SPEAKER_00: This podcast is a ministry of Grant Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about Grant Parkway, visit GrantProquay.org.
SPEAKER_01: Well Jesus, thanks for the truth of that.
SPEAKER_01: If that's not true, then this is just the worst kind of nonsense, religious nonsense.
SPEAKER_01: But we don't believe this is religious nonsense.
SPEAKER_01: This is not what parents use to control their kids to keep their kids from getting drunk and embarrassing them.
SPEAKER_01: That's not what Christianity is.
SPEAKER_01: And then after a certain age, well, it doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01: They made it through high school, not getting pregnant.
SPEAKER_01: That's not why Jesus came.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus came to seek and save that which is lost, to find screwed up, jacked up people like me and fixes.
SPEAKER_01: That's why you came.
SPEAKER_01: And part of the coming is that when you come, I'm gonna, death is not the end for me.
SPEAKER_01: That there's a life after death.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says in Job 14, 14, if a man dies, will he live again?
SPEAKER_01: And the answer is yes.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody in this room will live again.
SPEAKER_01: They'll live for eternity in heaven or they live for eternity in hell.
SPEAKER_01: So there's a grave nature to the Bible and to the truth.
SPEAKER_01: It's not heavy, it's light, but yet it's liberating.
SPEAKER_01: It's to that that we give ourselves now in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone said, Amen.
SPEAKER_01: You can have a seat.
SPEAKER_01: If you've got a Bible, I invite you to take it and open up to Luke chapter 24.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to pick up reading where my little friend Abby left off.
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, if you ever wonder, there's a verse in the Bible where Jesus took a small child and put them on his lap and said, Unless you become like this child, you're not going to see my father's kingdom.
SPEAKER_01: And I hope by listening to her read, you're reminded just of the simplicity that Jesus had in mind.
SPEAKER_01: I want to pick up, I want to talk to you this morning about the hope of Easter.
SPEAKER_01: And I want to pick up where Abby stopped reading in verse 13.
SPEAKER_01: It says that very day two of them were going to a village named Emmaus, and about seven miles from Jerusalem, while they were talking with each other about these things that had happened.
SPEAKER_01: And while they were talking and discussing together, Jesus himself drew near and went with them.
SPEAKER_01: But their eyes were kept from recognizing him.
SPEAKER_01: And he said to them, What is this conversation you were holding with each other as you walk?
SPEAKER_01: And they stood still, looking sad.
SPEAKER_01: And then one of them, named Cleopus, answered him, Are you the only visitor to Jerusalem who does not know these things that have happened there in these days?
SPEAKER_01: And he said to them, What things?
SPEAKER_01: And they said to him, Concerning Jesus of Nazareth, the man who was a prophet, mighty indeed and word before God and all the people, and how our chief priests and rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him.
SPEAKER_01: But we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, and besides all this, is now the third day since these things happened.
SPEAKER_01: Moreover, some women of our company amazed us that they were at the tomb early in the morning, and when they did not find his body, they came back, saying that they had even seen a vision of angels who said that he was alive.
SPEAKER_01: Some of those who were with us went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said.
SPEAKER_01: But they did not see but him they did not see.
SPEAKER_01: And he said to them, O foolish ones, and slow of heart to believe, all that the prophets have spoken.
SPEAKER_01: Was it not necessary that the Christ should suffer these things and enter into his glory?
SPEAKER_01: And beginning with Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.
SPEAKER_01: I want to uh just kind of focus on verse 21, where they said, almost with sadness in their voice, but we had hoped past tense.
SPEAKER_01: We had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.
SPEAKER_01: You may be sitting in this room today, all your thoughts about God are in past are in past tense.
SPEAKER_01: Back when I was a sophomore in high school, or back before I went to grad school, I went to college and got smart.
SPEAKER_01: I believed all that stuff.
SPEAKER_01: I want to say to you, you're not in bad company because the Bible says here's two of Christ's followers three days after he died on the cross for our for their sins as well as our sins, and they're walking down the road, kind of going, that was fun while it's lasted.
SPEAKER_01: Peter's already said in John's gospel, I'm going back fishing.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, I'm going back, and I'm going to do what I was doing before this whole thing happened.
SPEAKER_01: It was fun, but it's over.
SPEAKER_01: Let's get back to reality.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus shows up and says, Let's be careful how we define reality.
SPEAKER_01: The hope of we had hope that he was the one to redeem Israel.
SPEAKER_01: Past tense, and Jesus takes it and kind of turns it into the future tense, into right now.
SPEAKER_01: I want to talk to you about the hope of Easter, and I want to say five things this morning about the hope of Easter.
SPEAKER_01: And the first one is something I think we need to talk about more in church that we don't.
SPEAKER_01: And then the other four maybe are a little more uh accustomed to what what most of you in this room believe.
SPEAKER_01: But the hope of Easter, number one, for many people in the world, and for some of you in this room, your hope is that this is not true.
SPEAKER_01: That this is not true.
SPEAKER_01: Now that sounds crazy to say that.
SPEAKER_01: You say, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Not you would never say it with your lips, but you live it with your life that your hope is that this is not true, because if this is true, if Jesus really did rise from the dead, like the Bible says, live a sinless life, die on the cross as payment for your sins, rise from the dead to give evidence to this, and he fulfilled every promise and prophecy that the Bible ever talks about.
SPEAKER_01: He leaves no doubt that he is the Messiah, the fulfillment of all this stuff, then life is defined in relation to him.
SPEAKER_01: You're accountable to him, I'm accountable to him, and therefore you're forced to ask yourself, where am I in relation to Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: Because, see, the resurrection is the most threatening truth the world will ever know.
SPEAKER_01: And here's why.
SPEAKER_01: The Apostle Paul was talking to some very smart, cynical, skeptical people that clept out of all the Ivy League schools, and they sit around in nice robes and drink wine all day and discuss philosophy.
SPEAKER_01: And Paul is talking to them, and it's not going well for them.
SPEAKER_01: They're like scarecrows coming to a bonfire.
SPEAKER_01: The closer they get, the more they're just getting burned down.
SPEAKER_01: And what Paul says to them is he says that he says this, he says, the times of ignorance God has overlooked, but now he commands all people everywhere to repent.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world.
SPEAKER_01: And then he says this.
SPEAKER_01: Some people go, well, I don't believe in a God of judgments.
SPEAKER_01: You just lost me right there.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not here to change your mind.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just here to tell you what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: He says, what is so in what is so intense that God tells all people everywhere?
SPEAKER_01: All people everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: See, it would be hate not to tell all people everywhere, because God loves people.
SPEAKER_01: He tells all people everywhere, hey, you better get your stuff together and get your house in order because you're gonna stand before me when this all goes down.
SPEAKER_01: He commands all people everywhere to repent because he's fixed a day on which he'll judge the world.
SPEAKER_01: And then the Bible says this of this he has given assurance, proof, certifiable evidence to all by raising him from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: Now I want to back up to that very first part where Paul says in Acts 17, the times of ignorance, God has overlooked.
SPEAKER_01: Anybody remember a time in your life when you were just downright ignorant?
SPEAKER_01: You look back and you thought, what was I thinking?
SPEAKER_01: Anybody?
SPEAKER_01: Could I see your hand just for a second?
SPEAKER_01: Could you just hold it up?
SPEAKER_01: Leave it up just for a minute.
SPEAKER_01: I know some of your visits, but you can play too.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I see.
SPEAKER_01: My religious friend over here, Mark's got his pen up like, does this count?
SPEAKER_01: I was good.
SPEAKER_01: Let me start with some of my own ignorance.
SPEAKER_01: When I was in high school, I was not a Christian, okay?
SPEAKER_01: I didn't get you people, I didn't go to church, I didn't understand the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Me and my friends would go out and party hard every night.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, it didn't matter.
SPEAKER_01: Thursday's great, Tuesday's even better, weekend.
SPEAKER_01: Whoa! One night we are just baked.
SPEAKER_01: We are nine sheets into the wind.
SPEAKER_01: See, I can't tell this in the next service because my 16-year-old will be sitting over there, kind of going, I'm writing this down.
SPEAKER_01: And look, you turned out to be a preacher because your kids don't think that way, but mine do.
SPEAKER_01: They're like, Mom, remember that time, dad and his friends, and I'm like, no, I don't know what you're talking about.
SPEAKER_01: But we were just, we were partying.
SPEAKER_01: I say like that, me and my friends are partying.
SPEAKER_01: My friend Kendall said, I'm going home, man.
SPEAKER_01: At one o'clock, he spit the bit and went home.
SPEAKER_01: We just kept hammering down.
SPEAKER_01: About three o'clock, ignorance.
SPEAKER_01: Somebody says, Hey man, we ain't got no money to buy beer.
SPEAKER_01: We need to get some money.
SPEAKER_01: And somebody said, Hey man, let's go to Kendall's house and wake him up and get some money from him.
SPEAKER_01: So we went to my friend Kendall's house at 3.08 in the morning, broke into the bedroom window, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And slid the window open.
SPEAKER_01: I climbed in and I didn't know his house from anything.
SPEAKER_01: I'm groping around in the dark trying to find his bedroom.
SPEAKER_01: There's a distinct sound a 357 makes when a man cocks the hammer on that.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_01: Dove behind the bed, laying on my stomach.
SPEAKER_01: I played tennis in high school on the tennis team.
SPEAKER_01: I had these big red, white, and blue Tom Auker, thick gum soled tennis shoes.
SPEAKER_01: And I heard somebody say, Neil McClendon and your ugly shoes, stand up.
SPEAKER_01: And I stood up, and Kendall's dad, Neil O'Quinn, had a nickel plated 357 drawn down on me and said, Boy, I about blew your head off.
SPEAKER_01: You want me to call your dad?
SPEAKER_01: No, sir, just shoot me right now.
SPEAKER_01: Marched us into the living room.
SPEAKER_01: Now, students, if you're under the age of 50 in this room, that ain't bragging.
SPEAKER_01: That's a confession.
SPEAKER_01: That's how ignorant your pastor was.
SPEAKER_01: And the Bible says he walked us out in the parking lot, I mean, in the driveway, looked at all of us, he said, get your friends.
SPEAKER_01: I had to call Randy Shields and Cecil Petrie.
SPEAKER_01: He looked at every one of us and says, You boys are so dumb.
SPEAKER_01: You broke into my house looking for beer money.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, sir.
SPEAKER_01: It's 3:30 in the morning.
SPEAKER_01: Go home.
SPEAKER_01: Get out of here.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm 49 years old.
SPEAKER_01: I look back and I think, God, why didn't that man shoot me?
SPEAKER_01: And I'm not being silly.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I almost shot you, son.
SPEAKER_01: Then I saw those god-awful shoes you were wearing.
SPEAKER_01: I recognize those.
SPEAKER_01: No, none of it, nobody in this room is more happy than me that the Bible says the times of ignorance, God is overlooked.
SPEAKER_01: However, how he said you can wish all you want, that's just weren't true.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't change the fact that it is.
SPEAKER_01: The times of ignorance, God is overlooked, but he's also fixed a day.
SPEAKER_01: He's also said, hey, hey, I've overlooked all that, but now I'm telling you, you gotta repent because there's gonna come a time you stand before me and you're gonna be judged.
SPEAKER_01: Of this, he's given evidence, proof, assurance.
SPEAKER_01: God says, write this down.
SPEAKER_01: Before George Strait sang about it, God said it.
SPEAKER_01: Write this down.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna give assurance to you.
SPEAKER_01: How's that?
SPEAKER_01: By raising Christ, the person you're gonna stand before from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: See, our hope to begin with, let's just acknowledge the obvious.
SPEAKER_01: We hope that this isn't true, that somehow it's gonna get worked out.
SPEAKER_01: It's not.
SPEAKER_01: So because it is true, you've got to begin to think today, at least on Easter morning, about okay, if that's true, then where am I in relation to God?
SPEAKER_01: And do I have a relationship with God or do I believe in God?
SPEAKER_01: Because by the way, that's the first question God asked humanity way back in the garden.
SPEAKER_01: Adam and Eve sinned and they hid, and God came and said, Where are you?
SPEAKER_01: Not because he wanted information, he wanted proximity.
SPEAKER_01: You are not where you were created to be.
SPEAKER_01: You're created to be here with me in relationship with me.
SPEAKER_01: This is not a religion, this is not rules, this is a relationship, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And so God says, Where are you?
SPEAKER_01: And they were like, Hey, I I uh I was naked, so I hid myself.
SPEAKER_01: And God says, That's not where you're supposed to be.
SPEAKER_01: You're supposed to be in the Bible uses this word, fellowship, communion, relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: Because that's the way he intended it to be.
SPEAKER_01: And so you've got to ask yourself, hey, hey, hey, you can wish all you want, your hope all you want.
SPEAKER_01: This isn't true.
SPEAKER_01: It is.
SPEAKER_01: You should feel what it's like to not be in relationship with your father.
SPEAKER_01: If you can sit in this building this morning and not feel and realize, you know what, I don't believe this, I don't have a relationship with God, blah, blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_01: And that doesn't kind of register in your head and in your heart, you should be gravely concerned, my man.
SPEAKER_01: Because you should always have a sense of where you are in relation to God.
SPEAKER_01: When I was seven, my family, we were poor white trash in East Texas, and for vacation one year, we went to Six Flags for one day.
SPEAKER_01: We like sold a hog and butchered a pig and all this stuff, and we saved up, loaded up in the Woody Panel station wagon, drove to Arlington, Texas.
SPEAKER_01: I was like a it was like, oh my gosh, the world's gonna end.
SPEAKER_01: We get there.
SPEAKER_01: There were more people in the entrance of Six Flags than in my whole entire town.
SPEAKER_01: My dad looked at my brothers that were older than me.
SPEAKER_01: I was seven, and he said, Now, if we get separated for some reason, go to the lost parent center.
SPEAKER_01: It's right over here by the main gate.
SPEAKER_01: And my dad said, You put your hand in my back pocket and don't you take it out.
SPEAKER_01: So I walked around Six Flags like a little monkey with my hand in my dad's back pocket the whole time.
SPEAKER_01: Well, we were doing good about the first hour and a half, and then for some reason there was a big log jam, and I got my hand out of there and didn't realize I thought my dad was kind of, I could kind of feel him right there, and I'm looking around, and uh, and and all of a sudden I looked up and realized my dad's nowhere to be found.
SPEAKER_01: And when I realized I'd lost a connection with my dad, I freaked out.
SPEAKER_01: I was just like, uh, I made this realization that day in Six Flags as a seven-year-old 42 years ago.
SPEAKER_01: The loster you realize you are, the faster you run.
SPEAKER_01: And so I didn't understand the layout of Six Flags, and it's called Six Flags for a reason because six different countries have claimed Texas, and that Six Flags Amusement Park is divided into six sections.
SPEAKER_01: So as I'm running, kind of like, where's my dad?
SPEAKER_01: Where's my dad?
SPEAKER_01: I don't see my dad.
SPEAKER_01: I stopped and asked somebody, excuse me, can you tell me where I am?
SPEAKER_01: And they went, Yeah, I think you're in Spain.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, Spain! Oh my gosh, I'm a long way from home.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm just like running even faster, and I'm just like, oh my God, running everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: After about 20 minutes, I stopped.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, excuse me, excuse me, what?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, you know where I am?
SPEAKER_01: Uh uh, yeah, I think you're in France.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going the wrong way.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden I just start running.
SPEAKER_01: About 10 minutes later, I stop, and the guy says, Excuse me, what where am I?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, You're in Mexico.
SPEAKER_01: I'm getting closer.
SPEAKER_01: Mexico's connected to Texas.
SPEAKER_01: Sheer panic.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden I looked over and there's people standing over there looking at something, and they're all pointing.
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, well, I walk over there, and it's a big map of six flags with an orange dot and a little sign that says, You are here.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone was kind of, we want to ride the shockwave.
SPEAKER_01: Remember when the shockwave was new?
SPEAKER_01: Now you're like, shockwave, I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: It only goes 62 miles an hour.
SPEAKER_01: Sign me up.
SPEAKER_01: But I put my finger on there and I said, You are here.
SPEAKER_01: And I found the lost parent center.
SPEAKER_01: And I made me a little route, and I got there, and I the lady in a blue smockle never forget, saw me coming.
SPEAKER_01: She goes, Son, are you lost?
SPEAKER_01: What's your dad's name?
SPEAKER_01: Here's the announcement all over the park at Six Flags.
SPEAKER_01: Attention, Park Patrons, Leon McClendon, you are lost.
SPEAKER_01: Come to the Lost Parent Center to be reunited with your child.
SPEAKER_01: And all of a sudden, I looked up, probably 300 yards away.
SPEAKER_01: I saw stuffed animals flying up.
SPEAKER_01: I saw people's pink things and corn dogs going everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: I think a lady in a wheelchair got tipped over.
SPEAKER_01: It was like the Red Sea of people got parted because my dad knew where his kid was and he was coming for me, and all of a sudden he recognized that I'd been found and I was reminded I wouldn't have to be lost anymore.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because separation from your father isn't natural.
SPEAKER_01: You were created to be in a relationship with him.
SPEAKER_01: And so you can hope this is not true all you want.
SPEAKER_01: You're hoping against your created purpose.
SPEAKER_01: That's as simple as I know how to say it.
SPEAKER_01: You were created by God for a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not saying you're created to be religious.
SPEAKER_01: We got enough religious people in the world.
SPEAKER_01: We don't have enough people who have a relationship with Christ.
SPEAKER_01: Now the second hope of Easter is simply this that forgiveness is available.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean forgiveness is available?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says this in 1 Corinthians 15, 6, verses 16 and 17.
SPEAKER_01: For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised.
SPEAKER_01: And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you're still in your sins.
SPEAKER_01: Now hear that again.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you're a skeptic in this room, you didn't invent all the questions you have in your head today.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: They were around back in the Bible times.
SPEAKER_01: And that's why Paul writes, for if the dead are not raised, why does he say that?
SPEAKER_01: Because people are going around going, oh, dead people don't rise from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: Eat, drink, and be merry, and then you die, and it's all over.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't matter.
SPEAKER_01: But if it's not all over, then it ought to matter.
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, for if the dead are not raised, then not even Christ has been raised.
SPEAKER_01: And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you're still in your sins.
SPEAKER_01: If you follow the logic of the Bible, the Bible teaches very clearly that Christ is the only solution for your sin and my sin.
SPEAKER_01: Remember the disciples who were on the road, we read in verse 21, they said we had hoped that he was the one to redeem Israel.
SPEAKER_01: The word redeem used there is a Greek word betrayal, and it means to liberate by payment of ransom.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, we had hoped that he really was who he said he was, and then our sins were paid for.
SPEAKER_01: But now we're just stuck, just trying to work it out on our own.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: See, Christianity is very personal by nature.
SPEAKER_01: Remember back in the garden, God says, Where are you?
SPEAKER_01: It's very personal by nature.
SPEAKER_01: It's not about religion or rules, it's about a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: Here are the first two words of Ephesians chapter 1, verse 7.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says, in him.
SPEAKER_01: Not in it or in that.
SPEAKER_01: It's very personal.
SPEAKER_01: In him.
SPEAKER_01: We have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight.
SPEAKER_01: Mark that little phrase in your mind, which he lavished upon us in all wisdom and insight.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why do I say mark that?
SPEAKER_01: Because look at me, beloved.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you in this room have done ignorant things like I talked about a few minutes ago.
SPEAKER_01: And you've thought to yourself, and you've laid down in bed at night, and the enemy has beat you up with this and said, You know what?
SPEAKER_01: I bet if God knew you were going to do that, he would have never forgiven you for your sins.
SPEAKER_01: And the Bible says that he lavished this grace on you.
SPEAKER_01: There's a word you didn't use this week, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: None of you men came home and your wife said, How was work?
SPEAKER_01: I lavished my skill set on them fools at the office.
SPEAKER_01: Your husband was like a man smoking at a gas pump.
SPEAKER_01: I'm about to blow up on him, honey.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible says he lavished.
SPEAKER_01: That means he didn't just give a little, he lavished.
SPEAKER_01: He extravagantly overflowed grace upon you.
SPEAKER_01: That's what he did.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what he did it with all wisdom and insight.
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing about your depravity that takes God off guard that causes him to go, wait a minute.
SPEAKER_01: If I'd have known that, I'd have never done that.
SPEAKER_01: That's not the God of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, this voice in your head says that, and you just keep drifting further and further and further away from God.
SPEAKER_01: I'm here to tell you, you can come back today because God did what he did with all wisdom and insight, making known to us the mystery of his will according to his purpose.
SPEAKER_01: Once again, the Bible tells us very clearly that God's purpose is that you not be far off, but you be in relationship with him.
SPEAKER_01: See, that's the thing that's unique to Christianity, uh, is that our God purchases for us forgiveness and gives it to us as a gift.
SPEAKER_01: A couple weeks ago, if you were here on a Sunday, I wasn't here because I was in Destin, Florida.
SPEAKER_01: Somebody's got to go to the beach and teach the Bible, huh?
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm in Destin, Florida, with 275 college students.
SPEAKER_01: After one session, this guy from Iran comes up to me and we're talking.
SPEAKER_01: He tells me, I work in a brain layout, but I'm like, well, I better ratchet up my intellect on this guy, show him what I got.
SPEAKER_01: Then a guy from India comes up and I'm like, it's the United Nations right here.
SPEAKER_01: And we're talking.
SPEAKER_01: Both of them fundamentally disagree.
SPEAKER_01: They're not Christians.
SPEAKER_01: And they said, Well, the guy from Iran says, You are very direct.
SPEAKER_01: You do not have to wonder what you believe.
SPEAKER_01: Just listen.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, and some people like that, and some people don't.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, I find it very refreshing.
SPEAKER_01: Then the cat from India starts talking, and he's like, Yes, yes, yes.
SPEAKER_01: And I love how you distinguish your religion from all the other world religions.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Mine is not a religion, it's a relationship.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, What did you hear me say?
SPEAKER_01: And he said perfectly back to me, You took, you showed us, you didn't tell, you showed us in the Bible how your God purchases purchases forgiveness and gives it to you as a gift.
SPEAKER_01: He said, But in my religion, I said, in all the other world religions, you have to work out forgiveness on your own.
SPEAKER_01: He said, Yes.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, What do you think about that?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I got two words for you.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, good luck.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because the Bible says in Romans chapter 7, a man named Paul is talking.
SPEAKER_01: He's he's a Christian now when he writes, but he's thinking back to when he before he became a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: Do you ever look back at what you were like before you became a Christian and think, Lord, thank you for not just letting me die back then?
SPEAKER_01: I think that a lot.
SPEAKER_01: I think that last time I saw Neil O'Quinn, the man with the three, he said, Boy, I almost shot you one time.
SPEAKER_01: It's like great, say that in front of my four-year-old.
SPEAKER_01: So she goes, Daddy, why get me in almost shoot you?
SPEAKER_01: Like, put your hands over your ears.
SPEAKER_01: That man's crazy, honey.
SPEAKER_01: He's a salesman.
SPEAKER_01: You know, they say crazy stuff.
SPEAKER_01: But there'll come a day I have to say to my kids, yeah, your dad did not know God.
SPEAKER_01: I did goofy stuff.
SPEAKER_01: I ain't proud of it, but it doesn't have power over me.
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: But this guy, Paul, back to Paul.
SPEAKER_01: Paul is he's he's a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: He's thinking back to being, he was religious, but he didn't know Christ.
SPEAKER_01: He says, I was zealous, but my zeal for God wasn't based on knowledge.
SPEAKER_01: I was swinging, but there was no pinata up there.
SPEAKER_01: I just looked foolish.
SPEAKER_01: And this is what he's how he described his life.
SPEAKER_01: And I told these guys this.
SPEAKER_01: I said, here's what Paul said.
SPEAKER_01: Paul said, the good that I want to do, I don't do.
SPEAKER_01: The bad thing that I don't want to do, that's the thing I do.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, wretched man that I am.
SPEAKER_01: I said, unless you, it's sometime before you die, unless you repent and come to faith in Christ, all you have to look forward to is a life of wretchedness.
SPEAKER_01: Because it is hard to get in bed at night and have everything the world says you need, and there's a big hole, like God took an ice cream scoop and scooped out a hole in your heart.
SPEAKER_01: It's a gnawing reality that you can't get away from.
SPEAKER_01: And it's not your wife nagging you, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And he they didn't do one there.
SPEAKER_01: They go, Your wife nags?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, women don't do that.
SPEAKER_01: No, they suggest every hour on the hour with graphs and charts and flannel boards.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: And the guy's like, so forgiveness is purchased.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, God purchased forgiveness through the life of his son on the cross and gives it to his people as a gift.
SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 2, chapter 2, verse 8 and 9.
SPEAKER_01: For by grace you are saved through faith, not of works, is a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.
SPEAKER_01: It's a gift.
SPEAKER_01: See, the hope of Easter is that forgiveness is now available.
SPEAKER_01: Forgiveness is real and available.
SPEAKER_01: The third hope that we have in Easter is that grace is better than karma.
SPEAKER_01: Grace is better than karma.
SPEAKER_01: You say, well, what do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Let me define the two terms.
SPEAKER_01: Karma means I get what I deserve.
SPEAKER_01: Isn't that right?
SPEAKER_01: Karma says I get what I deserve.
SPEAKER_01: It means if I do good, I get that was pathetic.
SPEAKER_01: There's hardly an empty seat in this room, and all you can come up with is good.
SPEAKER_01: No, karma says if I do good, I get.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, thank you.
SPEAKER_01: But karma also dictates if I do bad, I get ru-ro.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why grace is better than karma.
SPEAKER_01: Karma says I get what I deserve.
SPEAKER_01: Grace says I don't get what I deserve.
SPEAKER_01: You should probably ask your question, yourself the question.
SPEAKER_01: You're smart people.
SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself this question today.
SPEAKER_01: If I don't get what I deserve, what happens to it?
SPEAKER_01: Where does it go?
SPEAKER_01: Is it just floating out in the universe looking for someone to attach itself to?
SPEAKER_01: Now the Bible says this in Isaiah chapter 53, verse 6: all we like sheep have gone astray.
SPEAKER_01: We've turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.
SPEAKER_01: All the bad that I deserved and you deserved.
SPEAKER_01: Not because of karma, but because of your sinful nature.
SPEAKER_01: God took it all and placed it on his son.
SPEAKER_01: That's why Christianity is a relationship, not a religion.
SPEAKER_01: It's very personal.
SPEAKER_01: Ephesians 1 says, In him a person died in your place for your sin.
SPEAKER_01: He's laid on him the iniquity of us all.
SPEAKER_01: He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth.
SPEAKER_01: Like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep before its shears is silent, so he opened not his mouth.
SPEAKER_01: See, the third hope of Easter is that grace is better in karma.
SPEAKER_01: Fourthly, our fourth hope is that the work of redemption has begun.
SPEAKER_01: The work of redemption has begun.
SPEAKER_01: Are you still with me this morning?
SPEAKER_01: You want to think a little bit?
SPEAKER_01: Are you with me this morning?
SPEAKER_01: Yes, you want to think a little bit?
SPEAKER_01: Oh we want to get to granny's before the ham burns, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Could you wrap this up, preacher?
SPEAKER_01: I'm getting there.
SPEAKER_01: I'll get you to granny's in time.
SPEAKER_01: Listen, I was here at 6 30 this morning.
SPEAKER_01: I think I'm gonna get to heaven and get like a crown for that or something.
SPEAKER_01: No, I'm not.
SPEAKER_01: The alarm went off this morning at 4 30, and I thought the end of the world had come.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, what in the world?
SPEAKER_01: And then I thought, oh, I get to preach the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean when I say the work of redemption has become?
SPEAKER_01: Here's my concern.
SPEAKER_01: Here's where I want us to think just for a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not being goofy.
SPEAKER_01: Think just for a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: If we're not careful in America, Christianity erodes into escapism.
SPEAKER_01: I'm stuck in a bad place.
SPEAKER_01: It's not perfect, it's sinful.
SPEAKER_01: We live in a fallen world.
SPEAKER_01: I'm stuck here, but I just suck it up and do my best until I die, and then I get to go from a bad place to a good place.
SPEAKER_01: That's not Christianity, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: That's escapism.
unknown: N.
SPEAKER_01: T.
SPEAKER_01: Wright, the British pastor and writer, he said it better.
SPEAKER_01: He said this.
SPEAKER_01: He said, to put it bluntly, creation is to be redeemed.
SPEAKER_01: That is, space is to be redeemed, time is to be redeemed, and matter is to be redeemed.
SPEAKER_01: The purpose of redemption is not simply to usher human souls off to some heavenly, non-corporal, non-reality existence for all of eternity.
SPEAKER_01: It is to restore that which God has deemed very good in Genesis 1.
SPEAKER_01: What is he saying?
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes preachers say things that don't make sense to real people.
SPEAKER_01: Have you noticed that?
SPEAKER_01: Like I remember when I was a kid, I didn't go to church much, but I went every once in a while just enough to feel stupid and not want to go back.
SPEAKER_01: And the guy would always say, in your heart of hearts.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I didn't get one of them.
SPEAKER_01: Where's the heart of hearts?
SPEAKER_01: I feel cheated all of a sudden.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, when you die, you're not going to go up on the clouds and play a harp and eat angel food cake and hang out and play canasta with grandma, okay?
SPEAKER_01: While bad people go to the bad place and eat devil's food cake with the devil.
SPEAKER_01: That's not what he's saying.
SPEAKER_01: The afterlife is not this non-matter-based kind of ethereal, whoo-hoo-hoo.
SPEAKER_01: No, it's very real.
SPEAKER_01: It's very real.
SPEAKER_01: That's why he says, hey, hey, the work of redemption has begun.
SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Let me just say this.
SPEAKER_01: Unless you couch the good you do in the context of something bigger than you, you'll just erode into you keeping score.
SPEAKER_01: Think with me just for a little bit.
SPEAKER_01: I'll say it again.
SPEAKER_01: Unless you and I can couch the good things that we do in this world.
SPEAKER_01: Because here's what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that you're not just stuck here in a bad place waiting to go to a good place.
SPEAKER_01: When Christ arose, as we'll read in just a minute, the Bible said from the dead, it says he's the first fruit from those among the dead among those who are asleep, the first fruits from those among the dead, the first person to rise from the dead and stay alive and he never dies again.
SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: That means that what God has had in mind all along, redeeming creation, not just people, but culture and creation, that when I become a Christian, I get to be part of that.
SPEAKER_01: It's called the cultural mandate.
SPEAKER_01: Way back in Genesis chapter 1, God said to Adam and Eve, hey, rule over creation and subdue it.
SPEAKER_01: That means if you're in the arts or finance or the sciences or music or oil and gas or whatever, you are called and commissioned by God to be a part of redeeming that culture, that environment you find yourself in.
SPEAKER_01: Otherwise, here's what you're gonna do: you're gonna climb the corporate ladder, you're gonna make all you can, stab all the people you have to in the back, lie, cheat, have affairs, drink hard liquor to kind of numb the pain of this dead conscience that you've collected over the years.
SPEAKER_01: And when it's all said and done, you're gonna try to lay down and sleep in your big house or your nice SUV, and they're not gonna be enough sleeping pills in the world to make you get a deep sleep.
SPEAKER_01: Because for all, despite all the stuff that you had, you live with this gnawing reality, something's missing.
SPEAKER_01: Something's missing.
SPEAKER_01: You try to buy it, but something's missing.
SPEAKER_01: You try to possess it, but something's missing.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that for those who give their life to Christ, that God doesn't just put you on a waiting list and kneel, table of for table of one for all of eternity.
SPEAKER_01: Call me on my table's ready.
SPEAKER_01: No, that God says, hey, if God's gonna redeem creation and culture, who do you think he's gonna do that through?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that he involves you and I.
SPEAKER_01: You become these agents of redemption in what God is doing in the world.
SPEAKER_01: Therefore, unless you and I can couch the good that we do in something bigger than ourselves, we can actually say, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: What I'm doing is I'm helping taking that which is broken and fixing it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm taking that which is wrong and making it right.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm I'm I'm taking what I'm bringing good news to the poor.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm binding up broken the heart, binding up the brokenhearted.
SPEAKER_01: I'm proclaiming liberty to the captives.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm I'm declaring freedom to the prisoners and exchanging the oil of gladness, okay, for the garment of despair.
SPEAKER_01: Unless you do that, unless you can say, you know what, the good that I do is cast in the bigger context of the greatness, the great work that God is doing.
SPEAKER_01: It just keeps going.
SPEAKER_01: You just look around and realize, oh, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Why didn't that person like me, or why didn't that person do what I do?
SPEAKER_01: Or why don't they think this way?
SPEAKER_01: Or you go to work and you see stuff and you think, surely other people see these things.
SPEAKER_01: I'll confess my own sin.
SPEAKER_01: Yesterday I was driving by the church and I looked up, and the landscape company that does our property forgot to trim the hedges.
SPEAKER_01: And I just thought, this is not rocket science, fellas.
SPEAKER_01: Just trim the hedges.
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Jesus was mistaken for being the gardener, not the preacher.
SPEAKER_01: I'll go home and get my hedge trimmers, and I was out here just by the way, there's gonna be a room in hell where you trim hedges for a thousand years.
SPEAKER_01: While the devil decides what to do with your sorry self.
SPEAKER_01: I'm out there and I'm just like, my arms are like falling off, and I'm just thinking, God, how can they forget this?
SPEAKER_01: This looks like we're growing trees here in front of our building.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm just and very clearly, because I'm keeping scores what I'm doing.
SPEAKER_01: I'm thinking, do the people that work here not see these things?
SPEAKER_01: I ain't talking you out of a book, I'm talking you out of yesterday.
SPEAKER_01: And clear as a bell, God spoke and said, I invented gas-powered hedge trimmers.
SPEAKER_01: It's like, you weak.
SPEAKER_01: I just dropped the hedge trimmers.
SPEAKER_01: Went and got, I'm not kidding.
SPEAKER_01: When I got my truck, drove to Home Depot.
SPEAKER_01: I said, What the biggest gas-powered hedge trimmers you got?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, Well, I got one, it's got like a 24-inch blade on it.
SPEAKER_01: I'll take it.
SPEAKER_01: It was like I had a sturgeon.
SPEAKER_01: I just revved that bowl, I just mowed them all down.
SPEAKER_01: I trimmed everything on the proper plate.
SPEAKER_01: I went her shout like a stay started ringing doorbell.
SPEAKER_01: You need me to trim anything?
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't bitter anymore.
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't keeping score.
SPEAKER_01: I wasn't going, God, do the people that work in that C stuff, it's not on my job description either.
SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because when you keep score, that exalts you.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what humbles you when it dawns on you that God's letting you be a part of redeeming the culture, taking what is wrong and making it right, exchanging the oil of gladness for the garment of despair.
SPEAKER_01: That humbles you.
SPEAKER_01: That's when you go, yay, God, thank you, God, that you would just you would use a jerk like me.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, God, yes.
SPEAKER_01: So I drove home, and there's a widow that lives on the corner of my neighborhood, and her hedges need to be trimmed.
SPEAKER_01: And I came back and got the hedges, the hedge, gas-powered hedge trimber.
SPEAKER_01: And so when you backsliding weasels are napping today, I'm gonna put on a Batman cape and tell my kids, come out here and get a load of this.
SPEAKER_01: Your dad's gonna bring some redemption to bear on the neighborhood.
SPEAKER_01: It'll take maybe 30 seconds.
SPEAKER_01: But it'll feel so good.
SPEAKER_01: Let me ask you a question.
SPEAKER_01: We're almost done.
SPEAKER_01: You still awake?
SPEAKER_01: When's the last time you sensed that what you were doing was a part of what God is doing?
SPEAKER_01: Because that's redemption.
SPEAKER_01: That's the work of redemption, is what he's called you to be involved in.
SPEAKER_01: Fifth and finally, our last hope of Easter is simply this that death is not final.
SPEAKER_01: Death is not final.
SPEAKER_01: You say, What do you mean?
SPEAKER_01: Back to the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
SPEAKER_01: I'll pick up in verse 17 where we were last time.
SPEAKER_01: He says, and if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile, and you're still in your sins.
SPEAKER_01: Then those who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished.
SPEAKER_01: That means loved ones that you lie, if Christ is not raised, if the resurrection is real, not real, then when your family members die, you should sob your eyes out because you'll never see them again.
SPEAKER_01: But the resurrection just explodes that.
SPEAKER_01: It says, I don't think so.
SPEAKER_01: It says, and those also who fall asleep in Christ have perished.
SPEAKER_01: If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
SPEAKER_01: And I wish the Bible wasn't so irregular and talks like it does, like some British nanny.
SPEAKER_01: Because what he's basically saying is, hey, Jack, if you think if only in this life you have hope in Christ, Christianity matters only in this life, you should be pitied above all men.
SPEAKER_01: When you go into work tomorrow, they should get on the loudspeaker and go, here comes Bill.
SPEAKER_01: Everybody feels sorry for Bill because he thinks he can have his best life now.
SPEAKER_01: And everybody comes out in the hall and just weeps on you, Bill.
SPEAKER_01: It says, You poor fool.
SPEAKER_01: Your religion is just getting you more stuff in this life.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul means when he says, if only in this life we have hope in Christ, we're to be pitied above all men.
SPEAKER_01: And because we're a non-discerning bunch of limbings, oh yes, I'll follow you wherever, people say, you can have your best life now.
SPEAKER_01: We go, oh, I'll buy that.
SPEAKER_01: I won't buy that because the Bible doesn't buy that.
SPEAKER_01: Because if it can be, if you can have your best life in this world, then heaven is unnecessary.
SPEAKER_01: And you got nothing to look forward to.
SPEAKER_01: You don't need a resurrected Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: Just get busy getting more here.
SPEAKER_01: But if Jesus is raised from the dead, because the Bible says, but in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the law of first fruits.
SPEAKER_01: The law of first fruits means that there's more fruit to come.
SPEAKER_01: That's why in an agrarian society in the Bible, farmers would grow fruits and crops and grains and all this stuff, and they'd bring the first portion, the first part of the harvest, they'd bring it and they'd offer it to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: People in the Bible would get their wages and they'd bring the first tenth, the tenth, the tenth, the tithe.
SPEAKER_01: That's what that means.
SPEAKER_01: And they'd bring it and they would offer it.
SPEAKER_01: It was their offering, they would give it to the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: That was their first fruits.
SPEAKER_01: People in this church today, if you're visiting, people walk by, you walked in, there's wooden boxes by the door.
SPEAKER_01: People in here this morning are gonna write ginormous checks and put them in these boxes.
SPEAKER_01: No, they're not.
SPEAKER_01: People are gonna write, and I'm being serious, people are gonna write$10 and$500 and$50.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care what kind of chuck you write.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the principle I'm getting at, because the Bible gets at this.
SPEAKER_01: Because you need to understand this and help you understand the resurrection.
SPEAKER_01: You give your first fruit.
SPEAKER_01: My family, we give the first 10% of everything we make, we give as a tithe to our church.
SPEAKER_01: Not because we're buying God off, because what we're saying is here's the first fruits, because we think there's more fruit coming.
SPEAKER_01: I can't make you believe that.
SPEAKER_01: I can just tell you it's all through the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: And so much so that the Bible appeals to it when he says, but in fact, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if he's the first fruit, that means there's more fruit.
SPEAKER_01: There are more people that are gonna rise from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we sang the song we sang earlier.
SPEAKER_01: See, see, our hope of Easter is that death is not final.
SPEAKER_01: And I just want to say, in closing, let's be careful that we don't get our thoughts of the afterlife from books and movies and stuff.
SPEAKER_01: Heaven's real popular right now.
SPEAKER_01: A lot of money being made off heaven.
SPEAKER_01: And then I say what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: Like the most popular, the best-selling book of the past 10 years in the evangelical world is a book called Heaven is Real.
SPEAKER_01: It's about a four-year-old boy who went to heaven, sat on Jesus' lap, he gave him a halo and some wings, and the angels sang to him.
SPEAKER_01: And and hear my heart on this, okay?
SPEAKER_01: I'm not making light of that.
SPEAKER_01: I think people can have dreams.
SPEAKER_01: I think people can be in surgery and wake up and describe things that were that were, oh, it was so real, it was so real.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible says no one goes to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Proverbs chapter 30, verse 4.
SPEAKER_01: Who has ascended to heaven and come down?
SPEAKER_01: Let me tell you something.
SPEAKER_01: If I go to heaven today, I won't be here next Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna need a new preacher.
SPEAKER_01: I ain't coming back.
SPEAKER_01: Gas is$3.45 a gallon.
SPEAKER_01: You can have it.
SPEAKER_01: But more importantly, the Bible says in John chapter 3, verse 13, no one has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven.
SPEAKER_01: No one has ascended into heaven except he, Jesus, who descended from heaven.
SPEAKER_01: Why do I tell you all this?
SPEAKER_01: Because we've got to be careful because culture kind of just kind of very creatively kind of overlays all these little films, these little blurry, little, little layers of sentiment all over the glory of heaven, and we're not prepared for how incredible it's going to be.
SPEAKER_01: There's four people in the Bible: Ezekiel, Isaiah, Paul, and John.
SPEAKER_01: Each one of them had a vision of heaven.
SPEAKER_01: They didn't say they went there, they just had a vision of it, and they couldn't even describe it.
SPEAKER_01: Lazarus was dead for four days and didn't write a word about it, didn't say a thing.
SPEAKER_01: All the biblical writers who saw heaven describe their visions.
SPEAKER_01: They give really sparse details.
SPEAKER_01: They're fixated on God's glory, which defines heaven and illuminates everything there.
SPEAKER_01: They're overwhelmed, they're chagrined, they're petrified, they're put to silence by the sheer majesty of God's holiness.
SPEAKER_01: And notably, missing from all the biblical accounts are the frivolous features and the juvenile attractions that seem to dominate every account of heaven currently on the bestseller list.
SPEAKER_01: No, let me just acknowledge this.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you are like, great, Debbie Downer just came to the party.
SPEAKER_01: No, I don't want you to think wrongly about heaven.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want you, and I don't hate the 40-year-old kid that had all those visions.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just telling you, no one's gone to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: If you believe the Bible, you can say, Yeah, he might have had a dream or had a vision, but but I'm not don't be so easily duped.
SPEAKER_01: Who has ascended into heaven except he who descended from heaven?
SPEAKER_01: And so I close with these words of Jesus as he's getting ready to ascend back into heaven, to go back to heaven.
SPEAKER_01: John 14, his disciples are freaking out, and Jesus says, Let not your heart be troubled.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to me, beloved, look at me.
SPEAKER_01: If you listen to everything they sell in the bookstore and they show at the movie theater, your heart's gonna be troubled.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna stand beside your hospital bed as your pastor when you're dying and say, Have you made your peace with God?
SPEAKER_01: Are you you right with God?
SPEAKER_01: And I don't want you to look at me and go, I sure hope so.
SPEAKER_01: I sure hope I get halo and wings.
SPEAKER_01: Because I'm gonna think I have failed you as your pastor by not teaching you the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus says, Let not your heart be troubled.
SPEAKER_01: Believe in God, believe also in me.
SPEAKER_01: In my Father's house are many rooms.
SPEAKER_01: If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you?
SPEAKER_01: And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and take you to myself, that where I am you may be also, and you know the way to where I'm going.
SPEAKER_01: And Thomas said to him, Lord, we don't know where you're going.
SPEAKER_01: How can we know the way?
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus said to him, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
SPEAKER_01: No one comes to the Father except through me.
SPEAKER_01: I want to tell you, there's life after death.
SPEAKER_01: And the only way you get, by the way, everyone lives forever.
SPEAKER_01: You live either in heaven or you live in hell.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not being harsh or judgmental.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just telling you that God's fixed a day when he's gonna judge the world and he's given assurance of this by raising Jesus from the dead.
SPEAKER_01: The resurrection is the most indictine in Christianity because it leaves us no wiggle room.
SPEAKER_01: Well, you know, I'm gonna bank on karma.
SPEAKER_01: Good luck.
SPEAKER_01: I urge you, by the mercies of God and by the truth of Jesus Christ, if it's never happened for you, let it be today, let it be even right now.
SPEAKER_01: There's only one way to God, and that's through a relationship with his son Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: I am the way, I am the truth, and I am the light.
SPEAKER_01: No one comes to the Father except through me.
SPEAKER_01: None of you have done so many ignorant things that God's looked down and said, Really?
SPEAKER_01: Again?
SPEAKER_01: Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: This is the fourth time.
SPEAKER_01: Times of ignorance, he's overlooked.
SPEAKER_01: But now he commands all people everywhere to repent, to come to a relationship with God, to answer their phone.
SPEAKER_01: He commands all people, no one's looking, go ahead and answer it.
SPEAKER_01: There's somebody over here going, like, don't make eye contact.
SPEAKER_01: Kids, stop looking at my purse.
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: Look at me.
SPEAKER_01: He commands all people everywhere.
SPEAKER_01: No pressure.
SPEAKER_01: We're not going into a big, we're not gonna dim the lights and hum kumbaya.
SPEAKER_01: Clyde's gonna come, not the whole band.
SPEAKER_01: Just Clyde's gonna come.
SPEAKER_01: He's gonna play that piano behind me.
SPEAKER_01: He's gonna sing a simple chorus.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna say to you, think about your life and ask yourself, is your place in heaven secure?
SPEAKER_01: Because you have a relationship with Christ, not because you believe in God or the big man upstairs, the demons in hell believe and tremble.
SPEAKER_01: Hell will be full of people that believed in God.
SPEAKER_01: I love what Sting said.
SPEAKER_01: You know who Sting is?
SPEAKER_01: Used to be with the police.
SPEAKER_01: Sting was asked if he's ever had a born-again experience.
SPEAKER_01: And he said, No, I've given lip service to the idea.
SPEAKER_01: But a devastating, ego-destroying, ontological epiphany, I simply have never had.
SPEAKER_01: I'm asking if you've had that before.
SPEAKER_01: Have you been killed and raised up, a new person?
SPEAKER_01: And if not, that can happen for you today.
SPEAKER_01: Stand to your feet.
SPEAKER_01: Let me speak a blessing over you.
SPEAKER_01: Hold your hands out.
SPEAKER_01: I smell the ham.
SPEAKER_01: Can you smell it?
SPEAKER_01: Hold your hands out.
SPEAKER_01: He is risen.
SPEAKER_01: Now get out of here and live like you actually believe that.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Bless you.
SPEAKER_01: You're dismissed.