Nora Ephron who is the writer of romantic comedies that you might be familiar with of sleepless in Seattle or when Harry met sally. She started to fall in love with writing. When she was in high school, she had a high school teacher whose name was Charlie Simms. He taught journalism 101 at Beverly Hills High School. And one of the early assignments in journalism one on one. Uh Mr Simms gave the assignment that as a journalist or as a writer it's important to find the lead of the story when you hear the facts. It's important to find what is the lead. What is the first thing that you say out of your mouth when you share the news or you right an article. And so he gave his students this challenge to find the lead from this news story to share in the student newspaper or in the student announcements. And so I want to see if you can find the lead in this exact same announcement. So he read this to his students. He said here is an example of information that you might find as a journalist here for the school that you have to discover the lead. And he told his students, he said mr Kenneth Peters, the principal of the high school announced today that the entire faculty will travel to sacramento next thursday for a colloquium in new teaching methods, speakers include anthropologist, Margaret mead, college president dr robert hutchins and California, Governor Pat Brown and he said okay there's your information students now right what is your lead statement or your lead story from that story. So they went away typing on their manual typewriters, that's because those were things. And so they started typing up on the typewriters and they would turn in the lead and he's like, oh good, try, nope good, try, nope. And so that some would talk about sacramento, someone talk about the governor of California being there, but can you guess what is the lead to that story says that there is no school next thursday? See the first sentence of that statement was that the entire faculty would travel to sacramento. And so he said, journalism is not just regurgitating facts, but finding what is the most important detail for the audience to which you're communicating. And so for the lead in that story, is that for the student says, hey, guess what next thursday? There's no school. And so for us in our lives, the question I want to start off this morning's message with is what is the lead in your life? If you examine the facts of your life, your details, your relationships, what is it that directs you? What is it that describes you? What is the most important fact that would tell someone about who you are and what you do And when you examine the lead in your life, it comes back to what is your primary priority? The word priority originated in the 14th century from a Latin word meaning this mattered the most. Now, the word priority used to remain singular and then it wasn't until the 20th century that they made that word plural priorities and changed the definition slightly to mean something that matters now. I'm not gonna give you a hard time because I myself will use that phrase, Okay, what are your priorities? And we make it plural. But what's important to understand that it starts with what is most important? What ranks first in your life? What has precedence in your life? Because if it's anything other than your relationship with God, then you're missing something. And that if jesus is not the lord of all, then he's really not the lord at all in your life, God doesn't settle for 2nd, 3rd or fourth place. He does not even settle for the first in the line of many. When we were in our launch team phase as a church plant. Getting ready to start. We walked through the book of Colossians and we talked about how in Colossians one Jesus is described as being preeminent and preeminence means only not just first but only think of it this way that if imagine standing there on your wedding day, the groom would not say to his bride. Honey, I love you. You are the first in the line of many. I have other ladies there on the side but you get the first dates and the best ones, don't you worry. Yeah, that's that's doomed to fail. Okay, the same thing is true in our relationship with God, God doesn't want to just be first in the line of many, he wants to be only. And so the question to start off this morning is what has the lead in your life or what is your primary priority? Because it's anything other than your relationship with God, you're going to be missing something. And when it comes to scheduling are our priorities are what we think is most important. Author Greg McCown says this, he says, remember that if you don't prioritize your life, somebody else will, if you do not set the priority in your life, somebody else will set it for you. Now, if you're taking notes, you can write down the big premise for this morning. Is this statement that the right decision can change your direction, the right decision at the right time. One right decision can ultimately change the direction in your life. If you are going this way and you're walking deciding to make the right decision can completely change the direction of your life. And I believe that you are one right decision away this morning from changing your destiny. Here's what I mean by that is that there is this concept in psychology called value attribution where our brains are not, they are not strong enough to take in all the information at all times at a maximum level. And so what we do is we take mental snapshots and we assign value to a person or an object or an idea the first time we interact with that. So that when we see that person, that idea or that thing in the future, our mind has a mental shortcut and says, oh that is worth this much. And so that's how you can be in a crowded room and you can have a conversation with someone and block out the other noise in the room because you have not attributed value to what's surrounding you. Where at the same time is that as you start to look for something that you will now notice it everywhere. For example, my wife and I were in the process of getting a new car. Our old car is on its last leg. It's kind of dying there. And so isn't it interesting that when you look for a new car, guess what you see on the road all the time? The exact car that you're looking for now, where do those all of a sudden appear or was your mind just more present because you are attributing value or you're thinking about something continually. And so now you notice it more often, another example of value attribution is the idea of diamonds, Diamonds are seen as rare, but it really hasn't been until the last 75 years that they've really been valued at such a high level. There's a corporation that de beers organization discovered these massive minds and in a sense for a long time held a monopoly on the diamond production because they owned most of them. And so they actually limited the amount that they would produce and put out into, into the supply of the world so to have the balance of supply and demand. And so by putting out less, they actually raised the value and they just told people over and over again that it was rare. So they limited the supply. They said no, you need a diamond and that diamonds have to be for and it has to be a diamond for an engagement ring. And then they started giving diamonds to celebrities and started putting it in movies. So right along the same time that movies and tv shows were being developed, you saw major motion pictures and people like Marilyn Monroe singing songs like diamonds are a girl's best friend. And so now they started organizing it. That I didn't realize that every kiss begins with, Kay until the commercial told me, okay, now what separates a diamond honestly from a rock? Well our, our minds, our culture, our society has attributed value to something and say this is a rock, this is a diamond and they've given us the four C's and all those things like, oh this is why this one's worth more and so they attributed and assigned a value to something so that now when we see that we think of relationships, we think of privilege, We think of wealth, we think of fame and so I'm not, I'm not dissing the diamonds because that's just the culture we're in and I was excited to like spend 50 cents out of the gumball machine and get a really nice one when I proposed to my wife. But the truth is that like diamonds are awesome, but understand that this is something that we just said as a culture, as a people group. Yes, that is valuable. Now the question is, what are the things that you assign value to in your life? One more example of the value attribution um kind of theory behind this. There was a guy named Nathan, his name was Nathan hand worker in 1916, opened up a hot dog stand on Coney Island. Now eventually this would become Nathan's famous hot dogs to, and the site of the yearly hot dog eating contest where now Joey chestnut somehow and unhuman, like can eat over 70 hot dogs I think in 10 minutes, which is not, that's not, I don't think it's possible and it's kind of gross, but how someone said like, wow, I wanna eat 70 I wanna do that someday, right? I don't know how that was someone's goal. Anyway, So all of the hot dog eating contest, the famous Nathan's hot dogs. All of this started in 1916 when this Polish immigrant came over and opened a hot dog stand now he was struggling at first because they're hot dogs. That stand is the new, he couldn't get people to value them for what he valued them for. He cut the price down, he started putting toppings on it and it wasn't working and it wasn't until he went to the local hospital and he said look he went to the doctors and said I will pay you to just come eat lunch in front of my stand and so doctors from the local hospital and their scrubs would come over to his stand in the in the early like 19 teens and the twenties. And then people would see doctors eating hot dogs on their lunch break and they started attributing, wow, this must be valuable. And so by watching somebody else do something, it actually started the chain that ended up becoming Nathan's famous hot dogs as it is today. Now as a culture, we do that as a people group, we do that, you know that as a teenager in school there were the cool kids, the uncool kids. That is that is value attribution. You're saying, okay, this is good, this is not. So the question is, what are the diamonds and the rocks in your life? What do you, what do you say is this is primary, this is most important, this is of the utmost value and I want to encourage you that the right decision can change your direction of your life. If you value what you should, if you value your relationship with God most if jesus is the lead in your life, it puts everything else in order. But if you do not have jesus in your life as primary as the lead your life is never going to be in order. And so how do we live that out? What does that look like? Well, our culture values faith and by saying, well it's just a crutch. If you if you believe in God, that's that's a crutch, I believe in science, see science can describe how things function, but they do not describe why things are made and the reality is is that faith is not a crutch, but a cornerstone faith gives you answers to life's biggest questions. Faith in God answers questions like why are you here? Where did you come from? Where is your value? Where are you going when you die? How do you describe abstract concepts like love and Joy and beauty? How do you escape suffering? How do you explain suffering? How do you persevere through that? Where does your hope come from? Is there if there is no God even? How do you define evil? If there is no good to pit evil against? When someone has come to me and said, how can there be a God? When there's evil in the world, I would say that evil actually affirms the existence of God because when you see something as evil, you know in your heart that there is something better and there is something more that is value that you've placed in your heart and I'm here to tell you this morning that value that idea that conscience, that picture that longing really points back to jesus. And so we're culture values faith. It only puts it down here as a crutch and says, no, it's not worth that much. Or maybe it views faith as intolerant and judgmental, which ironically, is a judgmental statement, right? That's kind of interesting to say, oh, christians, you're so judgmental as you're judging me saying that I'm judgmental. And so the reality is though, that jesus valued everybody the least, the last, the loss, the marginalized. It didn't matter gender or race or economic status. Jesus offered eternal life and died for everyone for God, so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. And so while culture tries to push faith to the side all you don't need it or that's for when you were a kid or that was a tradition. The reality is is that faith in jesus gives eternal life, it gives forgiveness, It gives meaning, it gives joy, it gives love and it gives abundant life. So how do we show that jesus is the lead in our life and I want to spend a good chunk of our morning here talking about one way that we can do that? And I want to ask you the question of every single person in this room, have you made the decision and have you been baptized, have you been baptized too to declare or to show that jesus is the lead in your life, the word baptism, baptism. Oh, in greek really means to dip or to plunge or to immerse, it's used roughly 100 times in the bible and I want to just address the question of, okay, who should get baptized or really should I get baptized? I don't know, like I've heard about it, that just seems really churchy, like I get spirituality, I get believing in God, I get praying, but like going in water and being dunked. That seems a little like a cult, I'm just going to be straight with you. That's it's weird, okay, if you didn't believe in God or maybe you came and you because of family and you walked in and you saw people with their hands raised and someone going in the water and coming out back up and everyone's shouting, you're like, that's weird, Okay, but what does the bible actually say if jesus really is first in our life, what does the bible actually say about baptism? What does it look like? What does it mean? And what could it mean if you take that step? Well let's dive in. There's three things that the Bible tells us about baptism, number one is that jesus is our model, jesus is our model. If you're sitting there thinking I'm too good to be baptized, that seems too weird, like I'm an adult now, or I'm past a certain age, I don't know if I want to get in the water, that seems odd, understand this, Jesus was baptized the creator of the universe, if anybody does not need to get baptized because they got their stuff altogether, it would be jesus, but notice what it says here in the Gospel of Mark, he writes this in Mark chapter one verse 9 to 11. In those days, Jesus came from Nazareth of galilee and was baptized by john in the Jordan river and when he came up out of the water immediately he saw the heavens being um torn open and the spirit descending on him like a dove and a voice came from heaven. You are my beloved son with you, I am well pleased. So this baptism marked the early start of the ministry of jesus and how awesome would it have been to be by the water and to hear a voice from heaven, This is my beloved son. Okay, but don't miss this, that jesus himself humbled himself to the point of baptism that gave us a picture of what he was going to do just a short time later and to give us a model of what he then calls us to do. So jesus himself is our model to get baptized, secondly, baptism is a part of our mission. So before we quickly right off, I don't need to get baptized, it's in the very mission statement of who we're supposed to be, as a people group, as christians, and as the church, Jesus says at the end of Matthew chapter 28, he says, go therefore and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the father, the son and the Holy Spirit teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you and behold I am with you always to the end of the age, we are called as a church to go and make disciples baptizing them. And this idea is that baptism is an outward picture of an inward belief, it's a declaration of a decision that you've made personally. So you declare publicly, you decide personally. And so when you say things like you like you accept jesus into your heart, that's kind of hard to see your heart, right? But what you're saying to the people around you to the body that celebrates that you were saying, I believe this, I commit my life to you. So baptism is so quickly attached to salvation because it is a picture, it's a tangible picture that people can celebrate their commitment to God. So jesus is our model, baptism is a part of our mission, but also baptism is a picture of the miracle itself, the very beginning of the Church Acts Chapter two, Peter preaches a sermon And then the people respond, starting in verse 37, he says, Now when they heard this, they were cut to the heart and they said to Peter and the rest of the apostles brothers, what shall we do? And Peter said to them, repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of jesus christ for the forgiveness of your sins and you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit for the promise is for you and for your Children and for all who are far off, everyone whom the Lord our God calls to himself and with many other words, he bore witness and continued to exhort them saying save yourselves from this crooked generation. Now, some people have argued that the phrase repent and be baptized attaches salvation to baptism. The problem is while there are 100 verses that talk about baptism, there are hundreds more that talk about salvation and actually don't mention baptism, and in fact when jesus died on the cross, one of the thieves next to him on the cross, acknowledge jesus as the messiah, as the savior, as God, and he says today, you will be with me in paradise. And so how do we reconcile the fact that it says repent and be baptized? Well verse 41 actually gives us the answer it says there, so those who received the word were baptized And they were added that day about 3000 souls. The idea of receiving the message is believing in your heart committing your life to jesus. And then the next step, the first step there of obedience is to then go and get baptized A couple of other verses, they won't be on the screen, but Mark 1616, Jesus says whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. So he's connecting baptism as a picture to demonstrate that you believe. But he said it's it's unbelief that and that sin that separates you from God. There's a story in Acts 18 that Philip is talking to the Ethiopian eunuch and he's explaining the scriptures to him and they're going along the side of the road and it clicks for him and he believes and so peter is telling him about the importance of baptized getting baptized and he says, wait, there's water, what are we waiting for. And so right there on the side of the road that actually baptizes the Ethiopian eunuch. In other stories, they're going from two different towns. So in Ephesus, they go to Ephesus and Paul's preaching and it says this in acts 19 that on hearing this, they were baptized in the name of the Lord, Jesus. So over and over again in scripture here, this idea that you believe in jesus as Lord and savior and then get baptized believe and get baptized as an expression of that. Now the reason we can say it's a picture because in romans 64 colossians two Galatians three and then even second Corinthians five it says the same thing that the idea that you have been buried in the likeness of his death. That's why when someone is baptized and they go under the water it represents being buried with christ And then it actually says in Romans 64 that you are raised to newness of life. So it is a symbol or a picture of your new identity in jesus of being forgiven of having eternal life, of committing your life to him. And so he's been giving us this challenge, this command to get baptized. So should we do it? Well jesus is the model. So we can't say we're too good for it, baptism is a part of our mission. So if we call ourselves christians as a church, we can't ignore it. And then baptism is a picture of the very miracle that happens in our heart that we die to self and we were raised because of God were given forgiveness and our purpose now is found in God. So scripture gives us the argument for why we should get baptized. But I want to highlight the fact that I understand that it's scary and so I want to I want to close this morning with this this idea, I want a picture that you're on the show the voice. Are you familiar with the show the voice. If someone stands up and they sing and there's four coaches turned around and if they like what they hear, they pushed their button and they turn around now if multiple chairs turn around then the person who's singing now has to choose which voice or which coach will they go with now instead of standing up and singing, I imagine just imagine yourself standing up on the stage with four chairs out in front of you and you say to yourself, should I get baptized and you ask the question and four chairs turn around and the four chairs in this story are fear, pride, doubt and truth because these are all voices that you will hear if you're thinking about taking that step towards baptism now the first coach fear is going to try to tell you, hey, what are people going to think of? You see baptism is not what people say of you, baptism is about what you say, if jesus, it's not about what other people think about you, it's about what do you think and say about jesus, Jesus says this and it's kind of scary says in luke, he says that if you deny me before men, I will deny you before my father. But then the opposite is true is that if we declare God before community, that God will bring us before the heavenly father as well, so fear says what will people think and it can be scary, I understand that's like wait a second, I'm an adult, I I'm I'm older as you know, that was something for kids and then you do that, which we celebrate when kids make those decisions. But the reality is is that I think a lot of our fear is unmerited, to be honest, like if we were in another country where we would be persecuted and killed for getting baptized, I could understand maybe a little more fear coming in our faith, but people are actually still doing that. But in the bible, it actually says God did not give us a spirit of fear but of power and of love and self control. And when you're in a family setting, man, I can promise you this, you are going to be celebrated and you're going to be loved. I never remember going to a wedding that when the bride walked down, you started hearing boos, that would be really awkward, wouldn't it? Everyone stand here comes the bride boo like, oh, everyone's so excited when you have a relationship with God. When you believe in jesus, he's described as a group and we're the bride that there's a relationship there or think about this. I've never heard booing at a family birthday, Happy birthday to you, boo! Like that's weird. That's awkward, right? Why? Because it's a celebration and you're with family and you're with friends and when you choose to get baptized publicly, it is a celebration of the church, it is a celebration in heaven and it is a declaration of who jesus is and so I want you to don't listen to fear because God did not give us a spirit of fear, but he gave us power, love and self control. It is not about what people think about you, it's about, what do you think about God? Now the second voice that's gonna try to talk to you, it's pride. Pride says, hey, you know it's been too long. You missed your chance, okay? You missed your chance. It's kind of like if you ever, I met someone at work or in the community in the neighborhood and you forgot to learn their name and then pretty soon you started a habit of like talking to the person but you don't quite know the name and now you've talked to them too many times to ask and it would be awkward. Do you know what I'm talking about? Maybe I'm the only one that this has happened to. Okay and you feel like I can't now it's too that'd be weird. It's been too long. Some of you that about baptism, but I want to show you a picture there's a picture of this lady. Her name is Ophelia White. Ophelia White is 94, bu y is 94 she said this, she got baptized, this was just a week ago, it was just a week ago, the church and her baptism went viral, which is just awesome. And she said this, I want people to know that it's never too late to be a christian. So get with it. See baptism does not diminish your past. It's not saying, okay, I am awful before. It's not baptism is not diminishing your past, it's a declaration of your future. Fear is going to say no, no, no, no, you can't do that. Pride is gonna come and say, hey, you missed, you missed your chance is too far and then doubts gonna say, hey, you're not good enough, you're not ready. Who do you think you are? Do you have issues? Everyone has issues. See the baptism is what's seen as an open handed issue and I say that because I want to respectfully understand that there are different traditions and practices And so maybe some of you in this room, grew up in a tradition that practiced the sprinkling of water on babies. Now, the heartbeat behind that as a dedication of a child. In fact on February nine, we're going to do what's called a baby dedication here in this church, but a dedication of a child is that you are saying, I am committing to raise this child under the Lord's wisdom and I'm giving this child to God, but that dedication is not a picture of salvation, let me share with you all the scriptures in which infants are baptized, Yeah, there are none, there are none. Church tradition actually um years later, even 100 years later started this practice at a fear for their kids. And so they would take verses that someone in their entire household was saved. Those are the verses they were pointing to. Now the household never talked about infants and there are actually zero instances of a baby being baptized in there. Now, if baptism actually means immerse, well that seems not humane to immerse a baby in water. And so then they kind of started sprinkling and so there is a respect and I understand the intent of that and I want to point out that baptism, I think we've shared is not what saves you. So if you were sprinkled as a baby, I'm not, I don't want to discredit the past. Okay, but I want to share as your pastor the friend of what scripture actually says and of 100 times the word baptism is used every single time. It's referring to immersion And and sometimes it talks about baptism of the spirit, but again, one is a physical picture, the other one is a spiritual reality. And so if you're saying to yourself that man, I was sprinkled as a baby, does that count. What I want to ask you is that I can't think of a better gift to give your family, your friends and your community than publicly declaring jesus christ before them. And so don't listen to fear. Don't listen to pride. Don't listen to doubt. Instead listen to truth because here's what truth says, truth says that if you believe that jesus is your savior, you are ready because Jesus is waiting, God himself was baptized. It's in our very mission and it's the picture of our salvation. I can't think of a better statement and legacy to leave your family than to public publicly declare that you are committing your life to jesus. So if the band comes up on stage, I want to challenge you with this. Are you ready to make that declaration in two weeks On February two, we're gonna end our service with baptism. And are you willing to take that step? Taylor's sitting out here and and took that step in the fall and I think she can attribute to that, was that a good or a negative experience. It was amazing. and in front of her friends in front of 11 community declared publicly that she believes in jesus. So I want to encourage you and challenge you. Are you willing to make that commitment public? If you close your eyes and bow your heads for just a minute, I want to pray for us and before you can get baptized, the one stipulation is that you receive jesus into your life and if you've never prayed to receive jesus, I want to give you that opportunity right now and I want you to pray along with me. Dear God, I acknowledge that I'm a sinner, I can't go through life alone and got in my humility. God, I I believe that jesus, you are God and that you are my savior and that by dying on a cross, you paid for my sins and by rising again, you conquered death. And so God, I believe in you that you are the only way to heaven and I commit my life to you guys and God for those who have made that decision, may this be a sunday that they can look back on the date that they are baptized because it's not something that if you're not feeling good, you need to baptize and get baptized again and again. It's not it's not about a feeling, it's not about just an experience. God, it's about obedience. And so we're not trying to get a bunch of people re baptized, but God for those that are in the room that are thinking about it, I pray that they would mark on that card, maybe they're receiving jesus into their life for the first time or may they mark on that connection card and God that they want more information on baptism or in the other section, they can write down that I want to get baptized now and I pray that God here in two weeks when we have our baptism service that we will celebrate those who are old enough to understand who you are and are making a decision on their own, that they're saying, I believe that they will not listen to the voices of fear of pride and doubt, but God, they will listen to the voice of truth and they will walk in obedience and they will decide to get baptized in your name, jesus. And so it's in that power. We thank you and we praise you and God, I pray for those that have been baptized, but we just re examine our hearts when we make sure that you are the lead in our life and that we can make that right decision to change the direction and destiny in our life. God, we love you and it's your son's name. We pray. Amen.