Hey, this is Pastor Jon Ryan Cantu from PNEUMA Church in Houston, Texas.

Thank you for listening to the message today.

I hope that it blesses you and all those that you share it with.

God bless you.

You may be seated for just a moment.

It's good to be in the house of God.

Amen.

Amen.

Praise the Lord.

God is good all the time, man.

It has been a busy, busy week, crazy weekend, but man, I can't even complain.

This Saturday night, we got here, we had an outreach, we partnered up with Cuts for Christ, and we were able to give a whole bunch.

Well, I didn't do anything, but they brought some barbers, and we were able to give free haircuts, and we gave away, like Brother Juan said, some free clothes.

It was a blessing.

And then we ended it with a beautiful night of worship, and we were here late.

I got home probably close to midnight, but as I was closing up, I just felt such a joy.

I was beat down.

I was tired.

And my daughter, Layla, decided to stay with me to close up, because her friend was here.

And then I said, "Your friend's probably going to leave in about 15 minutes," and sure enough, she did.

And so she just crashed out behind right there on the floor.

But every minute that went by, every table that we put up and all of that, I was just so grateful to have a church that is active and to have the Holy Spirit just inhabit this place.

It's such a blessing for that.

Yeah, give God praise for that.

Amen.

So God is doing things.

And I want to also, yes, I want to echo my wife.

I want to thank everybody who gave for our chairs.

Thank you.

Y'all stepped up.

We were able to pick up those funds in one Sunday.

So thank y'all.

And we added them upstairs.

So now we have about 450 chairs in here.

Praise God.

So continue to pray for that neighbor, that person that you've been inviting to church, that they're going to fill these seats.

Amen.

Because we know that it's coming.

It's been told and confirmed many times.

And we have to step into the things that we know are coming.

We can't wait till they come, because that's bad stewardship, and that's poor faith.

So we have to walk in faith before we even see the reality of it.

That's what faith is.

Amen.

So thank y'all for committing to that.

Two announcements that I want to make, and then we're going to go to the Word.

This coming December, December 7th, last year we had, for the very first time, something that we called our Serve Conference.

And this is something that we wanted to do for our leaders and our volunteers, anybody who takes part in serving their church.

And we're going to do it again this year.

We're going to try to elevate it a little bit.

We're opening up the doors for some more churches.

And we want to extend an invitation to everybody who wants to serve.

Maybe you're not serving yet, but we believe in equipping the saints for the work of the gospel.

Amen.

I reject the 80/20 rule, which says that 20% of the church typically does 80% of the work.

That's normal.

That's not going to be normal here.

Right?

I want to equip 100% of the body to do 100% of the work.

Amen.

So that we're growing and we're making space for what God wants to do.

So if you want to be a greeter, if you want to help out, if you want to teach, if you want to eventually preach one day, maybe you have a pastoral calling over your life, whatever it is, I want you to come to this event.

It's up there.

You got to register.

And here's the thing.

This is a free event.

And a lot of times the thing about free events is that people register because it's free.

And then they decide not to come last minute and we bought food for everybody.

That's messed up.

Don't do that.

Okay.

So, so, so I want you to register, but I also want you to come now, if you register and then the week of you're like, man, I'm not going to be able to make it reach out to somebody from the pastoral team and just let us know, but we want you there.

Amen.

And then, um, this a couple of weeks on the 13th of November, it's a Wednesday night.

We're going to have our, we're going to have a general membership meeting where we're going to talk.

It's, I don't want to say it's going to be boring, but it kind of probably will be boring.

Don't expect like a Pentecostal field service or anything like that.

Um, because we're going to talk about, you know, what God is doing in the church and what our goals are.

We're going to kind of get into the, to the finances so that the church knows what's going on.

Amen.

So we invite you to that on the 13th of November.

Amen.

That's it.

Y'all ready to get into the word.

Amen.

We're going to go to Romans chapter one, Romans chapter one.

I want to focus on verses 16 and 17.

So we're not, we don't even have a full length passage.

It's just two verses that I want to focus on.

The book of Romans is what many would call a theological masterpiece.

Um, it was written by the apostle Paul.

It's very theological.

It's very profound.

So we're going to go a little deep today with just these two small verses.

There's a lot that Paul speaks about in the book of Romans, but at its core, it's really all about the gospel and the justifying work of Christ.

And it's not so much the message of the gospel.

The message of the gospel is found in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

This is more about the response to the gospel.

And so, uh, verse 16 is probably the main verse in all of Romans.

I want you to stand with me as we read it.

Paul boldly declares these words.

He says, for, I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes to the Jew first and also the Greek for in it, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith at is as it is written.

The righteous shall live by faith.

Can we, can we just, since it's a short verse, can we just say that together?

Let's, let's just go to verse 16.

And I want, I want us to boldly declare that first statement for, I am not ashamed of the gospel for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes.

Amen.

Heavenly father, we thank you, my God, for this word that you have spoken over your servant.

Father, I pray that I would just steward it.

Well, Lord, I pray Lord that everything that is spoken of today, my God would not be from me or of me, but of you, Holy spirit.

I pray that you'd be on our lips, my God, my lips.

And I pray that you'd be on our hearts and our minds to receive your word in Jesus name.

Amen.

And amen.

You can be seated.

Amen.

How many of us are genuinely proud question to be a Christian?

Come on, baby.

That's right.

And not, I'm not, I'm not asking just proud of what Jesus did for humanity.

I'm the question is, are you proud of the person that the gospel has made you?

That's, that's really the root of my question.

I'm proud that I get to be a part of the kingdom family.

I'm proud to call God, my God, and I'm proud of what Jesus did for me, but I'm also proud of the person that I've become because of the transforming power of the gospel and the sanctifying work of the spirit.

Like the Holy spirit has made me more mature in a lot of areas.

There has been so much growth in my life.

Even though I've been a Christian pretty much all my life, there's been so much growth, even just this past year because of the Holy spirit.

So where are the Christians who are unashamed to walk in their identity as Christians?

That, that is the heart of what Paul is talking about when he says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel and we need more Christians who walk on the shamed of who the gospel has made them.

We're going to preach today.

All right.

We're going to preach today.

God has some things to say, you know, this y'all ready for this week.

This is where we can be weak, man.

We have, we have to pray for our nation.

Okay.

First and foremost, we're going to, we're going to need it.

Pray for the citizens, pray for the leaders, pray for the candidates, pray for whoever gets elected into office.

Whenever a candidate that we didn't want to get into office gets into office, the first thing that we do is complain.

The first thing we should do is pray.

Lord, I didn't want that, but you are sovereign.

Heal that heart.

Do what you need to do because ultimately, and brother Angel spoke of this this morning, we know who is in control of all things, right?

And we should always appeal to the highest authority in whatever political season we happen to be in.

So I invite you to pray for our nation this week, because we're going to need it.

We're in a time, you know, these past few weeks where Christians are being reminded left and right that we need to be bold and we need to speak up and we need to let our voice be heard with our vote.

You know, we need to vote godly.

We need to vote biblically.

And that's incredibly true, right?

There is so much that goes into the political and cultural issues of our day that should concern the Christians.

Not everything in politics is a moral issue.

Not everything is, but a lot of it is.

And I know many of you have already voted.

I've seen your little sticker picture, right?

If you don't post the picture, you don't count, right?

But if you haven't yet, man, get out and vote because look, this is not gonna be a political sermon, but I have to say it because we don't only have a civic duty.

We have a kingdom duty, right?

We're not just Americans.

We are Christians.

And the more Christians took to the world, what we bring into church Sunday after Sunday, which is zeal for the things of God, we might see revival hit the streets of America.

We might.

So we got to care about these things.

Politics was one of those things that really never interested me because I hated what it did to people.

I still hate what it does to people, divides people, divides churches, divides Christians.

So I used to just think, man, I'm going to stay out of it.

But I very quickly realized that you can't separate your politics from your Christianity because God should infiltrate your politics.

God should infiltrate every aspect of your life.

You can't, we can't say, God, you're going to sit this one out because you know, separation of church and state.

You can't, you don't do that as a Christian because if he really is Lord of my life, that means he should be Lord over every aspect of it.

And so I have a duty to make my vote, not just about the people, but about kingdom principles.

Okay.

And at the end of the day, we know that again, we, it's a cliche, but it's, it's still powerful.

Whoever's in the white house, Jesus is always on the throne, right?

And we've got no reason to ever think that we have lost because Jesus already won the battle that matters, right?

And the point, the point that I want to make with all of this is that we cannot be ashamed as Christians to stand and to speak and to behave and to vote in a way that reflects the gospel in us.

Right?

And so the title of my message is unashamed.

If you're a note taker unashamed, I think Christians have in many ways become very comfortable, too comfortable all across this world, man, Christians, we, we gather together.

We worship, we listen to sermons.

We listen to the Christian podcast.

We read our Bibles.

All of that is good.

But I, sometimes I wonder if we have forgotten that the gospel is still good news.

You know what I'm saying?

Like that's, that's what gospel means.

It means good news.

And the early church spoke of the gospel as the good news of Jesus.

And in, in the, the church days, it was news, right?

Jesus was a name that not everybody had heard yet.

There were stories that not everybody had heard yet.

The Holy spirit empowerment of the church.

It was a brand new phenomenon that was, that the world was just starting to experience.

And it was exciting.

But 2000 years after Jesus and after the apostles, I think the devil would have us believe that Jesus is old news.

Everybody's heard the name of Jesus already.

Everybody knows what a Christian is.

Everybody knows what Christians believe and stand for.

And so at this point, if you're not a Christian, it's because you're anti-God.

And I think that's our assumption many times as Christians.

But let me tell you that this way of thinking, it kills evangelism.

Like real evangelism, not preachers going into churches and preaching.

I'm talking about you as believers, us as believers going into the world and preaching the gospel.

It kills compassion because we think that anyone who isn't a Christian is just an enemy.

But I want to, I want to remind the Christian today that the gospel isn't just about the gospel isn't just about hearing.

It's about receiving.

People don't have the gospel when they hear it.

They have it when they receive it.

Paul had heard about the name of Jesus long before he received Jesus.

Paul had heard about what the apostles and the disciples were doing, but it wasn't until he had a personal encounter with Jesus that his life was transformed by the power of the gospel.

So don't give up on the person who went to church with you one time and didn't like it because they might've heard the gospel, but they haven't experienced the good news of Jesus just yet.

They still need you to preach to them.

They still need you to love them.

They still need you to be patient with them.

Don't write them off when they talk against you.

Don't write them off when they talk about the church and how ugly they think the people in the churches.

Yesterday I was talking to somebody, I'd reached out to him.

I hadn't seen him in a long time and I just asked how he was doing.

And I asked him, you know, I asked him, Hey man, are you still, are you, have you found a church?

Are you still walking with God?

This is a brother who's been through a lot of things.

You know, he's been picked up.

He's been knocked down so many times in his life.

And, and he finally, he came to the conclusion that the people in the church are just judges.

That's what he said.

And I didn't really, you know, it didn't offend me.

This is honestly, it's probably like the hundredth excuse that he's given me as to why he's not walking with the Lord.

And you know, at some point you think this guy just doesn't, just doesn't want it.

Move on.

All right.

And believe me, I have, I've, I've had those thoughts with many people.

I'm sure you have as well.

Cause I don't want to, I don't want to baby a grown man.

I'm not going to force somebody to come to church.

I'm not going to beg you to give your life to Jesus.

But at the same time, I have to remind myself that this person doesn't get it yet.

They don't get it yet.

They've experienced people, but they haven't experienced Jesus.

They've experienced the church.

They haven't experienced Jesus.

They, they might've even experienced ministry, but they haven't experienced Jesus the way that I've experienced them.

They don't have the good news that I'm living in.

So, so when, when the Holy spirit reminds me of that, I, I have to be patient because when they finally receive the goodness of the gospel, when they can actually be witnesses of what it has done, not just spectators of what it's done for other people, when they have experienced the power of the gospel and what it can do to them, then they're going to understand what we meant by good news.

The gospel, you still with me?

Don't, don't let me lose you today.

The gospel is so much more than just the message.

It's an experience.

So when you tell an unbeliever who has had a very hard life, when you tell an unbeliever who thinks nobody loves them, we've seen it time and time again.

I've had these conversations thousands of times.

I've had them sometimes here at the altar.

I've had them outside.

I've had it over, over lunch.

When you tell somebody who doesn't believe that they matter, that Jesus loves them, it's like news to them.

I didn't think that anybody loved me.

I didn't think that anybody cared for me.

I didn't think that anybody wanted a relationship with me like this man Jesus does.

But you know what?

A lot of times those conversations, they bring, they bring the person to tears.

Oh, and you feel the Holy Spirit doing something, right?

You feel it because they start to weep and then they ask you to pray with them.

And it's a beautiful experience if you've ever had that with somebody.

But I've had many of these conversations.

And you know what?

They don't always lead to a transformed life.

They make for good testimonies on Sundays.

Yeah, they do.

It makes for a great testimony when you're saying, "Hey, I was out at lunch and I saw this woman and she was just in need and I started telling her about Jesus and she cried."

And that's beautiful, but it was her life transformed.

But then there are those who receive it, right?

They actually get it.

And then they come to a point where it's not just something they hear anymore.

Now it's something they know.

It's something that they walk in and they can testify about where God has taken them and what God has taken them out of and how much God truly loves them.

And because they are living in it, they are unashamed to walk in the new person that they are.

That's what the gospel is, church.

That's what the gospel is about.

And I want to talk real quick to the church, to the Christians.

How many Christians we got in the room?

Amen.

We have a responsibility, church, to carry this gospel with us everywhere we go.

In this dark, in this evil world, right now more than ever, we have to be men and women of God, of the gospel.

We have to be men and women of the gospel.

Paul says, "I'm not ashamed of this gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation.

For in it, the righteousness of God is revealed."

What does it mean to live in the righteousness of God?

It means to live justified.

That's what it means.

We literally stand corrected as those who have put their faith in the gospel, corrected as those who have believed in Jesus.

And so we have been made right because we were all kinds of messed up.

And we've been made righteous before the Lord.

And now we walk in God's goodness and we walk in his grace and we walk in his love.

That's what the gospel exposes about God.

And so when we take the gospel and we live by it, we are a walking testimony for God's goodness.

You hear that?

Listen, the message of the gospel, the message of the gospel, when you read it, it reveals these things as well.

If you read about Jesus and what Jesus did on the cross and how he loved people and how he spoke to people, it reveals the goodness of God.

But for an unbelieving world, it's just theory until they see its application in you.

I don't know if I got to say that again.

The message of the, I'm gonna say, I'm gonna say it again.

The message of the gospel, when you, when you speak it to people, when you preach it to people and you say, Jesus loves you, they might receive it a little bit, but it's just theory.

But when they see you walking in it, when they see your joy, when they see that you actually believe the things that you preach about, then it makes them wonder a little bit more.

That's, that's the difference, right?

So how many, how many of us who have come into relationship with Christ, how many of us have actually seen a difference?

You're not the person that you were before God got ahold of you and you're still being transformed by the Holy Spirit.

And, and you know what?

People notice that people notice that there's been growth in you.

They notice that you speak more maturely.

They noticed that you stopped cussing and that you stopped partying so much and you stopped coming around the wrong circle of friends.

They notice when you start to be a more manly husband, a more godly man, a godly friend.

That's the powerful effect of the gospel.

It's not just seen by you, it's seen by others.

And so this is what Paul says.

This is why he says, I'm not ashamed of the gospel for the gospel is the power of God for salvation to everybody who believes in it.

The righteousness of God is revealed.

So because of what the gospel has done to me, other people should be pointed to the goodness of God simply by the way that I live.

Don't let me lose you.

This, this is, this is some deep stuff we're going to get into.

Look, I want you to get this.

I have your attention, right?

Okay.

Paul is not making a distinction between himself and the gospel.

He doesn't, he doesn't see it as two different things because for Paul, the gospel is now a part of who he is.

He, he's been transformed by the gospel personally.

So he's not saying, I'm not ashamed of what the gospel says, which is fine.

We shouldn't be ashamed of what the Bible says.

We shouldn't be ashamed of what God has spoken.

But Paul's not saying that he's going a step further.

He's, he's saying, I'm not ashamed of who the gospel has made me.

It's one thing to not be ashamed of what the gospel says.

It's a whole other thing to not be ashamed of what it's done to you.

Paul is saying because of the gospel, whatever I believe, whatever I think as a person, whatever I speak, however I behave, I'm not ashamed of it because whatever comes out of me is a result of the transforming power of the gospel in me.

So I won't be ashamed to think that marriage should be holy.

Marriage, it should be between a man and a woman.

And you probably shouldn't be living with somebody who is not your spouse.

And that's okay to say, and I say it with love, but I also can't be ashamed to say it because I believe it.

I'm not ashamed to say that abortion is wrong.

It might offend some people, but it's a part of who I am because that's what the gospel has done to my life.

I'm not going to be ashamed of these things.

Because it's not just about what the gospel says.

It's about what the gospel has done to me.

And listen, it's not until we get to this level of unashamedness that you begin to shake the gates of hell.

I'm not just trying to sound spiritual.

I'm not just trying to be a Pentecostal preacher.

I'm like, for real, it makes no devil nervous when a Christian creates no spiritual movement, when you've got no influence in spiritual spaces, because you don't allow the gospel to take effect in darkness.

This, this, this was the difference between the followers of Jesus and the disciples of Jesus.

The followers of Jesus will applaud.

They will praise.

They will support.

They might even give a little offering, but only a disciple of Jesus will do the things that Jesus did and say the things that Jesus said.

A follower of Jesus might not be ashamed of what Jesus preached on the sermon on the mount, but he might be ashamed to preach that same message to his family around the dinner table.

That's the difference.

And there are some people who will never shake the gates of hell because speak or behave in a manner that fully represents the gospel.

And it's time for Christians who have received this beautiful, powerful gift of the gospel.

Those of us who have been transformed by it, it's time for us to not be ashamed of what it's done to you.

Don't be ashamed of the convictions that you have now that you didn't used to have before.

Don't be ashamed of it.

Don't be ashamed of thinking differently than the way that you used to think.

That's okay.

That's okay to think a little bit different.

Right, babe?

This is a personal thing.

It has nothing to do with the gospel.

But you know, sometimes we're in an argument and she'll be like, "But you said this once."

And I'm like, "But I changed my mind."

It's okay to have an evolution of thought.

But don't come at me later, please.

But don't be afraid.

Don't be ashamed of the way that God has changed your mind on certain things.

Yeah, I used to be this way.

I'm not anymore.

Yeah.

I wonder if Paul kept some of the friends that he had, you know, before he came to the Lord.

Because I know that he lost a ton of friends.

That's how it goes sometimes.

But there's always that one or two, like, really good friend who's just going to love you no matter what.

Praise God for those people.

Praise God for them.

Praise God for the friends that you got in the world who don't believe anything like you, but they still love you anyways.

Praise God for them and pray for them.

I wonder if Paul had those people in his life.

Because I know that he wasn't afraid to be his new self around anybody.

This was a hardcore, devout Jew for much of his life who became a hulk, Jesus.

Even when it made him unpopular.

Even when it made him get thrown into prison and almost killed.

Why?

Because Paul wasn't ashamed of the new person that he had become.

And it's possible to have received the gospel and still be ashamed of it.

It's possible.

It's possible to proclaim the gospel in Christian circles but be ashamed of it in secular ones.

And I want you to hear me on this, okay?

Because when I say ashamed, because some of you are like, "Yeah, that's not me."

When I say ashamed, I don't mean that you don't tell anybody you're a Christian.

Being ashamed isn't hiding your Christianity.

Maybe people know that you're a Christian because you talk about going to church.

Maybe they know where to find you on a Sunday morning.

Maybe every now and then you share a nice little verse and you use the #GodIsGood hashtags, right?

You're not, you're not, that's not shame.

Hiding your Christianity is not, that's not shame.

Ashamed is being quiet in the world about the things that you're loud about in church.

Being ashamed is when that confidence that you bring in here on Sundays turns into insecurities on a Monday morning at the office.

Being ashamed is having Holy Spirit convictions that you ignore when you're out in public because you don't want to be controversial.

You don't want to offend anybody.

And I'm not, I'm not saying that to be unashamed you got to be controversial and you got to be a loud mouth everywhere you go.

No, don't, you don't got to be that.

But it does mean that we cannot be afraid to be uncomfortable about the gospel.

The world isn't uncomfortable about being the world.

Satan has worked ruthlessly to normalize things and not just normalize things, make them look good.

The world that this is good.

How is it that Christian values are being criticized as immoral?

How is it that biblical truths are seen as hate speech?

As a God fearing Christian, I can say that it's because they don't understand the message of God and they are interpreting biblical truth with worldly eyes because their presupposition is that Christians are hateful bigots.

But listen, you have to get this.

You have to get this because so many Christians want to go to war with these people.

And I get it because you talk to the person.

We argue with the person.

We get bothered by what the person does.

But the person is not who we go to war with.

It's the enemy.

It's the enemy.

And the way that we go to war with the enemy is by loving the people that he's blinded.

By loving the people and preaching to them the truth while remaining both calm and passionate and demonstrating the power of God in us and being unashamed of the gospel.

We don't do spiritual warfare by going after the hostages.

We do spiritual warfare by going after the enemy.

And earlier I said that if you're ashamed of what the gospel has done to you, you're not going to make any spiritual noise.

You will not make a devil nervous.

But the one that stands firm in their faith, the one who is standing on a rock for their family when their family is on shaky ground and you say, hey, come over here because the rock that I stand on is not going anywhere.

The one who speaks the truth, even if it hurts, those are the ones who are going to bring people to the feet of Jesus.

I don't know how a Christian can be a Christian for all their life and not once have brought somebody to the feet of Jesus.

That's what I mean by Christians are too comfortable.

We got our salvation.

I don't want to mess with anything.

I'm just here to receive.

No, no.

We have to be unashamed because the world needs Jesus.

We need to be a church that will be unashamed of what the gospel has done in them.

And for those of you in the room today, maybe there's maybe there's a little bit of a level of embarrassment or shame.

And I don't want to I don't want you to feel I want you to feel convicted, but I don't want you to feel bad.

I'm not coming at you like something's wrong with you.

I'm I'm encouraging you to get so close to God that you are unashamed of how you look when you worship.

Oh, how ugly you look when that mascara comes down.

Sorry, sorry.

I got let me stick up.

Let me stick to my notes.

I don't get in trouble when I'm on my notes.

But that's that's you know, maybe there's young people in the room.

You know, when when I was young, it was very easy for me to check my Christianity at the door when I was entering a place that wasn't a Christian atmosphere.

And so if you have friends that you hang out with regularly and they're not Christian and they begin to influence you, it's not that hard to act shamefully about the Christian that you are.

I was I remember being the same grade being made fun of because I I sang on the church choir.

I got funny looks every time I prayed for my food at lunch, and it was so tempting for me just to stop doing that.

Stop talking about what's going on in church.

But I want you to hear this.

This is the very next section of Romans.

I'm almost done.

But Romans 1 18 through 25.

I want you to read that real quick with me.

It says for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth for what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them for his invisible attributes, namely his eternal power and divine nature have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made.

So they are without excuse for although they knew God, somebody say knew God.

Although they knew God, they did not honor him as God or give thanks to him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened, claiming to be wise.

They became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.

Therefore, God gave them up to the less of their hearts to impurity to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves because they exchange the truth about God for lie and worship and serve the creature rather than the creator.

When we read this section, please don't let me lose you.

Let me give me five more minutes.

When we read this section, we always have the world in mind.

This this is the wrath of God for the world, not the Christian.

I'm good.

That's not me.

And that's that's true.

This is for the world, but we can't be so casual about it either, because notice the progression of the hearts of the people in this passage.

Paul uses the word exchange three times in this chapter.

The people exchanged the glory of God for images.

They exchanged the truth for a lie.

Later, it says they exchanged natural relations for unnatural ones.

So when I was first preparing this message, I thought to call it uneven exchange, because I was going to talk about how when we continuously compromise on the things of God, we end up trading godly things for ungodly ones, ultimately resulting in death.

Notice that at the top of this passage that Paul is talking about people who once knew the glory of God.

They knew it.

That's me.

I know the glory of God.

People who had the truth but began to suppress it.

That is the danger that comes when you live out your Christianity, ashamed of the person that God has made you, because little by little you begin to make these uneven exchanges.

You begin to make compromises.

You settle for church, maybe just a couple of times a month.

You settle for a week prayer life.

You open the door to so many things that don't give God glory.

You become tolerant of sin and you never get it out of your house.

You exchange and you exchange and you exchange until one day you exchange your soul for the world and you didn't even notice it.

This is why, this is why this message has to be preached.

We have to live unashamed of who the gospel has made us.

Unashamed of loving Jesus.

Unashamed of bringing him honor and glory to his name and everything that we do.

Unashamed of your convictions.

We got to be so unashamed that the world can see it without you even speaking it.

Worship team, can you come up?

I want to close with this.

See, I want to close on that last point.

Peter was never ashamed of Jesus.

Peter denied Jesus.

Yes, he did.

But he denied Jesus because he had a weak moment where he was afraid of his life.

He didn't want to go to prison.

Peter was never ashamed of Jesus.

In fact, Peter was so unashamed of Jesus that it gave him away.

I heard a preacher explain it well, man.

When all the disciples fled for fear of their life, the Bible says what?

Peter followed Jesus at a distance.

He was following his Lord to get tried.

And I imagine, you know, I like to, you know, think about the whole scene.

I imagine Peter there biting his nails, really, really uncomfortable, swaying back and forth, sweaty palms, maybe trying to hold back tears.

The look on his face, a dead giveaway that he was concerned for his best friend and his Lord, Jesus.

And so the Bible says that a servant girl recognized him and said, "Hey, hey, you were also with Jesus.

You're one of them."

And he had to deny it.

He had to lie about it.

And then somebody else says, "No, hey, your speech betrays you.

You sound like him.

You sound like a Christian.

You look like a Christian.

You walk like a Christian."

Peter had to deny, knowing he had to lie.

And three times they insisted that Peter knows Jesus.

Finally, the Bible says that Peter had to result in cursing and swearing to make it look like he hadn't been a loyal follower of Jesus for three years.

Peter had to look like the world to disassociate himself from Jesus.

I'm not making light of Peter's denial of Jesus, but you don't have to lie about being ashamed of Jesus.

If you're ashamed of Jesus, it probably looks like it.

When I was 17, I was just talking about this yesterday, my cousins took me to a club for the first time.

It was in Mexico.

My dad's side of the family.

And it gets darker.

I think we were there for Abuela's funeral.

Y'all can laugh.

But we were there for that.

And one night, you know, family gets together.

We're having fun.

Ryancito hasn't been to a club.

Let's take him to a club.

Of course, this was done without parents' permission, right?

Yeah, we're just going to go out.

We're going to go eat.

And so we go out to this club and I'm there.

Look, I'm church boy, man.

OK, born and raised in church.

I almost wore a suit and tie to the club, you know?

And so I was there and it was it was the worst experience.

They had literally demonic music.

And my cousins were like, this is not normal.

This isn't like a typical club.

On the background, they had a man dressed like the devil.

And they said it said, Dance with the devil.

And I was looking at my cousins like, where did y'all bring me?

And I can tell you that the entire time I was there, I looked uncomfortable.

I just looked like I was just sitting there waiting for the music to start.

I was just sitting there waiting to be called up to preach sermon.

I was so uncomfortable and no, I don't want a shot and no, I don't want to dance.

And I don't even want to be here.

See, even though I was in an ungodly place and made it look like I was of the world, I still sounded like a Christian.

I still talk like a Christian and I was still unashamed of being a Christian.

We need men and women of God who go out into the world, who are unashamed to live by the gospel.

Every week you hear me quote Romans 10, 9.

And with this, I close.

I'm going to ask that you stand.

The Bible says that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and you believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Verse 13 says, For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

And then he says, this is one of the most beautiful verses in all of scripture.

Paul says, how then will they call on him?

They being the world, how will they call on him whom they have not believed?

And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?

And how are they to hear without someone preaching?

And how are they to preach unless they are sent as it is written?

How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel?

But to tie it back in to the very first verse we read, how can we preach if we are ashamed of the gospel?

I want to challenge you, man and woman of God, to get so close to God, so close to God, that just when people look at you, they see a peace, and they see a joy, and there is such a presence about you, one that commands grace, and one that has patience, and one that loves, and one that has compassion for people.

The closer you get to God, personal testimony, the closer you get to God, you realize how close or how distant other people are from God.

And I can tell you that there was probably a time in my life where I was a little bit more, you know, politically correct about the things of the gospel.

You know, I didn't want to just tell everybody, you know, what I thought, you know, even though I loved God, but it wasn't until I got closer and I allowed this gospel to become a part of me.

I'm not just a preacher of what it says, I'm a doer of what it says.

And the closer I got to God, it's like God's DNA was just a part of me.

I can't not talk about Jesus, even if I'm not at church.

I can't not praise God when something good happens.

I can't not just pray when I feel the need to pray.

I could be at Home Depot.

I don't really go to Home Depot.

But when I go places, I'm not ashamed of being who God has made me.

And so I challenge you, man and woman of God, to get so deep, so lost in the presence of God that people begin to notice.

Don't be ashamed of this gospel because Jesus was never ashamed of you.

We worship you, my God.

With your head bowed this morning, eyes closed, I want to do this first.

I want to offer salvation this morning to anybody in the room who's not walking with Jesus.

The Bible says that whoever calls upon the name of the Lord will be saved.

And maybe you're not walking with God today.

Maybe you're not.

You have not accepted him as Lord and Savior.

Maybe you're still on the fence.

But Jesus wants to grab a hold of you today.

And he wants to walk with you.

And he wants to give you life.

And he wants to love you.

And he wants to remind you that no matter what you have done, there is no power in hell or on earth that could surpass the blessing of his grace.

And so if you want to come into fellowship with Jesus and get to know him on a deeper level, I just invite you right there where you're at to lift up your hands with every head bowed, every eye closed.

If that's you, you want to accept Jesus as Lord and Savior today.

Just raise your hand.

Raise your hand if that's you.

I see you.

I see you, sister.

I see you.

I see you, brother.

I see you.

Come on, raise them high.

Raise them high for me.

Come on.

Yes, come on.

Nine people saying yes to Jesus.

Is that it?

Come on.

Yes, Lord.

Yes.

Yes.

Yes.

We worship you, Father.

You deserve the glory, my God.

My God, I pray right now, Lord, that you would enter, enter this room right now.

Enter this room, Father.

I pray, my God, over this next few moments, my God, that we would feel the warmth of your presence, Lord.

Every person who is saying yes to you today, Father God, I pray, my God, a transformed life over them.

I pray, Father God, that this is not just something that they hear, but something that they receive in Jesus' name.

And I pray that it would transform the way that they think and the way that they speak and the way that they live, Father.

I pray that it would transform their entire life to God be all the glory.

I want you to repeat this prayer after me with a sincere heart.

Thanks for listening.

If you'd like some more information on PNEUMA Church, visit us on our website at mypneumachurch.org.

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Thanks again and God bless.