Let's pray together. Father, we love you. We are so grateful for your word and what it does to change us and transform us. Father, we are thankful for the fathers and the gift of fatherhood that you have given to us, the gift of family. Lord, raise up strong men as fathers in this community. Raise up strong men as fathers in this church. God, use us to glorify thy name in all of the earth. In Jesus' name we pray, amen. The world needs more Ray Winters. The world needs more Ray Winters. And I don't think any of you know who Ray Winter is. But that's the point. Ray Winter is a dad. And Ray Winter works a regular job. He travels every now and then. But Ray Winter is a man who fathers his children well. He builds forts with them and woods. He takes them to play disc golf. He throws birthday parties for his kids and he cooks on the grill for them. He stays with them faithfully and shows them what Christian manhood is all about. He's not the biggest and strongest guy, but he's strong in his faith. He's a faithful member of his church. He loves Jesus. He loves his wife. The world needs more Ray Winters. Men who love Jesus, who love their wives, and love their families dearly. Ray is a friend of mine, lives in Baton Rouge. And I told him yesterday, I saw him yesterday, I said, Ray, I'm talking about you tomorrow, because you are what the world needs more of. And on Father's Day, we celebrate the unknown dads. who do what dads need to do in Jesus' name. As I was thinking about this last night, what Ray Winter does is a lot like what happened this week in this church. And if I may, I'm going to call out some of the men of this church on Father's Day. because Hilton Guidry stood at the back door and greeted kids as they came in and made sure no kids were run over in our parking lot. Thank you Hilton Guidry. Mr. Chester opened doors and greeted families and kids. He made biscuits and he was the first one here I think every morning. Thank you Chester. Rick taught a class. Rick Greeted kids, gave them high fives as they walked in and stood by with his wife, as you could see. Throughout the week, making sure that kids heard the gospel, that Jesus saves sinners that repent. David, who's not here this morning, David Persick, hopped around like a frog this week. And I got this, I asked Jeff what he did. I'm gonna quote Jeff. He was a big help. He helped us with visual aids in class. He read scriptures. He helped a ton with Miss Avery. He took the boys to the bathroom. He got the kids hopping and dancing. He was just great. Thank you, David. Jeff dressed like a jungle guy and was the master teacher in his class and just does what Jeff does. Thank you, Jeff. Steve Martin wrangled preschool kids. Three cheers for Steve Martin. He manned the puzzle station. And he kept the kids from eating paint while they were painting their shirts. Thank you, Steve Martin. Wayne Feru. You're looking at Wayne Feru and all the sets that Wayne does. Not only did Wayne help build the sets, but he organized the building of the sets, and he was Miss Kathy's right-hand man throughout the week. Where are you, Wayne? Not here. Thank you, Wayne, if you're watching this. How about Jason? Jason went upstairs and taught the kids. He filled in in our drama set for the week. He kept the sloths moving. Thank you, Jason. Not even a member of our church, but a faithful, God-loving member of our church, our sister church, and their church got to participate in this church's VVS. Praise the Lord. Donald, he was more than a candy man this week. Donald got these sets going. He greeted each child in the hall with a smile because Donald passed a smile. Thank you, Donald, for what you did this week. Jack greeted all the kids. Jack was a part of the setting, and y'all just know what Jack Franklin does. He helps everybody around him. Jack, thank you. Manny Kutar helped. Fathers, fathering in the church, doing what fathers do, and I may have missed some. If I did, I apologize. Please, if you know another one, let me know. Fathers in this church caring for their family. by screwing screws in wood and giving a kid a high five on his way in. This is what fatherhood is about. Ray Winter is invested and active in his family. I told Gary this morning, I thought about Gary on the way to church. So Gary, forgive me for calling you out, but I was thinking about active fathers and their families. And I thought about Gary helping the Soapbox Derby every year and helping his son be a part of that. Men, Peyton, fathers-to-be, be involved, be active, be a part of things, and care for your son like you do for your brother-in-laws. This is what Christian manhood and fatherhood is about. Being there, being present, being active. And we're gonna look at a passage of scripture this morning that gives you even more resources. So if you have your Bible, I wanna invite you to open up to Philippians chapter two. We're gonna walk through a couple of verses in Philippians chapter two that give us the mind of Christ. That's what we're talking about. Froneo Christu, the mind of Christ. What does it mean to walk and think and live and act like Jesus at 4.30 on Monday afternoon? What does that mean? It means our mind is focused on the glory of God and presenting the picture of Jesus to the world around us. If you can think about it like this, the mind of Christ is being the one guy walking through the woods with a lantern that everybody's counting on to shine the light. because you, Christian, you have the light of Jesus. And as we'll look at later in the message today through the scripture, you are in a twisted and crooked generation of a world, but you have the light. So let's carry it well with the mind of Christ. Philippians chapter two, verse 14 says this, do all things, oh, y'all gotta read this with me. Y'all help read this with me. Do all things without grumbling or or disputing. This is really practical for us, all right? Do all things without grumbling or disputing. And I want you to know this verse has context. If you just take the verse out, it's a great verse and I could preach a sermon on the verse without any context. But what I'd like to do is give you context so that you know what's going on with this verse. So let's back up just a bit to verse 12. where he says at the end of the verse, work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and work for his good pleasure. We've talked about these verses, but here's where it comes from. Do all things without grumbling or complaining is a part of working out the salvation that God has put in you. So Christian, I'm talking to you this morning And I'm talking to myself because I want you to know that I grumble and I complain. And I'm assuming that you do as well. In fact, I know that some of you do because I've heard you do it. And your wives and your husbands know if I don't know. But this has context. So Christians, this is not about just a happy atmosphere that's fabricated, using rules to make us act right. That's one way of doing it. This is about the salvation that God has placed in your soul. that produces in you a mind that is now new where my hope is that I don't grumble or complain and look I know we all have done it and we're all going to do it but Christianity is about when we recognize we do it we stop and we go okay I've got to do this better and and how do we know how to do that and that's what the message is about today but we've got to get back to I now have the mind of Christ and now I no longer want to be a grumbler and I no longer want to be a complainer. Christian, this is about working out what is in us the Spirit of God has put in our souls. So here's what I want to do. I want to define, and which I think will be very helpful, define what grumbling and complaining is. So let's start with grumbling. The scripture tells us God has worked in us a salvation, and part of that working out is that we're not grumbling or complaining. What is grumbling? What is grumbling? And let me give you this definition. I think it will be helpful to you. And I just made it up based on what I read in scripture and understand. So if it's not very good, then go find another definition. But here's what I would call grumbling. Non-redemptive criticism. Non-redemptive criticism. And I say non-redemptive because criticism is not always bad, right? Right? Because sometimes things need to be fixed. And we have people around us who help us fix things. In fact, just a moment ago, just a moment ago, I was singing here at this microphone. I looked down at my wife and she was going... And she said, back up a little bit. Something's wrong with your mic. Oh, it's these walls up. It's just in the midst of worship. And so I was like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah. Was she grumbling? No, she wasn't grumbling. She was redemptively redeeming me by giving me helpful criticism. So it's not just criticism is bad. It's grumbling. It's I'm just talking bad because I'm mad. I don't like it. And I'm not trying to help anybody, I'm just grumbling. Sometimes Christians call this venting. I'm just venting. Well, you're really just grumbling, but you can call it venting. Grumbling is non-redemptive criticism. It's when we're not trying to help somebody or doing it in a helpful way, but we're speaking criticism and negativity into under our breath or to someone else, usually to someone else because that makes us feel better. The Apostle Paul tells us to do all things without grumbling or complaining because with the mind of Christ, can y'all imagine Jesus venting in the way that we do sometimes? Jesus would come and it's not that he wouldn't be critical to people because he called people brood of vipers. He called people hypocrites. He was quite critical of people. So we can't say being critical is wrong. But what we can say is Jesus was using that to show people how they needed to straighten up. And to people who were abrasive, harsh, and Violent, he did it in the way they did it. But to people who were down and about to be stoned to death by people around them, he met them where they were. And he said, what did you do to criticize her? He said, go now and sin no more. It was a criticism. But it wasn't grumbling to her. It was helping her to now live the life that she was supposed to live. So there is a difference between being critical and grumbling. And when we have the mind of Christ, we now can see, okay, I'm just grumbling now. Or I'm trying to be helpful to someone in the spirit of Christ and in a spirit of love. I'm trying to be helpful to someone. Let all that you do be done in what? In love. It says Paul in Colossians. Let's look at an example of grumbling in the scripture. If you have your Bible, Numbers chapter 14. Now, God had just redeemed his people from the land of Egypt. And he brought them to the cusp of the promised land and he sent spies in to go look at the promised land. And they sent 12. And 10 of the spies came back to the leadership, the elders of Israel, and they said, we can stay right where we are. There's giants in the hills over there. We're not going in. We saw people that we can't fight. We're not going in. Two of them said, we serve the Lord most high. He can be any giant that we see. But 10 of them came back and stirred up the congregation to say, no way we're going in there. They're bigger than us. And you think about the little kid trying to fight the bully, and he just kind of holds his hand out. That's kind of the fight they were going to go into. And listen to what happens in Numbers chapter 14. Then all of the congregation raised a loud cry and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel, what did they do? They grumbled against Moses and Aaron. The whole congregation said to them, would that we have died in the land of Egypt when they were beating us day after day, how great that was, or Would that we have died in this wilderness. Why is the Lord bringing us into this land to fall by the sword? How could he do that? Our wives and our little ones will become prey. Would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt? And then they said to one another, let us choose a leader and go back to Egypt. Let me give you a truth here just in these verses. Grumbling is an attempt to blame somebody for not doing it my way most of the time. Not all the time. Sometimes we grumble for other reasons, but many times we grumble because somebody's not doing it my way. And let me give you another little tidbit of information. Oftentimes, we're grumbling against God. You say, oh, I would never do such a thing. Would not grumble against the Lord. Now, they did it here in these verses, but I wouldn't do that. Let me provide you a bit of context of why I say that. Do you believe that God rules and reigns from heaven? Do you believe that all things are working together for good for those who love God and who are called according to His purpose? Romans 8, 28. Do you believe that God governs this universe and that the lot is cast in the lap, but it's every decision is from God? Do you believe that the grass grows on the hills because God raises that grass up to feed the cows? and the grazing animals. Do you believe that God is in control of this universe? Then when we grumble against circumstances around us, in essence, we're saying, God, I don't like the way you're doing this thing. I don't like the way you made me. I don't like the way my DNA showed up. Why can't I be more like her or him? Much of our grumbling, even if we don't realize it, is against the maker of heaven and earth and the one who rules and reigns daily, hourly, momentarily. Every moment, however you would say that. We are grumbling against God when we are mad at God because that red light changed when we're trying to get where we need to get. Consider that. People of Israel want a new leader. And Moses goes and he prays and says, Lord, what will we do? And the Lord says, I'm going to skip through, Craig, because I'm running behind. And the Lord says, I will now remove my protection from among the people that I have protected throughout this land. Remember, they are at the cusp of the promised land. ready to walk in under God's protective hand, who's carried them out of the most powerful land, Egypt, through a desert by providing miraculous food every day for them, and water and drink, and brought them to the cusp, and they see some tall guys and say, ah, nah, we can't do that. And God says, you don't trust me. I will remove now my hedge of protection around you. And those folks get turned right around. They get exactly what they want. And they march back into the desert. And the Bible says that every one of them, save Joshua and Caleb, die before they get to enter the promised land. Why? Because they grumbled. And I'm gonna go a little bit deeper than that. Because they revolted against God and grumbled. And so Christian, I want to share with you and encourage you today. I'm not fussing at you. A little bit I'm fussing at you. But I want to encourage you. When you are tempted to grumble, it's more than a grumble. It's a lack of trust and faith in God's sovereign goodness to you. The grumble is that manifestation of you being unhappy with God. So I wanna encourage you, when you feel the grumbling, when you hear the grumbling, when somebody says, and you can help each other, hey, you're kinda grumbling a little bit, you can go, okay. You're right. God, I'm just not happy right now, but I'm going to trust you even though I don't like my situation. Notice, church, that grumbling in our hearts comes from a lack of the application of faith. It comes from us not trusting God properly. How does it manifest in your life, brother or sister? Does it manifest by you grumbling about your husband or your wife? About your mom and dad maybe? Does it manifest in you grumbling about something going on at the office or at the church or at the hunting club? wherever the grumbling is rooted in you, I wanna encourage you to, by faith, trust in God's sovereign goodness, and if you think something needs to be corrected, then transform your non-redemptive complaining into redemptive complaint. So for instance, if your husband always leaves the seat on the toilet up, And that's pretty grievous, I know. Especially in the middle of the night, right? You know what would be great? Instead of saying, why do you always, y'all have heard this before, right? Why can't you ever, how about saying, you know, dear, that water's cold. And I would really appreciate it if, You pull that seat down every time. It would mean a lot to me. Or you could go say, why don't you ever put the seat down? It's so frustrating that every time, or you can do that. But the redemptive work, now that's a silly example, but I know that y'all can think of a thousand examples of where you do not approach things with redemptive correction. And I think we can all do a little bit better. Here's another one. Sometimes we gather together for prayer requests. I didn't get the laugh I thought it would. Sometimes we gather together for prayer requests when we complain about the president. Have y'all heard those? Y'all haven't heard those have you? Can you believe this president? Can you believe this governor? As Christian men and women, we need to know what's going on around us. We need to understand politics and we need to know what the president does and doesn't do. I'm not saying don't know. However, as Christian men and women, we should not look like talking heads on TV stations and just repeat what Fox News and CNN say. We are Christian men and women who should speak redemptively and say things like, you know what we could do that would be better? And maybe I can be involved in this is X, Y, Z. Or man, the youth in this country, they're just, they're crazy. They don't know what they're, or maybe we could say, I want to make a difference by being a part of the youth in this country and modeling to them what good Christian men and women do. And just for the sake, I am proud of the youth of our country because I think we have many of them that love God and are serving God, just for the record. Politics. I'm going to get you one more and then I'm moving on. I'm not going to ask you to show your hands, but what about when that light, that goofy light at Lukeville that's always red for some, why is that light always red? Get grumbling. Maybe it's red to keep me out of that accident that I may have gotten in. We've got to think like that. I've got to think like that. Grumbling will take over. Paul says do all things without grumbling or disputing. So let's look at disputing a bit, it's a different word. Oh, let me read, well, 1 Peter 4, 9, this is a good one. I think you've got it up here, Craig, if you can. 1 Peter 4, 9 says this, show hospitality to one another without grumbling. Sometimes we do a good deed and then complain about it. Any of y'all like that? I'm gonna go do something good for you, but I'm gonna make you pay for it by how I talk to you. Somebody's smiling out there. A couple of y'all have done that before. I will be nice to him, but he's going to pay for it. Y'all know how it is. Show hospitality without grumbling. Did you know if you're going to be nice to somebody, you might as well get the credit for it by being nice about how you're being nice. Because God's looking, and He's pleased when we show hospitality to one another, but He's not pleased when we're grumbling about it, if that makes sense. All right, let's keep going. What is disputing? Also translated, same word, translated arguing. Some translations. Disputing is non-redemptive conflict. Non-redemptive conflict. Rather than non-redemptive criticism, which is the grumbling, non-redemptive conflict would be the disputing portion of this, arguing, wanting to fuss or get our own way in a non-redemptive way. Now, arguing is not always bad. In fact, arguing is very good oftentimes. The Christian faith exists today because people argued over history. Right, Jay? People said, we're going to make these creeds, we're going to argue about it until we get it, and argue in a good way. We're going to debate these things, we're going to bring scriptures together, we're going to figure out what does God's word say, and then let's write it down. But we're going to get a council together and argue about it, argue to the truth, and then we're going to write it down. And look, many of y'all do the Apostles' Creed. We've talked about it here. We've taught it here. These are Christian truths that need to be known because people argue. But there is a non-redemptive arguing. Grumbling, you're not really engaging with somebody else. Arguing, this non-redemptive arguing is, all right, I'm talking back. She made me back. I'm going back at this. It's non-redemptive arguing. Now, sometimes there needs to be healthy arguments between people because we need to get to the truth. But non-redemptive arguing gets to name-calling, running people down, being critical of things that people can't change, bringing up the past when someone has asked to be forgiven about it. There are a lot of things that you can do in an argument that are just what is called ad hominem or against the person. It's not the idea we're trying to get straight. It's not the truth that we're arguing. It's the person you start to argue. And this happens a lot in families, doesn't it? It'll start with something of, who wants the last cup of strawberry milk? I don't know what family that happened in this week, but it happened in some family this week. Who wants the last cup of strawberry milk? Well, I should get the last cup. You had the last cup of strawberry milk. No, I didn't. Sometimes stuff like that happens. Non-redemptive. You know what the redemptive argument could be? We've only got one cup of strawberry milk. What should we do? Share it! We'll each take half. And now we redeemed a problem by critically thinking through and coming to a solution. And this is where healthy arguments should come. Do all things without grumbling or arguing. If we can use the fact that there are differences of opinion, but use that to say, but we're gonna, we're gonna redemptively talk through those things rather than start attacking our past, present, future, or genetic makeup. We would be in a lot better shape inside the church and inside our families. I'm gonna read you quickly from Exodus 17. This is the disputing, the argument that took place there. All of the congregation of the people of Israel moved on from the wilderness of sin by stages, according to the commandment of the Lord, and they camped at Rephidim. But there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore, the people quarreled with Moses and said, give us water to drink. And Moses said to them, why do you quarrel with me? Why do you argue with me? Why do you dispute with me? And then he said, what? Can y'all help me out? Why do you test the Lord? Oftentimes when we are arguing, it's not that we're trying to get what is right. That argument will turn into just trying to win that argument. I don't know if y'all have ever reached that point before, but if y'all remember a guy named Chaz Keating from years ago, Chaz Keating and I had a lot of arguments together that turned into trying to find the truth to trying to win the argument. I love you, Chaz. That's what happens. It becomes a quarrel rather than a quest for what is best. I had one of our VBS kids was crying this week. He got upset about something. He was crying. And I said, young man, why are you upset? And he said, he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said this, it's my human right to cry. What would you say to somebody like that? I looked right back at him and said, you're right. It's your human right to cry. But is it the best thing you can be doing right now? And he looked at me and he said, I don't care. I'm going to cry. I was trying to get across the point that it wasn't the best thing because it was a misunderstanding and all these sorts of things. It wasn't going to help him out to be fussing and upset about the situation. When quarreling or the temptation to quarrel comes, Church, someone's got to step up and say, I want to do what's best, not just win the quarrel. Let me turn this to some application. And dads, I wanna specifically talk to you today as fathers there. Christian fatherhood, I think a very helpful facet of Christian fatherhood is knowing what is best for our family and being willing to accomplish those best things. So Christian dads and dads-to-be, There's always going to be conflict in the family. Kids are growing up. You married a sinner. You are a sinner. There's always going to be conflict in the family. What I'm going to challenge you as dads today publicly is this. When conflict arises, when grumbling or complaining arises, when grumbling or disputes arise in your home, I'm going to challenge the dads in here to step up and make a difference by saying, let's get to the bottom of this in a redemptive way. We're gonna stop for a moment, and we're gonna stop the grumbling, we're gonna stop the arguing, and we're going to try to redeem this situation. So dads, I'm calling you to get your brains on, and rather than even being a catalyst of the conflict in your home, is to be, blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall, I don't know what they shall do, but Jesus said you're blessed, you're a peacemaker. You'll receive the kingdom of heaven, I think. I'm calling you dads to be peacemakers in your home that know how to stifle and have that strengthen your home. Just lower the volume and to come to redemptive solutions, whether it's with your wife, whether it's with your kids or between your kids or your kids and your wife. Step up, be involved, do what Ray Leonard would do. Love God, be involved, and come to redemptive ways of problem solving in your family. And I wanna tell you, it's not always easy. It's not always as easy as you get half the strawberry milk and you get the other half. Y'all know that. But Christian families need Christian men to step in and lead in this area. There is a way to do things that is the mind of Christ way to say, you know, it would be really great if you could sacrifice and be like Jesus and sacrifice so that this person could get this thing that's really important to them. I know it's your turn, but this is really important to your sister. Would you be willing to sacrifice like Jesus did? There are ways you can go about modeling Jesus and how he sacrificed. And that's part of this is setting a foundation of who Jesus is and regularly talking to our toddlers and our college student children and our grown adult children of teaching them about what Jesus did. Jesus came and lived a perfect life. for our sake that we might be able to take all of his good deeds into our bank account. Not only that, Jesus died on the cross so that I wouldn't have to endure the cost of eternity separated from God. Jesus bore the cross. He bore the punishment for me. And then Jesus rose from the dead to give us a new way of living. And if I'm a follower of Jesus, I want to live with the mind of Christ that says, yes, I'm willing to sacrifice my turn on the Xbox so that she can finish her game. Whatever it may be. I'm willing to put the seat down on the toilet. I'm willing to look out for others. Let me close with this. I know I'm late, y'all. I know it's Father's Day, but I wanna give you one other verse that will empower this for you, and it's this. It's Philippians 4, four through seven. I'm just gonna read it. The power is this. The joy of the Lord empowers us to not grumble or complain. When we are thankful, when we are delighting in God and rejoicing in God, The grumbling and complaining tends to fall away from our own heart. The scripture says this, rejoice in the Lord always. Grumbling and complaining will wash away when we rejoice in the Lord always. Again, I say rejoice. And I'm just gonna stop there. That's your power for battling, grumbling, and arguing the joy of the Lord. Delight in God, Christian. Delight in the truth that God has given you. Delight in the truth of Jesus Christ, our Savior. Delight in the word of God every day. Delight in your redemption. God loved you and gave his son for you to redeem you from the pit of hell. delight and rejoice in that church, and live a life without grumbling or complaining. Let's pray together. Father, we love you. We're so grateful for your Son. We're grateful for the joy that your Spirit gives us day by day. So Lord, produce fruit in us by your Spirit. Fill us to overflow with the power of the mind of Christ day by day. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.