2023 02 12

Amen. Well, good morning, church. My name is Dwayne, one of the pastors here at the district. Uh, at this time, we want to go ahead and dismiss our three to five year olds. So, if you're between, if you're three, four, or five, uh, you can head off to your classroom. Just follow the other herd of kids that are heading out there.

Uh, for the rest of us, go ahead and grab your Bibles. Uh, either open them up or turn them on. Uh, we're going to be in Luke chapter 7. Luke chapter 7. And we're going to be looking at verses 11-17 today. 11-17.

And uh as you're getting there, um again, we're walking through the book of Luke. And so the book of Luke is written by uh Dr. Luke, who was a physician. Um and he was funded by a benefactor named Theophilles. um who essentially wanted him to record everything possible that he knew about the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus so that he would have assurance of faith. If he's going to believe this, he needs to have assurance of faith.

And so, as we walk through Luke, it's that same thing that we're looking for. We're looking for an assurance of faith. Is Jesus really who he says he is? Did he really do what he said he did? Did he really die? and was he risen three days later?

Does he guarantee life for those who believe in him, who trust in him? And and as we walk through this, we're praying that the Holy Spirit grants that for us. We're praying that as we see what Jesus has done and what he's accomplished and what he's taught and what he's um done for other people as well. Like we're we're praying that the spirit of God leads us to understand that this wasn't just a good man who lived. This wasn't just a good teacher, but that this was the God man. was the son of God who put on flesh, came and dwelt among us.

Um, and that he moved towards us, um, that he forgave us, that he healed us, that he he does miraculous things. And today's story is another one of those examples of Jesus being the God man who does something that again only God could do, but also does it in a way that is fully human. Fully human. And so I want you to be able to see that as we as we walk through and talk about this idea of the compassion of Jesus, the compassion of Christ. And so starting in verse 11, I'll read it for us and then we'll we'll break it down a bit. Soon afterward, he went to a town called Naine.

And his disciples and a great crowd went with him. And as he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother. And she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her, and he said to her, "Do not weep." Then he came up and touched the beer. Um, not to be confused with what we consider beer.

Um, but he touched the frame or for the coffin that was being carried on it. That's what a beer is in this context. And the bearer stood still and he said, "Young man, I say to you, arise." And the dead man sat up and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother. Fear seized them all.

And they glorified God, saying, "A great prophet has arisen among us, and God has visited his people." and this report about him spread through the whole of Judea and all the surrounding country. Let's pray real quick before we break this down a bit. Father, thank you again for the goodness that we have in being able to come to your word. Uh we believe that the Bible is inspired by you, written by you, granted and given to us by you um for our assurance of faith. For us to be able to see Jesus and to be able to believe in Jesus, to be able to trust him for the forgiveness of our sins and to be able to trust him that he is actually coming to reconcile all things and to make all things new again.

And we're able to see that in the way that Jesus has dwelt among us and the way that he's interacted with us who do not deserve him, who are sinners, but yet he moved towards us and he pursued us even in our sin and even in our death in order to come and bring forgiveness and to bring life. And so we thank you, God, and we ask that your spirit right now would allow us to have that assurance of faith as we continue to walk through this passage this morning. It's in Jesus's name we pray. Amen. All right. So Jesus enters a town called Naine.

And usually whenever I say a weird naming for a town, I always want to know, okay, what's the meaning behind it? And I'm not just trying to find meaning behind it to try to put meaning where there's not meaning. Uh but the meaning of this town naine is just beautiful. All right, that's what it means. So it was likely a beautiful town. Um at the same time, and again not trying to put meaning into it that's not there, but I think also we're we're just seeing a beautiful moment.

We're seeing a beautiful moment in the life of Jesus and what he's about to uh to accomplish in this moment. So the town means beautiful. And as he's coming into this town, as he's entering into this gate, he encounters a funeral procession of a man who has died. Uh, and this man is the only son of his mother who also happens to be a widow. So, she's lost her husband point and now she's lost her only son. And so, it's safe to say that this woman, this mother is one who is who is acquainted with grief.

All right? She she's grieving. She's weeping. And that's what her experience is right now. That's what her circumstances are. We also see that there's a large with her, which again may mean that her character and reputation was highly respected among the town's people.

And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, "Do not weep." Jesus then raises the young man back to life, gifts him to his mother, and then the rest of the crowd responds in fear and amazement, glorifying God and declaring that God has visited his people. as a context of what we're seeing in this passage. And last week, what we saw, for those who weren't here, we actually saw Jesus marveling at a centurion's faith in him and the centurion's compassion that he had towards a a valued um uh servant of his who was near death. And so essentially what we're seeing is kind of the flip-flop in this scenario is we're now seeing Jesus moving towards the compassion of someone who's vulnerable and and and and dead, not just ill, but dead. And at the same time seeing the crowd then marvel in amazement at what Jesus is doing at what Jesus is doing here.

So, we're being able to see kind of the both sides of this experience of Jesus marveling and now us having the option or opportunity to marvel at something that he is accomplishing. And what a wonder that when God himself takes on our own flesh and blood, walks among us in our fallen world, is known for his compassion. He's known for his compassion. Because we might expect depending on how you were brought up, depending on how you were taught God and and how God functions as a father and as a judge, we might expect that he would be erupting with anger and frustration at every person in town that he visits. I mean, after all, human sin is simply a cosmic treason against Jesus and his father, and it grieves his holy spirit. So make no mistake like it would be right and it would be fitting for Jesus to respond with righteous anger when walking among us when dwelling among us in utter holiness and perfection.

Rather in this moment he g gives us a stunning glimpse into the heart full of his compassion. A heart full of his compassion. The fact that Matthew, Mark, and Luke each give us three clear glimpses into the compassion of Christ, it provides us a window into the fullness of Jesus's humanity, the fullness of his humanity. As John Calvin once said, "Christ put on our feelings just as much as he put on our flesh." In the warmth of Jesus's compassion, we see the fully emotional life of our savior. And I mentioned that last week when we saw this scenario of Jesus marveling at the centurion's faith and and kind of drawing into that conclusion of like isn't it amazing that Jesus marvels at something because you you could never surprise Jesus like you can never catch him off guard.

He you never think something he doesn't see you thinking before you think it. Like you can't do something that he doesn't already know you're going to do. But yet as a full human being, Jesus is able to enter into the experience and circumstance and feel the weight of the situation. So when he's experiencing the faith of the centurion, he's able to marvel and be joyful and be excited over something that he's created. And in this moment here, we're able to see Jesus do the same thing when he enters into compassion and he feels the weight of compassion when he sees someone who is hurting, who is suffering, who is grieving and mourning. Again, Jesus knows what he's walking into when he comes into name, when he comes into this town.

He knows what he's about to experience and what he's about to do. Yet he allows compassion to be the first thing that he feels that he feels. These are windows into the very heart and nature of God. You see where the word of God reveals the character, attributes and essence of who Jesus is. Like we read the Bible to get to know more of Jesus. Well, Jesus is the characteristic and attributes and essence of who the father is, of who God is.

So, we read the Bible to see who Jesus is. We look at Jesus to see who God is. And what we're getting to see in the God man in this situation, in this story, is we're also seeing a window into the compassion of God for man because we're seeing it worked out in the life of Jesus. So let's look closer into this story of Jesus having compassion for this widow who has lost her husband and now her only son and may we by the power of the Holy Spirit marvel at the heart of Jesus the very heart of God. Uh looking at verse 12 says, "As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of his mother, and she was a widow, and a considerable crowd from the town was with her." And when the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, "Do not weep."

And I got three things, kind of three observances that I want to show you from this passage. The one is this woman was acquainted with grief. She was acquainted with grief. Grief is an expression of loss. All right? It's an expression of loss.

It it's accompanied with deep sorrow. Deep sorrow. It's usually attached to someone who who has died. Um though there are other ways to experience grief. I mean, moving on from a friendship, the empty nest when children leave home, the loss of a job. These are all forms of grief.

But the greatest encounter with grief is when you is when someone you love dies. That that's the greatest encounter that you have with grief is when you love someone and they die. This woman has experienced the loss of her husband for she is a widow and now her only son who apparently is young since Jesus when he raises him says young man come back to life. Jesus who at this time is roughly 32 years old. the man would be younger than that. And usually for them to consider someone young but still be considered a man means they've passed the age of 13.

So we're going to guess he's somewhere in that range of 13 to 32. He's a young man. Losing a child is a deep sorrow. Possibly one of the top deepest sorrows you can encounter in life. You can encounter in life. I've been with people who have lost a spouse and I've been with people who have lost a child.

This woman has experienced both and she's weeping. She's weeping. A good response to grief. To grief. Jesus when approaching the funeral of Lazarus, a different story, his friend. Jesus grieved when he arrived and his response to his own grief was weeping.

Weeping. It's an appropriate response. It's a human response. It's this response that God gave us in order to have when this situation like this occurs. Jesus knows what this woman is going through. He knows.

He's acquainted with it himself. Jesus knows what you're going through. We We always say you're either coming into a season of suffering, you're in suffering, or you're coming out of a season of suffering. But it's always close. It's always close. And what we see here is that when Jesus comes into the town and he experiences this woman who is acquainted with grief and is weeping and is suffering, Jesus sees her.

He sees her. That's the second point. Jesus sees you. One of the loneliest places to be is when you are sad and nobody cares. Right? When you're sad and nobody cares.

like you just need a hug and yet there's nobody there to comfort you. Jesus enters this town, apparently a quite beautiful place. Maybe the disciples are thinking, "Sweet, a destination spot. Let's have a retreat. Let's get the bonfire going. Let's lay out by the pool."

But Jesus had other plans. They enter the town by the gate and they enter into the sounds of weeping. And this is important for what happens next. It says verse 12, "As he drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out." And if you were to skip verse 13 and move on to verse 14, it says he then goes straight up to the coffin and the bearer stood still and he said, "Young man, I say to you, arise." And the dead man sat up and began to speak and Jesus gave him to his mother.

It would have saved some time if Jesus would have just gone straight to the coffin. brought the boy back to life. It would have turned this funeral into a celebration of life. It would have it would have turned it into a party, a reception, and then they could have headed on to the main resort. But that's not what Jesus did. As Brian Laritz, a pastor out in North Carolina, likes to say, verse 13 is food for the soul.

It's food for the soul. You see verse 13, knowing what he's going to do, he still chooses to do this moment right here. When the Lord saw her, he had compassion on her and said to her, "Do not weep." He didn't go straight to the coffin. He diverted his attention to the mother. He saw her.

He wants her to know she's been seen. So he approaches her and seeing the grieving and weeping she is expressing Jesus is filled with compassion for her. Compassion is is when you see the suffering in someone else and you feel the suffering with them. You feel it with them. Again just like Lazarus, Jesus knows this is going to become a party very soon once he raises the young man back to life. But Jesus does not avoid the opportunity to comfort someone who is grieving.

He doesn't avoid that opportunity. He saw this woman suffering and he moves towards it, not away from it. I think sometimes for us, it's natural for us to see someone kind of mourning or grieving or weeping or crying and we're like, I'm not sure what to do here. And so we kind of avoid it and wait for it to stop. And then whenever it stops, we kind of is everything okay? Jesus moves towards it.

And maybe this is a a key takeaway for those here who are fixers. I don't want to I don't want to stereotype just the men in here because I believe there are women in here who are fixers as well, who operate that way. But if Jesus were like most men who see a woman upset, they don't take time to enter into the emotional situation. and they jump to, "Let me fix it. Let me go to the coffin and just raise this man. I'm going to fix your issue here."

But that's not what Jesus does. He sees the upset mother first and he goes to her and comforts her because of his compassion and he tells her, "Do not weep." I don't think that's Jesus telling a woman to calm down. That usually doesn't go well. or stop crying. I like to think Jesus is wiser than that.

But this is a moment of comfort. This is a moment where Jesus is going to do something that only Jesus can do. Only Jesus can do. And number three is that he reconciles all things. Jesus reconciles all things. This mother is getting to experience a first fruit of Jesus's saving work on earth.

Like what she's about to see in illustration is the very reason Jesus came to dwell among us. The very reason she's getting to see Genesis to Revelation played out in an evening. In an evening. I mean when we talk about the Bible, the Bible you can you can boil it all down into four categories. creation, fall, redemption, and then restoration or the reconciliation of all things. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

He created everything. And it was wonderful, and it was good, and it was beautiful, and it was exactly the way that he had designed it to function, for God to be in relationship with humanity, for humanity being in relationship with God, and to enjoy all things and give God all the credit for it. and that that's how we were intended to function and live. God, thank you for everything that you've provided for us. We get to enjoy all of these things and you are beautiful because it is your design. We are we are seeking and and experiencing the greatest pleasure in all things and at the same time enjoying you infinitely because it was your thought up idea.

you are good because of your goodness. And it wasn't enough for us. We were deceived and we were tempted and we were said, "You know what? Enjoying all of God's goodness and enjoying God in relationship, that's all fine and dandy. That's all great. But what about if you could actually become God?

Well, what's greater than what you're experiencing? Just become God." And then there then there is no separation. Like Satan caused us to believe the lie that we were in some way separated from God already. And we bought into the lie and we did the one thing that God asked us not to do. Don't eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.

We through our disobedience brought in death. Death. That's what God said. God gives life. To break that is the opposite. You then receive death and it ushered in the curse that fractured all of creation.

So now creation is dead. It's fractured. That's why we have storms. That's why we have hurricanes. That's why trees fall. It's why all of the things that are going on in our world is groaning and not working and is hostile is because of the curse.

Is because of our sin. And not only is gr is is creation fractured and broken, but we are. You get to Genesis 3 and we start blaming one another. Our relationship is fractured. And it goes on to literally I mean just one generation you got kids killing one another. Death is running rampant at this point.

And then we begin the process of redemption. God was not surprised by our failure. As he says in Genesis 3, there will be one that will be an offspring of the woman that will come and will crush the head of the serpent and in so doing will bruise his heel as well. A foreshadowing of the coming Christ uh cross of Jesus where he takes on the wrath of God. do us because of our sin. He takes it on himself being bruised.

But in that death, he defeats Satan once and for all. Crushes him. Crushes him. And then he begins to do the one thing that only Jesus can do. He begins to reverse the curse. What was dead, he can now grant life to it.

What was broken, he can now fix and repair. What was irreconcilable is now reconcilable in relationship with him. And then he promises to us that as we are now entering into this phase of redemption and restoration, he tells us in Revelation 21, I'm going to make all things new. I'm going to make all things new. that entire biblical narrative of what is going on in the world. We get to see it in this one moment.

This one moment Jesus comes in and says, "I see brokenness. I see death. I see mourning. I see weeping. I see grieving. I see uh separation of relationship between this mother and this son.

And I'm going to come in and I'm going to restore all this. I'm going to get rid of the weeping. Do not weep anymore. and I'm going to get rid of the death. I'm going to raise this young man back to life and I'm going to reconcile these two as I gift the son back to his mother. I mean, is there any greater picture of the gospel message?

We are children dead in our trespasses, separated from our father, and Jesus comes in and says, "Not anymore. Not anymore. I'm going to forgive you of your sins and I'm going to gift you back to your father where you can then enter back into relationship and where there is no more weeping and nashing of teeth but rather there is now rejoicing and celebration. Jesus will reconcile all things. It's interesting that as you kind of look through the gospels when it comes to his description of what death is and what hell is and what eternal separation from God is, the language that he uses is that in that place of darkness, there will be weeping and nashing of teeth. And Jesus in this moment is coming in and he's telling this woman, "Do not weep any longer.

Do not weep. The fullness of grief, suffering, and torment expressed for all eternity is hell. The opposite of that is what we experience in Christ in heaven. And we see this in scriptures like Colossians 1:1 19-20. For in him, that is Jesus, all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of his cross. When I say this mother is experiencing the first fruits of what Jesus is doing in all of human history, this is it right here.

This is it. And I want you to listen to this in the context of our passage. This is Revelation 21 1-5. He says, "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven, the first earth had passed away." I mean, I think about that. This this mother is experiencing a son who has passed away.

Yet, she's about to get a new son. And the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne, saying, "Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God." God is not a distant God who's just sitting on a throne judging everything.

He wants to be with us. He wants to come to us. Just as Jesus came to this mother who is weeping, he saw her and he moved towards her to be with her. That's what God is doing. In verse four, he will wipe away every tear from their eyes. What has he done for this mother in this moment?

He's wiping her tears away and death shall be no more. Your son is dead. Not anymore. Neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore. For the former things have passed away. Death will pass away.

Death will die. And it dies because through Christ, God's wrath towards sin and death is satisfied. because it's satisfied. Where God put brought death into the garden, he can now annihilate death and it will be no more for us. No more for us. And then he goes on to say, "And he who was seated on the throne said, behold, I Jesus, I am making all things new."

And then he goes on to say, 'W this down, for these words are trustworthy and true. What was Luke set out to understand and help Theophilles believe? Assurance of faith. Write these words down for these words are trustworthy and true. You see, Jesus comes into this beautiful town. He sees this grieving mother.

He feels compassion. He hurts that she is hurting. And in every ounce of his being, his essence, Jesus recognizes this. This is what I was sent for. This is what I was sent to accomplish. Though the moment it was a temporary fix for this mother, the reality, her son's going to die again.

He's going to die again. Maybe later on in life, but it would happen again. He's not still walking among us right now. And they'd be weird if he was, but he's not. But what Jesus is demonstrating in this moment is that God, seeing the suffering of this world because of our sin, feels compassion for us. He created us to experience his pleasure forever more.

And because of sin, we're not. We're not. He created us to experience his goodness in all things. So when we are not experiencing that pleasure forever more, he moves towards us. We're suffering without it. God moves towards us.

He sees us and he comes to lift our heads. He comes to tell us, "Stop weeping. Stop weeping. Stop mourning your sin and the groaning of your life. I can fix it. I can restore it.

I can reconcile it. And that's exactly what he does. Now because God is a compassionate God and because Jesus the God man has revealed the compassion of God in action. Jesus has revealed to us what we or what would be a truly human and g God glorifying response when we encounter others who are hurting. In other words, to be like God, to be like Jesus. Three things.

We are called to see one another when we are hurting, when we are suffering. We're called to see one another when we're hurting. We don't need to quickly run to let me fix it. Let me help you. Let me show you what you can do better. If you weren't doing this, you probably wouldn't have been in this situation.

Let us see one another in our hurting. And as Jesus experiences compassion, let us experience compassion for one another. Let us hurt when we are hurting. And that's number two. We are called to hurt. When we see one another hurting, don't be afraid to enter into that with someone.

It's it's human to do that. This is a mo day stuff. This is for Jesus to experience it means it's good for us to experience it. All right? There is no one who represents the IMO day greater than Jesus experiencing the IMO day. He is the image of God.

He is the visible representation of the invisible God. We are created as image bearsers of God. How do we bear that image? Look to how Jesus does it because he does it best. And if Jesus sees someone hurting and is filled with compassion and moves towards them, we ought to do the same. Every one of us.

We can't throw off the side and be like, "Well, I'm just not a compassionate person or I don't feel deeply or I'm not emotional." No, we are all emotional. So, don't use personality types to excuse it away and say, "Well, I'm just not wired that way. I'm a fixer." Let someone else deal with it and then when they're ready for a solution, pull me in and I'm there. No.

No. If we don't feel compassion for people that are hurting, then as we've been practicing as a church lately, pray for it. Pray for it. You have not because you ask not. Ask God to give you compassion for those around you who are hurting and move towards them. Which is number three.

We are called to comfort one another in our hurting. That's what Jesus is doing here. Again, this story, just like last week's, last week's was not about Jesus healing the centurion servant from afar because he's that incredibly powerful. Absolutely, that's a part of the story, but the story was Jesus marveling at the faith of the centurion. This story is not about Jesus having the power to raise someone from the dead back to life. This story is about the compassion of Christ for the mother.

That's what it's primarily about. There are other points to it that we can marvel at and and see and be amazed by just like the rest of the people in the town were experiencing. They didn't see Jesus being compassionate to the mother. They just saw what he did to the son and they were like created fear in them and amazement and the word of him continued to spread and go around. Don't miss verse 13. We're called to comfort one another.

And let me just be honest, as someone who has walked through difficult circumstances and suffering, comforting someone doesn't mean that you have the exact words to share with them. It might mean just showing up and being there and sitting with them. Just sitting with them. Maybe it isn't if they're they if they are touchy feely. Maybe it is an arm around their shoulder. But it's just knowing them and giving them what they need in the moment.

Words can come later, but in that moment, comfort one another in our hurting. For example, it'd be like James 2:14-17 when he says, "What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, "Go in peace. Be warmed and filled without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that?" So also faith by itself, if it does not have works, is dead.

Seeing someone hurting and not moving towards them to provide for them the comfort that they need in the moment would be like us just seeing someone who is hurting and from afar saying man I hope it works out for them. We'll pray for you. Let us be people who move towards one another when we are hurting. Compassion for others is a fruit of faith. Why? Because faith is of Jesus.

Compassion is of Jesus. It's his substance. So if you are of Jesus, then you will be people of compassion. And the last thing I want to say as we come to this time of communion, what gives Jesus the right to bring back to life a man who has died to actually take this woman from weeping and suffering and grieving and mourning? What gives him the right to reconcile her situation to actually walk her through the process of grieving to then hope that life is actually the answer. Colossians 2:8-15 says this, and there's some work here, so follow me.

See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit according to human tradition according to the elemental spirits of the world and not according to Christ. I want to point that out because our world has a lot of answers for what we talked about in creation and fall. The the world is responding to that. The world is trying to fix the problem. So for example, because of our sin, we are dying. And anytime you go to the store and you're sitting in the checkout line and you see the magazines, they're doing everything they can to keep us from dying.

Here's your 10-minute abs. Here's your magic pill. Here's this program. Here's this diet. Here's this one thing that you can do. I mean, there are literally right now uh billionaires investing millions of dollars into creating bodies that allow them to stay 18 forever.

Just Google that. It's legit. Not that they'll be able to do it, but that they're trying. We're trying to reverse the curse. And the world is going to throw all kinds of captive and philosophy and empty deceit and empty promises to fix the problem. And it's not according to Christ.

It's not according to Christ. For in him, Jesus, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily. Everyone's trying to play God. Paul's reminding us the only one who gets to play God is Jesus because he is God. And you have been filled in him who is the head of all rule and authority. You've been filled in him.

You you if you believe in Jesus, then you've entered into abiding relationship with Christ where you are in Christ and he is in you and he possesses all rule and all authority. In him, in Jesus also you were circumcised and with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ. You're like, "Okay, that's deep. Don't know what we're really talking about there." What it is trying to say is that there was a system in the past that allowed you to be a part of the people of God. There is now a new system that allows you to be a part of the people of God.

And it is cutting away the sin that is in your life and ushering in the forgiveness of Jesus due your sins that allows you to be a part of the people of God. Having been buried with him in baptism in which you were also raised with him through faith in the power powerful working of God who raised him from the dead. So now there is we're entering into a death and alive situation here. If you're still alive in your sin, you are dead. But if your aliveness to your sin is put to death through Jesus on the cross, you are then now granted life and raised from your deadness of sin over here to a life that is now in eternity with Jesus. Life and life abundant.

In sin, you're dead. In Christ, life and life abundant. For he says in verse 13, "And you who were dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses." And here's the clincher right here. This is what we celebrate every week by cancelling the record of debt that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross.

Nailing it to the cross. Canceling the record of debt. Guys, every sin that we commit from the moment we are conceived in sin, born sinners, every sin we are and every sin we commit, there is a debt piling up against God. We owe him death. That's what our debt is. We owe him death.

That's the only thing that's going to pay for our sins. as a righteous, good judge that he is. And Jesus enters into the scene with compassion for those who are here, who are weeping and who are mourning and who are grieving the lack of of relationship with God. Jesus with compassion for us because this is a John 3:16. For God so loved the world, for God so had much compassion for the world that he sent his son. He moved towards us.

He saw us. He sent his son to us. And his son goes to the cross. And he takes our debt and he nails it to himself on the cross. So that the death due, the death of payment that is necessary, the wrath of God is poured out on him, crushes him, kills him, and our debt is wiped away. We're free of it.

No longer owe it because the debt is taken care of. Just like this young man, we are granted new life. We were raised from our death to walk in the newness of life in Jesus Christ. By cancelelling the record of death that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and he put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him.

Like Jesus triumphs over the debt, over the sin, over the death, over the rulers and the principalities and everyone who's who's drawing us to that. Even the ones who are deceiving us, the enemy, all of it. Jesus is greater than. And Jesus wins. He wins. And he wins because of his sacrifice.

His sacrifice that grants us life. His sacrifice that allows us to go back to that Revelation 215 where he now is able to come to us and wipe away every tear and to wipe away every pain and to say it's no more. You get life. You get life. You get joy. You get peace by the blood of the cross.

That's what he's doing for us. And that's why every week we want to be reminded of that sacrifice because it is what took us from death to life. His sacrifice at the cross. Nothing we had to do to earn it. I mean honestly we're walking to our own funeral as we live in life. That's all we were doing.

Wandering around in the domain of darkness. In Colossians 1 says that he came to the domain of darkness and he transferred us from there to the kingdom of the beloved son. For those who believe and trust. That's it. For those who believe and trust in him. One of the most freeing things that you'll ever hear is grace.

There's not one thing you have to do to earn his forgiveness. Not one thing. It's given. It's grace. He moved towards us. He didn't come ask this mother, what have you done in order for me to raise your son?

What have you done? How much money have you given? How many good things have you done? Why is this entire crowd of people around you who likely respect you? What have you done to earn their approval and reputation? What have you done?

He didn't ask any of those questions. He saw her in her grief and he moved towards her and he wiped away her tears. That's salvation. That's what he does for us. That's what he does for us. Let's pray together.

Father, we thank you so much that you are a God who is compassionate. And we thank you so much that as we your creation sinned against you, you did not leave us in our debt, but instead you felt compassion for us and you moved towards us by sending your son Jesus. And he came and he lived the life that we could not live. He died the death that we deserved. And he rose again three days later, guaranteeing for us that he would also raise us to a new life to reconcile us in relationship with you, to gift us to you. God, we thank you for your grace and your mercy that you pour out to us every single day.

It's in Jesus name we pray. Amen. I'm going to ask you to stand. As we stand together, this is a moment that we enter into and we receive from the Lord. So, right before Jesus went to be crucified, he met with his disciples and he shared a meal with them. And as he sat down with them at that meal, he broke bread and he um passed a cup of wine.

And those two things represented what he was about to do at the cross. the fact that he was going to break his body for them so that they don't have to and that he was going to shed his blood for them so that they don't have to. Both representations of his death that was going to pay for their sins. And he told them, "This is something that I want you to do as often as you can to remember my sacrifice and to remember what I offered for you to fuel you to continue going and sharing this good news with those around you. Because there are people around you who are mourning and who are grieving, who are suffering because of sin in the world. And I want you to move towards them with the good news of the gospel.

And I want you to bring them out of their death to life by giving them the gift of Jesus. This fuels us as we remember what he's done for us. And so in this room, if there's been a time where you've believed in Jesus and you trust him and you understand that this is the good news, the gospel message, this is for you to remember that moment of when Jesus pursued you, came to you, comforted you, and saved you, and he removed your sin, and granted you life. For those in this room who have not done that, or like, "I'm not sure if I've done that." We ask that you refrain from this because again, there's nothing magical about what we're doing here. But it's for believers to remember that moment when God has saved them.

And if right now it's gnawing on your heart, I I want to believe in Jesus. Like I I I I've always heard it or maybe I've heard some bullet points about it, but for today, for whatever reason, it makes sense to me. And I want to believe Jesus for the removal of my sins. There's nothing I can do to earn it. I just believe that Jesus did it for me. Then I want this to be a moment for you to reflect on that.

And I want this to be a moment that if you came with someone who invited you or you've talked to someone um or you know someone in the room, whether it's myself or one of the pastors, Joshua Ransford, like come and talk to us and say, "I I I want to trust in Jesus. I want to believe in him for the cancelling of my debt, for the removal of my sins." Please do that with us afterwards. But let's go ahead and now for those who are believers, come down front, grab the elements, and then bring them back to your seats, and we will enter into this time together and receive it from the Lord.