Making a Holy Week: Sinless and Perfect

I'm here and I know you will fill me. Come down. Spirit, when you move you make my heart

pound. When you fill the room, you're here and I know you are moving. I'm here and I

know you will fill me.

Well, Father God, we are very thankful to be here once again. Lord, thank you for the

promise of your Holy Spirit. Thank you for the ability for us to gather with other

believers this morning to just seek your face and to know it's okay that we're not

worthy. None of us are truly prepared. None of us have qualified in any way to

deserve to be here today. Father, we're just simply here because you sent your one and

only son to pay the price for our sins and to cover us all with your grace and mercy.

So Lord, as we continue to talk about what all went into making this last week of your

life this Holy Week, Lord, I pray that you would just reveal very special truths to us.

And Lord, it may not be things that come so easily for us to understand. But God, I pray

where we don't understand it, Lord, we would step out in faith and trust and believe

until you do provide understanding. Lord, we come humbly before you because we need

you. We need you in our lives. We are not strong enough to do everything that we have

to do, much less everything you've called us to do. So Lord, we lean into you this

morning and we ask that you would be with us and strengthen us and guide us. Pray that

your Holy Spirit would be here today, not only in this place, but in our hearts and

that we would be receptive of it. And Lord, we would just listen to your voice this

morning. Listen to what it is that you're whispering to the depths of our heart.

Father, we are so thankful to be able to reach out in prayer, to lift up our

brothers and sisters who aren't able to be here no matter what reason or need there

may be in their life. We pray for them this morning, for all of our shut-ins,

all of our people with health issues. Lord, we just ask that you would be with our

people. Lord, we love you. We give you this time together. And again, we ask that

you would speak powerfully to the depths of our heart. We ask all this in the

precious and holy name of Jesus and all God's people said, Amen. You may be seated

this morning. We are in our second week of making a holy week. Last week we talked

about how important it was that Jesus came in the flesh, that He came as a

human, that He came and lived the life that me and you lived, experienced the

things that we experience and yet did it perfectly. And today we're focusing on

the sinlessness and perfectness of Jesus Christ. Nothing in this world can be

made holy without a holy one making it holy. And I think as we talk about stuff

like this and we throw around words and we talk about all these things that we

say that we believe in Jesus, I think for some of us who have been in church a

long time or maybe you grew up in church and you talk about Jesus coming

in the flesh and you talk about Jesus being sinless, it just makes sense

because you've done it your whole life. Like that language has been spoken to

you for most of your life. But for a lot of people who didn't grow up in church

and it's just like trying to rationalize and make sense of Jesus being God but

also being fully human. And Jesus living as a person but being sinless is

almost like so far fetched. It's like it's just hard to believe. It's hard

to like rationalize that in our minds that He lived a pure imperfect and

holy life. And so as we talk about this today this is one of the most

important aspects that we look at about Jesus to qualify Him to be that

perfect sacrifice for our sins but also to be the high priest that pleads on

our behalf at the right hand of the Father. So this morning we're going to

read from the book of Hebrews chapter 7 verses 23 through 28. And we're

Hebrews 7:23–28

focusing more on the perfect sinlessness of Jesus to be that

sacrifice but it also leads into something so much more than just being

the sacrifice for our sins and the forgiveness for our sins. It leads into

so much more in the victory that we can have as believers to live for

Jesus every day even after we get saved throughout the entirety of our

lives. So let's read this together Hebrews 7, 23 through 28. It says,

There were many priests under the old system, that's the Old Testament,

for death prevented them from remaining in office. But because Jesus lives

forever, His priesthood lasts forever. Therefore He is able once and

forever to save those who come to God through Him. That's good news.

This is like 101 what we believe in Jesus Christ as Christians. Verse 25,

Therefore He is able once and forever to save those who come to God through Him.

He lives forever to intercede with God on their behalf. So He sits at the

right hand of the Father. He intercedes for us. Verse 26, He is the kind of

He has been set apart from sinners and has been given the highest place of honor

in heaven. And this is one of those things that when you look at Scripture

and you read about the description of who Jesus is, one of the most common

things you're going to read about Him is that He was sinless. He was without

blame. He was perfect. And you can see that when you even read into the

last few days of Jesus life and the Pharisees and religious leaders are

really trying to pin Him down and they're trying to find fault with Him

because they're wanting to kill Him. They're wanting to get rid of Him.

They come to the point where they are willing to break the law themselves

to have people come in and have them falsely testify against Jesus

because they could not find a single thing wrong that He had ever done.

And He lived in more of a public eye than anyone had probably ever lived

in that time. People followed Him, swarmed Him. Even when He tried to be

alone, the crowd always found Him. He was always underneath the scrutiny

of the people who wanted the miracles performed and healed, but also the

religious leaders who were looking for Him to mess up. They were always

there and watching and questioning and trying to trap Him and they

never could to the point where they brought in people to testify

falsely against Him. They broke the law themselves to have Him condemned

to death. It is one of the most agreed upon things about Jesus

that He was sinless and perfect. And because of that, He's in the

highest place of honor in heaven. And it says, unlike those other high

priests, He does not need to offer sacrifices every day. We forget

about this. We forget that when people used to come to serve God

and to worship Him, that there was a bloody mess.

People became really good at butchering animals and sacrificing them

because every time we came before the Lord, we had to offer a sacrifice

because of our sins. He does not need to offer sacrifices every day.

They did this for their own sins first and then for the sins of the

people. But Jesus did this once and for all when He offered Himself as

the sacrifice for the people's sins. That's mine and your sins.

The law appointed high priests who were limited by human weakness.

But after the law was given, God appointed His Son with an oath

and His Son has been made the perfect high priest forever.

Point number one, let's start with the main point.

He was the perfect sacrifice. Now, in this passage, you're hearing a lot

about this high priest. We'll talk about that in a second. But for Him to qualify

as the perfect high priest, He first had to be the perfect sacrifice

in order to make that happen. And before, when you start looking at the

requirements of what it was like to bring a sacrifice before the Lord,

it was not an easy process. When you look at the criteria

of what had to be met to bring a sacrifice to God, first of all,

you couldn't just go grab a random animal and sacrifice Him.

There were only special significant animals that God had appointed

for sacrifice. And we see this going back to the book of Genesis in the flood

when He sent more of those animals on the ark because He knew. He said,

Noah, when I deliver you from this flood and I bring your family off this boat,

all these extra animals that you took for sacrifice, you're going to offer them to me.

It was kind of like a covenant that He made with Noah beforehand to say,

when you get off this ark, you're going to worship me. And these are the animals

I'm bringing to you so that you can do this. So God already set those animals

apart in Genesis. And then you see it through the temple system.

Cattle, oxen, sheep, goats, doves, pigeons, certain animals that only

God approved of to be done. The next thing is flawless.

There couldn't be any blemishes whatsoever among these animals.

Now I don't know about you guys, but if you've ever like dealt with animals

or anything like that, it's really difficult to find an animal that doesn't

have some type of blemish or something wrong with it.

Like it's a big deal. Hannah and I, we like documentaries.

We watched this really weird documentaries a couple of years ago called

Chicken People, and they raised chickens and they show chickens.

The amount of effort that they put into this is absolutely amazing.

Now in no way, shape or form did it convince us that we needed to show chickens,

but it was admirable at the amount of time and effort and money that these

people put into this thing of raising these chickens to get a perfect specimen

of chicken that they're taking to, this is real.

Like they take them to shows and they show them and like people love this stuff.

I didn't know that, but it's real.

And so they take them and show them and it's like these perfect specimens of

chickens where they're showing them and they go through all kinds of stuff

and all these different bloodlines and they keep up with it.

And it's a lot of time and effort that goes into that.

And when you talk about bringing a sacrifice before the Lord,

this thing cannot be blemished. It can't have anything wrong with it.

I don't know about you guys.

I can look in the mirror and there's a lot of blemishes.

There's a lot of flaws.

There's a lot of things that is in us as human beings that are just not perfect.

And so finding those animals that have no blemishes would be difficult.

For some of the sacrifices, it could only be a male.

So it's according to what sacrifice you were offering us,

whether or not it had to be a male or other sacrifices might permit

a female animal to be offered as well.

So then you had to know that.

And then the animal had to be domesticated.

It wasn't something you could just go pick up this wild animal

and just find it on the side of the road like,

oh, there's a good one and go rob somebody's cow out of the field.

Like it had to be yours.

And there had to be time invested into it.

You know, for the Passover feast,

they had to bring that lamb into their home.

And it had to dwell with them inside their home for weeks leading up to this.

And there was kind of like this bond that was created between them and the animal.

And then this animal that you kind of get fond of,

and it's really cute in this little lamb.

And like all of a sudden, and then you're going to go

and you're going to butcher this thing and you're going to eat it.

I don't know if you know who Ms. Juana is or not.

If you're smiling and laughing, you know who Ms. Juana is.

She's a phenomenal lady. She's 98 years old.

She told me when I was younger, she didn't eat chicken.

And I was like, why do you not eat chicken?

Chicken's like the best food there is. Like it's great.

And she was telling me that when she was little, she had a pet chicken.

And then her parents killed the chicken and cooked it.

And from that point forward, she's like, I can't eat chicken because that was her pet.

And back when she was little 98 years ago,

it wasn't like you could just go to the store,

pick up a dog or something like that. It meant something to her.

There was a personal aspect to sacrifice that needed to be met in order for you

for it to cost you something because God wanted that sacrifice to cost you

something because every time you and I sin, it costs God.

It costs the kingdom.

I don't know if you ever looked at it that way.

It's not just bringing consequences in our life and the curses of sin

and things in our life that come with it because that happens,

but it costs God. It costs his kingdom.

You know, we're called as believers to build his kingdom.

Whenever we sin, we're laying a block for the earth.

We're laying a block for Satan's kingdom with every sin that we commit.

With every time we're obedient to the Lord and we're living for him

and we're serving him, we're laying a block for the kingdom of heaven.

We're called to build the kingdom.

So it costs us something. He wanted sacrifices to cost something.

So when you look at 1 Peter, chapter 2, verses 21 to 24,

1 Peter 2:21–24

Peter talks about this example of Jesus.

And so today we're really lucky because none of you had to bring animals this morning.

None of you had to bring your pets this morning to lay on the altar.

I'm very thankful because I don't know if I would be okay with that.

But when he talks about Jesus in verse 21, he says,

for God called you to do good, even if it means suffering just as Christ suffered for you.

He is your example and you must follow in his steps.

We don't do a good job of explaining things like this inside the church.

We talk about salvation. We talk about the forgiveness of sin.

We talk about how salvation is free and it is.

Jesus already paid the price for your sins to be forgiven.

There's nothing that you could ever do to have your sins forgiven or for you to be good enough to get into heaven.

It's through Jesus and his perfect sinless life and his sacrifice on the cross for our sins.

That's how we're forgiven for sin.

But once we follow Jesus, there is a calling on every single one of our lives,

not just on pastors, not on missionaries, not on youth pastors or worship leaders or Sunday school teachers,

but every person who calls on the name of Jesus.

We are called to follow in Christ's steps and to be a living sacrifice.

That's what we're called to do.

In verse 22, he never sinned nor ever deceived anyone.

He did not retaliate when he was insulted nor threaten revenge when he suffered.

He left his case in the hands of God who always judges fairly.

He personally carried our sins in his body on the cross so that we can be dead to sin and live for what is right.

By his wounds, we are healed.

You're healed, I'm healed by his wounds.

We are called to follow the example of Christ, even if that means suffering.

And so as believers this morning, we're called to suffer.

And that could look in many different ways.

There's things that God calls us to do.

And many people are scared to follow Christ because there's something within us that understands this.

Like we know when we commit our lives to Christ,

he is calling us to come out of the world and to follow him.

And that means something.

And we're not always 100% sure what it is, but we know it's not going to be easy.

Because if it was easy, a lot more people would do it, right?

But they don't.

Because deep down inside, we know.

And so we have to step out in faith to follow Christ's example and to understand this morning

for whatever reason we may be resisting following the Lord or surrendering completely to the Lord

to be reminded today that we don't have to worry about our needs

because we believe in a God who is the ultimate provider.

We need to remind ourselves of that.

Needs are one of the biggest concerns that we have as human beings.

We have needs.

Jesus knows this.

When you look at the ministry of Christ as he walked on earth in human flesh,

remind yourself of how many needs he provided for the people that he ministered to.

And remind yourself that quite regularly he provided for their physical needs first

and then he addressed their spiritual needs.

You serve a God who is the ultimate provider.

So don't worry about your needs not being met.

God is the ultimate provider.

You don't have to worry about your family.

As men, if you are a good man, probably the greatest worry in your life will be your family.

You don't have to worry about them as much as you think you do

because God is the ultimate protector.

You surrender to the Lord and you put your family in his hands

and you trust in him to work and move and guide you.

He will help you to be the husband you're supposed to be.

He will help you to be the father you're supposed to be.

He will help you to be the person at work that you're supposed to be.

God will work all that out.

He is the ultimate protector and he can watch over your kids and your family when you can.

I don't know about you.

I'm very aware I cannot keep my eyes on my kids at all times and that's really hard.

It makes it a little more aware when you've lost a kid

about how hard that is to just let go and put it in God's hand.

Every day they get out of the car and go to school.

They walk in that door.

God watch over them when I can't be there to watch them

because I can't watch them all the time, but you can.

He's the ultimate protector.

The other thing is you don't have to worry about being done wrong.

One of the biggest struggles that we have in this world for American Christians

is accepting the fact that we've been wronged by someone else

and not demanding justice, not standing up for ourselves.

When you look at our focus passage and it talks about Jesus,

he didn't demand anything.

He didn't demand vengeance.

He didn't demand retribution.

He put it in God's hands and God is the ultimate judge.

I've been reminded so many times in my life by sitting back and watching

and waiting and being patient, which is the hardest thing to do,

that every time you sit back and you wait on God and you let God work it out,

number one, he always works it out.

Number two, he usually does it in a much better way

than you could ever think or dream of.

He takes care of it.

He's the ultimate judge and he will take care of everything.

You don't have to worry about not being worthy.

Like when you come to church this morning,

you don't have to worry about not being worthy.

None of us are worthy to be here.

None of us are worthy to be in the presence of God.

None of us are worthy to get into heaven.

But the great message about heaven is,

heaven is not a place for people who are worthy to be there.

Nobody who thinks that they're worthy will be there.

But everybody who knows they're not worthy will fill up heaven.

That's the beauty of it.

It will be filled with people who know that they're not worthy to be there.

And his life was the only way that it would ever happen.

His pure, sinless, perfect life to be offered up as a sacrifice for me and you.

That's the only way that it could happen.

Point number two, he's the perfect priest.

I don't know if you realize this or not, but it's we like to think.

And so many people say today, well, my relationship with God is personal.

You know, it's like I don't want people or pastors or other Christians to get involved in my relationship with God

and what I feel like I'm supposed to do and whatever.

Amen to that.

Amen to that.

When you look at our lives as we follow God,

we still have a priest who intercedes for us.

We have someone who stands at God's right hand.

We don't get to come to God in prayer because we just like have access to God.

We come to God in prayer because Jesus sits at his right hand and pleads on our behalf.

And when you talk about following the Lord, it's not about just doing not doing things

because as a Christian and the longer you've lived, you'll understand what I'm talking about.

Longer you've been saved.

It's actually easier to obey God's word and not do the things you're not supposed to do

because let's talk honestly.

We know what God's word says for the most part.

We know about the Ten Commandments.

We know the different laws and the things.

We know that if there are certain things that we do that God said not to do,

we can look and say, well, Brian's not supposed to do that.

We can say, Brian, God's word says this.

You're not supposed to do that.

And we know that.

But if God is calling Jamie to do something like this morning,

we had a lady who got anointed this morning because she felt like she needed to be anointed

for her body and some things she was going with.

If God's calling Jamie to do something like that and Jamie says,

no, I'm not getting up there in front of anybody.

I'm not going to do that, Lord.

None of us know that Jamie was supposed to be anointed this morning

or that he was supposed to do anything in obedience to God.

That goes completely over our heads.

We had no idea.

So it's much easier to be obedient and what not to do than it is to be obedient

and what we are called to do as believers because what God's calling Nick to do

may be very different from what God's calling Bruce to do.

And that's where we fail.

But thankfully, Jesus was not only perfect in obeying the law,

but also doing every single thing that God called him to do

above and beyond what just the law said.

You know, Jesus didn't come to just teach the law.

He came to explain the heart of the law.

And so he expounded on things like adultery.

He expounded on things like murder.

If you hate someone, you've committed murder in your heart.

He addressed the issues of the heart.

And this is what qualifies him to be our high priest.

And in Hebrews 4, verses 14 through 16,

Hebrews 4:14–16

the author of Hebrews writes,

And I just want to remind you this morning,

if you believe in Jesus Christ, if you've been saved,

you have to hold firmly to that.

It's not going to be something that you put your faith in Jesus as a kid

and you're going to live your whole life

and you're going to believe it no matter what.

And it's just like it's going to be gravy from that point on.

There will be times when you will struggle.

There will be times when you question.

There has been times where I went home on Sunday afternoons

and been like, what am I doing?

Did anybody even hear that?

Why are you preaching?

Is heaven real?

Like, are you sure you really believe that this eternity

you're talking about is true?

And there are times where Satan gets in my mind,

and I have to remind myself, Lord,

I don't know why I'm thinking like this.

I don't know what's going on, but I believe in you.

I'm trusting you no matter what.

I believe in you.

I'm going to keep doing what you call me to do.

And that's what I have to do as a pastor.

We have to hold firmly to what it is that we say we believe.

We have to remind ourselves of what it is that we say we believe.

And in verse 15, it says this high priest of ours,

he understands our weaknesses,

for he faced all of the same testings that we do,

yet he did not sin.

And every passage of scripture that we're going to read today,

it's going to talk over and over again.

It says, yet he did not sin.

It affirms the sinlessness of Christ.

But the awesome thing is,

is he sits at God's right hand,

and he understands every single thing that you're going through.

Every test, every temptation, he understands.

And he sits at God's right hand like,

Father, don't get them yet.

It's hard.

They're covered by my blood.

They believe.

Let's be patient.

He pleads on your behalf.

I don't know if you've ever been in a situation in life

where you could not defend yourself

and you had somebody who stepped in for you to do it.

That's an amazing feeling.

Whenever you're in a situation that you're going to lose something

or you're going to get hurt

or something's going to happen to you and you have no control,

but somebody else steps in on your behalf to take care of you,

that's a wonderful feeling to have.

And through Jesus Christ, because of his perfection,

not only was he the sacrifice for our sin once and for all time,

but it qualifies him to be that high priest

who sits at the Father's right hand

and pleads on our behalf day after day after day after day

because guess what?

If you're saved, thank the Lord you got saved

and called on the name of Jesus to be forgiven of your sins.

But you also have the rest of your life to live,

to fight against those temptations,

to fight against that sin,

to live a holy life that you're called to live.

And without someone sitting at God's right hand

and pleading on your behalf, you don't have a snowball's chance.

And I don't have a snowball's chance.

It's only through him that we get to do that.

So he sits at God's right hand.

He understands what we're going through.

Verse 16.

So let us come boldly to the throne of our gracious God.

There we will receive his mercy

and we will find grace to help us when we need it the most.

This is a great passage of scripture.

Because if you believe in Jesus

and you've asked Christ to come in your heart and you've been saved,

chances are you had this wonderful experience

where you just felt like the weight of those sins lift off of you.

You feel free.

You feel like you got more hope than you could ever imagine.

And then at some point in time,

you sinned or you did something in your relationship with God.

And then there's this enormous amount of guilt

that comes back into your life.

Or maybe there's a sin that's still present in your life

that you're struggling with and you haven't overcome it yet

and you're like, Lord, what's going on?

And so in these moments where we're battling through

our relationship with the Lord

and we're coming out of the world and we're trying to follow him,

Jesus sits at the Father's right hand

and he pleads on our behalf.

And because we have this high priest,

it gives us the ability to run boldly to the throne of God

and not run away from him.

Because chances are, after you've been saved, if you sin,

there's probably more guilt in your life

after you've been saved when you sin than there is before

because now you understand like, I shouldn't have done this.

This is wrong.

And it weighs on you differently as a Christian than it did before.

And our first reaction is people, when we sin,

is to run away from God.

You go back to Genesis 3 when man and woman sinned,

and what they do, they ran and they hid.

When the presence of God came, they ran away.

That's our first instinct.

But we are called to run boldly to the throne of God,

and it says there we will receive his mercy

and we will find grace to help us when we need it the most.

We have sinless, perfect sacrifice in Jesus

who also becomes this perfect high priest

who sits at the Father's right hand

and pleads on our behalf so that when we do fail,

when we fail, we can come boldly to his throne

and find that grace and mercy when we need it the most.

Point number three.

He is sinless and perfect so that he can deliver us from sin.

And as the American church,

we don't do a very good job of explaining this and talking about it.

To understand that Jesus did not just live a perfect life

to pay for your sins so that you can be forgiven once.

He paid that price so that you can be brought out of sin

and live a holy life.

Jesus created a holy week so that he could give you a holy life.

That's what you're called to.

You're not called to just call on his name for forgiveness.

You're called to holiness.

He's called you to be like him.

He's called you to follow his example.

And in 1 John chapter 3 verses 4 through 6,

1 John 3:4–6

it says,

Everyone who sins is breaking God's law,

for all sin is contrary to the law of God.

All sin.

Doesn't matter how big your sin is,

doesn't matter how little your sin is.

If there's sin in your life,

it is contrary to the law of God.

And you know that Jesus came to take away our sins

and there is no sin in him.

In verse 6, it's the heaviest thing you're going to hear today.

Anyone who can use to live in him will not sin.

But anyone who keeps on sinning does not know him

or understand who he is.

And that's heavy.

Because I don't know about you guys,

but even in my walk with Christ,

there are times where I fail.

There are times where I have sinned.

There are times where I've had to call on the name of Jesus

and repent from things that I've done, things that I've said.

And what John is talking about in this moment

is this understanding of people who call on the name of Jesus

and claim to be saved,

but then go on and live a lifestyle of sin.

We're not talking about people who are following Jesus

and then we're fighting the good fight, we're praying,

we're asking God, and then we mess up, we sin,

we do something we shouldn't do, we say something we shouldn't say.

We don't respond in a situation the way we should have responded

and we feel guilty for it.

We're not talking about that in this passage.

We're talking about people who call on the name of Jesus

and then willfully continue on in their sin.

Because people who willfully continue on in sin

and just act like, okay, I was forgiven,

forgiven for past, present, future sins,

there's all kinds of different theologies

that go back and forth with that.

But as you go on to understand that God,

Jesus died for us to deliver us from sin.

There is no need for us to continue on in the lifestyle of sin.

And anyone who keeps on sinning does not know Him

or understand who He is.

And that's heavy.

And this morning, I challenge you guys

to sit back and think and pray and just really consider God,

where am I in this?

Because I'm not perfect.

I don't expect any of you to be perfect because I'm not perfect.

But there has to be a point where we feel

and we seek the Lord with all of our hearts

and say, Lord, reveal to me what I should believe,

reveal to me how I should feel,

reveal to me what's really going on in my heart.

Is this something that I'm willfully doing

or is this something that I'm struggling with?

Is this something that you're helping me in?

Have we made progress in this through the power of your spirit?

But that's some stout words.

It's really hard to rationalize this morning

the fact that God calls us out of sin.

He calls us out of the world.

He calls us to follow His example.

And point number four, last one,

He does that because He wants to make us like God.

He wants to make us like Christ.

As we're called into salvation, we're called away from sin.

We're called to be like Christ.

Jesus was perfect.

He was sinless.

He did everything right.

He treated everyone the right way.

He responded to everyone the right way.

And when we talk about what we're called to do,

Jesus has made it possible for everybody to be reconciled to God.

And we're called to build His kingdom.

We're called to tell other people about Christ

and bring people to the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.

Jesus was the visible image of God.

And so we are called to be like Christ.

Therefore, you are called to be the visible image of God.

And that's heavy.

To think this morning, it's like, what has Jesus called you to do?

Well, He's called you to be holy.

He's called you out of sin.

He's called you to be like Him.

Jesus didn't have thousands of people following Him around

because He was just some regular old dude.

He had thousands of people following around,

listening on every word He said,

begging Him to perform miracles and do things that nobody else was doing,

because there was something different about Him.

You and I, as Christians, are called to be different.

We're called to be like Christ.

You have to understand this morning,

you could quote every passage of Scripture in the Bible.

You could pray the most eloquent prayers.

You could show up to church every time the doors are open.

You could do all the right things.

And you could have the greatest presentation of the gospel

that anybody's ever had.

And if your life does not look like that of Jesus Christ,

no one's going to listen to anything that you have to say.

In fact, it will do the very opposite.

It would make them hate the message of the gospel.

Think about how many people in this world

who are adamantly against the gospel,

adamantly against church,

adamantly against God's Word,

because they have lived their life in the presence

of someone who was a hypocrite in it.

And it turned them off, and it stained them to it forever.

Your life of being like Christ

is much more powerful than words ever would be.

And in fact, I could say you could be deaf and mute

and live like Jesus and win more people to the Lord

than if you had the greatest speech ever,

but your life did not look like Christ's life.

In 2 Corinthians 5, verses 18 through 21,

2 Corinthians 5:18–21

Paul's writing to the church in Corinth,

and this is what he says,

and all of this is a gift from God

who brought us back to himself through Christ.

And God has given us this task of reconciling people to him.

God's given you a task.

It's not just about being holy and living a life

so that you can be spared from the consequences of sin,

so that you can be somebody that God wants you to be

or meet these certain standards.

It's about living a holy life because God knows

you will never reconcile anyone else to Christ

if you don't live like Christ.

Like your feet have to match the words

that come from our mouth.

And so if we're not living like Christ,

we're not going to bring people to Christ.

In verse 19, for God was in Christ,

reconciling the world to himself,

no longer counting people's sins against them.

And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation.

So we are Christ ambassadors.

God is making his appeal through us.

To know this morning that the Lord wants to build his kingdom,

he wants to bring people to salvation through you.

You're his ambassador.

You're the people who are supposed to be representing him.

As much as I'm supposed to represent him,

we're all supposed to represent him.

We speak for Christ when we plead, come back to God.

For God made Christ, who never sinned,

to be the offering for our sin,

so that we could be made right through, with God, through Christ.

We're called to be like God.

You know, you think about the sinlessness of Jesus,

and it wasn't just for forgiveness of sin,

and then we just move on and live life as normal before.

It was so that he could sit at God's right hand.

It was so that he could plead on our behalf.

It was so that you and I could live holy lives

and be removed from the world,

to be freed from the bondage of sin.

So this morning, I asked you guys, how do you feel?

Just personally, in your own heart and mind right now,

like, where are you?

And I'm not saying that we have to be perfect,

because I'm not perfect.

Like, I'm not perfect.

But the Lord has called us to live like Christ,

to be filled with the Spirit, to come out of sin,

to not buy into this thing of, or this idea that,

well, I'm just a sinner, I sin every day.

To not buy into this thing of, well, you know,

we're gonna mess up and it's okay.

It's like, no, there's a reason why God wants you to feel that guilt

whenever we mess up.

He wants you to feel that guilt because it's not okay.

It is the ultimate indication that change needs to be made,

because it's not good enough and we know that it's not good enough.

And the wonderful thing about it is,

is there's nothing that you and I can do to qualify.

There's nothing that you and I can do to earn salvation,

earn eternal life, or earn a holy life.

It's through the blood and the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ.

To remember this morning that heaven is not gonna be filled with people

who think that they're good enough to be there.

Heaven's gonna be filled with people who know they're not worthy of it.

And so this morning, if you can just acknowledge, okay, guys,

I know I'm not perfect.

I know I haven't been doing everything the way that I should.

I know there's some changes that need to be made in my life.

I know there's some sins I need to ask you to come in and help me with.

I know there's some callings that I haven't been obedient to in my life.

Because maybe you're not struggling with sin,

but maybe God's been laying something on your heart

and you've just been like, nah, I'm not ready to do that yet, Lord.

To give in to the callings that he's put in your life.

Only you can answer those things.

Only you can give an honest answer and estimation of who you are

and where you're supposed to be in your relationship with Christ.

But I promise you this morning,

he wants to bring you out of sin.

He wants to bring you out of addictions.

He wants to bring you out of bondage for whatever this world has for you.

He wants to set you free.

And he wants you to have grace and mercy

and to be filled with his spirit and to have eternal life.

Let's pray.

Father God, thank you for the opportunity to be in your house

and to worship alongside other believers.

And Lord, this morning, whether we've been saved for many years

and grown up in the church or whether we are just brand new to this thing

and we're just figuring it out, God, I pray that you would speak

to the depths of our heart

and just show us who you are and what it is that you want.

Lord, it would be really easy.

It would be so much more simple if it was just being obedient to your word.

But Lord, there's a spirit that is speaking to us, calling us,

giving us gifts and responsibilities.

And Lord, we have to be obedient to that as well.

There's only so many things that our brothers and sisters around us

can hold us accountable in.

But Lord, our conscience is the only thing

that helps us to know whether or not we're following

the things that you're calling us to in the quiet and still moments of our life.

Lord, I pray that you would help us to be obedient

as your son Jesus was obedient in all things.

Help us to follow his example,

for us to live for him,

and to run to him to receive his grace and mercy when we need it,

and to cry out for the feeling of your spirit to empower us

to do all the things you call us to do.

We love you, and we ask all of us in Jesus' name. Amen.