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We're continuing our study of the Gospel of John, which, you know, if you vote if I voted on it, I would vote this as my favorite book in the Bible. And I'm a little bit um biased because this is actually, I was reading the Gospel of John, and that was the moment that the Lord saved me. I was like, oh my gosh. I was reading this book and I realized who Jesus was. And that was the moment that I became a Jesus follower. And so this book has a special place in my heart, and so I'm really, I'm really grateful to get to teach you guys this morning. Where we're at in the book of John is, if you'll remember, two weeks ago Lazarus had died, and Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead. Alright, this is like a super awesome miracle, and it gets everybody who saw it, which was a lot of people, gets them really, really jazzed, okay? They're like, oh my gosh, we just saw a guy who's been dead for four days come back to life. This is crazy. We would say the same thing, alright? And then last week, um, we saw how Lazarus and his family, how Mary and Martha, how in response to that incredible miracle, that incredible gift of Lazarus coming back to life, we saw how they each individually responded to Jesus and worshipped him in a different way. And so now, in the aftermath of Jesus' raising of Lazarus, we're gonna see kind of what's going on, what's the situation that is created by this miracle, because a lot of people are hearing about it, and a lot of people are getting really, really excited by Jesus, okay? So where we're at in the Gospel of John is we're in the final days of Jesus' life before the cross, okay? His ministry of miracles has basically come to an end. He's almost done teaching the people, and today as we read, he's entering Jerusalem for the last time, okay? His last week of life begins. What we call the Passion Week, or we call Holy Week. This is the last week of Jesus, okay? His road to the cross is almost complete. So we're gonna jump right into the text this morning in John chapter 12, verse 12. We're gonna read, um, I don't know, it's gonna take me a few minutes to get through it. So can you guys all agree we're gonna make it through the scripture and we're gonna focus and it's gonna be okay. Right? Yes. Thank you. Thanks, Jada, for saying yes. All right, here we go. Starting in verse 12. The next day, when the large crowd that had come to the festival heard that Jesus was coming to Jerusalem, they took palm branches and went out to meet him. They kept shouting, Hosanna, he who comes in the name of the Lord is the blessed one, the King of Israel. Jesus found a young donkey and sat on it, just as it is written, Fear no more, daughter Zion, look, your king is coming, sitting on a donkey's colt. His disciples did not understand these things at first, however, when Jesus was glorified, then they remembered that these things had been written about him, and that they had done these things to him. Meanwhile the crowd, which had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead, continued to testify. This is also why the crowd met him, because they had heard he had done this sign. Then the Pharisees said to one another, You see, you've accomplished nothing. Look, the whole world has gone after him. Now some Greeks were among those who went up to worship at the festival. So they came to Philip, who was from Beth Seda and Galilee, and requested of him, Sir, we want to see Jesus. Philip went and told Andrew, then Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. Jesus replied to them, The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I assure you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains by itself, but if it dies, it produces a large crop. The one who loves his life will lose it, and the one who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me. Where I am, there my servant will be. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. You are doing great, by the way. Let's keep going. Now my soul is troubled. What should I say? Father, save me from this hour? But that is why I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. Then a voice came from heaven, I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again. The crowd standing there heard it and said it was thunder. Others said that an angel had spoken to him. Jesus responded, This voice came not for me, but for you. Now is the judgment of this world. Now the ruler of this world will be cast out. As for me, if I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw all people to myself. He said this to signify what kind of death he was about to die. Then the crowd replied to him, We've heard from the Scripture that the Messiah will remain forever, so how can you say the Son of Man must be lifted up? Who is this Son of Man? Jesus answered, The light will be with you only a little longer. Walk while you have the light so that darkness doesn't overtake you. The one who walks in darkness doesn't know where he's going. While you have the light, believe in the light so that you may become sons of light. Jesus said this, then went away and hid from them. Even though he had performed so many signs in their presence, they did not believe in him. But this is to fulfill the word of Isaiah the prophet, who said, Lord, who has believed our message? And to whom has the arm of the Lord been revealed? This is why they were unable to believe, because Isaiah also said, He has blinded their eyes and hardened their hearts, so that they would not see with their eyes or understand with their hearts and be converted, and I would heal them. Isaiah said these things because he saw his glory and spoke about him. Nevertheless, many did believe in him, even among the rulers, but because of the Pharisees, they did not confess him, so they would not be banned from the synagogue. For they loved praise from men more than praise from God. Alright. You guys did really, really good. I could tell y'all are sticking with me. That was great. Okay. What's awesome about that is when we read the whole scripture, when you read it out like that, it's the triumphal entry, is like Jesus riding on a donkey, obviously, and he's on this little dirt road, and he's riding into this little village, and there's like a crowd of like a hundred people around him going, yay, waving palm wrenches, right? Like in my head, when I picture ancient Israel, I picture really small, really dusty, not a lot of people. Maybe I've gotten that from the movies I've watched, like from the Passion of the Christ, because Mel Gibson can only afford to hire like 200 extras or something. But it's like, in my head, like it's like, okay, it seems like kind of a party, but not that big a deal, okay? Because I forget that in reality, Jesus is walking into this city that is like unimaginably to us busting at the seams, okay? It's busting at the seams. I was Googling, I was asking Google, I was looking for the size of the city of Jerusalem in the time of Jesus, okay? You know, I couldn't really get like any hard and fast figures, but it's super tiny. It's really super tiny. I spent way too long on Google, you guys. Okay. I asked Nick, and Nick was like, you can basically measure the size of ancient Jerusalem in acres. Okay? Um, this city was like, the city proper was a few square miles, and so I could be way off on this, but when I'm imagining the size of Jerusalem, I'm picturing like South Park Meadows. All right? The size of South Park Meadows, and inside it, you know, there's a temple and a lot of houses, but like the city's not very big, and there's hundreds and hundreds of thousands of people that have all descended on Jerusalem for the festival of Passover. Okay, there's an ancient Jewish historian named Josephus, he's really, really famous. Um, that when he writes about the Passover, he says that there are upwards of two million people coming to the city of Jerusalem to worship. Okay, two million people, okay? That's a massive amount of humanity. And all those people are like crazy hype. They're crazy hyped up because this is the most important week of their year. They're in Jerusalem to celebrate Passover. Um, so imagine South Park Meadows and all of Austin is in South Park Meadows for a week, and there's no air conditioning or deodorant. All right? It's crazy. The situation Jesus is riding into is not a little podunk town. He is riding into probably the like most packed city in the world for that week. It is crazy. And these people that are in Jerusalem, they're there for the most important religious tradition that they do all year, okay? Passover, which is a celebration and a remembrance of how God has delivered their people from Egypt, you know, a thousand, I don't know, 1500 years prior. All right, this is the center of the Jewish self-identity. It's the center of their faith. It's it's how they view themselves. We are the people that God rescued from Egypt. We're the people that we were in bondage, we were in captivity, and God came. He sent Moses, he sent plagues on Egypt, he brought us out, he brought us through the dang ocean on dry ground, and he led us in a pillar of fire. He gave us his commandments, he gave us his law. We are God's people. And Passover is like the number one time that they remember this. They remember that they were people in captivity and that God rescued them and turned them into his nation. Okay? Now think about how potent and how emotional remembering that story would be for the people of Israel at the time of Jesus. Because kind of like the people that were enslaved in Egypt, the people of Israel are also in a type of bondage. They're basically living in enemy-occupied territory, okay? When they look around Jerusalem, they're seeing the temple, they're seeing all the normal things you would see, but what else are they seeing? They're seeing armed Roman soldiers, right? There's Roman soldiers all around Jerusalem. And why is that? It's because Israel at this time is basically just a province of this greater Roman Empire, okay? They're living in a state that's policed by Roman soldiers. They're allowed a certain amount of freedom, but they're never allowed to forget who's really in control, right? There's a reason they asked Jesus about paying taxes to Caesar, because the people of Israel, they have to send their money to Rome every year, okay? Like they're paying that state. Um, they have seen around their city criminals put up on crosses. Like a sign that, hey, Rome is in charge, and if you mess with us, we're going to crucify you. Okay? This is very, very real to the people in Jerusalem and the people that have come to worship at Jerusalem. They know Rome is the boss, and if you mess with Rome, man, I did not intend for that to rhyme. But George knows where I was going. And if you mess with Rome, you get the cross, right? Worst poem ever. So embarrassing. Okay. So the men and the men and women in Jerusalem at this time, right? They are thirsty for freedom. They are ready for liberation. And they also have these promises in the Old Testament that there is this coming Messiah, there's this coming king who is the one who is going to free them from bondage, right? Can you see why this particular situation is kind of a powder keg about to explode? Okay? There's two million people in South Park Meadows that are crying out for freedom. They want to be free from Rome. And into this situation walks Jesus. Okay? Enter Jesus to this situation. His fame has probably reached its peak. This whole city, everybody knows, hundreds of thousands of people. They know who Jesus is. They've heard what he's done. They've heard about Lazarus. And so everybody wants to see Jesus. They're like, we've got to see this guy. And not only that, they're ready to make this guy king. This guy heals the sick. He teaches with way more authority than these rare sees and religious leaders. Slash raises people from the dead. This guy is the Messiah. They're like, this is it. This is the moment. So they're whipping themselves into this worshipful frenzy, going, Hosanna, he who comes in the name of the Lord, right? He's the blessed one, the king of Israel. That statement is politically explosive, right, in this context. Now, a few months in our time, a few months prior, we were in John 6, right? And we read the story of Jesus feeding 5,000 people. Well, really more than 5,000, thousands and thousands of people from a few loaves of bread and a few fish, right? After Jesus does this miracle, people also want to make him king, right? Let's read, I think we had this on a slide in John 6. When the people saw the sign that he had done, they said, This really is the prophet who was to come into the world. Therefore, when Jesus knew that they were about to come and take him by force to make him king, he withdrew again to the mountains by himself. So previously, before in John 6, Jesus really shies away from the plans of the people to come make him king. And the reason is because he knows that his time is not yet come. But here, in John 12, he fully embraces these titles that the people are going to put on him. You know, he rides a donkey into the city. Okay, we see that it fulfills this Old Testament prophecy, which comes from the book of Zechariah, chapter 9. And by fulfilling this prophecy, Jesus is basically saying, Yes, all the things that you're saying about me are true. I am in fact the king who is to come. I am in fact the Messiah. I am the king of Israel. So if we read, let's actually go to Zechariah 9, it'll be on the screen. You don't have to turn there. This is what the prophecy actually says. In verse 9, Rejoice greatly, daughter Zion. Shout in triumph, daughter Jerusalem, look, your king is coming to you. He is righteous and victorious, humble and riding on a donkey, on a colt, the foal of a donkey. I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the horse from Jerusalem. The bow of war will be removed. And he will proclaim peace to the nations. His dominion will extend from sea to sea, from the Euphrates River to the ends of the earth. Alright, to the ends of the earth. When Jesus is riding into Jerusalem on this donkey, he's saying, All of this applies to me. Not only am I the coming Messiah, not only am I king of Israel, I'm actually king of the entire world. Okay, Jesus is claiming I am king of the whole world. Okay, pretty sure that's a blank on the sheet. If you're a blank person, you can fill that up. Alright. The significance of this act is not at all lost on the Pharisees who see Jesus doing this, okay? They start freaking out even more. They say, See, you've accomplished nothing. The whole world has gone after him, which is funny to me because it's the second time they accidentally make a prophecy. Before we see Caiaphas is like, we have to kill Jesus, because if we kill Jesus, like it will save our nation, which is true, just not in the way that they thought. And the Pharisees are true that the whole world is going to come after Jesus, but they didn't realize that that was actually a good thing. They thought it was bad. Okay? Why do they not want that to happen? Jesus is a threat not only to their religious authority, okay? He's challenging them, he's challenging the way they do things. Obviously, Jesus is preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God. Pharisees didn't like what he had to say, particularly about him being God, but he was also a huge threat to their political stability, okay? Pharisees did not want things to change. They were kind of happy with the arrangement with Rome. And Jesus is coming into Jerusalem saying, I'm king, right? And there's hundreds of thousands of people that are going to follow him. They're like, this could go really, really bad. Because if something, if if Jesus leads a rebellion, Rome's gonna come and kill everyone. Okay, the Pharisees are scared of that happening. And so they're like, we have to stop whatever Jesus is planning, okay? So in this situation, the crowds, they're crying, Hosanna. Hosanna. Hosanna basically means like, please save us. It's like God, come save us right now. It's a plea for salvation, okay? They're expecting Jesus to come save them from Rome. They're like, we are gonna have this awesome king. He's gonna come make everything better. All right, and Jesus is going to bring salvation, but it's not the kind that they were expecting. And the Pharisees are right to think that Jesus is gonna lead this revolution, right? But it's not this armed political revolution that they were afraid of, right? It's something totally different. Jesus is gonna defy both of their expectations. So as we move on, we see there's this group of Greeks that come asked to see Jesus. We don't know much about them. Uh they're probably most likely Gentiles. Um, probably not just Jews that lived in Greece, but they're probably actually Gentiles. They may or may not fear God, they may or may not believe in God. Uh for some reason they want to see Jesus. We don't really know why, and we don't really know if they get to. But when they ask to see him, something about these Greeks asking to see Jesus makes him respond in this way. It kicks off this statement. Jesus says, The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. The hour has come. Okay, if you've been with us for the last however many weeks, more than twelve, several, we've been studying the Gospel of John, and we see Jesus over and over saying, The time has not yet come. The time has not yet come. Alright? And now this is changing. Jesus changes what he says. He says, Now is the Son of Man glorified. The hour has come. And so the people around probably hear him say that, and they're like, Yes! Grab a sword, Peter. Like, get a shield, Bartholomew, if you you know. Let's do this. It's time to glorify Jesus. Let's kill some people. Put him on the throne. They're like, yes, finally. Okay? Um, but obviously, their expectation is to fight again. That's not what Jesus is talking about when he's talking about him being glorified, okay? He's not talking about overthrowing Rome because that kingdom, the Roman Empire, is small potatoes, right? It is just a dot compared to the enemy and the kingdom that Jesus has come to dismantle. The enemy he has come to defeat, which is, you know, uh the kingdom of Satan, the kingdom of sin, death that reigns in us. Jesus has come to defeat that kingdom. Alright, he doesn't say, the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. I need some better clothes, and get me a real nice horse and get me a room in the palace. Alright, that's the kind of glory that I'm after. Jesus doesn't say that. Okay, Jesus says, the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified. And then he starts talking about dead seeds. Alright? He starts talking about seeds dying. Alright, so why does why does Jesus go here? Okay? It's because, like I said, Jesus didn't come to waltz into Jerusalem, blast the Romans, and set up a worldly kingdom with him at the head. Okay? That's not what he came to do. It was not a regional political battle that Jesus came to fight, but this cosmic one, right? Against the enemy of sin. That's the battle Jesus came to fight and win. Alright? The people, just like Landon said earlier, I loved how Landon said this. They were expecting a glorious war leader to come kick in the doors and, you know, kick out the Romans and start this new Jewish Israeli state that he was going to rule forever, okay? But Jesus came to be glorified in a much different way. A much more lasting, glorious thing, and thank God for us here in this room, a way that was far more inclusive, right? Jesus is glorified through his death, okay? Jesus is glorified through his death. Jesus goes on to say this. He says, I assure you, unless a grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains by itself. But if it dies, it produces a large crop. The one who loves his life will lose it, and the one who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. Okay? Jesus is the grain of wheat falling to the ground. That's Jesus. He's talking about his coming sacrificial death, right? The large crop is us. It's the people that are going to believe in him, follow him, and receive life in his name. Okay? Skipping down to verse 27, he says, you know, now is my soul troubled. What should I say? Father, save me from this hour. But that is why I came to this hour. And down to verse 32, Jesus says, As for me, if I'm lifted up from this earth, I will draw all people to myself. He said this to signify what kind of death he was about to die. Alright. I praise God for his wisdom. Right? Jesus had every right to come to This earth, take up a sword, and kill whoever he wanted to, to take whatever authority he wanted to, to be in charge of the entire the entire earth. He could have been like, You think the Roman Empire is good? This is a small fraction of the earth. I'm going to create an empire that covers the entire world, and you will all like be my subjects, alright? It was well within Jesus' rights to do that, because as we know, Jesus is king of the universe, not some piddly little planet around our solar system. Jesus is the king of the universe. That was well within his rights to do. But what does Jesus do? His enemy was not the empires of this world, like I said. He came to seek and to save the lost. Thank God. Because if Jesus ruled this entire world, if he came and he just conquered and never did away with our sin, we're nothing more than subjects without eternal hope. But that's not what Jesus wanted. He didn't come to just be the boss man, although he is. He came to pay for, to rescue for himself a people. Not that we would just be subjects in an earthly kingdom, but that we would be sons and daughters of God, eternally with him, in his family, like invited into the family of God. Not subjects in an earthly kingdom, but members of a family. You see how much bigger God's view of Christ and his mission is than what people imagine. It's so much bigger. And what's crazy is the glory that we see in the cross. This mark of utter shame. To die on a cross was incredibly shameful, right? It was reserved in the Roman Empire for like the worst of the worst. Okay? The worst offenders died on the cross because it was a publicly humiliating way to die. And this was the manner in which our God, Jesus Christ, second person, eternal of the Trinity, God eternal, decides to come, put on flesh, and allow himself to die in the most publicly brutal and humiliating way that it was possible for a human being to die. Not only suffering physically, but as we know and as we have come to believe, bearing the weight of God's wrath, bearing the weight of our sin on his shoulders. This symbol of ultimate shame has become to us the most beautiful thing we could possibly imagine. Like, consider how crazy it is that, I mean, there's a cross in the back of the room back there. Like, what that represents is this symbol of Roman torture, but for us, it's become this beautiful symbol of the humility and love that our God has for us, that He would do that for us. This is what Paul says in Philippians 2. Make your own attitude that of Christ Jesus, who existing in the form of God, did not consider equality with God as something to be used for his own advantage. Instead, he emptied himself by assuming the form of a slave, taking on the likeness of men. And when he had come as a man in his external form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even to death on a cross. For this reason, God highly exalted him and gave him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow of those who are in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue should confess that Jesus is Lord to the glory of God the Father. I wish I could live my life with a one billionth of the emotion that that truth should create in my heart. The truth of the cross, like what that really is, I feel like I have not even scratched the surface of it. Okay? Because there is going to become a day, I mean, when we're with Christ in eternity. We're not going to be debating about the end times, all right? There's going to be no debates about the rapture, okay, when we're in the kingdom of God. We're not going to be debating theology when the king of the universe is right there and be like, hey Jesus. You know, it's like, there's no more questions. In that day, we will be with God for eternity. There's not going to be any more war, famine, death, tears, okay? These things will pass away. But you know what will not pass away is our awe and wonder at the fact that God died for us. Our wonder at the cross of Jesus. In Revelation, the elders gathered around the throne of God, they're bowing down, throwing all riches in front of Jesus, saying, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive all power and glory and honor and strength. The cross is the centerpiece, it's the focus of our eternal worship in the kingdom of God. We are never going to move past all the implications that the cross has. Alright? Jesus is King of heaven. And you know what he still has on his hands? He still has holes from those nails. He still has a wound in his side, holes in his feet. Alright? The cross is the most amazing, epic, important thing that has ever happened and ever will happen, right? In the kingdom of God, we don't move past the cross. We don't move past it because of how incredible it is. And my prayer is, oh man, for me, me first, God, would you help me just in this life see just a bit more of how incredible that love is. That God, the creator of the universe, the one who sustains every atom of my body, would do this for me. Pray that God would help us see that beauty just a little bit more. Because we are never gonna stop for eternity being in awe of Jesus Christ and what he has done for us. Jesus is so awesome. Um, unlike the Pharisees, who love the praise from men more than they loved the praise of God, Jesus didn't have that problem, right? The crowd loves him. They're like, Jesus, we want to make you king. He's like, no. I've got a different plan. It's the plan of my father, okay? I'm gonna do what my father wants. A few days later, the crowd's gonna be like, crucify him, kill him. Jesus could have been like, no. No. I'm God, I can just do whatever I want, I can leave. He could have left it any time. You guys realize that, right? He went to the cross willingly. It was always his choice. It was not against his will. But Jesus said, no, I'm not gonna do that. I'm gonna obey the will of my Father. He knew who he was and what he came to do, and the feelings of the people around him were not gonna sway him from that purpose. So y'all, the cross is just the most incredible thing. It's the most incredible thing. And in light of it, let's go back to verse 26. Okay, we skipped it earlier. And you see something very important. Jesus says this to us. He says, If anyone serves me, he must follow me. Where I am, there also my servant will be. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. Okay, Jesus says, We must follow him. That his servant will be where he is. Okay, in the context of this passage, where is that? He's talking about the cross. Jesus is talking about the cross. The call of a Christian, the call of a follower of Jesus is to come die with him. That is the call of a Christian. This is what Luke 9 says, 23 and 24. Jesus says this in Matthew. He's saying basically this in John, but just a little bit of a different way of saying it. He says, If anyone wants to come with me, he must deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life because of me will save it. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who's a German theologian, says it this way. Really like this quote. The first Christ suffering, which every man must experience, is the call to abandon the attachments of this world. And it is that dying of the old man which is the result of his encounter with Christ. As we embark upon discipleship, we surrender ourselves to Christ in union with his death, and we give over our lives to death. Thus it begins. The cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise God-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ. When Christ calls a man, he bids him come and die. It may be a death like that of the first disciples who had to leave home and work to follow him, or it may be a death like Luther's, who had to leave the monastery and go out into the world, but it is the same death every time. Death in Jesus Christ. The death of the old man at his call. Alright? Following Jesus and dying to ourselves is the beginning. That's the beginning of the Christian life. It's not the end, right? You know, picking up our cross and following Jesus, dying for Christ, looks like a lot of different things, okay? It looks like putting to death sin in us, putting to death this old man, right? Being sanctified, being made more like Jesus as God's Spirit works in us, right? We're putting to death who we used to be and more fully walking into this new creation that we now are, okay? Could mean putting to death our ambitions, our goals, our schemes in this life, because now we are living for a future kingdom, right? So when people are like, why did you turn down that promotion? And you say, I want more time with my family, and I want more time to pursue the things of the kingdom of God. Okay, that doesn't make sense unless you're putting to death yourself and the things that the world wants us to pursue. We're putting to death our own desires for the glory of Jesus. Alright? It could mean physical death, right? Christians around the world, even to this day, are dying because of their witness for the risen Christ. There are places where if you publicly confess Jesus, they will kill you. And that is the cost of following him. For some in this room, the cost of following Jesus might mean we die. It definitely means in the coming years in this culture, we are going to have to sacrifice approval of the people around us. We live in a culture that is increasingly becoming hostile to the things that we believe. And we have to make the choice. Are we going to stand under the word of God, submitted to it, submitted to God's truth, or are we going to cave? We don't want people to not like us, right? We don't want people to disapprove of us. But that may be what God is calling us to do right now. That may be for us what it looks like to follow Jesus, to die to ourselves with him. Because Jesus tells us very plainly, very clearly, that it's only in dying to ourselves that we can truly live. It is in dying to this world, dying to our flesh with its passions and desires, that we truly experience eternal life. Jim Elliott, who was a missionary in Ecuador, he said this quote. It's really, really famous. You may have heard it before, but he says this. Right? It's only with the wisdom of heaven, it's only with the wisdom given to us by the Spirit of God that we see it makes no sense to cling on to this life. We would be fools. Because eternity is real. God is real and he reigns and is in control. How foolish to cling and scratch and claw for like money. Or to like make your body and your health here like your God. How foolish to make this world the center of our existence. When we were made, we were built for eternity. But that is wisdom that can only be taught by God's Spirit, and praise God that He's speaking to us still. King Jesus came into Jerusalem on this day that we read about in John 12, in humility, okay? Although he was God in the flesh, Jesus comes riding on the back of a donkey, okay? He's going to be despised, he's going to be rejected, and he's going to die for us, for his people, bearing our sin. Like Becca said, our atoning sacrifice to give us a hope and a future, to conquer the power of death. But the truth is, Jesus is coming back again, right? We sang that in Gracious Redeemer. I love that song. Jesus is coming back again. And on that day, he's not going to be riding a donkey. He's not going to be humbly riding in on a donkey. He is going to come in riding on clouds with his angels in glory, coming to judge the world, to remake the earth. Okay? Jesus is going to come back in power, in the fullness of his role and his nature as king of the universe. Alright? There's this passage in 2 Thessalonians that we rarely read, but I think it puts it pretty starkly what this is going to be like when Jesus returns. This is Paul writing in 2 Thessalonians chapter 1. He says, It's righteous for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to reward with rest you who are afflicted along with us. This will take place at the revelation of the Lord Jesus from heaven, with his powerful angels, taking vengeance with flaming fire on those who don't know God, and on those who don't obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction from the Lord's presence and from his glorious strength in that day when he comes to be glorified by his saints and to be admired by all who have believed, because our testimony among you was believed. And in view of this, we always pray for you that our God will consider you worthy of his calling, and will, by his power, fulfill every desire for goodness and the work of faith, so that the name of our Lord Jesus will be glorified by you and you by him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ. Alright. People don't teach on that verse a lot, but it's right there in the Bible. Sort of teaches itself, right? This is what it's going to be like when Jesus returns. And at point, you know, as the leaders here, our prayer for you as our church, our little part of the body of Christ here, is that we would all come worship King Jesus. This God who didn't just come to set up an earthly kingdom, but came to set up an eternal one, who died for us. He did that so we wouldn't remain lost in our sin, but that he would give us a hope and an invitation to experience his grace and become sons and daughters of God, okay? The author of Hebrews says this Watch out, brothers, so that there won't be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart that departs from the living God, but encourage each other daily while it is still called today, so that none of you is hardened by sin's deception. For we have become companions of the Messiah if we hold firmly until the end the reality that we had at the start. As it is said, today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion. So we're pleading. We're pleading with you guys. I know a lot of you guys love Jesus. I know some of you guys don't yet. So our plea is don't harden your hearts. Jesus has made a way for us, and there is no other way. Jesus has given us hope, and there is no hope apart from him. But this freedom and this forgiveness and this life is available to us if we put our trust in Christ. The only thing we must do is believe. Just believe in him. And then he calls us to come and die with him. Because in that we'll experience true life. Let's pray, church. God, we're so glad. We're so glad you didn't come to just set up a kingdom just in the Near East. Jesus, you didn't come to be a political leader. But you came in humility to die for your people, to give us hope and a future, to pay for our sin, that we could come to your presence and not be destroyed, Lord. You have loved us. Oh God, we don't even see the tiniest part of your love. The cross is so incredible, God, and I pray, oh risen Jesus, that you would show us more of how incredible your love is. How great your love is for us, God. Thank you for making a way. Thank you for inviting us into your family, Lord. And we come to you this morning responding to that in gratitude. God, the only response is to live for you. To die to ourselves and live for you, Jesus. Help us to do that. Pray that in your name. Amen.