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So good to be with you guys. Thanks, guys. Appreciate you. Grab your Bibles. Turn now to the New Testament book of John, where we have been and will be all summer. If you don't have a Bible, or if you didn't bring a Bible with you this morning, I invite you to raise your hand. We've got ushers who are going to come from all sides of our worship center, and they would love nothing more than to bring you a Bible as a gift. The Bible that they give you is your Bible. We encourage you to take it with you when you leave today and invite you to bring it back with you next week when you come. Just hold your hand up, they're going to find you. If you're unfamiliar with the Bible and you're looking for the book of John, the fastest and easiest way to find it is going to be in the very beginning of the Bible at the table of contents. It's going to be found in the New Testament, the fourth book of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and then John. We're going to pick up today where we left off last week in John chapter 4. We're in a series through the book of John that we're calling seven. And that's because in the gospel or the good news of John, there is a triad of sevens. There are seven recorded messages, seven recorded miracles, and seven recorded I am teachings of Jesus. In this series, we've chosen to focus on the seven messages of Jesus and the seven miracles of Jesus, knowing that every miracle is intended to substantiate the message. The premise of our entire seven series is this is predicated on the understanding that who we are is informed by whose we are, which influences everything that we do. Who we are is informed by whose we are, which influences every single thing that we do. As we study and as we learn, and as we grow, and as we apply these messages and the experience of these miracles in our lives, it not only helps us understand our identity, our DNA, the inner weaving of our fibers as followers of Jesus Christ, but in how Jesus speaks, what Jesus taught, and how he lived, it influences how we ought to live our lives as well. Last week we looked in John chapter 4, where Jesus was in Sikar in a region called Samaria. If you remember, in John chapter 4 and verse 4, we read that Jesus had to go through Samaria. He had been down in Jerusalem, which is in the Judean region. He was there for worship, which I'll cover here in a few minutes. But as he's going up to Capernaum in Galilee, the far northest part of Israel, it's about a 90-minute trek straight north to south. Jesus passes through this forbidden land. It's forbidden for Jews. Any God-fearing, respectable Jewish person would not be caught dead or alive in Samaria. They would do everything within their ability to avoid even touching Samaritan land. Jesus is going to flip culture upside down and introducing counter-culture. Jesus is not only going to go through Samaria, but he's going to encounter a woman. And not just a woman, but a woman at the heat of the day at a well. And not just any woman at a well, but a woman who was in ill repute. Amongst a despised people group, the Samaritans, she was even more reviled than they were. This woman is known by reputation more than anything else. Jesus calls out her history that she had been married five times and that the man that she was living with now wasn't even her husband. As a byproduct of this conversation that Jesus has, this woman leaves her life source, this jar that she was there to collect water from Jacob's well, and she runs back into the village of people who hate her. She runs back into the village of people who had excommunicated her. She runs back into the village and putting her life on the line, she cries to the people come and see. Come and see a man who's told me everything. Could this be the Messiah? And as a byproduct of her story, many people in that area believe. But they follow her all the same. She shares with them how she has an encounter with Jesus and her life is transformed. They are incredibly impressed with her transformation, so much so that at the invitation, come and see, they follow her to where Jesus is at. And when they see Jesus and when they hear Jesus, they believe themselves. And their lives are transformed. And the lives of those that they are responsible for are transformed. And they plead with Jesus to stay with them a little while longer. And what we're going to learn is that Jesus is going to stay for two more days teaching. And Jesus is going to stay doing miracles. And Jesus is going to stay meeting the needs of the people. And he's going to continue to build relationships, which is probably and may be arguably the greatest miracle of all that this Jewish man was building community with these Samaritan people. We read in John chapter 4, beginning in verse 43 to the end, 54. After two days, he departed, Sikar, he departed Samaria for Galilee. For Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in his own hometown. So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast, for they had to go to the feast. So he came again to Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water, wine. And at Capernaum there was an official whose son was ill. When this man heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and asked him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. So Jesus said to him, Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe. The official said to him, Sir, come down before my child dies. Jesus said to him, Go. Your son will live. The man believed. The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went away. As he was going down, his servants met him and asked, uh excuse me, told him that his son was recovering. Verse 52. So he asked them the hour when he began to set feel better. And they said to him, Yesterday at the seventh hour, the fever left him. The father knew that that was the hour when Jesus had said to him, Your son will live. And he himself believed. And all his household. This was now the second sign that Jesus did when he had come from Judea to Galilee. Let's pray. Father, I thank you so much for the privilege of getting to read your word aloud together as a community of faith. Thank you now for the opportunity to rightly divide your word. I pray that you would give me all the strength, all the knowledge, all the wisdom, all the prophetic words that I need to rightly divide your word in ways that are equally authentic and accurate and that help us understand and apply what it is you would have for us and from us in our time together today. As your word goes out, may it not return avoid. Father, I thank you for how you've already moved today. And I pray that you would do it again. May a fresh anointing be evident over me and in us. Lord, may all that we say and do be for the good of one another and for your glory. Now may the words of my mouth, the meditation of our hearts, be pleasing to you, O Lord, our rock and our redeemer. And the whole church said in 2017, one of the most now famous musicals hit the big screen. It is now the number nine most popular biographical movie of all time. And it doesn't hurt that the soundtrack is one of the most recognizable soundtracks of any movie of all time. In the opening weekend, the greatest showman net $470 plus million dollars in the box office, making it one, the only musical I'll ever watch, and two, one of the greatest musicals of all time. Assume with me for a moment that we've all seen the greatest showman. Then you know that it is a depiction of the famous P. T. Barnum. It's a story of rags to riches to faults and failures, and ultimately back to success.

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T. Barnum, as the movie depicts, a part of his life is an upbringing that was depraved. His father working, P.T. lacking an education, following his father around on his job. His father dies, and P. T. Barnum then has to pull himself up by his bootstraps and has to earn a living to make a life for himself. So he begins to use corruption as a means to provide for himself. Finagling his way through life, he'll go and take recycled newspapers and he'll begin to sell them as new news. He's always working an angle. He's always trying to figure out what he can do to earn a dollar. After losing his job and now married with a family, he is coming to an end. Realizing the promise that he made to his father-in-law, a man who hated him and despised their marriage relationship, he was bound and determined to do whatever he could to make a way. He made a career out of oddities. The story is depicted of him seeing a woman with an apple whose face was disfigured and then a tiny person, and uh one after the next, he he ends up buying this wax museum and ultimately he fails initially to get people to even come out. But once he sees that there's a market for the mysterious, once he recognizes that people will come out to see these oddities, he begins to go after all of them the bearded lady, the giant Irish man, the acrobatics, and the lions and the tigers and the bears, oh my! All of the things. And he becomes radically successful. And in his success, pride runs in front of him and gets in his way and ultimately costs him everything. His marriage, his family, even the circus. Toward the end of the movie, you see a moment where everything that he had built is in rubble. It's been burnt down and broken. And it's in this moment where he realizes that there's nothing he can do to change this circumstance. He has to give himself away. He has to give the rights to the circus away. He has to give the opportunity to the circus away. And it's through giving himself away that he's able to rebuild or experience the rebuilding of his life. That's exactly what we're going to explore together as we study word for word John chapter 4 and verses 43 through 54. We're going to study one of the most unreached people groups in the United States of America. It's not Native Americans, it's not uh immigrants who are coming in from foreign countries, it's it's it's it's the corner office. Statistics will show that the largest, most unreached people group in the United States of America are the self-made men and women who have risen the ranks and accomplished all that they wanted to accomplish by climbing the corporate ladder. They're surrounded by glass and ornates, decorations, and people serving them, and they've got all the things going for them. And I am not suggesting in and of themselves that these things are inherently wrong or evil. I will say that taken out of context and misplaced, the devil uses it as a playground. And we learn to rely on things or individuals, not the least of which ourselves, for our own success, for our own happiness, and for our own joy. The other thing that we're gonna learn from this illustration is that too many people approach the church, too many people approach faith in Jesus like a circus, like a show. Too many people show up to the local church and they want a good show. They want a production, they want all the lights, they want all the sound, they want all the entertainment, and they they come for a show. They feel like they pay for a show, and so they're deserving of a show. What we're gonna see is that Jesus isn't about a show at all. As we're gonna study these again verse by verse, let's start again in chapter 4 and verse 43. After two days, this is Jesus and Sikar agreeing to the request of the people that he would stay a little longer teaching. And I would tell you that I actually believe that during this time Jesus continues to do miracles and signs and wonders. They're not all recorded, we're only reading about seven of them. But if you go to John 25, 21, you read at the very end of the Gospel of John that there are so many miracles that Jesus did that they could not be contained in a book. It's to be understood that Jesus, this was not only a part of what he did, but who he was. And so Jesus stays then for two more days there in Samaria and Sikar. And then he departs for Galilee. Galilee is the farther northern, farthest northern part of what we would call Israel today. It's about 90 miles from where he just was in Judea, Jerusalem. For Jesus himself had testified that a prophet has no honor in his own hometown. So when he came to Galilee, the Galileans welcomed him, having seen all that he had done in Jerusalem at the feast. For they too had gone to the feast. I want to talk about this. The Galileans were a devout Jewish group who were a little rough around the edges. They were Christian with a little cursing. These are individuals who were surrounded by border towns that had people coming into their collective and influencing them. They were devoted to their faith. They practiced piety and specifically were committed to worship. They would go to the local synagogues, which in our context would be a church gathering not too dissimilar to this one. But they were also committed to the three major feasts. In the late spring and then autumn, you would have the feast of Pentecost, 50 days. You would have the feast of tabernacle or the feast of booths. But the most prominent would be the feast of Passover, what we call the Passover Feast. It was expected that devout, God-fearing Jews would preemptively make concessions financially and physically to go to these feasts. It was expected that if you were able-bodied and you lived demographically, geographically in a region that allowed you to be there, that you would be there. In fact, Jerusalem for a majority of the year was somewhere around 50,000 people. Some historians would argue that the suburbs of Jerusalem could make it up to about 100,000. Over these festival weeks, specifically the Passover, they would swell to over a million people. People would come from everywhere. They would make concessions and take with them processions. They would take animals a lot of times for the sacrifice. They would take their family, their household. They would take their household servants. They would take provisions of food and provisions of water and provisions of extra clothes. They would go out of their way to make sure that they were adequately prepared for multiple days' journey to the festival or the feast and then multiple days' return home. These Galileans, as part of their faith, would have practiced going to Jerusalem to be a part of these holy festivals or these holy feasts. While they're there, they see Jesus and they hear Jesus. They've heard about him. This is the same guy in the same region, Capernaum, is in Galilee. It's about 20 miles from where Jesus is actually going to land as we read today. What they heard about was this man from Nazareth who was at a wedding, and at the wedding party, they ran out of wine, and all of a sudden he turned water into wine and not just any water, but water from servants' jugs that were used to wash people's feet. And it was stale water, stagnant water. And it wasn't just any wine, but it was the most profound wine, prolific, unlike anything that had been done before. And if you know the history and the context, Pastor Chris did an incredible job explaining it just a couple of weeks ago. I won't go back over that, but you can learn about the context of this miracle and why it was so significant. You see, these Galileans had heard about Jesus, but now in Jerusalem, 90 miles removed from their hometown, they're seeing Jesus. And do you know what they're seeing? They're watching Jesus as he walks into the temple courts. And as he's walking in, he sees that there are money changers who have established tables, and they are taking advantage of people. So Jesus starts flipping tables over, and he makes a whip from leather, and he starts driving these money changers out, and he makes a declaration about the importance and the significance and the purpose of the house of God, what it is for and what it is not for. Now, before we misappropriate or misunderstand what Jesus was upset about, he wasn't upset that there was exchange going on. He was upset that people, disadvantaged people, were being taken advantage of. Let me explain a little further. It was expected that to participate in the feast, you would bring a sacrifice of some sort. A lot of people had the means and the ability to bring with them an animal for sacrifice. But there were still many, many others who didn't. They couldn't afford to bring an animal with them. The travel was too long, it was too much money, and so what they would do then is they would wait until they got to the point of the temple and they would pay for or purchase the animal to be sacrificed. This created a monopoly where these religious leaders, in the name of God, were taking advantage of the least of these. Jesus was outraged at people taking advantage of other people. We know the Ten Commandments. There's actually 613 of them. But I had a professor in seminary when I was working on my Master of Divinity who said if there was an 11th commandment, it would be thou shalt not take advantage of others. Jesus was angry that they were creating obstacles and barriers for people to encounter God in worship. And they were profiting off of the piety of the people. The Galileans are there for worship and they're watching this man Jesus flip over tables in church. I wouldn't try that. We got cops on the premise. But uh Jesus made a scene, and not just a scene, but a declaration. Now they're seeing Jesus in his teachings, but also in the miracles that we were gonna read about. So these Galileans have heard about Jesus, but now they know that Jesus is coming to Galilee. The Bible says that they were ecstatic to have him. Are you kidding me? But you know what they were looking for? Let me tell you what they weren't. They weren't looking for the Messiah. They weren't looking for a savior, they weren't even looking for a good teacher, they were looking for a good time. Here comes the magic man, the greatest show on earth. They showed up because they wanted to see what else this Nazarene would do. They were excited to see Jesus, not for who he is, but because of what they felt he could do. Now, verse 46. Jesus came to Cana in Galilee, where he had made the water wine, and at Capernaum, 20 miles to the south, there was an official whose son was ill. When this man heard that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and he asked him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. I want to talk about this official for just a moment because culture and context changes the way that we understand and apply the word of God to our lives. At the time, there is a Tetrarch, like a governor of this area. His name is Herod Agrippa. He is the son of Herod the Great. He is appointed by Rome, Tiberius Caesar, to govern this region, Galilee. His position is very, very volatile. His identity is wrapped up in the success of the land that he has been entrusted and the way that things are operating there. In Capernaum, which will serve for about 80% of Jesus' earthly ministry, most of Jesus' teachings and miracles happen in Capernaum. In Capernaum, this is a military outpost. It's also a hotbed for the fishing industry and some agriculture. It's also a significant collection point for taxes. Though Galilee, in and of itself, wasn't a part of the Roman government, it was a party to the Roman government. They were in relationship together. They were in good standing. But it required that Herod Agrippa would make sure that things happen in a certain way. So what he did then was he hired centurions or guards. Historians and theologians alike have studied this, and they believe that these centurions, these Roman soldiers that came in weren't actually from Italy, but they would have been outside of the region and they would have come in as mercenaries. That's gonna come into play here in just a moment. They were expert at warfare. They were trained, paid killers. I want you to think for just a moment, Liam Neeson taken. I've got a unique set of skills. That is what this man is. But this man is also a very significantly wealthy man. He's a self-made man. He's been appointed by Herod Agrippa. He is so wealthy that he will have about a hundred soldiers under his care, this regiment that would serve him. But we learn then that he has other household servants. He's got people that are doing his laundry, he's got a chef that is cooking his meals, he's got a chauffeur that's driving around where he needs to go and making sure that his horse is getting valeted. He's got people that are nannying his kids. He has arrived financially, he has arrived politically, he has arrived physically. This man has significantly accomplished a lot of great things in life. Things that you and I in our flesh we admire, that we look at and we think, I want that. I want that kind of success. I want to be admired and feared. I want to be known by my accomplishments. That is this man. This man doesn't have a need to go to anyone for anything. He's used to people coming to him for everything. So there's a turning point in this man's life. This is often what we find in ministry is that for unreached people groups, indigenous or otherwise, who have accomplished what it is they set out to accomplish in life. That far too often it requires an unthinkable tragedy or a breaking point that is beyond anything that they can do to undo. So this man's son, we don't have an age, we don't understand what he's sick with, but he's sick to the point of death. This man's son is incredibly sick. He's heard about Jesus, he's heard about what Jesus did in Cana, he's heard about what Jesus did in Galilee, he's heard about what Jesus did in Jerusalem and in Judea. So he comes with this desperation inside of him to see his son saved. When this man heard verse 47 that Jesus had come from Judea to Galilee, he went to him and asked him to come down and heal his son, for he was at the point of death. So Jesus said to him, Unless you see signs and wonders, you will not believe. Now, before we make an assumption about Jesus talking to this man, what you need to know is the language here. The word you is actually plural. So imagine then this man coming of great authority and power and prominence, begging Jesus to come with him 20 miles to Capernaum to heal his son, and Jesus takes this opportunity to admonish everybody else. There's a need right in front of you, but listen, here's the thing. All y'all, like that's that's the southern Jesus. All y'all, you need a sign, you need a miracle to believe this. Y'all, y'all, y'all, y'all's motives are twisted. You're here for the show. But I want to show you the Savior. Jesus doesn't even acknowledge the man's request. He actually looks at the opportunity he has in front of him to admonish all the people who were excited that Jesus was there, but their excitement was wrapped up in what he could do for them. Look at this unfazed man, verse 49. The official said to him, Sir, come down before my child dies. He doesn't give any attention to Jesus admonishing the community. He is so singular focused on his son. He is so caught up in the sickness of his son that he's willing to do anything. He's begging Jesus. Now let me explain to you why this is significant. This is a man of dignitary status. This is an official. This is a man who would not lower himself to the standards of a beggar. And yet, in his greatest need, in his darkest hour, he is begging Jesus. He is doing something that is undignified because his soul is unsatisfied. And in his lowest, Jesus is going to bring him to his highest. We just sang about this. We just sang about the hope that we have in deserts and gardens. That regardless of the circumstance, Jesus will meet you where you're at. That whole song is based on Psalm 23. The Lord is my shepherd. I lack nothing. This man in front of everybody. Not only humbles himself, but culturally humiliates himself. He would have looked different than everybody. He would have been wearing high court garb. His men would have accompanied him. And now here's this man bowing down. Would you just come? Would you come? My son is sick. And I need you to be here to heal him. I don't know how many of you know the feelings of lost and broken and hurting. And that's have you have you've ever been in that space where you would do anything in that moment to change the outcome? I I've had a lot of those moments in my life. I'm reminded of one. I think I've actually shared it with you before church, but I'll I'll share it again. In 2017, our youngest daughter today, she's 11, she was about 18 months old. We were packing up to leave Nebraska to go to Fort Myers, Florida for a week to stay with some friends of ours. We had done this every year. They had a very large house and made uh made it possible for us to come and visit them. All we had to do was pay for our gas. Now, if I have to drive that long, I'm not going. Ask, tell me you're getting old without telling me you're getting old. Why don't y'all go on vacation? Because I'm not driving. If I can't fly, we're not going. We get to Florida, and within an hour, our kids jump right into the pool in the ocean. They're just right into it. And our little girl had done the same thing. Well, she got out, and this friend of mine, uh, he was a uh a police, high, high-ranking police officer for 27 years, but he was also trained in advanced medicine and and first aid. He noticed that Brienne was breathing funny. It's called polling, belly breathing. We had never heard of that before, but every breath she took was actually coming from her stomach and not her diaphragm. And if you looked at her neck, just below her chin and just above her collarbone, you could actually see every breath she took, you could, you could, it was almost like she had a flap of skin that was pulling in and out. And he said, Hey, you just want to get that checked out. So we took her into a little clinic who then sent us off to an urgent care. My wife Stacy was with me. And as we went into the urgent care, we got to the counter, and I was holding Brienne, 18 months old. My wife Stacy had been given a clipboard before we could sit down to start filling out the paperwork. The doctor and two nurses came from behind this room, opened the door, and walked right up to us. I'm talking like I'm about to sit down with my daughter so we can fill out paperwork. She pulled a stethoscope, pulled us into the hall, listened to our daughter, and within seconds looked at me and said, Take her to the hospital immediately. Do not stop, not even for red lights. You don't have time for an ambulance. And I looked at her and I looked at my wife and she said, Sir, go. I ran with my then 18-month-old daughter, my wife with me. I handed Brienne off to Stacy. I jumped in our Dodge Grand Caravan because that's what all middle-aged soccer parents have at some point. And my wife fastened our 18-month-old into the car seat, and we began to make our way seven miles to the hospital there in Fort Myers, and we ran lights. I mean, we were, it was crazy. The only thing that was like God, God, God's provisions is great because the only driving that might be as bad or worse than Ohio is Fort Myers. We get there and we are met in the parking lot. As I pull up to the curb, a crash team, like a trauma team, is there with crash cart and everything. They load her up on a stretcher, they take her back in. I'm like, what in the world? I'm gonna save you a lot of details. There's a point in this hospital visit where the doctor and the nurse got in a fight in our room, arguing about the best course of treatment for my daughter. I almost discharged her. It was a wild, wild, wild scene. I swear to you, an angel showed up and protected my daughter. I went home that night, Stacy stayed with Brienne. The next day I show up at the hospital, and now they've admitted her, and I walk into the room and the doctor shows up. You guys, he is the most attractive doctor I've ever seen in my life. He's Puerto Rican, about 5'9, salt and pepper hair, early 50s, deep guttural voice, and he's jacked out of his mind. And he walks in and he said, I heard that you almost checked your daughter out of the hospital last night. And I said, Yes. And he we talked about why, and he said, It's a good thing you didn't, because right now you'd be planning her funeral, not her treatment. Brianne, they later determined when we asked how long we were there for, they said, indefinitely. There is no end date to your stay here. They had her hooked up to an adult-sized cannula with I don't remember how many milliliters of oxygen there were, but they could not get her oxygen above like 85. It was just pouring through her. Wild. She was hooked up to all kinds of machines and tubes and things. The second day we were there, uh, they had her laying on my chest trying to comfort her. The only thing they needed to do was to treat her like she had cystic fibrosis. What they determined is that both of her lungs had collapsed, they were both filling up a fluid, and she was aspirating. Had we checked out of the hospital or not gotten her there when we did, she would have died in her own fluid. So it turns out that uh periodically you have three common coal viruses, a rotavirus and a couple of others. But one in 300,000 kids, it will actually impact them and it will affect their brain, their heart, or in Brianne's case, her lungs. We're there. Now, now I'll never forget this Sunday miracle. I know it was February 2017 because on the same day that God miraculously restored my little girl's body, and she sat up eating macaroni and cheese and watching Mulan. We were getting ready to leave the hospital. We get home in time to watch my beloved birds upset the New England Patriots. Fly Eagles fly, Nick Falls in the end zone, my little girl in my arms, praise God. Why do I share that story with you? This is gonna surprise most of you. I can be emotional. I know. Take it in. And there are too many times that I actually lead from emotion. But let me also tell you that the way that I grew up is probably not too dissimilar to many of you, where you were taught to pull yourself up by your bootstraps and to do it right. If you want it done right and done right the first time, you might as well do it yourself, and that you've got to work harder and be smarter than everybody else around you. And so I had a drive. In fact, I had my whole identity had been wrapped up in what I could accomplish. I was athletically accomplished, I was relationally accomplished. Everything that I had done was always to work harder and to be better and to be more recognized and to have more accolades and to have more accomplishments. And everything I did, I did on my own. And even in ministry, I carried the same attitude into ministry because I didn't have a traditional orthodox approach to ministry. I didn't grow up in the church. I didn't grow up going to Bible college and get a four-year Bible degree with theology and then go on to get my three-year Masters of Divinity degree. I started seminary when I was 30 years old with a family. Everything I did, I mean, I worked my tail off to get where I got. And here's what I say: I love hard work. I'm not disparaging anyone who works hard, but I do know that Satan will use it to leverage how you see the need for a savior. You get to a moment where there was nothing I could do to change the trajectory of my little girl's life. And I don't remember a time where I cried out to God like that. Where I was that receptive and that open. I would have done anything, and yet I could do nothing but God. But God. That's this moment for this man. That's this moment for this man. There was nothing, there was nothing that he could do to change the outcome. Sir, come down before my child dies. Verse 50, Jesus said to him, Go. Your son will live. Now listen to this. This is, I want you to circle this because it's going to come up twice in short order. The man believed. Circle that word, believed. The man believed the word that Jesus spoke to him and went on his way. He received, he believed, and he obeyed. He received the word from the Lord, he believed Jesus and took him at his word, and he obeyed. The reason that you and I don't experience miracles at this level is because we have a hard time believing, receiving, and obeying. Most of us believe it for others. A lot of us want to receive it, but we allow obstacles instead of opportunities to deprive us of the opportunity, to deprive us of the opportunity to step into the miracle that God has for us. But here's the greatest problem I see in the church today. It's not about believing or receiving, it's about obeying. I want you to think about the sacrifice that this man had to lay down before he ever got the miracle. Twenty miles this man had to walk. I want you to think about every footstep associated with every thought of his son and his son's life. Every step. And in this moment, three things happen. He heard, he received, and he believed that this would happen. The problem that we have inside the church today is that too many of us want to hear and receive, we want to believe, but we don't obey. And this isn't unique to us. I want to show you a passage in the Old Testament. 500 plus years before Jesus, there is a prophet, a man by the name of Ezekiel, and he addresses the nation of Israel who is now being held captive, and the temple has been destroyed because they had a word from the Lord that they refused to receive, and they did not act in obedience, but in absolute disobedience. And here's the word from the Lord, Ezekiel 33, verses 31 and 32. Write it down in the margin of your Bible or wherever you're taking notes and go study this on your own. Ezekiel 33, 31 and 32. Here is the word of God to the prophet Ezekiel for the nation of Israel. And they, the people of Israel, come to you. They come to you as people come. And they sit before you as my people, as Christians. And they hear your words. But they don't do them. Can I tell you as a pastor how relatable this feels to me? This is one of the most taxing things on my mind, on my emotions, and on my soul is pouring out myself to the Lord, crying out to God every week for a fresh and new anointing, for a fresh revelation, for a word that is unlike anything we've had before. And going through the process of studying the text, of understanding it, of rightly dividing God's word, but then asking the Lord to help me understand how we can apply it to our lives so that we can be all the more wholly surrendered, fully devoted followers of Jesus. And what pains me is the thought, not that you may not be entertained by something I say, but the fact that you adhere and receive God's word and not do anything with it. My name is not P.T. Barnum, and this is not a show. What we deal with here is a matter of life and death for eternity. And we need to create a formidable faith. But in order for us to have a formidable faith, we have got to put into place an action that God calls us to. He says to Ezekiel, they come to you as people come, and they sit before you as my people and hear your words. But they don't do them. They pursue the lustful desires expressed by their mouth, and their heart follows their unlawful gain. Verse 32, and behold, hear a show to them. You are like to them a love song by one who has a beautiful voice. Listen to this. This is God to Ezekiel for the nation of Israel. You're just there like a showman with a beautiful voice and plays well on an instrument, for they hear your words, but they do not practice them. This is an epidemic that has been starving our faith for thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of years. This man sets a standard, this man who had never encountered Jesus before. Christian, pay attention. He didn't grow up going to church with flannel grass, learning all the Bible stories. He didn't go to vacation Bible school. He wasn't a part of I'ms. He wasn't a part of a catechism class. He wasn't a part of a confirmation class. He didn't receive his first communion or his first baptism. This is a man who had encountered Jesus in the lowest point of his life. And he said, Please come with me. The reason he believed that is because he believed that Jesus was a doctor. That's the only reason why he would invite Jesus to come with him to his home. Because doctors did their work, they practiced their medicine by the bedside of those in need. He invites Jesus to come with him, to go to the home. And Jesus says, Go. With a word, go. Your son will live. And the Bible says that this man believed. He believed. And he went on his way. He believed Jesus. He took Jesus at his word. And then he put it to practice. I could care less. If we have the largest church in our city, the largest church in our county, the largest church in our state, or the largest count, the less church in the country, if we're filling seats with people who are actively disobeying their faith, I don't care. We are here to rightly divide God's word. My responsibility as a shepherd is to raise up the saints for the work of the ministry. Nowhere, nowhere in the 66 books of this Bible do I read that we are here to create programs or entertainment, but to raise up fully devoted followers of King Jesus. If that's you, welcome to Crossroads Church. I'm glad you're here. If you're uncomfortable, welcome to Crossroads Church. I'm glad you're here. Now don't get it twisted. I will never advocate for boring anybody into the kingdom of God. If we're gonna do church, we're gonna do it right. We're gonna have fun, we're gonna make memories, we're gonna learn to love one another, and we're gonna like we are gonna border on being charismatic. Some of you are really wondering what I just said. Some of you charismatics explain to them later. We're gonna hold to the entire truth of God's word, the orthodoxy of God's word, but we're also gonna start letting loose. Y'all did it last night at the don't don't lie to me. Y'all were at the Mansfield Motor Speedway going crazy over fireworks and races. And y'all are some of you were in my neighborhood. Knuckleheads. Man, we lose our minds for things that have zero value. No eternal gain, but we come to church so sophisticated. Stop it. Get some help. Jesus. I normally get that from the front row. I'm a little confused. What's happening right now? I don't know. Jesus? This man took Jesus at his word and he believed. Verse 51. As this man was going home, his servants met him and told him that his son was recovering. So verse 52 says, He asked them the hour when he began to get better, and they said to him, Yesterday, pay attention to this. Yesterday, at the seventh hour, when Jesus had said to him, he knew this was what Jesus had said to him, Your son will live. And he himself believed, and all his household, not only him, but all his household. This was the second miracle performed in Cana of Galilee. Friends, I need you to see something here. This man not only believed Jesus and obeyed Jesus, but he took Jesus at his word so much so that he wasn't even in a hurry to get home. Why? Because Jesus said it was already done and he knew that it was. There was no need to rush. He had 20 miles. He got to Jesus by 1 o'clock. We know that because when he asked the servants, what time was my son healed? He said at the seventh hour, which means 1 o'clock on their clock time for us. Jesus then had from 1 p.m. in the afternoon until through the evening to get home. He's not Jesus, excuse me, this centurion. And he chose to stay overnight somewhere. Maybe in in Cana. But he wasn't in a hurry to get back to Capernaum because there was no rush. Because there was no need. Because the boy was healed. I hope and pray that somebody leaves here with that kind of faith today. Jesus is stirring in your spirit. He wants to do something in you. He wants to do something through you. He wants to do something for you. He just is waiting for you to go out there with a supernatural confidence. What we lack is faith. What we lack is faith. Now I want us to understand faith, okay? In this word that I asked you to circle and highlight, sir, twice, the word is believed. The word in the original Greek is pestuo. But the second iteration is a derivative of pestuo. It's pistus. One is a noun, one is a verb in our language. In the Greek language, they are symbiotic one with the other. They're amoebic. It's not that you either have faith or you have this belief. It's both and. It's not just a noun or just a verb, it's both and. We think about the language and you don't faithing something. I'm going faithing. No, you have faith and you treat it like a noun: a person, place, or thing to behold. Believing, hey, I am believing, that's a verb. It requires action. But in the original language, there is no delineation, there is no difference, there's no separation. To have faith is to believe, and to believe is to have faith. It's faith in action. I want to read this to you. It's from a commentary that I read this week. The linguistic blueprint, the noun pistis, faith, trust, and allegiance, the verb pistuo is to put faith into action, to risk or to commit. Okay? It is the exact same word, which unfortunately makes the fact that we break them up between a noun and a verb, it unfortunately makes modern readers think of a passive mental opinion. In reality, pistuo, listen to this, I love this. Pestuo, faith, and pistus, belief, in reality, pistuo is simply pistus wearing work boots. It's faith in action. So James says, you go ahead and talk about your faith all you want. I'm going to show you my faith with how I live my life. Hebrews 11, 1 says, now faith is being sure of what you hope for and certain of what you do not see. And I'm sitting here thinking, what can I give us church and a community to help us capture faith at its essence, to hold on to it? What do we need to walk out of here with? And here, I want to break it down to you in one word, five different ways. Faith is simply this. Forfeiting all I have, trusting Him. Faith is this. Forfeiting all I have, trusting Him. Can you put that? Is there a slide associated with that? I just want you to see this again. This is faith. Forfeiting all I have, trusting Him. It's a conscious decision followed by a concerted effort through an act of obedience. Faith, forfeiting all I have, trusting Him. Where are you lacking faith in your life today? Where is Jesus poised to present a miracle in you, for you, or through you that you are not experiencing the fullness of right now because you're lacking faith? And by the way, faith is not circumstantial, it's forfeiting all I have. It's always in all things. I got to thinking about this, unpacking this. For me, I need faith as a husband. Forfeiting all I have expected of my relationship with my wife, trusting him with our relationship. I was messing with my wife. I've been in Proverbs this summer in my own devotion time. And I sent my wife this. This is, I don't know what I was doing. I was reading Proverbs 21. Proverbs 21, verse 9, and verse 19. I sent this to my wife. Took a picture from my phone, just sent it to her, no explanation. Proverbs 21, verse 9. Here's the word of the Lord. It is better to live in a corner on the housetop than in a house shared with a quarrelsome wife. Hold on. I didn't write this. Proverbs 21, 19. It is better to live in a desert land than with a quarrelsome and fretful woman. She sent back, what does that mean? I don't think she found the humor that I had intended. In all seriousness, not to create levity. I want you to know, and I stand by this, my wife is a Proverbs 31 woman. Proverbs 21, 9 and 19, talk about what it's like to live with a miserable woman. Proverbs 31 conveys a message of what it's like to live with a woman who knows, loves, and fears God. And I am blessed to have a Proverbs 31 wife. All jokes aside. But let me let me let me explain this. As a husband, I have responsibilities. So in order for me to lead my wife or to love my wife like Christ loved the church and he gave his life for the church, I need faith. I need to forfeit all I have trusting him. As a dad, I've got a lot of responsibility. I've got a lot of titles. I've worn a lot of hats in my life. My favorite, the one that I have right now that's the most fun, I've got a bracelet on my wrist that says Grandpa. My youngest daughter, Eleven, made this bracelet. I don't take it off. Grandpa. I got a screenshot or yesterday, uh, my phone, my iPhone, it said, Hey, do you want to like here's the month of June in pictures or whatever they call that. Photo, photo, ask me how you know I'm old. It's whatever it's called. I took a screenshot because out of the first 20 photos, 18 of them are Tegan. As a dad. What an incredible honor and even greater responsibility I have as a dad. But to in order for me to lead my family well, like this man, guys, listen to me. I love all the ministries that we have at this church. I am so excited about the well in August. All the women are gonna get together and worship and learn and grow together, but I have no greater passion than I do for men's ministry because the speed of the leader is the speed of the pack. I know this about the men. We are the thermostats who set the temperature for our entire family, including spiritual temperature. And we need godly men to step up and stand out for Jesus. And when we do that, it's gonna transform our families. It's gonna not only transform our families, but our communities. It's gonna transform our kids' schools, it's gonna transform our workplace, it's gonna change, it's gonna transform everything. We know this because of testimonies like this man's, where it says that when he found out that the hour that his son was healed was the same hour that Jesus says, go, your son will live. It says he believed and it changed his life, and his entire household believed. Man, it's time to step up and stand out for Jesus. But in order for us to lead our family well, we need faith. We need to forfeit all I have trusting him. I know what that's like because as parents, we know everything that's best for our kids. I'll never forget the phone call I got from my son. Three and a half years this kid played professional soccer. He had in his hand a first team contract from Louisville FC, a premier USL1 team in Louisville, Kentucky. And he called me up and he said, Hey Dad, I just want to let you know I'm retiring from soccer. And I said, You are not retiring from soccer, you idiot. And he said, Dad, you're the one who always taught me that ministry isn't something you run to, it's something you can't run away from. Why are you getting in my way? And I said, I'm an idiot. So you know what I had to do in that moment? And what I've had to do in many moments since then? Faith. Forfeiting all I have, trusting him. I'm doing it with my daughters. I have plans for what I think their life should look like, so I have to forfeit all I have, trusting him. You know where else we need it? Our finances. We need to forfeit all we have and trust him. That he sees us, he knows our needs, and he'll provide everything according to his riches and glory. Somebody today, I'm done right now. I'm gonna pray. I'm done. Here, here, here now this is this is you, this is it. All that you need to hear this morning is that what God is requiring of you isn't to have all the answers, but that you're ready to walk out of here by faith, and he'll take care of the rest. By faith, God wants to do something in your marriage. By faith, God wants to do something in your family, by faith, God wants to do something in your finances. By faith, God wants to do something in your body. And one thing I know for sure is that by faith, God wants to transform every one of you spiritually. The question is are you just gonna sit here and listen and learn, but not apply it? Dear Jesus, change our lives, I pray. May we walk by faith. Amen.