Pablo Padilla: I have the honor of, uh, leading the sermon today and,
uh, we're gonna have a good time.
Amen.
What's up, Jamie?
It is good seeing all of you here and, uh, what a, an amazing song that talks about
men who dream and women who dream, right?
It's all about the ladies too, and it is just wonderful to be with all of you.
OC Church, welcome.
It's great to just have the privilege to speak before you.
Same to those who are watching online.
We wanted to acknowledge them and it's grateful.
I'm grateful that we're all here together.
And today I wanted to talk about Jesus's honor, ma'am.
And, uh, I have an incredible story here that I wanted to just, uh, mention
that I think will prepare our hearts as we take communion in a short while.
I'm just gonna make sure that our slides are working.
There it goes.
Let me see.
All right.
It's a cool little green laser up here, so I dunno if I'm pointing
it the right direction, but,
well, you know what, I'll just old school say next slide until we figure this out.
Is that okay?
So, uh, we are gonna talk about today about Jesus Honor.
I hope you could see it behind me and in the next slide.
Honor is something very difficult to achieve.
It's not something that's easily given, right.
Yeah, I mean, you gotta ask yourself, who do you honor today?
What kind of honor do you want?
What honor are you seeking?
And as a church, we've been studying out this year trusting in God, and
one of the great things that we're learning about trusting in God is that
it's not about us, it's about him.
A lot of times we're fighting for what we want, our needs, hence our
honor, what we think we deserve.
But at the end of the day, it's really all about Jesus' honor.
That's right.
And so I thought as the elders and the, some of the staff had asked
me, could you speak on Sunday?
And if you can, can you talk about something that could really capture
how God is working in the midst of our region, our church, and what God is doing?
And I started thinking, okay, Easter's in a couple of weeks from now, right?
Yeah.
Next week is what we classically call Palm Sunday, which is.
In the Bible, you'll see it's about six days before the Passover.
So some people say it's Saturday, Sunday, or Monday.
It depends.
But the whole point, it's about a week before, and I started reading
the Bible, okay, God give me ideas.
What do you want me to speak to your people?
'cause I don't know what I should speak on.
And so I said, trusting in God, trusting in God.
But God gave me a great idea and I started thinking what
happened right before Palm's Day.
Right.
And if we could go to the next slide.
It says here, well, I'll just pick it up in Mark, chapter six, verse four.
It says that a prophet is not without honor, except in his own town,
amongst relatives and in his own home.
So it's difficult to achieve honor.
And if we go to the next slide after that, right, we know that it's the day
before, palms day, if you will, and what's happening if we go to the next slide.
Jesus is building momentum.
He's facing a lot of tension.
He's doing incredible works, incredible miracles.
And if we go to the next slide after that, right?
He's resolutely set out setting out for Jerusalem.
So he's on a mission.
In this mission, he's trying to help people be saved.
He's trying to help people be healed.
He's trying to help the Apostles all be together.
How many of you have been watching The Chosen lately?
A few of you have.
Some of us.
If you have a chance, go watch it.
Especially go watch it in the movie theaters.
I watched part two yesterday in the movie theaters, which were episodes three,
four, and five, and it was phenomenal.
But as you could see, it's building a lot of tension.
It's so thick.
You could literally cut it with a knife.
When you see the interactions between Judas and Jesus.
But Jesus, it says here, he's resolutely setting out for Jerusalem even though
he knows he's gonna die, right?
So if we go to the next slide, in John chapter 12, the Bible reads,
this is where we pick it up.
Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany where Lazarus lived,
whom Jesus had raised from the dead.
Very controversial.
By the way, here.
A dinner was given in Jesus' honor.
That's where we get the title from today's sermon.
Martha served while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him.
Then Mary took about a pint of pure Nard, an expensive perfume.
She poured on Jesus's feet and wiped his feet with her hair, and the house was
filled with the fragrance of the perfume.
If we go to the next slide, my very first point is you gotta pour out your best.
For Jesus's honor.
Jesus is not mediocre.
Jesus doesn't like second best.
He's not into just gimme your leftovers.
Give me what you saved, what you cooked from the day before.
He wants you to cook him a fresh, hot meal that day.
Amen.
That's how Jesus is, and that's okay.
He's our king.
He's our Lord.
He's our God.
We should give him our best.
And that's what Mary did.
Mary gave her very best.
If we go to the next slide.
Right.
We see a depiction here, an artist.
It wasn't like this of course, but a, an artwork of her humility.
She came in there and literally with this jar full of this expensive perfume,
and if we go to the next slide, this perfume nard, they shortened it or
abbreviated it here in John 12 for us.
But really the technical name is Spikenard, and it was a potent
fragrance that they transported it all the way from the Himalayan mountains.
Now, if you don't know where the Himalayan mountains are, that's by Nepal, Northern
India, and it's a very mountainous region.
It's very difficult.
You can't really walk there.
I mean, you need a calvary to get you up and down these hills,
up and down these mountains.
And so when they found this type of fragrance there and cultivated
it to bring it thousands of miles back to Jerusalem, to those ancient
biblical lands for us in our time.
It was a mission.
I mean, there was no FedEx in those days, right?
There was no UPS, no.
Amazon.
Hey, I'm gonna send this package over there.
I mean, it took a lot of work.
So this perfume, this fragrance was very expensive.
Yeah.
Now, I don't know exactly why Mary had this perfume.
I know there's another story in the gospels that talks about someone
who was wicked, a sinner, a woman who came before Jesus and had
a similar interaction with him.
At a Pharisees home, so that was a separate one.
This is completely different.
Mary's been part of Jesus' ministry.
She has repented of her life, and Jesus has healed her over
seven demons, and so she's here.
We don't know, maybe it was something she inherited.
Maybe it was some money she had saved up for her own burial.
Maybe she thought one day when I go, I want to smell good and I want
people to approach my body and say, Shalom, peace, and I wanna smell great.
I have no idea.
But all I know is that she said, this is my most coveted possession or physical
possession I have on this planet.
Now, if Jesus were to ask you today, Hey, can you give me
your most coveted possession?
Whatever you've been saving for your 401k, your jobs, your titles, degrees,
whatever you put out there, yeah, your heirlooms that maybe has been
passed down generation to generation.
Would you be able to sacrifice it before Jesus' feet?
That's the honor that Jesus is looking for.
Amen.
If we could go to the next slide.
What you see here in this beautiful passage is an intersection
of four amazing characters.
You have, uh, Martha, who's a servant, and I'm like her.
I'm a worry person.
So I'm like, go, go, go.
Do, do, do.
What's the next thing on in line?
So that's Martha.
And a lot of us can relate with that.
You know, Mary the sinner, she had a heart that.
It was so humble.
She would fall before prostrate, right before Jesus' feet and
say, Jesus, you are king.
And she was a sinner.
And I've been there before too, right?
Every day.
I'm a sinner, so I could relate with that.
She felt so undeserving.
And then you have Lazarus who's reclining at the table.
He's kicking back, chilling, right?
He's eating good food and he's just safe.
He was dead for four days.
So imagine his cow WBS in his mind, right?
I mean, we can't blame him for reclining.
He must have been like, dude, I was dead for four days.
How do I recover from that?
But Jesus saved him after being four days.
He was so smelly.
I'm sure he got a shower right afterwards.
They, you know, took care of him.
And so he's there reclining, eating good, and he was saved.
He was raised from the dead like many of us.
But who was there too?
The fourth and final most important characters, Jesus' Savior, was there.
And so when you see these four characters always in the same
room, the tension is gonna be high.
The tension is gonna be thick, the tension is gonna be hard because you need to be
spiritual to handle those moments there.
And Jesus is trying to deal with all these situations.
All at the same time, and you get a really good look at that
when you watch the Chosen.
If we go to the next slide, you know, speaking about honor, I
wanna honor all the faithful disciples of Orange County Church.
Amen.
You guys have done so much over the last many years.
You have appointed five new elders in our congregation.
The people chose them.
It wasn't the leadership.
We sought advice.
We had a consultant, we did all that.
But the people nominated those names.
We went through a vetting process.
And thank God we have those five elders and their wives.
We have a financial plan in motion.
You know, I appreciate Kenny Barber talking about that.
I know a lot of us, Hey, we want the finances to be transparent.
We're working on that.
We're working on including you and inclusive, and please talk to your
group leaders and your ministry leaders, because we include them in on the mix.
Amen.
They're fully briefed on most things, and we wanna make sure
that they know everything.
And if you wanna know, be in the know, please ask 'em.
But there is a financial plan in motion.
It's not perfect.
It's not.
It's always gonna be needed to get better.
Of course, we gotta improve it, but we need your feedback and we appreciate that.
That is something that's great that God is doing.
We're also on the cusp of possibly hiring a new regional leader.
Amen.
And we're gonna be talking about that in our leadership team
today with all the leaders from.
We have a vision to go back to the building at some point
and be the one OC church.
Isn't that incredible?
Many of us have been wanting that.
I know.
When I heard that initially I was, that was not my cup
of tea or coffee or any cup.
Hey man.
I was like, wow.
I, I love what we're building here in coastline, in, in
the Huntington Beach area.
I like the beach.
I like the breeze weather.
It gets a little warm inland, don't get me wrong.
Right.
I mean, it's true.
But I'm like, I like being where I'm at.
But you know what?
After talking to my people, I wanted to listen to my people.
I said, this is not my church.
I said, what do you guys want to do?
And most of the people in cosign were like, we should go back to the building.
Parents were like, Hey, we'll help my teens.
My kids grow up with other kids.
The singles were like, I want to be part with other singles.
Pablo in, in cosign.
We don't even have a campus ministry.
It'd be great to relate with the campus students and the leadership
and the staff and the elders were like, let's go be back one.
That's amazing.
Yeah.
You know, it took a lot of a lot of gritty work, and I wanna
applaud the staff and the elders.
It's a lot of gritty work that we have to do to talk
that.
That was, that's not an easy decision to make.
Amen.
Just to uproot and move on.
More details to come about that.
And lastly, and I think most importantly, we've been closer
to God like never before.
I'm really impressed by the eldership that we have the six
couples, if you include the Willis.
When you, when you, when you hear the things that they're doing, and,
and they wouldn't say this but I'm gonna say it for them, they've been
fasting, they've been taking turns, fasting every day amongst themselves.
So remember they're six.
Someone has to fast twice a week.
So if you fast it on Sunday, you might have to fast on Saturday, and that is
the rotation that they've been having.
Isn't that amazing to withhold food.
I can't even withhold a meal.
I mean, it's just not my thing.
Even last night we, we were going on a double date.
I'm like, you want dessert?
Technically, I'm not supposed to have it, but I'm gonna get it.
Let's get the dessert.
So I got a nice apple crumble cheesecake type thing.
It was amazing.
If we go to the next slide,
but it says that one of his disciples, what happens when good things are
going on and Jesus is building momentum, A disciple gets in the way.
Can you believe that?
You would think it would be a sinner.
You would think it would be a Roman soldier or some king or something.
In John 12, there's, here's a warning we gotta take to heart.
One of his disciples, Judas, is scar it, who was later to betray him.
Objected.
Why wasn't this perfume sold and the money given to the poor not a terrible
idea, it was worth a year's wages.
He did not say this because he cared about the poor, but he, but because he was a
thief, as keeper of the money of the bag, he used to help himself and get this.
He would and to what was put into it.
So my first point was Mary was pouring out her best for Jesus.
And we need to imitate that of her to honor Jesus.
But when you're about self and into that, you're, when you pour into
self, it disrupts Jesus's honor.
Now, let me be very clear.
You'll never stop Jesus from getting all the honor even on the cross.
He got all the honor when people didn't believe the resurrection.
He got all the honor.
Yes.
So no matter what happens, Jesus is gonna get the honor, but our role can
disrupt that process a little bit.
God is always gonna work his way, but ourselves, when we pour
into ourselves, it disrupts.
Now that might be paradoxical to many of us because we think don't, shouldn't.
We do self-care, and if we go to the next slide,
it's a matter of the heart.
Yeah, because here in Luke 5 37, Jesus addresses this.
No one pours new wine.
Right?
God's new teaching, new vision into old wineskins.
An old crabby disrupted hard heart.
Otherwise, a new wine will burst.
Because what happens with the leather wine holder, it breaks.
I mean, leather at some point will get so dry and brittle.
It will break.
It will start to disintegrate.
And the wine and the gases that has been in there will disrupt that and we'll burst
them and the wine they'll burst, the wine skins and it says that the wine will run
out and the wineskins will be ruined.
No, the new wine must be poured into new wineskins, so we don't need to worry about
the wine that Jesus is presenting to us, his teaching and the His best for us.
What we need to worry about is our hearts being open to him.
Let's hope.
Go to the next slide please.
Here's an incredible scripture that I want to spend a minute on.
In two Corinthians chapter six, verse three to 13, it says, this is
Paul's heart for the church in CORs, we put no stumbling block, right?
He doesn't wanna be disruptive.
He's like, how can I help God's purpose move forward?
I don't wanna get in the way.
So he says, we put no stumbling block in anyone's path, anyone's path, so that
our ministry will not be discredited.
It won't be dishonored.
Amen.
Rather, as servants of God, we commend ourselves in every way.
In great endurance in OC church, you have endured in troubles, in
hardships, distresses, beatings, imprisonments, riots, and hard work,
sleepless nights and hunger impurity.
It's a struggle to stay pure, right?
Understanding, patience, kindness in the Holy Spirit and insincere love.
In truthful speech and in the power of God with weapons of righteousness
in the right hand and in the left through glory and dishonor.
Bad report, good report.
Genuine, yet regarded as inspo.
Imposters, known yet regarded as unknown.
Dying.
Yet we live on.
Come on, Kevin Mains.
His spirit lives on amongst our fellowship.
Amen.
Beaten yet not killed, sorrowful yet.
Always rejoicing poor, yet making many rich, having nothing
yet possessing everything.
We have spoken freely to you Corinthians, and opened wide our hearts to you
see Paul's heart here, he's like, I'm opening my heart to you guys.
He's not worried about what's being poured in.
He's worried about what's going out.
Amen.
Yeah.
He's like, how can I honor the church?
How can I honor Christ's body?
And in verse 12, it says, we are not withholding our affection from you,
but you are withholding yours from us.
Yes, as a fair exchange, I speak as to my children.
Open wide.
Your hearts also.
Amen.
You wanna be refreshed?
Open your heart.
Get open, confess a sin.
Come on.
You don't even have to confess multiple sins.
Just confess one.
Start with one.
That'll build your courage.
You're not open to some ideas, talk about it.
Get open, get help, seek some input.
Sit down with people, invite people over to your house.
So many times, no one invites me to these meetings.
Why don't you open up your house and open people to come to your house
and say, Hey, I prepare a meal.
Let's talk about it.
I have some questions, I have some thoughts, and I made a meal.
I have some dessert in the oven 'cause I wanna talk about these issues.
Let's go to the next slide.
But you know what sometimes we could do is we could be cynical and let me be,
from an outside perspective moving in.
I'm so proud to be a part of the OC Church, my former ministry.
It's a great ministry.
It went through a lot of tumultuous times and during the pandemic, God
miraculously worked through that region, uh, Metro LA and, and it was amazing.
And God has been healing that ministry and strengthening that ministry.
And when we ended up moving over.
To, um, orange County.
We were like, wow, they're in good hands.
Now.
We wanna help another ministry situation.
And in the last four or five years since we've been here, people may say, man,
the church OOC struggles with pride.
Or maybe they struggle with this situation or that situation.
Selfishness, maybe.
You know what our biggest sin, I think is today, is we're cynical.
We don't think things are gonna change.
Hmm, that leader's never gonna grow.
That leader's never gonna change.
These people are never gonna have soft hearts.
We're never gonna give to what we used to give to.
Since Kevin Main's past in 2017, things have not been the same.
But you know what?
They can get even better.
And I know Kevin from the other side, he's rooting for us.
He's telling us, you guys can change.
You guys can grow, bring back the honor to Christ, but stop being cynical.
Wow.
And I had to repent of that.
If we go to the next slide,
because I was doing therapy for people, uh, where I work out here
in Laguna Beach, and I remember many individuals would come and see me.
Paolo, I've been traumatized since the pandemic.
I had a lost one.
Uh, recently, even this week I had a, a, uh, a mother who came, she
lost two of her children recently.
It was so heartbreaking.
I was like, oh my goodness.
What do we do here?
Yeah, and I remember using this narrative therapy technique with her and with many
of my patients the last many years since I've been in Orange County, and even I use
this with disciples in our ministry there.
And I'd like to pass it on to you that narrative therapy is a form
of psychotherapy that focuses on helping individuals understand and
change the stories they tell about themselves and their experiences.
It is based on the premise that people's identities and problems
are shaped by the narrative.
They create.
What narrative are you creating today for yourself?
The key principles are you gotta externalize, Hey, separate yourself.
Look from 10 feet away.
Okay, I see the problem and I'm over here.
I'm not with the problem.
Then you gotta deconstruct it and then you gotta re-author it.
You gotta come up with a new narrative and make yourself the star of it.
Because one of the things I told that lady, I'm really sorry
that you lost your two children.
And I know this is gonna sound controversial, I told her this, but
even the loss of your children, that's not the star of the show of your life.
You are the star of your life.
And she broke down crying.
She says, I've been holding this for years, Pablo, thank you so much.
I wanna see you next week.
She said, and I empowered her and I said, you don't have to live that life that.
You know, this tragedy's gonna define you, it's gonna shape you, it's gonna
make an impact, but you could still be the star of the show and we can
honor your kids through your legacy.
If we go, and I do wanna give a shout out to some of the sisters who had a a, we
call 'em passion groups when they meet for midweeks for a couple of months.
And they discussed some of the tough topics and they, their group
was called Mind Change and uh, I wanted to lift them up because if
you've never heard of mind change.
Talk to my wife or talk to some of the sisters that participated in that.
It's really, really helpful and healthy.
If we move on to the next slide, one of the things that I wanted
to just call the ministry to is we wanna do 15 days of honor.
And man, this was just my idea that I think God provided to me is that
so many times we're cynical and we complain, and all we do is sometimes
in our minds focused on the negative.
And so in a way, to honor one another about ourselves, I'd like
to ask between now 15 days from now, we'll be exactly Easter.
Amen.
Yeah.
No complaining, no negativity, no criticizing.
I'm lucky.
'cause after this, you can't criticize a sermon.
Amen.
So I'm blessed,
but next week, if you hear from Marcel or Kyle or whoever, Martine,
whoever speaks in your ministry, Ron or James, let's not criticize 'em.
Let's encourage them.
If someone does a communion and they don't do it, well lift them up.
Man.
You had the courage.
Yeah, right.
Anybody who does anything, hey you.
Those cupcakes aren't the best, but you know what?
Awesome job, sister.
Bro.
You look like you're losing weight.
Not really, but you're looking like you're losing weight.
Let's honor one another and refrain from being critical.
I wonder what God can do in two weeks.
I wonder what the spirit can do in two weeks time.
Be before now.
And to set you up your success for your Palm Sundays and your Easter services.
'cause you're gonna bring your friends and family, and I want them to come and
see the body of Christ and be blown away.
Like, what is this fellowship all about?
This is amazing.
You guys love each other, the diversity.
You guys forgive each other.
You guys are encouraging each other.
It's amazing.
That's what we want to do, but we gotta obey the Bible.
Honor one another above ourselves.
If we could go to the next slide.
God has been blessing.
Amen.
Yes.
The South singles Ministry, Armando Pineta, got baptized recently
in the campus ministry.
Peyton Wilson got, uh, baptized
in the singles ministry.
Ryan, to me, got restored.
Shout out to Eric Scheffler.
And, uh, Andrew Richmond and Tony and all the brothers there that helped 'em.
It was amazing.
God is working.
And I do have some more good news.
If we could go to the next slide.
If, uh, I'm gonna ask in a few minutes anyone who's been baptized or
restored to do me something simple.
Two little things.
You'll be asked to walk somewhere and you'll be asked to stand.
That's how you're gonna do.
Amen.
So if you know of someone that got baptized or restored since
the pandemic, we could even start as early as January of 2020.
It don't matter.
Right.
This is, we're not legalistic here.
Just whoever got baptized or restored in the last four or five months, I'm
gonna four or five years I should say.
I'm gonna ask them to come up in a short while, so get ready.
Okay.
Fix your hair a little bit.
If you're wearing a jacket, you know, make sure you wanna look proper.
I get it.
You may be a little shy, but I wanna build up your courage 'cause you can do it.
I'm gonna ask you to do something really simple in a short while, but in John
12, we're gonna close that out here.
Jesus replied to Judas who was being disruptive, leave her alone.
Come on ladies.
Right?
Don't you wanna hear that all the time?
Leave her alone.
It was intended that she should say this perfume for the day of my burial.
You'll always have the poor.
We will always have issues you, but you will not always have me.
If we go to the next slide, Jesus goes even deeper in
Matthew 26, this version says.
That when she poured the perfume on her, on his body, he, well,
he's speaking, so I'll read it.
In his, uh, in, in his perspective, when she poured this perfume on my body,
she did it to prepare me for burial.
Truly, I tell you, wherever this gospel is preached and it's preached
right here in OC Church throughout the world, what she has done will also
be told in memory of her AKA honor.
Amen.
Wow, Pablo.
But, but I've been speaking up and I've been trying to champion these
causes and I just don't feel it.
Keep opening up your heart.
God will return you the honor.
Yeah.
You don't have to fight for your honor.
God will do it for you and in amazing ways as a better
storyteller in my sin, in my shame.
Um, I have a sister, her name is Ramona.
She's incredible.
And, uh, our relationship's been getting better, but my goodness, me and her
we're step, uh, brother and sisters.
Oh, we, uh, hated each other.
Same mom, different dads.
And I remember one time, um, my sister was in a real bad need and
she needed to move into our home, and she brought her niece with her.
And I remember asking my wife about it, and, uh, it's public knowledge.
By the way.
She shared this.
She's been in our church and out of our church, and she was restored.
She shared this.
That she's, uh, battled with substance, uh, abuse, addiction.
And uh, there was a point where she was sober and she was in our home.
She got restored and it was great.
It was phenomenal.
And unfortunately she relapsed and was going through a very challenging time.
I remember we got to the point where she was breaking a lot of boundaries
and disobeying our household rules, and she was not contributing that
I had to tell her, you know, I think you may need to move out.
And what was really shameful was, I remember she came to the door and I told
Nicole I was at work, change the locks.
And so my wife being obedient, change the locks and my sister was knocking
on the door and she couldn't get in.
And I remember, I, I, I, she text me, I was in bed and she said,
Pablo, please open the door.
I'm out here.
And I said, I'm not coming out to the door.
She says, I'm gonna call the cops.
I know my rights.
And I said, you don't know nothing.
This is my house.
Right.
I was poured into myself, right.
My sin.
I was like, this, this ain't your house.
It's my house.
It's me and my wife's home.
And this is, I even use Jesus' name.
And by the way, it's Jesus's home.
So we don't do drugs here.
We don't come at two in the morning partying and, uh, inebriated
and we bring boys to the home.
We don't do none of that stuff, right?
We respect the rules of the home.
And I was really just talking about me.
Of course, my honor.
Well, the police came.
They knocked on my door, so I let them in.
They told me, sir, have a seat.
My sister came in, my wife was there, all witnesses about, like, they thought I was,
I don't know, some, some crazy assassin because there was like three patrol cars
out there, and I was so embarrassed.
I was living in an area called Monterey Park.
It's really calm and quiet.
There's beautiful hills, and I was remembering at the
time, this is so embarrassing.
Why is this happening?
I'm here to help my sister, but look, she, oh my gosh, I should
have never let her, let her in.
Look at all this.
This is bringing shame to our family, to my home.
People know me here.
I'm a therapist, I'm a minister.
Why are cops coming to your house?
So I remember the gentleman, the officer sat us down and said, has your
sister lived here more than two weeks?
And I said, yeah.
And by the way, there's a law if you don't know that if, if someone lives with you
on the 15th day, they're your tenant.
Whether they pay rent, do drugs, don't do drugs, whether they eat
your drink, your milk or not, right?
They're your tenant.
That is the law by California, because they're supposedly
trying to decrease homelessness.
So I said, yeah, she's been a tenant for five and a half months
and I don't wanna make it six.
So can you please get her outta here?
And they say, we won't be able to do that.
She has a right to live here, and if you want to do that, you have
to put a notice on her door for 30 days that she has to leave.
And she won't.
And so after another 30 days, you go to the Pasadena Courthouse, you pay a hundred
and something dollars to evict her.
And then on the 61st day, we will come out and pick her up
and take her if she's still here.
And I said, I have to deal with this for another two months.
And the officer said, absolutely.
And he said, look, sir, I just want to tell you, you and your
sister, you guys are fighting.
But I would just say drop the issue.
And I was, you know, my heart, I was, my blood pressure was up.
I wanted to slap the police officer.
I was like, man, get outta here with that.
I don't want to hear that.
And I remember the police officer said, you know, I've lost loved ones and I
would give my right arm to bring them back just to spend a day with them.
And he says, don't you love your sister?
He started with me and me as an evangelist of God's kingdom, as
a disciple of Christ since 99.
Through all that I've been through at the time.
I said, no, I don't love her.
And my sister's Faith fell and she was like, okay, my sister used the 60 days.
Trust me, she didn't leave any, any earlier and she left.
And it was a very heartbreaking situation.
But in that moment, I brought Shing to my family and I dishon my sister, my mom.
And the kingdom of God and God, most of all his love, because he
wanted me at that time to say yes.
And man, it's taken many years and thank God our relationship's better now.
My sister's been through, uh, we've celebrated our birthdays.
You know, we're, we're on better terms now, but I had to say sorry.
A lot of times I remember it got so bad we had a, a picture of her on the
refrigerator where she had been restored.
And at that time we were doing monthly newsletters.
And her face was on the picture.
And I remember I had two copies.
I had one in my office of that, so I said, I'm gonna keep it.
But in my pride, I, when she left, I, I grabbed that thing and I
crumpled it and I remember, man, whatever, I threw it in the trash
can in the kitchen and I walked away.
I have another copy, but I don't wanna see her face on my fridge.
That's what I said.
And I remember one day my mom was asking me, Hey Pablo, I lost something.
Can you go in my closet?
And.
Figure it out.
I'm like, oh mom.
Okay, sure.
So I go, I go to the closet, I'm trying to look through some documents
and lo and behold, I look up in the closet and you know what I see
inside of the closet, the crumpled up newsletter that I threw in the trash.
Wow.
My mom had more honor for my sister than I did as a disciple.
Wow.
And I was like, my mom didn't know I had another copy.
And my mom.
I suspected maybe Pablo or Nicole or somebody crumpled
it up, but I was like, wow.
Again, I brought shame.
That's why I poured into myself.
Don't be like Pablo today.
Amen.
Don't do that.
It causes division, and I am happy to report me and my sister on better terms.
That's why I'm able to share this story with you and pray for her.
Her name is Ramona.
Amen.
We're praying for her every day.
But I want one day for her to re be returned to God's kingdom and
be restored so that her story could be told all over the world.
That's what we gotta do as disciples.
Amen.
If we go to the next slide.
Meanwhile, large crowd of of Jews found out that Jesus was there and came not
only because of him, but also to see Lazarus whom he had raised from the dead.
So the chief priest made plans to kill Lazarus as well for an account of him.
Many of the Jews were going over to Jesus and believing in him.
And so we need some Jews and we need some disciples that became, uh,
Christians over the four or five years.
'cause you believe in Jesus and you're following Jesus.
And we wanted to honor you today.
So if you've been baptized or restored, I'd like to ask you
to come and join me on stage.
Amen.
Because I'm about to pray.
So yeah,
because.
Remember, this is not about our honor.
Great to see you, sister.
Good, look nice.
We're gonna have to make some room, so let's come on in.
So yeah, if you got baptized, restored, come on through.
Great job.
Great job, Brendan.
Make room.
There's a few more coming.
Thank you guys for being courageous and coming up.
Feel free to go to your right.
More Parker.
Good seeing you, my friend.
Now, why did I wanna do this?
It was to bring up Jesus's honor.
Amen.
That in the midst of losing our loved ones, people moving out, maybe to move to
another state, to have a better life, and us being heartbroken and left with that,
maybe some of us losing our friends and.
Neighbors to, to COVID or or to division or whatever you call it, heartbreak.
God is still always working.
He's working with the servants, he's working with the sinners.
He's working with those who are saved because he's the savior.
And this is the product of God's love right here.
And I wanted.
And we wanted the staff and the elders wanted you to see this so that you could
be encouraged that God still works in the midst of trials, that God still
works in the midst of suffering, and that he will return the honor only if
you hang in there and fight for it.
Amen.
If we go to, please stay here guys, uh, but we're gonna close out
shortly if you go to the next slide.
I already did that.
You brought you guys all up.
I wanted to close out with this.
As we think of communion, uh, Jesus says, this is my blood of the covenant.
He made a new covenant with these amazing disciples, right?
But it says, which is poured out again, that's the theme today,
honoring God by being poured out.
It says, for many, for all these individuals here.
And that is what Jesus did.
He poured out his best for us.
And said, I'm gonna die for these people so that they can
have a second chance at life.
And so what we're gonna do is we're gonna go arm in arm and I'm gonna
close us out with their communion.
If we can grab arm in arm, everyone, for those of you that are able, if
you wanna hold hands or, or lock arms if you're close to someone.
And we're gonna close out with communion.
The ushers will be passing around communion sets if any of you need 'em.
And we'll be listening to an amazing song during the moment.
Let's pray.
Father, we're so grateful for you because you've honored us.
And it is true that sometimes we sadly bring this honor upon you.
We break your heart.
I know I've done it multiple times where I've been faithless, cruel, unloving.
But thank you, father, that you stoop so down to reach a sinner like
me in hell from the pit of hell, and to bring you even before me,
to bring me before your presence.
It's so undeserving.
I do not deserve the honor, but I'm just grateful, father, that you've given me
enough of courage, enough of strength, not just to me, to my fellow brothers and
sisters here on stage, and to those in the audience and those watching online.
I pray that you just comfort them, that you are with them, that I know
some of them are wondering, when is my honor, Pablo, when is our turn?
But Father, it will happen soon enough.
We just need to be patient and fight and hold on to the miracles
that you are about to provide.
And I pray that today could be a display of honor to you.
Father, as we take communion that remember that Jesus poured out his best for us.
I pray that we humbly meditate on that and that we're encouraged
that he would do such a thing, a noble act to love us that way.
In Jesus, holy name.
We pray all these things.
Amen.