SPEAKER_00: This podcast is a ministry of Grand Parkway Baptist Church, helping people know, enjoy, and glorify God.
SPEAKER_00: For more information about Grand Parkway, visit Grandparkway.org.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Well, let me ask you to stay standing for just a second.
SPEAKER_01: I just want to remind you that what you're just saying is the gospel.
SPEAKER_01: You say, what do you mean the gospel?
SPEAKER_01: The gospel is a word that we use in the church.
SPEAKER_01: It means good news.
SPEAKER_01: That it's the good news of Christianity, is that God didn't come to get you all jammed up and put a lot of religious rules on you, He came to set you free.
SPEAKER_01: So if you hear anything today, this may be the first time you've been in church since last Easter, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Relax, all right?
SPEAKER_01: No one's gonna beat you up or shame you or anything.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you didn't know the words for the song, so like me when I first started coming to church, I would just move my mouth and say, banana, banana, banana, banana.
SPEAKER_01: I would start when you weren't supposed to start and keep singing that you're supposed to stop.
SPEAKER_01: And it was just like, that was embarrassing.
SPEAKER_01: Memoryself never go back.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing Jesus came.
SPEAKER_01: The first thing God said to Adam and Eve was, You're free.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus comes, dies on the cross, lives a sinless life, dies on the cross as a sacrifice for our sins, which you'll hear about this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: So we could be free.
SPEAKER_01: So we could live in the freedom God created us to live in.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: So if you're here, you're jaded, you're cynical, and you're like, I'm just here because my wife told me it's Easter, we're going to church.
SPEAKER_01: Relax.
SPEAKER_01: At least she got free coffee.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: So here's what I'm gonna do.
SPEAKER_01: Just a minute, I'm gonna pray.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna open up the Bible and I and I'm gonna read from 1 Corinthians 15, the guy named Paul, that God used to record 13 books of the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: He says this.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Hey, I'm passing on to you what I received as of first importance.
SPEAKER_01: In other words, hey, this matters.
SPEAKER_01: You got to think about these things.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna read 11 verses in the Bible, and I'm gonna say, hey, here's five things that the Bible says to us to think about.
SPEAKER_01: At the end of it, I'm gonna shut up.
SPEAKER_01: And everybody said, Not so loud.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna be quiet.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm gonna say, hey, let's just spend some time thinking about this.
SPEAKER_01: What we will not do here, we do not do this here.
SPEAKER_01: We're not gonna try to manipulate you into something.
SPEAKER_01: We're not gonna try to make you feel bad.
SPEAKER_01: We're not gonna dim the lights and hum kumbayah or pass out bunnies.
SPEAKER_01: No, the Bible, it engages your head and your heart.
SPEAKER_01: And it expresses itself through your hands and what you do.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: You good with that?
SPEAKER_01: Let me voice a prayer and we'll get going.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we we love you.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you that you set us free.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you that it was for freedom that you set us free.
SPEAKER_01: And so you're not here to get us all jammed up with a bunch of rules and everything.
SPEAKER_01: And so, Lord, help us to understand the life we were created to live.
SPEAKER_01: Help us to understand what the resurrection means and why it's important, okay?
SPEAKER_01: It's just not a day to dress up and have a family photo op and go eat lunch with our parents and grandparents or whatever.
SPEAKER_01: All that stuff is well and good.
SPEAKER_01: But if we miss what's of most importance, then we miss the whole thing.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to miss it, God.
SPEAKER_01: That's why we're here.
SPEAKER_01: So speak today.
SPEAKER_01: Say something that has our name on it in a language we understand.
SPEAKER_01: We ask in Jesus' name.
SPEAKER_01: And everyone said, You can have a seat.
SPEAKER_01: If you got a Bible, I invite you to take it and open it up to 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Corinthians is after the gospels of the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, uh, and then it has the book of Acts, and then it has 1 and 2 Corinthians.
SPEAKER_01: 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
SPEAKER_01: If you don't have a Bible, it's one on your row.
SPEAKER_01: I'm on page 961.
SPEAKER_01: And if you don't own a Bible personally and you like that one, you can take it with you as our gift to you, and we'll get some more, okay?
SPEAKER_01: So, 1 Corinthians chapter 15.
SPEAKER_01: I want to talk to you today about the importance of Easter.
SPEAKER_01: And the importance of Easter.
SPEAKER_01: When I say the importance of Easter, I don't mean uh, well, I don't mean what you may think I mean.
SPEAKER_01: Like, for example, I made the bad mistake on Friday of going to the mall.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't really, I totally forgot it's Good Friday.
SPEAKER_01: I thought I man's Good Friday.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, kids are out of school on Good Friday.
SPEAKER_01: What in the world?
SPEAKER_01: I thought we had, I thought we had separation of church and state.
SPEAKER_01: Why aren't these kids in school?
SPEAKER_01: So I go to the mall, there's just roving bands of teenagers everywhere, and I'm like, come here, I'm gonna take my belt off and whip you.
SPEAKER_01: Who let you out of the house wearing that?
SPEAKER_01: My goodness, what in the world?
SPEAKER_01: So I was getting worked up, and finally I said to the lady in the dealers, I said, Where are all these people?
SPEAKER_01: And she said, It's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, What's the big deal about Easter?
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, It's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, But what's the big deal about Easter?
SPEAKER_01: I don't know, it's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone comes shopping to get a dress or something to wear to Easter.
SPEAKER_01: It's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Where to Easter?
SPEAKER_01: Where do they go to wear it to Easter?
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, sir, you're confusing me.
SPEAKER_01: It's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: Can I help you?
SPEAKER_01: No, no, you cannot.
SPEAKER_01: I want to tell you why it's such a big deal.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, uh, I mean, people all over the world, they stop what they're doing and they go to church on Easter.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible tells us, hey, there's a reason, there's something inside of us that kind of says, hey, you might want to think about this.
SPEAKER_01: The Apostle Paul writes about it in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verse 1.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel that I preach to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word that I preach to you, unless you believed in vain.
SPEAKER_01: For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins, in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day, in accordance with the scriptures, and then he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelfth.
SPEAKER_01: And then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom were still alive, though some have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: And then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.
SPEAKER_01: Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
SPEAKER_01: For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.
SPEAKER_01: But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace towards me was not in vain.
SPEAKER_01: On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, but it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
SPEAKER_01: Whether then it was I or they, so we preach, and so you believed.
SPEAKER_01: What's the big deal about Easter?
SPEAKER_01: Why is Easter so important in everyone's mind?
SPEAKER_01: Well, the Bible gives us five things to think about from these eleven verses.
SPEAKER_01: And the first thing it says to us is this right here, that the death of Jesus is real.
SPEAKER_01: The death of Jesus is real.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're a thinking person, when I say that, the first thought that goes off into your head like fireworks is really?
SPEAKER_01: I shaved my legs to hear you tell me that.
SPEAKER_01: I could have told you that.
SPEAKER_01: Now, let me say it again because I want to establish a basic baseline of understanding.
SPEAKER_01: When I say the death of Jesus is real, here's why that is a big deal.
SPEAKER_01: In most world religions today, the way you demonstrate your love and your allegiance to your God is you sacrifice yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Make sense?
SPEAKER_01: Well, if the Bible comes along and says, hey, the way God demonstrates his love for us is that he sacrifices himself.
SPEAKER_01: Christianity is the only religion in the world where the central character, the God, the highest power, the deity of that religion sacrifices himself.
SPEAKER_01: And he doesn't tell his followers, hey, if you love me, you'll blow yourself up for me, or you'll offer your life up for me.
SPEAKER_01: No, he goes first and he offers himself up.
SPEAKER_01: Now this was a problem for people, okay?
SPEAKER_01: In the Bible, it's a problem for people here in Fort Bend County.
SPEAKER_01: I've talked to people, and they said when they find out I'm a preacher, they say, Well, you know, preacher, no, no, no disrespect, but you know, I just can't believe in a God that he couldn't keep himself from getting killed.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, if Jesus was the Son of God, it seems like he could have overpowered those people and and they couldn't have killed him.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, If if Jesus would have saved himself, he couldn't save you.
SPEAKER_01: And the guy's like, Well, I don't know what that means, but I just, I think I said, so if you don't trust in God, if you don't believe that Jesus is God because he got himself killed, then who do you trust in?
SPEAKER_01: And the man looked at me and said, I trust me.
SPEAKER_01: I said, That's gonna be sadder and sadder the older you get.
SPEAKER_01: But by the way, if you're here this morning, you're one of those people that's thinking, you know what, if he was really God and he's all powerful, seems like he could have done something and not got himself killed.
SPEAKER_01: You're not the first person to think that way.
SPEAKER_01: Matter of fact, the people in the Bible thought that way.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible records this in Matthew chapter 27, starting verse 39.
SPEAKER_01: It says, And those who pass by derided him, wagging their heads and saying, You who would destroy the temple and rebuild it in three days, save yourself.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're the son of God, come down from the cross.
SPEAKER_01: And so also the chief priests with the scribes and the elders mocked him, saying, He saved others, he cannot even save himself.
SPEAKER_01: He's the king of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: Let him come down now from the cross, and we will believe in him.
SPEAKER_01: He trusts in God.
SPEAKER_01: Let God deliver him now, if he desires him, for he said, I'm the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: And the robbers who were crucified with him also reviled him in the same way.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I want you to think about what we just read, okay?
SPEAKER_01: We'll leave we'll leave that passage up there because I want you to look at that, and I want you to notice the progression of the people that insult Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: It starts off with, first of all, those who pass by.
SPEAKER_01: Those who pass by, anonymous, random strangers.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus was crucified.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus, in this passage, is on the cross.
SPEAKER_01: He's not dead yet, and people are making fun of him.
SPEAKER_01: How cruel and heartless do you have to be?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, they're giving Jesus the business, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And it was in a public place, very popular place.
SPEAKER_01: Matter of fact, the sign that they put on the cross above Jesus' head was written in three languages.
SPEAKER_01: That was that much of a cosmopolitan uh uh exposure.
SPEAKER_01: And so, first of all, it's the people that just passed by.
SPEAKER_01: They derided him, wagging their heads, saying, You talked about destroying the temple and building it back in three days.
SPEAKER_01: You can't even save yourself.
SPEAKER_01: If you're the son of God, come down from the cross.
SPEAKER_01: Translation: if you're really the son of God, save yourself.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus just hangs there.
SPEAKER_01: The second group of people that that kind of make fun of him, uh, the Bible says it's the chief priests, the scribes, and the elders.
SPEAKER_01: We don't use those words today, but it'd be like modern-day preachers.
SPEAKER_01: So a group of preachers come by and they mocked him.
SPEAKER_01: Listen to what they said.
SPEAKER_01: He saved others, he cannot save himself.
SPEAKER_01: He's the king of Israel.
SPEAKER_01: Let him come down now from the cross and we will believe in him.
SPEAKER_01: Translation, if you can get yourself out of this, if you can come down from the cross, then we'll believe in you.
SPEAKER_01: But what Jesus knows, that they don't understand, is that if he comes down off the cross, they have nothing to believe in.
SPEAKER_01: Ask yourself this morning, what do you believe to be ultimate?
SPEAKER_01: What governs your life?
SPEAKER_01: What do you know beyond a shadow of a doubt?
SPEAKER_01: This is certain and absolute, and I will never change my mind about that.
SPEAKER_01: Because here's what I'm saying to you, I'm submitting this to you to think about today.
SPEAKER_01: It's that by staying on the cross, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, gives the world something that's absolutely real and truthful to be the baseline, governing reality in their life.
SPEAKER_01: The third group of people gets even worse down to the very bottom of the last sentence it says, and the robbers who were crucified with him.
SPEAKER_01: You ever had a bad day where one thing after another happens and it goes from bad to bad to worse to worse, and just kind of snowballs?
SPEAKER_01: This is that kind of day.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, Jesus is hanging there between two robbers, between two thieves, and everyone's everyone's giving the business, and these guys turn on him.
SPEAKER_01: It's like you go into work tomorrow and you picture a big presentation and your boss says, Hey, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: Horrible job.
SPEAKER_01: Go do the whole thing over.
SPEAKER_01: I know you worked on it for four months, but that was horrible.
SPEAKER_01: Your PowerPoint was messed up, the bar, the bar graph was out of whack, the pie chart didn't make any sense.
SPEAKER_01: Go do it over.
SPEAKER_01: Then you walk down the hall, and two hours later you hear guys snickering around the water cooler, talking about you and your lousy presentation.
SPEAKER_01: You come back from lunch and your secretary's kind of like, Yeah, I heard you tanked it this morning, boss.
SPEAKER_01: Awesome.
SPEAKER_01: And you're like, can anybody else talk about me?
SPEAKER_01: And then you go to your car and you're driving out of the parking garage, and the security guard sees you at the little booth, and he's kind of like, boom boom.
SPEAKER_01: You're just like, I'm going home.
SPEAKER_01: You go home, you open the door, your wife's kind of like, so we got to sell the house, loser?
SPEAKER_01: You're really put it in the ditch today.
SPEAKER_01: I thought I coached you on this.
SPEAKER_01: It's that kind of day.
SPEAKER_01: But he's the son of God, it's the person who had the capacity.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus says in one of the gospels, I could have called on my father and he would have sent 12 legions of angels.
SPEAKER_01: But he didn't.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because the death of Jesus is real.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus actually is the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: He could have saved himself, but he chose not to.
SPEAKER_01: Even when they came to arrest him in the garden before they tried him on trumped-up charges and and nailed him to the cross, when they first came to get him in the garden, it was an indication that Jesus was like, hey, I I'm not here to defend myself.
SPEAKER_01: Because they came, one of his most faithful followers, guy named Peter, pulled out a sword.
SPEAKER_01: You need redneck friends who carry knives, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Takes a swing to cut a guy's head off.
SPEAKER_01: The guy ducks and he locks his ear off, just clean, smooth.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus reaches down, brushes the grass off, three-second rule, puts it back on.
SPEAKER_01: That's in the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: That's why you should read the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: And they're just kind of like, What just happened?
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus spoke, and listen to this.
SPEAKER_01: He had so much authority that he just him speaking knocked men flat on their back.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, Hey, I'm not here, my kingdom's not of this world.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not here to fight you.
SPEAKER_01: If it was of this world, my men will be fighting.
SPEAKER_01: Instead, I put that cat's ear back on.
SPEAKER_01: Figure that out.
SPEAKER_01: Take me to your leader.
SPEAKER_01: And they're like, okay, let's go.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because the death of Jesus is real, it has to happen.
SPEAKER_01: He knows that.
SPEAKER_01: So he surrenders himself to the plan of God.
SPEAKER_01: Why is the death of Jesus real?
SPEAKER_01: Because secondly, the death of Jesus is necessary.
SPEAKER_01: The death of Jesus is necessary.
SPEAKER_01: Look at the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 3.
SPEAKER_01: He says, For I delivered to you as a first importance what I also receive, that Christ died.
SPEAKER_01: That means it's real.
SPEAKER_01: But why?
SPEAKER_01: Look at the next three words.
SPEAKER_01: For our sins.
SPEAKER_01: See, when you factor that into the equation, then the death of Jesus isn't just death, it's payment.
SPEAKER_01: Let me say that again.
SPEAKER_01: When you factor that into the equation, because the Bible says he died for our sins.
SPEAKER_01: Now, I don't want to assume that you know what sins are, but the Bible says that we've all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: To sin, it's a Greek word homartia, and it means to miss the mark.
SPEAKER_01: It means that you're aiming at this and just a little bit outside.
SPEAKER_01: That's what sin is.
SPEAKER_01: You're kind of missing it.
SPEAKER_01: You're falling short of God's standard.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says we've all done that, but I don't want to assume you realize that.
SPEAKER_01: So let me ask this question.
SPEAKER_01: How many in this room know, hey, at least once in my life I've done something I knew was wrong and it was a sin?
SPEAKER_01: Can I see your hand for a second?
SPEAKER_01: Hold it up real high.
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
SPEAKER_01: Aren't you in great company?
SPEAKER_01: Look around.
SPEAKER_01: Yes, this is awesome.
SPEAKER_01: So the Bible says here, hey, hey, because we've all sinned, that's the easy question.
SPEAKER_01: How many of you sinned?
SPEAKER_01: Like, who hadn't?
SPEAKER_01: Here's the really harder question.
SPEAKER_01: What can you do about that to make it right in God's eyes?
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you want to get a great conversation going in a bar the next time you're in a bar, lob that up on the table.
SPEAKER_01: Them cats will be like, we need another round of crown over here.
SPEAKER_01: We're gonna be a while.
SPEAKER_01: Because here's a you boil it all down, you put all the responses in a pot, put it on low heat, stir it every 10 minutes.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what it comes out as.
SPEAKER_01: I do some good stuff to outweigh my bad stuff.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible calls that works.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what the Bible says about works.
SPEAKER_01: Works doesn't work.
SPEAKER_01: And here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because you're smart people, you know this.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why works doesn't work.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you can do good stuff to outweigh your bad stuff and that gets you forgiveness and gets you into heaven, then why do you need Jesus?
SPEAKER_01: You have figured out a way to get forgiveness and get eternal life in heaven with God, and you don't even need Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: But the Bible says that's impossible.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says that for by grace we're saved through faith, not of works, lest any man should boast.
SPEAKER_01: It also says in a book, the book in the Bible called Titus in chapter 3, he says, hey, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy has he saved us.
SPEAKER_01: Now that's good news, and here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because despite you could do some good things, I'm not saying you can't do good things, but you can't do enough good things to discount your bad things.
SPEAKER_01: And the Bible says the reason that's good news is, hey, not because of works of righteousness, but according to God's mercy.
SPEAKER_01: God has more mercy than you do good deeds.
SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
SPEAKER_01: God has more mercy than I have in me the capacity to do good things.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible, matter of fact, says of God that He's rich in mercy.
SPEAKER_01: And so you got to understand, okay, I've sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.
SPEAKER_01: We don't like that.
SPEAKER_01: We don't like, hey, maybe ramp my hand Friday night at our Good Friday service.
SPEAKER_01: I began in talking about, hey, the Barabbas.
SPEAKER_01: He was the guy that they held up, and Pilate said, hey, we have a law that says we let somebody go, just kind of to remind ourselves during Passover that, hey, forgiveness is real.
SPEAKER_01: You want Jesus, King of the Jews, or you want Barabbas, who the Bible said was a robber.
SPEAKER_01: And because I love my church so much, I told them all on Friday night, you're all like Barabbas, you're a bunch of robbers.
SPEAKER_01: I got an email that night when I got home from a man in our church.
SPEAKER_01: He's got a daughter, she's like six or seven years old.
SPEAKER_01: He said, Neil, my daughter did not like being called a robber tonight.
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, here we go.
SPEAKER_01: Here's one of those emails.
SPEAKER_01: But it was incredible.
SPEAKER_01: The next line said, However, on the way home, unprovoked by anybody, she did admit to being a little bit of a liar.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, that's progress, my man.
SPEAKER_01: That is progress.
SPEAKER_01: Hang on to that.
SPEAKER_01: So here's what you do.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what you gotta ask yourself, okay?
SPEAKER_01: So if I've sinned, if I've messed up, and I can't get right with God by doing good deeds, so how do I get right?
SPEAKER_01: Because sin is, here's the thing about sin.
SPEAKER_01: Sin didn't suddenly make you feel bad.
SPEAKER_01: Sin separates you from God.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says your sins have separated you and cut you off.
SPEAKER_01: You say, I don't know what you mean.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you know what I'm talking about, because some of us sometimes we get stuck in a rut doing the wrong thing for so long, we don't even want to pray to God.
SPEAKER_01: We just kind of get in bed and kind of go, uh, let's just not.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna turn over now and go to sleep.
SPEAKER_01: You can read my mind.
SPEAKER_01: Here we go.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: Because you feel it.
SPEAKER_01: What do you feel?
SPEAKER_01: You feel the separation inside of you.
SPEAKER_01: That's not God, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: That's the mercy of God.
SPEAKER_01: That separation, that yucky feeling is God kind of going, hello, hello, excuse me, you think it's supposed to be this way?
SPEAKER_01: And sometimes it's so bad, you're just kind of laying there and you're like, uh, and you just pull the covers up over your head.
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
SPEAKER_01: So what do you do?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says this in Romans chapter 5, verse 6.
SPEAKER_01: It says, For while we're still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly.
SPEAKER_01: For one will scarcely die for a righteous person.
SPEAKER_01: Though perhaps for a good person, one would dare even to die.
SPEAKER_01: But God, He shows His love for us and that while we're still sinners, Christ died for us.
SPEAKER_01: Do you hear that kind of sliding scale?
SPEAKER_01: He says, hear it again.
SPEAKER_01: He says, For while we were still weak at the right time.
SPEAKER_01: Now don't miss that.
SPEAKER_01: I ain't got time to go into that this morning because it's Easter.
SPEAKER_01: I gotta get you out here on time.
SPEAKER_01: So you can go to grandma's and have ham.
SPEAKER_01: I find it ironic that in celebration of our Jewish Messiah, you eat ham, but that's a whole nother thing.
SPEAKER_01: Uh but we'll we'll press on.
SPEAKER_01: But look what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: He says this right here.
SPEAKER_01: He says, hey, for while we were still weak at the right time.
SPEAKER_01: Do you hear that?
SPEAKER_01: The right time is not when you get it all together and you feel spiritually strong and like, now this makes sense for God to love me and for me to respond to that.
SPEAKER_01: It's never gonna make sense.
SPEAKER_01: The love of God is so big and so overwhelming and so forgiving, it's never gonna make sense.
SPEAKER_01: He says at the right time, and then he goes on and says, Christ died for the ungodly.
SPEAKER_01: For one will scarcely die for a righteous person, or for a good person, one might get one one might possibly die.
SPEAKER_01: And look at the sliding scale.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Hey, no one's gonna die for a righteous person.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because they don't need it.
SPEAKER_01: He said, but one might die for a good person, but then God lowers the bar way down here.
SPEAKER_01: Now, when I was in the seventh grade, I played football, I played basketball, the last day of basketball practice.
SPEAKER_01: My friend looked at me and said, You're gonna play track?
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, play track.
SPEAKER_01: I'm for playing track.
SPEAKER_01: He said, You get running shoes and you get sweats.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, I'm down with that.
SPEAKER_01: No one told me you don't play track, you run track.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't get that memo.
SPEAKER_01: So first day of track practice, we had our sweats and our little track king, three-striped shoes to make us run faster.
SPEAKER_01: We're running around out there like a bunch of hairless electric chihuahuas.
SPEAKER_01: And they had a porta pit, which is a big foam mat, and they had a high jump bar.
SPEAKER_01: We put the bar up there, it was like maybe three feet off the ground, and we're I there's probably 40 seventh graders lined up jumping over three feet.
SPEAKER_01: It's just like we're rolling around on the mat.
SPEAKER_01: It's like a house of pain video.
SPEAKER_01: Jump around, jump around, and we're get out of the way.
SPEAKER_01: It's my turn.
SPEAKER_01: And we're doing the Fosberry flop and the Western roll.
SPEAKER_01: We got all the styles out.
SPEAKER_01: And then Coach showed up.
SPEAKER_01: Brother snapped an artery and bled out right there on the scene.
SPEAKER_01: Went blowing up.
SPEAKER_01: What are you doing?
SPEAKER_01: Get off that portiped! Are you kidding me?
SPEAKER_01: And we were like, oh, coach, what's the big deal?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, we're just having fun.
SPEAKER_01: It's just a big deal.
SPEAKER_01: It's my mom can high jump three feet.
SPEAKER_01: And then he unscrewed this little thing, the standard, and slid it up to four feet six inches.
SPEAKER_01: Went on this side over here because on those things there's measurements.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, shut up.
SPEAKER_01: Put the bar up there.
SPEAKER_01: This changed my life.
SPEAKER_01: I never thought the same way about track ever again.
SPEAKER_01: And I never played track ever again either.
SPEAKER_01: He put the bar up there and he said, open in height in the seventh grade track meet is four feet six inches.
SPEAKER_01: If you sorry, rascals can't clear this height, you're not gonna do high jump.
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna do a running event.
SPEAKER_01: And so he made his all line up and he tooted the whistle, and one after the other, you had to run.
SPEAKER_01: And they were just clanging it down.
SPEAKER_01: He went, next, go run.
SPEAKER_01: I'll find you something to do.
SPEAKER_01: Well, in the seventh grade, I thought, if you get a big head start, get way back here and get down low like this and pull your sweats up, make you gonna run faster.
SPEAKER_01: I was back behind the concession stand.
SPEAKER_01: I got running, I was like, it was like a quarter of a mile.
SPEAKER_01: I was winning by the time I got to the bar.
SPEAKER_01: I got there, I'm on dunking.
SPEAKER_01: I was laid in the thing, rolled up my head.
SPEAKER_01: So, McClane, you're horrible, son.
SPEAKER_01: You're horrible.
SPEAKER_01: I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: My lungs are gonna fall like a colour.
SPEAKER_01: Spin my mouth, make the pain stop.
SPEAKER_01: Dip your finger in the water and touch my tongue.
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna haggan in this flame.
SPEAKER_01: I went, I did this for the rest of the period, all around the track.
SPEAKER_01: At the end of the day, end of that period, we had track first period, by the way.
SPEAKER_01: I folded them gray sweats up, took them shoes up, put them on top.
SPEAKER_01: I went to Coach Haggerty, I said, here you go.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to play track.
SPEAKER_01: Anymore.
SPEAKER_01: He said, That's a good decision, McClendon.
SPEAKER_01: Set him down.
SPEAKER_01: Why do I tell you that?
SPEAKER_01: Because the standard is such that no one can meet it.
SPEAKER_01: The standard's perfection.
SPEAKER_01: It's not four feet, six inches.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says if you sin once, you're guilty of breaking the whole law.
SPEAKER_01: So if the standard is perfection, how are you gonna high jump that?
SPEAKER_01: But see what God does.
SPEAKER_01: He says, hey, for a righteous person, one will rarely die.
SPEAKER_01: You don't need that.
SPEAKER_01: For a good person, maybe, but God, because He's a God of mercy, He lowers it down there by three feet and says, But for sinners.
SPEAKER_01: You see what God just did?
SPEAKER_01: He said, Hey, for a righteous person, they don't need it.
SPEAKER_01: For a good person, maybe.
SPEAKER_01: But for real live sinners.
SPEAKER_01: That's what the Bible says.
SPEAKER_01: He says, but hey, for a good person, one would dare even to die, but God chose his love for us in that while we're still sinners, Christ died for us.
SPEAKER_01: See, when I say that the death of Jesus is real, the death of Jesus is necessary.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: The death of Jesus lowers the standard and makes it possible for you to die to get over.
SPEAKER_01: That's why Jesus says Jesus is not rude or arrogant, he's just right.
SPEAKER_01: That's why he says in John 14, 6, I am the way, the truth, and the life.
SPEAKER_01: No man comes to the Father except through me.
SPEAKER_01: Third thing the Bible tells us on this Easter morning is that the Bible's reliable.
SPEAKER_01: Look there in verse 3.
SPEAKER_01: You still with me?
SPEAKER_01: For I delivered of you as of first importance.
SPEAKER_01: What I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.
SPEAKER_01: Now stop right there.
SPEAKER_01: Twice in about 20 words, he's used this phrase in accordance with the scriptures.
SPEAKER_01: Did any of you all use that phrase this week?
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: It sounds irregular coming out of your mouth, doesn't it?
SPEAKER_01: In accordance with the scriptures.
SPEAKER_01: If I got up next Sunday and said, I'm going to talk to you in accordance with the scriptures, you'd be like, Pinch the baby, make the baby cry, so we'll have an excuse for leaving early.
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: But here's the deal.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what somebody did pinch the baby, see?
SPEAKER_01: I see you, ma'am.
SPEAKER_01: On to you.
SPEAKER_01: Look away.
SPEAKER_01: Everyone has kids and sometimes they act out.
SPEAKER_01: Mine's 19 and she acts out.
SPEAKER_01: The 13-year-old I blame on her mother.
SPEAKER_01: Anyway.
SPEAKER_01: No, you're here.
SPEAKER_01: Hey, by the way, we've all had that.
SPEAKER_01: We've all done that.
SPEAKER_01: Don't be looking like, can that woman not control that baby?
SPEAKER_01: Hey, your wife can't even control you, Bozo, so hush.
SPEAKER_01: What I mean in accordance with the scriptures, look at me.
SPEAKER_01: Here's what the Bible does.
SPEAKER_01: Okay, twice he repeats this phrase.
SPEAKER_01: But look, I want to make a distinction.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible doesn't predict these things, the Bible promised these things.
SPEAKER_01: Subtle but big difference.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible doesn't predict.
SPEAKER_01: Prediction makes, hey, I think this is going to happen.
SPEAKER_01: A promise is I know this is going to happen.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible word they use for that is called pro is prophecies.
SPEAKER_01: There's almost 400 biblical prophecies about the coming Messiah, about who is going to be the Son of God.
SPEAKER_01: Everything from the fact he was going to ride into Jerusalem on a donkey to how he was going to die, the city he was going to die in, uh the day he was going to die on, then he was going to rise from the dead, the day he was going to rise from the dead, the tomb they were going to lay him in, all this stuff was talked about, was promised hundreds and thousands of years before Jesus ever left heaven and came to the earth.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why do I make a big deal out of that?
SPEAKER_01: Because the Bible's reliable.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't predict, it promises.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you try to sit down and figure out the statistical probability that one person will fulfill all these biblical prophecies or all these promises, we can't come up with a number for that.
SPEAKER_01: It's just, it it's hard, it's impossible to get our head around.
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of like someone told me the other day, I ran into one of our church members at a gas station buying a lottery ticket.
SPEAKER_01: I love to walk in on you guys when you're doing stuff you're suspect about.
SPEAKER_01: Because I walked in and the person was like, oh, hey, hey.
SPEAKER_01: And then the person held it up and said, you know, there's a the the chances are one in 272 million or like one in 300 million, and there's 300 million people in in America.
SPEAKER_01: And so I figure I at least got a chance.
SPEAKER_01: And I was kind of like, I'm just here to get gas, man.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not, you know, it's not illegal, but just don't, don't, don't, don't, don't bet your don't bet your farm on that, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Oh, well, you know, there's a chance, you know, there's 300 million people.
SPEAKER_01: I heard you say that a minute ago.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, when people are nervous, they say crazy things.
SPEAKER_01: He was like, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, because along with the lottery ticket, he had a six-pack and a and and and and a and a pack of Winston's.
SPEAKER_01: And I thought, we are hitting for the cycle here.
SPEAKER_01: And my pastor walks in on me and I'm like, hey man, I relax, okay?
SPEAKER_01: He says, Well, you know, there's a I mean, there's three million people, and somebody's got to win.
SPEAKER_01: Might as well be me.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, Did you take algebra in high school?
SPEAKER_01: Because this doesn't add up.
SPEAKER_01: But okay, go ahead.
SPEAKER_01: No big deal.
SPEAKER_01: He says, Oh, I'll I'll see you Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: You told me that the last time I saw you, which was about nine months ago.
SPEAKER_01: I hadn't seen you since.
SPEAKER_01: So, do I believe you now?
SPEAKER_01: Come on, man, why are you hating on me?
SPEAKER_01: I'm just giving you the business, man.
SPEAKER_01: Come on, Easter's coming up.
SPEAKER_01: Make an appearance, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And guess what?
SPEAKER_01: He was here already this morning.
SPEAKER_01: And I told him, I said, hey, you get 10 Jesus points for coming to the first service.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Did you win that lottery?
SPEAKER_01: And he goes, No, I didn't win.
SPEAKER_01: I said, keep playing.
SPEAKER_01: We need a new sanctuary.
SPEAKER_01: Amen?
SPEAKER_01: Play Lotto, give God a chance.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, That ain't funny, Pastor.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Come on, man, I'm just giving you the needle.
SPEAKER_01: Relax.
SPEAKER_01: If I like you, I give you the business, okay?
SPEAKER_01: You must love me.
SPEAKER_01: I do.
SPEAKER_01: Now, hey, back to the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: In accordance with the scriptures, it doesn't make these promises.
SPEAKER_01: You're trying to figure out, hey, one in 300 million win a lottery.
SPEAKER_01: The statistical probability of one person uh fulfilling all these things.
SPEAKER_01: And here's the deal breaker.
SPEAKER_01: It's like they can't even get it.
SPEAKER_01: It's an infinite number.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because it has something in it, one of the prophecies that the human mind cannot even get wrapped around it's this, that he would be born of a virgin.
SPEAKER_01: That's the one that makes the calculator go crazy.
SPEAKER_01: And so they come, they try to explain it and they said, hey, here's what they come up with.
SPEAKER_01: Here's a statistical probability in in a mental picture.
SPEAKER_01: It's like if you covered the state of Texas two feet deep with silver dollars, and you took a black sharp and you put an X on one of those silver dollars, and you got in a helicopter and you flew all over Texas, and you just threw the thing out the window somewhere over Texas, landed the helicopter here in Houston, got back in the helicopter, blindfolded, flew the helicopter all around, set it down, got out of the helicopter blindfolded, walked over and picked up the silver dollar off the ground that has the X on it.
SPEAKER_01: That is the closest they can come to the statistical probability that all the Bible promises that were fulfilled in Jesus would come true in one person.
SPEAKER_01: So, here's why I tell you that.
SPEAKER_01: When Paul uses that little phrase, in accordance with the scripture, he's saying, you can trust the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: You're not like reading a fairy tale.
SPEAKER_01: You the Bible's reliable.
SPEAKER_01: Fourth thing that the Bible tells us this morning is that the resurrection is verifiable.
SPEAKER_01: Here's why Easter is important.
SPEAKER_01: The resurrection is verifiable.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 5.
SPEAKER_01: You still awake?
SPEAKER_01: Verse 5 it says, after that, he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve.
SPEAKER_01: Then he appeared to more than 500 brothers at one time, most of whom were still alive, though some have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: And then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles, and last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me.
SPEAKER_01: For I'm the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God.
SPEAKER_01: Now, if you're here today and you've got a list and litany of reasons for why you don't go to church because you're such a bad person, you're in a good place today because this guy that God used to write 13 books in the Bible, at one point in his life, he felt the same way about himself.
SPEAKER_01: He was a horrible individual.
SPEAKER_01: We'll get to him in a minute.
SPEAKER_01: Because the Bible, when I say that the resurrection is verifiable, what I mean is there's this list of people and people groups there that Jesus, after he rose from the dead, appeared to.
SPEAKER_01: And so it lists all these people off.
SPEAKER_01: So you could go to them and say, hey, did you see Jesus after he supposedly rose from the dead?
SPEAKER_01: And they could say yes or they could say no.
SPEAKER_01: The first person he lists, I just want to point to three of them.
SPEAKER_01: The first person he lists is a guy named Cephas.
SPEAKER_01: He says, first of all, he appeared to Cephas.
SPEAKER_01: This is a reference to Peter.
SPEAKER_01: Peter was the guy that he was the guy cutting people's ears off in the Garden of Gethsemane.
SPEAKER_01: He was probably one of the most, one of Jesus' first disciples.
SPEAKER_01: Matter of fact, in the book of John, chapter one, Peter had a brother named Andrew.
SPEAKER_01: Andrew heard Jesus teach, and he said, You know what?
SPEAKER_01: This guy may be the Messiah.
SPEAKER_01: And he went and got his brother.
SPEAKER_01: He went and got his brother, his name was Simon back then.
SPEAKER_01: He brought him to Jesus, and Jesus saw him.
SPEAKER_01: And before he said anything to Jesus, you know what Jesus said to him?
SPEAKER_01: He looked at him and he said, You are Simon, the son of John, but you will be called Cephas, which means Peter.
SPEAKER_01: And Peter was like, What?
SPEAKER_01: I grew up in a small town, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And when someone looked at me like the sheriff, who I was not a Christian all through high school.
SPEAKER_01: And so when the sheriff looked at me and said, Hey, boy, you want me to call your dad?
SPEAKER_01: No, sir.
SPEAKER_01: So every time I read in John 1, where he says, You are Simon, the son of John, I just think chills go up my spine.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm like, oh yeah, don't call my dad.
SPEAKER_01: He said to us one night, I want you boys to get this all picked up, cleaned up, I want you to go home.
SPEAKER_01: If I see you on the streets in 30 minutes, I'm calling your father.
SPEAKER_01: McClellan, you got that?
SPEAKER_01: Please, sir, don't do that.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus says to Peter, I know you and I know your dad.
SPEAKER_01: Not just that, you are Simon, the son of John.
SPEAKER_01: Hear this part.
SPEAKER_01: You will be called Cephas, which means Peter.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Here's why.
SPEAKER_01: Because Jesus has the grace to accept who he is and the power to transform him into who he can be.
SPEAKER_01: And the same thing applies to you today.
SPEAKER_01: You may have this list and litany, I don't know this, I got this, and I got that, and I watch that, and I do this, and I imbibe in that, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
SPEAKER_01: I say to you, on the authority of the Bible, that God has the grace to accept who you are and the power to change you into who the Bible says you can be.
SPEAKER_01: So the first person he lists off there is, he said, Hey, there's, there's, there, there's Cephas.
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, the reason he says he appears first to him, he lists him first is I think God wants him to know, I've not changed my mind about you.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you Christians in the room, let me talk to you for a minute.
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever, don't, don't raise your hand, but have you ever overpromised and underdelivered when it comes to you and God?
SPEAKER_01: This was Peter.
SPEAKER_01: This was Cephas.
SPEAKER_01: He was the guy that Jesus got closer to the cross, and they were like, hey, Jesus' like, hey, they're gonna strike the shepherd and the sheep are gonna scatter.
SPEAKER_01: He's like, Oh, y'all are gonna turn your back on me.
SPEAKER_01: And Peter's like, no, not me.
SPEAKER_01: Shut up, don't talk that way.
SPEAKER_01: These people may, and that guy over there, I've had questions about him, that beady-eyed guy the whole time, but not me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm your man.
SPEAKER_01: I will die for you.
SPEAKER_01: And Jesus is like, hey man, for the rooster crows, you'll deny me three times.
SPEAKER_01: No way.
SPEAKER_01: Guess what?
SPEAKER_01: Way.
SPEAKER_01: And the last time he denied Jesus, the third time he denied Jesus, he even swore for emphasis.
SPEAKER_01: And then he heard the rooster crow, and he's like, Oh, dude.
SPEAKER_01: You ever overpromise, underdeliver?
SPEAKER_01: I did a funeral in my hometown a couple Saturdays ago.
SPEAKER_01: And I went to see my mom afterwards and went in the bathroom.
SPEAKER_01: There's just one bathroom in a little house, and there's a dent in the sheetrock.
SPEAKER_01: Two days before I became a believer, I was in a not good state of mind.
SPEAKER_01: And I stumbled and fell on my elbow.
SPEAKER_01: Didn't put a hole in there.
SPEAKER_01: I was so messed up in the head, I took the bathroom plunger and tried to suck the dent out.
SPEAKER_01: That happened.
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
SPEAKER_01: And I remember you say, What do you mean, overpromise and underdeliver?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I was hallucinating, I was having all kinds of bad things here.
SPEAKER_01: Thought my teeth were melting, it was horrible.
SPEAKER_01: My friends were like, Let's go to the emergency room.
SPEAKER_01: Shut up, leave me alone, I got it.
SPEAKER_01: I didn't have it.
SPEAKER_01: I so didn't have it.
SPEAKER_01: I said, This God, if you'll get me out of this, do not let me die right here on the bathroom floor.
SPEAKER_01: I'll do anything, I'll even become a preacher.
SPEAKER_01: Whoa, whoa.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: And by the way, I couldn't get the plunger doesn't work.
SPEAKER_01: That dent removal method on sheetrock, it's still there.
SPEAKER_01: I pulled up my cell phone and took a picture of it.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: No, it doesn't have power over me.
SPEAKER_01: I just, I just, as Paul saying just a minute, but God's grace to me was not without effect.
SPEAKER_01: It just reminded me.
SPEAKER_01: I'm I'm not who I used to be.
SPEAKER_01: It's like the Holy Spirit said, You remember that night?
SPEAKER_01: I was like, oh man, do I?
SPEAKER_01: Whew, we've come a long way, baby.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: He says to Peter, hey, I ain't changed my mind about you.
SPEAKER_01: Second person that's mentioned, there's a group of 500.
SPEAKER_01: He said he appeared to 500, most of whom are still alive, although some have fallen asleep.
SPEAKER_01: That means they're dead.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why do I what's the big deal about that?
SPEAKER_01: Here's the significance of this many people, most of whom were still alive.
SPEAKER_01: If it were not true, if it was just some big catfish Ponzi scheme they were running, don't you think they could go to those people and one of them would say, Yeah, we made it all up?
SPEAKER_01: So there's verifiable witnesses to the resurrection.
SPEAKER_01: Last person Paul lists is it, and by the way, as the words get smaller, the emphasis and the meaning gets bigger.
SPEAKER_01: Last person he lists, he says this.
SPEAKER_01: And last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared to me.
SPEAKER_01: As the guy voted most unlikely to ever become a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul's saying.
SPEAKER_01: He says four things about himself.
SPEAKER_01: The first thing he says there as to one untimely born.
SPEAKER_01: That word untimely born in the Greek is where we get our English word miscarriage or abortion.
SPEAKER_01: Paul says, My life was out of sync.
SPEAKER_01: I was born out of sync with what God was doing.
SPEAKER_01: So what Paul did was he just leaned all the way the other way.
SPEAKER_01: And he's like, I do not get Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: I don't understand it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm hostile to it.
SPEAKER_01: And so he became a persecutor of Christians.
SPEAKER_01: We'll get to that in a minute.
SPEAKER_01: So I just want you to say, he said, hey, God appeared to me.
SPEAKER_01: Who's me?
SPEAKER_01: First of all, it's a man who just went through life thinking I'm a day late and a dollar short.
SPEAKER_01: I can't catch a break.
SPEAKER_01: I'm out of sync.
SPEAKER_01: And so I'm just, I'm, I, I, I'm internally, I'm pretty torqued about that.
SPEAKER_01: Second thing he says, he says, I'm the least of all the apostles.
SPEAKER_01: I'm the guy that deserves it the least.
SPEAKER_01: At the funeral I did a couple weeks ago in my hometown, I there's one guy that I hadn't seen in 35 years.
SPEAKER_01: He walked up to me and he went, No way.
SPEAKER_01: No way.
SPEAKER_01: I told my old lady, and I was like, by the way, that's what we call our wives in East Texas.
SPEAKER_01: He said, I told my old lady, there's no way that is Neil McClendon.
SPEAKER_01: There is no way.
SPEAKER_01: This is physically not possible.
SPEAKER_01: And it's that phrase right there that I just thought, ooh, that's beautiful.
SPEAKER_01: And I looked at him and I said, You're exactly right.
SPEAKER_01: It's physically not possible.
SPEAKER_01: Only God could change somebody.
SPEAKER_01: You knew what a wretched sinner I was.
SPEAKER_01: I sure did.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01: When I said I became a Christian short after I graduated, and after not long after that I went in the ministry.
SPEAKER_01: No way.
SPEAKER_01: And then he said this.
SPEAKER_01: I I wouldn't have believed it unless I saw it myself.
SPEAKER_01: And I looked at his wife, and his wife is like, he was the guy muttering during the whole sermon.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I heard that.
SPEAKER_01: Was that him?
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
SPEAKER_01: He was just going, No way.
SPEAKER_01: No way.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, could somebody stop saying no way?
SPEAKER_01: Way.
SPEAKER_01: He says, I'm the least of the apostles.
SPEAKER_01: He says, thirdly, he says, I'm unworthy.
SPEAKER_01: I'm unworthy.
SPEAKER_01: I don't deserve this.
SPEAKER_01: Now, why don't I make a big deal out of this?
SPEAKER_01: Look at me.
SPEAKER_01: Because some of you in this room feel the same way.
SPEAKER_01: If I ask you, hey, list out everything that's wrong with you, how screwed up are you?
SPEAKER_01: You'd be like, How long you got?
SPEAKER_01: But see, here's the reality.
SPEAKER_01: He seals the deal and he says these four words.
SPEAKER_01: He says, here's why I'm unworthy.
SPEAKER_01: Because I persecuted the church.
SPEAKER_01: I persecuted the church.
SPEAKER_01: If Paul were alive today, he'd be a member of ISIS.
SPEAKER_01: He persecuted and killed people because they didn't agree with his religion and he hated theirs.
SPEAKER_01: Just to give you a frame of reference.
SPEAKER_01: Now, the last thing I want to say to you is simply this is that grace is available.
SPEAKER_01: Grace is available.
SPEAKER_01: Look at verse 10.
SPEAKER_01: We'll be done this morning.
SPEAKER_01: He says that he lists all this stuff.
SPEAKER_01: And the first word of verse 10 is but.
SPEAKER_01: But except, in other words, if this didn't exist, I wouldn't have a chance.
SPEAKER_01: But for the grace of God, I am what I am.
SPEAKER_01: And his grace towards me was not in vain.
SPEAKER_01: On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me, whether then it was I or they, so we preached, and so you believed.
SPEAKER_01: Paul refers three times.
SPEAKER_01: In these two verses, he refers three times this thing called grace.
SPEAKER_01: Grace, grace, grace.
SPEAKER_01: So I want you to have an understanding of what he means when he says grace.
SPEAKER_01: So I brought a definition this morning.
SPEAKER_01: It's up on the screen.
SPEAKER_01: Grace.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to look at this.
SPEAKER_01: Grace is the merciful kindness by which God, exerting his influence upon souls, turns them to Christ, and then keeps, strengthens, and increases them in the Christian faith.
SPEAKER_01: Now, there's two parts to this equation.
SPEAKER_01: The first part is to the unbeliever, the person that's not yet a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: What does it mean?
SPEAKER_01: Grace is the merciful kindness by which God exerting his influence upon souls turns them to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: If you've been at this church any one Sunday, two Sundays, three Sundays, you'll realize that we don't do guilt and manipulation, a lot of pressure, a lot of games, you know.
SPEAKER_01: If you died tonight, would you go to heaven and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah?
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: Because we believe in grace.
SPEAKER_01: We believe that the grace of God has a power that I, as your pastor, do not have.
SPEAKER_01: I cannot create belief for you.
SPEAKER_01: I cannot make you become a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: I can preach what the Bible says about grace.
SPEAKER_01: I can point to grace and say, grace is the merciful kindness by which God, exerting his influence upon souls, turns them to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: I can love you enough to tell you this, though, unless your soul's ever been turned to Christ, unless you've ever been converted, you've ever become a Christian, that the grace of God, the love of God, and the forgiveness of God mean nothing to you.
SPEAKER_01: Allow me to demonstrate.
SPEAKER_01: I see a lot of people for counseling, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Because we say here a lot and we mean it.
SPEAKER_01: We don't want to just preach to you.
SPEAKER_01: We want to be your pastor.
SPEAKER_01: So I see this lady.
SPEAKER_01: She didn't go to church anywhere.
SPEAKER_01: She's in her mid-40s, a little past mid-40s, uh, and and she's very affluent.
SPEAKER_01: She's very successful.
SPEAKER_01: And she came to see me and she said, Well, first of all, what's your fee?
SPEAKER_01: I said, I don't have a fee.
SPEAKER_01: I do this for free because I may have to say things that you don't like.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're paying me, I might sell out.
SPEAKER_01: And she's like, Well, at least you're honest.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I know myself, okay?
SPEAKER_01: And so we get to talking there.
SPEAKER_01: And here was the big issue for her, because she was like, Well, I I I'm, you know, I make some bad choices.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, How do you get forgiveness for those?
SPEAKER_01: Because she made very clear, I am not a spiritual person.
SPEAKER_01: I am not a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: I do not consider myself a Christmas.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: And she came to me because she's having anxiety because all these sinful choices she was making.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, How do you get relief?
SPEAKER_01: Or my word would be forgiveness for your sins.
SPEAKER_01: And she said, Well, I just asked God for forgiveness.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, How do you get forgiveness from God if you don't have a relationship with God?
SPEAKER_01: And she was like, I don't know what you're saying.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, You're a smart woman.
SPEAKER_01: You're rolled up in a sweet Audi out there.
SPEAKER_01: You got to know what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_01: She said, No, I don't understand.
SPEAKER_01: And she works in oil and gas, she's an petroleum engineer type.
SPEAKER_01: Brilliant woman, very smart.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, You can't get the forgiveness of God unless you're in a relationship with God.
SPEAKER_01: And it was just stuck on her.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Can I ask you a personal question?
SPEAKER_01: She goes, like you haven't already.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, Well, okay, I'll just keep asking them.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Are you a woman of means?
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, Are you asking what I think you're asking me?
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, you got money?
SPEAKER_01: You got bling bling?
SPEAKER_01: And she goes, I've done okay.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, In the church, we say blessed.
SPEAKER_01: I'm blessed.
SPEAKER_01: No one in the church says, I'm loaded, I'm stacking paper up in here, make it rain.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I get the feeling, and it's okay.
SPEAKER_01: It's okay.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, her purse costs as much as my truck.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, that is a nice purse.
SPEAKER_01: How do you know?
SPEAKER_01: Because my wife wanted one, and I said, Oh, no, not gonna happen.
SPEAKER_01: If I have to finance it, you don't deserve it.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Hey, by the way, I don't care you got money, love your money, I don't care.
SPEAKER_01: But here, see, here's the thing.
SPEAKER_01: What would you think if I went to the bank and I started writing checks on your account?
SPEAKER_01: And she said, You can't do that.
SPEAKER_01: You're not related to me.
SPEAKER_01: And she said, What is this?
SPEAKER_01: I like to touch my nose and point at people.
SPEAKER_01: I said, say what you just said again.
SPEAKER_01: And she said, You cannot access my money because you're not related to me.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, You cannot re cannot access God's resources because you're not related to him.
SPEAKER_01: And so the grace of God is this merciful kindness which God exerts his influence upon souls and turns them to Christ.
SPEAKER_01: And she said, So what am I to do?
SPEAKER_01: This is not very hopeful.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, I'm just gonna ask that God would kind of begin to turn your soul towards him.
SPEAKER_01: Now she did tell me the next session when I saw her, she said, You're making it increasingly difficult for me to remain an unbeliever.
SPEAKER_01: And I said, That's not me.
SPEAKER_01: That's the grace of God.
SPEAKER_01: Because it finds you and unwinds you.
SPEAKER_01: But it goes on, see, that's conversion.
SPEAKER_01: That's what we call conversion, becoming a Christian.
SPEAKER_01: But it goes on for the believer and it says it turns up to Christ, and then, because grace never leaves you alone.
SPEAKER_01: You know that?
SPEAKER_01: Hello?
SPEAKER_01: You know, it never leaves you alone.
SPEAKER_01: That's what Paul says there up there.
SPEAKER_01: That's why he's trying to, the point he's trying to make in a lot of part in verse 10 and 11, he says, on the contrary, he says, hey, his grace towards me was not in vain.
SPEAKER_01: On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them.
SPEAKER_01: Though it's not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
SPEAKER_01: The grace of God inside of him, he turns him to Christ, and then it keeps, strengthens, and increases them in the Christian faith.
SPEAKER_01: If you're here this morning, you're already a Christian, ask yourself the question, hey, what's one of those three words do I most need?
SPEAKER_01: Is God keeping me?
SPEAKER_01: Do I need God to keep me?
SPEAKER_01: Because sometimes in the Christian life, stuff happens and it just it's kind of like it's just a groundhog day.
SPEAKER_01: It's just a series of bad stuff, and you're just kind of like, just I need to be kept.
SPEAKER_01: There's nothing wrong with that.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you need to be strengthened.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you need to be increased.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe your prayer today is, hey, Lord, Lord, I believe, help my unbelief.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says this, everyone.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible says, Do not despise the day of small beginnings.
SPEAKER_01: And so your small beginning today may be you know what?
SPEAKER_01: It's a guy who he came to church last Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: He said, This wasn't as bad as I thought.
SPEAKER_01: Should I be encouraged by that?
SPEAKER_01: Somebody said to me recently, he said, You know my favorite part of this church?
SPEAKER_01: I said, What?
SPEAKER_01: He goes, You let me bring coffee in here.
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
SPEAKER_01: So, what about the preaching and the worship?
SPEAKER_01: I like the coffee.
SPEAKER_01: I said, Okay.
SPEAKER_01: I don't hurt my feelings.
SPEAKER_01: He goes, How's that not hurt your feelings?
SPEAKER_01: I don't have any.
SPEAKER_01: No.
SPEAKER_01: Here's the thing.
SPEAKER_01: Do not despise the day of small beginnings.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, your takeaway could be this today.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you have to ponder the claims of Christianity.
SPEAKER_01: Because look at me, all right?
SPEAKER_01: We're done in one minute.
SPEAKER_01: Some of you, your heart, your soul's kind of turning towards this.
SPEAKER_01: And that's not because of me, it's because God, He speaks a language you understand.
SPEAKER_01: Hopefully you've understood today that none of you is beyond the pale.
SPEAKER_01: None of you sinned so much that God looked down and kind of said, That's it.
SPEAKER_01: You're on your own.
SPEAKER_01: It's not the God of the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Matter of fact, the God of the Bible says where sin did increase, grace did increase all the more.
SPEAKER_01: So you never outsend the grace of God.
SPEAKER_01: So maybe your small beginning is, you know what?
SPEAKER_01: I want to find a church where I can understand God and the Bible and myself better.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: We'd love for that to be here.
SPEAKER_01: If it's not, find your church somewhere that does that.
SPEAKER_01: We do this every Sunday.
SPEAKER_01: The only difference in today and next Sunday is the Easter lilies, okay?
SPEAKER_01: We don't put on a big dog and pony show, and then the next week you show up and it's like.
SPEAKER_01: Every week we go hard after God in worship.
SPEAKER_01: And every week we open up the Bible and it finds us and it unwinds us and makes us think things that we by nature and pace would not normally think.
SPEAKER_01: So look up there at that definition and just kind of ask yourself, hey, because Paul says this about grace, and I'll be done.
SPEAKER_01: Verse 11, he says, whether then it was I or they, so we preached, and so you believed.
SPEAKER_01: What do you?
SPEAKER_01: Here's my question for you, and I'm done.
SPEAKER_01: What are you gonna walk out here in a few minutes and believe that you did not believe before you walked in here?
SPEAKER_01: Because wherever grace is preached, wherever grace is preached, people are given something to believe in.
SPEAKER_01: And so, what's your takeaway?
SPEAKER_01: For some of you, maybe that that one point we talked about the Bible's reliable.
SPEAKER_01: You may want to walk away and go, you know what, I need to start reading the Bible.
SPEAKER_01: Starting the Gospel of John.
SPEAKER_01: Fourth book of the New Testament.
SPEAKER_01: After we do this next series, we're gonna preach to the Gospel of John.
SPEAKER_01: Why?
SPEAKER_01: The Bible's not a list of rules and regulations that tell you how much you stink.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible is a reminder of who God is and who you are, and who God can make you into.
SPEAKER_01: He has the grace to accept you as you are and the power to change you into who the Bible says you are.
SPEAKER_01: Okay?
SPEAKER_01: Let's think about these things.
SPEAKER_01: Let's pray together.
SPEAKER_01: I said a minute ago, we like to just teach the Bible and give you, I told you at the beginning, we like to teach the Bible and give you some soul space to think about it.
SPEAKER_01: And that's what this time is for.
SPEAKER_01: Clyde, our worship pastor, is gonna just sing an old hymn, a verse of an old hymn over us.
SPEAKER_01: And just ask yourself, hey, what's what's happening inside of me?
SPEAKER_01: Is my soul kind of turning towards this?
SPEAKER_01: Do I feel myself having some desires I don't by nature have?
SPEAKER_01: That's okay.
SPEAKER_01: Have you ever experienced the merciful kindness of God?
SPEAKER_01: And perhaps he's exerting his influence over you this morning.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe you're a believer and you just need to be strengthened in your faith.
SPEAKER_01: Whatever it is, just let's just take a minute and listen.
SPEAKER_01: Father, we're mindful today that you're not a God, you're not a God that comes and tries to get us all jammed up with religious rules.
SPEAKER_01: You're the one true God who came to set us free, to give us back what we forfeited through disobedience, what the Bible calls sin.
SPEAKER_01: You came to restore.
SPEAKER_01: Thank you that you're a God of restoration and forgiveness and a God of grace.
SPEAKER_01: I pray, Father, for those that are here in this room and they don't have a relationship with you, that they would feel their souls kind of turning towards that, towards that reality, towards your invitation to them.
SPEAKER_01: I pray for the believer that they'd be strengthened in their faith, their faith would increase, that they'd live a connected life, integrated life.
SPEAKER_01: Lord, all of this is possible because of the resurrection.
SPEAKER_01: Because of the life, death, burial, and resurrection of King Jesus.
SPEAKER_01: So thank you.
SPEAKER_01: May the power of the resurrection be manifest in our life this day and this week.
SPEAKER_01: We pray in Christ's name.
SPEAKER_01: When everyone said, Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Thanks for being part of our service.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, I encourage you to take your worship folder with you as information about events at our church, but about our church as well.
SPEAKER_01: If you have any questions about anything you heard or about our church, some of those will be available down front when you're dismissed here in a second.
SPEAKER_01: Let me just point to three things that are in your bulletin we want you to be aware of.
SPEAKER_01: First of all, once a month we have a men's breakfast.
SPEAKER_01: Our next one is this Tuesday.
SPEAKER_01: It's from 6 to 7 o'clock in the morning.
SPEAKER_01: It's at the warehouse, which is our student ministry building towards the back of our property.
SPEAKER_01: This building right here is our children's ministry building, and behind that is the warehouse of student ministry building.
SPEAKER_01: Uh, it's free breakfast.
SPEAKER_01: We have Whataburger Taquitos.
SPEAKER_01: You're more than welcome to come.
SPEAKER_01: I'll talk about 15 minutes, and then we come have some discussion questions around the table.
SPEAKER_01: You can talk, or you can just sit there and drink coffee and eat and go.
SPEAKER_01: I'm just checking it out, okay?
SPEAKER_01: Uh so we'd love for you.
SPEAKER_01: Each one's a standalone.
SPEAKER_01: So if you've never been, you can come this Tuesday and fit right in.
SPEAKER_01: Second thing I'll remind you of is that on Friday night we have what's called Secret Church.
SPEAKER_01: It's a why it's a live telecast of uh a guy named David Platt.
SPEAKER_01: He's teaching and takes a different topic and kind of walks it through a workbook.
SPEAKER_01: And this time it's about the Bible in the age of uh of cynicism and in this jaded age we live.
SPEAKER_01: Is the Bible reliable?
SPEAKER_01: How do we get it?
SPEAKER_01: So if you want to get a bigger understanding about the Bible, the authority of the Bible, this is a great opportunity.
SPEAKER_01: It is a time commitment, though.
SPEAKER_01: It's from 5:30 to 11:30.
SPEAKER_01: And so there'll be snacks and breaks, okay?
SPEAKER_01: So if you'd like some more information on a register, you can click on the church website and get all that there.
SPEAKER_01: The last thing I want to tell you is that next time, because people ask me all the time, they visit on Easter, they go, What do you do every Sunday?
SPEAKER_01: Uh next Sunday we start a new sermon series called Life Songs.
SPEAKER_01: Uh and because sometimes your life looks like that guitar there.
SPEAKER_01: That guitar is named Trigger, and it belongs to a man named Willie Nelson.
SPEAKER_01: That's Willie's arm.
SPEAKER_01: Uh he stopped by last week.
SPEAKER_01: We shot that picture in the parking lot.
SPEAKER_01: I appreciated it.
SPEAKER_01: Anyway.
SPEAKER_01: Because sometimes life just beats the snot out of you.
SPEAKER_01: That's why.
SPEAKER_01: Sometimes people come by relationships and they just scrawl graffiti on you on the walls of your heart, and then they walk out and leave you heartbroken.
SPEAKER_01: The Bible, we'll look at this four or five-part series from the book in the Bible called The Psalms.
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of the prayer book of God's people.
SPEAKER_01: We'll cover the range of emotion.
SPEAKER_01: You'll see people that are so excited they can't stand themselves, and then people that are so low, they're like, God, I don't know if you're even real.
SPEAKER_01: And everything in between.
SPEAKER_01: So we'd love for you to come be a part of that with us, okay?
SPEAKER_01: We'd like to close our service with a blessing.
SPEAKER_01: So if you'd stand to your feet, let me speak a blessing over you, and you can get out of here.
SPEAKER_01: Hold your hands out.
SPEAKER_01: Christ rose from the dead not to condemn you, but to make forgiveness possible and available, free, informative.
SPEAKER_01: Depart now and live in these realities.
SPEAKER_01: In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Amen.
SPEAKER_01: Bless you or dismiss you.