Good News - Sunday, February 19, 2023
2023-02-19
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pjgF87WEMXI

Amen. Amen. Amen.

Have you seen Theo yet? He's adorable. He's got like a bear costume. Great. Ezra's here. Theo's with Susan. Okay. Good morning. We're going to get started today and be reading together out of 1 Peter. So if you want to go ahead and stand. Hi, Colton. And the verses will be on the screen behind me. And it says, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to his great mercy to be born again to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are being guarded through faith for a salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time." This is the word of the Lord. Let's pray. God, we thank you so much for the opportunity to gather together today and worship you. We thank you for those that are watching online, and we ask that you allow this service to

glorify you today through our worship and through our reading of Scripture and through the message that's being brought. Thank you so much for Jesus and your mercy and grace in Jesus' name. Amen. All right. We're going to get started today by singing "The Battle Belongs."

"When all I see is the battle, you see my victory." "When all I see is the mountain, you see a mountain." "And as I walk through the shadow, your love serves me." "When all I see is the battle, you see a mountain." "And as I walk through the shadow, your love surrounds me." "There's nothing to fear now, for I am safe with you." So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees, with my hands lifted high. Oh God, the battle belongs to you. And every fear I lay at your feet, I'll sing through the night. Oh God, the battle belongs to you. And if you are for me, who can't be against me? For Jesus, there's nothing impossible for you. When all I see are the ashes, you see the beauty of me. When all I see is a cross, God, you see the empty tomb. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees with my hands lifted high. Oh, God, the back of my knees, you see the beauty.

When all I see is a cross, God, you see the beauty. When all I see is a cross, God, you see the empty tomb. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees with my hands lifted high. Oh, God, the battle belongs to you. And every fear I lay at your feet, I'll sing through the night. Oh, God, the battle belongs to you. So when I fight, I'll fight on my knees with my hands lifted high. Oh, God, the battle belongs to you. And every fear I lay at your feet, I'll sing through the night. Oh, God, the battle belongs to you. Oh, God, the battle belongs to you.

All right, next we're going to be moving into raise a hallelujah. And it's -- oh, sorry. No, yeah, I hit a wrong button. Hold, please. I accidentally hit clear. Oh. This is when the chorus -- the choir descends from the ceiling. Okay, there we go. I raise it, hallelujah. In the presence of my enemies. I raise it, hallelujah. Louder than the unbelief. I raise it, hallelujah. My weapon is a melody. I raise it, hallelujah. Heaven comes to fight for me. I'm gonna sing in the middle of the storm. Louder and louder, you're gonna hear my praises roar. Up from the ashes, hope will arise. Death is defeated, the King is alive. I raise a hallelujah. With everything inside me. I raise a hallelujah. I will watch the darkness flee. I raise a hallelujah. In the middle of the mystery. I raise a hallelujah. Fear you lost your hold on me. I'm gonna sing in the middle of the storm. Louder and louder. You're gonna hear my praises roar.

Up from the ashes. Hope will arise. Death is defeated. The King is alive. Sing a little louder. In the presence of my enemies. Sing a little louder. Louder than the unbelief. Sing a little louder. My weapon is a melody. Sing a little louder. And comes to fight for me. I'm gonna sing in the middle of the storm. Louder and louder. You're gonna hear my praises roar. Up from the ashes. Hope will arise. Death is defeated. The key is the right. Alright, you may be seated. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Amen. Amen. Amen. All right, as we move into our time of communion, we're going to be singing Your Great Name.

All condemned. Feel no shame at the sound of Your Great Name. Every fear has no place at the sound of Your Great Name. The enemy, he has to leave at the sound of Your Great Name. Jesus, worthy is the Lamb that once saved for us. Son of God and man, you are high and lifted up. Let all the world will praise Your Great Name. All the weak find their strength and sound of Your Great Name. Hungry souls receive praise. Receive praise at the sound of Your Great Name. The Father lives. They find their rest at the sound of Your Great Name. Take a hill and the dead are raised at the sound of Your Great Name. Praise at the sound of Your Great Name. Jesus, worthy is the Lamb that was slain for us. Son of God and Lamb, who are high and lifted up, then all the world will praise Your Great Name.

Redeemer, my Header, Lord Almighty, my Savior, defender You are my King. Redeemer, my Header, Lord Almighty, my Savior, defender You are my King. Redeemer, my Savior, defender You are my King. Jesus, worthy is the Lamb that was laid for us. Son of God and man, You are high and lifted up. That all the world will praise Your great name. Your great name. Your great name. Your great name.

Good morning. Well, it was until I got up here. Now you have to suffer through me. Brandon is going to start a new series to get us, hopefully, closer to Christ. We kind of wander. So, where does it all start? Actually, Old Testament. So, I'm going back there for the day. I'm going to read some things here that I've written down, and then give what's in Psalms, and we'll continue on. It can be very self-serving, but in most cases, it's quite natural to ask, "What is in it for me?" When somebody asks us to do something, why should I? How will it benefit me? Or, if we look for a new job, what do we want? I want more than decent pay. I want better benefits than anybody else can get, because the economy is around us, and those things are important to us.

We almost, in our minds, we want them, we demand them, we better get them, right? In a similar way, it's also natural for people in the world to ask, "Why should I be a follower of Christ?" Why should I believe in God? And some people, is there one? How does believing that way benefit me? Well, the psalmist had a lot of answers for us in Psalms 103. The first five verses is what I'm going to go through this morning. It has very, very specific benefits. The writer lived long before our Lord and Savior Jesus died on the cross on our behalf. But what it says is a good summary of the benefits that we have and will always have. And what's written there? I'll read this. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me. Bless His holy name. Praise the Lord, O my soul, and do not forget all His benefits.

Who forgives all your iniquities? Who heals all your diseases? Who redeems your life from the pit? Who crowns you with steadfast love and mercy? Who satisfies you with the good things as long as you live, so that your youth is renewed like the eagles? I'm puzzled when we read this, because even the people of the world know God exists, for the most part. They know, many times, what God's Word has to say. Read these benefits, and still stay at arm lengths, God. We don't want to follow you, and we will follow our own path until later in their lives. But can you think of any better benefits? Forgiveness for all sins. That's great, because who in here is without? Healing. We see it all the time. As sick as Neil, a member, was. He's here. He's up. He's walking. He's getting better every day.

We may not like the idea of being so slow in the healing, but the healing is coming. Redemption from the pit of destruction. I don't want to go over. I don't want to see the rich man and Lazarus, that great gulf that you apparently can see the other side, but you can't get there. But I don't want to think about that, because none of us do. Being crowned, and one version puts it, being surrounded by steadfast love and mercy. It's a good thing, because I need it all the time. That person that just cut me off in traffic, I have to think before I make some stupid remark or some stupid action. And being satisfied with good all of our lives, or as another version has it, "Who will sacrifice your years with good things?"

In Matthew chapter 12, verse 20, the bruised reed he will not break. A smoldering wick he will not snuff out. What's he going to do? When I fail, he puts a splint on me. Because I need help. If I feel myself going to the world, and I am putting out that candle, he has a match, and he will relight it for me. This all sounds like a good deal. It does to me, anyway. I like those benefits, and all of them are available to each and every one of us by the faith in our Lord Jesus who loved us. Who came and gave his life for us. So let us think of these benefits. These are only a few. I mean, we could be up here for several hours like in the Old Testament times and you don't want to hear me that long.

But we could go on and on and on with the benefits that we receive from our Lord and Savior Jesus through the Father God. So as we remember him, and he said himself, "This bread is my body given for you. This cup is the blood of the new covenant shed for the remission of sins. Do this in remembrance of me." Let us pray and then we'll partake together. Dear Lord, our Heavenly Father, we thank you so very much that you love us. With all of our failings, you still love us. You start us back again when we go down a road that we shouldn't have gone. You bring us back if we allow it. You straighten our paths. And Father, you continue to be with us. When we put out our candles, you relight them. Father, you are the one that we turn to, and it's only through Jesus that we can get to you. And Father, as we come to this portion of our service, and we partake of these emblems

of the bread and the juice that represent our Savior's body and our Savior's blood that was given on that cross so that we might have eternity with you. Forgive us, Father, and strengthen us as we partake. There is always something that gets in our way. The world never lets us go, and it looks and sounds so good, and it shouldn't be a problem. But one step here, one step there. And before we know it, we are down the wrong path, and we have to look back. Sometimes we're too proud to look back, and Father, take that pride away from us. Give us the foresight, the insight to always come to you knowing there is no better place to hide from the world than through you. That, Father, our hearts should be always yours. Guide us in this.

Be with us as we partake. These things we do ask and give thanks in Jesus' name. Amen. And many have read through this in 1 Corinthians 11, "For I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you. The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, 'This is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.'" Please partake. "In the same way, after supper, he took the cup, saying, 'This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of me. For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." Please partake. We know where our salvation lies. We know all of these things. And we

still fail. And that is the reason Jesus died for us. Because when we fail, we can come back. And we will come back joyously and be accepted without a problem. Thank you this morning.

Thank you. Thank you. Let's pray. This past year at Christmas, we were driving back through this subdivision to look at Christmas lights. We just didn't really have a plan. We just sort of started driving. It's like, "Oh, it looks like there's some lights down here, and it looks like there's some lights over here, and it looks like there might be some lights here." We're curving sort of back and forth through the subdivision. At that point, I realized everybody's kind of tired. We're getting ready to go home. I was like, "All right, we're going to head back home." I take a turn, and I take another turn, and another turn. "Oh, this way I'll take us back home." It ends in a field. At this point, I have no idea where I am, and we say in the car, "Oh, I guess we're lost."

Now, the reality is we're probably really not. We all have cell phones, but for my kids, this was the first time that they had heard those words in the car, right? They're going, "We're lost? What? How do we find our way out? Maybe we can find the McGee's and just stay with them." It's like, "Well, if we can find the McGee's, we can find our way home," right? Like, it's not that hard. And so, it was for them, the first time in their life that they'd ever heard in the car, those words, "We're lost." Which for me, pre-cell phones and pre-GPS was a pretty normal thing, right? Maybe your street map doesn't have the level of detail, maybe the roads aren't labeled very well, and we find ourselves lost. And so, what happens, as such happens so frequently, the things in our physical life also sort of move out into other parts

of our life, and we can find ourselves in life lost in a lot of different ways, right? We can find ourselves sort of unsure and lost about our purpose. What am I supposed to do? Why am I doing it? Where am I supposed to go? What kind of career am I supposed to pursue? What about my relationship? Is this a good relationship? Should I pursue this? We find ourselves in so many ways uncertain and lost, and not just physically and emotionally and in relation to the direction of our life, but we can find ourselves lost spiritually. And that feeling of lostness may not impact us physically as much as it does emotionally and spiritually. What's interesting is throughout Scripture, the Bible talks about being lost a whole lot of different ways, right? In the Old Testament, there's

protocol for lost things or lost animals, and we hear about lost battles. And then we hear about people who are lost and who are fearful. For example, in Lamentations, the author, as he looks at what is happening, says this, "Water flows over my head, and I said, I am lost." And what he's saying there is that I'm without hope. And many times, being lost feels that way. I don't know where to go. I don't know how to get there. I don't know what is happening. And it feels, in many cases, like we are drowning. And Scripture doesn't just point to us all the ways in which we can be lost, or we can experience lostness spiritually. But Scripture will point us to the path in which we can walk. And one of my favorite verses about this is in Jeremiah chapter 6. And it's right in the

middle of this passage about judgment. And the Babylonians are coming, and they're going to judge Jerusalem, and they're going to judge the tribe of Benjamin. And in the midst of all of this, there is this glimpse of grace and mercy. And you hear this, "Thus says the Lord of hosts: Stand by the road, and look, and ask for the ancient paths, where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls." And God says in the midst of the upcoming lostness of grief, and property, and life, and all of these things. He said, "There is a way that I have given you in which to walk, which you will not only be found, but you will have your soul satisfied." And the response of the people, and this is why judgment is coming for them, is because they

simply reply, "We will not walk in it." And so over the next couple weeks, or the next several weeks, what I want us to try to do is take a look at that place where we can walk, where we will find our souls deeply satisfying. To look at the path that God has called us to. That leads us to something more wonderful. That leads us into grace and to mercy. And not, I don't want us just to see where it is. I want to see what it means that we walk in it and we follow God. And so what I mean by that is not just saying, "Here's the good way," but here's how we walk in that good way when we're really tired and we're really grumpy, and we walk in the house and our kids just immediately begin grumping at us.

Or we show up to work and the first thing we do is that co-worker that hates us or we hate them and they begin picking and nagging and asking us all of these things. What do we do when somebody cuts us off in traffic? How does the way that God has laid out for us, how does that not just show us that way, but how does it work when we're tired and we're grumpy and we have to forgive somebody and we have to love somebody and we have to sacrifice for somebody? What does that look like practically in our life? And in order to know where we're going, we have to find ourselves at a starting point. I remember when I first came here to this church, it was before, you know, websites were super common and cell phones were, you know, smartphones were super common.

Everybody had a cell phone. But what would happen on a lot of Sunday mornings is the phone would ring and somebody would say, "How do I get to your church?" And I remember, it was like the second week I was here, that happened. I said, "I have no idea." Right? Like, I've been here a week and a half. I have no idea. I was like, "Do you know where Big Lots is? That's the best I can do to get you here." They're like, "Well, we're from out of town." I said, "So am I." I don't... And what I realized very quickly was in order to tell somebody how to get somewhere, you have to know where they are. Right? You have to have a starting place. Are you coming from the north? Are you coming from the south? Are you coming from the east?

Are you coming from the west? Right? You have to know where you are in order to get to where you are going. And spiritually, I think that's the case as well. Until we have a proper starting point, whether you're a Christian, whether you're not a Christian, whether we're talking about us individually or corporately as a church, until we have a place where we are and we start, we're not going to be able to progress down that path. And so what I want to do this morning is try to unpack a little bit of what that starting place for us, whether you're a Christian, whether you're not, whether we're talking about individuals or whether we're talking about the church, where does that starting place begin? And I would say this, first of all, the starting place that we need does not necessarily begin with a deep and complete theological knowledge.

You don't have to know a lot of words with ology at the end of them. You don't have to be able to talk about propitiation or penal substitutionary atonement or any of these big theological words. Now, I will say the place we start will lead us into a deeper knowledge of God and of Jesus and the work of the Spirit, but I don't know that it necessarily starts there. And the second thing is that our starting place doesn't necessarily begin with a bunch of rules or a bunch of strict moral codes where you need to do this and you don't do that, and then you can begin. Now, I will say this. The place where we start will lead us more deeply into righteousness. It'll tell us and help us to say no to sin and yes to righteousness, but it doesn't begin in that place.

The place where we begin this morning is just simply the gospel. And I would say it's more than just our beginning, right? It's our middle and it's our end as well. The word gospel, sometimes we use it as a type of music. Sometimes we use it as a way to express our certainty of truth. Sometimes we use it for books of the Bible. Mark, Luke, and John are referred to as Gospels, but very simply that word just means good news. And very specifically when we talk about gospel, what we mean is not just a general good news, that it's sunny, that there's coffee, that I like the snacks this morning, but the good news about a specific person, Jesus. Specifically, who He is and what He has done. And so we begin with the gospel. In fact, it's where the angels, as they begin to announce Jesus, the shepherds begin. Listen to what they say, "Fear not, for behold, we bring you good news." In Greek, it's gospel. "We bring you good news of great joy that will be for all people." You say, "What's the good news?"

"The good news is that unto you is born this day, in the city of David, a Savior who is Christ the Lord." You see, who He is? He's the Christ, who is Lord. And the good news of His actions is that He is going to save. And in 1 Timothy chapter 1, Paul will write this. He does this like five times in 1 and 2 Timothy. He'll say, "The saying is trustworthy and deserving of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, of whom I am the foremost." And Paul, as he writes to Timothy with this trustworthy saying, will say, first of all, see who Jesus is, that He is the Christ. He is Jesus, the Son of God. That's who He is. And He came into this world with a specific purpose to save sinners. That the gospel is good news about Jesus, who He is, and what He has done. In fact, Jesus' very first sermon, He will come into the synagogue, and He'll take the scroll of Isaiah, and He'll open it, and He'll begin to

to read those passages. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me. He's called me to proclaim good news of the poor, sight to the blind, to help those who are oppressed and crushed. And then He's going to roll up the scroll, sit down and say, "Today these words are fulfilled in your hearing." And what He's saying is, "This is who I am. I'm the promised one, and here is what I came to do." What you find, biblically, is that all Scripture directs us to Jesus. And in the very last chapter of the book of Luke, you see this in two places. One is with two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Another is with the eleven as Jesus begins to teach them. And they have some questions about how the things that have just happened, the crucifixion and the resurrection of Jesus, fit into the entire plan of God. And so what Jesus will do is sort of give them an Old Testament class, an in-depth study of the Old Testament from the Psalms and the

writings and the prophets, and what he's going to say in both of these places, all of the things concerning himself. The Old Testament in its entirety, the purpose of the Old Testament, isn't just to record history, but it's to point us to Jesus. And so when you see Adam, and you see the sin that breaks the world, you're pointed forward to Christ, to the one who takes away the sin of the world. When you look at Cain killing Abel, and Abel's blood crying out for vengeance, the chapter of Hebrews will say that Jesus' word speaks, Jesus' blood speaks a better word, not calling for vengeance, but calling for forgiveness. And you can go through the whole Old Testament through Abraham to David. You can look at those big Old Testament roles, prophet, priest, and king. And here comes Jesus, and he's the better prophet, he's the better priest, he's the better king. You can come to Passover, and you can see that lamb, and then there is Jesus, our better Passover lamb.

And who is sacrificed for us throughout the Old Testament, what you find is that it points to Jesus. Paul, when he preaches in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, will say, "Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel, not with words of eloquent wisdom, but the cross of Christ be emptied of its power." Now, Paul, when he's saying this, isn't sort of making a dig at baptism. What he's saying is, before any of the other things that happen in the church, there has to be gospel. Before you can do anything else, you have to have the good news about who Jesus is and what he has done specifically, he'll say in 1 Corinthians 15, that he died in our place for our sins according to Scripture, was buried, and on the third day he rose again according to Scripture. And the gospel must be our starting point. It has to be our starting point because it encompasses all of Scripture.

Our lostness, our brokenness, our salvation, and our hope within these pages. I would say this as well, the gospel is more than simply a beginning. So as Christians, we have this tendency to sort of see the gospel as a starting place, right? Something we grow out of. It's something that happens all the time when you have kids, right? They start out maybe on one of those little scooter tractor things. They scoot along with their feet. They move up to a tricycle. They move up to a bike. a bicycle with training wheels. They outgrow that, and they start riding around without training wheels. Then as they grow, they get to a bigger and bigger bike, leaving behind them a path of things that they have outgrown. And as Christians, you and I, we have this tendency to come to the gospel, the good news about who Jesus is and what he has done, and say, "Yes, this is how I became a Christian. Now show me something else." And biblically, what happens is that we don't outgrow the gospel, but

rather we grow more deeply into the gospel. Paul will say to the church in Corinth, right? Not the outsiders, but he'll say, "Now I remind you, brothers, of the gospel which I preached to you." Paul, writing to a church that's struggling and hurting, filled with sin, brokenness, and division, will say, "You guys need the gospel." In Galatians chapter 2, as he talks about the conflict with Peter and the Jews, he will say, "When I saw that their conflict conduct was not in step with the gospel." And what he is saying is that there is a way to walk Christians. We don't start with the gospel and strike out on our own, but the gospel throughout our lives directs our step. It's not just the beginning, but it's the middle and the end. The gospel has to be the starting place, not just if you're outside the faith, but also for those who are inside the faith. And it's one thing, I think, for us to see the facts of the gospel

that it's about Jesus, and that Scripture points to Him, and that He has died in our place for our sins. He has rose again for our victory. And to know this, I think for us, it's different to see it and to feel it as well. It might be the difference between hearing about a natural wonder like the Grand Canyon, or a massive beautiful waterfall, and then standing and seeing those things for ourselves. the gospel comes in that second word, good news. You see, we live in a pretty dark and a pretty broken world, right? And that darkness is both outside of us, and we see it in all of the hurt and the struggle. You have to watch the news for about 30 seconds to see that this world is dark, and it's broken, and it's hurting. But here's the thing. That darkness is not just

outside the walls of your house or outside the walls of your church. It's not just outside of you. That darkness we see is inside of us as well. Right? We see it and we feel it. We see it and feel it in our broken relationships. We see it in our shame and our fear and our avoidance. We see it in how we treat others with unforgiveness and with harshness and pushing people away and abandoning them when they don't seem to fit our needs anymore. When we use people like objects. When we seek our own good above that of everyone else. We see it doesn't take very long in the quiet of the night with no noise and music and movies or people to distract us. We begin to see it's just as dark inside of us as it is outside of us.

And when we find in our world, there are two approaches to dealing with this darkness. One is the approach of good advice. Here's what you need to do, right? We'll sit down and look at the darkness. We'll look at the brokenness. We'll look at the problem. Let's come up with a plan and fix it, right? We've tried this as a nation, right? Well, maybe the problem is that we aren't educated enough, so let's educate everybody. And that doesn't fix the brokenness. Maybe if everybody is healthy enough, right? We try to fix that. Maybe if everybody has everything they need, and we try to fix that, and what you find is the brokenness, no matter what solution we apply to it, it just doesn't work. And religion, in many cases, is the same way. It comes to us with advice. Here is what you need to do in order to fix the brokenness that you feel

so deeply inside of you, right? Maybe meditate, do some good. Bank some karma. Pray in this direction, in this way. Fast in this way. Do this or that. And what you find, the difference between Christianity, and this is so important, the difference between Christianity and every other system of belief in this world is the difference between advice and news, right? Every other system of belief will tell you this is what you need to do to fix the problem. The news of the gospel is that it's been done. That's what news means. And when we come to Jesus, we don't come to advice. We come to news, right? That Jesus, the Son of God, steps into the darkness of our world as our light, and He overcomes the darkness, and He brings us into that light as well.

Christianity comes with good news that Jesus has taken care of the darkness. The darkness isn't strong enough. Those three transformative words in English from the cross, they sum up good news. It is finished. Jesus doesn't just mean His life. He means your redemption. It is finished. You see, you have a choice when it comes to dealing with the darkness that surrounds you and is inside of you. You can seek to work it out through good advice, or you can throw yourself on the Savior who brings good news. And I want you to think about your darkness for just a minute. Think about the shame that is inside all of us. It's the very first thing we see in the garden. Adam and Eve, they eat the fruit and they immediately realize that they're naked and they have to cover up and hide themselves.

And it doesn't just stop with clothing. As God comes down, they hide themselves in the garden, which seems really fruitless. Because God knows exactly where they are. And they are hiding because they are filled with shame. They see their brokenness, they don't want anybody else to see it, so they cover it up and they try to hide it. And you and I, when we see the brokenness and the guilt that comes from our sin, it makes us ashamed and we want to hide it. And so maybe we hide it by putting on a good veneer and a great outside. Maybe we hide it by avoiding thinking or talking about it, pretending it doesn't exist, trying to drown it out with entertainment or hobbies or whatever else we seek that can We can dull that sense of shame for a short time. And shame and guilt go hand in hand. And then there's fear.

And then this brokenness of shame and guilt and fear inside of us begins to pour out into the lives of others. And many of you have heard it said that hurt people end up hurting people. And because we are filled with shame and guilt and fear, we begin to hurt those around us. And here's what Jesus does. He steps into this world, and He picks up your shame. And it's not like picking up something and helping someone move it, right? I need to move a couch. Will you help me move it? That's not what Jesus does. He just doesn't come and help you with your shame. But He picks it up, and He makes it His own. As Jesus is crucified, naked on the cross, He is taking all of your shame. All of the things that you have hidden. And He is taking them from you, putting them onto Himself.

And He picks up your guilt, not just helping you carry the weight, but He takes that guilt. And you see it in the flogging, and in the crown of thorns, and in the mocking, and in the nails, and in the crucifixion. You see, Jesus is broken for your brokenness. And then He says, in the midst of it all, "It is finished." Not just paid for, right? It's a definitive victory. And we see it in the resurrection where Jesus arises, and He conquers. He doesn't just pay for your sins. He conquers them. He doesn't just take your shame and pay for it, right? Defeats shame. He doesn't just conquer, or He doesn't just take away your sin, but He conquers it. Death, Satan, sin, and hell are conquered with the resurrection. And that's not the end of the Gospel.

Because Jesus doesn't deserve any of those things that He takes, right? He's been good. And not just good and always choosing right, but when He has the opportunity to do right, He does it as well. He doesn't just avoid wrong, but He also does right at every opportunity. He is truly righteous. What Jesus does in the Gospels, He gives that righteousness to you. So that when God looks at you, when He looks at me, He doesn't see Brandon with his brokenness, and his hurts, and his fears, and his insecurities. He sees Jesus. As a Christian, it's not just that your sin is taken away. It's that Jesus gives you His righteousness. I remember when I was a younger bachelor, long before Rachel, and I lived a typical bachelor life, and I was going away for a while, and I thought my house was pretty okay, right?

I mean, it wasn't that bad. When I was gone, a couple of ladies in the church who had kids about the same age as me, they came into my house without my knowledge and cleaned the whole thing. And I walked in, I was like, "This is amazing! It's like a brand new house!" And they left me a note, they said, "This is a one-time bailout." Right? We cleaned it up, you're on your own from now on, right? That's not what the gospel does to you. Jesus on the cross does not show up, take your shame, your guilt, your sin, and your brokenness, and say, "Alright, it's a one-time thing. Your slate is clean." He comes in, He takes it away, but then He gives you and He fills you with His righteousness. So that when God looks at you as a broken sinner, He doesn't see your brokenness and your sin.

He sees the righteousness of Jesus. At the cross, Jesus takes your brokenness and gives you His righteousness and is victorious over sin and death. Second Corinthians 5:21, "For our sake, He made Him who knew no sin to be sin," takes our sin so that in Him we might become the righteousness of God. And in Colossians 3, "For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God." You see, there's this picture of the gospel that Jesus doesn't just take your sin, He gives you His righteousness. He gives you a new heart. He gives you His Spirit. And ultimately this should lead us to joy. Paul at the end of Ephesians 3 will say, "I bow my knee before the Father from whom all things in heaven and on earth are proclaimed." And he begins to overflow with this praise and glory to the goodness of God. And the reason for that is because Paul has seen the gospel.

And when he says he bends his knees, it doesn't mean that he slowly gets down on the ground, but that he falls on his face before God. Because he has seen the fact that his sin is taken. Righteousness has been given. He's been equipped with the Spirit. And he's been given a new life. So what happens now? First of all, I think for Christians it is essential that we know the gospel well. Because if we are to live the gospel, and if we are to share the gospel, we have to know the gospel. Martin Luther talking about the gospel in one of my favorite Martin Luther quotes, he will talk about how the gospel is different than the law. Because the law tells us what we should have done, but the gospel tells us what Christ has done for us.

And then he will go on to say, "It is essential for us to know this article well, to teach it to others, and to beat it into their heads continually." And I love that imagery, but I would change it to say, "Beat it into our own heads continually." Right? It's easy to be distracted. It's easy to turn. It's easy to get busy. It's easy to get discouraged and stuck. We must know the gospel well, and we must beat it into our heads continually. We also must understand that transformation and righteousness are not rooted in our self-control, but it's rooted in the gospel. And we'll see this in the coming weeks, but I'll give you a couple of examples. You want to talk about how hard it is to love somebody, right? Spend time in close proximity to them.

It's why when Paul talks about unity in the church, he will say, "Bear with one another." You could translate that, "Put up with one another," right? Because we let each other down, and it's a struggle sometimes if personalities clash, and he says, "Love one another." Remember when he says, "Love one another as Christ has loved you." That your love for others comes from the fact that you have seen the gospel. It's transformed you, and the only way you can love someone else is because of the gospel. He'll say the same thing about forgiveness. The only way that we can let go of the wrong that has been done to us is by seeing the forgiveness in the gospel. He'll even take it into the practical place in 2 Corinthians of generosity, that as we see how God has given to us, right, that flows out in how we treat our brothers and sisters in Christ.

Paul will say in Galatians 3 that we begin in the Spirit and we continue in the Spirit. The gospel brings us deeper into the Christian life because it's a temptation for us to say, "If Jesus has paid it all, then what must I do?" And in Romans chapter 6, Paul answers that question by saying, "May it never be." And then do you know what he does? He talks about the gospel and how we are immersed into the gospel, and it covers our life. And that righteousness begins not with our self-control, but it begins with the gospel. And we must understand that without the gospel, our spiritual life becomes a roller coaster of pride and despair. If everything in my salvation, in my Christian life, is about me, I'm either going to be very proud of that or very discouraged about it.

We see it in Scripture with the Pharisee in the Gospel of Luke who comes up and he says, "I thank you, God, that I am not like other men, that I fast and I give and I pray." And notice the common word in what he says, "I, I, I." As he prays to God, he's really looking at himself, and he's become proud. Or the rich man with the bigger barns, "I have had this harvest, I have this plant, I will build these barns." Once again, the focus becomes self. You see, without the Gospel, it's easy for our Christianity to become very self-centered and very proud that, "I don't do this, and I do do this, and look at how great I am." And at the root of our struggle with pride is because we have forgotten the Gospel. And on the other side of that coin is despair. Once again, it's all about us.

I can't do that. I failed at that. Just like pride, but the other side. And without the Gospel, you would either be very proud or very despairing. And it's only when we fix our eyes on Jesus and on what He has done, it changes everything. You see it in Scripture. Remember Elijah? He defeats the prophets of Baal. They don't respond with revival in Israel. In fact, Queen Jezebel seeks to have him killed, and you find him in the wilderness laying under a tree, going, "God, kill me." So God will feed him, give him a nap, take him further into the wilderness, and he'll say, "What's the problem?" He says, "I have been zealous for God. Look at how good I am." And then he goes, "But I'm the only one left. I've failed. I've been good. I'm proud.

Now I'm in despair because I have failed." Because Elijah, rather than looking at God, has been looking at himself. We see it in the 42nd Psalm, and the psalmist writes about how he has been broken, and how he has nothing to drink, and he's being chased and pursued by his enemies. But the psalmist, what he does is he preaches the gospel to himself, and he says, "Why are you downcast, O my soul? Hope in God." And the psalmist recognizes that because his eyes have been on himself and on his situation, it has brought him to despair, and he calls himself, and he preaches to himself to focus his eyes on God. Dr. Martyn Lloyd-Jones, in a sermon on spiritual weariness that I was listening to this past week, talks to us as Christians who are struggling with that.

He says, "Here you are," and he says, "There's two roads. There's the broad road, and then there is the narrow way, and that in your despair, you must look at yourself and say this, I have come to this, this narrow road, because the only begotten Son of God left heaven and came down to earth, having divested himself of the insignia of his eternal glory, and humbled himself, and was born as a babe, and put in a manger, and endured life in this world for 33 years, and was spat upon, and reviled, and a crown of thorns was pushed into his head, nailed upon the cross, and bore the punishment for my sins, and that is how I have come from that to this, through the power of the Gospel. And so the Gospel is our starting place. It's the path that satisfies our soul. We must preach the Gospel to ourself. We must know it well.

We must see that all of our righteousness is fueled, not by our goodness, but by the goodness of the Gospel. And if we are to avoid the traps of arrogant pride and the depths of despair, we must fix our eyes on Jesus. As the prophet says, God through his prophet says, "Stand by the roads and look. Ask for the ancient paths where the good way is, and walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls." Father, help us to find rest for our weary souls. Help us to find light in the darkness through you, through the good news of the Gospel, not of what we have done, but what you have done. We thank you for how you change us and transform us. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. We're going to stand and sing "Graves and Chains."

I searched the world But it couldn't fill me Man's empty praise And treasures that fade Are never enough Then you came along And put me back together And every desire Is now satisfied Here in your love Oh, there's nothing Better than you There's nothing Better than you Lord, there's nothing Nothing is better than you

You turn mourning to dancing You give beauty for ashes You turn shame into glory You're the only one who can You turn graves into gardens You turn bones into armies You turn seas into highways You're the only one who can Oh, there's nothing Better than you There's nothing Better than you, Lord There's nothing Nothing is better than you Oh, there's nothing Better than you There's nothing Better than you, Lord There's nothing Nothing is better than you Announcements as we get ready to dismiss. We are, first of all, very thankful that Debbie is here with us this morning. It's such an encouraging thing. Also, this Wednesday night, we will have James, our study, through the book of James, and that's at 7pm. You're welcome to join us. If you'd like to watch through these sessions, they are available. There's a link in the email that we send out kind of about every other week, I think, right now.

There's a link in there that has all of those sessions. If you want that link, you can just let me know. We're also in the middle of, I don't know, kind of snowballed into like three different projects, which is a good thing and a wonderful thing. So you'll probably, over the next couple weeks, start to see a couple of different things happening. And so if you're interested in volunteering or helping in any way with those, just go ahead. I can fill you in on what we're working on and what we're doing with that. Additionally, if you did not get a text this week about Debbie and her recovery, we sent out a church text, I guess it was Tuesday. If you did not get that, what that means is I probably don't have your cell phone number in our system for that,

or I have the wrong cell phone number. So if you would like to be included in that, I think back by the offering plate and the bottles of water back there, there's some papers you can write down your information or, you know, write it on any piece of paper and either drop it in the offering plate or pass it to me and Greg, and we'll get you included in that as well. And also next week, we're going to begin just right after church for a few minutes. We're going to work with the kids on teaching them some kids songs. So we're kind of excited to do that, and then we're going to start incorporating a couple of those into our service. So just a reminder, next week for a few minutes, we're going to steal the kids right after church.

And that probably was phrased badly about stealing the kids. So we're going to go ahead and have a word of prayer. Read a quick verse and sing the doxology. Father in heaven, thank you for Jesus and grace, and thank you for our church. Thank you for the good news of the gospel. Just be with us throughout this week. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen. We've read this a couple times, but I want to leave you with it. As God says, "Stand by the roads and look. Ask for the ancient paths where the good way is. Walk in it, and you will find rest for your souls." Praise God from whom all blessings flow. Praise Him, all creatures here below. Praise Him above ye heavenly hosts. Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you.