Highlands Fellowship Baptism Sunday Transcript
0:00 Well, hey, everybody, and welcome to Highlands Fellowship, where our mission is to help people experience life with Jesus. So if you're joining us from Bristol, Marion, and Highlands Country, in our chapel, in one of our cafe venues, online, or on TV, it's great to be together. It really is, and if you're here with us for the very first time, I want you to make yourself right at home, because, as we like to say around here, Highlands is home. And so welcome home today. It's such a privilege to be able to share this message with you, because today is a special day.
0:34 Today is one of those Sundays that I absolutely love, because it's not just another Sunday. Today, we are celebrating changed lives, and after each of our services, we're gonna be celebrating people who are going public with their faith through baptism. And if you're here because someone you love is being baptized, we're glad that you're here. Maybe you're a parent or a grandparent, a spouse, a friend, a coworker. Maybe you don't normally come to church. Maybe you're not exactly sure where you stand and what you believe. We're glad you're here.
1:10 And I want you to know something. You don't have to have everything figured out in order to be here today. I want you to know that. In fact, I think today's message is really for everybody. Maybe you're not sure about Jesus. Maybe you're just beginning your relationship with Him, or maybe you've followed Him for 20 years or more. Wherever you are, it doesn't really matter.
1:34 I wanna talk to you about how God really changes our lives because here's what I think sometimes we misunderstand about following Jesus. We think following Jesus is about becoming a better person. Try harder, be nicer, you know, stop doing the bad things, start doing the good things, clean yourself up, go to church, read your Bible, and hopefully, over time, you'll become a pretty good person. Hopefully, right?
2:04 But that's not exactly the message of Jesus, and maybe you've heard this statement before, but I think it's wonderful. It says, "Jesus didn't come to make bad people good. Jesus came to make dead people alive." He didn't come simply to improve your life. He came to give you a new life, and I'm excited to be able to share a message with you today that I believe has the potential to be a defining moment in your life if you will actually allow yourself to be open to what God has to say to you through His Word.
2:39 So as we get into the message, I just wanna start by asking a question, all right? How many of you have ever forgotten something? If you've ever forgotten something, go ahead and raise your hand, all right? All right, I'll say it this way. Uh, how many of you would say, "I'm just a forgetful person"? Go ahead and put your hand up if you're just a forgetful person. And for those of you who are asking the person next to you, "Now, what did he ask? I forgot," don't even worry about it, all right? Just don't even worry about it.
3:06 No, but, but seriously, this can definitely be a problem, right? And I used to be able to remember everything. I was sharp. But, you know, almost 41 years and 4 kids later, my memory is not what it used to be, for sure.
3:22 And listen, Megan, my wife, she can send me to the grocery store for, like, 3 specific things, and I'll go, and I'll walk through the entire store, and I'll buy, like, 17 items that I didn't need, and somehow I get back home without the 3 things that I went for. I mean, has that ever happened to you, or am I the only one? I hope I'm not the only one. I'll tell you what happened the other day.
3:46 Um, we were trying to get out of the house to go to a family gathering, and listen, I was ready. I was ready. I was waiting at the door. I was griping at the kids. I was griping at Megan. I'm telling you, I had gotten on my high horse. I had. And I'm sure you know what I'm talking about, but like, "What are y'all doing? Are y'all not ready yet? We were supposed to leave 15 minutes ago." And I was huffing. I was puffing around, and finally, I was able to get everybody out of the house, and I'm locking the door.
4:16 I'm locking the front door, and I turn around, and everybody's just standing there waiting to get into the car because it's locked, of course. And so I reach into my pocket, and I realize that, you know what? I had forgotten my key. So I did the walk of shame back into the house to get the key, right? And when I came back out, I didn't even look up. I didn't even look up because I could feel the eyes, and I could feel the faces that were so ready to just put me in my place.
4:43 And when we got into the car, I just said, "I know, I know. You don't even have to say it. I already know what you're gonna say. I know what you're thinking." Now, listen, we all have things that we don't want to forget, things like birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, special trips or special vacations that you took that meant something to you, the birth of a child.
5:06 Maybe it was the day that you met somebody that changed your life. We take pictures because we know something about ourselves that we forget. We know that, and that's interesting because we don't usually forget the big things immediately, but over time, even significant moments can become a bit blurry in our lives. That's why we mark them. That's why we take pictures. That's why we write things down, and we save things. We celebrate certain milestones. We tell the stories because sometimes we need something that reminds us, "Don't forget what happened here. Don't forget it."
5:47 So I want to share a story with you from God's Word. It's in the Old Testament book of Joshua, so if you have your Bible or a Bible app, go ahead and open those up to Joshua chapter 4 because this idea of not forgetting is exactly what's happening in Joshua chapter 4. The Israelites have just experienced one of the greatest miracles in their history. And they've just crossed over the Jordan River, and they physically entered into the Promised Land. They had been wandering in the desert for 40 years.
6:21 So when you think about this picture, I mean, this is a big deal. And not only that, but God actually stopped the river from flowing upstream so that the Israelites could cross over on dry ground. And this was all done when the river was at flood stage during the spring harvest. So when I say God has brought them through the Jordan River, I really mean God has brought them through the Jordan River because I truly believe this was a miracle, and it was. And God tells them to do something very specific.
6:54 So he tells them to remember this. So let's read Joshua 4:1-9. It says this: "When the whole nation had finished crossing the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua, 'Choose 12 men from among the people, one from each tribe, and tell them to take up 12 stones from the middle of the Jordan from right where the priests are standing and carry them over with you and put them down at the place where you will stay tonight.' So Joshua called together the 12 men that he had appointed from the Israelites, one from each tribe. And he said to them, 'Go over before the ark of the Lord your God into the middle of the Jordan. And each of you is to take up a stone on his shoulder, according to the number of tribes of the Israelites, to serve as a sign among you. In the future, when your children ask you, "What do these stones mean?" tell them that the flow of the Jordan was cut off before the ark of the covenant of the Lord. When it crossed the Jordan, the waters of the Jordan were cut off, and these stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever.' So the Israelites did as Joshua had commanded them. They took 12 stones from the middle of the Jordan, according to the number of tribes of the Israelites and as the Lord had told Joshua, and they carried them over with them to their camp, where they put them down. And Joshua set the 12 stones that had been in the middle of the Jordan at the spot where the priests who carried the ark of the covenant had stood. And they are there to this day."
8:29 Now, I'm telling you, when I read this in preparation for this message, I got chills. I mean, just think about all of the emotion that was wrapped up in this one moment. I mean, it's amazing to see how God provided for them yet again. So as we think about these defining moments and we try to remember the things that we should remember, I wanna give you a few things that you need to remember today.
8:57 The first thing is that we need to remember that God brought us through. I think this is very important. God is the one who brought us through.
9:07 The Israelites are standing on the other side of the Jordan River, okay? But you have to understand what just happened. The Jordan River was at flood stage. It wasn't them casually walking across a shallow creek. God told them to step into the water. So the priests carrying the ark of the covenant stepped into the Jordan, and when their feet actually touched the water, God stopped the river. The people then crossed over on dry ground. And then when everybody had crossed, God tells Joshua to choose 12 men, one from each tribe, and have each man take up a stone from the middle of the Jordan.
9:50 Now, why would he do that? Because God wanted them to remember. These stones are to be a memorial to the people of Israel forever, and I absolutely love that. God knew that there would come a day. He knew that there would come a day when they would be tempted to forget. There would be another battle, there would be another challenge that would come, there would be another obstacle, another generation would be coming up, and God wanted them to have something that they could point to and they could say, "God is the one who brought us through."
10:26 So that's the first thing that I want you to remember today. God brought us through. And maybe some of you can actually look back over your life and you can say the same thing. Like there was a season when you didn't know how you were gonna make it. Like you didn't know how your marriage was gonna survive. You didn't know how you were gonna get through it financially. You didn't know how you were gonna get through the diagnosis. You didn't know how you were gonna make it through what's happening with your child. You didn't know how you were going to recover from what had happened to you, and yet here you are.
10:29 You're here. God brought you through. And maybe the circumstances didn't turn out exactly the way that you wanted them to, but God was still faithful. He carried you, He strengthened you, He provided for you, and He comforted you. He brought you through. And sometimes we just need to stop long enough to look back and say, "God, you did that. You did that."
11:33 Because if we don't remember what God has done, it's very easy to become consumed by what we're facing right now. The Israelites, they were gonna face more battles across the Jordan, right? Crossing the Jordan didn't mean that their problems were over. It meant that God had proven Himself faithful. And sometimes remembering yesterday's faithfulness actually gives you the courage for today's challenges.
12:02 So remember, it was God who brought us through. The second thing is this: don't forget where He found you. So God brought us through, and then don't forget where He found you.
12:20 You know, there's something else that I think is so important about these stones. They weren't just reminders that God had done something amazing. They were also reminders of where they had come from. These people had spent generations in slavery in Egypt. God had rescued them. He had brought them through the Red Sea. He had provided manna in the wilderness. He had guided them with a cloud by day and a fire by night, and now He's actually bringing them across the Jordan into the promised land.
12:51 Their story wasn't, "Look at what we accomplished." Their story was, "Look at what God has done." And that's an important difference, okay? It's an important distinction because one of the greatest dangers in our spiritual lives is actually forgetting where we've come from. We can get to a place where we start thinking, "I'm doing pretty well. I'm doing pretty good right now," right? "I've gotten my life together. I've become a pretty good person."
13:21 But the gospel reminds us that we didn't save ourselves, but Jesus is the one who saved us. That's why I love second Corinthians chapter 5, verse 17, where it says this: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, the new creation has come. The old has gone. The new is here." And that's what we're celebrating in baptism. We're celebrating people who — not who finally got their lives together. We're celebrating people who actually discovered who Jesus is and that He can make all things new, and that's an important difference. Because following Jesus isn't about becoming a slightly improved version of yourself.
14:10 It's about becoming a new creation in Christ Jesus. Some of us need to remember that today. Remember who you were. Remember what Jesus has forgiven. Remember the places that He's brought you out of. Remember the chains that He broke. Remember the prayers that He answered. Remember the grace that He gave you when you didn't even deserve it. We need to remember the cross, remember the empty tomb, and remember that you are not who you used to be.
14:42 And maybe that's why baptism is so powerful. Because baptism gives us a picture that we can remember. Paul says this in Romans chapter 6, verse 4: "We were therefore buried with Him through baptism into death in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead through the glory of the Father, we too may live a new life." That's what baptism represents. Going under the water represents the old life actually being buried, and then coming up out of the water represents the new life that Jesus has given to us.
15:18 The water isn't what saves us. Jesus saves us. But baptism gives us a picture of what Jesus has done. And so every time we see it, we're reminded, "That's what Jesus did for me." God brought us through. Don't forget where He found you.
15:49 And number 3 is this: we must remember to tell the next generation. We've got to tell the next generation. There's another reason that God told them to set up these stones. It wasn't just for the people who crossed the Jordan. No, this was for people who weren't even born yet. Joshua chapter 4, verses six and seven says, "In the future, when your children ask you, 'What do these stones mean?' Tell them." I absolutely love that. God was thinking beyond the moment.
16:16 He wanted the story to pass down, one generation telling the next generation, you know, "Let me tell you what God has done."
16:30 And so I just wanna pause for just a moment, and I wanna tell you what God has done as we talk about the next generation.
16:40 So last week across all of our campuses, and it just blows my mind the responsibility and opportunity God has given to us here at Highlands Fellowship. Last week we had 445 students and kids checked into one of our services last week. I mean, it's an amazing opportunity that we have to tell the next generation of what God has done in our lives.
16:58 And guys, we want you to bring your kids. We want them to be in church. We want them to hear God's Word. We want them to hear it on their level so that they can understand it. We want them to make the decision to follow after Jesus Christ, because we believe that that is the best possible decision that they could make with their lives.
17:16 And you don't have to be a kid to do that either. But we believe very strongly that when we invest in our kids, it will change their lives for eternity, and their lives on this earth will be better because of it. So let's continue investing in the next generation.
17:34 I think that's also one of the most important and most powerful things about Baptism Sunday. I mean, if we look around this room today, there are people who are gonna be baptized. There are parents who are watching their children. There are grandparents who are watching their grandchildren. Friends are here today celebrating their friends. And there may be even people here today who don't know Jesus yet, but they're here to watch somebody be baptized. But everybody gets to hear the story, and the story is Jesus changes lives, and that's a story worth telling.
18:13 So, parents, don't underestimate the power of telling your kids what God has done in your life. And don't just tell them what you believe, but tell them why you believe it. Tell them about the time that God answered your prayer. Tell them about the time that you failed and God showed you grace. Tell them about the time that you came to faith in Jesus. Tell them about the things that He's brought you through.
18:35 Because eventually our children have to decide. They have to decide what they're going to do with Jesus, and we can't make that decision for them. But we can make sure that they know the story, and that's what these stones were for. When your children ask, tell them. That's what the Lord said. Tell them. Tell them about God's faithfulness. Tell them about His grace. Tell them about His goodness. Tell them about the cross. Tell them about the empty tomb. Tell them about the day God changed your life.
18:54 We have to be willing to tell the next generation. And then the 4th thing is this: let your life become a memorial. Let your life become a memorial. And here's where I think this message gets really, really personal. The Israelites built a memorial out of stones. But what if our lives became a memorial to the faithfulness of God? Our lives. What if when people looked at our lives, they could actually see evidence that Jesus changes people? Not that we're perfect, not that we never struggle, not that we never make mistakes, because we know we do all those things, but that Jesus is still changing us.
19:35 What if your marriage became a testimony? What if the way that you parent became a testimony? What if the way that you handle adversity in your life became a testimony? What if the way that you forgive became a testimony? Or the way that you serve other people? What if the way you live your life caused somebody else to say, "There's something different about that person right there." And eventually you get the opportunity to tell them, "It's all because of Jesus, and He's the one who changed me."
20:10 That's what I want my life to be. I don't want people to look at my life and simply say, "Well, old Tim, you know, he's a good guy." That's not what I want. I want them to be able to look at my life and say, "Tim knows Jesus, and he has a relationship with Him," because there's a big difference. You may say, "Well, yeah, good people do good things," and all that, but none of us are really good. None of us are good, not unless we know Jesus Christ, and we are only righteous because of Him, not because of ourselves. But it's only Jesus who can make us new.
20:45 And really, when you think about baptism and what it represents, baptism is like our memorial, and that's why today matters. Because every time we see somebody go into the water, we are reminded of the gospel of Jesus Christ. We're reminded that Jesus died for our sins, that He was buried, and that He rose again. And we're reminded that old life can be buried and that new life is actually possible. We're reminded that our past doesn't have to define our future, and we're reminded that Jesus still changes lives.
21:20 Maybe that's why baptism is so very special. Because years from now, these people who are gonna be baptized today, they're gonna look back on this day and they'll remember standing boldly for Christ. They'll remember their family being here to witness it. They'll remember their church standing with them and celebrating for them. But more importantly, they'll remember that this was the day that I went public with my faith in Jesus. They'll remember. And for everyone else in the room, their baptism actually becomes a reminder to us, too.
22:00 Maybe you've been following Jesus for 40 years. You need to remember this. Maybe you've been following Jesus for 6 days or 6 months. You need to remember this. Maybe you're not even sure about Jesus yet. Today, you get to see what it looks like when somebody says, "I'm ready to tell the world that I follow Jesus Christ."
22:25 So let me bring this back to Joshua. God brought Israel through the Jordan River, and He told them, He said, "Don't forget. Build a memorial out of these 12 stones that you took from the river." He said, "Remember what happened here. Tell your children. Tell the next generation. And every time you see these stones, remember that God was faithful."
22:55 And I think that's what God wants us to do with our lives: remember what He's done. Don't forget where He found you. Tell the next generation, and let your life become a memorial or a testimony to His faithfulness. Because here's the thing, we are all going to have these Jordan River moments. There will be moments in our lives when God asks us to trust Him, moments when we don't know what to do next, moments when we need to remember the God who brought us through.
23:35 And the God who brought us through yesterday is still the God who we can trust to carry us tomorrow. So when you get to the other side, don't just keep walking. You need to stop. You need to remember. You need to look back and say, "God, you brought me through."
24:00 And when you see somebody baptized today, don't just clap for them. I mean, clap for them, celebrate with them, scream, hoot, and holler. Let's get excited together. But don't just do that. Also remember. Remember what Jesus has done in your life. Remember the gospel of Jesus Christ. Remember your own story. Remember that if you're a follower of Jesus Christ, you are a new creation. Remember the grace of God.
24:40 And maybe for some of you, today will actually become a defining moment, a memorial, if you will. Maybe this is the day that you'll decide, "I'm ready to follow after Jesus," not just become a better person, not just clean up my life, not just start going to church, but to give my life to Jesus Christ and follow after Him. Because when Jesus gets ahold of your life, He doesn't just make you better. He makes you new, and that's something worth remembering. That's something worth celebrating, and I'm telling you, that's a story worth telling.
25:15 Would you pray with me today?
25:20 God, we thank you so much for how you show us in your Word how to do things. And today, you've shown us how to remember you. To remember your faithfulness, to remember what you've done in our lives, and we're also gonna celebrate some people today in a way that they will remember and we also will, through baptism. And whenever somebody's baptized, it represents our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. You came to this earth, and you died on the cross. You were buried, and you were raised again so that we could be forgiven of our sins, and we could have a right relationship with you.
26:15 And so I pray that our minds would remember today that when somebody goes down into that water, it represents the death of an old, sinful nature, and it has died, and it is buried, but yet, through the power of the Holy Spirit at work within our lives, we are raised to a new life.
26:50 And we're not just the same old guy, same old lady that just, you know, still sins all the time. No, we are a new creation. Yes, we will still mess up. Yes, we will sin, but our heart has been changed. And the Holy Spirit will continue to work in us and on us as we move forward. But we can trust in Him. We don't worry about it within our strength, but we trust the strength and the power of God to change us because that's what He tells us He'll do. We are faithful to Him as we follow after Him with our lives.
27:35 And so today, if there's somebody who has never given their heart and life over to Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit is working on you right now, and you think, "Maybe I should take that step. I don't know," let me tell you something. That's the Holy Spirit at work within you, and He is nudging you to follow after Him. And we all have to answer the question in our lives, what are we gonna do with Jesus?
28:00 And so are you gonna follow Him, or are you gonna reject Him? Follow Him leads to eternity in heaven with Jesus and with our God, whereas if we deny Him and reject Him, it leads to eternity in hell, separated from God forever, and He gives us the choice. What are you gonna choose today? I hope that you'll choose Jesus.
28:20 And you can pray, and you can say, "God, I believe in you. I believe that you sent your Son, Jesus, to live on this earth, and He faced temptations, and He never sinned, and He lived a perfect life. And He's the only one that could be the perfect sacrifice for the sins of the world, my sins included.
28:50 He paid the price for the sins that I've committed. And so today, I remember that, and I want to give my heart and life over to you.
29:05 So I believe in your Son, Jesus. I believe He died on the cross, that He was buried, and that He rose again to defeat death, hell, and sin forever. And I just have to put my faith and trust in Him and follow Him, and I get to receive the free gift of grace that He gives. Today, I want to do that, so I give my heart and life over to you. My life has been bought with a price. It is no longer my own. I'm yours, God."
29:35 Guys, if you made that decision, first of all, welcome to the family of God. But second, the next step is to follow Him in baptism. And so my prayer is that you would truly consider following Him in baptism today. Why wait? There's some water. Go get baptized, and share with the world that you follow after Jesus.
29:55 Guys, let's continue to follow Jesus, and let's remember God's faithfulness each and every day. God, we love you. We praise you. It's in the name of Jesus we pray, and everybody said, "Amen."