Hebrews 1:1-4

For the service of today, we're going to be reading from Hebrews chapter one, from verse one through to four, the English Standard Version.

Long ago, at many times, and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophet.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed the head of all things, through whom also he created the world.

He is the radiance of the glory of God and the exact imprint of his nature.

And he upholds the universe by the word of his power after making purification for sins.

He sat thou at the right hand of the majesty on high, having become as such superior to angels, as the name he has inherited is more excellent than he is.

May the Lord bless the reading of his word in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Well, it is uh it is amazing to be back.

I've missed it here, and and one of the things that I didn't share is my mom immigrated to the States uh from the Cork area.

Um, and so this is it's there's something in my blood, and it is great to be here and to honor that heritage.

And you have always received me so well.

And um, you know, I was with Mark earlier this week, and I'm really glad that he's he's not here because I want him to be resting.

And I know he came last Sunday, and uh, as somebody who's been on sabbaticals, if you show up to the church, you're pastor, and it kind of brings you right back in.

So I I just told him, I'm like, don't come Sunday morning.

I won't be offended, but I do get the last word, you know?

And uh he said something cheeky to me uh this last week, and uh, and I said, that's all right, keep talking because uh I'm preaching at your church on Sunday, so uh we'll take care of business then.

Um yeah, that might be better.

Yeah.

You know, it's just my Bible's so heavy.

So it's all right, perfect.

All right, cool.

Um, and so anyway, so I am I'm thankful to be here.

And I just want to say thank you for sending him away, for being willing to go without him for a few months.

Um, pastoring a church is is a pressure that is unlike other pressures uh in the sense that it's just continual, no matter what.

Sunday's always coming.

And as a pastor, no matter what happens in your life, you have you are thinking about how to give and serve and uh and love the church.

And so uh no matter what happens, you gotta stand up, you gotta preach, and be faithful to the word.

And inside uh you might be struggling.

So I just want to say thank you.

And uh, and and I'm really thankful to to be here um to stand in his place um as the better looking Mark.

So uh Amen, amen, amen.

All right, now we got chatting it up.

Um so uh who anybody in here?

I mean, I I not that I could even see you, but sushi fans.

We got some sushi fans in here.

Love some sushi.

Okay.

I just wanted to know who not to go out with with lunch after this.

Um I I want to like fish, I hate fish, um, and I have an allergy.

I don't know if it uh if you can experience this, but it leaves a terrible taste in my mouth.

It's a terrible allergy.

Um I I just cannot stand it, but I want to like it.

I really want to like fish, but I but I just cannot.

It's terrible.

Give me Bunsen burger any day.

That's where I'm at.

My dad would always say, Well, Jesus ate fish, that's good enough for you.

And I'm like, well, he he he didn't have burgers, so uh, and he didn't eat bacon, right?

So uh he he will in heaven, but he didn't up to then.

Um and but I want to like fish.

But here's the thing uh there was this time we were just planting a church in Sacramento.

This is about 13 years ago, and when you're planting a church, you want to meet as many people as possible under any circumstances.

If somebody's willing to have a conversation with you, you're willing to have a conversation with them.

My wife got into a mom's group, met some people, they were not Christians, um, and we got invited to their birthday party, which was amazing.

That's a great opportunity.

We're trying to build relationships and plant a church.

So we show up to their birthday party.

It's at a sushi restaurant.

I am this is like my worst nightmare.

And uh, and there, and at this restaurant, there's not even chicken.

You can't even order uh, you know, teriyaki chicken and white rice, you know, and be that guy.

You can't.

And they just order this huge spread of things with eyes.

And uh, and and I have a funnel, I have a kind of a fundamental principle.

If it doesn't blink, I don't eat it.

Um, so that that's really uh what it comes down to for me.

But here we are at this sushi restaurant, this entire spread of fish, which none of it on the table is appetizing, and uh, and and I I think I'm going to be sick, right?

Uh I'm I might be Duncan's son from this morning, you know?

So uh but here's the thing we're trying to build relationship, make connection.

We're trying to plant a church, and so we we sit at the table, and uh, and I know there's nothing I like on this table, but I take the chopsticks and I'm as much wasabi as possible, you know, and I'm I'm putting it in my mouth and I'm chewing.

Uh, but then when no one's looking and I have the right opportunity, I'm throwing it in a little napkin like this, right?

And so it's a it's a long dinner, and I collected eight napkins, maybe like a hundred dollars of of semi-chewed sushi.

Um, and it was terrible.

I was that guy.

It was awful.

But I was there, and here's what's amazing.

I'm chewing it, you know, I'm putting it in my napkin, trying to be discreet.

I don't think anybody caught me.

Um, but we're we're making relationships and we're doing whatever we can in order to have a conversation and build a relationship with people who don't know Jesus.

And that includes eating sushi.

And and to, I know some of you are like, that doesn't sound like hard missional work.

I'm like, no, it is.

It is, it really is.

It sounds like hell to me, you know.

So um, but here's the thing: from there, because we went to that that table and the people who'd invited us, we had them in our house, ultimately, they were the first people we baptized, became a Christian and baptized in our church plant.

And they walked with the Lord, and they're some of our closest friends.

They were actually on a trip here with me a few years ago, and um, and and just because the willingness to get kind of in that, and I hated the experience, but I love the people, and then God birthed fruit from it.

And and and here's the thing, and I use that illustration because it's just sushi.

It's not going overseas, it's not doing some big mission thing, it's living in ordinary life and how we live in the ordinary on mission for Jesus so that his name can be made great in our city.

You can make Jesus look good while eating sushi.

I don't know.

I I just pray that that's true.

Um, but here's the thing I want to bring us into Hebrews.

Ordinary life with an extraordinary message.

Hebrews 1 just starts like this.

Long ago, and in many times and in many ways, God spoke to our fathers by the prophets.

God has been speaking from the beginning.

So, in this letter, now we're in the New Testament, and now it's to the Jewish people so that they would be convinced of Jesus from the Old Testament.

That's the book of Hebrews.

And here's what he here's what he's saying.

God has been speaking from the very beginning.

When God created everything, he was speaking.

When when he sent angels to talk to Abraham and to others, God was speaking.

When he led his people out of Egypt, God was speaking.

In the Old Testament, God has been speaking, always.

God has been revealing from the very beginning, which is amazing.

God has always been revealing himself to us, which is great news because sometimes we wonder if God even notices us.

But right here in the beginning, God is speaking.

He's been speaking long before you were born, long, long before any of us were here, long before our countries existed.

God has been speaking.

And then how?

In many times and many different ways.

It continues.

So what's he saying?

God has been speaking from the very beginning.

He's been revealing, he's been showing himself, he's been loving people, he's been displaying his glory, displaying his um awesome nature and his attributes.

But it's been fragmented, it's been in pieces, it's been disconnected.

It's been through the prophets and it's been through the fathers.

So it's been through God walking through the circumstances of the fathers of the Jewish, uh, the Jewish family, Abraham, uh, Joshua, Isaac, and how God has worked in all of them.

And yet it's by the prophets, which is God speaking.

But here's the thing it's been kind of all over the place.

It's been fragmented, it's been in pieces.

God has been talking, but it's hard, it's been hard to see the thread of everything that God has been doing.

There's dreams, visions, miracles, David, and David's mighty men, and uh, and the and the exile and getting into the land and and um and and uh um taking the land for themselves, the commandments of God in Exodus chapter 20 is God speaking and the stories and the poems and the theophanies, the the the uh visions of God, right?

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

And the presence of God, or the Christophanes when it was the appearance of Jesus as the angel of the Lord.

These all these ways God's been speaking, but they've been fragmented, and it's been hard to piece it all together, and how do they all connect?

Um, when when we go on car rides with the family, we we play the Bible in like an audio Bible.

And so one day we were we were driving to school, we're playing the audio Bible, and we're in Leviticus, and um, and it's the chapter about the mold and the leprosy of the houses in the walls.

Really weird passage, right?

And it's like if you're if your walls in your house have leprosy, now maybe that's more of a thing here, you know, because of how rainy it is, right?

But uh, if the walls of your house have leprosy or boils, if you have skin issues, and it's it's this entire chapter that's very disturbing.

You're like, why does God care about this?

And one of one of my kids said, Why does that matter?

What does it matter if the paint is peeling in your house?

Why does God care about that?

See, and that was a fragmented revelation of God.

Now it was good for God's people in the moment, but how does it fit into the bigger picture?

It was in fragments and in pieces, and it was always, it wasn't always easy to see what God was doing with those kind of laws in the Old Testament, but then there's this much bigger story.

And here's how the author of Hebrews, so the preacher of Hebrews, is gonna say it.

But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son.

So it was fragmented, it was all over, there's boils in the walls.

How does that fit?

Why does that matter?

Don't eat shellfish, that's still my favorite command.

How does all of that how does all of that matter?

It's because there's a bigger story, and and all of it was God speaking and revealing so that it would all make sense and all get fulfilled through God speaking through his son Jesus Christ.

God has been speaking in pieces, and now God has spoken through Jesus.

Do you see the past tense?

That's really critical.

God has did speak through all those ways, but now he has spoken, completed, done.

Past tense.

It's over.

God has spoken to us by Jesus.

Jesus is the complete and final message of God.

Now, that doesn't mean that Jesus reveals everything God could say.

It just means that Jesus reveals everything necessary for us to know about God and salvation and redemption and God's work in the world.

So it's not it's not everything, but it is thorough, and it is everything necessary that we must know about God.

Here's another way to say it.

If God could appear and say anything to you, He would say Jesus.

He would say Jesus.

And part of the question is, is that enough for us?

Some of us want more.

We want we want God to to work in some radical way in our life to prove that He loves us and that He's real.

We're not content enough with the cross and the resurrection and the incarnation of Christ.

We want more.

We're not content.

It must be, it must be Jesus and the resurrection as well as healing.

God, I if you actually were who you are, then my wife wouldn't be suffering in the way she is.

That's Jesus plus the healing.

Are we content?

Because here's what God, God's like, I just I would tell you Jesus.

What I want you to know is Jesus.

Is there other graces and other blessings and other good?

Yes, yes, and amen.

But the ultimate message is Jesus.

And we have it better than anybody else who lived in the time of the New Testament or had the Old Testament scriptures in Hebrew.

They had the revelation of God in pieces and fragments.

We have the completed message, which is Jesus.

Now what's powerful is Jesus is not only a messenger, I want to reiterate, he is also the message.

That's what Hebrews 1 tells us.

He has spoken to us by his son.

It doesn't say he's just sending a messenger, it's saying he has spoken by his son.

Meaning the the very fact that his son was present and incarnated and came from heaven and and was sent to us and died and rose again.

The the very person of Jesus is the message.

Jesus is the messenger and the message for us now.

I'm gonna show five uh things, uh five uh keys here about who Christ is.

My my whole goal in this in my life and in and in in into and encourage you to exhort you is just to get such a vision of Jesus, a radical vision of Jesus, so that you could go out in ordinary life and eat sushi for the glory of God.

One, it says, Jesus is the heir of all things.

So he has spoken to us by his son.

Jesus himself is the message, not the messenger, is the message, which is incredible in a world where there's lots of spiritual messengers and there's a lot of misunderstanding.

Well, if you are uh from if you're you could be a messenger in Hinduism, but you're pointing to the same God.

You can be a messenger in Buddhism, but you're pointing to the same God.

You can be a messenger like Jesus in Christianity, but you're pointing to the same God.

You could also be the prophet Jesus in in Islam and you're and you're pointing to God.

And so there's this misunderstanding about Jesus in our culture, which is namely that he's a messenger.

No, no, no.

The Bible asserts him as the actual message.

That's a big difference in regards to the religions of the world.

He's not just one of many, he is the main thing.

He's the heir of all things.

So here we're first part.

He is the heir of all things.

This word is kiernamus, heir.

And it means that you receive something by the allocation or possession of the right of sonship.

So it exactly, right?

So if you're a son of a good of a father, that father leaves an inheritance.

Jesus is the heir by right of his sonship.

It means that there is nothing that will not ultimately be given to Jesus at the end of everything.

He will own it all.

He's the heir of all things, which makes sense as it goes on.

He created the world, right?

Uh, and and all the world, that that word world is not only the world itself, but everything in it.

He's he's the owner.

So it reminds us that Jesus inherits everything for one simple reason, because it's all his from the beginning.

John tells us that nothing was made that was made, that was made apart from Christ.

So at the end of all things, God the Father is going to hand over to Jesus everything.

It all becomes his, which has kind of two implications.

One, if God or if Christ is the ultimate heir and owner of all things, it means that he has all ability at his disposal to fulfill every promise.

Yeah?

It means if God owns it, God has it so that he could make good to us on his covenant promises.

If you wonder, if you wonder, will God remember me?

Like the like the man crucified on the cross, remember me, Jesus, today in paradise.

Today you'll be with me in paradise.

How do we know that through death God will remember you?

How do we know that the promises that God has made, which is might be something like um turning, turning into good, meaning for good what others or the devil has meant for evil?

How do we know that he can do that?

How do we know that nothing will ever separate us from the love in Christ?

How do we know that?

Because God, Christ, owns everything and is therefore able to fulfill everything.

Listen to uh how John Piper puts it.

It's just so beautiful.

I wanted to say it.

He says this.

If he says, Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth, then he can make good on that promise because he owns the earth.

If he says nothing in all of creation will separate us, he can make good on that promise because he owns all creation and has it all under his control.

If he says there's no longer there, there is no longer to be death or mourning or crying or pain, he can make good on that promise because he will own life, death, and rule completely unhindered.

All those things which cause pain and crying.

So, why does it matter that Jesus is the heir of all things?

It's because we can trust him when he promises to us life and good and joy, life abundant.

But then, secondly, another implication would just be this.

He owns you.

You are in the world.

Whom he appointed the heir of all things.

Are you all things?

Are you in there?

Yes.

Does that mean you're a person unto yourself?

No.

Does that mean you are a body unto yourself?

No.

It means that Christ inherits you ultimately.

And that we are not, we don't belong to ourselves.

We belong to Christ.

We don't, we don't get to inherit, we are part of his inheritance.

There's this phrase that my my dad would always say in the States, and I don't know if it's here, but it's I brought you in this world and I can take you out of this world.

He would say that to me all the time.

Boy, I brought you in this world.

I can still hear his voice.

Well, in one sense, that's what God is saying to us.

Hey, kid, I brought you in this world.

I can take you out of this world.

I own you.

I own your life.

Which also, in one sense, is very encouraging because God owns my life.

I'm not in charge of it.

I can trust him again for him to fulfill the promises.

But on another side of it is whether I surrender to him or not doesn't change the fact that I belong to him and he owns me.

And so then the implication is to surrender to the reality that we are not our own.

Some of us are holding on so tightly that it's my life, my dreams, my decisions, my body, my way.

And God's like, you're not apart from me.

You are an heir to me.

Surrender to me.

Surrender to the reality which is, is that all things belong to me.

Secondly, he is, what does it say?

He is the radiance of the glory of God.

Let's get this right.

That he is radiance, not reflection.

We know the difference.

The sun radiates and the moon reflects, right?

Unless you're a flat earther, uh, then then they both illuminate and you're dumb.

And uh so the the sun is radiating and the moon is reflecting.

And again, we we see that uh that Jesus is oftentimes seen as a uh as reflecting merely whatever this unknown God is.

But again, he is not just a messenger, he is the message, he himself is self-illuminating.

Jesus illuminates and is light and radiates.

So in that sense, it's the very nature of God.

So if we get to a place in the scripture, we're like, well, does the Bible ever say that Jesus and God, Jesus and the Father are one and the same?

Yes, there's one.

He radiates the same glory of God.

He doesn't just reflect, he's not the moon, he's the source of light.

Like C.S.

Lewis says, it's it's it's not that in light I see Jesus, but by the light of Jesus I see everything else.

2 Corinthians or Corinthians 2 says, For God who said, Let light shine out of darkness has shown in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

He is the radiating glory of God.

And he himself is the light.

And it's not, here's the thing: we don't check to see if there's a sun by merely staring at the sun.

We look around and we know the sun is there.

You can't stare directly at the sun, you look around.

So then Christ becomes the way in which we see the world around us, the way in which we experience the reality around us.

It does our life match the light of Christ as he shines.

Is that the filter that the prism by which we are looking through?

So then we only see, if we see it all, we only see truly by the light of Christ.

It's like Proverbs 1:7.

Proverbs 1:7

The beginning of knowledge and understanding is the fear of the Lord.

So whatever we think we know, if it what it does, if fearing God, the awe of God, does not come first, it's not true knowledge.

Whatever we think we know about reality, if if it is not through the prism of Jesus Christ, it is not true.

So then we must look through Christ.

Now an implication of this would be that the devil, the enemy of God and grace, is working hard, the scripture tells us, to blind our eyes so that we can't see God.

We can't see Christ as glorious, as good, as beautiful, as awe-aspiring.

Wait that that he wants to blind us so that we will be compelled to be content with lower light, lesser light, smaller light.

But Christ is shining, and the enemy is relentlessly working to keep us from seeing the light of God's love and glory in the face of Jesus everywhere we go, at any time we go, the enemy is at work constantly, constantly at work in me.

It's just in me.

Going, Mark, don't see that glory.

Don't love that glory.

Don't go towards that glory.

Love yourself, love the pleasure, love the comfort.

That's better glory.

Blind the eyes.

Don't see Jesus beautiful.

In fact, you're having a hard time seeing Jesus beautiful because you haven't sensed his present recently.

You don't know he's near you.

You can't experience him.

The enemy is at work trying to hide the beauty of the light of Jesus.

Temptation is the blinding work of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

In anything.

It could be a good thing we're gravitated to, but we're gravitated to at the expense of the light of Christ.

Next, he says, the radiance of the glory of God.

He's the exact imprint of his nature.

You will find me in some of my kids, and you will find my wife and some of our kids.

We have four.

And some of them look like me, some of them, well, three of them look like me, one of them looks like her.

So took twins.

But here's the thing: when it says that Jesus is the exact imprint of God's nature, it doesn't mean it's it's like a kid looks like their parents in some way.

It means that it's the it's the exact imprint, a coin.

And the imprint of the emperor would have been on the coin face.

And it's like if if if it was a coin, the the face of God and the father's nature and the the exact nature of Jesus, it would be the imprint of his nature.

In fact, this is the only time in all of the Bible in which this is said.

It is not said anywhere else.

It is so unique.

Every distinguishable mark of the Father is seen in the Son.

Philo says it like this, because there's a paradox here.

Philo says it like this: God's nature is such that nothing and presumably no one can be said to represent his nature.

Yet, that is precisely what the preacher declares concerning Jesus.

God is so unique, so different, presumably, no one or nothing could be what he is.

And yet the preacher in Hebrews is saying Jesus is exactly like that.

He's 100% like that.

And so then Jesus is not only father-like, but the father is Christ-like.

They are exact imprints of one another in nature.

Where there is one, there is the display of the other.

So in that sense, right, Jesus says, if you want to come to the Father, you come through me.

Why?

Because I'm the exact imprint of the nature.

You cannot separate us.

So if you want relationship with God, it can only come through relationship with Christ.

Again, again, showing the uniqueness of the message of Jesus versus the messengers of our day.

And then it continues.

I would love to spend more time, but I just got to keep moving here.

Fourthly, look at what it says about Jesus.

And he upholds the universe by the word of his power.

You know what that means?

That means we exist because Jesus continues to speak in our existence.

He upholds the universe.

Have you ever thought of Jesus upholding the universe, not by the work of his hand, but by the work of his voice?

It is saying that not only does Jesus have the same nature as God, the exact imprint, the same glory of God, the not the reflection, but the radiance of God's glory.

It says here that he has the exact same power as God the Father.

How did creation begin?

God spoke.

How does creation continue?

Jesus speaks.

You see that connection?

That he is the very power of God.

And that he's upholding everything.

So we are utterly dependent on Christ in ways that we have no idea.

Namely, one of them is that we depend upon Christ for our very existence.

If Jesus stopped speaking and upholding the universe, we would evaporate.

That is how dependent we are upon Christ.

We're not just spiritually dependent on him.

So we're not just looking for a spiritual life.

We are utterly dependent upon him in every way, every breath, every step, every part of our existence, every single day belongs to the upholding power of the word of Jesus.

We are so dependent.

Now, why does that matter?

It matters in things like anxiety.

Years ago, because of some family trauma, I just began experiencing deep, just deep and dark anxiety.

It was such abiding fear about things that I just could not explain.

It all revolved around uh uh my heart, and and there's I don't have time to even go into that madness, but it all revolved around this idea that I was just gonna die of a heart attack any minute.

And it it just overwhelmed me.

And it sounds so silly, like as you know, when you're talking about anxiety, it it's not rational and it sounds silly when you're talking to other people, but but 20 years ago, I I would have thought about walking up these steps and thinking that that I don't know if I could walk upstairs at the moments that anxiety just ruled me.

And it was extreme and it didn't make sense.

When my daughter was about to be born, I was like, God, I I want to be free of this.

I want to be free of this and started pursuing some help.

But one one of the things is I was in seminary at the time and I I studied, so I did I did my uh main work and my master's degree in the book of Hebrews, and I'm studying this passage at the same time.

I'm living with extreme anxiety, and I I came across just meditating on each part of these um for cr uh in terms of regarding Jesus, and I came across this that that he is upholding the entire universe, which in my mind said to me there is nothing that I can do if God desires to see me die.

And yet, there is nothing my anxiety or my heart can do if God desires to see me live.

And that became just steps of walking out of this incredibly life-altering and extreme anxiety.

And I know some of you have that.

Some of you are really anxious and you don't know why.

But here's the thing our anxiety isn't rational, but it's part of the fall in us.

Or maybe it's trauma or the home you grew up in, or a father that was never there, whatever those those pains and hurts are.

We it's it's the idea that Jesus is holding up our whole world so that when we're utterly anxious about reality, we remember that everything is being upheld by the word of Christ.

So it is not the thing that I fear that will get me.

I'm in the hands of Jesus, and if he wills me to live, I'll live.

And if he wills me to be with him and on the other side of this world, then I will do that.

But either way, it is not a random accident, it is a sovereign choice by Christ.

And so then it begins to affect our anxiety very, very deeply.

And then lastly, verse five, and then I'll make some implications and get out of here.

Verse five, after making purification for sin, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, having become as much superior to the angels.

You guys know this really well in such a Catholic context, but the the priests of the Old Testament in the temple never sat down.

They were always at work.

Why?

Because people were always sinning.

Sin happened continually.

The priest had to atone for that sin.

Sin was ongoing, the priest would work.

Never, never.

There was so much sin to deal with.

And when you were on shift to be a priest, you were on your feet all day long, giving sacrifices and providing atonement for God's people and for their sin.

It was an arduous job.

It was a backbreaking job.

Animal after animal, you're lifting up all day, killing, bleeding, burning, always, always, always.

The priest was ever standing before God and in between sinners and a holy God.

But here we find that the priest, the high priest, the greatest of all priests, the the very message of Christ is that he is the ultimate priest.

He's not working anymore, he's sitting down.

He's at rest.

He's not constantly before our sin and God the Father.

Why?

Because sin has been conquered through the cross.

Sin has been killed by the holiness of Christ, and then he gives me his righteousness.

And now, do I still sin?

Yes, but the righteousness and the blood of Christ covers all sin as I depend and trust upon his perfect work.

And so then it looks like this.

Jesus is sitting, why are we working so hard to find favor in God's eyes?

Why are why are we still struggling with a religion that says if you do more, God will give you more favor.

If you try harder, you will get more favor.

If I obey, then God will find greater favor in me.

The message is Jesus sat down.

Why are we still working so hard?

The favor has been given and it is full.

We don't need to work to please God.

God is pleased in us and we work from there.

Now, Jesus is a better message.

If we could see Christ in this way, it's it's big, it's a lot, each one could be its own sermon, but it would utterly transform who we are and how we live, not in dramatic ways, but in ordinary ways in our everyday life around people in a spiritually dead city that desperately needs Christ, but doesn't know him like this, doesn't see him this big, doesn't see him as the message, but maybe sees him merely as a messenger.

And so, how may it look?

Well, it might look like this a year ago when my wife's heart was bleeding and being crushed by a liter of blood, and she needed emergency surgery.

We had no idea how dire the situation was.

And the doctors came in, they sat next to us in the emergency department and sat next to us and said and said, Christy, that's my wife's name.

Look, look at me.

I just want to make sure you can understand this.

This is a very bad situation.

And we are gonna take you in emergency surgery, but I would advise you to call your children because it is far more likely that you don't come out of surgery than you do.

And so, and they kind of left us, and we had about three minutes, and I'm on my knees next to a bed, and Christy's there, and she's crying, I'm crying, I'm holding her hands, and I'm just trying to process this whole thing, and we get our kids, all four of them, that are at home, and we get them on FaceTime, and and we just tell them the news.

This is what's happening.

Uh mom is very, very sick.

We're going into an emergency operation, and they and we and and and mom just wanted to talk with you guys just in case.

And so she she's there and she's like, uh, she says some very personal loving things.

But this was the thing.

We're we're in tears, we're praying, the kids are crying, and uh, and she says, uh, she says, guys, if the worst is to happen, the worst in our eyes is to happen, whatever you do, don't be mad at Jesus.

And then they come in and they raise her out, she has to say goodbye.

And her last words, if she did not pull through that surgery, was Jesus so good, he is in charge of everything, he is over all things.

We all belong to him, trust him, every promise will be fulfilled.

When you suffer, whatever happens, if mom dies tonight, don't be mad at Jesus.

That's the impact of this kind of text.

Or it could be relationships.

Unforgiveness is the lack of seeing the bigness and the message of Christ.

The lack of surrender, engaging the difficult, building community, getting out of our isolation, engaging in conflict that we would rather just put under the carpet.

Um, with the way we talk about other people who have hurt us, what we're holding on to in the wounds of others in the church.

Maybe we don't even want to be a part of the church because of relationships.

Well, Jesus, our view of Jesus changes all of that.

Or maybe purpose and mission.

You are a church planting church.

You are sending out Duncan and whoever of you might go and need to go.

Why would you give up this?

Why would you give up what you have?

Why would you uh leave people that have deep relationships and move into the hardship of church planting?

It's because we have a view of Jesus like this.

So we ask ourselves whether it's relationships or purpose or mission in the ordinary it's having a view of Jesus like this in a sushi restaurant, it's having a view of Jesus like this in our marriage, it's having a view of Jesus like this in our suffering.

And I would just ask these three questions for you to process for 30 seconds.

What did you need to know about Christ this morning that you had not considered?

His power, his nature, his strength, his word, our dependence, the fulfillment of God's message?

What did you need to know about Christ this morning?

What do you need to believe this morning?

Move what you know eighteen inches down into your heart.

What do you need to believe?

And what is the first step this morning of applying that today?