithful staff and members that will not relent. Come rain or shine. So when Jesus is asking the church to receive his foundation, you need to understand the cornerstone. We got a lot of builders here. Some of you are gonna be like, I'm checking out for the next five minutes. It's totally fine. Cornerstone. Cornerstone is not just the first stone laid, but the cornerstone is what dictates the walls, it affects the roof and the entire structure. The cornerstone must be square and true, and Jesus is. But if it's not, if you build your life on something other than Jesus, Jesus plus uh my tribe, Jesus plus my politics, Jesus plus my really, really good efforts. I take communion and I pray and I like try to love my neighbor or something, then that house, that church, it begins to creak. If you've ever been in a Florida hurricane, you know what I'm talking about. You're like, I bought this roof, we did inspections, but I think it's gonna come off. You know, the the trusses they begin to twist. And if your foundations are not laid on the rock, it will break under the false gospel burden of our tribalism, or you name it. When Christ is the cornerstone, the creed makes sense. Holy, not because we're impressive, but because God is making us his dwelling, Catholic, universal, one people across all nations in time, loved and led by the same God, an apostolic, built on that foundation, laid not to be added to, not to be improved upon at any given point throughout time. Now notice that Paul repeats, verse 21, joined together, built together. That means the Christian life is not a solo act, it's not a rolling stone thing. Ben and others have really taught me when you're baptized, you're baptized into a community. That's where this really matters. You're baptized into a church. He joins you not just to the Father, but Jesus joins you to one another. Jesus doesn't drop perfectly finished stones from heaven. That means if he's for living stones, there's a quarry somewhere. He's got some tools, that builder, Jesus. Uh Ben reminded me, he's a tecton. That means he's a builder of stone and wood. Uh, he's got a resume. He knows what he's doing. So what's he got? He's got a hammer, he's got a chisel, and he's going to work. If you're following Jesus, you better believe he's gonna change you. There's chiseling. Jesus is removing some of Peter's pride. Doesn't always feel so good. There's hammering. He's gonna knock some idols loose in my heart. I'll worship you a little bit, not too much. That's painful. And there's sanding. Jesus feels, ooh, there's some distrust right there. Let's buff it out. And then there's pressure. He is purging me of my self-reliance, and he's doing it today, right now, in front of you. But here's the deal. I've been able to see this up close. Um, I have an opportunity to do it, so I'm gonna do it. I'd have you all know a name. You're not gonna know the guy, but you'll know the name. His name is Daniel Hadab. Now he's with the Lord, he's seen him with his own eyes at the right hand. But Danny was my buddy for the longest time here in Orlando when we didn't know anyone. Danny and I would meet weekly, and when we would meet, we'd be talking through life. Uh we talked through theology, but Danny always lead with prayer. Hey, it's good, it's good. Hey, do we have enough time to pray? Let's pray. Danny's a dear buddy. He calls me, and I knew where he's going. I just didn't know how bad it would be. He gave me a ring. Three letters. A L S. He says, I got three to five years at best. I'll never forget how he responded. With tears and brokenness, not wanting it, with no denial and no bravado. He said he and his wife Natalie had the purest worship they had ever had on that drive home to Orlando. Danny had a steady courage that only Christ gives. He asked the builder to do his best work, even through suffering. Danny began praying. He said, Peter, I'm praying that five people will come to know Jesus and put their trust in him through my dying. I said, Well, all right, I'm on board. So we started praying that way. And then all of a sudden, our conversations went from he's a fantastic, he, well, yeah, he is a fantastic guitar player. And every week he'd find a new thing that's not working on him. My hands aren't working, I can't feed myself. Every week, a new reminder that death is that much closer. But instead, he turned his eyes. He loved the chisel, he loved the hammer. He said, You're forming me into something. There's fitment going on. You're building up this temple, and I'm your living stone. Lord, give me five people. Danny would pass without the five people. In fact, the Lord gave him ten. At the end of his service, another five, uh, six would end up giving their lives to Christ. Danny modeled to me what being built together looked like. God didn't just comfort my brother, he used Danny to form me. This is what it means to be set into a family. Robbie Riddle, you form me. Aaron Angstrom, he forms me. Ben, he forms me. Jason, he forms me. This is the gift. We're not merely saved from hell and the condemnation that our sin rightly deserves. We are saved for delight. As the Trinity delights in one another, we get to delight in this amazing community. Terribly imperfect. The problem? You're in it. The good news, you'll be a part of its transformation, and it will be all the better for it. That's what built together looks like. If the church is a dwelling place by the Spirit, what's the sound inside the house? Prayer. Prayer is not a side hobby or a side hustle. Some of us take a lifetime to figure that out. Prayer is the chief work the church is saved for. It's the means in which we commune with God. We leverage the power of heaven here on earth, seeing his will be done. Notice how Paul uses corporate language. The whole structure joined together, grows, built together. This isn't sentimental language, it's temple language. So we must be careful. We must understand that when we confess Jesus, we're confessing ourselves into a community that we must be diligent to be careful in. And you could say it this way: we look most like what we confess when we pray together through the Son, in the Spirit, to the Father. Many persons, one access, many members, one body. The unity we share is not self-made, it's a Trinitarian gift from our Creator. Hey, if you really believe that, if you really believe you have that kind of access, how would it change the way you pray? How would it change maybe the way you live, the way you parent, the way you give? Some of you are very tired. Some of you are discouraged. Some of you feel like your prayers are running on fumes. But hear this, you're never closer to the living God than you are in prayer. So even when your heart betrays you and you're indifferent in prayer, and the problem persists, what do we do? We pray. Life-altering diagnosis comes back. Church, what do we do? We pray. Lost job. Church, what do we do? Wey now, Ben and this way, God. I don't know what you're saying. The prodigal is still out and gone. Church, what do we do? We delays, disappointments, sufferings, joy, come, rain, or shine. The church is most faithful. When it is found, praying. When we practice prayer, we put our unity to work, church. That's what Seek First and Seek Week is all about. It's not religious busy work of this church, it is the embodied confession. Lord, make us one in Christ by your spirit. So you are invited two ways. You're invited into this household. You have a place at New City. The question is, would you relent? Would you receive Christ and his finished work on the cross and place your trust in his atoning work? Or might you leave this place thinking, didn't that guy have long hair? So, the second invitation, what is it? Will you consider giving an hour to the Lord? Hey Peter, I got New Year's uh practices, traditions with my family. Maybe you're maybe you're crushing it. It's cool, it's fine. Come for one hour. Bring all your kids, let them be noisy in the grass, it's fine. But come to Seekweek, come come to seek first. Sign up. Uh QR code, boom, there it is. Great job. Somebody's doing their job. Great. So sign up. Grab a slot. If you're a parent, you got a kid, wake them up at two in the morning with an awesome junk food. Say, hey, Rick and Bobby, we're gonna pray. I don't know. Maybe you love your wife. Wake her up and pray with her. Maybe you're like, Peter, I really just need to go alone on a walk and be alone with the Lord. Do it. Let's get our reps in, new city. This is what we are made for: prayer. So come with your family, come to your community, come with questions, doubts, and disappointments. Let's ring in the new year not with resolutions, but with resolve and kingdom-focused prayer, asking the Lord to build up his dwelling place. Amen, church? All right, cool means. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we do love you. We thank you so much for sending the Son. Son, thank you for coming. Holy Spirit, we need you. Bind us to the name that saves Jesus. Lord, help us to admit we need you. We are sinners. We cannot save ourselves. Help us to believe in and on Jesus that his finished work on the cross is more than enough to overcome my sins, addictions. Lord, help us to confess, believing each day in Christ, to tell others of who we are and whose we are and who we belong to and how grateful we are to be a part of a stuffy, imperfect church like New City. Help us, Lord Jesus, to know we are a part of the problem, but we are part of the solution. As you've set us into a family, you're transforming us. Would you help us to believe it? We pray and ask in Jesus' name. Amen.