WEBVTT 00:00:00.719 --> 00:00:01.679 Well, very good. 00:00:01.679 --> 00:00:06.080 This uh is our last in our Broadway series. 00:00:06.080 --> 00:00:10.000 I hope you uh have uh enjoyed it. 00:00:10.000 --> 00:00:21.120 It's kind of a way for us to get out of the regular routine, it seems, and maybe even talk into the relevancy of the world around us. 00:00:21.120 --> 00:00:25.120 Uh but this particular story takes a little bit. 00:00:25.120 --> 00:00:29.519 There's a little bit of complexity to it, so I'm just gonna jump right in. 00:00:29.519 --> 00:00:35.359 Uh, Evan Hansen is this young man in high school, 17 years old. 00:00:35.359 --> 00:00:40.159 He's got severe social anxiety. 00:00:40.159 --> 00:00:57.200 So the therapist that he goes to gives him the suggestion that he start writing affirming letters to himself to remind himself of what is good about his life and to remind him what is good about himself to build his confidence, right? 00:00:57.200 --> 00:01:04.000 So he would start these letters with the phrase, dear Evan Hansen, to himself. 00:01:04.000 --> 00:01:17.920 Now, while at school one day, a classmate who was a bit troubled, Connor Murphy, he takes one of those letters, all right, uh, and and then kind of shoves in his pocket and leaves with it. 00:01:17.920 --> 00:01:28.400 And then in a tragedy of early on in the story itself, he ends his life, but he has that letter inside his pocket. 00:01:28.400 --> 00:01:44.239 So when his parents are able to re-engage with him and find this letter that says, Dear Evan Hansen, they assume that their son, who had given up his life, was really close with Evan Hanson. 00:01:44.239 --> 00:01:46.480 He thought they were very, very close friends. 00:01:46.480 --> 00:01:51.040 And so they invite Evan to come over, and Evan, he feels bad about this. 00:01:51.040 --> 00:01:58.879 Uh, he feels that he that there's been a mistake, and yet he doesn't want to ruin this comfort that they have found. 00:01:58.879 --> 00:02:06.400 And so he kind of just expands on the uh this fabrication, this understanding, right? 00:02:06.400 --> 00:02:13.439 And he starts inventing stories about this secret relationship that he had with Connor. 00:02:13.439 --> 00:02:31.919 Then he gets together with one friend named Milana and who has a tech savvy student friend named Jared, and together they make up this whole email history of a relationship that Evan and Connor had that nobody knew about. 00:02:31.919 --> 00:02:42.719 What it culminates in is that Evan is asked to speak at this memorial that they have at the school for Connor. 00:02:42.719 --> 00:02:47.919 Uh, and it is such a moving, viral moment. 00:02:47.919 --> 00:02:52.639 Uh well, it is such a moving moment that it goes viral. 00:02:52.639 --> 00:03:06.240 Everybody starts listening to the words and the song that Evan sings and starts getting really moved by it, really words that they really needed to hear, obviously, because it goes viral. 00:03:06.240 --> 00:03:09.520 People really are there for it. 00:03:09.520 --> 00:03:21.520 As the movement grows, though, that fabrication starts getting a little bit too challenging to maintain, and Evan eventually confesses. 00:03:21.520 --> 00:03:37.680 He confesses to the to Connor's family, confesses to the public, and what happens is massive backlash, online harassment, the disintegration of his relationship with the Murphys. 00:03:37.680 --> 00:03:41.680 It just blows up on him when he confesses. 00:03:41.680 --> 00:03:50.240 He's left along with his single mother to kind of rebuild a life amidst those uh ashes. 00:03:50.240 --> 00:04:16.319 Uh, and a year later we learn, spoiler alert, we learn that he's figured out a way to accept all of his actions and to repair a lot of the relationships that he allowed to uh get burned and even moves towards a place of some self-acceptance, which was the initial um the initial desire as the story started. 00:04:16.319 --> 00:04:19.759 So that's the story of Dear Evan Hansen. 00:04:19.759 --> 00:04:29.680 It's probably the story or the show that we've used, and the song that we've used, it's the most on the nose of the whole series. 00:04:29.680 --> 00:04:38.800 We're using a song called You Will Be Found, and it's paired with Luke 15 about the lost sheep. 00:04:38.800 --> 00:04:42.240 So do you hear me when I say it's kind of on the nose? 00:04:42.240 --> 00:04:46.240 This one was a little easier than others to map out. 00:04:46.240 --> 00:04:52.319 And actually, scripturally, it's just the first of three lost stories. 00:04:52.319 --> 00:04:56.000 Not everybody recognizes that or has looked through to see that. 00:04:56.000 --> 00:04:58.720 The first is that story of the lost sheep, right? 00:04:58.720 --> 00:05:08.639 That the shepherd uh loses just one of the sheep and leaves the rest of the flock to go and get just the one that was lost. 00:05:08.639 --> 00:05:11.920 Then there is a second story. 00:05:11.920 --> 00:05:21.360 It is uh an old one older woman who doesn't have many resources, doesn't have much money, and she loses a coin. 00:05:21.360 --> 00:05:27.839 And Jesus asks us, oh, how how much is she gonna look for that coin? 00:05:27.839 --> 00:05:35.120 She's poor, she needs that coin, and how much will she celebrate when she finds that coin? 00:05:35.120 --> 00:05:45.439 And then the other lost story is one that many of us know as the prodigal son story or the lost son story. 00:05:45.439 --> 00:05:55.839 The one in which the the son uh decides that he'd rather have his uh inheritance that uh will be due to him when his father passes. 00:05:55.839 --> 00:05:58.480 He wants it now rather than later. 00:05:58.480 --> 00:06:03.680 His father gives it to him, he goes and wastes it all on wine, women, and song. 00:06:03.680 --> 00:06:20.319 And then comes back humbled to his uh to his father, whom he thinks will probably just tuck him in a back door somewhere and give him a job, but instead he's met with grand forgiveness and grace. 00:06:20.319 --> 00:06:24.319 Those are the three lost stories. 00:06:24.319 --> 00:06:31.920 Now, if Pastor Darren was writing scripture, there would have been a fourth lost story, the lost hairline. 00:06:31.920 --> 00:06:39.199 Bless these follicles, my lord. 00:06:39.199 --> 00:06:42.879 They know not what they do. 00:06:42.879 --> 00:07:04.160 But the message seems pretty clear of these lost stories. First, we're invited to see God as this shepherd, this shepherd that loves us so deeply that if we are lost, God is willing to leave the rest of the flock to come find us. 00:07:04.160 --> 00:07:23.279 God is this woman, a woman who is very much in need of her resources and how how valuable her coin, her coins would be to her, and how hard she would search for that coin and how much she would celebrate when she finds it. 00:07:23.279 --> 00:07:28.160 That is God's vision of us and how important God is to us. 00:07:28.160 --> 00:07:44.639 And then finally, uh the last story that God uh um God is like the father in the prodigal son story forgiving us even when we've made the choices to have ourselves astray. 00:07:44.639 --> 00:07:46.560 God is still greeting us. 00:07:46.560 --> 00:07:53.600 We're supposed to recognize the heart of God for the lost in these passages. 00:07:53.600 --> 00:08:07.759 Sometimes I wonder when I read these how something like this was received back in ancient times, biblical times, the intimacy of this relationship with God is so clear. 00:08:07.759 --> 00:08:11.600 A God who who loves us so much. 00:08:11.600 --> 00:08:19.199 And not just the special people like Moses, but all of us. 00:08:19.199 --> 00:08:30.560 I wonder how counterintuitive it might have been for them in that ancient world to to believe that there is a God, that the God we know would love us that deeply. 00:08:30.560 --> 00:08:38.559 Now, in today's world, I could see it also being a difficult concept, a difficult belief to have. 00:08:38.559 --> 00:08:52.879 I mean, to a certain extent we know what it means to be loved in this world, whether it was by parents or friends, mentors, right? 00:08:52.879 --> 00:09:06.879 We've each known at least in some way uh some love in our lives, and we know what that feels like, but we also likely know times of feeling not loved. 00:09:06.879 --> 00:09:12.720 Maybe even lost in the world around us. 00:09:12.720 --> 00:09:17.519 I like to use the word unmoored. 00:09:17.519 --> 00:09:23.840 But I'm the only one in the world who likes to use the word unmoored. 00:09:23.840 --> 00:09:28.639 Does anybody else like to use the word unmoored? 00:09:29.600 --> 00:09:30.080 Maybe now. 00:09:30.480 --> 00:09:32.639 Maybe now, or yeah, yeah. 00:09:32.639 --> 00:09:36.879 We do have a special club of us, the unmoored club. 00:09:36.879 --> 00:09:41.279 There is no meeting time and no meeting place. 00:09:41.279 --> 00:09:43.679 Do you know why? 00:09:43.679 --> 00:09:46.480 We're unmoored. 00:09:46.480 --> 00:09:55.440 No, I I do though, that just that word just it really speaks to how I feel when I'm in that place of being lost. 00:09:55.440 --> 00:10:00.080 I'm I'm disconnected from the tracks of my life. 00:10:00.080 --> 00:10:06.159 I'm feeling just uh um being tossed to and fro in the ocean. 00:10:06.159 --> 00:10:10.080 I'm unmoored, I'm unsure, I'm disconnected. 00:10:10.080 --> 00:10:15.440 This is the headspace that Evan Hansen is in as we start the story. 00:10:15.440 --> 00:10:18.080 This is where he is. 00:10:18.080 --> 00:10:30.720 He is um so deep into this unmoored, unsure, not feeling worthy place that he has the therapist having him write self-affirmations. 00:10:30.720 --> 00:10:38.240 The show itself, the musical, speaks to this challenge we have as a as a society right now. 00:10:38.240 --> 00:10:46.320 Some might even say it's a bit of an epidemic of this feeling lost, of our young people really feeling lost. 00:10:46.320 --> 00:10:51.039 It's a bit ironic because of today's technology, right? 00:10:51.039 --> 00:10:59.519 We are more connected than we have ever been virtually. 00:10:59.519 --> 00:11:12.720 We are invited into each other's lives more than we have ever been invited into each other's lives virtually. 00:11:12.720 --> 00:11:15.600 And it's different. 00:11:15.600 --> 00:11:24.559 It's different than that that real experience, and we're learning that it might not be all that healthy. 00:11:24.559 --> 00:11:28.320 The awareness of this concern is so prevalent. 00:11:28.320 --> 00:11:33.360 I don't feel like I'm preaching anything new or anything you guys haven't heard already. 00:11:33.360 --> 00:11:35.200 I'm not going to emphasize it more. 00:11:35.200 --> 00:11:45.840 But the fact that this story becomes as significant as it did, this became a very well-known uh uh musical, that should not be lost on us. 00:11:45.840 --> 00:11:54.559 It's the story itself uh would it would invite us to understand this as a reality of our time. 00:11:54.559 --> 00:12:03.919 Our young people seem to identify with this kind of pain, this kind of loneliness. 00:12:03.919 --> 00:12:12.080 It might be how in how we understand the reason for our pain. 00:12:12.080 --> 00:12:19.600 There could be a question of of worthiness that sits in our minds, right? 00:12:19.600 --> 00:12:22.320 Sits in our psyche. 00:12:22.320 --> 00:12:30.799 We have things not go our way, and we're asking ourselves, uh, what is the universe saying to me? 00:12:30.799 --> 00:12:33.120 What is God saying to me? 00:12:33.120 --> 00:12:36.320 Am I not worthy? 00:12:36.320 --> 00:12:44.559 And then we have the whole other layer of uh questions of our own ownership in our pain. 00:12:44.559 --> 00:12:47.919 Are we really victims? 00:12:47.919 --> 00:12:55.039 Or did we have something to do with why we are hurting? 00:12:55.039 --> 00:12:58.480 Did we really get lost? 00:12:58.480 --> 00:13:02.960 Or did we just fail to stop and ask for directions? 00:13:02.960 --> 00:13:13.679 This may also be why we have to remind ourselves to have com compassion for the lost human being. 00:13:13.679 --> 00:13:20.799 Definitely for when that human is someone else, but especially when that human is us. 00:13:20.799 --> 00:13:28.559 We need to have compassion in the way that is modeled to us by God in the stories that Jesus teaches us. 00:13:28.559 --> 00:13:42.399 We are blessed that in our scriptures, with teaching from Jesus Himself, we are taught about the heart of God, which holds unconditional love for each and every one of us. 00:13:42.399 --> 00:13:47.120 God loves you enough to leave the flock to find you. 00:13:47.120 --> 00:13:56.320 God finds you so valuable that when you are finally found there is celebration. 00:13:56.320 --> 00:14:09.519 Even when you stray from God, sometimes even reject God, your return is going to be met with forgiveness, joy, and celebration. 00:14:09.519 --> 00:14:20.240 So the song we picked could be considered as God's words to us in this spirit. 00:14:20.240 --> 00:14:24.080 Like I said, it's called You Will Be Found. 00:14:24.080 --> 00:14:26.879 It does have an interesting lead up. 00:14:26.879 --> 00:14:38.559 It occurs in the part of the story when Evren is fabricating that story of the relationship with Connor, the other troubled youth. 00:14:38.559 --> 00:14:48.320 In the chaos of all that, he is able to create an actually uh strong life-affirming message. 00:14:48.320 --> 00:15:04.080 It is such a strong life-affirming message that it becomes viral, that it starts really touching people in their hearts in a way that it's getting spread all throughout the world of technology, the social media, and all of that. 00:15:04.080 --> 00:15:14.480 And the irony being that it touches people's hearts, that it is so meaningful, and that it's made up. 00:15:14.480 --> 00:15:17.919 It didn't really happen. 00:15:17.919 --> 00:15:25.759 What we should probably recognize is the way that the message is received. 00:15:25.759 --> 00:15:32.879 It goes viral because the words are needed by so many people. 00:15:32.879 --> 00:16:06.559 It's so often we are wondering why if we are really, really lost, or at least why we're feeling lost, disconnected, unsure of what the right thing to do or the wrong thing to do, disconnected from any sense of uh purpose and place, leaving us in that spot of asking, is God really looking for us? 00:16:06.559 --> 00:16:10.799 Are we really valuable to God? 00:16:10.799 --> 00:16:14.159 As valuable as a poor woman's coins. 00:16:14.159 --> 00:16:17.600 What if I make bad choices? 00:16:17.600 --> 00:16:19.759 What if I really mess up? 00:16:19.759 --> 00:16:24.480 Is God still searching? 00:16:24.480 --> 00:16:30.720 This is what's on the hearts of the community that makes this moment go viral. 00:16:30.720 --> 00:16:37.519 To me, it's clear that heaven is singing this song. 00:16:37.519 --> 00:16:44.399 He's singing the song that he wishes was being sung to him. 00:16:44.399 --> 00:16:51.679 This is the song we all want sung to us. 00:16:51.679 --> 00:16:57.600 This is the song we want Jesus to be singing to us. 00:16:57.600 --> 00:17:02.159 The song we want God singing to us. 00:17:02.159 --> 00:17:08.799 This morning you're invited to listen to it as God's words to you. 00:17:08.799 --> 00:17:15.920 Let them remind you of the God that we've come to know in this world. 00:17:15.920 --> 00:17:21.039 Our God who loves us unconditionally. 00:17:57.839 --> 00:18:04.480 Have you ever felt like you could feel? 00:18:16.160 --> 00:18:20.640 So let that lonely feeling wash away. 00:18:20.640 --> 00:18:27.359 Cause maybe there's a reason to believe you'll be okay. 00:18:27.359 --> 00:18:50.640 Cause when you don't feel strong enough to stand, you can reach, reach out your hand, and oh someone will come running, and I know they'll take you home. 00:18:50.640 --> 00:19:06.079 Even when the dark comes crashing through, when you need a friend to carry you, and when you're broken on the ground, you will be found. 00:19:06.079 --> 00:19:12.079 So let the sun come streaming in 'cause you reach up and you'll rise again. 00:19:12.079 --> 00:19:15.519 Lift your head and look around. 00:19:16.240 --> 00:19:18.400 You will be found. 00:19:18.400 --> 00:19:24.000 You will be found. 00:19:24.000 --> 00:19:35.039 You will be fine. 00:20:00.319 --> 00:20:02.400 Every time that you call out. 00:20:06.960 --> 00:22:22.640 If you only say the word from across the colour, you can't do that.