Grace Makes Us Family | Sarah Escandon

In this enlightening podcast sermon, we journey through the concept of grace and its powerful role in forming us into a family within God's kingdom. Drawing from personal experiences and the profound truths in Galatians 4:4-7, we unpack the themes of identity, adoption, and mission.

This message sheds light on how grace changes our lives—not through striving or achievements, but by embracing our identity as God's beloved children. You’ll be inspired to live with confidence, love others deeply, and serve as Christ’s ambassadors in the world. Through engaging stories and scriptural insights, discover how to approach God boldly, foster genuine connections, and rely on the Holy Spirit to reflect Christ’s love.

Tune in to explore God’s invitation to grow in grace, reshape your relationships, and fulfill your God-given purpose. Whether you're dealing with personal challenges, desiring deeper community ties, or searching for meaning, this sermon offers encouragement and practical guidance for living out your faith identity in everyday life. Don’t miss out on experiencing how grace makes us a family and empowers our mission in the world.

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Transcript

 Did y'all have a good Thanksgiving?

Yeah?

Oh, I did.

My aunt made two turkeys, you know what I'm saying?

We came ready to eat.

But I don't know about you guys, but whether you got to spend it with friends or with family, or maybe you were doing something new this year, I feel like the holidays always remind us of family.

They always bring family to mind.

And over Thanksgiving, over the last few weeks of getting to spend some extra quality time with family, I was reminded of a moment that really significantly shaped the way that I saw family.

 and as I've been praying for you cathedrals I've been praying for our church in this message I really believe that what God was reminding me of is connected to where God is leading us because God has an identity on this house he has invitations to this house through the words that he's prophesied over us and he is interested in forming us into being more than a church that just gathers he's interested in forming us into a family sons and daughters who know who we are who know how much God loves us

 Siblings who love and guard one another.

Siblings who pursue one another.

Ambassadors who carry his name boldly into the world, representing King Jesus with great grace and truth and compassion.

And I don't know about you, but when I look at my life, none of it happened because I was really great.

 Like, me being able to step into any of those things never happened because I worked really hard, because I really set my mind to it, right?

And it sure as heck didn't happen by accident.

Like, me thinking about it or me just hearing a message didn't necessarily just make something change in me.

Maturity happens by grace.

 And God has heaps of it.

So we're in a good spot.

Like we're set up.

We're set up to succeed.

We're set up to experience and grow in God.

And so today we're going to talk about how grace makes us family.

How grace makes us family and what it looks like to live from that identity together.

 together.

And you know, growing up, I was the youngest of three.

I've got two older brothers and my maiden name is Wallach.

So in case I say that later, that's why.

But we were all born within three years.

Like my parents be crazy.

I was a surprise, but we were born within three years.

Like I'm less than a year apart from my middle brother, Matt.

So they call us Irish triplets.

So there's three of us.

Yeah, it'd be crazy.

God bless my parents.

All the parents are like mercy.

 Um, but yeah, but we were, we were born so close.

And so what that meant is that anytime I went into school, like my last name was fresh on teacher's minds.

You know what I'm saying?

Like they didn't have any chance to forget about the legacy that my brothers may have left or may have built.

And the most common thing, whether it was a sports field, whether it was a classroom or whether it was like a community thing, the phrase that I heard most of my life is here comes another Wallach.

 I know you.

And it was the best.

Like in other words, right?

Like I was known before I was known because of who I belong to.

 right?

And so I'll never forget one moment that shaped how I lived the rest of high school, and mind you, I didn't know Jesus in high school.

I wasn't saved until college, and so I look back on this moment, and I'm so evident of how it was God's grace over me, protecting me before I wanted anything to do with him, guarding me, and protecting me from a lot of things that I might have stepped into.

It was early freshman year, and I, you know, third of

 two boys and so I was basically a third boy, kind of like got born into cleats, if you will.

Not really pink jellies, more like soccer cleats and hand-me-downs.

But so we were really into sports and so my brothers all played sports and I played sports and I was at my high school freshman year and I was out there getting some extra training in for the soccer team.

Soccer tryouts were about to happen.

 and I was really ambitious and and wanting to make the varsity team as a freshman and so I was out there trying to get some extra reps in and the soccer team shared the field with the baseball team and so I was out there running and then the varsity baseball coach rocks up and he just looks at me because I was like the only one out there and he was like who are you and what are you doing here like what are you doing out on this field when no one else is here and I said I'm Sarah Wallach I'm just prepping for for soccer trouts I'm just getting some extra conditioning in and he paused

 And he looked at me and he said a sentence I will never forget.

You're a Wallach.

I hope you work as hard as your brother.

 And that moment changed everything.

It hit me immediately.

My parents had built something.

They'd shaped who they'd raised us to be.

And my brother exemplified that, modeled that for me.

And now I carry that legacy.

I remember standing there in the field, just complete at a stop.

And I remember thinking, there is no way I'm going to ruin what my parents built or be the reason that what was said about my brother cannot be said about our last name.

 There was something in me that said, I don't wanna just carry the Wallach name, I wanna do it justice.

I wanna carry and be the reason that that gets to be true.

And I didn't recognize it then, right?

Like I said, I was just living my life, but looking back now, grace was forming me.

Grace was protecting me.

My brother's example shaped my belonging before I could earn it.

 was a freshman had no credibility had no patches on the jacket you know i'm saying like you know like but was barely making friends and the last name wallach meant something that i got to step into even though i didn't earn it and it kept me honestly that sense of legacy that was given by my parents and and modeled by my brother kept me from a lot of painful recklessness because i hadn't i had an understanding of what was at stake with the choices that i made in high school

 And again, I didn't know Jesus.

And I guarantee you, I would have plunged into so many other decisions if it weren't for something bigger than myself to represent.

And I didn't work for that covering.

I didn't love God enough.

I didn't earn anything like that was just given.

It was grace unto me.

My identity was a gift that I got to receive and steward and care for.

And scripture tells us the same story, only get this, infinitely better.

Yeah.

 infinitely better because you didn't just inherit a name people of god you were adopted by god himself this is the reality and so i want to walk us through galatians 4 4 4 through 7 who loves scripture who loves the word of god the only thing that we can build our life upon the words of life

 This is what it says in Galatians 4, four through seven.

This is where we're gonna be today to realize how much better it is being in the family of God even.

Galatians 4 starts with, but when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his son, born of a woman, born under the law to redeem those who are under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons.

And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of his son

 See, the idea here is that living as a son or daughter isn't about effort.

It's not about personality.

It's not about if you got the right vibes.

It's not about entitlement or what you can earn.

It's about allowing the Spirit to do a work in you that we are incapable of doing in ourselves.

Amen.

 And the good news is that just like we need this reminder, so did the early church, right?

We have these words because this was a need, because Paul knew our propensity to move into slavery, to move into earning, to move into survival.

And he didn't just say it to the church in Galatians.

He said it to the church in Rome too.

He told them that we didn't receive a spirit of slavery so that we could fall back into fear, so that we could fall into self-defense and trying to take care of ourselves.

No, we received the spirit of adoption.

 right?

The spirit who teaches our hearts to cry Abba.

And I love that word cry because I don't know about you, but anytime I hear my nieces and nephews crying, they don't whisper.

You know what I'm saying?

Like they don't go.

 Like, Henry wasn't like, Dad, can I have another Spider-Man?

Like, he was like, Dad!

I was like, Dad, can I have the toy?

Crying, crying out Abba Father denotes confidence.

It means you know who you're talking to, and you know the relationship that you have with them.

And that's what the Spirit does.

It teaches our hearts to come with confidence and boldness before the throne of God.

 And so if becoming sons and daughters is a work of the Spirit, I want to impact for us a little bit deeper today what that means.

So let's go verse by verse, going back to that verse 4.

But when the fullness of time had come, God set forth his Son, born of a woman, born under law.

Paul first sets out reminding us of God's perfect wisdom and timing.

 we can just take a deep breath right there, that he is infinitely trustworthy.

In saying the fullness of time had come, Paul is saying that in God's perfect wisdom, knowing the right moment in human history to send Jesus, he did so to fulfill every single promise he made to redeem humanity.

 And in the middle of Paul's reminder, he draws our attention to two very specific characteristics of the father sending of the son that we need to clue into today.

The first is that Jesus was born of a woman.

What Paul is saying here is that the second person of the Trinity, who is fully God, added humanity to his deity.

 Jesus is both fully God and fully man.

And we're going to get to what this means for us in a moment.

But second thing that we got to take note of is that in taking on humanity, Jesus submitted himself, lived under the full authority and weight of the Mosaic law that was given to the Jews by God.

 What the Bible is putting forward for us to recognize is that because Jesus is God, the all-powerful, he's got all the power and the wisdom and the resources needed to redeem us.

And because Jesus is man, he has the very right

 the ability, rather, to redeem you and me and all of humanity.

There was heresy, which is basically like false teaching, going around in the fourth century saying that Jesus did not have the mind like a human mind, that he did not have the fullness of humanity in his mind as well.

And a fourth century theologian, Gregory of Nazianzus, I knew I was going to mess that up, said it perfectly.

He said this, whatever is not assumed cannot be healed.

 If Jesus had only come as God, untouched by our suffering, untouched by your weakness, untouched by your grief, untouched or unafflicted by the temptation that every single one of us faces in our humanity could not have been saved.

It would have been impossible.

But because Jesus took it all on, he can heal it all.

 And that's not an accident.

That was the plan.

That was the plan, that he assumed everything it meant to be human so that he could heal it all.

Or in other words, like Paul said, redeem.

Right?

In Galatians 4, 5, Christ came to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons.

Paul is making a stunning claim.

We do not enter God's family by earning.

 not by achieving, not by behaving, not by proving.

We enter because we've put our faith in the son to redeem us, knowing that we couldn't redeem ourselves.

 As humans, we will struggle against, or as myself, we will struggle against sin our entire lives.

I don't know about you, putting my faith in Jesus didn't make me perfect.

It just helps me be sanctified and drawn near over and over.

But in that fight, I get discouraged sometimes.

How about you?

And sometimes in my foolishness, I even distance myself from God, thinking that I need to clean myself up first.

Have you ever been there?

 Because what this verse is doing, the reason we're hanging out here is because it pulls us up from the ditches of self salvation and of bitterness or despair that we so easily trip into with the truth that our hope is not in us.

Your hope is not in you to make yourself better.

 your hope is in jesus christ who accomplished the work of redeeming humanity because he alone provides both the forgiveness from our sins and the new heart that we needed that desires to love and obey god we didn't just need a clean slate we needed a new heart and jesus did it all so yes we stray and struggle and often fail but in our weakness as sons and daughters we are not turned away

 If you can believe it, and I encourage you to do so today, we are invited to draw near based on Jesus's righteousness, based on him and him alone, commanded even, right?

Commanded to receive the mercy that God has towards us, to come boldly, to find the powerful and precious grace that actually empowers us to live the life that God has called us to live.

 It makes perfect sense in why God would say, I've given you everything you need for a life of godliness, right?

Because he knows it's not going to be us.

We need him.

And he's given us him.

He's not held anything back.

He gave us the son on the cross.

And after that, he pours out his spirit.

 Paul is grounding us in the truth that he didn't just die so you could be a forgiven sinner.

In Roman culture, in the culture where Paul was talking to the church in Galatia, they would have been so familiar with this, that adoption was not about pity.

 It was about inheritance.

A wealthy man would legally adopt his son to make him the rightful heir of everything.

Like everything, y'all.

I'm talking land.

I'm talking wealth.

I'm talking name.

I'm talking legacy.

Paul is saying that Christ didn't just forgive you.

He made you an heir.

 You don't just get a clean record.

You get the full inheritance of God.

What is that inheritance?

Peace with God through Jesus Christ.

And the very Spirit of God poured into your heart lavishly.

The Spirit of God that draws you near and watch, just like it says in that next verse, verse 6, confirms that you have been claimed as a beloved son or daughter.

 Right?

Verse 6.

And because you are sons, he has sent the spirit of a son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father.

Jesus was the son by nature.

We become sons and daughters by adoption.

Adoption language means you were wanted.

I was not a choice child.

I am a chosen child.

 And the same goes for you.

You were brought near intentionally.

You belong, not because you're impressive, but because you're loved.

We got to look at verses 6 and 7 together now to understand Paul's crucial declaration.

And because you are sons, God has sent the spirit of a son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father, so you are no longer a slave, but a son.

And if a son, then an

 than an heir through God.

Meaning belonging isn't just a theological concept we are meant to keep up here.

It is a reality we are meant to experience.

And this is what it looks like to live from that.

Grace empowers you as a child to worship.

 not out of duty, not out of fear or conformity, but because you actually believe God delights in you.

Where's Candy Woo at?

Oh, she's serving in... No, she's... Hi, you're right at the camera.

This is amazing.

Candy Woo is a stunning example of this.

Have you seen this girl?

She doesn't need a warm-up song in worship.

She's not coming in using the first song to decide whether or not God is worthy of her all.

She responds by the first moment she walks in, ready to respond to God with gratitude and bold humility.

 faithfully carrying the culture of extravagant worship that has been sacrificially set by our lead pastors.

She catches the vision and she carries it.

As a child who trusts God, what we do is we walk into this room on a Sunday morning and feel at home.

Not because you've performed well enough, but because you know your family, if you are in the family of God.

 Hobie Harder is a beautiful example of daughterhood at Cathedral.

Her servanthood is marked by a constant joy that is like literally like, I don't know, I just keep thinking of like Flubber, you know, like he gets everywhere kind of or like all the things.

Like you can't walk by Hobie without Hobie's joy getting up on you.

You know what I'm saying?

Like she creates life for the whole team, for the whole room every time she serves.

And let me just tell you, as someone who knows that kind of joy, the joy that she serves with,

 The joy that comes with being present instead of anxious.

It's simply out of reach when you are preoccupied with proving yourself and earning your spot.

Hobie knows she belongs and it shows in her generosity of spirit.

 See, experiencing the reality that Paul is talking about, what we're talking about today looks like knowing your God's beloved child.

And when you know that, you don't just carry his name, but carry his heart.

You become the reason people don't go unseen on Sundays and why neighborhood groups actually feel like family.

 You do that and you have an understanding of what you've experienced with God, that there was always room at the table.

So you live with that kind of mentality.

This example is a two-for-one special.

Y'all ready?

 I love Sam Alvarado and Brock Vinari, who embody God's heart for the new and lost.

The first day I met Brock, what, like four months ago?

I don't know, recently.

Like he came to the Connect Us.

Sam had already introduced this man to like 82 people, including his neighborhood group leaders, including inviting him to hang out with the boys that week.

And now months later, Brock is doing the same for another young man named Riley, who's about to get baptized next Sunday.

Shout out, get baptized.

 And I was on the phone with Brock and we were talking about praying for Riley and just helping him prepare.

And because we pair people up so that everyone that gets baptized is prayed for the whole way through.

And I was asking Brock, like, how do you know homeboy so well?

Like, how did this happen?

He literally just came.

And Brock told me, I just thought about how easy Sam made it for me to get connected.

How open he was with his life, inviting me to hangouts and inviting me into group.

So I did for Riley what Sam did for me.

 And all Sam did was notice that Brock walked in alone and he decided it was more important to put himself out there to uphold the heart of God and the heart of this house for a son who is looking for a home.

 That's as simple as it is.

And Cathedral, I believe God is inviting you into the same reality.

He's not wanting you to live from a mental concept.

He's wanting you to live from your identity, fully lived in as his beloved children, empowered by grace.

Your identity was never meant to stay in your head.

I'm so glad two people love it.

Today, God is inviting you, and this is so crucial.

He's inviting you to live from it, not try harder.

 That's just for me, but maybe it's for you too.

Because by asking for the grace, you need to be transformed from the inside out.

God can't help but say yes.

It's one of his favorite prayers.

The ultimate message of this passion, of this passage, Galatians 4, 4 through 7 is that forgiveness gets you out of slavery.

Adoption brings you into family.

And once we're in family, grace doesn't stop.

It forms us.

 right brock was was formed by sam's care sam no doubt was formed by the way that all these other boys right neighborhood group leaders and everything had brought him in it's forming and god forms us in family it teaches us to worship freely to love deeply to live boldly as ambassadors for the king in other words grace doesn't only accomplish our salvation it empowers our sanctification

 And it guards us, if we'll let it, as we live toward God's ultimate restoration.

And you know, before we talk about how to live this out, we need to remember something crucial.

Jesus didn't just make you a child.

He modeled for you what it was like to live as a child.

He worshiped the Father in intimacy.

He loved his brothers and sisters, even when they were slow.

And y'all be knowing the disciples.

Even when they were frustrating.

 even when they were immature.

And he carried the father's welcome to the world, eating with the outsider.

 touching the unclean, restoring the forgotten.

And now through the spirit, he empowers us to live the very same way.

The spirit, the reason that we can bet on this is because the spirit's favorite thing is to reveal the son to us, to make us more like Jesus, to grow us in Christ likeness.

And this is exactly what we're talking about doing today.

And I want you to know, I see it all over this house.

I see IO who felt God speaking to him during house offering to buy a camera, like a nice camera,

 to start shooting video for the video team on the Sundays when he's not already serving on essentials.

And as if that wasn't enough, he drove down to Jesus Image Worship Conference to watch how their video team captured the night.

Homeboy drove down to the OC in traffic.

 You know what I'm saying?

But that's hard.

You don't do that to earn a spot.

That's overflow.

That's identity.

That's identity lived out.

I see Michaela Jones, who moved here from Texas to be, or Tennessee, to be a daughter in this community.

She's always ready to greet people with encouragement, to lead us in worship, to lead people as a neighborhood group leader with grace and trustworthiness.

 I see Jojo Reyes, who's back there faithfully on sound, making sure I sound all right.

He's always willing to serve in and outside of the house, willing and joyful about having his plans completely rearranged so that he can sit with a stranger and tell them about Jesus.

There are people in this church because Jojo gave up his lunch break to have a conversation with a regular at his coffee shop.

 This is what it's like.

That's having an identity of an ambassador, right?

And lastly, how about Tanner Yoder?

This man has stepped up so much in these last few months, just graduated.

I'll see you.

I'll see you.

Just graduated from discipleship group, about to step into leading our amazing venue team.

And here's the thing.

It's not just him carrying a role.

 No, no, no.

Tanner knows what it means to carry responsibility.

He has taken on a new understanding of what it means to be a member of this house, taking time to hang out with newer guys, bring people in, seeing it as his responsibility of this house to represent and bring people in, to make room for more people.

 That is what it looks like.

Identity means that you don't carry a role.

You carry a responsibility, right?

Children in this house, we have responsibility and it's the most beautiful entrustment.

It's a joy.

And this is what it looks like when grace is forming us right into greater reflections of Jesus Christ, not perfection.

Notice perfection was not in any one of those stories.

Faithfulness was.

 responsiveness to the spirits leading.

It took Tanner saying yes to D group.

It took IO being sensitive and hearing from God and then actually hitting purchase, right?

He didn't just leave it in his cart.

He followed through on what the spirit was leading him.

He then drove down again, like all of these things, Hobie, right?

I'm sure Hobie doesn't have the most amazing week.

Every single week chooses joy before she walks in.

 knowing she sets a tone as a daughter of this house, right?

Not striving, but responding to what Christ has already done.

And this same grace that formed them is the grace that will form you and I, is the grace that will form your children as you raise them, is the grace that will shape Cathedral to be the house God has called it to be, that LA needs it to be, that Nashville needs it to be, that every future city we are in will need us to be.

 And the beautiful thing is everyone has put their faith in Jesus Christ as Lord.

We are already adopted.

It's settled.

It's so settled.

And now grace teaches us how to live like family.

And if you've yet to trust in God to redeem and lead your life, coming to him humbly saying, I can't do it.

It's all you.

I trust you.

I submit to you.

You're going to have the opportunity to do that today.

And I encourage you to step into that life, that relationship with God.

 Because if we are going to grow into the identity that he gives every single person who turns from their sin and trusts in Jesus, the adopted, the beloved, the holy wanted sons and daughters, we need to remember the agenda of God's grace in our lives.

Grace adopts us as sons and daughters.

Grace grows us into family.

And grace sends us on mission.

 But before we talk about what it looks like, I don't want you walking out of here with a list of behaviors to change, a list of things to do.

I wanna help us understand how grace works.

Because many of us have been trained in the wrong paradigm.

The slave paradigm, the one that our flesh defaults to, the one that the world reinforces, the one that we fall back into when we forget the glorious riches of the gospel, is this.

Try harder to pray.

 should you should no no just try harder to forgive just just do it just just just forgive try harder to serve with joy it's okay just keep shoving everything else down just choose joy just shove just just just just do this thing i'm glad there are a few honest people in the room and when you fail here's the thing it tells you when you fail muster up more will power and try again

 This is the way of slavery.

Always performing, never secure.

And if you recognize that in any area of your life, it might not be your whole life.

Maybe it's one or two.

Maybe it's a few.

The altar will be here for you.

And we can confidently lay that down and ask God for his help to live as a child.

But we need to be able to recognize what might be at work in us.

Because Christ didn't come to make you a better slave.

He came to make you a child.

 He came to set you free.

And remember what we just read in Galatians 4, that Jesus was born under the law to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons, right?

And Paul says, so you are no longer a slave, but a son.

What is the sonship paradigm?

What is the daughterhood paradigm?

This is the child paradigm, the way of grace.

We start with Christ's all sufficiency and our weaknesses.

 We don't start with what we need to try harder at.

We start with who Christ is, what he's done, why we can even hope for a better, more whole life.

And we start with where we need help.

We confess our inability and we ask for grace and watch Christ work.

 This is crucial.

I'm not here today to talk to you about how to perform better as a Christian.

That is not the heart of this house.

This is not the heart of pastors Jake and Nicole.

That is not the heart of God for you to just perform better.

We are talking about how to behold Christ more clearly.

Because as we behold him, when you see him, you cannot help but be changed.

I don't have a shot in you know where at changing myself.

 But I have a really good opportunity every time I just take time to be still and look and meditate and think upon what Christ has done, what Christ did on the cross, what he's afforded me now in the spirit.

This is what we're talking about.

And so what does it look like living as sons and daughters?

I'm going to give us three ways.

These are not three things to do better.

I'm giving you three pieces of language for your prayer life.

 God can do way more when we're in prayer than he can do when we're just trying to do it.

And he, I just, I promise you, he always meets you.

And you know, I just like, as I think about being a child, I think about being a sibling, I think about being an ambassador.

I want to encourage you guys, I don't do this perfectly.

 But I get to talk about this because the grace of God has done a work in my life.

And he's here to do one in yours.

You know, earlier this year, I was building ministry with someone on our team and things got really hard.

And instead of addressing it, I let frustration build up.

Like if my heart had a shelf, I was collecting hurts and misunderstanding, like, oh, I'll just put that there.

And like, I'll take care of that later.

Oh, that could fit nicely there next to the picture frame.

This is me just camping out.

I'm probably the only one who does this.

Maybe it's just me.

 But I noticed I was growing bitter.

I knew I needed to have a conversation, but I was terrified.

Terrified of saying it wrong.

Of making it worse.

Of messing up the relationship.

And a friend, because I have friends in this house who have full permission to speak into my life, to guard me and protect me, encouraged me to talk to her.

 And I walked away intending to do it, but I didn't because I got in my head again.

And I don't know about you, but just all the ways that it could go wrong or trying to figure out what I needed to say or what was really in my heart and what was going on.

And I remember I was in my devotional one morning and I just cried out to God.

Like I was so grieved by what I was letting happen in my heart because I knew it wasn't God's heart.

And I just finally, I got to the end of myself and I said, I don't know how to do this.

 I don't know how to bring this up, but I know your heart is for unity and tenderness, and I want that too.

I just don't know how to get there.

Would you please help me?

Give me the grace I need to overcome my pride and my fear, and in that moment, in my weakness and my inability, God and the Holy Spirit brought something to mind.

The Sunday before, Michelle Kalou, who's in this room somewhere, or maybe, oh yeah, right there in that beautiful, hell, look at that beautiful smile.

 Michelle called me up the Sunday before and said, Sarah, I owe you an apology.

The Holy Spirit convicted me at the altar, at the altar, talk about humility, that I've been believing the lie that you don't have my back and I've been building alongside you like we're not a team.

Would you forgive me?

 I was stunned.

I didn't even think she needed to apologize.

Quite frankly, she was doing great.

Like it was amazing.

But she and in her humility and courage, they were so beautiful.

And as I was crying out to God that morning, the Holy Spirit spoke to me.

I've already shown you how to do this.

I gave you Michelle as an example.

 all the anxiety left, all the fear left.

I knew what I needed to do.

I needed to sit my friend down.

It wasn't about airing anything out.

It wasn't about coming and trying to explain things perfectly.

I just needed to apologize.

I didn't need to explain anything, it turned out.

I just needed the freedom to apologize.

So I sat down with her and I said, I need to apologize.

I've let things build up in my heart that have no business being there.

And I've not believed in the best, the best in you.

I've grown bitter.

 And I'd like to ask for your forgiveness.

And just like I met Michelle with grace, this sister met me with grace, heaps of grace.

And in both of those instances, trust was rebuilt.

The relationship was deepened.

And here's what I realized.

Pride is tragic, not just because of it being sin, but because of what it costs us.

My pride was keeping me from the very grace that I needed.

 It was stunting a relationship God wanted to heal.

And it was robbing me of the joy of being family.

 You know, I think about that.

God's grace was at work in Michelle.

This is why I talk about grace making us a family.

How beautiful it is to be in the family.

Imagine if I was trying to do that alone.

If I didn't have my friend sit with me and encourage me and hold me accountable to talking to that friend.

If I didn't have that example of grace in Michelle.

But that was God's grace at work.

None of us get credit.

God's grace was at work in Michelle at an altar just like this, giving her the courage to call me.

God's grace was at work in me, speaking to me in my devotional.

God's grace was at work in my sister meeting me with forgiveness.

 Grace doesn't just meet us individually and it doesn't just save us individually either.

It meets and forms us into family.

Grace's direction is always towards other people.

If you're ever heading in the opposite direction, I would ask God for a refreshing of his grace.

And here's the thing, right?

I said, I don't want to talk to you about just having better behaviors.

 I want to talk to you about being children, about being siblings, about being ambassadors.

And here's the thing.

What we have to do, the paradigm, right, is acknowledging our need.

It's identifying Christ's all-sufficiency, confessing our need, and coming to God, asking for his grace.

And then here is the kicker, though, responding in faith.

 right?

Lifted hands in worship, sitting with someone at coffee on your lunch break, going and driving hours in traffic to better serve your house.

Those are responses to the invitation of grace to be at work in our lives.

And so here's what we do.

As children, we get to behold Christ and what he's done for us.

Hebrews 10, 19, Hebrews 10, 19, 20, 22 says this,

 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the holy places by what?

By the blood of Jesus.

By the new and living way that he opened up for us.

Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith.

Jesus is your mediator.

Because of his blood, the way is open.

And now the Father delights to hear from you.

Not because your performance, but because you're in Christ.

 And so even though sometimes we don't always live like this, we treat being in God's presence like a duty.

We worship and pray because it's what we're supposed to do or what the culture of cathedral is.

Or we approach God like an employee checking in.

God's got grace for you.

He's got grace for the exhausted one.

He's got grace for the distant child.

He's got grace for the child full of fear.

He's got grace for the child who doesn't know how to close.

 So here's what grace invites us to do, right?

Acknowledge the need.

And here's the first way we can pray.

Father, I don't know how to pray like your child, but Jesus made a way.

Help me.

Give me the grace to come boldly and trust your mercy.

And when you do come in your weakness, the spirit does what only he can do.

He reminds you you're loved and he teaches your heart to cry Abba.

 How about when it comes to being siblings?

Because grace doesn't stop with your relationship to God.

It shapes how you relate to one another.

Listen to what Paul says in Ephesians 2, 18 through 22, and we can put that whole just me and Jesus thing to bed.

Y'all ready?

 Through him, we both have access.

And once, I'm a discipleship director, so sorry.

Let me just disciple for a minute.

Through him, we both have access in one spirit to the Father.

Son, you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built on the foundation of the apostles and the prophets.

Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole structure being joined, what?

Grows into a holy temple in the Lord.

In him, you are also being built

 into a dwelling place for the spirit of God.

Did you catch that?

That Christ reconciled you.

You were an enemy.

I was an enemy of God.

Wanted nothing to do with him.

Defamed his name, but this is what he does.

He made me family.

He brought me near.

You were a stranger and he brought you home.

 And now the spirit is building you together with your brothers and sisters into a dwelling place for God.

That means your spiritual life isn't just about your relationship with Jesus.

It's about whether you're growing in togetherness with the local church that he has planted you in.

It's about whether you are contributing alongside your brothers and sisters to this cathedral family becoming a place where God loves to dwell.

 right every single one of those stories is not just that people are perfect or they did something they were making a dwelling place can you imagine being the father and looking at his children what they were doing like man i love the way candy worships oh my gosh i can't believe the way i was stepping into servanthood like my son right that that's what we get to step into and so you know sometimes we get tripped up and we live like we roommates and not like we family

 I don't know about you, roommates are way more likely to keep people at a distance.

Roommates are way more likely to label food.

I just released freedom.

No, I'm just kidding.

Roommates, they're more likely, I love that y'all laugh.

Roommates keep people at a distance.

They're way more likely to avoid conflict.

They're way more likely to leave when things get messy.

 And aside from that lease, they really ain't got nothing but keeping them from like leaving.

They could even sublease if they wanted to.

You know what I'm saying?

Like roommates are crazy.

But sometimes we be showing up to the house of God, to the family of God, like roommates.

Not knowing how to share in the riches of the inheritance.

Not knowing how to share in all that God has given us.

But even when we get tripped up, here's what grace invites us to do.

Acknowledge the need.

 confess the roommate mentality, and then in your weakness, ask God for the grace to love like a sibling.

Not perfectly, but faithfully.

And here again, not another checkbox for you to tick off, but a prayer you can pray.

Father, I don't know how to forgive as you've forgiven me.

 don't know how to stay when it's hard i don't know how to draw near enough for it to get hard at times so but still so far away it's not hard at all but god wants you up close god wants people praying for you in your world i want people to know more about you than the god is good amen that you can give someone on a sunday you can say

 don't know how to stay when it's hard but God you've reconciled me help me give me the grace to love my brothers and sisters the way that you have loved me and when you do when we come in our weakness and ask for this for the grace the Spirit does what only he can do he supernaturally softened your heart towards the person who hurt you he gives you the courage to stay in the hard conversation

 He builds you together with people you would have never chosen on your own.

And somehow, miraculously, it becomes family.

That's the fruit of beholding Christ and receiving grace.

Not striving to be a better sibling, not try harder, but discovering that when you remember how Christ reconciled you, you cannot help but reconcile with others.

And I want to invite us to stand.

The last one is Ambassadors.

 And I hope you're picking up on the cadence here, right?

Not do this, not do that.

Reflect on Christ's righteousness and glory.

Confess our need.

Ask for grace.

And watch what the Spirit does, right?

And I won't go into the full verse, but 2 Corinthians 5, 17 says that Christ has reconciled us to himself and given us the ministry of reconciliation.

Therefore, we are ambassadors of Christ, God making his appeal through us.

 I want you to know today that Christ crossed the greatest divide to bring you home.

You were far off and he pursued you.

You were lost and he found you.

Like we said, you were an enemy and he reconciled you.

And now he's made you an ambassador to that life-changing work and trusted us with carrying the same message of reconciliation to a world that desperately needs it.

 But sometimes we play it safe and we stay comfortable and we care more about our reputation than his.

So we walk past people who are lost, lonely, or hurting because we're afraid, we're apathetic, we're too preoccupied with our own lives.

And sometimes just if we're honest, we want to, but we just don't know how.

Like me in that prayer, we just don't know how to come boldly.

We're afraid that we might trip over our words and give them a worse example if we step out.

But God's grace is here for you, child.

 He's here for the afraid child.

He's here for the apathetic child.

He's here for the preoccupied child with grace and courage.

And so here's the prayer you can pray.

Father, I don't know how to love as you've loved me.

I don't know how to cross divides as you've crossed them for me.

But you've reconciled me.

Help me.

Give me the grace to carry your welcome to the people you're putting in my path.

And when you do,

 When you come in your weakness and ask for His grace, the Spirit will do what only He can do.

He will make us family that then become a witness to the world, just like John 13, 35 says, by this, all people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another.

Loving one another well is not just for our benefit.

The world's at stake.

Your neighbor's at stake, your coworkers.

 And so I want to encourage you.

What can God do in your world outside of these walls by transforming how you show up on the inside?

And we're going to get to respond to God in this moment.

And so I would love for us to pray a prayer together.

Can we do that here today to ready our hearts for what God is wanting to do on the altar?

Amazing.

 great okay in three two one father thank you that in christ i am your child i let go of fear and striving and i receive again the spirit of adoption holy spirit give me the grace to be a child who trusts you

 Teach me to live as a daughter in this house, in this family.

Make me a faithful sibling.

Use my life to reflect your love.

In Jesus' name, amen.

 Now, what I want to do is give you an opportunity to make a great exchange, to lay aside the things and the identities that you've been clinging to and receive the great grace that God has for you.

And so if you need the grace to become a son and daughter today, if you've never given your life to Jesus before, if you want to come in and say, God, I trust you to redeem me.

I trust you to lead me.

 At the altar, you get to exchange your striving and your shame for God's grace and God's love and God's mercy and God's kindness.