Porch - Ben Stuart 1

howdy good to see you guys if you have a Bible I want to read to you a couple verses starting in mark chapter 1 and I want to read them to you and then we'll we'll pray and then we can move through them together but if you've got a Bible mark chapter ones we're going to be if you don't I think they're going to put them on the screen so you'll be okay but while you're turning there let me just say I love this church when I graduated from Texas A&M I did not move to Dallas but I had people that I cared about moved to Dallas and there were some people that that I just I weren't wasn't sure was going to happen to him spiritually and it was awesome for me too to run into them months later and to see them just blasting off in their love of God trust of him in their peace and their joy and life just hitting new levels of living and so much of it was because of the community and the love and the support they found at this place and over the last several years I found that people I really care about come here and are blessed that are ministered to so when they asked me to come this summer I said yes absolutely because I'm a fan of water mark and all these people so it's wonderful wonderful to be here mark chapter 1 beginning in verse 14 let me read a couple verses he will pray and dive in and says this now after John was arrested Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God and saying the time is fulfilled and the kingdom of God is at hand repent and believe in the gospel passing alongside the Sea of Galilee he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea for they were fishermen and Jesus said to them follow me and I will make you become fishers of men and immediately they left their nets and followed him and going on a little farther he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother who were in their boat mending the nets and immediately he called to them and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him and they went into Capernaum and immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and was teaching and they were astonished at his teaching for he taught them as one who had Authority and not as the scribes and immediately there was in the synagogue a man with an unclean spirit and he cried out what have you to do with us Jesus of Nazareth have you come to destroy us I know who you are the Holy One of God but Jesus rebuked him saying be silent come out of him and the unclean spirit convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice came out of him and they were all amazed so that they questioned among themselves saying what is this a new teaching with authority he commands even the unclean spirits and they obey Him and it once his fame spread everywhere throughout all the surrounding region of Galilee and immediately he left the synagogue entered the house of Simon and Andrew with James and John now Simon's mother-in-law lay ill with a fever and immediately they told him about her and he came and took her by the hand and lifted her up and the fever left her and she began to serve them and that evening at sundown they brought to him all who were sick or oppressed by demons and the whole city was gathered together at the door let me pray for us Lord thanks for these few minutes we have together on your word thanks for every person here God whether they came here because they just loved studying the Bible and they just couldn't wait to do that and Sunday isn't sufficient they need other days to connect with you in a space like this I just think that's awesome and thank you for the people that are here that that's not their story at all they're here because they got tricked or something or someone just brought them and they said ok and acquiesced to being at a church on a Tuesday wherever we are God and how we connect to to moments like this and how we think about you I just want to thank you that you've given us this collective moment together to talk about you and to think about you and to hear about what you care about and I just want to ask you God in these few minutes would you help us see Jesus and see him clearly open our eyes so that we understand what he was doing and understand how he wanted to present himself and then father I pray we wouldn't just understand that I pray you would help us think your thoughts and also love what you love help us see him and see him as lovely got our hearts need to be touched by you and I'm asking you to do that I want some lives to be different as a result of this moment and I just really feel it tonight I can't generate that I can't watermark and the shames and bin are not what people in this room need it's really not it's you we need you God together and so please sit with us and I want to ask you if you're willing just to take a minute and pray you talk to him and say God please teach me something right now I mean if you would please pray for me that the Lord would use me and I would be helpful to you well father we love you when we trust you use this time and we pray that in Jesus name Amen well several years ago I was part of a ministry in Houston they used to gather periodically with other pastors from the area to pray and I remember whenever we would do it there was always one guy and I that were reintroduced and I say reintroduced because I always remembered him but he never remembered me but he would never say that they would always say hey do you remember Ben and you would do yeah right and then to to show everybody that he remembered me he would tell a story about a shared experience we had the only problem is the stories were never actually about me so I remember the first on there do you remember Ben he was like yeah we used to play golf together he's got a great swing and I'm sitting there thinking I've never played golf like in my life like not just with you but like in life and the next time I saw him they were like you remember Ben he was like yeah man we shared the gospel once in the Third Ward and Houston down in this bar this guy's a powerful evangelist he's anointed and he's going on and I'm like I've never been to a bar with you yeah and the longer this went on I was like you know I don't know who this golf-playing bar evangelist is that he's thinking of but it's not me and you know I never called him on it I was never like you were a liar but uh I just kind of went hey you know and we'd visit for a minute and then move on but you know the interactions were always brief they were always shallow our relationship wasn't very deep and it was certainly not one of those handful of relationships you get in life that was transformative to me as a person because at the end of the day he didn't know me and so we could know each other's names know a little bit but he it wasn't transformative he doesn't know me now I tell you that for this reason we're talking about Jesus tonight and everybody knows Jesus everybody likes Jesus everybody's on board with Jesus everyone's like Jesus yeah I know Jesus yeah that's great I love him Katy Perry's got his name on her wrist Justin Bieber's got it on his ribs Kesha's got Jesus on her necklace right everybody's into Jesus every religion has a prominent place for Jesus I remember sitting with a Satanist at the zoo a story I don't have time to unpack but even for them Jesus has a prominent place in Satanism so everybody is on board with Jesus I've never really met someone that's like Jesus hate that guy like even people that aren't into Christians aren't into church say they don't have a problem with Jesus everyone's like Jesus yeah I know Jesus I'm into Jesus unlike Jesus but he said to ask people didn't tell me about him like when you ask people about what do you like actually did and actually said it's amazing how few people really know what the real Jesus had to say and what he thought in what he did and so there's people I say yeah I know Jesus yeah I'm into Jesus but but they don't actually know much about Jesus so they've got a picture of Jesus but it's one that they've just kind of filled in the gaps with things they made up out of their own heads like a make-believe Jesus and the problem with the Jesus like that is he's not real it's like having an imaginary girlfriend imaginary boyfriend that's not going to be a deep relationship and it's not going to be transformative it's not going to change you right because at the end of the day this is kind of you and so the reality is I'm just was thinking about us and praying about us and here and I'm thinking what we need is not like oh Jesus we make up at Jesus we like because it tends to be the Jesus as we make up tend to agree with everything we think or belief and that's not going to change you but none of us are who were meant to be we're not the men were meant to be and we know it we're not the women we're meant to be and we know it and what we need if we're going to change if we're going to be what we were meant to be under god what we need is not a Jesus we made up what we need is the real Jesus and that's why we're in mark because that's what mark gives us Gospel of Mark most scholars believe was the first one ever written about Jesus first written account of him and for the first decade or two after Jesus's life there weren't really written accounts about him because the they didn't really need one I mean there were so many people that knew him first Corinthians 15 says there was like hundreds of people that connected with Jesus knew Jesus so in those early days after his death and resurrection there wasn't much written down about him because if there was any distortions about Jesus if anyone was confused about what he was really like or began to say stuff that wasn't true like oh yeah Jesus didn't he like fly and like shoot fireballs there was enough people that knew him they would be like no no but like he wasn't like that but as time went on the people that knew Jesus personally were dying off and so those that knew him realized hey we want generations later people like us to know the real Jesus and so guys like Mark wrote down this account of Jesus so we could know the real Jesus and what we're looking at tonight is we're looking at Jesus introduced himself to the world and what's interesting is I don't know how you would introduce Jesus like if I asked you hey tell this person about Jesus I don't know what the first things would be that you would say but I will say this my guess is it would not be like this but let me tell you what we're going to do I'm here tonight and and then next week I'll tell you what we're going to do is we look at mark most people when they teach the Gospels you know if you look at your Bible it's broken down to these little kind of bite-sized pieces and most people just teach each little bite-sized peach was which is a great way to do it but we don't have that kind of time right and those are neat little vignettes but we're going to do something a little different scholars call those little things pericope x' which we won't because that's a weird word look all the moments and usually the Bible breaks a month into these little moments and that's not bad but the problem is if you just read the life of Jesus that way you can miss some things like in Chapter one the section I just read verses 21 to 39 and my Bible they're broken up into three little independent sections but if you just read the verses that's one day in the life of Jesus one crazy day so what we're going to do is just kind of fly over this section of Jesus introducing himself to the world and we're going to see his first impressions how he came off to people and we're going to see his self-identification how he wanted to introduce himself and then we're going to get some personal application for us but to look at his first impressions you see it in 14 as he launches his ministry and says Jesus came into Galilee proclaiming the gospel of God saying the time is fulfilled the kingdom of God is at hand repent and believe in the gospel now we could do a whole sermon on just that on the kingdom of God and that would be a great sermon but we're not gonna but even if you don't know what that means you realize that sounds significant he's saying there's a new era has arrived there's a new system of rule that's present he's not just walking around handing out hugs and being like I just love you guys right he's saying something new has started now it's a new governing of things and then he says repent your whole life changes right now because I'm here and you read something on thaton you go who talks like that who says that kind of stuff I mean how would you feel if I walked in here and said your life changes forever today because I'm here yeah I do that for you who talks like that but you don't get much time to think about it cuz it in verse 16 it says he immediately starts calling people to him and he says follow me and I will make you become fishers of men and it says immediately they left their nets and they followed it that Jesus is preaching this message and then he comes up to people and says you guys follow me that he doesn't just think he should is someone that should be listened to he thinks he's someone that should be followed that your life should reprioritize to be around him and what's crazy about that as he's walking preaching this message and he looks at guys and says hey you guys follow me that's crazy what's even crazier is that they do and their response is immediate and total they drop the nets and follow him now some of you here that you go well bin isn't that how they did it back then like rabbis teachers would walk and their disciples would follow them didn't they all do it this way no because back then yes you would follow a rabbi and a teacher but you would stay at your job Jesus says follow me and they dropped their nets and follow him two of them that he calls later dropped their net and their dad they're like a bi and they just leave to follow him and the other thing that was different was back then you would pick the rabbi the rabbi didn't pick you you would say I want to learn from that guy and you would go do it it's like colleges Baylor doesn't just call you and say you Baylor bear green shirts in the mail get over here to Waco it doesn't work that way you pick where you want to study and yet Jesus is walking down the street and guide you to get in the truck and they're doing it and so if you were some of the first people reading this the natural question you would ask is who calls people like who talks to people like this change your life for me and then they do it what kind of guy is this and then in verse 21 we jump into this crazy day with him and it says he took him into Capernaum and immediately on the Sabbath he entered the synagogue and was teaching a synagogue was a place like this where you would teach he steps in and starts teaching them the Word of God and it says and they were astonished at his teaching for he taught them as one who had Authority and not as the scribes he gets in there and he's blowing their mind because he doesn't sound like what they're used to the scribes vecten would read the words of God and then they would always kind of quote other rabbis to sort of try to get around the interpretation they're like well Halil says this game ll believes it's coming from this angle and they were just kind of teach it that way they said Jesus is astonishing them because in when he walks in he's teaching as if he has authority he's teaching like you've heard it said but I say to you he's talking like he runs this place and they're listening to him and they're going ah who talks like that but they don't get along to think about it because it says and immediately there wasn't a synagogue a man with an unclean spirit and he cried out what did he do with us Jesus of Nazareth have you come to destroy us I know who you are the Holy One of God and Jesus rebuked him saying be silent come out of him and the unclean spirit convulsing him and crying out with a loud voice came out of him and they were all amazed so that they questioned among themselves saying what is this a new teaching with authority he commands even the unclean spirits and they obey Him so Jesus is teaching in a way that's blowing their minds but they don't even get much of a chance to think about it because all of a sudden a demon-possessed I starts losing his mind which makes her a very memorable church service right and Jesus cast out the demon Jesus just shuts it down and what's crazy about that is it says they were amazed but did you see why they weren't amazed that he cast out a demon there were other people doing that and there wasn't even amazing things about the way he did it the way he did it was innocent similar to what other exorcists in the time would do you would always call the demon to be silent and then call it to come out it says what amazed them was Jesus's authority as he did it because the Exorcist and the day back there they would call a demon to be silent in the name of the Most High they would invoke a higher power and then they would call it to come out with different chants and incantations and different things like that to try to call it out Jesus doesn't do any of that he doesn't call on any other power than his own this guy literally starts freaking out ah stop it and it's done it would have made a very boring exorcism movie you know because there's no like twirling heads no one climbing the wall literally like that yeah stop credits roll it would have been a very short film and it says the people see this and they have no category for this they go this is a level of of power we're not familiar with who talks like this and who has control over the spiritual world like this what kind of authority is this and it says it immediately he left the synagogue and entered the house of Simon Andrew with James and John and Simon's mother-in-law like ill with fever and immediately they told him about her and he came and took her hand and lifted her up in the fever left and she began to serve them so he's teaching powerfully great and then he's exercising spiritual power that's awesome but now we got a physical issue I mean this isn't the intangibles of teaching the spiritual world this is physical sickness fever right Jesus walks in says mother-in-laws sick and so he walks up and just casts out the fever fever out right and it's not just like the fever broke that suddenly she got better and they're like oh Jesus takes credit for it that was me guys right and then she lays in bed the rest a day drinks fluids and try to recover it's that he touches her and it's gone and she goes from ill to popping up and mark lets you know that because he says she just popped up starts serving people she's like Morty Johnstone bill she's just ready to go and you look at this and the question that you asked when you see that is who has authority over the physical world like that he just told a fever what to do and it did it and it says by the end of it the whole cities at the door wondering what kind of guy we just got ourselves into here now let me just stop right there and let's just before we continue look at something I want you to see what was Jesus's first impression with these first people that met him if you were to ask them hey tell me about Jesus what was the first thing that that stood out to them that burned into their minds that they were talking about what stood out about Jesus to them was his authority was his authority not his wisdom though he was wise not even his love per se though he is loving what stood out to them what they would think of when they thought of Jesus was Authority he commands people as if he thinks he has the right to command people he commands the unseen world as if he believes he has the right to command the unseen world he commands nature as if he thinks he has the right to command nature and it looks like all those spheres agree with him what kind of guy is this what kind of authority is this I wonder if that's what you think of when you think of Jesus is that the Jesus that comes to mind when you when you think about it that he walks in with that kind of authority or do you see him more like they do on South Park or Family Guy just a little guy in a bathrobe you know I remember I was at a wedding once with a bunch of Navy SEALs that's another story I won't unpack but getting to visit with them I appreciated the honesty at one moment with one guy we were just visiting and he said man I'm the most F and not religious person you're ever going to meet you know just kind of dropped it on me and I was like okay rockin all right you know and that's how we started the conversation but I remember as we sat in that church we were looking up at this stained-glass window and it was this picture of Jesus and he was just like this is tiny tiny little guy and whisking a long hair and just looked he was like petting his sheep and he just looked adorable and small and I remember looking at that and just saying hey man you know he was nothing like that right that the people who met him what struck them about him was his authority that he runs this place but what's interesting if you noticed they don't start following at his feet and calling him Lord yet they don't start worshipping truthfully they see the power but they don't know what to do with him so they start doing what a lot of people do they start trying to put him in a box trying to figure out what box to put him in and there's two popular boxes they start to put him in and incidentally the same boxes we tend to put him in the first group starts to put him in like the the healing helper box like oh he's the guy that's just here to help us with a problem so I just I come to him if I have a problem he fixes it we high-five and I leave and some people want to treat him that way and some of us do too you know I don't really want anything to do with Jesus unless I have a problem then I'll pray cause I got a problem if he fixes it great and I'm going to move on and incidentally that's one reason why some people approach him that's the same reason why some of your friends reject him is it not and you've heard people say that to you yeah yet you are into Jesus because you need him to solve your problems because you're weak and frail and need that I on the other hand am not a weak person I am self-sufficient so I don't need your religious crutch I don't need your Jesus right that's the first box they want to put him in kind of your healing helper guy what's funny is after this crazy day Jesus goes out early to pray that morning they go look for him and the disciples are like dude everybody's looking for you they all want their friends healed let's set up shop is healing ministry time let's go and Jesus says no no I'm not doing that he's not anti healing but he says no I need to keep moving because I have a message to preach and the miracles they serve a message I'm not just here to solve problems I have something to say to you about your life the miracle serve a message I want to preach to you now some people hear that and you go okay I see where you're going he's not the little healing helper buddy you're gonna say he's Authority he's power he's sort of the religious rule maker like here it comes I'm used to this he's the one that's going to charge in and start telling me you're making a mess of your life you need to quit sleeping with her don't drink that dump smoke that don't touch her oh here we go right he's the guy that's going to drop some rules on us well what's interesting and we won't read through this section but jesus heals a leper and once he does that his ministry blows up which just if any of you are in ministry just a little FYI if you ever healed leper buckle up because it goes crazy all right and it gets to the point where he can't go anywhere everywhere he goes he's getting mobbed he's like Justin Bieber in a Hollister you know like it's crazy everywhere he goes and once that happens the religious leadership of the day takes interest in him they go oh we got a religious guy on the scene that's kind of blowing up and so they start showing up to check and make sure that he's sitting in the appropriate religious box the problem with Jesus though is he just gets out of all your boxes and so what's interesting is if we get to mark chapter 2 Jesus starts to introduce himself and mark just ties together these five stories in a row of his interaction with these religious leaders and they basically get in fights the whole time and it's fights over Jesus's identity that Jesus says no I'll identify myself and I don't fit into these boxes of yours and so we won't go in deep on all five but we'll look at one he goes to Capernaum in chapter 2 verse 1 and he's preaching in the houses packed people can't get in it's just wall-to-wall and there's some guys with a paralytic friend I got a friend who's paralyzed on a mat they want to get him to jesus because jesus heals people and they can't get into places back so they climb up on the roof of the place rip the roof open and lower their buddy down right in front of Jesus like you do right and Jesus doesn't get mad about it he's not like what is this I mean like he's not he's not anti healing but he doesn't heal the guy right away he just stops with all right stay paralyzed for a second and he decides to use this as a teaching illustration and it says he gets into this moment that when he saw their faith he says to the paralytic son your sins are forgiven your sins are forgiven now he's been healing other people without maybe even saying anything this is something else he decides to use this as a teaching moment and says son your sins are forgiven and it says now some of the scribes were sitting there questioning their heart why does this man speak like that he's blaspheming who can forgive sins but God alone and that's a good question they say hey who talks like that and who does talk like that I mean honestly it would be like like if you two were in a fight right now like let's say something went sideways yes y'all and like let's say something like just what really crazy between the two of you and it's ugly and you're fighting in direct relationships far from over this may turn you know like police involvement like it's getting ugly imagine if I stepped into the moment was like woops I forgive you you'd be like who are you like you're not a part of this and if I was like then I wipe away every wrong you've ever done you'd be like who do you think you are and that's what they're saying like oh this guy's a good preacher oh this guy can heal people now suddenly he's up there taking a divine prerogative your sins are forgiven and they're in the back throne penalty flags like he can't talk like that what's that guy do it only God can do that and what's crazy is they actually don't even get to say it out loud it says they're questioning in their heart who does this and while they're questioning in their heart who does this it says immediately Jesus perceived this and said which is easier which is easier to say paralytic rise or your sins are forgiven which is easier which is easier yeah they're about as quiet as you are it's a hard question on the end of day the answer is it depends right I mean in one sense to say your sins are forgiven is easier why because there's no way to verify if it really worked or not so I could say that all day long right and in that sense to say to someone who's paralyzed get up and walk is infinitely harder because that's instantly verifiable you're going to know if it if I got the juice to pull that off in about five seconds if the dude can get up or not right but on the other side only God can forgive your sin that's infinitely harder and so Jesus asked them which is harder they can't answer that and so Jesus takes those two things and ties it together and says so that you may know that the Son of man has authority to forgive sins get up in law and the guy rises and they're amazed and they glorify God what kind of guy can forgive sin what kind of guy can step into our crazy and make it peaceful what kind of guy is this conflict number two is Jesus hanging out with the party crowd he goes to a party at Matthews house Matthew throws crazy parties the religious people say you can't do that you can't show up there and what's interesting is Jesus doesn't look at the religious people and go y'all need to relax y'all are bein legalist just calm down like you doesn't like pick a side like they say you can't be there and Jesus says these guys are sick and they are sick he says to to seek to fill the vacancies in your heart with with things or sex or did some sort of new trick or exciting things that's not sufficient he says what they're doing that desperate insecurity he says it's it's a sickness but then he says they're sick but I'm the cure I'm the cure who talks like that who says something like that all the brokenness in you I can fix it I can fix it his disciples don't fast the Jewish religious people back then would fast go without food certain days it was they were mourn over their sin hoping that one day God would send the Messiah his official representative that would fix things so they'd come to him and say why aren't your disciples doing that and what's interesting as Jesus could have just said oh no fast later but Jesus says something else he says they're not fasting because the bridegroom's here was the bridegroom's here that was a mildly arrogant thing to say because all through the prophetic writings the bridegroom the husband of his people the one that was going to come and love your soul for better and for worse always and forever is God alone and Jesus says my boys aren't fasting no why because the bridegroom is here and they're like you how can you say that that's who God is and you're talking like that they see him the next Sabbath and he's walking with his disciples and they're plucking grain and they're the rolling the grip of the little chaff off so they can eat their grain and the religious leaders calm on that they say you can't do that that's harvesting harvesting is illegal on the Sabbath and that's a conflict and Jesus could have said to them well you know technically just running your hands together and eating a little seed it's not harvesting if you read the Hebrew in its original touch you know he could have done it that way and that would have been a legitimate way he goes the harder way and says you guys have completely missed the heart of God in the Bible you have missed God entirely even though you have the belleville memorized you got it all sideways you guys don't understand that God put his word out there to bless us not to tyrannize us you guys are mixed up on who God even is that that was the gutsier way and he could have stopped there and that would have been like whoa that was intense but then he goes and on the lord of the sabbath he says this day set aside to worship God alone that's my day that's my day that day is about me and then on the next sabbath he picks a guy up in front of them who's got a withered hand and he says is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath they're sitting in the back leg down James goes healed and if you are making a movie about it that's when you would kick in the soundtrack of like Rihanna singing who's going to run this town tonight you know you're just like this guy is mic dropping these people and by the end of it it says they want to kill him because they understand what he's doing he's saying I'm not just a religious teacher and I'm not just your little buddy I am in a class all my own you have never met anyone like me who runs the world like that who runs the spiritual world like that who can look into the darkness of my soul and say I can fix that I'm here to fix that who can look at us and say yeah this place is broken and sad but I'm here to bring the joy of a wedding day who talks like that who does that you've never seen anyone like him CS Lewis said it this way on one side clear definite moral teaching on the other claims which if not true are those of a megalomaniac compared with whom Hitler was the most sane and humblest of men Jesus told people their sins were forgiven this made sense only if he really was the God his laws were broken and whose love is wounded in every sin I am trying here to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him I'm ready to accept Jesus was a great moral teacher but I don't accept his claims to be God that is the one thing we must not say a man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher he'd be either a lunatic on the level of a man who says he's a poached egg or else he would be a devil of hell you can shut him up for a fool spit on him and kill him in as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God but let none of us come up with this patronizing nonsense about him being a great human teacher he's not left that open to us he did not intend to he stepped into this place and says this is my world this is my kingdom I run this place the first impression is his authority and as he introduces himself he says you've never met anyone like me I'm God on earth the son of God with all God's Authority right here and I've come for you and when a man makes a claim like that you're really only left for two options allegiance or rebellion Allegiance or rebellion now some of us hear that and we're really uncomfortable because you're like I been I don't like Authority so if you're saying the goal of tonight was Jesus is your authority yes that is the goal tonight if you're like my only problem is I don't like Authority I don't want anyone telling me what to do so I don't like this well let me just say this you won Authority you do maybe not all the time right but when things really go sideways for you and stuff begins to break you want somebody that can show up and lead this place so I remember I remember when Katrina hit New Orleans I remember listening to the radio and the mayor is client like the mayor that's supposed to like be strong and tell people where to go they asked the mayor what are we going to do and he just starts crying on the on the radio and the announcer starts crying and I'm sitting there in the car just listening to these two grown men just heave and make noises they have no answers they're just in need and they start crying Shepard Smith he's standing out there in an overpass dead bodies that nobody's picking up and he just starts crying on national TV like he's got no answers no power all he has is helplessness in the face of problems he can't solve and he just starts crying and I remember watching this all over of going somebody help us and I'll never forget I was watching the news when Lieutenant General Russell Andre got off the helicopter that they sent it general and I remember he stepped off that helicopter with just the badges rolling down his chest and even the news people that are meant to be professional or a little skeptical the media or fawning over him they were just like are you here to tell us what to do oh just send us places and I remember he would just walk at me like you the same back to UK that water you just run around in circles you and he would just start telling you what to do and they were all like yes sir that's awesome I'm on it right and off they would go there was such relief in such joy because in the midst of my chaos in pain somebody is here to tell me what to do that'll help me and give me life and so we may say Ben I don't want an authority over my life but let me tell you something we're all one phone call away from being brought to our knees we're too frail in this world whether we know it or not we really are and some of us external crises will help us see that problems we can't control some of us it's the internal stuff there's things going on in you that you don't like and as much as you try to dial in your discipline you can't fix you and you're starting to develop some secrets that are eating you alive and you're starting to get scared and you're wondering who's going to step in and help you we want an authority we do we might be scared of it some of us because people who had Authority and our lives before used it to abuse us and that was wrong but Jesus steps in and says I'm your authority whether you like it or not but look at what kind of King he is how does he use his power he comes to the person who's unclean and he makes him clean he comes to the people who were sick and he makes him okay he comes to the people who are lonely and desperate and brings them the joy of a wedding day look at what kind of King we have look at him Bob Dylan saying it you're going to serve somebody it may be the devil it may be the Lord but you're going to serve somebody look at this King his power is in service of his love CS Lewis his quote I read earlier was an atheist very proud one very defiant one as he taught at Oxford became a Christian I read the first book he wrote after he became a Christian it was an allegory and it's really raw he like houses and he's very upset but his picture of becoming a Christian and this allegorical story is of the character being forced down a mountain in the rain at night by sword point to have to go drown himself CS Lewis was not excited about becoming a Christian but he couldn't get away from this little carpenter from Nazareth who changed the world and said he was God and so he bowed his knees and was the lowliest saddest convert in all of London but then he wrote a biography about his experience it wasn't allegory it was his actual conversion experience told from his life story and he entitled it surprised by Joey he said I saw that he really was who he said he was and I I fell to my knees because I had nowhere else to go and what I found there was the joy I had longed for that he's the King and he's good let me read for us God you came here with all the authority of heaven you taught like you ran this place because you do you commanded the unseen world because it's yours to command you commanded this physical world because you hold it together by the word of your power you Jesus Christ the Son of God rule this place even now and all of us there's no secrets here no surprises no one off your radar and yet with all that power how do you use it you talk to us you grab the hand of an old woman who's hurting and make it okay you grab a guy that's unclean and you do the impossible you don't become dirty by touching him you make him clean and some of us just really need that really one time you make the people who are empty full you make the sad joyful you live the perfect life we could not and you came to sacrifice your life greater love has no man than this that he lay down his life for his friends you went to the cross to move our sin and shame out of the way to open up a relationship with God all of your power used in service of your love to take lonely wayward broken sick people and make us holy loved adopted cherished children of God Thank You King Jesus we joyfully submit to you and God I know there wasn't a lot of application in this sermon I wrestled without but the truth is there's a thousand or two thousand problems in here I couldn't illustrate them all if I wanted to but we have them and many of us what we need is not a three-step plan of how to get our mess together what we need is a hero and so god I just pray even now is we have a moment to talk to you we could come honestly and some people in this room need to just say okay I'm ready to belong to Jesus if he's calling people to himself I'm in I want in if he's forgiven sin I need forgiveness if he's cleansing people I need cleansing I went on the team give me the jersey and if that's you you cry out to him and tell the person who brought you until one of the pastor's here we'd love to encourage you and celebrate with you and walk with you and God for those of us that know you maybe we've been walking with you every moment of every day right up until this moment or maybe it's been a long time but what we need more than anything tonight is not a not a technique what we need is to sit at the feet of our hero that as we look into the face of Jesus we see God the God who said let light shine out of darkness shone into our hearts to show us the glory of God in the face of Christ and in beholding him we are changed from glory to glory guys are going to lead us to respond to Jesus and song and you can sing it I want to challenge you whatever you're bringing in here lay it at his feet he cares any strong and maybe not all the answers will come tonight but there's peace and knowing that the king of the universe knows my name and cares we rest in you are good and loving King Jesus

Channel: The Porch

Views: 18,143

Rating: 4.888268 out of 5

Keywords: Skepticism (Quotation Subject), the porch, watermark, ben stuart

Id: IJPpcUYZ7dM

Length: 43min 40sec (2620 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 28 2014