It's a good day to be in the house of the Lord. If you're joining
us on live stream, thank you for joining us. It is Spirit break
week and, some people decide to go out of town. So I hope that they
are on a on live stream today. And
next week is resurrection Sunday and that is and and
guys we should be excited about that. But do you know that he didn't just
resurrect on March 31st? It's every day we get to
celebrate that Jesus is alive. Are you glad Jesus is alive
today? Before I get in too deep into where I
wanna go, today, let me make a few announcements leading up to this week. This
week is Holy week. And so, as a part of Holy Week, we have some
things happening here at Springhouse that we want you to be aware of. First of
all, on Thursday night, we'll be closing out the series lessons from the table
that pastor Jonathan, Jesus has been leading.
And, man, just a wonderful word each Thursday. If you haven't had an
opportunity, go back and look at that online. And, it's
rich and you'll learn a lot, and you don't have to have come to the
last ones to come this Thursday and be a part of it. It's Maundy Thursday.
It would be a great thing to do during Holy Week to come and worship
with us from 6 to 7 on Thursday. And then, again, on Good
Friday, we're going to be meeting from 6 to 7 and having a worship
service, that evening in this room from 6 to 7, we'll also be doing
communion together, on Good Friday. So we want you to be a part of that
as well. And then of course, Easter Sunday, Jesus is
alive, we're gonna celebrate. As I mentioned last
week, I do have a favor to ask. If you are not serving in
any capacity next Sunday and your and your schedule
allows, if you could come to the early gathering, they will be
repeat gatherings. You won't miss anything. That will just make some
more room in this gathering for those new people who will be coming that
week. We find, typically throughout history, we have
more people show up on Easter Sunday and this service tends to get kind of
packed out. So if you're able to come to the early gathering, I would appreciate
the following week we're gonna have something special happening here at Spring House. We're gonna
have the Lee University Singers are gonna lead us in worship and that's gonna be
followed by an outdoor picnic, okay? So the reason why we're putting our
picnic there is because we want an opportunity to
get to know the people who come on Easter Sunday and the week after.
So next week, if you if the people you bring enjoy the service,
enjoy the gathering, and you want to invite them back, let them know there's gonna
be a picnic the next week and we will feed them. People like food, that's
what I learned. People like food, so we will feed them. We want them to
come and be a part of that. The thought I don't have a slide for
this, but the following week, Jonathan Evans is gonna be with us and that's gonna
be a real, real rich, Sunday, as well. So God
has saved the very best for Amen. Right now. And,
and I'm so grateful for the word that the Lord has given me,
today. We are in the middle of a mini series within a series. And,
we've been talking about His word at the beginning of the, of the year. We
are in His life, and then, in a few weeks, we're gonna be opening up
His church for the remainder, of the year. And within the His
life, portion of our series, we're doing this mini series because it is
Easter. And last week pastor Justin did a phenomenal job of unpackaging
It is the truth. Jesus went through the torture on the cross
for us and we need to hear that and be reminded of that.
Man, sometimes we can skip right over those portions of scripture that we don't want
to feel, but sometimes we need to feel the whole
truth, to to better lean in and to understand.
And then this week we're gonna talk about his burial. Next week we're gonna talk
of course about, his resurrection. And so, we're God to stand today
and read from John theater 19. If you'll stand with me. And we're
going to start reading. Here we go.
Now it was the day of prayer and the next day was to be
a special Sabbath. Because the Jewish leaders did not
want the bodies left on the crosses during the Sabbath,
they asked Pilate to have the legs broken and the bodies
taken down. The soldiers therefore came and
broke the legs of the first man who had been crucified with
Jesus and then those of the other. But when they
came to Jesus and found that he was already dead, they
did not break his legs. Instead, one of the
shoulders pierced Jesus side with a Spirit,
bringing a sudden flow of blood and water. The man
who saw it has given testimony and his testimony
is true. He knows that he tells the truth and he
testifies so that you also may believe.
These things happen so that the scripture would be fulfilled.
Not one of his bones will be broken and as another
scripture says, they will look on the one they have
pierced. 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 Pilate's 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 myrrh aloes and about £75.
Taking Jesus body, the 2 of them wrapped it with the
spices in strips of linen. This was an accordance
with the Jew burial customs. At the place
where Jesus was crucified, there was a garden and in
the garden, a new tomb in which no one who'd ever
been laid because it was the Jewish day of preparation
and since the tomb was nearby, they laid Jesus
there. Father, I thank you for your word and that it brings life.
My prayer today is that the dark things would be exposed
and that light would penetrate darkness and that
redemption would draw near. I love you today in Jesus
name. Amen. You may be seated.
We're talking, this week about,
about his burial. In the middle of looking at his
death and his resurrection is his is his burial. Does anybody
like a good game of hide and seek? Anybody? When was the
last time you played hide and seek? In fact, I'm gonna count and if you
guys would go hide. No. I love a good game of
hide and seek. In fact, I like playing hide hide and seek right now. When
my kids try to look for me, I'm hiding every time, but they always seem
to find me. But I love I love playing
hide and seek. In fact, a few years ago, I remember I was at the
school and, the teens at the school enjoy a good lock in.
They love staying up all night and they love being at the school during the
lock in. And, and one of the things that they like to do during
the lock in is play hide and seek. And so what I what I
did because hide and seek is no fun in the light, so I went and
cut all the power off to the building and we played hide and seek.
And I'm a really good hider. And so I went and I found
a great hiding space. I went into the library of the school and
I laid, I laid horizontally on the top of
one of the bookshelves. And, and I just laid there and
it was 20, 25, 30 minutes that they
were searching and looking for me all over the school. And what was so
fun was when they would circle the bookcase looking for me
and I would literally be laying there on top and they had no idea. And
I would hear them, they would say, Maybe he's down on this end of the
hall, or maybe he's in a locker, or maybe he's in the restroom, or maybe
you know, and they could not find me. And I was content to lay there
all night long. I had no there was no rush for me to
get out of a hiding spot. I would have let them just continue to look
and look and look, but something happened, that caused
my hiding place to be discovered. The
bookcase crashed down onto the floor. So here
I go a tumbling down on all of the books with a loud cry
and all of the teens knew where I was whenever I
screamed out loud from falling, on the on the on the bookcase.
But man, I pride myself on being a really good hider during hide and
seek. But something that I'm not so very proud of is that I'm good at
hiding my sin.
If I'm really honest, I am really really good at hiding
the things that really need light in my life.
And I wonder if anybody could join me in that sentiment.
That we become really really good at
hiding. Paul writes a letter to the Corinthians
and he wants to be sure that they understand the very
basics of the gospel of Jesus Christ. And it's in 1 Corinthians
15 he says this, Now brothers and sisters, I want to remind you of the
gospel I pray to you church you have received, and on which you have
taken your stand. By this gospel, you are saved. If you
hold firmly to the word I preach to you. Otherwise, you have believed
in vain. For what I received, I passed on to you
as a first importance. And this is the gospel,
that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures,
that he was buried, and that he was raised on the
3rd pray according to the scriptures. So
the gospel literally translates into good news, and the
good news is that Jesus Christ died according to the
scriptures. He was buried and he was raised again
3 days later. That is the crux of the gospel. But
we spend a lot of time, especially around this time of year, we spend
a lot of time focusing on His death, which we should, and we
spend a lot of time next week focusing on His resurrection,
which we should, but there's this middle section that is
included in the picture
encapsulation of the gospel. His death, his burial, and
his resurrection. Well, the reason that the burial is a
very important part of the 3 piece
encapsulation of the gospel, the reason that's important is because we need to
understand that Jesus Christ was emphatically dead.
If he was not dead, he would have not been able to raise from the
dead. He was emphatically
dead. He did not faint. He did not fall asleep.
There was a Gnostic movement that believed that Jesus wouldn't even have a
body. He was just a he was just a figure or a spirit. No,
Jesus had a body and Jesus died,
completely died on the cross. And he died at
the moment when he uttered those words, it is
finished. Three powerful words. Of course, he
did not say it is finished. He, he said he did not say it in
English, but that was the translation. It is finished,
meaning it is done. Now, did it is finished mean
that the work of Jesus Christ was just done and
we just move forward in time? No, it is finished
meant that Jesus commission from his father had
come to completion, but the redemption of mankind was just
beginning. The redemption of mankind was just
beginning. The Roman crucifixion, as
Justin pointed out last week, was one of the or
the most grueling, shameful
ways to die. Painful, horrific
ways to die. The Romans wanted to ensure that
there was complete and utter suffering when it came to the
cross. And suffer, Jesus did. And
so what the Romans would do after they had
crucified the people is they would leave the bodies
on the crosses for days, perhaps sometimes weeks.
And sometimes because of the way Justin was talking about how the
feet were nailed in the hands and they would have to pull up for breath
and then allow themselves to go down until they suffocated to
death. Some of this would sometimes this will last for a few days
because they were able to pull themselves up, but theatre Romans would allow the
bodies to stay on the cross for a long period of time.
And oftentimes they were crucified up on a hill so that all the
people who would look up on those people who had died would know you better
not cross the Roman law or this could become your fate.
And so these bodies would just decay. They would be if they were
when they were taken off the cross, they were just thrown into the trash heap.
They weren't given dignity. They were not given a dignified burial or
any type of graveside service. These bodies were as
if they were trash. Crows would nibble at
them. Dogs would, they were nasty. They
smelled. These bodies were left there for a very long
time, except for this occasion. Why? Because of
this occasion. Well, this was a very special
time period that Jesus was crucified. This was the day
before the Sabbath. The Sabbath was about to happen, but not just any Sabbath.
This was the Passover. And those who
crucified Jesus wanted to get home to their families to
enjoy supper, to enjoy their time of Sabbath without having to know
that these crosses with these individuals were were on were on
on on the crosses decaying there. What's more, their
law told them that they had to take the bodies down. This
is what it says in Deuteronomy. If someone has committed a crime worthy of death
and is executed and hung on a tree, the body must not remain
hanging from the tree overnight. You must bury the
body the same day for anyone who is hung is cursed in the
sight of God. And so they were ordered by their law, by their
custom to take these bodies down before the Sabbath and get them
buried. And so what did they do?
Well, the Jewish leaders went to Pilate and they said,
hey Pilate, according to our customs, we need to have
these bodies taken down and they need to be buried. So could you please
God? Would you please go and break the legs of the people on
the crosses so that their death could be quick and we could
remove the bodies from the cross? You see, when you break the
legs, that means that any chance of them lifting up and getting prayer,
it's taken away from them. And so in a way,
breaking the legs was actually an act of mercy because
death happened a lot quicker. Well, it
was customary in Roman and Roman times that there would be 4
Roman soldiers assigned to the cross,
assigned to do the work and they sent the 4 Roman shoulders up and they
see the person who is hung to the left of Jesus and
they beat the legs of the person to the left and break his
legs. He dies. They go to the person on the right of
Jesus and they take their club and they beat the legs and
they break the legs of the person to the right and he dies.
But as they gaze upon Jesus, they notice that
Jesus has already died. And
instead of breaking his legs, the Roman soldier
takes a spear and thrust it into Jesus side.
And the word tells us that when that thrust happened, out of
the wound, out of the Holy came both blood and
water. That's significant. That's significant.
Hold on to that thought for just a second. Over in Numbers, Exodus and Psalm
34, we are told that none of Jesus' bones would be
broken. None of Jesus' bones were
broken. They didn't break his legs. Why didn't they break their
theatre, his legs? He had, they had every right to do it. That was the
order that they were given, but they didn't break
his legs. Morticians
would look at, morticians would look at the flow
of water and the flow of blood and they would see these two
ingredients together. I believe that the theater would be called,
pericardial fluid. I'm probably saying that wrong.
But the fluid that would be mixed in with the blood, they would look at
this, morticians would look at this and they would pray, they would determine that the
reason or the cause of death would be because of heart failure, because
of something surrounding the heart, the pressure on the
heart. So it could be believed that Jesus died because of some
type of heart failure. Now morticians would actually call
this broken heart syndrome. If you've ever been notice
anybody that's been married for a very very very long time and they have a
spouse that goes on and they die and you see them start to
just completely lose everything within and then they die right after,
broken heart syndrome is actually a real thing. And it
means that there's lots of pressure put on actually on the
interior artery of the of the heart Pressure is put there and it just
caves in and you can imagine the amount of stress,
emotional, spiritual, physical that
Jesus was enduring. And so if this is
correct, if Jesus died of heart failure,
it could be said that Jesus died because of a broken
heart. Jesus died
on this cross.
In fact, in Psalm 22 and later in John
19, he records the story. Jesus dies
and He didn't die in dignity or honor
because they were casting lots for His very clothing. I
mentioned earlier, there were 4 Roman soldiers. Well, there were 5 pieces of
garments on a on a Jewish person. There was the inner tunic, the
outer tunic, a belt, a hat, or a covering rather, and
shoes. So there would not be an even distribution between the
Roman soldiers of any of the garb that Jesus would have worn.
And so they cast lots and they didn't wanna shred the garment.
So they cast lots for it just as the prophecy
foretold. Why am I laboring on these points? I want
you to understand that Jesus never leaves
anything undone. Jesus never leaves
anything undone. Everything that he said was going to
happen,
You can trust, you can believe that the word of God is
true. It is accurate. It is sound and it will be
done according to his will.
And so here is Jesus hanging on the
cross, the Jewish leaders need to get these bodies completely
dead, get them off the cross. Everyone that rolls with
Jesus, all of his friends, all of his comrades, the people
who broke bread with him, the people who are surrounding him,
all of them leave and flee Jesus and they go
into hiding. Have you ever
felt a sense of abandonment in your worst moment?
Jesus abandoned by the ones he spent
the most time with. There is a quote
that goes like this. A friend is someone who comes in when the
whole world goes out. Jesus
had some friends show up that were not over
followers of him, not pronounced followers
of him. The scripture tells us that a guy named Joseph of
Arimathea and a guy named Nicodemus, which we read about in John
3, come and they decide that
they want to take the body of Jesus off the cross to give
him a proper burial.
Now, I want you to understand that both Joseph and Nicodemus
were a part of the Sanhedrin, which meant that they were a part of the
Jewish council. They both were a part of the group that
was saying, crucify him, though we don't know that they
actually agreed with the verdict of crucify
him. Yet while Jesus was alive, both of these
men were in the shadows hiding.
But after his death in an act
of courage, an act of boldness, and I
believe in an act of belief.
Joseph goes before Pilate risking
everything. This rich man, Joseph, who we learn about, goes before
Pilate and he says, may I please take this body
down so that I may bury him with
dignity. And Pilate shocked that Jesus has already
died, says, Absolutely, yes, you
may. This fulfills the scripture in Isaiah that says that he was assigned
a grave with the wicked, but he was to be buried among the rich.
The scriptures continue to unfold and be
done as it is said. Guys, that is something to be excited
about. It's exciting to know that we can
count on what he says he's gonna do, that he will do it, he will
complete it to the end of the age.
And so Joseph and Nicodemus, they
take this body off of the cross. Now, I want you to understand
that this is not a pretty thing. I don't believe Listen, Nicodemus and
Joseph probably had lots of servants. They would have had a lot of people that
would work for them. I believe that these 2 guys took Jesus
off the cross. And I imagine because of
Jewish custom, they had to prepare the
body for burial. And they had to do it in haste,
because Sabbath was coming. So here's the thing. They take
the body off of the cross. And can you just imagine
that they had to take every defiled part of the body pray? So
can you imagine the thorns that were still stuck in his head,
That they had to pluck out those thorns, any of the thistles that are
in there. That they had to take rags and cloths and wash
the wounds that were caused by the cat of 9 tails.
That they were washing the body to prepare for the burial. And I can
only imagine Nicodemus sitting there and reliving
his encounter with the Holy of Holies, with the Lord of
Lords, who said, you must be born again. Well, how
do you be born again? How can someone go back into the mother's flesh
and come out? And and Jesus says, no, you don't get it. Flesh gives birth
to flesh. Spirit gives birth to spirit.
This Nicodemus and Joseph who witnessed the miracles,
the teaching. I can only imagine as they have this
body and they're preparing it for its its burial, that they're reliving
and recounting these things and thinking to themselves, surely this
was the son of God. Surely
he is who he said he was.
Mind you, he had not resurrected yet.
I think Nicodemus and Joseph give a bad pray get a bad rap because they
were in hiding. But I want you to know they came out of hiding and
they made a choice. They made a choice and you have
the opportunity and the ability to come out of hiding today and make a
choice. No matter what the choices were in the past, you can make new
choices for the future and God will give you the strength to make those
choices. So we need to understand
that Jesus was emphatically dead.
He was dead. Anybody that would go up to Nicodemus and
Joseph and say, oh, I bet he's just fainted. I bet he's alive. I bet
they punch him right in the nose.
Because they were dealing with the body of
Jesus. £75
of Spirit, of aloe, of
myrrh. It was usually about £10,
£75 for Jesus
to wrap him up in strips of linen
And to take Jesus
to the grave, to take him to the rich man's
tomb. The word tells us in Hebrews 2, but we do see
that Jesus who was made lower than the angels for a little while now crowned
with glory and honor because he suffered death so that by the grace of
God, he might taste death for everyone that he might taste death
for you and me. Jesus Christ
separated from God in the midst of
darkness, taking on the weight in the sin of the world,
tasted death so that you don't have to. So
that I don't have to. Jesus Christ experienced
hell so that you don't have to, so that I
don't have to. So
why is it then that we are okay
with frequent visits to hell on earth?
Because we gravitate to our sin and our worldly flesh
desires when Jesus has life abundant
available for us.
Nicodemus and Joseph came out of hiding.
And I believe that the truth that they had to own was it is
not too late. And I want you
to understand this morning church, that no matter what
decisions you have made, no matter what choices you have made, it
is not too late for you to be redeemed and
restored to savior Jesus Christ.
It is not too late for you to experience life in
its fullest form. Here's what the
word says in John, everyone who sins is a slave
to sin. Now a slave has no permanent place in the family, but
a son belongs to it forever.
So the sun set you free, you will be free
indeed. What does sin do? Sin separates
us from the father. Do you recognize also though, I've learned
sin doesn't just separate us from the father, sin also separates us from
one another. When we're dealing with
sin and we're hiding and we're in shame, there is a wall that
begins to build between one another. And you know what's hard about that
is God's most chosen instrument when He's revealing His glory and His grace is
to use people. And when we're building walls between each other, we're building walls
within, sin is separated and sin is the culprit.
And so we become shackled to our sin yet
We have a promise that we've been set free.
So if it's supposed to be dead, if the sin
is supposed to be dead, and if it's true that Jesus
has set us free, why then church
do so many of us bury our sin
alive? Do you know that you're not
supposed to bury things that are alive?
Burial is reserved for dead things.
But so many of us can get up. We have the propensity to get up
on Sunday morning and say, well, I gotta go to church, So I'm just gonna
bury that thing for a few hours knowing good and well, I'm gonna come right
back to it on Sunday night.
I'm about to go hang out with that group of people and I certainly
don't want them to know what it is I'm doing. So I'm gonna
go and bury him and dig a just a shallow enough Holy to bury this
sin for a moment, knowing good and full well I'm coming right
back to it when the moment presents itself.
Somebody said it this pray. We want to
defeat our demons, but we can't defeat our demons when we are
still enjoying their company.
But I like my sin. Or
maybe I don't like my sin, but I don't know how to get rid of
my sin. I don't know how to release it.
And so I'm just content being in hiding and I wonder
why I do not feel an experience the goodness and the
glory of God in my life. The extraordinary promises are not
unfolding in front of me. The extravagant love of God,
muck and nasty and in the muck and mire and there you are as the
prodigal son who has run from God and all he's doing is saying,
come home. Come
home. Are you hiding
this morning? Are
you hiding this morning? The invitation
this morning is to come out of hiding
into a place of light so that you can experience this
God in a way that you have never experienced him before.
And what ends up stopping us from making that
step, from taking that step, most of the time what stops
us is fear. What am I afraid of? I'm afraid
of what Barbie's gonna think of me if I'm exposed.
I'm afraid of what TJ is God say if I'm around him and hanging out
and all of a sudden he sees the evidence of my
sin. I'm so scared of
what they might think about me, but guys,
raise your hand if you need a savior in this place. Would you just raise
your hand? Would you look around this room? Every single one of
us need a savior. Every single one of us need this
God to do a mighty work in our lives. And the lie of the
enemy, the tactic of fear that he places in your life is that you
are the only one and you are alone.
But that is a lie from the accuser of the brethren. That is a lie
from the devil. That is a lie from the father of lies. You are not
alone. In fact, not only are you not alone, you have been set
free. You have been set free. And so
when it comes to fear, the antidote to fear, we
talked about this, is is love. Listen to this. This is how we know
that we live in Him and He in us. He has given us His Spirit.
And we have seen and testify that the Father has sent His Son to be
the savior of the world. If anyone acknowledges that Jesus is the Son of God,
God lives in them and they in God and so we know and rely
on the love God has for us. Listen to this, God is
love. God is love. Whoever lives in
love, lives in God and God in them. This is how love
is made complete among us so that we will have the confidence on the
day of judgment. In this world, listen to this, we are like
Jesus. We are like Jesus. There
is no fear in love, but perfect love
drives out fear because fear has to do with punishment. The one who
fears is not made perfect in love. Listen to me, when
you obedience the true love of Christ,
that sin becomes far, far, far less desirable.
That sin becomes so so less desirable in your
life because you are loved by
the one who breathes stars. The one who knows
your name. The one who puts you on this
planet. The one who knows the prayer, numbers
of hairs on your head. The one who sees the hurt and the
brokenness and the pain that you have endured. He's the
one who endured the cross and was buried
dead, but came back to life. So
that you would have the power in your life to overcome any
obstacle in any sin. Today is
Palm Sunday. Historically, we celebrate the
story in the scripture where Jesus rides in triumphal
triumphantly as the King. But here
is the crux of this, of this, of this story. This is this is
the problem. Jesus Christ was indeed
their king, but it was only from a positional
standpoint. It wasn't from a life changing
standpoint. We have access to a king that wants to change our life, wants to
change our heart. He didn't
come to give you just a wonderful life. He came to change
your life and for the better.
They wanted a king to liberate them from the Roman
oppression and law. That was the reason why they were crying out to this
king. But they didn't really want a King to liberate them
from their own wickedness and their own sin.
Because true freedom comes when we are liberated
from ourselves and reconciled to him.
So the cry of Hosanna, do you know what Hosanna actually means? This is
crazy. This is crazy. The people are crying
out, Hosanna, glory to God in the highest,
Hosanna. Well, Hosanna literally
means literally translated, deliver me, save
me. In other words, Hosanna is a cry for help and they
didn't even know they needed to help. Help
God in the highest. Help
God. Glory, glory God, the King
of kings, the King of the Jews but not just the Jews now, the King
of everybody. Holy, Hosanna. And I
wonder if there's somebody under the sound of my voice that needs to cry out
for help. Because the minute you cry out
for help, he draws near to you. The word tells us if you draw near
to God, what's gonna happen? He's gonna draw near to you. And there's no
caveat there, clean up your mess and then draw near to me. Get your life
straight then draw near to me. I don't cry out
for help when I don't need help. I cry out for help when
I'm in danger. When I need help, there's a
story that I've shared before of my daughter Lucia.
Sherry and I were getting in obedience night and I have a tradition of going
around and kissing all of the girls. And I went into
Hadassah's room, and I went to Ruby and Nora, and give them a
kiss. I see that Lucia is not in her bed. I'm like, what's going
on? Well, maybe she's in the restroom.
Stairs to get a drink. So I rode downstairs and I don't see her downstairs,
downstairs to get a drink. So I rode downstairs and I don't see her downstairs.
It's like 11:12 that night, and I run downstairs, I don't see her down there,
and there's the back doors cracked open.
You want to talk about a father's heart?
I Spirit to panic. And so I go to the back
door and I go outside and say, Lucy, Lucia,
Lucia, where are you? She's not answering.
Nobody's answering. So I start to fly through the house and of course I go
to the front door and I opened the front door and I go out to
the front porch. Lucy, Lucia. By this
time, Sherry's getting worried and she's like, what's going on? And I come inside, I
can't find Lucia. She's not upstairs, not downstairs, the back door is open. And as
I started to make my way up the stairs to go and grab my shoes,
I hear a noise and
it's coming from the front bathroom. I'm like, well, I passed the
bathroom, but maybe she's in there. So I quickly go in there and open the
door and I don't see anything. And so I turn around and and I hear
something else and I stopped and I get real still.
And I slowly turn around and I go into the bathroom.
And when I go down to the bathroom, I go to the vanity
and I get down on my knees and I open the
door, and there's Lucia
with chocolate all over her face.
Sin leaves residue.
I want you to know at that moment, as a dad,
it didn't matter what Lucy had done. It didn't
matter that she had chocolate on her face, that she had gotten out of bed,
that she had gotten into the candy jar. What had mattered was I
couldn't find Lucia and now she had been found.
And I want you to know that it doesn't matter how much chocolate you
got on your face, doesn't matter what you've done, Jesus is sufficient for all of
it. Can I say that again? Actually is sufficient for all of it. Can I
say that again? Jesus's blood is actually
sufficient for all of it. The totality of
it. And if you will accept
and believe that his blood washes you white as white
as snow, then you have access and you can come
into God's presence and you can benefit as
a son and a daughter of God Most High.
Do you wanna stay in the vanity or do you wanna come
out and be liberated this morning?
3 weeks ago, I really messed up.
I really really messed up and I got caught. Sherry found
me and I got caught.
And Sherry had every right to be angry with
me. She had every right to to for us to be
talking for weeks about it, for her to to just be on my
case, all of this stuff, I really messed up. But you know what Sherry did
in the middle of my mess? She grabbed my face,
looked me eyeball to eyeball, and said, Kevin, you could do
nothing that would separate the love that I have for you.
I want you to know that that is the grace of your
savior. There is nothing that you can do, no mess up that's
so big that He will not meet you where
you are. And so God, this week,
I have been so praying for today, because we are going into
Holy week. We are about to celebrate Easter. Guys, what if
Easter 2024 was a celebration without
the shackles? What if 2024
Easter was a celebration where we actually
access the power of the gospel? Where we actually
access theatre this God of the universe. And when we came in
here and we jumped and we shouted and we sang praise, it was
because we're free. And we are sons and daughters of the most
high God. What if this year was different people?
All it takes is a choice to come out of hiding
into his glorious light. This week, I have been praying for you. I
have so been praying for you. And there were 3 specific areas that
the Lord gave me that he wants to liberate people from this morning.
The first area is to a 2 a 2 pronged thing.
The first area that the Lord wants to set people free from is pride and
pornography. Pride says,
I can do it myself. I don't need your help.
Situation going on in my home or my family with my life. I don't want
to call anybody. I don't want to let anybody know because I can take care
of it myself. I don't want to bother people. I don't want to invite people
in. And so it causes you, whether
it's inch by inch, small by small things, it causes you to hide.
Pride says, I don't need you.
Pornography. I don't have to go into an explanation. Pornography has a grip on
somebody in this house, maybe more than 1 person, but pornography has a grip.
And you have been struggling and struggling and struggling and you don't know how to
get free and you feel like like shame every single time.
And God says there's freedom today. The second thing
is this, some of you have confessed
your sin to somebody. You've
gotten liberated, but you buried that thing alive and it's
come back. And so now what you're dealing with
is, I already put that to death, but
it's reared its ugly head and I can't face the shame of going back to
that person or going back to those people and saying, I'm dealing with
this again and again
and again, and the 8th time, and the 20th
time. And so instead of confessing it
again, you have just gone right back into hiding.
And so now the issue isn't the sin of what you're doing, it's deceit.
And God says, don't believe the lie.
Come out of hiding. Go back to that person, go back to
them and say, listen, I am so flawed and messed up. I
I I did it again and I want to be set free. I want to
be right. I don't want there to be anything dark inside me.
And the third thing, if you are a leader at Spirit House or
in a workplace, if you are a leader, you would consider yourself a leader either
here or in a workplace, would you stand?
I am a leader of people in any facet.
Probably the hardest word I received this
week was the Lord wanted me to say,
you are not exempt from this word. You
are not exempt from this word. In
fact, leaders hide the most.
And the ultimate courageous act of humility a leader
can make, is to abandon their ego and position and
fall flat at the feet of Jesus and say, I need the savior
like everybody else. And the invitation
is for you. The invitation is also for you.
Jesus sees you. And it does not
lessen your importance or value in what you do by you
committing to him. And by you, surrendering
whatever it is that you're holding on to, to him.
And so the invitation is to you as well. And so if
you are a part of any of those three things, or you're just
in hiding, today is the day
of salvation. Today is the day to get
things right so that you can walk out of this place into
this world knowing, I'm free.
I'm free. This is what Romans 8 says,
Therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ
Jesus. No condemnation.
Guys, everyone in here needs a savior.
And so if you come this morning, it's about you and Him, and
Him liberating you. And you know that every single
person on the side of my voice at one time or the other needed to
do that and will need to do it again and
again and again. And aren't you glad we have a
God who is the God of the again and again
and again. And so this morning, I want to
invite you to come to the altars
and be liberated and set free,
so that we can go into Holy Week with a celebration like
none other, unshackled, unashamedly,
wonderful, extraordinary God who loves us. Would you stand with
me this morning? And if you're gonna come
this morning, you come on down right now. Don't hesitate.
Is it me? Do I need to come? Yes, you need to come. Am I
included in this? Yes, you're included in this. God, are you wanting
me to clean this up? Yes. Come. Come.
Come to the altar.
And I want to say that it is impossible
for you to do this alone. And so
if you are not one of the ones coming this morning, would you come behind
these and would you agree with them? Come on down
here guys. Come on down. There's plenty of room right here in the altar.
There is freedom happening in the house this morning, friends.
And it is the most awesome thing when light meets darkness
and he clears things out. Get ready for a move of God like
you have never witnessed before.
God in all of his glory wants you. He
sees you. Let's worship and let's clean up what's
going on in our hearts.