Welcome to the Illuminate Church podcast.
We hope today's message is encouraging to you.
Welcome everybody. We're in our series called Jesus
the one and Only and speaking about gifts given, there's never
been a greater gift than the gift that we received when
Christ Jesus decided to leave the glory and the splendor of
heaven and come and make his abode here on earth with us.
We're looking at Matthew chapter 2.
If you want to open up your scriptures, that's the the text
for this entire series. If you need a Bible, you can
raise your hand and they will bring a Bible to you.
Our wonderful ushers, Matthew the 1st of the four gospels, the
good news retelling of Jesus time here on earth.
Anyone need a Bible? They're standing by to give you
1. Matthew chapter 2.
Here we go. We're going to just read four or
five verses. Matthew chapter 2, verses one
and two and then 9/10/11 and 12. I guess that's 6 verses.
Verse one says after Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea
during the time of King Herod. Magi from the east.
You want to pay attention and underline these words in your
scripture because every scripture, every word is
intended by God. Magi from the East came to
Jerusalem and asked, Where is the one who has been born king
of the Jews? Not heir apparent, not Prince of
the Jews. He's born king of the Jews.
We saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him.
Skip down to verse 9. After they had heard the king,
they went on their way, and the star they had seen when it rose
went ahead of them until it stopped over the place where the
child was. When they stall the star, they
were hyped. They were overjoyed.
On coming to the house they saw the child with his mother Mary.
They bowed down these magi from the east, these non Jews
worshipped him. Then they opened their treasures
and presented him with gifts of gold, say gold, frankincense and
myrrh. Yeah, myrrh.
Father, use your word today to bless us with revelation.
We don't want to leave here the same as we walked in and we
believe your word God is meant for teaching and encouraging and
even rebuking, making us better to glorify your Son who gave
himself this Christmas even unto Easter.
We praise you in Jesus name. Amen.
The text of Matthew 2 calls the Magi from the East.
I told you in week one that I wanted to talk about the Magi in
week 3. Here we are given the context of
Matthew chapter 2, specifically that there's this juxtaposition,
this battle going on between King Herod and Jesus, who is now
proclaimed as the King of the Jews.
The scholars believe that Matthew is deliberately using
the term Magi. Why?
Well because these are highly educated priestly astronomer
astrologers from Persia and Babylonia, what we kind of know
today as modern day Iraq, part of Syria, Turkey, even a little
bit east and Iran. These are these magi still carry
this ancient title and this reputation as Persian Magi.
They were ancient even in Jesus time, meaning the magi had been
around for generations and generations doing what they do
in the book of Matthew. It's not always the case they
are portrayed positively. These are men seeking genuine
seekers of truth who recognize the star as a divine sign from
the Lord of the birth of the quote King of the Jews.
The Magi in the Christmas store are not just wise men, as
sometimes they're referred to. Not at all.
They're not just generic. They are specifically
historical, ethnic, religious. They're holding this title that
points to the priestly class of these famous Persian magi.
And what were they famous for? Throughout the generations on up
into Jesus time and beyond, they were known to read the stars, to
look at them and honor newborn kings.
In fact, in Persia and Babylonia, a king was not a king
without the blessing and the conferring of kingship done by
the Magi. Even if there was a coup when
somebody took over the kingship, they weren't considered the king
by everybody until the Magi said so.
The Magi had to speak. In other words, In short, and
you can know this for the rest of your life, the Magi were true
kingmakers. They made the decision no
coronation was valid without them.
They could declare A reigning king to be illegitimate.
They could choose or approve whoever's supposed to be the
next ruler when succession was disputed amongst the people.
They even had religious veto power to overturn certain major
royal decisions. They're kind of like the Supreme
Court in some ways. That's why when Matthew calls
them these visitors from the East Magi, he's not just saying,
oh, there's some wise astrologers who happened to stop
by again, He is deliberately identifying these as members of
the only priestly class in the ancient world that had the
historic and the constitutional authority to recognize and to
crown, even depose kings. And here they show up to Jesus's
house. In coming to crown Jesus as king
of the Jews, they were doing exactly what their priestly
class had done for centuries, officially acknowledging
officially Halloween, a newborn or a newly elected king.
They're not there by accident, just some wise guy that's
happened to stop by. And if that wasn't enough, and
this has gone wild on social media, you might have seen this.
But this is fascinating. If you look in the book of
Daniel, which is in the Old Testament, Daniel a leader of
God's people, Daniel a prophet, that the context is the people
of Israel and Judah. They were two separate nations
at this time. Because of warring, they both
got taken away into captivity. 1 after the other, Israel went
first, Judah went second. Babylon king Nebuchadnezzar now
has them as exiles. In Babylon, most of the people
are just doing regular stuff, becoming Babylonians, kind of
falling into whatever gods are there.
But Daniel says faithful to the one true God, to Yahweh, and God
because of it favors him. Daniel stands for the Lord when
other people are sitting down or rejecting the Lord.
And so because God favors Daniel, Daniel gets elevated in
the nation of Babylon. Daniel chapter 2 verse 48 look
at this. Then the king placed Daniel in a
high position and lavished many gifts on him.
He made him ruler over the entire province of Babylon and
note this placed him in charge of all of its wise men.
Daniel, a Hebrew Daniel who lives for Yahweh, Daniel who
knows the Hebrew Scriptures and the Hebrew prophecies, is now in
charge of leading, teaching all the wise men of Babylon.
Well, who are the wise men? We get another descriptor of
them later in Daniel chapter 4, verse 9.
I said Beltestrazar, which is Daniel's name in Babylonian.
All right, it's the same guy, Beltrazar, however you say that
name, chief of the magicians, the Magi.
I know that the spirit of the Holy God is in you, and no
mystery is too difficult for you.
Here is my dream. Interpret it for me.
Now, clearly there's another part of the story going on here,
but what's important for us to note today is that Daniel is the
head of the wise men. And who are the wise men?
They're the magician. Who are the magicians?
They're the magi. Daniel, 600 years before Jesus
is born, is leading the very people who will be the first to
recognize Jesus as the king of the Jews.
And Daniel being a good Hebrew with the best Hebrew, he's the,
he's the one standing for God when everyone else is kind of
sitting down. Daniel leading these magi
assuredly as they are astronomer astrologers would have said to
them, you know, there's prophesied in my faith tradition
that a star will rise in the East and you will note it.
And when you see that star rise, it'll be because the king of the
Jews have arrived 600 years later, passed down from magi to
magi to magi, generation, generation, generation.
These magi today's like, oh, the stars rising that that guy 600
years told our forefathers about.
We finally see it and they follow the star and the rest is
history. I'm telling you folks, it is a
sovereignty, the creativity, the divinity of God, that it's no
accident that it's these magi, these kingmakers, these holders
of the biblical prophecy taught to them by Daniel, that they are
the ones who come to acknowledge Jesus as King of the Jews.
It's mind blowing to me. It's fascinating to me that the
Lord sets us all up. Just them being there should
have been enough for people. The magi have arrived.
The magi have spoken. He is king of the Jews.
But to double down, if you will, the Magi bring these gifts that
we've been reading about, these prophetic gifts, these symbolic
gifts that overwhelmingly make this declaration for the magi.
This Jesus is God Incarnate. This Jesus is the king of the
Jews. This Jesus is the one that the
world has been waiting for. We've been waiting 600 years and
the Jews have been waiting longer.
So as we are coming to the close of this short series, Jesus the
one and only. The entire point of it was for
us to consider the gifts of the Magi and bring those gifts
ourselves so that as we bring them, we make the same
declaration that the Magi made. When I bring the gift of gold or
the gift of frankincense, or today the gift of myrrh, I want
my life to say the same thing, that there's that He is God
Incarnate, God in the flesh. He is royalty.
And today, as we'll see with the final gift, He is God also as a
human God also who will die for our sins.
Let's just refresh today with gold.
We said in week 1, the magi said, and we get to say along
with them that this is a king. He is royalty.
Our goal to bring to him means that we're going to off our
lives in holiness. I'm going to live according to
His word. I'm going to get a live
according to the Kingdom culture so that my life glorifies him.
My life is gold to him and to the world.
Wow, look at that shiny beautiful thing and remember the
Scripture. They will see your good deeds
and glorify your Father in heaven.
Also to bring our treasure, our physical treasure, and bring it
to the Lord as an offering, just as these wise men did.
They brought millions of dollars worth of gold to Jesus, to a
baby. Who does that?
Then we have frankincense, and with the frankincense, the Magi
said, and we get to say as well that the baby is divine God in
the flesh. He is the high priest who
forever removes the distance between US and God by his own
sacrifice. If you missed last week, the
shed blood of Jesus is the covering that we need to stand
in front of a holy God. There's no way to stand in front
of a holy God without a covering.
And Jesus has become that covering.
He's become the veil. He's become our frankincense and
because of it we get to enter into His presence and pray unto
Him and spend time with Him. Prayer is communion and prayer
is the exchange of wills. Father, not my will be done, but
my, Your will be done. Amen.
Amen. 9:00 AM Hallelujah. And today we have one final
gift, the gift of myrrh. And as I briefly said, myrrh
signifies Jesus's humanity and death.
As Isaiah chapter 53 says, as we just sung in this last song, he
is the suffering servant, and the myrrh is the what represents
that myrrh. This myrrh is miraculous.
It is beyond fascinating what myrrh is.
Myrrh is used, was used and is still used I guess today in some
traditions for healing and also embalming.
Why? Because of how God created
myrrh. It is amazing.
This myrrh stuff. Myrrh first of all kills germs.
It has antiseptic power. How does myrrh do this?
I researched it. This is so fascinating.
You're like, well, tell us. OK, Myrrh is like soap.
In fact, some people call it soaps when they speak, speak
about myrrh. I don't know why how it
translates, but myrrh is like a soap.
What myrrh and soap both do is they have these spikes in its
chemical makeup that you can see under microscopes.
And these spikes drill into the membrane of bacteria and fungi,
and only bacteria and fungi, your healthy cells, They're all
right. But bacteria and fungi, when
myrrh comes to him, has all these spikes and it drills into
the membrane and separates the membrane, and the innards of the
bacteria and fungi spill out and it dies.
It kills bacteria and fungi just in the way that is designed,
with all these spikes on it to destroy it.
Not only that, myrrh also helps reduce swelling and pain.
You all know this. When your body gets hurt, it
gets infected, it sends out these alarm chemicals called
cytokines. They they go rushing out and
they say, hey, repair crew, ambulances, paramedics, all
rushed to the spot and inflammation happens.
You all know this. So yes.
And there's some swelling in redness.
Yes, it's doing its job in there, yes.
But sometimes it's overdoing it. Too much pain, too much
swelling. And so you want to get the
swelling down. Well, Mer does that.
It's chemical properties block the production and the release
of these messengers that go out and say, everybody come and help
right here. It sends us out so that swelling
goes down. In other words, it's like Mer
brings peace to the situation and says the paramedics, like,
we have enough here, turns off the fire alarm.
It's OK everyone, calm down. This is what myrrh does.
And because of this, because it kills germs and reduces swelling
and pain, myrrh actually helps wounds to heal faster than if
they were just left to themselves.
You all know the process. Healing a cut happens in stages.
First we got to stop the blood, then we got to clean up the dead
stuff, Then we got to build new skin, and finally we got to
strengthen it. That's how a heal gets a wound
gets healed. Myrh helps by keeping germs away
more, helps by reducing extra swelling, and then it encourages
skin cells to multiply and make new tissue faster.
It's like giving your body's repair crew a boost while at the
same time protecting them while they do their work.
It's fascinating, don't you think?
Am I the only one? It's incredible.
Yeah. So it makes sense that when
somebody in Jesus time and even before Jesus died and since he's
passed, that myrrh was used on the body of a dead person to
slow down the decay, the decomposition and deterioration
of the body. It's put in place when Jesus
dies upon the cross. It should be no surprise to us
that myrrh is also used upon his body.
John chapter 19, verse 38. Later Joseph of Arimathea asked
Pilate for the body of Jesus. Now Joseph was a disciple of
Jesus, but secretly, because he feared the Jewish leaders, with
pilots permission he came and took the body away.
He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited
Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of
look at this, myrrh and aloes, about £75.
That's a lot. Taking Jesus body, the two of
them wrapped it with the spices, that's myrrh in strips of linen.
This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs.
Jesus is dead, body smeared, covered in myrrh.
Let's talk about myrrh just a little bit more.
Myrrh comes from a tree. It's a funny name.
It's called Comaphora mura. Kamaphora.
That's the first word mura. You want to say it's a kamaphora
mura. It looks like this, another
beautiful tree, kind of like frankincense last week, this
beautiful tree. But I want to show you a close
up of the limbs of myrrh and see what you see.
Y'all, When I saw this picture, I'm my hair standing up in my
arms, my heart started beating faster.
The myrrh tree is covered in thorns.
Your brain starting to go somewhere.
You start the spirit starting to speak to you and connect the
dots. Thorns are actually present on
the earth only because of sin. Exactly part of the curse of
turning from a loving God in the garden.
Genesis chapter 1-2 and three. Go read it for yourself.
Adam and Eve are given the beauty of the garden that God
says eat from any tree except for one.
Don't eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil.
For when you do that, you're trying to become God and that
will not go well for you. Let me be God, you be humans.
I'm giving you one command. Don't eat from this tree.
Of course, if you know the story, Adam and Eve eat from the
tree, and because of it, God pronounces a curse on both the
woman and the man. To the woman's, she's going to
toil and labor, physical pain and labor and for the man, this
working of the land to produce the food, you're going to have
to work the dirt in order for food to be produced.
Genesis chapter 3, verse 17 to Adam, God said because you
listened to your wife and ate fruit from the tree about which
I commanded you, you must not eat from it.
Cursed as the ground because of you through painful toil.
You will eat food from it all the days of your life.
It will produce thorns and thistles for you.
You will eat the plants of the field that by the sweat of your
bow brow. You will eat your food until you
return to the ground, since from it you were taken.
For dust you are, and to dust you will return.
Part of the curse is the thorns and the thistles, and your mind
is already jumping to the crucifixion of Jesus our Savior.
Matthew 27 Then the governor's soldiers took Jesus into the
praetorium and gathered the whole company of soldiers around
him. They stripped him and put a
scarlet robe on him, and then twisted together a crown of
thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right
hand. They then they knelt in front of
him and mocked him. Hail, King of the Jews.
Have we heard this words before? These words the Magi declare it
first, saying this is the king of the Jews.
And now here the Roman soldiers are mocking him, saying King of
the Jews. They spit on him and took the
staff and struck him on the head again and again.
After they had mocked him, they took off the robe and put on his
own clothes on him. Then they led him away to
crucify him. Notice they never took off the
crown of thorns. So the soldiers intended this to
be pure mockery. Jesus, by wearing the crown of
thorns, symbolically takes on the curse of humanity, said
suffering in our place to redeem us for the penalty of sin.
What was meant for humiliation by these Roman soldiers has
become a powerful image of His sacrificial kingship for all
time. And now consider the mercury
again covered in thorns, the tree of thorns itself
symbolizing the crown of thorns, and Christ's own passion, which
is as love poured out for us on the cross of Calvary.
And now here's the even more crazy part.
In order to get this wonderfully powerful healing resin from the
tree, the tree bark has to be cut.
Myrrh does not seep out of the tree unless the skin of the tree
is pierced. Oh my word, this is what it
looks like when you Pierce the tree.
When you research the word myrrh, it talks about the myrrh
coming out of the tree like tears in the world.
God, you designed all of this. The piercing of the tree crowned
in thorns in order to release healing parallels Jesus's wounds
that yield redemption. And the fragrance, this
spiritual sweetness that comes from his suffering.
Wow, Isaiah 53, five. Now we understand.
But He was pierced for our transgressions.
He was crushed for our iniquities.
The punishment that brought us peace was on Him, and by his
wounds we are healed. Glory to God in the highest.
Like wow, wow, wow. Go with me back to Bethlehem.
About a year, year and a half after Jesus birth, we moved from
the Manger and now Jesus is in a home.
Joseph and Mary are there, right Open the door.
Joseph standing there, he's like Mary.
It's the Magi, foreign to us, but known in their area of the
world for centuries upon centuries.
When the magi showed up, you were like, I wonder who these
guys are? Mary, It's the magi.
It's the kingmakers. Now, of course, they believe the
Angel that came and said that this would be the son of God.
But every time there's affirmation and confirmation.
It must have felt really assuring to Joseph and Mary.
Yeah, he is who we heard he is. And here are the magi, the
kingmakers, Mary. And look, they have gold.
Gold is reserved for royalty. It's true.
He's the king. And frankincense.
Wow. Frankincense is reserved for the
high priest. Mary's.
Like, I know, Joseph, you don't need a mansplain.
Everything to me. But it works for the story,
right? OK.
And Mary, they have one more gift.
What is it? Mary's like, what is it?
It's like it's the spice that we wrapped the dead in.
The 1st 2 can't be true and then the third one be false.
It answers the question of the song.
Mary, did you know? She sure did.
Mary, did you know? Could you comprehend the cost?
Could you bear to understand that your sweet baby boy came to
give life to anyone who to receive him but look at on a
screen. The only way for him to give
life to us was to give his life for us.
This child was bound and swaddling clothes.
This child would be bound to the cross and one day with myrrh be
bound in burial, all so that we could be unbound from sin.
Somebody say Hallelujah, what a savior.
Yes, I've been asking this question.
It might have been the title, should have been the title of
the series. But is he your king?
And the way that you answer the question is by the way that you
live and you give the way that you pray.
And today it's by bringing him your myrrh.
Bring him your myrrh. What does that mean?
I'm glad you asked. To bring myrrh to Jesus means to
bring him your sacrifice. And you are that sacrifice.
I am that sacrifice, as myrrh was a representation of Jesus's
impending sacrifice. Our response is to consider how
great a sacrifice that Jesus made for us and then compare it
to the sacrifice that I'm willing to make for him.
Do they even come close? I mean, is it even like in the
same neighborhood? The sacrifice he made for me
compared to the sacrifice that I'm willing to make for him?
He suffered for us. Are you suffering for Him?
In the giving of our gold, we're giving our lives in holiness.
In the giving of the myrrh, we're giving of our lives in
sacrifice. You're going to suffer when you
sacrifice. Jesus suffered when he
sacrifice. Your pride may suffer if you
become bold for Jesus. What will people think of you if
you actually speak his name at your workplace or don't imbibe
on what they imbibe on when you're out of the business trip
or you're in a circle of friends and they're all doing something
like this isn't representative of Jesus, but I really want to
fit in. So I'm I'm going to do this
instead of standing up and saying, you know, the most
important thing to me is Christ Jesus my king.
You're going to suffer when you make that sacrifice.
People will look at you funny. People don't want to be near the
light because then it reveals the darkness within them, and
they'd rather you not see that. So your pride's going to suffer.
Matthew chapter 5, by the way, says blessed are you when they
revile you because of me, For in the same way they reviled me.
Blessed are the persecuted, blessed are those whose pride
suffers because you make a stand for the One He made more than a
stand. It feels like such an
underselling to say He made a stand for you.
He gave his life. He took on the weight of all sin
and all darkness and opposed every demonic agency of Satan.
Your money's going to suffer when you bring your treasure to
the Lord. People will scoff at your
generosity to the Lord. You gave what?
And you say, listen, I'm not motivated by your opinion.
I'm motivated by the generosity of my Savior.
I'm trying to match what He's given to me.
You cannot give God, by the way, you can try.
Your time is going to suffer when you give it to the Lord.
Sacrifice it to the Lord. Taking time to help a neighbor
when you could have just been doing whatever you wanted to do.
Taking time to serve in kids ministry when everyone else is
in the big church suffering over there with snotty nosed
beautiful children. I drove in this morning early,
as I often do on Sundays, and there's other people here before
I am. In fact, one guy was out on the
median out there on Sinclair Rd. putting out parking signs all by
himself. And he does this all the time.
I rolled down my window. I said good morning, Alex.
He said morning. It's like, how are you?
He says I'm tired because it's early.
You know what time you had to get up to get here, to get the
pickup truck to go load it with all the stuff from the trailer
over there, and then to drive around the property putting up
cones and signs so that you and I can move orderly about our
parking lot. It's a sacrifice.
When his alarm went off this morning, he suffered.
Our worship team, I'm looking here at Wayne, our AVL team,
They're all part of the worship team.
You know what time they get here.
What time is it, Wayne? 6:00 AM.
They get here when their alarm goes off at 4:30 for Wayne 555.
He just out the door right here is like I'm here on time.
They're suffering and the enemy wants to tell you this lie that
the suffering is the end of the story.
So that all that you do when you consider the cost of following
Jesus is just consider the cost. The enemy does not want you to
think about what you're suffering.
What Jesus is suffering produces because his suffering produced
salvation. His suffering was not wasted and
neither will your suffering be. When you bring your sacrifice,
it will produce something, but the enemy is just going to have
you focus on the sacrifice. The Lord your God today, via me,
wants you to think about what suffering produces, what a
produce for Jesus, and what it can produce for us.
The tree was cut. The tree was suffering, but it
produced healing. The tree of life was pierced and
it is suffering produced healing.
What could your suffering produce?
Romans chapter 5. Therefore, since we have been
justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord
Jesus Christ, through whom we have gained access by faith into
this grace in which we now stand, and we boast in the hope
of the glory of our God. Not only so, but we also glory
in our sufferings. This is the mark of a mature
believer because we know that suffering produces something.
Perseverance. Perseverance is your ability to
stand up under it. Whatever it is, whatever comes
crashing down, whatever the cost, the sacrifice, you're able
to stand up under it. And then perseverance produces
character. Yeah, come on, say it.
What is character? Character is the integrity of
your heart, knowing that when I stand up under it, God meets me
and I'm able then to walk in the ability of what He has in me,
which eventually produces hope. And hope is this.
No, not a notion. It is a knowing in your spirit
that whatever comes next I can face because of what happened
before and who He is and what He's done and what He said He
will do. I have persevered.
It has grown my character. Now no matter what comes, I have
hope, which I didn't read the scripture, I just started
talking. And hope does not put us to
shame because God's love has been poured out into our hearts
to the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.
To bring your myrrh is to sacrifice.
Be willing to pay the price to suffer.
Air quotes for Jesus. Yes, you will feel pain, you
will experience it, but what it produces is worth it.
Here's the last way I want to tell you that you can suffer.
And maybe today you came just to hear this.
Somebody in here. This is this part God put on me
last minute for you. Here's another way to suffer.
You see, myrrh was not just for embalming the dead.
It was more often used for healing the living.
Rub it on a wound, swish it in your mouth.
It's used for healing. It's almost as if the Magi knew
Jesus. You're going to need this.
You will be wounded yourself, yet you will bring healing to so
many. This is what myrrh represents,
not the death, but the healing. So to bring your myrrh is to
partner with Jesus and become a healer.
The healing is first for you because there's a wound in your
heart because of sin. And God said, let me rush some
myrrh on it, the blood of my Jesus, and I will heal you of
the wound of sin, the penalty of sin, the price of sin, which is
death. Let me rub some myrrh on it.
I'm asking you to think of any wound that is currently going on
in your life. It's usually because we're
humans in relationship to another human, and there's a
wound between you and another person.
Or maybe there's a wound between you and the person in the
mirror. Either way, the solution is the
same. Wherever there's a wound, rub
some mirror on it. Rub the healing blood of Jesus
on it. Be a forgiver.
Be a peacemaker, not a peacekeeper.
Is there somebody you need to rub some mirror on?
Here's the last little part. You don't have any myrrh
yourself. We are smeared, covered in the
blood of the Lamb. So when you're rubbing myrrh on
somebody else, this is what you're doing.
What has been given to me, I give to you.
In the name of the Father, Son and the Holy Spirit.
Let's pray. God, what you have done in myrrh
is stunning. It's not just some throwaway
gift at the end of a sentence. It is spectacular and what you
have created, it is astonishing. And the parallels between that
and your son Jesus, who is far more astonishing than myrrh,
pierced for our transgressions and by his wounds we are healed.
For that we say thank you to the extent that the audacious
forgiveness you've given us in Jesus, we are commanded,
inspired to extend to another. And just now in your heart, in
your, in your mind where you can see mentally another face,
another person that there is distance between you and them,
would you just reach out and smear them with myrrh, smear it
right on them? You got to take what Jesus has
given you, the forgiveness that he's given you, and offer it to
them. Father, forgive us our
trespasses as we forgive those who trespassed against us.
And finally, know this church, if you have never received the
forgiveness of Jesus, never been smeared in the blood of Jesus,
the myrrh, the healing, the forgiveness of God, you can do
that right here, right now. He went to the cross for you.
The myrrh was for you, the piercing was for you, the blood
of healing and redemption shed for you.
Don't let it go to waste. Receive it into your heart today
by just repeating this prayer. In fact, everybody together
would you pray with me saying, Father, in the name of Jesus, I
recognize that I am a Sinner in need of the blood of Jesus, the
healing blood of Jesus. So I confess and I believe that
Jesus is Lord and I receive you, Jesus as my Savior now and
forevermore. Hallelujah.
Just pray that in your heart for a second.
If that's you today making a decision to receive Jesus by
faith, I'm going to ask you to do 1 bold thing in the same way
that Jesus love was bold for you on the count of three.
I'm going to ask you if you've believed this for the first time
today to raise your hand as high as it will go because I have
something I need to put in your hands here and now, something so
crucial and important that you would just raise your hand if
you believe for the first time today. 123, any believers today,
any new believers, come on, praise God.
Any others, we're coming to you. Keep your hands up.
Well done. You made the most important,
best decision of your life. Church is already celebrating.
Heaven is celebrating with you. Anyone else, praise God.
If you're making that decision online, just type in the
comments. I believe in Jesus.
We want to connect with you church.
I'm going to say Amen. And you know what to do,
Celebrate. His heaven is celebrating
because God is good and he just saved some people from hell in
Jesus name, Amen. Thanks for joining us today.
We hope God is speaking to your heart through this message.
If you'd like to connect with us, you can text connect to
407-588-0115 or visit Illuminate dot church.
Have a great week.