SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: Please be seated.
SPEAKER_00: You know, Miss Natalie likes to uh point out when I do something different and take her off track.
SPEAKER_00: And she said I changed the sermon, and in truth, I had.
SPEAKER_00: But if you were here last week, her children's time was last week's sermon.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so someone wasn't paying attention uh or listening to me last week uh because she missed it, but she was in with your kids and taking care of your kids.
SPEAKER_00: But last week we started this This is the day.
SPEAKER_00: It's our new series on Psalm 118, the very middle, as she pointed out, that's really cool trivia.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know if all of you knew that or not, of the Bible.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 118.
SPEAKER_00: And it's the end of these so-called Egyptian Hillel Psalms, these songs of praise that people would sing and to shout about as you come into Jerusalem for the high holy days, for for the celebration of Passover, or maybe for Sukkot, which is actually coming up next month.
SPEAKER_00: These celebrations where we celebrate all that God has done in our lives.
SPEAKER_00: But I don't know, how many of you like after last did anybody have a bad week this past week?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody?
SPEAKER_00: A couple of people had bad weeks, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: My week was a little off.
SPEAKER_00: My week was a little, I don't I don't know, Sunday was not good for me.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: What we talked about last week is one of the more famous lines in Psalm 118 is this is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: And I said, and I will rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: I kept hammering that.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what storms are in your life.
SPEAKER_00: Like I was going to Baptist on you, right?
SPEAKER_00: Every now and then we got some waves coming over our boats.
SPEAKER_00: But this is the day, yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Ah, right?
SPEAKER_00: I kept doing that.
SPEAKER_00: And then I go home, and you know what happened?
SPEAKER_00: I was Eeyore all day long.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: You know who wants to hang around Eeyore?
SPEAKER_00: Nobody.
SPEAKER_00: Nobody likes Eeyore.
SPEAKER_00: We don't want to hang around Eeyore.
SPEAKER_00: Eeyore bums us out, right?
SPEAKER_00: But that's I just walked into it, and somebody in the room kept calling me out on it.
SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna name names, but it rhymes with Virginia.
SPEAKER_00: And she's like, man, you're just being so odd.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, stop it! And she kept doing this.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day.
SPEAKER_00: Don't you hate when people use stuff that you've said against you?
SPEAKER_00: She's like, you're not rejoicing.
SPEAKER_00: You need to rejoice in it.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day.
SPEAKER_00: Rejoice like that.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, shh.
SPEAKER_00: You're just making me angrier.
SPEAKER_00: But sometimes, here's the thing, and here's why I believe that it went this way, and here's why I kind of feel like I got into the Eeyore mode, is because I was doing it on my own.
SPEAKER_00: And I started this whole this whole sermon series about this Psalm 118, and we talked about it.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: I will rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know what is going to come your way, but I will rejoice today.
SPEAKER_00: But I was missing part of it.
SPEAKER_00: Big part of it.
SPEAKER_00: You know what I was missing?
SPEAKER_00: Y'all.
SPEAKER_00: That's Hebrew for you people.
SPEAKER_00: I was missing y'all.
SPEAKER_00: Because here's the deal, right?
SPEAKER_00: We've talked about this.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 113 to 118, the Hillel Psalms, the songs of praise, where the people would rejoice and remember all that God had done.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: When you come in, you celebrate Passover, you sing these songs, 113, 14, 15, 17, 18.
SPEAKER_00: And you're celebrating the movement of God.
SPEAKER_00: You remember when God reached into Egypt, said, Let my people go.
SPEAKER_00: He took them out of slavery into freedom.
SPEAKER_00: Every year at Passover, the people of Jerusalem, the Hebrews are required if they're able to go and to celebrate.
SPEAKER_00: And Sukkot, the same deal as the Feast of Tabernacles.
SPEAKER_00: When they remember when they were in the wilderness, and time after time after time, God provided for them.
SPEAKER_00: You celebrate these moments.
SPEAKER_00: But they didn't do it alone.
SPEAKER_00: They did it together.
SPEAKER_00: But Psalm 118 is a very individualized, we talked about it.
SPEAKER_00: It's the last of these Hillel Psalms.
SPEAKER_00: And it's like there's this liturgical bent to it, like this liturgical rhythm.
SPEAKER_00: There's very some personal language, some formal language.
SPEAKER_00: There's one person who's kind of the main character, a king, if you will, who's demanding access to the altar, and who's granted access, and he's reminding God, the bees are swarming around me.
SPEAKER_00: All this stuff's going on, but you, God, are my victory.
SPEAKER_00: You, God, are my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: That's what some translations will say.
SPEAKER_00: You're my victory, my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: But things shift.
SPEAKER_00: And Psalm 118 goes from this individualized kind of story to a group thing.
SPEAKER_00: Because if we're all if we're all honest, it's better when we're together.
SPEAKER_00: And in fact, that's how God designed us.
SPEAKER_00: Was to be together.
SPEAKER_00: That's why small groups are so important.
SPEAKER_00: You ever, I know there, like this is a great time of year, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00: It's it's the summer's over, fall, like tomorrow morning, you know it's gonna be 60 degrees in my house, because we turn the AC down.
SPEAKER_00: Come on, yeah, you know?
SPEAKER_00: It's fall, the Christmas in the air, but like sports seasons are starting.
SPEAKER_00: Right, like some of you, not everybody's a hunter, but I'm a hunter.
SPEAKER_00: I went out dove season.
SPEAKER_00: It was the first time without my dad, but it was just so cool and special to be out there.
SPEAKER_00: I love this time of year.
SPEAKER_00: It's greatness.
SPEAKER_00: All this stuff going on.
SPEAKER_00: Serie A is three games in.
SPEAKER_00: Anybody?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody with me?
SPEAKER_00: Really?
SPEAKER_00: Football?
SPEAKER_00: Any football fans in here?
SPEAKER_00: No footbug.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: Soccer is what you normal people call it.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Anybody, any soccer fans in the house?
SPEAKER_00: Did anybody get into the World Cup this year?
SPEAKER_00: Come on, America.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: What?
SPEAKER_00: You didn't support our boys?
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, soccer is just, okay, it's not everybody's on board with soccer, but our family is.
SPEAKER_00: For whatever reason, we kind of got into the World Cup this year.
SPEAKER_00: And we got just excited about it, and Corbin got us excited.
SPEAKER_00: We we got to go uh to a cousin's wedding in New York, and um, and there was a soccer store.
SPEAKER_00: Corbin got a jersey, like, and it was just awesome.
SPEAKER_00: It was great.
SPEAKER_00: We were there when Brazil was playing the game, and we're walking through Times Square, and the Brazilians are just going nuts.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, we've got to leave right now.
SPEAKER_00: Uh this is about to go down.
SPEAKER_00: Like, let's go.
SPEAKER_00: Uh it was just it was awesome.
SPEAKER_00: It was so great.
SPEAKER_00: Loved watching the matches and everything, and so we were trying to try to pick teams.
SPEAKER_00: You know, and we're like, okay, well, what's a team after the World Cup ends?
SPEAKER_00: Like, we want to get into this in the Premier League, right?
SPEAKER_00: That's supposedly the greatest.
SPEAKER_00: And so we're trying to choose a team based on some of the players that we liked from the World Cup and stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And, you know, there's Premier League teams, there's La Liga, if you're a La Liga fan, if you're a Real Madrid fan, something like that.
SPEAKER_00: Then there's Serie A, which is the Italian version of the Premier League.
SPEAKER_00: It's the top of the top.
SPEAKER_00: And if you ever watched a soccer game, and just the excitement that comes around it.
SPEAKER_00: Yesterday, it was college football apparently started.
SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
SPEAKER_00: I think we're taking the season off.
SPEAKER_00: And so college game day on, and that's one of the that's one of the traditions of our family.
SPEAKER_00: We love to wake up on Saturdays and we watch College Game Day and get excited for all the games that are coming, blah, blah, blah all that stuff.
SPEAKER_00: And Jenna walks in to where I was watching, she goes, What are you doing?
SPEAKER_00: And I was watching a soccer game, soccer match.
SPEAKER_00: It was a Serie A team.
SPEAKER_00: It was Napoli against Inter Milan.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I know.
SPEAKER_00: I know you want to know what happened.
SPEAKER_00: I'll tell you in a second.
SPEAKER_00: But just I was she goes, What are you doing watching this?
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, this is we have to watch this now.
SPEAKER_00: It's amazing.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason I tell you that, I'm gonna brag on my brother a little bit because I talk bad about him all the time.
SPEAKER_00: He deserves it, but whatever.
SPEAKER_00: Um, so my older brother is he was an attorney.
SPEAKER_00: He went to a little school in Austin and became a lawyer, blah, blah, blah, whatever.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he hated being an attorney.
SPEAKER_00: And he wanted to do something else.
SPEAKER_00: So he got into uh serving the dark Lord Bean Caffeine.
SPEAKER_00: He runs coffee shops.
SPEAKER_00: Uh, anybody ever been to Summer Moon Coffee?
SPEAKER_00: You should go there.
SPEAKER_00: It's great, it's awesome.
SPEAKER_00: When we have our new building, that's gonna be Summer Moon Coffee that is served in there.
SPEAKER_00: My brother has all of the Summer Moon coffees here in San Antonio.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and apparently, even though not everybody in this place has raised their hand, a lot more people in San Antonio know about it.
SPEAKER_00: Um, because brother's killing it.
SPEAKER_00: Like he made he made a good living as an attorney.
SPEAKER_00: He is slaying it um serving you caffeine.
SPEAKER_00: Um and just doing great.
SPEAKER_00: And I'm super proud of him.
SPEAKER_00: I really am.
SPEAKER_00: I'm so proud of the way that he's transitioned in the half part of his life and done everything and been so successful and great and awesome.
SPEAKER_00: Um, but one of the things that it's allowed him to do, because he's way into soccer, very into it.
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he's been following Premier League teams for a long time.
SPEAKER_00: He was given this opportunity to buy into ownership of a team in Italy.
SPEAKER_00: Um and he said yes.
SPEAKER_00: And so he is now part owner of Forsenone.
SPEAKER_00: For Sanoneone, there you go.
SPEAKER_00: I've been practicing that all morning.
SPEAKER_00: Um Forcenone, which is which was a Series B team when he bought into it, but then they went on a tear and got promoted, and now they're in the big boy league, Serie A.
SPEAKER_00: So my brother is a part owner of a Serie A team, which by the way is already off to a fantastic start this season.
SPEAKER_00: And so I told Jenna, why are we watching this?
SPEAKER_00: Because this is our life now.
SPEAKER_00: Like, like, we are all about Italian soccer.
SPEAKER_00: We are all in, and we're gonna celebrate when Forstanone wins, and we're gonna I'm getting a scarf.
SPEAKER_00: You know, soccer people wear scarf.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna start wearing scarfs and stuff and kits.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna talk about my kit and things like that.
SPEAKER_00: But one of the things I love about soccer is when they score a goal.
SPEAKER_00: Like, have you ever watched a match, a soccer match?
SPEAKER_00: It lets it can be boring, right?
SPEAKER_00: There's a lot of running.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of running.
SPEAKER_00: And you know who has two thumbs and doesn't run?
SPEAKER_00: This guy.
SPEAKER_00: Uh yeah.
SPEAKER_00: I'm like, so it's like there's a ton of running.
SPEAKER_00: There's not a lot of scoring that happens.
SPEAKER_00: A lot of times games end in nil-nil, which means zero zero for those of you who don't understand that, right?
SPEAKER_00: And they have to go to extra time, whatever, and just all this stuff.
SPEAKER_00: But when they score, watch out.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: Because what happens when they score?
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's what the announcer does.
SPEAKER_00: Goal! That happened at 9.32.
SPEAKER_00: I'm glad you're all with me.
SPEAKER_00: They go nuts.
SPEAKER_00: The guy who scores the goal runs to the corner away from the rest of his team because they are trying to attack him.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: The entire team runs after the guy who has scored the goal and just jumps on him, including everyone who's sitting on the bench.
SPEAKER_00: All the subs, every the entire team, 20-something guys, run and jump on this guy, and they're celebrating it.
SPEAKER_00: In the Premier League, they call it the Celly.
SPEAKER_00: That's right, the Celly.
SPEAKER_00: It's the Celly.
SPEAKER_00: It's the moment where, look, the one guy scored the goal, but without the rest of the team, he wouldn't have.
SPEAKER_00: And they all acknowledge that there is something tremendous that just happened.
SPEAKER_00: It is better when we celebrate together, when something happens, when there is a big victory and the world changes, you celebrate those moments together.
SPEAKER_00: When time bends and physics and rules no longer apply, and you get one more second to try one more play, and you illegally win the game, you still rush the field.
SPEAKER_00: Come on, somebody.
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
SPEAKER_00: You still rush the field because victory happened.
SPEAKER_00: Because it's meaningful.
SPEAKER_00: And you celebrate together.
SPEAKER_00: Psalm 118 takes it from an individual sport into a celly.
SPEAKER_00: It takes it from this beautiful, powerful language of calling out to God and crying out for God to move to verse 24.
SPEAKER_00: Now look, verse 24 was a verse that I used a lot last week, but I changed it.
SPEAKER_00: One word of it.
SPEAKER_00: Verse 24 says, This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: And this is what I said.
SPEAKER_00: I will rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: What does the verse really say?
SPEAKER_00: We.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: We will rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made, so let us all come together in the corner and jump on one another because God created this day for us.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: We will rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: Please, Lord, it goes on verse 25.
SPEAKER_00: Please save us.
SPEAKER_00: Hosanna, it says.
SPEAKER_00: Please, Lord.
SPEAKER_00: Please give us success.
SPEAKER_00: Bless the one who comes in the name of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: We bless you.
SPEAKER_00: The house of the Lord.
SPEAKER_00: It changes from an individual sport to a team sport.
SPEAKER_00: It changes everything because of how they celebrate.
SPEAKER_00: Because we weren't ever meant to go through this life individually.
SPEAKER_00: But together.
SPEAKER_00: And yes, yes, yes, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_00: Your individual relationship with Jesus matters.
SPEAKER_00: And if we go back to the last series, all in, you need to pour into your relationship with Jesus.
SPEAKER_00: But we can't do it all the time alone.
SPEAKER_00: And when something tremendous happens, we need to have the celly.
SPEAKER_00: We need to run to the corner and celebrate with one another and say, God is good.
SPEAKER_00: This is the day the Lord has made.
SPEAKER_00: Let us rejoice and be glad in it.
SPEAKER_00: There's so much power when we do this together.
SPEAKER_00: Remember the people of Israel right here, right?
SPEAKER_00: They are remembering what God had done.
SPEAKER_00: Right?
SPEAKER_00: So this is remembering when God reached into Egypt and brought 400 years of identity as slaves and said, that's not who you are, and brings them into freedom and begins to shape them as sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: The people who were celebrating this didn't go through it.
SPEAKER_00: The people who were singing these songs didn't experience it.
SPEAKER_00: It was history.
SPEAKER_00: And for the Hebraic mind, history is memory and all that stuff, but but it still wasn't them.
SPEAKER_00: And yet they were celebrating as if it was.
SPEAKER_00: But do you hear the words there?
SPEAKER_00: If you have a Bible and some of you, if you have your Bible open and you read right next to verse 26, there's a footnote that says John 12, 13.
SPEAKER_00: And the reason that's there is because when Jesus, this is the triumphal entry passage in John, when Jesus comes into Jerusalem for the last time, the triumphal entry, as we call it, right?
SPEAKER_00: He's coming in to celebrate.
SPEAKER_00: What does he come in to celebrate?
SPEAKER_00: Passover.
SPEAKER_00: It's a holy day.
SPEAKER_00: And if it's a holy day and people are coming into the city to celebrate, what are they doing?
SPEAKER_00: They're singing these songs.
SPEAKER_00: 113, 114, 15, 16, 17, 8.
SPEAKER_00: They're singing these halel praises, these songs of praise.
SPEAKER_00: These words are on their lips.
SPEAKER_00: And listen to what they say.
SPEAKER_00: Please, Lord, please save us.
SPEAKER_00: Remember when Jesus comes into Jerusalem?
SPEAKER_00: What are the people shouting?
SPEAKER_00: Hosanna.
SPEAKER_00: Oh Shanah.
SPEAKER_00: Hoshnah, save us.
SPEAKER_00: God, save us.
SPEAKER_00: God.
SPEAKER_00: And the people of Psalm 118 are saying, you did.
SPEAKER_00: They're remembering the moment when God reached into the most powerful force of the world at the time and said, You don't have control over my people.
SPEAKER_00: They are my sons and daughters.
SPEAKER_00: And he removes them from slavery and puts them into freedom.
SPEAKER_00: But we, oh, we got a different celebration going on, don't we?
SPEAKER_00: Because what the people of the triumphal entry were hoping for is what we know happened.
SPEAKER_00: That Jesus went to the cross.
SPEAKER_00: He was buried in the tomb.
SPEAKER_00: But on the third day, he rose again.
SPEAKER_00: See, they were celebrating the fact that God once moved and brought them into freedom out of captivity.
SPEAKER_00: We celebrate the fact that God moved and conquered death and brings us life.
SPEAKER_00: That's a celebration.
SPEAKER_00: That is something to shout about.
SPEAKER_00: That is something to run into the corner and jump up and down on one another and say, You too! He died for you too.
SPEAKER_00: He died for us all.
SPEAKER_00: You know, the church has passed down many things and many traditions over the years.
SPEAKER_00: Two of them we call sacraments, where we believe that God's presence and movement is just a little different than at other times.
SPEAKER_00: And one of them comes from right after that triumphal entry when Jesus walks into Jerusalem, right?
SPEAKER_00: Because they go to the upper room.
SPEAKER_00: And you know these guys had grown up, these disciples had grown up singing these psalms and knowing them and just knowing the stories and all that, that God would one day bring Hosherah, save us, bring freedom into the people.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus, he takes that moment to do the Seder meal, what we call the Last Supper, this telling of the story that they had done year after year after year, remembering when God moved and brought salvation.
SPEAKER_00: You are my victory, you are my salvation.
SPEAKER_00: And Jesus says, but I'm gonna change the narrative a little bit.
SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna change.
SPEAKER_00: Because this is this is my body.
SPEAKER_00: This is my blood.
SPEAKER_00: And I give this so that you might have life.
SPEAKER_00: You know, oftentimes we come to this table with solemn reverence, and that's right.
SPEAKER_00: We should approach this table in a reverential manner and understanding what sacrifice and gift is being offered to us.
SPEAKER_00: But too often, I think, out of the sense of reverence, we miss the moment of celebration that it truly is.
SPEAKER_00: We miss the moment that we get to celebrate all that God has done through the life, the death, and the resurrection of Jesus Christ.
SPEAKER_00: The people who are shouting out and crying for the day when God would truly save them.
SPEAKER_00: We live in that day.
SPEAKER_00: And that gift is available to all of us.
SPEAKER_00: So when we come to this table this morning, you do you, but can I can I invite you to celebrate a little?
SPEAKER_00: Can I invite you to have a heart full of joy, full of the sense that Jesus died for y'all, and that his life, death, and resurrection are right here and available to you.
SPEAKER_00: If you've known it for the length of your life, that is great and wonderful, and it's another time to celebrate all that God has done.
SPEAKER_00: But maybe today is the first time you come to the table and truly celebrate the gift that is this moment.
SPEAKER_00: Let us celebrate.
SPEAKER_00: Gracious and heavenly Father, we thank you and praise you for the ways that you move in our life.
SPEAKER_00: God, we thank you so much that you were a God who saved us.
SPEAKER_00: You didn't leave us out to languish in the death of this world.
SPEAKER_00: But you said, not my children.
SPEAKER_00: And you gave your son, who lived his life, who died our death, but conquered it, so that we might have life.
SPEAKER_00: God, we thank you and praise you for that gift.
SPEAKER_00: We thank you for that moment when you gave us life.
SPEAKER_00: We pray that through the power of the Holy Spirit that you would make this be the body broken for us and the blood poured out for the forgiveness of sins.
SPEAKER_00: As often as we come, we do so in remembrance of you.
SPEAKER_00: And Father, we join our voices this morning and pray the prayer that your Son taught us.
SPEAKER_00: Our Father, who art in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Hallowed be thy name.
SPEAKER_00: Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
SPEAKER_00: Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.
SPEAKER_00: For thine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever.
SPEAKER_00: Amen.
SPEAKER_00: If you would continue in an attitude of prayer and those who are assisting with communion, if you would come forward at this time.