. So, as we said earlier, we are studying out a, a series, uh, we're
that we're calling the real Jesus.
And because we started off with the cause of Jesus and that Jesus, uh, is
not just something that to to believe.
You're not just something for followers to subscribe to or to post little cute
little posts on Instagram or maybe do some videos on TikTok, but the real Jesus
is worthy and he's calling us to know him, to follow him, and also to show the
real Jesus to those that we are around.
And so we're studying out through the Book of Luke, the real Jesus.
So we're in search of the real Jesus, the Jesus of the Bible, the Jesus of Nazareth.
Then what does that mean then for us today in 2023 to be followers of the real Jesus?
And so we've been making some observations and last week I thought
Kyle did a phenomenal job there in, in guiding us and helping us to
see how the real Jesus was open and welcomed in interruptions in our life.
And so he even called us to pray that as a church, that we can ask God
to reveal ways that we can welcome.
Interruption.
And so hopefully you've been praying that prayer for all of us,
and we are gonna have something as well to pray through this week.
So here today, we're gonna be talking about how the real
Jesus challenges our worldviews.
The real Jesus challenges our worldviews.
Let's go to God in prayer.
God almighty, father in heaven, king of kings, we see
your glory in the man, Jesus.
And God, as we see Jesus, he reveals you and we are so in awe of Jesus.
We're so in awe of your character, the way you interacted with
others, the way you interact with.
Father even hearing that was just so cool how, uh, uh, for Lawrence there,
Lord, you, you were a distant figure.
Someone who was a long time ago that really wasn't relevant to his daily life.
But now here he is saying he is compelled by the love that you have shown him,
the relationship that you have built with him, to now share that with others.
And God, we're grateful for this opportunity to shake off the religiosity
that we maybe some of us grew up with to, uh, uh, to dismiss, uh, certain, uh,
ideas and views of you and God be able to come in contact with the real Jesus and
God, I pray today that you will challenge our worldviews and that we will submit
our worldviews to the Lordship of Jesus.
It's in his name.
Amen.
Well, if you guys can turn over your Bibles to Luke chapter eight.
Luke chapter eight.
First off, it would be good here to understand our worldview.
A worldview we all understand is a particular philosophy of
life or conception of the world.
And so we, we have a worldview and so we view world, uh, uh, we view the world
through this lens, and we all have one.
It doesn't matter.
It's usually shaped by our family, our culture, our society, where we
live, what side of the tracks we grew up on, and, and our worldviews.
What happens when they come in, clash with other people's worldviews.
A fight, right?
There's a clash even in that, well, when we have different worldviews
with people, and that's what we see the result of fruit of, even in our
society, in your block, in your, in your school, wherever the case may be.
But our worldviews are so important because they dictate not only how we
view the world, but how we feel about things and our behavior, how we treat.
Our neighbors, how we view others, how we're gonna view each other before and
after this football game today, right?
And so it's important here that we look and see and examine our worldviews.
But here's the thing, when we come in contact with the real Jesus, he's
going to challenge your worldview.
And then we have a choice to make.
Are we going to hold on to our worldview?
Or if we're gonna follow the real Jesus, are we going to then submit
it to the lordship of Jesus?
And that's challenging, isn't it?
And so let's look and see how Jesus, the real Jesus challenges our worldview.
Church.
Are you with me here today?
Going over to Luke chapter eight.
Luke chapter eight.
We're gonna start off here in verse one.
Again, we've been looking through the book of Luke here, and we've seen Jesus
do a number of cool things that we've understood him, and, and we're gonna look
at something here and, and I'm just gonna say this real quickly, man, there is, oh,
I, I really wish we could just go verse by verse throughout the whole book of
Luke, but, but we're not going to, okay?
And, uh, and so we're gonna try to cover as much as we can.
And so I might get a little speedy here on my speed chair.
So I'm sorry, Emily, if I go too fast, try to stick with me here.
All right.
So in Luke chapter eight in verse one, it says, after this, Jesus
traveled about from one town in village to another, proclaiming the
good news of the Kingdom of God.
The 12 were with him and also some women who have been cured
of evil spirits and diseases.
Mary called Magdalene, from whom seven demons had come out.
Joanna the wife, Chuah, the manager of Herod's household, Susanna and many
others, these women were helping to support them out of their own means.
Let's stop right there.
Anything stand out?
Did anything stand out?
There's women participation.
Did you see that?
It says the 12 were with him and also who some women were right there.
And it says that these women were following.
So as they all went about from town to town and from Village.
Village, he's preaching.
And guess what?
You got the 12.
We all know we're all familiar with who the 12 apostles were.
And guess what?
There were women right there with him and they were also also
financially supporting the cause.
And the woman said, amen.
And the brother should say Amen.
Amen.
And we see this is radical.
We think, wow, look at our room.
That doesn't really mean much, but let's go back in time and let's enter that
culture and then extract what Jesus wants us to see for you and I today.
Can we do that?
Brothers and sisters, you know, this is a male dominated society.
We're familiar with that.
And for many, or maybe some women were considered second class
citizens, women were excluded from participation in synagogue worship.
So they couldn't participate in the, in the local church service there.
They were restricted to a spectator role and forbid in the enter the temple
and had to stay in the court of women.
Says you got to the temple in the court.
They had the court of women, they had the gentile part, but then the
Gentiles couldn't move any forward.
And then the women had their spot and that's where you're supposed to be.
You can't enter the temple.
And then a woman was not to touch the scriptures to avoid her defiling them.
Wow.
That's the setting that we're in.
And so Jesus is walking around with his crew.
They're preaching, and guess who's right along with them?
The women are, they're right along with him.
And again, women weren't taught by rabbis, so this was unfamiliar
territory because they're like, Hey, the, the rabbis might have some women
around maybe doing some, some, some, some, some type of service, but they
weren't following and they definitely weren't being taught by the rabbis.
But here, Jesus, he's teaching the women, the women are following Jesus
as we see, they become his disciples.
And guess what?
They're even footing the bill in the ministry.
Yeah.
Okay.
They're spiritually, the sugar mamas of the ministry.
Yeah.
And some of y'all get a little sensitive.
I this, I'm not saying anything to grading.
Okay.
I, I'm, you get what I'm saying?
I'm saying the women were like, I got this.
Jesus.
Yeah.
They were financially supporting while the real Jesus humbled to take help.
He's the real Jesus is not even to take help, but I, I have the
women be able to serve and be able to have this prominent role.
Ooh, this is something radical.
You know, Jesus ministry always depended on people sharing their resources.
Yeah.
They supported his ministry.
And I just want to thank all of those here.
I know we gave our financial offering and thank you, Jamie, that
that was a great offering there, uh, leading our thoughts there.
I wanna thank all those who support Jesus ministry today, still
through your sacrificial giving.
I want to thank you so much because Jesus ministry didn't stop then, as we know,
we're a part of Jesus' ministry today.
And we wouldn't have this ministry today without the selfless,
sacrificial giving of the congregation.
So go ahead and give yourselves some love right there.
I wish I could have heard the women do the offering talk, man.
I wonder what they would say today when they would get up and share with us.
But that's another side note.
Right?
And here's something interesting that says Joanna the wife, Chuah,
the manager of Hart's household, Hart was a a, a ruler there.
And that's interesting.
Check that out.
She was married and her man is linked up with her.
He's politically connected.
It depends on maybe what's meant here, but he could have been the financial
manager of Herod and here she is, what bravery to followed Jesus at a time
where women's rights were very limited.
It.
And you know, I've heard this term, I actually only heard it here in,
um, in Orange County, but, but even back then, they had what we call
the spiritually single people in the church who were married, but yet they,
their spouse is not a disciple yet.
So even in Jesus's ministry then, just like it is today, there were
those who were spiritually single.
And I just wanna lift up every brother and sister who is faithful to Jesus.
And your spouse is not a disciple of Jesus yet.
I wanna lift you up because that takes a lot and we appreciate and
we admire the example that you are setting for every single one of us.
And again, let's be praying for those that we know that are spiritually single.
Let's be praying and serving and loving upon their spouses.
Amen.
I mean, how much harder was it back then when women had less rights and she could
have easily been abandoned by her husband?
But she's still faithfully committed to following Jesus.
She probably was the one that had a lot of the money.
In a side note here, that's really cool.
This is probably how Hared heard of Jesus and probably his initial
thought of Jesus was negative.
Cuz he's hearing from choosing like, man, my wife is running around
and she's going on with Jesus and preaching and all that type of stuff.
Man, what's wrong with this guy?
And so that's probably how Harriet had heard of Jesus initially.
But then we know he has his other things that he has against him.
But Jesus challenges the worldview of many with his treatment of women.
And we see this clearly in the Book of Luke.
You see the role of women from the beginning of Jesus', time and life here on
earth, to the time in which he resurrects.
Check this out, right here in Luke one, we see Mary and Elizabeth.
There's some of the heroes of the infancy narratives about
John the Baptist in Jesus.
We see in Luke seven that Jesus lets a sinful woman touch his feet.
This is what we studied out last week, right through, uh, through
Kyle there, and he defended her in an argument with the Pharisees.
Then at Luke eight, we see here what we're looking at now, the women
follow Jesus, just like disciples and then provided material support.
Luke 10, we see Jesus commends Mary for sitting at his feet
and learning like a disciple.
Only disciples would be at the feet, and here she is and Jesus commends
her publicly for what she is doing.
Luke 13, Jesus cared for the dignity of this crippled woman
over it and against the Pharisees.
Again, in Luke 13, he uses a woman's work in his parable, in his
teaching, Luke 21 and 23, he showed his sorrow over the sufferings that
the woman would be forced to endure because they decided to follow him.
Later on in Luke 23, he, we see the women and they, they attend to his final rights.
And then we see in Luke 24 at the cmb, the women were the first to see,
recognized and also even proclaim the news of the resurrected Jesus again.
Can I get a amen from the brothers and the sisters?
You know what's a side note that's pretty wild is that the gospels
actually never record any women ever taking action against Jesus.
All his enemies were men.
Isn't that interesting?
That's just a little cool.
Side note.
I see, I see women all fired up like, yeah, Uhhuh.
It's the men messing it up.
But this is incredible.
This is incredible for Jesus in this time.
He's challenging.
How do you view the operative sex?
He's lifting it up that they are valuable and it's just as important
in my ministry as anybody else.
Let's continue reading.
Luke chapter eight, verse 19.
Now, Jesus' mother and brothers came to see him, but they were not able
to get near him because of the crowd.
Someone told him, your mother and brothers are standing outside wanting to see you.
He replied, my mother and brothers are those who hear God's
word and put it into practice.
We'll stop right there.
The gospel of Mark tells us that the family actually came in and
take charge of him, and they said, Hey, he's out of his mind.
So that's a little bit of the context that's there.
And so here Jesus is, and just imagine if you were there
and you heard this statement.
Jesus is in this crowd and they say, Hey, your mom, your brothers
are all outside to get you.
And he says, Hey, no, these people in here listening to me, the people who actually
do my, that do the the bidding of God who followed God through these are my mother.
My brothers are my sisters.
Whoa.
How would you feel if you heard that?
That's a little jarring.
That's a, that that does something to us, doesn't it?
Yeah.
It's challenging the day.
And it was challenging back then.
Again, this was a collective society.
Family was vital, family was important.
Families usually lived together in family units.
Oftentimes they would can, they would have parents, children, and grandparents.
And even in the same uh, area, you would have aunts, uncles, cousins, so
auntie, auntie Jan, uncle Joey, uh, uh, they would all be in the same place.
And in many cases you needed the whole family unit just for survival.
Yeah.
So this mindset of family was, Hey, family is important, families needed.
And Jesus says, those who do God's will are my true brothers and sisters.
This is jarring not just for the family, but for those around hearing this.
Jesus says, my true family is the spiritual family.
I don't believe he's really trying to disrespect or dismiss his physical family.
That could, that could be the case when we read this, but we also know that Jesus'
brothers, at least two of them, and also his mom, become followers of Jesus, and
he makes sure even on the cross that he takes care of his mother and that
she gets taken care of after he's gone.
So Jesus never was anti his own family.
What's he doing?
He's actually lifting up the spiritual family.
He's challenging our view of church.
He's challenging our views of our relationships.
We see here, Jesus, the spiritual family ties are stronger than
any physical ties can ever be.
He's saying, basically, my relatives imitate me and obey God.
You know, this is challenging, but if you think about it, it makes sense.
You know, one of my favorite, uh, uh, biblical commentaries, his name is
William Bar Barclay, and, uh, Barclay said this, I thought it was really cool,
and I wanted to read it with you guys.
It says, the deepest relationship of life is not merely a blood relationship.
It is the relationship of mind to mind and heart to heart.
It is when people have common aims, common principles, common
interests, a common goal that they become really and truly kin.
Some of us can attest to that, can't we?
We're, we're connected.
So to soul, mind to mind, heart to heart, passion.
We, we are driven for the cause of Jesus.
And so we look around and we go, man, you're my brother, man.
You're my sister.
You know, we've all heard the phrase, blood is thicker than water, but the
blood of Jesus is the thickest of all.
You know, this is challenging for many, but this is also freeing for all.
This means that nothing in our physical birth or environment
determines our relationship to God.
The only thing that does is our response to the word of God.
And so it doesn't matter what, what side of the tracks I grew up on.
It's all about how I respond to God's word.
I mean, again, this is challenging, but this is freeing.
This is helpful.
This is, this is incredible to be a part of God's spiritual family.
So when you become a child of God through baptism, you enter a spiritual family.
You know the person who follows the real Jesus enters a family in which includes
all the saints in earth and in heaven.
Now, this requires a change in our worldview.
This means that if we follow the real Jesus, then my church folk
aren't my church friends, but they are my true brothers and sisters.
Amen.
Because you can't view the person to your right or left
as, oh, that's my church friend.
That's somebody I know and see on Sunday and be following the Jesus
who says, no, no, no, no, no, no.
My family are those who actually follow the word of God.
That's my true family.
Amen.
See, it requires a change in worldview.
It requires a difference.
It requires relationships, not just attending service and
sitting in the pews together.
It requires a commitment, not to an organization, but to what?
To people.
To individuals.
It requires a commitment to serving one another.
And it requires a commitment to resolving conflict.
Ooh, can the church have some conflicts?
Yep.
All of y'all like mm-hmm.
, I had some on the way up in here.
And so we can, we, we can view each other as that and then
keep each other at a distance.
Let me give the Heisman to that brother.
That's sister, but not in God's family.
I gotta serve.
I have to love, and you know, I need to get resolved.
And again, for the Jew, or even for many Gentiles at this time, the idea of
family, it was necessary for survival.
So now how do I view you and how do you view me?
Are we necessary for spiritual survival?
That's why I'll make a commitment to be there on Wednesday.
That's why I'll make a commitment to be there on Sunday.
That's why I'll make a commitment to pray for you on those days.
This is why I'll make a commitment to spend time with you despite Wednesday
and Sunday and church activities, brother and sister, do you hear what I'm saying?
And I just wanna lift up the church.
The recent responses for a couple of the deaths that we've, that we've had
to endure and suffer here recently.
The memorial that was set up for Brene Turner.
I mean, she, she, she passed away in Texas, but here in California.
Why?
Because she was so loved.
There was a little memorial here for her.
Then a love and support that's been had for the Laier family.
I had a brother, uh, come up to me earlier and say, Hey, what can we do as college
students to be there to support the Laier family that is the family of God?
And I just wanted to commend the brothers and sisters, even as
Karina shared earlier, so grateful that we had true relationships.
But if we're honest for just a quick second, we're on the verge
of losing some of that for covid.
Some of us, we started to extract ourselves out of this, and so
we're not fully delving in to relationships with one another.
And so we might show up in the pews.
We might show up every now and then to an event, but we don't
have that kinship with one another.
You guys get what I'm saying?
And I know we've had some new brothers and sisters in Christ to get baptized.
I wanna encourage you never just bolt outta here after service.
Go ahead and go out to eat with somebody, engage in conversation and
build those lifelong relationships.
Amen.
Because here's the thing, if we do anything less than being committed
to each other, that means we are no longer following the real Jesus.
We're following some form of Jesus, but we're not following the real Jesus.
And so hallelujah, that the real Jesus challenges our view of church.
Amen.
Is Jesus challenging your worldview yet?
I dunno about you, but I get so excited.
But man, I get challenged by this.
We don't have enough time.
Uh uh.
So in Luke 8 22 to 25, he calms a storm.
He shows that he has authority over power, uh, the power over nature.
Luke 8 26 to 39, you have to read it on your own.
Jesus heals.
This man was a demonn possessed, and, uh, we're gonna take it up in Luke
chapter eight in verse 40, church.
Oh, you're still with me here.
Let's go to Luke chapter eight, verse 40.
Now, when Jesus returns, a crowd welcomed him for they were all expecting him.
Then a man named Gyrus, a synagogue leader, came and fell at Jesus's
feet, pleading with him to come to his house because his only daughter,
a girl of about 12, was dying.
As Jesus was on his way, the crowd almost crushed him.
And a woman was there who had been subject to bleeding for 12
years, but no one could heal her.
She came up behind and touched the edge of his cloak, and
immediately her bleeding stopped.
Who touched me?
Jesus has.
When they all denied it, Peter said, master, the people are
crowding, pressing against you.
The, the Greek word basically means like they were, they were being crushed.
And because maybe the streets were so narrow, it was like, Hey man, you're
we're basically being suffocated around here, and you're asking who touched you?
Like, what kind of question is that?
Jesus?
And he said, but Jesus says, someone touched me.
I know that power has gone out for me.
Then the woman seeing that she cannot go unnoticed, came trembling and fell at his
feet in the presence of all the people.
She told why she had touched him and how she had been instantly healed.
Then he said to her Daughter, your faith has healed.
You go in peace.
While Jesus was still speaking, someone came from the house of gyrus to
synagogue leader, your daughter is dead.
He said, don't bother the teacher anymore.
Hearing as Jesus said to Gyrus, don't be afraid.
Just believe and she will be healed.
We won't have time to read the whole thing, but Jesus goes into
the house of Gyrus and he heals and brings back to life his daughter.
And what do we see from this?
As we see that the real Jesus challenges our view of who's valuable, he
challenges our view of who is valuable.
Let's go ahead and let's let, let's break it down here again.
You see, we have the synagogue ruler and we have this bleeding
woman and see the synagogue ruler.
For him, that means he had wealth.
He was a wealthy man.
He's in charge of the local, uh, uh, uh, worship center there.
So he has respect.
He has prestige.
He has clout amongst his peers and in the community.
While the bleeding woman, while she's ostracized from her community,
she's ceremonially unclean.
She has no clout respect, and we know from, from the Book of Mark
that, that she spent all her money to on doctors trying to get healed.
It's funny that, that Luke o omits that part cuz he's a doctor.
I think he asked Holy Spirit, can I just like not leave that part?
You know what I'm saying?
Not have that part about the doctors couldn't help.
You know what I'm saying?
Holy Spirit was like, yeah, go ahead, because we're gonna
still expose it anyway, , and so here we have this situation.
You have this synagogue ruler, and then you have this woman
who's been bleeding, ostracized.
Let me ask you this, how would you view these two?
Where's your personal bias?
How do you, how does our society view these two scenarios?
Who do they value some value?
The person with wealth, it probably worked hard.
They did this.
They're respected.
They're, they're, they're, they have great faith.
Some, her bias would be towards the woman.
Well, she's ostracized, she's poor.
She's part of the people.
She's the outcast.
But what about Jesus?
Where does his bias lie?
You see the real Jesus.
What did he do?
He sees people.
Jesus saw them as people in need.
He didn't focus in on their, their, their sociopolitical, socioeconomic status.
He didn't look at that and let that determine what he was going to do.
He saw them as people who were both in need.
Check this out.
It says the woman had been bleeding for 12 years and it said that JI'S
daughter was about 12 years old.
These are two totally different experiences for the
last 12 years, aren't they?
She's been suffering.
She's been ostracized for the last 12 years while he's been loving and raising
up his daughter for the last 12 years.
These are two totally different scenarios, aren't they?
And again, maybe our biases start to lean toward one or the other.
However, Jesus saw them as what both in desperate need.
These are people that need help.
His heart was moved.
He ends her suffering and her isolation and restores a woman's
religious and social life.
And you know what?
Her overall dignity, he could have denounced a woman.
He had every right to denounce her for touching him, and he
could have demanded punishment.
You touched me like this woman.
What is wrong with you?
And then you're unclean.
But is that what he did?
By no means Jesus stands up.
He has her stand up.
He have her.
He has her openly identify herself, and then he affirms her publicly.
I want everybody to see this.
Your faith has saved you.
He lifts her up.
Confirms reaffirms that she is what valuable.
You could go back to your social community, you could go back to the
religious participation in what you had at this time, but Jesus doesn't
resist or resent Gru at the same time.
Well might be the case where some of us, remember Gru is a synagogue
ruler, so who are his peers?
Probably other synagogue rulers, maybe a couple Pharisees in the mix
with, and by this time, Jesus doesn't do a lot of teaching in a synagogue.
He's more outside.
It's possible because the crowds are larger.
It's also possible because the synagogue rulers are like, Hey,
we don't want this man anymore.
He's had problems in other places.
So who gyrus hangs out with either or, or potentially enemies of Jesus?
These are the ops of Jesus.
And what does he do?
Treats him with dignity.
He serves him, he helps him.
He restores his daughter's health and brings her back to life, treats him with
respect, and he honors their requests.
He takes note of both people and sees that they both are valuable in his sights.
Let me ask you this again.
Has the real Jesus challenged your worldview yet has
he challenged your world?
Worldview, the view of the opposite sex, the view of church and relationships,
the view that, that, that, that, uh, uh, others may be more valuable
than others or some aren't valuable or some, whatever the case may be.
Has he challenged your worldview yet?
I know for me, he continues to challenge, but I know in particular,
even with some of these instances, how Jesus has transformed my worldview.
, yeah.
Growing up, I know, I, I, I, I used to idolize the idea of, of being
a womanizer and, and so being able to use women and, and for, for,
uh, my own particular pleasure.
And so I, I, that's what I, I went and sought after and tried to do.
And so my view of women wa was, was not necessarily maybe subconsciously,
but maybe I even said it in into a certain extent, that they were sat
class citizens for my enjoyment.
Now again, women, this was my past.
Okay, I see some of y'all getting ready to get some stones and throw 'em at me.
Okay, hold on for a sec.
Let her brother finish the story.
, but that was my view.
Then I think of other issues.
I think of, I think of class issues, I think of race issues.
I know for a long period of time there, there was this idea of
resentment towards white people in particular, white people with wealth.
Then I'm, I'm a brother from Southern California.
I was involved in street stuff and street life and gangs and stuff like that, and
so black and brown, we get down, but black and brown, we get down as well.
And so I had issues with, with Hispanic males because oftentimes
we'd be at odds and we'd be fighting.
And so my worldview was like, Hey, it's all about me.
It's about my race, it's about the poor.
Let's go.
And so there was resentments, and my worldview was like, you
guys understand what I'm saying?
Then it started coming in contact with the real Jesus and
going, whoa, this is ungodly.
You claim to be religious, but yet look at your worldview.
That's not the real Jesus.
You're following some other form of Jesus.
And so then it ha, I have to, and I still have to submit it
now to the lordship of Jesus.
You guys get what I'm saying?
And God's so funny.
He's like, oh yeah, you used to be a womanizer.
Hey, guess what?
I'm gonna give you two daughters.
, we gonna keep working on you, Marcel.
He says, oh, I know you should have some issues with some race.
Guess what?
You gonna fall in love with a Latina?
I'm like, Lord, you just keep working on me.
You know what I'm saying?
My whole world has been flipped upside down.
I'm like, man, I got a whole bunch of women at the house.
I got people speaking Spanish at the house.
What's going on,
And I'm grateful to God though.
Yeah, I'm grateful to God.
And then I think about it, I said, oh, you know what?
You know some of my mentors, some of my best friends, good old classic white
guys, some of the two of my mentors, Reese kneeling and Bruce Williams, man, they
didn't really have any experience with black people until they became Christians
I'm like, man, if you ask me that question, that means you really didn't
grow up with any black people have you.
But God is just so cool how he's continually transforming our
world, views, our characters, our behaviors, our attitudes.
You guys get what I'm saying?
Church.
And so what does that mean for us?
That means we need to know, we need to follow and show the real Jesus, right?
The real Jesus out there is not one who values women.
I mean, the, the, the false Jesus death out there.
Excuse me, people will take Christianity.
Ah, putting women down.
That's not the real Jesus.
The real Jesus.
There are whole bunch of hypocrite, the relationships and all.
That's not the real Jesus.
The real Jesus.
Oh, they only value certain types of people.
They look down upon others.
That's not the real Jesus.
The real Jesus has a worldview that challenges our very core, what
we grew up with, our experiences.
And so now again, that question that we asked at the beginning,
when we come in contact with the real Jesus, what are we going to do?
Are we gonna hold on or are we gonna submit it to the lordship of Jesus?
That means, Hey, you know, I'm gonna pray.
I'm going to read scriptures.
I'm gonna allow you now to form and shape.
My worldview of people of how I should behave.
You know, you can't keep the same worldviews that you had before
following Jesus, after following Jesus.
There's no way it's incompatible.
But when we do, when we submit it to the Lordship of Jesus, we now align
ourselves with our creator and we allow, align ourselves with the real Jesus.
And so let's get real practical church, right?
You still with me here?
Here's an action step in prayer for the week.
First up here, I asked you to pray.
Please pray.
Join with us every day this week, seven days this week.
Here.
You can continue past seven if you want, but pray for our church to
have the humility to submit our worldview to the lordship of Jesus.
Not just yourself, but for every single one of us to submit it.
Just imagine if we all submitted our worldviews to the Lordship of
Jesus, what would that look like?
You think our fellowship might be enhanced a little bit, yes.
You think the people around us who come in contact might
have a different view of this?
Jesus, of course they would.
And then I, since we're, we're still studying now,
Luke, I asked you to do this.
Read Luke chapter nine.
We're gonna go over Luke nine next week and just take note,
whatever note of the real Jesus.
You can do this one day, one sit in.
You can break it up in the seven days, however you wanna do it.
But just go ahead and read the, the chapter in Luke chapter nine so that
when we come together, you already have some ideas of the real Jesus and how
he has impacted or resonated with you.
Right now, we're gonna take communion.
It's where, remember Jesus' death on the cross.
We take the emblems that represent his body and blood that was shed
upon the cross and sacrifice for the opportunity for us to have salvation.
And if you think about this, through the sacrifice of Jesus, our view of God.
Of love, of grace, of mercy, of judgment, of hope, of purpose, has
all been radically transformed.
Even the fact that ju, that that, that God had Jesus go upon and suffer a,
a, a criminal, a wicked criminal's death, he flipped that to being a
symbol of grace and mercy, again, transforming our worldviews of who
God is, what's his character like, and what's our response to him.
I wanna close out here in one Corinthians chapter one in verse 13.
It says, for the message of the cross is foolishness to those who
are perishing, but to those who are being saved, it is the power of God.
Amen.
Let's pray.
Father in heaven, I thank you so much for Jesus.
I thank you that, that He, he just, I'm just so incredibly in awe.
God, when we study and we see your, your character, When we see how you
view things, what you value God is, it's just like, wow, I am, I, I, I.
That's not who I am.
That's not who I once was, but God, I, we look at it and we go, but that is good.
We're inspired by it.
We see the truth in it.
We see the reasoning.
We see the benefit of it, and God, we're humbled and we're grateful.
Thank you that we have a chance to respond to your grace.
Thank you for, for, for challenging our worldviews.
And God, I do pray that as a church, we will submit our
worldviews to the lordship of Jesus.
Thank you that you turned cross upside down, God, allowing it to be
a sign of love and grace and mercy.
God, we're so thankful that Jesus stayed upon a cross.
They did not come down, but allowed himself to suffer, but to raise again
so that we could die to our old selves and be raised in the faith in Christ.
Thank you for your spirit.
Thank you for your love.
Thank you for Jesus in His name.
Amen.