Welcome to the one Crossing podcast here.
You can find past sermons along with other exclusive content.
Our prayer is that God will move in your life.
Even when you are on the go we hope you enjoyed this message
Crossing Nation. How are you doing today?
Are you doing all right man, in the middle of the pandemic.
I said there's going to come a moment in time where I'm just
going to start giving out hugs. I just want you to know I
started this weekend. I'm giving him out I'm not
Charging. I'm getting consent.
But if you're in the mood to hug a heavy person, I am your guy.
It is just so good to be out. In fact, I think we're going to
be going out, our communities and offering up some free hugs.
It's just good to be able to be together and recognize that God
is doing something cool in our church, in our communities and
hopefully God will use what we do today to further move or move
forward in that initiative. I want to talk to you guys about
a couple things before we get going.
So, for all of you who are Join here. 48 suit are different
locations or watching online. We are two weeks away from
Easter and that's a big opportunity for us.
As we celebrate, what Jesus did on our behalf, and I want to
encourage you guys to do one of two of three of three things.
First thing is, we've added a bunch of different Services,
many of our locations, which means we're going to be having
auxiliary service times across many of our different spaces
Where We Gather, and we've posted Add those.
And if you're the kind of person who's on social media, would you
help us get the word out to our community?
So that way they know when we're going to be having services so
that they can plan with their family on how to attend because
we want to make sure we have space for everybody.
Second thing, I want to encourage you to do is I want
you to encourage to bring somebody.
We, those of us who have an intimate personal relationship
with Jesus Christ know how meaningful that is for us.
And we also know that the Gospel of Jesus wasn't supposed to just
come to us. They were supposed to go
through. And we want to use Easter as an
opportunity to bring some people that we care about, the don't
have a relationship with Jesus Christ.
Yet, Jerry's going to have an incredible Easter message, it
will be a great weekend for you to bring a friend.
So I want you to work hard on bringing somebody with you.
And then the third thing, I'm going to ask you guys do is,
would you just start praying over our Easter services that
they God, would use those to help as many people as possible.
Find an intimate, personal relationship with Jesus Christ.
If that's a deal. Can I see you guys?
Say deal deal. Perfect.
You guys are great. So, three years ago, something
special happened in my house, my chair broke.
And when I say my chair, it's because I have a chair in the
house. How many viewed all of our
locations? You have your chair like
everybody? Yeah, everybody can sit wherever
they want but this is this is your chair.
Well, for the first eight years of Jennifer nice marriage.
We had gotten all of our furniture from either, the
thrift store, or we would be at someone's house and they would
be like, I think we're going to get rid of this and Jennifer and
I would be like, are you sure you don't.
Get because we'll take it right now.
We'll be right back. Let me go get a trailer.
And so all of our furniture had been you know two or three or
four hand-me-downs by the time it got to us and one day I'm
sitting in my chair and it broke.
And so for the first time I went to a furniture store.
Crazy, cool places. If you guys never been, you'll
love it there. And I went in and they had a
chair. That was a Clayton.
Hensel sighs chair. Now this is a big deal.
I'm six foot six and I bought a chair that when Nice it in at my
feet. Don't touch the ground.
Like I look like a normal person in it.
It's that huge. I was going to.
This is not that chair. Okay.
I don't think I can get my chair out of my house.
I think it stays with like, when I sell it bike, and it has this
chair because it's now a part of the house, it's just that big,
so I couldn't bring it. So your, this chair will have to
do and the deal is, is I like sitting in my chair.
There's a couple that come to our church and above his bed.
He has like a his initial with like a crown hanging off the
side of it. And I want that because I want
to feel like I'm the king of my castle.
Jennifer has given me a hard, no on all of that happening.
But that's that's what happens. What?
I when I sit in my chair, I mean this is like my throne and oh
yeah, I mean you guys get against it all through church,
we should start changing this. I should get to sit during
church to. This is the chair that this is
the chair where my boys. Well, they watch movies with me.
There's been over, 400 pounds of Hensel, flesh in my chair, as we
have moved through the Marvel movies, they just sit there and
it's just she's so hot. But we just watch, this is the
chair where Zane almost every night reads for 15 or 20 minutes
as we go through the books, he supposed to read for school.
It's where my niece Kinley, she comes up to me and she goes, I
go. What do you want?
Ken Lane she goes. I need a cuddle Clayton, so she
hops up here and sits right here.
Jennifer mood, rearranges the furniture from time to time.
But there's only two places that my chair goes in all the
rearranging. You can put it there or there
and then the TV has to be tilted to whichever direction, just how
it is. Now.
Kay, she loves me. This is in the chair where I eat
my well-deserved ice cream. After the kids.
Go to bed like tonight about 9:00 I'll be going through Dairy
Queen I'm going to get you know, a cookie jar blizzard.
No fudge the other day. I was sore.
It and I started my order and the lady.
Finished it on the other side of the thing and like bless you, my
child come to Crossing for Easter.
You know, I'm going to tonight, I'm going to be eating ice cream
in my chair. It's where I want to my
basketball games. It's where I speak.
Encouraging words over my kids. It's where I issue out,
judgments bark out, orders solve disputes, I mean, it's where I
Reign from the king of my castle.
This is my throne And from time to time, I'll come into my house
and somebody will be sitting in my chair.
I mean that's a more. You guys are already like preach
clean. You've been there?
The smart kids get up and they just disappear there.
Like they know what they've done is wrong.
Then sometimes the kids will pretend like they're asleep.
Now that's a baller move because parents sometimes we don't want
to risk waking them up. If they are sleep, just like
just let them stay there, put a blanket on him.
Leave, you know, you just backing out of the room.
But sometimes there's an argument Why do you always get
to sit in this chair dad? Son.
I'll tell you, why will you guys know the answer?
Because I bought it. That's that's why I get to sit
in that chair. I get up early, stay up late, I
work hard. I bought that chair and son.
When you get a job and you want to live in your own house and
you got money, you can buy any chair you want and you can sit
in it. The other issue is I don't fit
anywhere else. You just need to know that, like
there's no other piece of furniture other than me sleeping
in my bed that's comfortable in the house.
So I'm either going to lay in bed or sit in this chair, that's
it. And so when someone's in my
seat, messes, everything up. I entitled this message, the
problem with Kings. I mean, Kings need a throne to
rule from. They need a place to sit.
And the people of Israel, they had left Egypt, and they'd
entered into the promised land and they became jealous of other
nations. And they came to the conclusion
that we need a king and that's the problem with Kings.
We need them, we need Kings since the very beginning of
God's interaction with people. I mean it begins with Adam and
then it passes to Noah then Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob then
you find yourself dealing with Moses and Joshua and Then you
find yourself in the judges and the Israelites there in the
promised land and from time to time God raises up judges in
times of need to deliver the people from their enemies.
But at the end of the Book of Judges, there's this interesting
phrase Judges chapter 21 in those days.
Israel had no everybody at all of our locations.
Help me out king and everyone did as they saw fit.
The irony of that statement, is that up until this moment in
time, Israel had, well technically never had a king.
So when it says, in those days, they had no king.
Those days have been all days. They've never had a king.
And the irony of that statement is that it's just as true today.
When you and I, we don't surrender Our Lives to something
greater than ourselves, something Beyond ourselves.
When collectively we, as people don't, choose to serve something
other than us, everyone ends up doing what they want.
You know, this to be true parents.
Why do you get babysitters? Because when you're gone you
want to make sure that the kids don't get to do whatever they
want. So as you leave your Castle, you
install a temporary King to keep the kids in check and then there
comes that ignorant phase in parenting where you go.
Our kids are old enough to watch themselves because parents like
our kids are great kids they're awesome.
They can watch themselves or just going to be gone.
For one night, the amount of high school parties that have
been that have been taking care of under the realm of watch
themselves. You soon as you leave the house,
kids are like Mom. Dad will be praying for you.
Come home quickly, they're gone. Let's get this party.
Started is exactly what happens. We know this some we need
someone to rule and eventually Everyone realizes that they need
someone to rule over them and so the people came to the prophet
Samuel and this is what they said you are all dead and your
son's do not follow your ways. Now appoint a king to lead us
such as all the other nations have.
But when they said give us a king to lead us this displeased
Samuel Since the beginning of human history, I know I said the
people of had no king, but at the same time, they've always
had a king. From the beginning of time,
their King has always been God. He's LED them, he's protected
them. He's delivered them, he's cared
for them. It wasn't Moses.
That parted the Red Sea. That was God.
It wasn't Moses who created the pillar of Fire by day and the
pillar are the pillar of cloud by day and the pillar of Fire by
night that was God to. It wasn't Joshua who cried out
in the walls of Jericho came falling down.
It was god who caused the walls to fall down.
It wasn't the judges who were delivering the people of Israel
from their enemies. It was God, who was doing that,
God was their King. They just didn't want to
recognize him as king. And that's one of the problems
with Kings is sometimes. We don't want to recognize the
one we have. So Samuel, he's displeased and
he goes to the Lord. And this is what he says in
verse 8. So he prayed to the Lord and the
Lord told him listen to all that, the people are saying to
you. It is not you.
They have rejected, but they have rejected me as their King
as they have done from the day. I brought them up out of Egypt
and till this day forsaking me and serving other gods.
So they are doing to you now, listen to them, but warn them
solemnly and let them know that the king who will reign over.
Over them will claim or what? What the king, who will reign
over them, will claim as his rights.
Here's the problem. With Kings were bad at picking
them. You and I are bad at picking
Kings and if you go all the way back in human history everybody
else is bad at picking Kings 2. Samuel went out to pick a king
and look how he describes the king.
He finds in first Samuel chapter 9, there was a benjamite, a man
of standing whose name was Kish. Kish had a son named Saul as
handsome, a young man as could be found.
Anywhere and Israel and he was a head taller than anyone else.
They go out looking for a king to rule over them and Samuel
just can't get over. How Good.
This guy looks. You think that this would be a
one-off? But that's not it at all.
Eventually. God rejects Saul as king and so
he tells Samuel to go out and anoint another king, he sends
them to the house of Jesse who has a whole bunch of sons.
He's bring seven sons out to Samuel and the first time single
sees Jesse's oldest son. Look what he says in verse 16.
When are in chapter 16 verse 6, when they arrived, Samuel saw
Eli of this is Jesse's oldest son and thought.
Surely the Lord's anointed stands here before the Lord, but
look what the Lord says, but the Lord said to Samuel, do not
consider his appearance or his height for, I have rejected him,
the Lord does not look at the things that people look at
people. Look at the outward appearance,
but the Lord looks at the everybody.
Help me out hard. Seven sons passed in front of
Samuel, the eventual son, that was chosen to be the next king
wasn't even picked. You think you have family
problems? Jesse has the the priest over
and he's they're ready to anoint, a king.
They don't even invite David to the party.
David's out, tending, the Sheep, they get through all seven kids,
and Samuel looks at Justin goes, is this all of your sons?
And he's like, well, I've got David so they sent for David out
in the fields and he comes in and Samuel can't help himself.
He acknowledges what David looks like.
We're so bad at picking Kings because we look at all the wrong
things. We put all kinds of people on
the throne of Our Lives. You've done it.
I've done it. For some of you, you put the
approval of a bad dad in The Throne of your heart.
I mean, you know, when the lottery came, you got skipped
and you got a bad one and you're still trying to win his approval
and he has taken so much from you because you keep him here in
this seat. Some of you, it's the approval
of somebody, you desperately, want their approval and so you
have bent your life. So that way it looks more like
their life. And you've traded your god-given
individuality for a bad copy of what God created in somebody.
A else and in doing so you've lost who you are.
Some of us, we've put our emotions on, the throne of our
lives, were driven by our anger, our greed, or lust we buy and
spend and live for pleasure all because of the carnal nature.
We have we have a we're trying to Quench and never-ending
thirst. We're trying to satisfy and
unrelenting hunger. There are some of us who are in
desperate need for a relationship or The happy in our
singleness. And so we go I've just got to go
out and find somebody. And we have all these lists and
attributes of the man or the woman that you want to be in
relationship with and then over time you compromise on all the
things you're looking for and you're just kind of like Do you
have a job? Are you breathing you like to
sit here? Because you can Some of you
married people, let me know. I'm not going to let you off the
hook. Some of you married people,
guys. Some of you, you've put your
wife here. And she's like, yeah, holla, no,
that's a bad spot. And some of you ladies, you've
put your husband here. That's not good.
A parents. You've put your kids here.
They rule you. You've seen your kids get
dressed, right? You've seen them come down the
stairs, ready to go places and you want those people to sit
here in your life? Not a chance.
Not me. I mean you can be crazy.
No. We do that though.
Don't we we put all kinds of people and things on the throne
of your heart. We're bad at picking Kings. and
just so you know, all the people that you invite to sit here
They're happy to do so. They love to sit down for a
little bit. But I need you to remember.
They can never give you. What?
Only God can give you and eventually you end up getting
mad at them disappointed in them.
Because they couldn't give you what you desperately needed and
then you push them away. Because you think that they
failed you It's not fair. You failed them because you put
them in a seat. They were never supposed to sit
in in the first place. You asked them to be God without
beam God. We're just not good at picking
Kings. And so then you know what?
We do all you've been there after we've put a couple people
on the throne. We're like, boy.
Nobody else is really good. At being King.
You know what? I'm gonna deal.
You know what I mean? I need to just take over.
I'm going to be in charge of my life for a little bit at first.
It feels pretty good. There's an excitement, there's
Freedom, it's high time. We put ourselves in charge.
And it seems like a pretty good idea.
But Proverbs 14:12 it says there's a way that appears to be
right? But in the end it leads to help
me out. Well it sounds like a pretty
good idea for you to be in charge of your life but that
pretty good idea. It leads somewhere.
That leads to death. I'll be honest though, sometimes
when we try to sit in a seat that Belongs to God it's kind of
cute. Like when my kids are sitting in
my chair underneath, my blanket watching TV.
It's kind of cute when they come outside wearing one of my hats.
It doesn't fit any kind of hangs off the side.
It's kind of cute. What I'm working outside and
they put on my Muck Boots and they're walking around in them
and they're just dragging them everywhere because they can't
get their feet off the ground. It's cute.
It's cute that they want to be like me.
The problem is is when they want to be me.
When the oldest son starts trying to discipline the other
younger kids in the house. Like whoa, whoa, whoa, boy, just
because you sit in my chair just because you wear my hat, just
because you can put your leg in my in my shoes.
Doesn't mean you're me. So you and I we we sit in the
god seat. And that's when things really
start to fall apart for us, because, what we don't realize
is that when we sit in this seat in our lives, we become
ultimately responsible for how our life turns out.
You take your life into your own hands which means you're
responsible for all of it. We want to rule.
But deep down inside we don't want the responsibility. we were
driving somewhere and I had the kids in the car and Jennifer and
one of my nieces and I hinted that I was going to take the
kids to Dairy, Queen, possibly And we were driving in my kids
were just acting out of pocket. You've been there, maybe.
And I just was like, I don't want to spend money on getting
these boys ice cream. And so I turned to their mom
because she would know what I was going to do.
And I said, I'll just be honest with you.
This is kind of where I'm at. She goes, I completely agree
which was like a huge first for us that we agreed on a parenting
move. And so she articulated the news
to my boys that they would not. Not be getting ice cream because
of how they were behaving. Now, I have one of my niece's in
the car and she's been fantastic.
So she deserves ice cream. So I'm still going to get her
ice cream and I've been really well behaved.
So, so I'm eating ice cream. But my two boys aren't getting
any. My oldest son, full-blown
repentance that. I'm so sorry.
I want to be a better son. I didn't know I'm so I
appreciate. I appreciate you telling me that
but you're not getting any ice cream.
Youngest son does not take the news.
Well, by the time, we finally get home, he doesn't want to be
a part of our house anymore. So I sit down in my chair.
I don't want to be here anymore. Well now I'm in the parenting
move. Like what do you do?
You've been there. So I first of all I go it's
really sad Mannix that you love ice cream more than your mom.
Right now, I do. I get it man.
Dairy Queen's. Got some good stuff going on.
I'm not gonna so then he's like, I'm leaving He gets to the door.
Opens it like where you going? I said I'm leaving.
With those clothes. What?
With those clothes. What do you mean Dad?
Why bought those clothes? Those are mine.
So, you can go just now with those clothes.
So my son shuts, the slams, the door and goes back upstairs.
I'm like, yeah, I'm a smart guy. Next thing I know about 2
minutes later. My son comes down the stairs
wearing. Nothing but a towel.
Opens the front door of the house.
Throws the towel back, inside shuts.
The door. Yeah, I give out classes charge
and my wife is now fully attuned to what my parenting processes.
And my son, it's 8:30 at night. My kids naked on the front
porch. I'm still eating.
This is like just so, you know, this was like two weeks ago.
Okay, this is not like when he was little notes like two weeks
ago, Next thing I know the door opens.
I'm staying one more night and then I'm leaving.
He wanted to be in charge but he didn't want the responsibility
of being in charge. And you and I we like to sit in
the seat but over time we realize that this is not the
seat we were ever supposed to sit in.
The other problem with Kings is that, there's an illusion that
if we could get the right King life wouldn't be so tough.
But the truth is all kings are tough.
That if we could get the right King, maybe we wouldn't have so
much hardship. So much adversity, so much
difficulty. It's just not the case.
All kings are tough. I mean, Jesus says love your
enemies, be honest with yourself.
Is that tough? Yeah, yeah, yeah.
So is letting hate take over your life.
All kings are tough. Jesus says to bless those who
persecute you. I think we can all agree.
That's tough. Yeah, but so is letting anger
control your life. All kings are tough King.
Jesus says, we're supposed to forgive that's tough, but so is
closing yourself off from everybody else.
So you never get hurt again. That's tough too.
Jesus says that we're supposed to live a life of service and
that's tough. But so, is the loneliness that
sets in from living a life that only benefits you all kings are
tough. You just have to choose which
tough King. Do you want to have?
The promise of when you pick Jesus as your king is that he
actually provide you with the strength and the power to live
out that life. He gives it to you because you
can't do it on your own, no matter what choice you make.
It's going to be tough but one tough comes with Godly strength
and power. Look what it says in 2nd
Thessalonians chapter 3 verse 3 but the Lord or the king is
faithful. That means you can trust him
whatever. He says he will do, you can
trust him and he will strengthen you and protect you from the
evil one. What is he promising?
Thing to do for you to strengthen you and to protect
you. All kings are tough but not all
kings are good. Most of us know this in our
hearts and our minds and many of us, we know this from experience
that not all kings are good. I mean, all Kings Rule, and
govern and direct. But all the other kings out
there. They take from you, they take
your identity, your happiness, your possessions, your freedom.
Just so, you know, Jesus Takes Two.
But what he takes is, he takes your sins away.
All kings are tough, but not all kings are good.
I mean, Kings Rule and all other kings.
They, they will temporarily. They move on they extract as
much value as they possibly can from you, and then they leave.
But Jesus is rain, isn't temporary.
It's forever. There's no end to his rule, all
Kings serve other kings, they serve themselves.
It's about their welfare, their expansion, their Dominion.
But Jesus, Is a different kind of King.
He's the kind of King that came to, you know, serve who you and
give his life as a ransom for many all Kings protect, they
protect the reputation. They protect their standing but
Jesus instead of protecting himself, laid himself down and
in doing so protects you and me from the sting of death, all
kings are tough. But not all kings are good. and
so some of us we get to the point where we're going, you
know what, we should let Jesus sit on a throne but the problem
with true Kings Is true Kings. Don't sit on small Thrones.
And that's what a lot of us have tried to do, isn't it?
Instead of giving Jesus, this part of our life, we'll make
something for him. Something we're more comfortable
with and go Jesus. You can sit here.
True Kings. They're not supposed to sit on
small Thrones. I mean, tell me if this is you,
you said Jesus, you can sit on the throne of my Sunday. just
not my Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday,
Saturday, Jesus, you can sit on the throne of my prayer life.
Just not the Throne of my real life.
Now Jesus, you can sit on the throne of my problems, you just
can't sit on the throne of my successes Jesus.
You can sit on the throne and getting me a job but you can't
sit on the throne of my finances.
Jesus, you can't sit on the throne who I marry.
But you're getting, I'm going to ask you to sit on the throne to
try to put my marriage back together, that I shouldn't have
gotten in the first place. Jesus, you can sit on the throne
of my sickness. But you can't sit on the throne
of my health. It's my life and I want to do
whatever I want with it. Just so, you know, we weren't
the first people to do this, to trying to get Jesus, to sit on a
throne. He was never designed to sit on
when Jesus came here to Earth. That's what the Israelites kept
trying to do. They kept trying to get Jesus to
become their Earthly King, If only he would step into his
rightful place, be king of the Jews, overthrow the Roman
government sit on an Earthly throne.
Then everything would be okay. They wanted to make Jesus a
political King, they wanted him to be in charge of their
government. and Jesus, well, He wanted to be the king of their
heart. Your heart is a bigger Throne
than the Oval Office. Jesus came for you to sit here.
That's where he wants to rain. So, let me ask you a question,
who's King in your life? I know, you know, the right what
the answer should be. I know, you know what?
The answer could be? I'm asking what is the answer
right now? Who's King in your life?
Maybe there's somebody sitting in a chair that you need to
boot. Maybe the person you need to
boot, is you maybe if you're looking, you're seeing that
Jesus is sitting here and you need to get rid of that chair
all together, and invite Jesus to sit here, Every single week
we show you, baptism videos of people getting baptized before
the they get baptized we ask them if they're ready to take
Jesus Christ as their lord and savior savior because he's
saving them. We realize that we've got
ourselves in a situation that we can never fix ourselves and that
we need to be rescued from it. There's no way we could fix it
ourselves but we also say we're making him our Lord, another
word for Lord is King. Isn't the reason Jesus is having
to save us. Is because we've been our own
King and we got ourselves into the mess.
He's not just saving you, he is replacing himself as the ruler
in your life, and some of us need to get off of his throne.
He bought it, he paid the price for it.
Just so, you know, you can bow to him now or you can bow to him
later. Either way, it'll happen.
Philippians chapter 2 says this therefore God exalted him to the
highest place and gave him. The name.
That is above every name that at the name of Us every knee should
bow in heaven and on Earth and under the Earth.
And every tongue acknowledge that Jesus Christ is Lord to the
glory of God, the Father, you can bow now or you'll be forced
to buy later. There will come a time when
Jesus will come back to rain. But to those of us who've
already made him Lord and savior of Our Lives to those of us who
are already in an intimate personal relationship with Jesus
Christ, that will be a wonderful day. but to those of us who have
it, It won't. Second thing I need you to
really contemplate here. Is everybody else looks at the
outward appearance? But God is looking at your
heart. When Jesus showed up here on
Earth, he would interact with these religious leaders.
And he would use this phrase called whitewashed tombs.
They looked so pretty on the outside, but they were full of
dead things. There's a tendency for those of
us who've been in relationship with Jesus for a while to say
the right things and to do the right things, but our heart
could still be far from Jesus. We could be a whitewashed tomb.
Everybody around of us is amazed at how spiritual we are, how
committed we are, how serious? We take our faith and yet, God,
looks at our heart. What that means is you can fool
your boyfriend, you can fool your girlfriend, you can fool
your mom and dad, you can fool the people you Come to church
with the people. You sit with but you can't fool
him. so, just be real with Him and acknowledge.
Who's sitting on the throne. We called this sermon series
360, Jesus. He's, yes.
Jesus came to serve, and Jesus came to save and Jesus came to
love, but if you don't recognize that, Jesus also came to rule
over you, you don't have a full picture, a full 360-degree
understanding of Jesus. He came to rule and he came to
rule in your heart. Second thing is, if they're, if
you're looking at your life and you're giving this over to
Jesus, and this over to Jesus and this over to Jesus, but
there's other areas of your life that you haven't turned over to
him yet. Jesus wants 360-degree access to
you. My question is, will you let him
have it? We're moving to a time of
decision. Thank you for joining us.
A special thank you to those of you that choose to give to this
ministry it's because of your generosity that this ministry is
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