Forrest: Father, we come before you, God, and in a heavy week that has been filled with heartache, tragedy and obstacles and hurting.
Forrest: Lord, we thank you that you sent your son Jesus and that he experienced all those things as well.
Forrest: And so today, God, as we open your word and as we learn from you, and as we intercede on behalf of our city, God, we begin this holy week with our heart posture turned towards you, asking God for your help, for your power, for your might.
Forrest: Through this church, in each church that proclaims Jesus as the Christ.
Forrest: So now today, God, as you were, as we worship you, God, I pray, God, that you would change us, wash us from the inside out.
Forrest: We thank you that we can trust you to help us every step of the way.
Forrest: Pray all these things in the mighty name of Jesus.
Forrest: Everybody said amen.
Forrest: As you grab your seat and as you're as we jump into this series again, blood, sweat, and tears.
Forrest: The I want to start off, is it okay if I can just get real with y'all for a minute?
Forrest: It's been a challenging week.
Forrest: But I have been incredibly proud of our church.
Forrest: I've been so thankful for the fact that we've been able to step in and to serve our city in some pretty tangible ways this week as a church.
Forrest: And just to be real with you, my prayer was, and y'all are gonna understand this, especially y'all who grew up in Frankfurt, for a city that most of the time is annoyed by the church and the body of Christ.
Forrest: I was praying that this week that the body of Christ would be on display as a picture of who Jesus is, and we get to join in with Jesus and being that picture.
Forrest: Anyone hear me?
Forrest: And so that made us make a lot of decisions this week of jumping in and having teams start to go before relief organizations came into town to start doing construction.
Forrest: Daryl and a team of folks got in and were able to help uh Muck clean out five houses over the last two or three days for our local friends.
Forrest: Which is a lot because we're not a disaster relief organization.
Forrest: Um our friends uh at the Relation of Estoplish Network connected us with One Generation Away, which is this relief organization now in Nashville.
Forrest: We were gonna bring a truckload of food and of cleaner and supplies up uh yesterday that was unloaded, and those boxes of shelf stable food were handed out in Bellpoint yesterday.
Forrest: Praise God.
Forrest: You guys helped to provide 120 meals for police officers and firefighters and first responders yesterday, of the ones who have been working around the clock so that we can provide a meal for them.
Forrest: These are just a couple of things that have happened throughout the week, and then a number of you who have been serving in different ways uh in the supply center at the Boys and Girls Club.
Forrest: There, there's there's so much that has gone into this week, and others of you who have prayed and given, and all the ways basically, this has been a week of pouring out.
Forrest: It's been a week of pouring out, and it's been a week of pouring out blood, sweat, and tears.
Forrest: And as I get into my message today, uh the this message was chosen weeks ago, weeks ago, and the title of my message weeks ago, and the the theme of the message today of the blood, sweat, and the tears is the tears.
Forrest: And I don't think that it's any coincidence that God laid it out like that.
Forrest: And so the title of my message today is Wash from the Inside.
Forrest: And as we think about our church and a city that has poured out this week blood, sweat, and tears, we're jumping into this holy week, and it's been heavy.
Forrest: I also want to tell you guys this is also very personal to me, but a very good friend of mine who's been a friend and mentor for 15 years, I got word on Sunday night that he uh unexpectedly passed away.
Forrest: Pastor Tim Jones, who has been a mentor of mine.
Forrest: I literally have listened to his prayers that he has we prayed together and he sent me every day for the last six months.
Forrest: He's made an incredible impact on my life.
Forrest: And he went to be with Jesus last weekend.
Forrest: The most amazing way he uh passed away in his prayer chair at 72.
Forrest: I think he's 72, 73 maybe.
Forrest: And uh after the service today, Emily and I are actually heading to his funeral after the 11 o'clock.
Forrest: So when I think when I talk about the heaviness and the tears that have poured out for this week, I'm thankful that we have a Savior who knew what it was to pour out his blood, his sweat, his tears, to walk and to serve in exhaustion, not just exhaustion, but to be crushed.
Forrest: And as we kick off this holy week, in light of everything that's happening in our city, I wonder if, from a spiritual standpoint, what we need as a people and as a community is not just relief, but renewal, a changing, a turning, a way that Jesus showed us a weeping, not just of suffering, and not just being just being satisfied or settled, just being close or near to the things of God, but actually being changed by Him.
Forrest: See, as we talk about this moment in the Holy Week, starting with Palm Sunday, which is today, Jesus gives some interesting words that we're gonna look at, and he talks about his coming, and he's speaking to a people that are near to the temple, they're near to the scriptures, they're near to the miracles, but they're far away from the Messiah.
Forrest: And there's a danger that we can be close to the things of God, but not actually washed and cleansed by God.
Forrest: An external religion without an internal renewal.
Forrest: Tears over suffering, but not over our sinfulness.
Forrest: See, because oftentimes we crave peace, but we resist the purity that brings it.
Forrest: We want the joy of the resurrection without the renewal of the surrender and the tears.
Forrest: So I wonder, and I ask this question of us, is it possible to feel spiritual but not actually be transformed?
Forrest: Is it possible to mistake feeling bad and conviction with actually being cleansed?
Forrest: Is it possible to have deep emotions but still walk away unchanged?
Forrest: That's what we're gonna look at at this picture of the beginning of Holy Week, the beginning of Palm Sunday.
Forrest: So we ended last Sunday with Jesus' arrest, and we're gonna flash back to the beginning of the week, to the Sunday before the resurrection, a full week, five days ahead of the crucifixion, as Jesus is entering into Jerusalem.
Forrest: And there are people that are that are praising and they're waving palm branches and they're praising Jesus as he rides into Jerusalem, and and there's all this hope among everyone, and people are smiling, and Jesus is crying.
Forrest: I'm gonna give some parts of the story of Easter that doesn't get a whole lot of airtime today.
Forrest: But as I talk about this triumphal entry, and that Jesus is actually viewing it as a tragedy, I want us to take a look at the story and the words of Christ here.
Forrest: In Luke chapter 19, verse 37.
Forrest: Jesus is making this entry into Jerusalem, about to begin this holy week.
Forrest: And in verse 37, we see that he reached the place where the road started down, the Mount of Olives.
Forrest: And all of his followers began to shout and to sing and walked along, praising God for all the wonderful miracles that they had seen.
Forrest: Blessed blessings on the king who comes in the name of the Lord.
Forrest: Peace in heaven and glory in the highest heaven.
Forrest: But some of the Pharisees among the crowd said, Teacher, rebuke your followers for saying these things.
Forrest: And he replied, If they kept quiet, the stones along the road would burst into cheers.
Forrest: And then verse 41.
Forrest: But as he came closer to Jerusalem, he saw the city ahead, and he began to what?
Forrest: Weep.
Forrest: Verse 42.
Forrest: How I wish today that you of all people would understand the way to peace.
Forrest: But now it's too late, and peace is hidden from your eyes.
Forrest: Before long your enemies will build ramparts against your walls and encircle you and close in on you from every side.
Forrest: They will crush you into the ground and your children with you.
Forrest: Your enemies will not leave a single stone in place because you did not recognize it when God visited you.
SPEAKER_00: It's a celebration.
Forrest: People are cheering.
Forrest: And Jesus is crying.
Forrest: See, because they what they wanted and what they were expecting was to have a king come carrying a sword, and instead they have a savior that came carrying a cross.
Forrest: And what felt like a triumph was actually a tragedy.
Forrest: And Jesus is seeing what truly is happening, and what the heart behind the people that are at that point waving and worshiping, and there's more than meets the eye.
Forrest: See, Jesus is telling them about a coming judgment that's going to come against Jerusalem.
Forrest: His words as he's telling them that no stone will be left on the other and that their enemies are going to come against them and tear down their walls.
Forrest: Jesus isn't speaking in exaggeration or poetically, he's speaking prophetically.
Forrest: Because in about four decades' time, in 70 AD, the Emperor Nero is going to send the Roman army to siege against Jerusalem to stamp out the rebellion and the uprising of the Jews.
Forrest: And what ends up happening is that Jerusalem is laid waste.
Forrest: The walls are torn down, the temple where all the religious activity is happening, torn down.
Forrest: And those that rejected Jesus at his coming, Jesus is prophetically telling them and seeing the fact that they have rejected him, and he's looking into the future, and he's giving them what's not meeting the eye, but what's hidden.
Forrest: Josephus, the Jewish historian, said that during that siege, nearly a million Jewish people were killed.
Forrest: Jesus is speaking about the fact that all these people who are there and they're welcoming him into the town, they look religious, but they're lacking renewal.
Forrest: Because this is the same crowd that at one point is singing Hosanna, Hosanna, and yelling and screaming, and just a few days later, the crowd will yell, crucify him, crucify him, crucify him.
Forrest: And Pontius Pilate will wash his hands, and Jesus will go to the cross in front of the same people who at one point were cheering him on.
Forrest: These people who looked religious, who even saw miracles, but in a very short time they're going to participate in the murder of the followers of Jesus in the early church and the persecution.
Forrest: Now, I know for me, when it comes to tears flowing, I I can get upset about being hurt or being misunderstood or being embarrassed.
Forrest: But rarely do I weep over how my sin has hurt God.
Forrest: And you may feel a lot of emotions, and maybe even this week you felt loss and fatigue and compassion.
Forrest: But I wonder if we would be as broken over our sin as we are over our circumstances.
Forrest: Jesus is looking at this crowd and he's showing them what is to come.
Forrest: And he's telling them that the stones are going to be pulled off of stones and the temple is going to be torn down.
Forrest: And in that moment, Jesus is placing himself and telling him, like he had told them before, that he is the foundation.
Forrest: See, we have to be a people that don't forget the foundation.
Forrest: Jesus was the cornerstone of the temple that the Jewish people rejected.
Forrest: And even today, we can be guilty of building tiny temples in our life of temporary things that get in the way of our relationship with God, even good things.
Forrest: May it be career, your career or accomplishments or entertainment.
Forrest: But if it's not Jesus, it doesn't last.
Forrest: He's the foundation.
Forrest: Jesus tells them, you didn't recognize when God visited you.
Forrest: You aren't seeing me right in front of your eyes.
Forrest: Jesus is seeing religious activity, but not a spiritual sensitivity to what's actually going on, and he weeps not out of weakness, but because his love would be rejected.
Forrest: These people who were religious and had rituals and even had the scripture, they missed when God walked in.
Forrest: They were expecting this political salvation, but they rejected the personal surrender and recognizing Jesus as the Messiah.
Forrest: There's a lot of religious activity today.
Forrest: And we can even think to ourselves, well, you know what?
Forrest: Like, I mean, I go to church, so I'm good.
Forrest: But I can't call myself a car just because I stand in a garage.
Forrest: You can't call yourself a Christian just because you came to church or you come to church, or maybe you grew up going to grandma's church.
Forrest: It's an active decision for you to be renewed in Christ.
Forrest: Because proximity to religion, that doesn't equal peace with God.
Forrest: It's only by renewal, by the blood of Jesus, that we're washed from the inside.
Forrest: The temple looks stable.
Forrest: But Jesus said that it would fall.
Forrest: And there are times in our life where we hit rock bottom.
Forrest: And when we hit rock bottom, bottom, sometimes as we hit rock bottom, God shows us that He's the only foundation at the bottom.
Forrest: And so if you hit rock bottom, I wonder do you hit the rock of ages?
Forrest: Do you have the right foundation or do you not?
Forrest: We have to be a people that don't forget that our foundation is in Christ.
Forrest: And so in this passage, Jesus is entering in, he's giving this prophecy to the people of Jerusalem.
Forrest: We also reflect on ourselves, and and it might be good for you to ask this question of God this week in holy week and just say, God, show me where I've missed you.
Forrest: Or maybe that thing that you've been excusing, you need to confess it.
Forrest: Or maybe you need to spend time praying and reflecting instead of performance and productivity.
Forrest: Now we're going to flash forward.
Forrest: We're going to zoom forward in the story.
Forrest: Jesus has been arrested.
Forrest: He's been tried.
Forrest: A crown of thorns is putting put on his head.
Forrest: He's been mocked.
Forrest: He's been spit on.
Forrest: And he's carrying his cross up the hill to Golgotha, to Calvary.
Forrest: And there's a moment in the story where Jesus falls.
Forrest: And there's a man in the crowd, Simon of Cyrene, who's asked to pick up the cross.
Forrest: And Jesus, again, gives some words to some people who are standing close that gets almost no airtime in the story of Easter.
Forrest: Verse 26 of Luke 23.
Forrest: As they led Jesus away, a man named Simon, who was from Cyrene, happened to be coming in from the countryside.
Forrest: The soldiers seized him and put the cross on him and made him carry it behind Jesus.
Forrest: A large crowd trailed behind, including many grief stricken women.
Forrest: But Jesus turned and said to them, Daughters of Jerusalem, don't weep for me, but weep for yourselves and your children.
Forrest: And then he goes on again to describe.
Forrest: What's going to happen in just four decades of the destruction that's going to happen to Jerusalem.
Forrest: And Jesus turns and he rebukes these ladies not because their feelings are wrong, it's because Jesus wanted them to really see.
Forrest: He tells them not to weep for him.
Forrest: And the tears that's flowing, he's wanting from them the kind of tears that will actually lead to their change.
Forrest: See, so many times I want to feel close to Jesus, but I avoid facing what I need to surrender in order to be close to him.
Forrest: It's possible that we can feel deep feelings and be deeply moved, but not actually transformed.
Forrest: And Jesus turns to these women and he looks at them as they're weeping for him, and he essentially tells them, don't weep for the wrong things.
Forrest: And we have to make sure that we're not weeping over the wrong things as well.
Forrest: The temporary things.
Forrest: But instead that our tears flow for the things that truly matter, not just our preferences.
Forrest: It's possible for us to let our feelings put us in a place where we feel like, well, you know, I felt emotionally moved, so that means I'm close to God.
Forrest: But it's not feelings that transform us, it's faith that transforms us.
Forrest: See, Jesus didn't die for our sympathy, he died for our salvation.
Forrest: And just being emotional doesn't mean that we're close to God.
Forrest: It's only through the renewal and the repentance that comes and the sorrow that comes in true repentance that salvation can come.
Forrest: It's when we actually are weeping and our weeping turns inwardly that his grace is able to flow out of us outwardly.
Forrest: Now, on a holy week like this, and I I think I can't think about holy week without thinking about the Passion of the Christ movie.
Forrest: By show of hands, who's all seen the Passion of the Christ?
Forrest: Okay, probably like 75% of the room.
Forrest: I remember the first time that I saw The Passion of the Christ, I was very young, and each time I watched the Passion of the Christ, it's uh it's hard to watch.
Forrest: Because of the suffering, because of the injustice.
Forrest: And what hit me in reading this text is that as we're watching, as I'm watching the Passion of Christ, Jesus doesn't want my pity.
Forrest: He wants tears from me of life change and brokenness over my sin and my renewal and my repentance and my surrender to him.
Forrest: I think about how oftentimes as I think about the cross, I want to cry.
Forrest: Or I feel deeply, and I just think about Jesus turning to these ladies and saying, Don't weep for me.
Forrest: Jesus went to the cross out of love, voluntarily.
Forrest: He laid his life down for us.
Forrest: And as Jesus hung on the cross, and he invited a thief next to him to join him in paradise, and as he spoke to the followers and those that were in front of him, with his final breath, he says to Telestar, it is finished, it's paid in full, and he doesn't say it in a whisper or in a whimper, he yells it out.
SPEAKER_00: It is finished.
Forrest: And in those final moments, we see that the sky goes dark and the earth begins to shake, and there's women that are there that are standing at a distance and they're watching.
Forrest: This is later, just a few chapter a few verses down in Luke chapter 23, verse 44.
Forrest: But this time it was about noon, and darkness fell across the whole land until three o'clock.
Forrest: The light from the sun was gone, and suddenly the curtain in the sanctuary of the temple was torn down the middle.
Forrest: Then Jesus shouted, Father, I entrust my spirit into your hands.
Forrest: And with those words he breathed his last breath.
Forrest: And when the Roman officer overseeing the execution saw what had happened, he worshipped God and said, Surely this man was innocent.
Forrest: And when all the crowd that came to see the crucifixion saw what had happened, they went home in deep sorrow.
Forrest: But Jesus' friends, including the women who had followed him from Galilee, stood at a distance watching.
Forrest: When I think about that picture of the cross and I watch Passion of Christ or I see these images, I want to look away.
Forrest: But Jesus doesn't just want me to look away out of pity or of shame.
Forrest: He doesn't want me just to spectate.
Forrest: But the cross is supposed to be something that we are cleansed by.
Forrest: That we wouldn't just be close to the cross and proximity like some of these people who were standing around the cross and some of the women that followed him.
Forrest: But not only would we near the cross, but that we would be cleansed by it.
Forrest: Jesus doesn't just want like our whitewash behavior.
Forrest: He literally wants to wash us from the inside out.
Forrest: And it's the cross that is what cleanses us.
Forrest: And Jesus didn't suffer for us just to spectate, he suffered so that we would be saved.
Forrest: So that we would follow him.
Forrest: And the world just wants to tell you, hey, just try to be a good person.
Forrest: Just try to be a good person.
Forrest: But listen to me, Jesus didn't die to make you nice, he died to make you new.
Forrest: He died so that we would be cleansed, so that we would be washed from the inside out, and that he would be able to do this holy, restorative work that we could never do on our own, that we couldn't possibly do for ourselves.
Forrest: And as these women were weeping on the road, and then hopefully they realized that Jesus wasn't asking for their tears, he was giving them an opportunity to be washed, to be cleansed.
Forrest: And so we don't treat the cross as just this something to admire, we treat it as something that we place ourselves at the feet of and surrender.
Forrest: So that means that we get brutally honest in our prayers with the Lord.
Forrest: And we aren't just people who spectate or just watch, but we actually respond.
Forrest: Jesus, he he didn't weep for us to feel guilty, he wept to extend grace to us.
Forrest: And ultimately he's looking at us and he's like, I don't want your pity.
Forrest: He literally is telling us, I don't want your tears, I want your transformation.
Forrest: I want you to be changed.
Forrest: And I'm so glad that God didn't ask for us to impress him, he just asked for us to follow him and give us the Holy Spirit to be able to walk in a new life.
Forrest: And I just imagine if we would be people who would be renewed and that we wouldn't just cry over circumstances or pain, but that we were grieved over our sin.
Forrest: That we wouldn't be like the people who just, you know, are worshiping and giving lip service and waving palm branches, but that we lay down our pride and give ourselves fully to God and repentance and confession, that we won't be people who just stand near to the cross, but that we're people who are changed and washed from the inside out.
Forrest: And so that requires some things of us for us to confess, to confess our sin to him, to be changed, to repent, to be washed by his power.
Forrest: And so maybe you're somebody who came into the room today and you've been standing near to the things of God, but you haven't yet been changed by him.
Forrest: You may have some like religious activity in your history, but you never fully surrendered yourself to Jesus and received what he did for you on the cross.
Forrest: Maybe you've been somebody who has just watched, but you need to now be washed by what Jesus did for us on the cross.
Forrest: And maybe you're somebody who walked into the room and you have hit rock bottom.
Forrest: Maybe it's now, maybe it's in light of all the things that have happened this week.
Forrest: I want you to remind you and to tell you that Jesus is the only foundation.
Forrest: He is the one that our lives are built upon.
Forrest: That's not shifting sand, but a firm foundation.
SPEAKER_00: And we don't get it by earning or deserving.
SPEAKER_00: It's a gift that's freely given.
Forrest: His grace extended to us for them for us to carry it to a lost and dying world, who often thinks about the church and the cross more as a cartoon and a caricature than they do the eternal Son of God who went to the cross not so that we would feel bad or shame, so that we would be saved.
Forrest: So that what we couldn't do for ourselves, Jesus did for us.
Forrest: And you may be in the room, and maybe today is your day for you to truly receive the grace of God, to stop holding back, to quit putting up walls, to see Jesus help you to tear them down.
Forrest: And for the rest of us who are saved, for us to be the ones who carry the salvation of Christ on our lips and on our hands and on our feet in a week that's filled with tragedy, that we would be people that are marked not by rejecting Jesus' love, but carrying it for every single one that we know.
Forrest: So let's carry his love, the cross, and we reflect on the cross and this holy week that leads to the celebration of Easter that's coming soon.
Forrest: Church, we're gonna continue to be a light in this city.
Forrest: We're gonna show up, we're gonna serve.
Forrest: We got all these things planned for Easter.
Forrest: We got like awesome new yard signs to put in your yard so you can be a light.
Forrest: And what may seem trivial in a week of flood, like we're gonna declare that this is a home that loves Jesus, that's dedicated to him.
Forrest: And we're gonna invite friends to Easter, aren't we, church?
Forrest: And we're gonna share his love.
Forrest: Because what is a better, what better time is there?
Forrest: What better time is there for our city, for this to happen in the holiest of weeks, for his people to truly show his love.
Forrest: Will you bow your head and pray?
Forrest: Father, I thank you, God, for who you are to us and how you died for us on the cross.
Forrest: And Lord, we look at it today, Father, and we don't look away.
Forrest: We don't look in shame.
Forrest: Instead, Jesus, we look at it in gratitude and gratefulness and thanksgiving.
Forrest: We thank you for the cross.
Forrest: We thank you that you died in our place and you did for us what we can do, could not do for ourselves.
Forrest: So, God, I pray, Lord, that right now, today, this Sunday morning, that God, you would renew us.
Forrest: Who would be made new by giving their heart and their life over to you to be restored.
Forrest: And Father, help us, God, as we're your people and your body in this city, to show your love all throughout this week and the months to come.
Forrest: With Easter coming soon, Father, we just, right now, God, we pray, Lord, that this week, God, you would help us to reflect, to look at ourselves in light of the cross, to be transformed, to be changed, to confess, to walk with you and not miss you as you walk in.
Forrest: Father, I pray right now across this room, if there's anybody in this place who's not received you at Savior, that today would be the day of their salvation.
Forrest: Today would be the day that they cross over from death to life.
Forrest: Today would be the day that they give you their life, their heart, their mind, and their commitment to you for the by the power of the cross and by the hope of the resurrection, God, that today would be their day of salvation.
Forrest: And so if that's you today, I ask you that you would pray, Jesus, save me.
Forrest: In your heart and your mind, save me.
Forrest: I believe that you died on the cross for my sins, and I believe that you're alive, that you walked out of the grave and that you're the Son of God.
Forrest: I confess with my lips that you are Lord.
Forrest: And now I'm believing in my heart that you can and will save me.
Forrest: Forgive me, wash me, cleanse me so that I can be in heaven with you one day.
Forrest: I give my life to you today and every single day forward until my last breath on earth will be my first breath in heaven with you, God.
Forrest: Thank you for saving me.
Forrest: Nobody looking around.
Forrest: Today you prayed that to receive Christ as your Savior for the first time.
Forrest: I'm gonna ask you just a moment for you to raise your hand so that I can see you and pray for you, and so our team can pray for you, and so as a sign before heaven, if that's you, receive Christ as your savior.
Forrest: At the count of three, ready one, two, three.
Forrest: Anyone in the house?
Forrest: Hold it high, Father.
Forrest: We pray, God, that this house will be a house, Lord, filled with your grace and with your mercy, with your salvation and love.
Forrest: And God, as we reflect on this holy week, God, meet us.
Forrest: Meet us in our workplaces, and as we serve, and as we love with our family, with our friends, in anticipation of the celebration to come at Easter.
Forrest: We love you, we praise you, we thank you.
Forrest: In the strong name of Jesus, everybody said, Amen.
Forrest: Will you stand at your feet now?
Forrest: We're gonna sing, we're gonna worship together.