Oh, crossing family, I want to welcome those of you joining at
all of our physical locations. So whether or not you're here at
our 48th St. location, joining us from Macomb or Kirksville,
929 Pike County, Hannibal, Lima, Mount Sterling, Keokuk,
Monmouth, Jacksonville, as well as those of you who are joining
us online. And a special shout out to those
of you who are part of the crossing inside, as we just
celebrated the baptisms that have been happening there.
I love it. Just because you're locked up
doesn't mean that your heart is, because Jesus will find a way.
And we are so excited to be able to minister and partner with
you. I also want to welcome those of
you who are joining for the first time or the first time in
a long time. God is always working, always
moving, and the fact that you are here today is a sign that
God is trying to draw you closer to Him.
You're going to hear this later in the service, but I want to
encourage you. Take advantage of the QR code on
the seat in front of you and swing by the New Here booth in
the lobby. Why?
Connected? Things grow when you stay
unconnected. You don't.
A battle is going on for your peace, your life, your eternity.
The good news is you don't have to do it alone.
This church across three states serving 22 counties and 10,000
square miles wide is in your corner.
Our hope is simple to make this region the hardest place on
planet earth to get the hell from.
And if you are listening to my voice right now, you are either
the focus of this mission or you are part of this mission.
And there is no middle ground. Now, if you're new to the church
or you've gone for a bit because you've been enjoying this
summer, we are in a brand new sermon series called Decisions
in the Desert. Following God through trials and
triumphs, Every single one of us, we are going to find
ourselves in the desert at some point in time.
You are either coming out of the desert, you are either in the
desert or, and I hate to break this to you because you're like
those two, first two aren't me. Well, that means you're probably
going into a desert. It might be in your
relationships, it might be spiritually, but we will go
through dry, discouraging times. And the decisions that you make
in the desert will define you. They will determine your
destiny. And if you have missed this
series at any point in time as we've been kind of going through
and you're wanting to catch up, there's all kinds of ways for
you to check that out. You can see us on the website,
YouTube, podcast, Spotify, and sometimes you might be going,
you know what, my friend? I really know that they're going
through something and they could really be a benefit to it.
Knowing where those things are will gives you the opportunity
to be able to share it. So that way you can minister to
them passively. Now, as we've been going through
this series, there have no doubt been some, what would you say,
some moments that are confusing, maybe a little bit challenging.
And I want you to know that today is no different.
There are going to be some tough things in this section of
Scripture, so we're going to need a little bit of background.
So I'm going to teach for about 10 minutes and then I'll preach
and I'll get you guys out of here in under an hour and 45
minutes. Promise.
All right, if you were to open up your Bible first page, you
find yourself in Genesis and what we hear read in Genesis,
not just the creation of the world, but God's interaction
with Adam and Eve. After Adam and Eve, God has an
interaction with a guy named Noah, Noah and his ark.
After that, God enters into a conversation with a man by the
name of Abram, and God makes a promise to Abram that his future
generations will be a special people and he will give them a
land of their own, a promised land.
The land that was belonged to them was called Canaan.
This is modern day Israel, modern day West Bank, modern day
Gaza, Jordan, and parts of Syria and Lebanon.
God changed Abraham's name to Abraham.
So if you're reading through the Bible and he's talking to
Abraham and then all of a sudden he's talking about the Abraham.
Same guy. Abraham had a son named Isaac.
Isaac had a son named Jacob. Check this out.
Surprise, surprise, God changed Jacob's name to Israel.
Why does all of this matter? So when you are reading the Old
Testament and you hear things like children of Abraham,
Hebrews, Jews, or Israelites, they are talking about the exact
same group of people. They're talking about the people
who come out of the family tree of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, and
they are called children of Abraham.
They're called Israelites, Hebrews and Jews.
Now, Jacob has a bunch of sons and as is common in large
families, some of the kids don't like some of the other kids.
Raise your hand if you've heard stories right.
And but they took it to a whole new level.
Like if you think your family is jacked up, this family is the
most jacked up. And the all the older brothers
got together and they sold the youngest brother at the time by
the name of Joseph into slavery. And Joseph is sold into slavery
and he ends up in a country called Egypt.
While he is in Egypt, he is obedient to what God tells him
to do, and he rises to power and ends up being put second in
command in all of Egypt. He does so because he protected
Egypt and all the surrounding countries from extinction
because of a famine. Well, many years later, Pharaoh,
which is what the Egyptians would call their king Pharaoh,
comes to power and he has no memory, no recollection of what
God had done through Joseph and how Joseph and Joseph's God had
saved his people. And so instead of honoring the
Israelites, he enslaved the Israelites, and the Israelites
lived in captivity. So God raises up two people,
Moses and Aaron, and they go to Pharaoh to tell him to let the
people of God go, Let the Hebrews go, let the Jews go, let
the children of Abraham go, let the Israelites go and Pharaoh
refuses. So God does some plagues, signs
and wonders to not only reveal to the Egyptians that God is
real, he should be trusted, he should be followed, and he
should be worshipped, but also to show the Israelites, because
the Israelites have been living in slavery where they really
don't see the hand of God moving and working in their life.
And when God is doing the plagues and the signs and
wonders, it's also not just to show the Egyptians that God is a
is God, but it's also to show the Israelites that God is God
and should be worshipped, obeyed and followed.
Some of the plagues that happened affected everybody,
both the Egyptians, who are the slaveholders, and the Israelites
who were the slaves. But some of the plagues happened
in Egypt. And inside of Egypt there was
this piece of property, they called it the land of Goshen.
This is where the Israelites had their homes.
It's where they raised their families.
It's where they cooked their meals in slavery.
And in during some of the plagues, there'd be a plague in
Egypt. But all the way around Egypt
there'd be plagues, except for in this little spot called the
land of Goshen where the people of God were, there was no
plague. Plague, no plague.
Today we are going to talk about the last plague.
Last week we talked about the 1st 9:00.
Today we're going to talk about the 10th plague.
It's called the death of the first born.
Exodus Chapter 11 verses first one, and then we'll do four and
seven. Now the Lord had said to Moses,
I will bring one more plague on Pharaoh and on Egypt.
After that he will let you go from here, and when he does he
will drive you out completely. So Moses said this is what the
Lord says, about midnight I will go throughout Egypt.
Every first born son in Egypt will die, from the first born
son of Pharaoh who sits on the throne, to the first born son of
the female slave who is at her hand, mill and all.
The first born of the cattle as well.
There will be loud wailing throughout Egypt, worse than
there has ever been or ever will be again.
But among the Israelites, not a dog will bark at any person or
animal. Then you will know that the Lord
makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel.
And I just go ahead and tell you there is no way for you to hear
what we just read and not be a little confused and a little
conflicted because this is kind of a head scratcher.
And if you're here for the first time, you're like, this is
definitely not what I was thinking about when I was
thinking about God. Like, hey, I want to come to
church and start getting my life right with God.
And the first thing you're going to tell me is about God goes out
and kills the first born. So let's unpack that for a
little bit. All right, First thing I would
tell you is remember at the very beginning of of the story,
Pharaoh had issued a decree that all of the Hebrew boys that were
born should be killed. God is punishing them for their
cruel act #2 God has giving given the Israelites and he has
given the Egyptians. 9 Signs and wonders 9 plagues and giving
them a chance to acknowledge God, worship God, obey God,
follow God. And the Bible tells us that to
whom much is given, much will be expected.
They have had nine opportunities to not just witness the hand of
God, the mighty acts of God, and yet still they have a heart that
refuses to acknowledge God and there are consequences.
Jesus and his teaching says blessed are those who believe
even though they don't see. Why does this matter?
Because the the centerpiece of the Christian life or the way
you access the Christian life is through faith.
Faith is not the absence of evidence, but faith is the
absence of sight. And the only way to please God
is through faith. Faith.
And so the more you have seen of God, the higher he will raise
the accountability or the standard for how you and I are
to behave. So when you see the hand of God
in an indisputable way in your life, you will be held
accountable for how you lived. As a result of that, all of
these people have seen 9 plagues in six months and they're still
gone. Yeah, I'm not going to follow
you. Third thing we need to know.
Paul teaches us in the book of Romans that there is no one
righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands.
There is no one who seeks God. All have turned away.
They have together become worthless.
There is no one who does good, not even one.
Romans chapter 323 says this, for all have sinned and fall
short of the glory of God. Going further, Romans 623 says
for the wages of sin is death. Why does all this matter?
I'll tell you, nobody who died in the 10th plague was innocent.
Everybody who died deserved to die.
The question is why are they dying?
Is because they have fallen short of the perfect and holy
standard of God. You might be going, well, I
don't think that's right, and I hear you.
That's fine. And when you speak your own
world into existence with your words, you can make your own
rules. But since you don't have a
universe and you're not a God, maybe you should shut up #4 I
want you to know that God is perfect and holy, including
every decision that He makes. So even when God is punishing,
he is right in the punishing. Look what it says in Deuteronomy
chapter 32. I will proclaim the name of the
Lord. Oh, praise the greatness of our
God. He is the rock.
His works are perfect and all His ways are just.
A faithful God who does no wrong, upright and just.
Is He. To be clear, while there is.
While this story is hard to hear, there's not a single
person who deserved or who didn't deserve to die.
All of them deserved it. The tougher truth is that you
and I deserve to die as well. The real question we should be
asking is why did those people die?
The question we should be asking is why are we not dead yet?
Because we have fallen short of the standard of God.
The reason you and I are still alive and we have the
opportunity today to respond to His goodness is because God is
not just perfect and holy, He is also good and great and gracious
and compassionate. So how did God protect the
Israelites from this plague of death?
He gave them very specific commands that they were to take
a lamb without blemish and they were to kill it.
They were to be careful not to break a single bone when they
did so, and they were to take some of the blood and they were
to sprinkle it on the top and on the sides of the door frame of
their house. And then they were to take a
meal with bread that had no leaven in it, no yeast.
It was like the original flatbread for hippies.
God was to say, when you eat this meal, we're going to do
flatbreads. And inside of this we can find
it in Exodus chapter 12, verse 21.
Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to
them, Go at once and select the animals for your families and
slaughter the Passover lamb. Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it
into the blood in the basin, and put some of the blood on the top
and on both sides of the door frame.
None of you shall go out of the door of your house until
morning. When the Lord goes through the
land to strike down the Egyptians, He will see the blood
on the top and the sides of the door frame and will pass over
that doorway, and He will not permit the destroyer to enter
your house and strike you down. Now, for just a second, anytime
you're reading the Bible, it's really good for you to kind of
like roll around in the text until you get some letters stuck
to you. So imagine for just a second
that you are an Israelite getting ready to go through this
Passover meal. Some of you would be a little
freaked out. Some of you would be excited
because you're a second born and you're tired of sharing a room.
You're like, he deserves to die, Lord, take him.
Right. I know you guys.
I know you second borns and you got two guys.
You got Burton Kurt. And they're both a little
nervous about, you know, they're both talking about, hey, what
are we supposed to do? Yeah, We, you know, we, we got
the land. We go ahead, we went ahead and
we, we got ourselves our stuff taken care of and we went out
and we put stuff over the door. And.
But, you know, I got to be honest with you, Bert, I'm a
little nervous. Really.
Yeah. I mean, you know, my dad's a
first born and I'm a first born and my kids are first born and,
you know, it's just a little. So I'm a little nervous.
I'm a little scared. I'm a little worried.
And Kurt's like, I'm not. You're not.
No. Why not?
Well, I mean, I, I did what God told me to do.
And Bert's like, well, I did too.
I went, I put the, I put the blood where I was supposed to
put the blood and I did the stuff with the lamb that I was
supposed to do with the lamb. I did all the same things.
I'm just a little scared. And you could look at Burton
Curtin and be like, one has a ton of faith and the other one
just has a little What happened after the Passover?
They come out of their house the next morning.
Did Burt or Kurt lose anybody in their home?
No. Did the one who was confident
that they would be completely fine and protected lose any of
the first born in their family? No.
What about the one who was nervous?
Did he lose anybody? What about the one who was
scared? Did he lose anybody?
No, neither 1 lost any of the first born in their home.
Why? Because death passed over them,
not on account of the strength of their conviction, but whether
or not through faith they had covered themselves and the door
frame of their house by the blood.
It is called the Passover because the judgment of God
passed over them on account of the blood, and by faith in
obedience they did what God had called them to do.
The faith was not in themselves. The faith, great or small, was
in the obedience that they had that God would do what He said
He was going to do. This became for the Israelites
what July 4th is for rednecks in the Midwest.
This became a day of massive celebration.
In fact, every single year the Jews would celebrate the
Passover. It was their Independence Day
out of slavery from the Egyptians, as well as the fact
that God's judgment had passed over them.
A unblemished lamb selected in advance, not a bone broken,
covered by the blood. And the judgment passes over.
Some of you are already getting ahead of.
With me. So let's go ahead and get there.
I'd like to introduce you to somebody, a friend of mine by
the name of Jesus. You might be asking yourself, is
this Jesus in fact an unblemished lamb?
Well, when he walks onto the scene in the book of John
written by the apostle John, he quotes John the Baptist saying
this. When John the Baptist interacts
with Jesus, John chapter one, the next day John saw Jesus
coming toward him and said, look, the Lamb of God who takes
away the sins of the world. If you have no sin in your life,
the judgment of God would pass over you.
Was this lamb Jesus selected in advance?
Well, first Peter seems to point to it.
Look what he has to say with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb
without blemish or defect. He, this is Jesus, was chosen,
oh, before the creation of the world.
I hope you see this about our God before you were ever born,
before He breathed his breath into you, before you could do
something wrong or you could do something right, before you said
your first cuss word, before you stole your first candy bar,
before you had your first affair.
God was already moving on your behalf to redeem and rescue you.
Because Jesus was chosen before the creation of the world to
redeem the world that was rebelling against its Creator.
Through Him you believed in God who raised him.
That's Jesus from the dead and glorified him.
So your faith and hope are in God.
Let me be clear. Your hope is not in me.
My hope is not in me. Your hope should not be in you.
My hope is not in you. Our hope is to be firmly placed
in the work of Jesus. And when our life is covered in
the work of Jesus, the judgment passes over not a bone broken.
Look what it says in John chapter 19.
But when they came to Jesus, this is Jesus on the cross, and
found that he was already dead. They did not break his legs.
Instead, one of the soldiers pierced Jesus's side with a
spear, bringing a sudden flow of blood and water.
The man who saw it has given testimony, and his testimony is
true. He knows that He tells the truth
and He testifies so that you also may believe.
These things happen so that the scripture would be fulfilled.
Not one of his bones will be broken, and as another scripture
says, they will look on the 1:00.
They have Pierce a lamb selected in advance, not a bone broken,
covered by the blood. Hebrews chapter 10 says this.
Let us draw near to God with a sincere heart and with the full
assurance that faith brings. We can draw close to God because
of what Jesus has done, and we access what Jesus has done
through faith, not in ourselves, but in Him.
Having our hearts sprinkled to cleanse us from a guilty
conscience, having our bodies washed with pure water.
Let us, that's you and me, hold unswervingly to the hope we
profess, for He who promised is faithful.
The Jews still celebrate the Passover every year.
They are waiting on a Messiah who has already arrived.
In fact, in Jesus's lifetime, Jesus celebrated the Passover.
In fact, they were. Jesus celebrated the Passover,
and the Passover in that Jesus celebrated was his Last Supper.
Did you know when Jesus died? It was past over the meal, the
last meal, the meal where he washed his disciples feet was
Jesus celebrating the Passover meal.
And in the middle of the Passover meal, Jesus takes a
little bit of bread and he says this, this is my body given for
you. And when you circle up and when
you gather as Christians in my name, do this and remembrance of
me. Then he took the cup and he says
this is the cup of the new covenant in my blood.
Do this and remembrance of me. That's why when Christians
gather all across the world every single week, you know what
we do? We take communion.
We take communion in remembrance of Him.
But do you know where this meal that we take in communion comes
from? It comes from the Passover meal
where we celebrate the fact that the judgment of God that would
bring our death passes over us. The judgment of God that we
deserve passes over us. But it landed on somebody.
It landed on Jesus, the Passover lamb.
We are covered by the blood of Jesus and that when you come to
faith in him, you place the blood of his life over the top
and the sides of you. You might be here today and you
might be going. Yeah, that's great.
I'm a pretty good person, though.
Clayton, you need to hear me say this.
You might be a good person, but you are not good enough to get
into heaven. You might be here today and
you're going. I'm a pretty hard worker and
you've got where you've got because you're an incredibly
hard worker. That's wonderful.
I'm happy for you, but you can't work hard enough to get yourself
in to heaven. You might be here today and you
have a pretty wife because you're a smooth talker, but I
need you to know that you can't smooth talk your way into
heaven. The only way that you and I get
into heaven is if we are covered by the blood of Jesus.
We to deserve death and judgement and hell, but through
Jesus's sacrifice, the lamb that was slain, the blood that was
spilled, we can cover our lives in the blood of Jesus and the
judgement of God passes over us. Look what it says in Isaiah
chapter 53, verses 6 and seven. We all, like sheep, have gone
astray. You know that's true.
Each of us has turned to our own way.
You know that to be true, but the Lord has laid on him that's
Jesus, the iniquity of us all. He that's Jesus was oppressed
and afflicted, yet he did not open his mouth.
He was led like a lamb to the slaughter as a sheep before it's
sheer is silent. So he did not open his mouth.
God laid on Jesus what we have done.
He took the sins that you and I have committed and He placed
them on Jesus. Look what it says in verses four
and five of the exact same chapter.
Surely he that's Jesus took up our pain and bore our suffering
what we deserved, yet we considered Him punished by God.
That's exactly right. God was punishing Jesus for the
sins that we deserved. He was pierced for our
transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities, and the
punishment that brought us peace was put on him, and by his
wounds we are healed. You can go home and look this up
in Second Corinthians chapter 5. This is what it says.
God took him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that in him,
that's Jesus, we become the righteousness of God.
Here's what God's doing. He is taking the sins of you and
me, and it's placing him on Jesus.
Jesus is being treated the way you and I deserve to be treated.
And because of that, the judgement of God passes over us,
and you and I get treated the way Jesus deserved.
Well, Jesus was perfect. Jesus was spotless.
Jesus had never sinned. And the way I'm able to get into
heaven, the way I'm able to have a right relationship with God is
because I'm getting treated like Jesus because Jesus got treated
by me. That means that when you and I
are struggling with the sins of our past, and some of you are
very realistic about the sins, you know what you've done.
You're sitting here in a church at one of our locations and you
can look across the auditorium and see some of the people that
you've done stupid stuff with. Not only do you know your past,
they know your past. But I want you to know you don't
have to worry about the sins of your past.
They have been laid on Jesus and through faith and baptism, when
you receive what He has done on your behalf, the judgment of God
passes over you and it landed on Jesus so that you could be
treated like Jesus. There might be some of you today
and you're just being completely real and you're going the stuff
that I am in the middle of right now has disqualified me from a
right relationship with the Father.
And you could not be more accurate.
You are disqualified, but you become qualified not on the work
that you have done, but on the fact that you can be covered in
the blood of Jesus and what you were once unqualified.
You become qualified when you are covered in the blood because
the judgement of God passes over you and it lands on Him who knew
no sin. So that way you could be treated
as if you had never sinned. That means that when I look into
my future and I know that there are things about me that are
going to bust and break and they'll be sins that I don't
want to do, that I end up doing, I have No Fear.
Because when those moments happen, I know that those
moments too were covered by the blood of Jesus, who was who
before the creation of the world was already in moving on my
behalf to redeem and restore me to the Heavenly Father.
The judgment that I will rightly deserve in my future.
I do not need to fear because I have through faith, covered
myself in the blood of Jesus. Then the punishment that I
deserve will be on Him and the relationship with the Father
that I don't deserve I will have access to because I will be
treated as a son because of the work of Jesus.
If you are listening to my voice right now and you are not
covered in the blood, you should be.
There might be some of you. We're going Clayton, man, that
sounds great. But I got to be honest with you.
If I, I feel like that's a little narrow minded when you
guys talk about Jesus being the only way to heaven, I mean,
there's a lot of people who believe in awful lot of things
and I think it's just a little narrow minded for you guys to
think that Jesus is the only way.
And what I would tell you is, I get it.
That makes sense. I will tell you that Jesus said
that he's the only way to the Father and that no one gets to
the Father except through him because the only way to get to
the Father is to be covered in the blood and the only way to be
covered in the blood is through Jesus.
But what I would tell you is you're, you're stopping the
sentence too short. It's not just that Jesus is the
only one, it's Jesus is the only one who.
Let me unpack that. Would you guys say who?
You see, Jesus is the only one left heaven and came to earth on
my behalf. Jesus is the only one lived a
perfect and spotless life. Jesus is the only one paid the
ultimate price. He's the only one who?
Oh, Dang it, I did The Who? I'll preach my own sermon.
Jesus is the only one who perfectly demonstrated the love
of God. He's the only one who destroyed
the works of the devil. Let me unpack that for a second.
If Satan wants to come after me and accuse me and point at me
for all the sin that I've done, he can't figure out where to
place his finger because everywhere he points in my life
is covered by the blood of Christ.
He can't find me. He can't accuse me.
He can't come after me. Jesus is the only one who picked
me up. He's the only one who turned me
around. He's he's the only one who
placed my feet on solid ground. If you ask me, Clayton, how did
you end up in heaven? I'll tell you, Jesus is the only
one who could have made that happen.
If you ask me how is my life the way it is, I'll tell you Jesus
is the only one who could pull me up out of the miry clay.
He's the only one who could bring me in the right
relationship. He's the only one who could make
me righteous. He's the only one who had the
sins of my life and your life placed on his shoulders.
He's the only one who saves because he's the only one.
Whoever has, he's the only one, whoever will, and he's the only
one who has already accomplished it past, present and future.
He's not just the only way, He's the only one.
And if you are in relationship with Him, you are covered in the
blood. And when you and I become
obedient in the area of baptism and place our faith in Him, we
get access to that blood. We're moving to a time of
decision. If you are here today and you've
never started an intimate personal relationship with Jesus
Christ, I need to spit some facts in your direction.
That means that right now your life is not covered in the
blood. And that means that the
judgement you will get is the judgement that you deserve.
But it doesn't have to be that way.
And I know some of you, you're going, Clayton, I got some
questions that I need to answer. And I would tell you it's time
for you to start asking those questions because your life and
your eternity are too important to put off getting the answers
that you, your family and your eternity desperately need
answered. But I would also tell you like,
if you'd allow me to like poke you in the chest for a little
bit, back into the corner for a little bit.
I think you know more than you realize.
You know, I think you know enough.
You may not know all of it, but I don't really know if I could
worship a God that I could completely understand, because
if I could figure everything there is out about a God, that
would kind of make me a God. I know you want to know more,
but I think you know enough. Fellas, help me out here.
Raise your hand if you know everything there is to know
about women. Yeah, a couple single people
almost lifted their hands. Those fellas, like they're easy.
Yeah, whatever with Jennifer and I this year, we're going to
celebrate 15 years of marriage. She's been happily married for
two. I've been happily married for.
Yeah, 14. You're, we're applauding her
because if you've been around me, you know I'm a lot.
Can you imagine? Like, we got to go home with
him? I mean, he's great for like 30
minutes a week, but Can you imagine living with me?
And you got to know something. Jennifer's.
She's not in here. And if you tell her, I'll pray
in purgatory. Prayers on your life.
Just as soon as I think I figured her out, she changes.
There's like 5 love languages. She's made-up six more and she
just rotates them. So I'm over here slaving on last
month's love language. Doesn't care about that one
anymore. I've changed it.
I didn't tell you no. Post it.
No, you're just failing. OK, Appreciate you.
I don't know everything there is to know about women.
I don't know everything there is to know about Jennifer.
I just knew I wanted her. I just knew I needed her.
I don't know how to make a pizza.
I don't know everything that goes in to making a delicious
pizza. But I know when I want one and I
know that I need one. I don't know everything there is
to know about a car. I don't know everything about
how to make them work. I don't know how to fix them
when they're busted. I don't know if I paid the right
price or the wrong price. There's an awful lot I don't
know about cars. I just know I didn't want to
walk here. I knew I needed one, and there
are some of you here today that you're going.
I just don't know everything I need to know about God.
I'm just saying, I think you should know at this point.
You should know enough that you need Him.
I don't understand everything there is about God's love, but I
know enough about the fact that I need it in my life.
I don't understand everything that happened on the cross.
I just need the forgiveness that came from it.
I know enough to know that I need it.
And some of you are waiting till all of the pieces of the puzzle
come together. Other than the fact that
recognizing that the pieces, the puzzle that need put back
together are not God, it's you. And today, maybe today you're
going. You know what?
I know enough. I know enough to know that God
is real, that Jesus is alive, that the cross was real, that
the tomb is empty and I want to be covered in the blood.
And if that's you, in just a few moments, the people around you
are going to stand and worship, and some of them are going to
come to the steps and pray. And I'm going to encourage you
to take a walk of faith right over there underneath that
screen next to that baptistry, and start asking some of the
questions that you know you need to ask.
To the rest of you in the room, those of you who are Christians,
I'm going to be quick. I've talked about this before.
When I take communion at our church, I take a double dose.
And it's not because I'm, you know, bigger than all of you and
we're a bigger center than all of you, although both of those
things are true. It's because there are four
prayers that I've been praying for, I think ever since college.
When I take communion, when I take the first piece of bread,
I'm reminded the fact that he paid a price that I could never
pay, that he did something that I could never do.
If I could fix me, he wouldn't have sent Jesus.
If I was the solution to the problem, Jesus wouldn't have
been on the cross. He did something that I could
never do on my own, and I thank Him for doing so.
The second prayer that I pray is thank you for never giving up on
me. Because, man, I've given him
plenty of opportunities. There is nobody on planet Earth
that I have let down more than him.
There's nobody. There is nobody that I have
failed more times than him. There is nobody that I have
given more excuses to walk in or me to walk away and out of my
life. There is nobody I have failed
like I have failed him. And yet I cling to the fact that
his mercies are new every morning.
Other people have walked out on me, but not him.
I've run from him. And when I got done running and
I turned around, he was already there waiting on me.
And when you pray a prayer, being honest about the fact that
this God who has done something that you could never do on your
behalf and has never given up on you after he already did it, it
changes you. When I take the first piece of
juice, I said God help me to live a life.
In response to this, one of the biggest, dumbest things you
could ever think is that you can call yourself a Christian, have
been covered in the blood based on the sacrifice of Jesus, be
exposed to the love of God in a radical way, and live however
you want. That you can just pick and
choose where you're going to be obedient.
That you can go, oh I love him and oh he's good and oh he's
great and oh he's God and oh he's wonderful, but I'm just
going to do whatever I want to do.
Those two statements are not compatible.
Either he is the God of your life or he's not.
Either he is your Lord or he is not.
There's no middle ground and it's because I've been exposed
to what he's done. My life must reflect it. 4th
prayer. You're not going to like this
one. This is where it gets worse.
This is where you wish the grape juice was actually wine.
My 4th prayer is helped me to remember that you died for
everybody I will ever meet. How many of you know somebody
you don't like? Yeah.
How many of you have somebody that's hurt you?
Yeah. How many of you know somebody
that you'd classify as an enemy You.
One of the hallmarks of the Christian faith is enemy love.
You want to know why? Because I was an enemy of God
and he sent his Son to die on my behalf to redeem his enemy and
turn an enemy into a son or daughter of the King.
And so when you and I take communion, we are recognizing
that the very blood that covers us, that passes, that allows the
judgement to Passover us, has not just been shed on our
behalf, but on our enemies behalf.
That the same blood that covers me could cover them.
And the same God that sent Jesus to die on my behalf sent Jesus
to die on their behalf. And when you pray prayers like
that, it'll mess with you. Would you stand, God, I'm asking
you to move in a very specific way, God, that those who are far
from you right now would be drawn close to you, that they
would overcome every obstacle that they need to overcome so
they could be covered in the blood today.
And God, for those of us who are followers of you, that our lives
would begin to be shaped and conformed by you, that we would
turn over the reins so we would get out of the driver's seat.
That we would turn our life over to you and live a life in
response to you. Your name, I pray.
Amen.