Joseph’s Dilemma - Christmas

Joseph, don't be afraid to take Mary home to be your wife.

What is conceived in her is pure and is right and it's from the Holy Spirit.

And you, Joseph, should name him Jesus because he is going to save the world from their sin.

And Joseph woke up and it was a complete game changer.

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We hope you are encouraged by today's message.

Well, good morning.

I hope everybody's starting to fall out a little bit.

Uh to introduce my friend, Pastor Bobby Sanders from CHC.

He's going to come and share the word today.

And Bobby, thank you for being with us, sir.

It's been a pleasure to get to know him in the last couple years, and we're looking forward to uh one of his many hidden talents on Christmas Eve.

I'm not going to spoil a surprise, but it's going to be a blessing, and we're excited to have you, man.

Thank you, brother.

Good to be here.

Thank you.

Well, good morning.

Um, well, we're not in the book of Revelation today.

We're going to take a little bit of a break.

Uh I got to tell you, it is fun to be the pastor of Chapel Hills Church and be able to park in guest parking.

It's really neat.

It's really neat.

I got to move my car before the second service, but but it's really neat.

Uh open your Bibles up to Matthew, and we're going to be in chapter two this morning.

As we're doing that, let's just go ahead and uh invite the Lord to be a part of this.

Father, we thank you so much for giving us a chance to get your words, Lord.

The words from a living God.

Lord, you are so meticulous in writing them down.

So that not only your disciples could hear your words, and not only the saints in Jerusalem could hear your words, but Lord, we could hear them as well.

Or you've preserved a way for us to follow you with confidence.

Not just in your spirit, but in your word, and we pray that both are alive and well and strong today in this service.

Father, be with those whose hearts are hard towards the word, not by intention, or they're actually praying that you would soften their heart.

I pray that you do that today.

God, soften my heart and give me a sensitivity to your spirit and what you're wanting to do today.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Amen.

So actually, look, this is where I messed up.

I am preaching in another church or at my church in just a little bit, and it is in chapter two.

Go to Matthew chapter one and uh verse 18.

Sorry.

So is everybody done Christmas shopping?

We're good?

No?

Okay, well, then I'm in good company.

Uh so hey, I wanted to look at a couple of gifts that you might be able to give somebody, but they won't appreciate it until they actually need it.

Uh so here's a list of gifts.

I wrote them out of things that you will uh be able to give somebody, and they won't actually appreciate it until the day that they need it when they when they're using it.

And the first one is a snow scraper.

Nobody likes opening a snow scraper on Christmas morning.

But I bet you'll like it this morning.

Uh another one, how about this one?

A hide a key.

I mean, if you get a hide a key for Christmas morning, on Christmas morning, you're it that's probably not one of those picture moments.

You know, the moment where right before you go to open it up, everybody's got pictures ready, and you're like, oh, this one's gonna be good.

And then you open it up and it's a hidea key.

That would be funny.

Uh how about how about hand warmers?

Yeah, hand warmers.

Those are good stocking stuffers, but uh nobody jumps for joy when they get hand warmers or gloves.

Uh here's some, here's one that you don't appreciate until you need it.

Jumper cables.

Yeah.

Yeah.

How many of you thought, man, I wish I had my jumper cables in my car right now, uh, whenever you needed it?

Uh but this is probably above all gifts that you wouldn't appreciate.

This is a gift a man would give.

Gifts that you would not appreciate until you need it is a window breaker.

Do you know what a window breaker is?

It's that little tool that you put up against your window and you press a little button and it shatters the glass in your car when you're under the water, about to drown, and you can't get out because the pressure's too hard.

Can you imagine your husband giving you that thing and you throwing it in the junk drawer out of pure disgust?

And then you're under the water thinking, man, I wish I had a window breaker.

Yeah.

So if you find yourself in that situation and your headrest can come off the back of your car, like the you can use that, but you got to Google it first.

Alright, this is your one gift from me to you for Christmas.

You can't just like use it without looking at it.

You have to go on YouTube and you have to look at how to use your headrest as a window breaker because you can't just like bang it.

There's a trick to it.

Bottom line is this you won't appreciate a window breaker until you're under the water and you wish you had it.

But if you have it, you will tell everybody about that awesome gift your husband gave you that year.

So, I want to look today at a gift that we don't appreciate until we need it.

And unfortunately, we can't really know how much we need it until we're deep in the fire.

Let's look at verse 18 of Matthew chapter 1.

Matthew 1 · chapter mention

It says, This is how the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, came about.

His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit.

Because Joseph, her husband, was faithful to the law and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to take Mary home to be your wife, because what is conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins.

All this took place to fulfill what the Lord had said through the prophet.

The Virgin will conceive and give birth to a son, and they will call him Emmanuel, which means God with us.

When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord had commanded him and took Mary home to be his wife, but he did not consummate the marriage until she gave birth to a son, and he gave him the name Jesus.

Now, in order to understand this gift that I'm talking about, you have to begin to try to get inside of where is Joseph at?

What is Joseph's mindset like?

Because we typically read this with candlelights, and we probably just got through singing a few Christmas carols, and this is just a beautiful moment.

This is Joseph's worst day of his life.

There's nothing beautiful about this scripture to Joseph.

Joseph, when he's being told this, he's not thinking, oh, this is awesome.

One day, people are going to come from all around wearing ugly sweaters.

And they're going to read this.

And then when they get done, they're going to have cookies and hot chocolate, and it's going to be beautiful.

No.

You have to look at this and you have to read in verse 18, understanding that verse 20 has not happened yet.

So let's look back at verse 18.

In verse 18, in order to truly understand it, you have to read it like this.

This is how the birth of Jesus, the Messiah, came about.

His mother Mary was pledged to be married to Joseph, but before they came together, she was found to be pregnant.

You cannot say, if you really want to understand where he's coming from, if you really want to understand what he's going through, you can't read this scripture and say, found to be pregnant through the Holy Spirit.

Because verse 20 hasn't happened yet.

And in verse 20 is where he's going to begin to understand this.

You have to read it as before they came together, she was found to be pregnant.

And that's why this is literally probably one of the worst days, if not the worst day, of Joseph's whole life.

Because the person that he loves and the person that he's engaged to be married to is found to be pregnant.

And he knows that it's not his.

Now, with an understanding that David is going through it, then you can begin to dive into the rest of the scripture.

Look at verse 19.

Verse 19 tells us a little bit about who Joseph was, what his character was like, who he was as a person.

It says, Because Joseph, her husband, was faithful to the law and yet did not want to expose her to public disgrace, he had in mind to divorce her quietly.

Now you read that language.

This is not like you and I look at engagement.

You know, we're engaged, and then the jury's kind of still out until the day you walk the aisle.

No, that's not how this works.

In this day, they're married.

The Bible refers to him as her husband.

And now that this has happened, it's not like he can just say, well, it didn't work out, and so I guess we weren't meant to be married.

I'm going to go marry someone else and I'm free of my obligation.

No, he has to divorce her.

Even though they're just in our culture, in our mind, they're engaged, he has to divorce her.

And I want you to look at verse 19 and get a sense of who this guy is.

It says he wanted to divorce her quietly.

Now that shows a man that really loved his woman.

Because that's not how this works in their day.

Take your Bibles and go to Leviticus chapter 20.

Leviticus 20 · chapter mention

Leviticus chapter 20, verse 10, gives us a little bit of insight into how this thing works.

Leviticus 20:10

If a man commits adultery with another man's wife, with the wife of his neighbor, both the adulterer and the adulteress are to be put to death.

That's how this works in that day.

In fact, we have a real clear picture if you go to John chapter 8.

John 8 · chapter mention

Go to John chapter 8.

John 8 · chapter mention

We have a real clear picture of how the culture understood this was supposed to work.

In John chapter 8 and verse 1, it says, Then they all went home, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.

John 8 · chapter mention

At dawn, he appeared again in the temple courts, and where all the people, uh where all the people gathered around him and sat down to teach them.

The teachers of the law and the Pharisees brought in a woman caught in adultery, and they made her stand before the group and said, Jesus, teacher, this woman was caught in the act of adultery.

In the law, Moses commanded us to stone such women.

Now, what do you say?

And this is one of my favorite pieces of scripture ever, ever, because it shows me a little bit about who Jesus is.

I think Jesus was excellent in sarcasm.

I really do.

I think Jesus was quite witty, and he was always, I mean, we, you know, a witty person is three steps ahead of the people behind him, but Jesus is like Jesus.

So he's like light years ahead of people, literally.

And so he bends down and he begins to write in the sand.

And then the Bible says he straightens up.

And I believe he straightens up so they can see what he wrote.

And he probably wrote in code.

It probably just says Sally with a smiley face.

And he probably looks at one of the guys and is like, and he's like, Hey, I gotta go.

I gotta leave.

My wife's calling me.

It's dinner time.

Y'all handle this.

And he just writes stuff in the ground, and people begin to leave, and he looks at the lady and he says, Where are all your condemners?

And she said, They're all gone.

And he doesn't say, Neither can I condemn you.

He says, Neither do I condemn you.

But that's where we get the phrase that we've all used, let him without sin cast the first stone.

That's literal.

He was saying, Whoever's without sin, go ahead, throw the first rock.

Let's get this on.

Because what was supposed to happen that day was she was supposed to be beat to death with rocks.

And that's what Joseph doesn't want.

His heart is so for her that he wants to put her away privately.

And now that has no implications on you and I.

It doesn't impact us at all to put her away privately, but it does for him.

Because to put her away privately says he just wanted a divorce.

He just, it was much easier at that time, they needed to get a certificate of divorce than it would have been in the way that Jesus was preaching.

Because Jesus was preaching, with the exception of infidelity, Christians should work it out.

But in that time, he just needed a certificate of divorce.

Moses had permitted that.

But in order to do that, it kind of looks like that's his kid and he's walking out on them.

Doesn't it?

I mean, if you really try to get inside this story and he puts her away privately, he can't say, I'm putting her away because she cheated on me and that's not my kid.

Because if so, she's gonna die.

So he's gonna put her away privately.

So he's got to take some heat himself for why would you do that?

Now, he's so loving towards Mary that he's willing to take that hit, and he's willing to take that pain.

However, he can't just ignore it.

And the reason why he can't just ignore it says so in verse 19.

It says, because Joseph, her husband, was faithful to the law, he was committed to the law.

Joseph was a man of righteousness, a man of God.

And to him that meant you follow the law.

You can't abandon the law, the Bible, the word of God.

We stick to it.

And then verse 20 happens.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him how?

In a dream.

So, what you have to do is you have to get inside of Joseph's world.

This is what happened.

He found out that Mary was pregnant.

Now, whether Mary told him it was from the Holy Spirit and he was like, You have lost your mind right now.

Or whether she knew he wouldn't believe that, so she didn't even bother to tell him.

Joseph just found out that the woman he loves is pregnant.

And it is going through his head, she deserves death.

That's what she deserves.

I get that she doesn't.

I get that this is all going to be revealed later in a dream.

But in his world, she deserves to die.

But he loves her.

And he wishes she didn't have to die.

And he goes to bed in sheer exhaustion.

Have you ever had one of those times where you went to bed so emotionally beat that your pillow was soaking wet from your tears, and you slept out of exhaustion.

Now, those are you don't have like a dozen of those.

You have like one or two of those.

And if you're young, you might not have had any of those yet.

But I've had a couple of times in my life where I've laid my head down so emotionally hurt, so emotionally beat, that I cried myself to sleep, and I thought, this is the end of the world.

Now there's two reasons why you can do that.

One is because somebody has hurt or disappointed you.

That somebody can be a person or it can be the Lord.

It can be a person that has just done to you what Joseph has done, what Mary has done to Joseph in his mind.

Believe me, I understand Mary was a virgin, okay?

But in his mind, he's just been betrayed in the worst betrayal.

And so you can lay your head down crushed by what someone's done to you.

You can even lay your head down crushed by what you perceive the Lord has done to you.

I'm thinking about the loss of a child, or the news of a sickness, or something that you lay your head down and you know the world's never going to be the same for me again.

And that's one way you could lay your head down with your pillow soaked and fall asleep in sheer exhaustion.

But another is because of what you have done to others.

Have you ever been so disappointed in yourself that you didn't think there would be any coming back from this?

Because Mary knew she didn't do anything wrong, and I promise you, she still laid her head down crying.

Because her fiance, her husband, doesn't believe her.

Or she can't get the courage to tell him because he'll think I'm crazy.

I don't know what she was thinking.

But I promise you, she laid her head down, her pillow soaked, just as much as his, and both of them are disturbed.

But Joseph thought, the world is coming to an end for me.

And Joseph laid his head down thinking, I wish there was a way I could take care of this.

I wish there was a way that I could deal with this, that I could divorce her and still be true to the law, but somehow still show her love.

If there was a way to do the law and to do love, man, that would be incredible.

God, I wish you would provide a way out of this.

Now go to verse 20.

But after he had considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid.

Take Mary home as your wife.

Because what is coming?

Conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.

She will give birth to a son, and you are to give him the name Jesus, because he will save the people from their sins.

And then he woke up.

And then he realized God was five steps ahead of him.

And how incredible is this gift of grace that people that wish they could stick to the law but blew it.

And they wish that there was a way of love.

If those two things could come together.

Joseph, don't be afraid to take Mary home to be your wife.

What is conceived in her is pure and is right and is from the Holy Spirit.

And you, Joseph, should name him Jesus because he is going to save the world from their sins.

And Joseph woke up and it was a complete game changer.

Everything changed at that point.

Can you imagine the lightness in Joseph's step?

Can you imagine how the sun was brighter that morning?

How everything was different?

Can you imagine how he would have ran to Mary's house and said, I had a dream, and this is what the Lord said.

And she's either going to say, I tried to tell you that.

We need to work on our communication, Joseph.

Or she said, I couldn't bring it to tell you this.

And he's saying, Why?

Why couldn't you just trust me as your husband?

And she's like, Really?

That gift is grace.

Because if you go back and you look at verse 19 one last time, it says that he did not want to expose her to public disgrace.

Disgrace is the opposite of grace.

Disgrace is you deserve this.

And so you're going to get what you deserve.

And you're going to be humiliated in front of everyone, and you're going to die like you should die.

Grace says, but I love her.

And I'm hurt in my deepest part of my soul by what she did to me, but I love her.

And I don't want her to go through this.

Listen to me, listen to me.

That is what Jesus and the Lord feels about you.

You feel like I've blown it.

You feel like I've hurt the Lord.

In the deepest possible way, I've betrayed the Lord.

And the Lord says, But I love you.

But I love you.

I'm going to make a way so you don't have to go through disgrace, and that is called grace.

And that grace is in Jesus Christ.

And that changes everything.

So I want to take a few minutes, and I want to look at the gift that you're giving, and the gift that I'm giving as we go back to verse 20.

In verse 20, it says, but after he considered this, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid.

It's that perfect love that cast out fear.

Don't be afraid.

She's faithful.

Don't be worried about breaking the law.

You're not breaking the law.

You're not moving into a relationship with a person that's not faithful to the Lord.

Let me restore you.

She's faithful.

And then he says, she will give birth to a son, and it is the promised Messiah.

Name him Jesus, Jeshua in the Greek, which means the Lord saves.

And not only is she clean and pure, but Joseph, you're not clean and pure.

And your son is going to save you from that.

Not just the biggest days of your life that you can't believe you blew it or someone hurt you so bad that you can't get over it.

Not just those, but even in the small days.

His grace is incredible.

I want to unwrap this gift of grace that we've been given.

Let's go then to Romans chapter 6, verse 23, and let's look at our dilemma.

Romans 6:23

In Romans chapter 6 and verse 23, it says that the wages of sin is what?

Romans 6 · chapter mention

It's death.

But the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

You know, he says, hey, whoever's without sin, cast the first stone.

This guy deserves to die.

His sin deserves the same sentence that an adulterous sin deserved in Leviticus.

This person deserves to die.

So let me give you an uncomfortable statement for you and I.

This is talking about me and you.

This is a sentence on us.

Because go to Romans chapter 3, verse 10 through 12.

Romans 3:10–12

It says the wages of sin is death in Romans chapter 6, but then in Romans chapter 3 it says that we're all sinful.

Romans 6 · chapter mention Romans 3 · chapter mention

Look in verse 10.

As it is written, there is no one who is righteous.

Not even one.

There is no one who understands.

There's no one who seeks God.

All have turned away.

They have together become worthless.

There is no one who does good, not even one.

One of my favorite passages of all time is the Sermon on the Mount.

I believe the Sermon on the Mount was actually to bring people to a crisis place to say, we got a problem here.

Because if you remember, he stands up and he's preaching to a crowd and he says, Hey, if your eye has ever caused you to sin, gouge it out.

It's not enough to divorce, it's not enough to want a divorce, it's not enough to commit adultery.

Even if you have lustful thoughts, you're not going to make it into the kingdom.

If someone steals your coat, give them your shirt.

He begins to teach in such strong language that if you could imagine we're all here, and he's beginning to preach on things that each one of us struggle with.

And he's saying, hey, if that's your problem, you can't make it into the kingdom.

And he says this if your righteousness does not surpass the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees, you can't enter the kingdom of heaven.

Now to us, it's like, yeah, those terrible Pharisees, they're bad.

No, to them, it's like, what?

You're saying if I'm not better than the pastor, I can't get in?

That was what they would have heard.

If your righteousness is not far surpassing the Pharisees and the scribes, it's like saying, hey, if your righteousness is not far surpassing Pastor Steve and the elders, you're in trouble.

That's what they would have heard.

And then for those few self-righteous people that are like, well, I'm sure I'm better than Pastor Steve.

Those few self-righteous people that are sitting in the crowd, my favorite verse of all time is sitting right there in Matthew chapter 5 and verse 48.

Matthew 5 · chapter mention

It says, be perfect, just like God is perfect.

So he's saying, if your righteousness has not only surpassed them, but if you can't measure up to God's righteousness, you're in trouble.

And that left the disciples to say, well, who then can be saved?

This seems impossible.

And that's where we get the very famous verse, with God all things are possible.

That was actually a crisis moment where Jesus was saying how rich people cannot enter.

It's very hard for rich people to enter the kingdom of heaven because they struggle to surrender.

It was that beautiful moment where the disciples actually said, Then who can be saved?

I don't know who can be saved if this is the case.

We just heard you preaching on the Sermon on the Mount.

Now you're rebuking this rich man who says he wants to follow you, but he's just not willing to sell everything.

And you're telling him he can't go.

Who can be saved?

Then he says, Without God, this is impossible.

But with God, all things are possible.

I think the whole point of the Sermon on the Mount was to point people to the need of a Savior.

And it says in Romans chapter 3, verse 10 through 12 that we all are sinful.

Romans 3:10–12

I'm going to listen, you can tell by my the way I talk that I'm Southern.

They don't have as many of these here, but in the South, after church, we would all go out to eat.

And we would go out to eat at buffets.

Southern people love buffets.

We like eating.

And we like to get as much as we can for our money.

And let me, for those of you that don't know how buffets work, where the rest of us are going to like teach you right now.

So, if I go eat at a buffet, and the buffet is$10, and I eat five pieces of chicken, a whole plate of mac and cheese, a whole bowl of collard greens, and then I go up and I do it twice, how much is the buffet?

It's$10.

Now, for uh those of you young girls that are 10 years old, 12 years old, and you only like chicken tenders, and you go to the buffet and you just eat chicken tenders, and your parents tell you to eat some vegetables, so you put a few of them on your plate, but you don't actually eat them.

You just put them on there.

How much is that buffet?

That's how a buffet works.

That's why people like me like buffets because we feel like we got over on somebody.

The scripture says the wages of sin is death.

Okay, so if I am the most heinous person ever imaginable, and I've committed some of the worst sin that you could ever imagine, what is the wage of my sin?

Death.

Now, if I've been coming to this church and I've been doing D Group and I've been doing PBJ, and I buy my Starbucks for the people for the car behind me, how much does my sin cost?

Death.

Death.

Righteousness to God is righteousness.

There's no, well, there's a little bit of you are kind of bad, and you were really bad.

It's all death.

And so Scripture says this.

Look in Romans, let's go to stay in chapter 3 and go to verse 20.

We're going to read through 24.

It says, Therefore, no one will be declared righteous in God's sight by the works of the law.

Rather, through the law, we become conscious of our sin, kind of like Jesus was doing when he was preaching the Sermon on the Mount.

But now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been made known to us, which the law and the prophets testify.

This righteousness is given through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe.

There is no difference between Jew and Gentiles, for all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and all are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Jesus Christ.

Jesus paid the death that your sin cost.

That's like going back to the buffet thing.

If Pastor Steve or Ryan, where's Ryan at?

He's right back there.

So if Ryan said, hey, we're going to all go out to eat afterwards, and I'm going to pay for it.

That's good.

That's good.

Then we all go out to eat.

But there's a couple of you in the crowd that are like, nah, nah, you don't have to pay for mine.

You don't have to pay, I'll pay for it.

You don't have to pay for mine.

And Ryan says, no, no, I'll pay for yours.

No, no, you don't have to pay for mine.

And a couple of you are even like prideful about it.

You ain't paying for my food.

I'll pay for my own food.

Okay, all right.

When you get ready to leave, so I'm going to let him pay for mine.

Okay, because I'm like that.

But Steve, Steve's not going to let him pay for his.

When we get ready to leave, just say me and Steve had to leave early.

And the cashier stops us and they say, uh, what are we going to do about your bill?

And I'm going to say, Oh, Ryan.

Ryan said he was going to pay for mine.

And she looks back at Ryan, and Ryan's like, yeah, thumbs up, he's okay.

Okay, all right, go ahead.

And looks at Steve, and Steve says, Okay, here's my money.

And he pulls out his card.

But when he goes to pay for his card, pay with his card, his card won't work.

It doesn't work.

And he looks at Ryan and he's like, Ryan.

And Ryan's like, no, I really, we, no, you didn't, remember, I was too good for you.

Or I wasn't good enough for you.

So you get a thumbs down, Bobby gets a thumbs up.

Christ paid for your sin.

There is still a responsibility for you to say, I receive with humility the gift that has been given to me.

I appreciate the gift of God that came through Christ Jesus.

And Ephesians chapter 2, verse 8 through 9 says, For it is by grace that you have been saved through faith, and this is not of yourself, it is the gift of God.

Ephesians 2:8–9

It is not by works so that no one can boast.

This is the gift of God that we've been given.

For the times that we've laid our heads on the pillow and we say, I can't believe I did that.

I can't believe I went to the darkest place of who I am.

I can't believe I've disappointed myself this bad.

Surely I can't come back from this.

And God says, Oh my grace.

My grace is sufficient for you.

What really matters is, will you receive it?

Or will you try to figure out a way within the law to make this thing work out because you do not have enough money.

It cannot happen.

You do not have enough in your life account to pay for the mistakes that you've made.

I don't, you don't, and no one else does.

And that is when you find yourself in the bottom, in the mess, and you think, man, I wish I had a window breaker right now.

It's not until you've actually been at a place where you're exhausted because of your own mistakes that you can't lay your head on a pillow without being exhausted with your emotions.

And you cry out to the Lord and you say, Lord, if there was only a way, and the Lord says, the way is through my Son.

That is when you understand the gift that God has given you.

Now I want to go back to the story right quick because there is a piece to this that I think we need to see.

Go back to Matthew chapter 1 and verse 24.

Matthew 1 · chapter mention

This is where everything changed.

God's already done his part.

When Joseph woke up, he did what the angel of the Lord commanded him.

That's it.

That's the key.

He took God at his word and he did what the angel of the Lord commanded him.

And I'm going to tell you, for some of us, we're kind of trapped in that law world and we're kind of trying to work our way back, and you can't work your way back.

Here's what you have to do: you have to do what the Lord commands.

If you want peace from the Lord, just do what he commands you to do.

For some of you, you need to be calling someone and saying, hey, I really messed up and I'm sorry.

I want our relationship back.

And they may say yes, or they may say, go fly a kite.

But you've done your part.

For some of you, it is whatever your thing is.

The Lord is saying, stop doing that.

Stop doing that.

It's hurting our relationship.

I'm not telling you to figure it out and go find a way back, but I am telling you stop doing that.

The angel of the Lord is telling you to stop doing that.

For some of you, the Lord may be telling you, men, hey, you need to start loving your wives again.

Start loving your wives again.

Stop being so harsh with your children.

I don't know what it is.

Because you know what it is.

But the angel of the Lord has something to say to you.

And he has already provided grace.

And that grace allows you to wake up and say, Lord, what was I thinking?

I want my relationship with you.

And you just do it.

And that's all that it's that simple.

I drove in this morning thinking, Lord, I my relationship's not where it needs to be with you.

It's not what it needs to be.

And here's how I know is because I don't worship you in the small things anymore.

I don't see small things, and it doesn't draw me into fellowship with you anymore.

So I'm consumed with worry.

And I'm consumed with my own junk.

Now the good news is I don't have to go and figure it out.

All I have to do is just wake up and confess it.

John says, John, 1 John chapter 1, verse 9 says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and he is just.

1 John 1:9

That means he is within his rights to forgive you.

He's not only faithful, he will do that.

But he is also within his rights because he's already given you the gift of his son, Jesus Emmanuel, God with us, that has come to forgive the world of their sin.

So he's within his rights to say, okay, we're going to move that over and we're going to start today.

And that gives me the ability to sit with the Lord as I'm driving in and saying, God, something's wrong with my heart.

Because I keep coming to you with only heavy stuff.

And I'm not worshiping you anymore.

My heart's not worshiping in the small things.

So I want to confess that to you, Lord.

And I want you to help me.

And God's able to do that.

And let's finish up with this last little verse.

Hebrews chapter 4, verse 16.

Hebrews 4:16

Hebrews chapter 4, verse 16 says this.

Hebrews 4:16

Let us then approach God's throne of grace with confidence.

Notice that it is God's throne of grace.

God sits on a throne, and it is a throne of grace.

Grace is the opposite of disgrace, and God is sitting on it.

Just telling you, approach not my throne of judgment, not my throne of righteousness, which of course he's righteous, which of course he's a judge, but he chooses to explain it as a throne of grace.

Just walk up into this grace, receive the gift, isn't it great?

That's the gift that God gave us.

I mean, is that not incredible?

If it's not incredible, then you haven't blown your life too much.

If grace does not blow you away, then you have not been where I've been.

I'm telling you.

If grace has not blown you away, then you know nothing of the life that I know.

Because I sit back in amazement.

It's like I'm under this ocean of water, this wanting to just kill me.

And the Lord is saying, Aren't you glad you have a window breaker?

That's God's grace.

This is not just a message for those.

That aren't believers.

That's not what this message is.

Because I would dare to bet 90% of the people that got up and weathered the storm this morning to come to a church and listen to somebody other than Pastor Steve, you're probably believers.

Probably 90% of you are.

This is not a message for the other 10%.

This is a message of you already have the gift.

Isn't it great?

Isn't it great?

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We hope you have been blessed by today's message.

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