"Struggling To Believe" 1 COR 15:1-19 and Mark 16:1-12

There are others who are struggling, going through some sicknesses and stuff.

I heard somebody talking just in the room this morning about how our immune systems are down

because of last year and 2020 and that's the reality. That's what we're facing.

But the good news is, down doesn't mean out. We are still his.

And we are still able. And we're going to praise him today.

So the order will be a little bit different for those of you who are very, very order focused.

You'll notice that for the both of us, it's a little bit different.

And so we're not going to have our regular inspirational moment time today.

So we'll bring that back next Sunday.

That's the time where we can share from the Word and what we've discovered in our studies throughout the week and so on.

And so we'll bring that back next Sunday.

Just have a couple of readings and some worship and then we'll go to the Word.

Give her a second and then we're going to pray.

Pray for little Zoe too. She fell down. That happens a lot when you're a toddler.

That's what toddler means. I go fast, but I fall down. That's what it means.

That's a good definition.

That's kind of how I live actually. I think I'm still a toddler.

All right. So let's pray together and we'll praise God.

This is the Sunday we celebrate his actual resurrection.

Father in heaven, we are so grateful for this Sunday and all of Sunday.

We're so grateful for every Sunday, for 365 and sometimes for 166 days a year.

And we're able to celebrate the awesome things that you've done, who you are, what you're doing in us.

Lord, you've created an amazing creation that testifies to your glory.

At the same time, I must confess to you Lord, I feel like I wasted 25 years of my life not recognizing who you were,

not living according to your word, not living according to who you were trying to make me into, lead me to be.

But I'm grateful, God, that you carried law and were patient with me.

I look at the condition of the world and I realize, well, the world needs a resurrection.

The human system, the way things are done, it's actively suffering, actively falling apart, actively draining the life out of one another.

We know you are able, more than able, through your gospel message, through the weapon that you've given us,

which is your word, Lord, that we are able to share, to encourage others, to stand up for what we believe in and know is true.

This Sunday morning, this resurrection Sunday morning, the morning in which they went and found the tomb of Anthony,

the morning in which the resurrected Jesus first appeared again, reminds us of your resurrection power,

of your ability to change, transform, to recreate.

If you can make it all for nothing, you can make what it is into something good.

God, we pray on a regular basis your will be done here on earth as it is in heaven.

We pray your kingdom come. We know that your kingdom exists here on earth in this present day.

Eventually, Lord, your new heaven and earth will be filled with your kingdom and it will only be there and elsewhere for those who would not be with you.

We are grateful that we have been called in many cases for those who in this room have trusted Jesus as their Lord and Savior.

We know that means we are saved. We are born again, begun anew.

And this Sunday as we celebrate your resurrection, even as we overcome tough odds,

and we know for example Alicia is on the stage right now playing guitar but not able to sing the way she really wants to because she lost a lot of her voice.

We're missing Brother Tim, Brother Ron. We're missing some others who are sick and hurting.

Father, we pray for them. We ask you to lift them up from right where they are.

To overcome that spirit of infirmity that strikes their body. To overcome the illnesses that have spread in the community.

But to make us stronger, Lord, that we might glorify you. I pray they're watching us online.

I pray that Brother Ron is tapping out the beat.

I pray that Brother Tim is running his fingers on imaginary keys.

Lord, we just ask you to take over this service time and make it what you would want it to be.

We've had our ideas. We've tried to consult you. Selected your music for what we thought you will be.

Looked at the Bible, tried to understand what it would say. Come to explain that. The lessons have been prepared for the children.

And fun activities.

But we really only need one thing. We can do without all of that if we just have one thing.

And that is you in charge of this place.

So we submit ourselves to you. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.

Alright, so if you can't tell by the state of the voices happening this morning, the praise team is one for six for Healthy This Morning.

But we are here, we are singing, and we are overcoming on Resurrection Sunday.

So would you stand with us this morning? Could we have the young people towards the front? We've got some motions for you this morning.

Get up, let's go. I see you back there.

And if you can't dance, you can clap. Everybody can clap, right? We have no drummers, so I'm going to need a beat here.

Celebrate Jesus, celebrate.

He is risen, he is risen, and he is forevermore.

He is risen, he is risen, and he is forevermore. Let's celebrate the resurrection of our Lord.

Celebrate Jesus, celebrate.

He is risen, he is risen, and he is forevermore.

He is risen, he is risen, and he is forevermore. Let's celebrate the resurrection of our Lord.

Alright, this next one you know, so stay on your feet. Here we go.

Lord, I lift Your name on high. Lord, I close in Your praises. I'm so glad You're in my life. I'm so glad You came to save us, Jesus.

You came from heaven to earth to show way, from the earth to the cross. I can't live from the cross to the grave, from the night to the sky.

Lord, I lift Your name on high. Lord, I lift Your name on high. Lord, I love to sing Your praises. I'm so glad You're in my life.

I'm so glad You came to save us, Jesus. You came from heaven to earth to show way, from the earth to the cross.

I can't live from the cross to the grave, from the night to the sky. Lord, I lift Your name on high.

You came from heaven to earth to show way, from the earth to the cross. My exaltation, from the cross to the grave, from the grave to the sky.

Lord, I lift Your name on high.

Okay, I'm going to read Psalms 42, verse 1 through 18, if you want to follow along. I'm reading from the New American Standard Version.

My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Far from my deliverance are the words of my droning. O my God, I cry by day, but You do not answer, and by night, but I have no rest. Yet You are holy.

O You who are enthroned upon the praises of Israel. In You our fathers trusted. They trusted and You delivered them. To You they cried out and were delivered.

In You they trusted and were not disappointed, that I am a worm, not a man. Their approach of men is despised by the people. All who see me sneer at me. They separate with the lip. They wag the head.

They say, Commit yourself to the Lord. Let Him deliver him. Let Him rescue him, because He delights in him. Yet You are He who brought me forth from the womb. You made me trust when upon my mother's breast. Upon You I was cast from birth. You have been my God from my mother's womb.

You are not far from me, for trouble is near me. For there is none to help. Many bulls have surrounded me. Strong bulls of passion have disturbed me. They open wide their mouth at me as a raving and roaring lion.

I am poured out like water, and all my bones are out of joint. My heart is like wax, it is welded within me. My strength is dried up like a potsherd, and my tongue cleaves to my jaws. You lay me in the dust of death.

For dogs have surrounded me. A band of evildoers has encompassed me. They pierce my hands and my feet. I can count all my bones. They look, they stare at me. They divide my garments among them, and from my clothing they cast lots.

You are Heaven's first, you see. For me is God, and I know I'll save all the hour we can see.

You are the new soul, and you are the new soul. Heaven's first, you see.

Holy, holy, holy is our Lord God Almighty. The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

You are the new soul, and you are the new soul.

The love and the love of living color, flashing like the arrows of God. Let's sing in honor, strength and glory and power to you, the only one I see.

Holy, holy, holy is our Lord God Almighty. The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

You are the new soul, and you are the new soul.

The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

Holy, holy, holy is our Lord God Almighty. The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

Holy, holy, holy is our Lord God Almighty. The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

The one who lives and lives through all. In all creation I sing praise to the King of Kings. You are my everything, and I will adore you.

Psalm 22, 19-31. But be not far off, O Jehovah, O thou my succor, haste thee to help me. Deliver my soul from the sword, my darling from the power of the dog. Save me from the lion's mouth. Be from the horns of the wild oxen thou hast answered me.

I will declare thy name, O Jehovah, in the midst of the assembly will I praise thee. Ye that fear Jehovah, praise him. Ye the seed of Jacob, glorify him. And stand in awe of him, all ye the seed of Israel.

For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted. Neither hath he hid his face from him. But when he cried unto him, he heard, Of thee cometh my praise in the great assembly.

I will pay my vows before them that fear him. The meek shall eat and be satisfied. They shall praise Jehovah that seek after him. Let your heart live forever. All the ends of the earth shall remember and turn unto Jehovah.

And all the kindreds of the nations shall worship before thee. For the kingdom is Jehovah, and he is the ruler over the nations. All the fat ones of the earth shall eat and worship. All they that go down to the dust shall bow before him. Even he that cannot keep his soul alive.

A seed shall serve him. It shall be told of the Lord unto the next generation. He shall come and shall declare his righteousness unto a people that shall be born. That he hath done.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you.

We are all our mysteries, gadgets in your melody. Beautiful as we are, the honest eyes of breaking hearts.

Better than a holiday, better than a church bell ringing, better than a choir singing out, singing out.

We pour out our mysteries, gadgets in your melody. Beautiful as we are, the honest eyes of breaking hearts.

Better than a holiday.

As I was studying the text for today, and the way I felt the Lord had led me to go, I found in myself a certain weakness that I was, I want to say surprised at.

There have been a number of times in my life where I've seen God do something that I felt was miraculous. Obviously the first of those was probably my salvation.

After I got saved I looked back at a few things that God had done before I was saved and I thought, well that was pretty miraculous now that I think about it. But I hadn't even noticed them.

Then when I got saved I felt like that was definitely a miracle. I felt very changed, very renewed, begun, starting over, fixing a lot of things.

I remember when I was first saved I made a short list of a few things that I felt like I would have to work on.

I look back now and I think about how silly that was. That I would think I would have to work on those things since God had made me completely new.

But then since I've been saved there have been a number of other miraculous instances where God has done something that I went, that's definitely God. That's a miracle.

Called me to something, changed me in a certain way, changed a family member. There were a couple of times I would say almost like curses.

You know things as God struck somebody because something happened. But they were all miraculous incidents.

Now I look back at them and I see that in many of those cases, and I haven't made a thorough survey of them all. I don't know that that's even possible.

But I see that in many of those cases I frankly just did not believe they were happening.

So the question that I'm asking us today then is what happens if God decides to do a miracle and we don't believe it?

If the next miraculous thing that God is going to do in your life or in the life of your church or your community begins to unfold, begins to become evident, and we don't believe it, then what happens?

So if you would grab your Bibles if you would. We tend to get a little excited, hoot and holler. Some of us are sore throated so somebody else might have to chip in a little bit. Maybe say amen.

As we go to 1 Corinthians chapter 15. He is risen! Thank you, he is indeed risen. He is risen indeed.

1 Corinthians 15 · chapter mention

So before you even get there you may know that 1 Corinthians chapter 15, the first part of it, is sort of a summary. I went to go get another translation so I would have a little different perspective when I read this here.

1 Corinthians 15 · chapter mention

So 1 Corinthians chapter 15 beginning in verse 1 is Paul is talking about the teaching of the gospel, about what we know to be true and what people get saved by. And then he is going to give a little summary of the events and the history of what he gave.

1 Corinthians 15 · chapter mention

So we are going to start in 15.1. Here we go.

Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel which I preached unto you, which also ye have received, and wherein ye stand. So Paul is saying, I am going to tell you again that which I preached to you, and you received it, and now you stand by it.

So this is what I am about to tell you. By which also ye are saved, if you keep in memory what I preached unto you, unless you have believed in vain.

So he says, this thing I am teaching you again, this is what you got saved by. This was the key or the step that you went through, the understanding that you came to that led you to a saving grace with God.

He says, if you keep in memory what I preached unto you, in other words, let's not get confused about what that truth is that we understood or believed in order that God could save us, or what we placed our faith in.

Let's not get confused about what that is. Then he says, unless you have believed in vain. When I read that phrase, unless you have believed in vain, I thought to myself, how can a person believe the gospel in vain?

If you believe the gospel, therein is the power of salvation, first the Jews, then the Gentiles. So we can be saved by believing the truth, and that opens the channel and God really delivers the grace.

Believing is not a work that a person does to be saved, no more than any other work. Believing is you saying to God, okay God, based on what I now know about you, and he's going to summarize it here eventually, based on what I now know about you, I believe you, I trust you.

God said, okay, that opens the way for me to do a work of saving grace in you. That's what Ephesians 2 says, right? For by grace are you saved, that is a free gift from God that you do not deserve, through faith. So it's like the trust or the belief in the gospel opens the channel so that God can by his grace save us.

Which means you cannot believe in the gospel in vain. However, you certainly could misbelieve or believe in a missed gospel, and that would be in vain.

And that was Paul's concern. Paul's concern for them was not that they had believed in the real gospel and opened up the floodgates of God's grace, but that maybe they had believed in something that wasn't quite right. And that would be believing in vain.

In fact, I submit to you that if you believe in any gospel that is not 100% the gospel, that's a false gospel. What does it take to turn a truth into a lie? Very little. The minor, most slight alteration turns a truth into a lie.

So the gospel must be believed just the way the gospel is. And frankly, it's offensive. It's troubling. And therefore, people want to minorly adjust it. Well, I know it says, but I'm just going to tweak it a little bit and now I can accept it.

That little bit of tweaking would cause a person to have believed in vain. That's Paul's saying. Alright, now verse 3. He says, For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures.

So this is where the gospel begins, essentially. This is the core of the message. It is the foundation. Jesus the Christ, the Messiah, the one who was weighted upon by the Jewish people who would be the final sacrifice, died for sins according to the scriptures.

Now we'll see later in a text that we're going to read, and I'll try to point it out to you when we get there, that they didn't always get that. And that was part of the problem. They didn't always understand that it was prophecy in advance that Jesus the Messiah would die, be a suffering Messiah.

You and I might look at Isaiah 53 and we see Jesus so clearly and we say, oh, that just makes sense. Of course they're talking about Jesus. Now we see crucifixion is laid out there. That was written a thousand years before Jesus was born, which was way before the crucifying people was ever invented.

And yet this is clearly explaining crucifixion, so we can see that. But in Jesus' day, there was a time in which they had not assimilated the Old Testament scripture explaining that Jesus would be a suffering Messiah.

A little further, he says, for I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures.

Notice there, he was buried, he died, and he was buried. And then he rose again the third day. It does not say he rose again after three days. Now there are a couple places in the Bible where you can see that it says rose again after three days, but don't get messed up on that.

Anytime something says it happens on the third day, that always means that at the very least the final day is not a full day. So if I tell you, today is Sunday, and I say three days from now, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, sometime on Wednesday, this is going to happen.

You're not expecting that all of Wednesday is going to pass before it happens. You're expecting maybe one o'clock on Wednesday or dinner time on Wednesday or something. That's only a partial day there.

And if I say it's going to take until the third day from now, then if you count today, it would be Tuesday, and you're expecting sometime on Tuesday, and you're not expecting today to be a full day, because we don't have the rest of it left.

So if I go in the tomb today, and I come out on Tuesday, that's the third day. So there's no difficulty in Scripture with that, although some people have tried to say so, and they got confused about it, whatever.

The bottom line is, Jesus went in the tomb and came out on the third day. Now we know he came out on a Sunday, Sunday morning, first thing, after their Sabbath, after their feast, etc.

But we know that he was buried. We have an account of that. We'll read it before we're through. It says, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.

Again, they had not assimilated from Scripture that Jesus had to die and raise again yet at a certain point, but it was in the, it's there. We can read it now.

Now we get into the account of what happened. It says, and that he was seen of Cephas, then of the Twelve.

Alright, so now we're going to look at Mark, and we're going to look at chapter 16. So in your Bibles, flip pages and find Mark chapter 16.

Mark 16 · chapter mention

Alright, so here we go, Mark 16, verse 1. And when the Sabbath was passed, Mary Magdalene and Mary, the mother of James and Salome, bought spices that they might come and anoint him, and the hymn is Jesus.

Mark 16:1

And very early on the first day of the week they came to the tomb when the sun was risen, and they were saying among themselves, Who shall roll us away the stone from the door of the tomb?

And looking up, they see that the stone is rolled back, for it was exceeding great.

And entering into the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, arrayed in a white robe, and they were amazed. And he saith unto them, Be not amazed, ye seek Jesus the Nazarene, which hath been crucified.

He is risen, he is not here. Behold the place where they laid him. But go tell his disciples and Peter, he goeth before you into Galilee, and there shall you see him, as he said unto you.

And they went out and fled from the tomb, for trembling and astonishment had come upon them. And they said nothing to anyone, for they were afraid.

Now, when he was risen early on the first day of the week, he appeared first to Mary Magdalene, from whom he had cast out seven devils. She went and told them that had been with him, as they mourned and wept.

They were mourning and weeping the death of Jesus. They, when they heard that he was alive, and had been seen of her, disbelieved.

They didn't believe it.

Did you notice that Paul in 1 Corinthians 15, 1 through 5, which we read, does not mention the women at all?

He skipped right over it. Why? Well, the answer is, back in that day, a woman's testimony wasn't considered to be worth much.

Worse than that, it could possibly bring about doubt.

In fact, when they went to the men to explain to them that they had seen Jesus alive, when Mary Magdalene goes to the men to say that she had seen Jesus alive, what was their response?

They didn't believe her.

And that's a problem.

Paul is leaving out, in his explanation to the Corinthians, the fact that when the disciples first heard that Jesus was alive, they didn't believe it.

I submit to you, the reason he's leaving that out is because it's not part of the Gospel.

Our disbelief, our lack of being willing to believe what God is doing, is not part of the action of God.

Remember I said, saved by grace through faith. The channel is open.

Those who would believe in Jesus are saved by the grace of God.

Those who will not believe in Jesus are not saved by the grace of God because the channel is blocked.

They are refusing to allow God to work.

So the question is, what if Jesus does a miracle and our response is disbelief?

And we've now seen that the disciples, at least, began in a position of disbelief.

Look at Luke 24 verse 11.

Luke 24:11

I have a parallel here so I'm tracking on this, trying to keep them straight.

It says, and I'll back up a little second so you understand for sure what's going on. It says, and to all the rest, now there was Mary Magdalene and Joanna,

and Mary the mother of James and the other women, with them told these things unto the apostles.

And verse 11 says, and these words appeared in their sight, that's in the apostles' sight, as idle talk.

And they disbelieved them.

However, it says, but Peter arose and he ran into the tomb, and stooping and looking in, he seeth the linencloths by themselves.

And he departed to his home, wondering at that which was come to pass.

See, so he heard the tale from the women who couldn't be trusted.

And he thought, but what if? What if there is something? I mean, surely there is something.

There's got to be some truth to what they're saying. And he runs there, and he sees there is indeed some truth to what they're saying.

Now, John 20.

John 20 beginning in verse 4. If you'll flip along, I'll try to go a little slow, but I got a little excited when I was doing this, so it's kind of fast.

John 20 verse 4.

John 20:4

We're backing up kind of into the middle of 3, where it says, Peter therefore went forth and the other disciple, and they ran toward the tomb.

By the way, when you see that phrase, other disciple, in the book of John, you probably might guess that was John.

It was also a thing in the writings of their day not to give themselves credit or not to make themselves look big or be prideful.

So a lot of times when they were there and they would see something, they would refer to themselves in the third person and without a name.

And so probably that was John.

It says, Peter therefore went forth and the other disciple, and they went toward the tomb and they ran both together.

And the other disciple outran Peter and came first to the tomb.

And stooping and looking in, he seeth the linen cloth lying, yet entered he not in.

Simon Peter therefore also cometh following him and entered into the tomb.

And he behold the linen cloth lying and the napkin that was lying, that was upon his head, not lying with the linen cloths, but rolled up in a place by itself.

They entered in therefore the other disciple also, which came first to the tomb.

Listen.

And he saw and believed, for as yet they knew not the scripture that he must rise again from the dead.

So the disciples went away again unto their own home.

So if indeed the other disciple is John, here we have his first hand account and testimony that he ran in, they ran in together.

Peter went in first.

John got there first, but hesitated to go in.

Peter ran and went right down into the tomb to look.

John follows him in and it says, essentially, I believed.

I realized what I saw meant something and I believed.

The fact that he believes there tells you that moments before he didn't, when the women said he didn't.

But he believed just enough to run to the tomb and see what it was that they were saying, just enough to check it out, just enough to grope a bit for the truth, the reality.

Notice here is that phrase where it says that they did not yet know, and to that point in time they had not run into the scripture that he must rise again from the dead.

Later they'll get it and then it will be included in Paul's 1 Corinthians 15 passage, which he got from the disciples.

So later they will get it.

They'll find their scripture that says that he had to rise from the dead and then they will share that with Paul and Paul will recount it to the Corinthians.

A little bit more.

Luke 24, 18.

These are all in the Gospels.

So Luke 24, 18.

I'll back up to the beginning of the sentence.

What communications are these that you have with one another as you walk?

So this is coming from the story of the two men walking on the road to Emmaus. Perhaps you've heard it before.

Maybe not. It's okay.

And they stood still looking sad.

So the one who just spoke, what communications are these that you have as you walk, is actually Jesus, but they don't recognize him.

He's not revealed himself yet.

He asked them, what are you talking about as you're walking?

And they stood still looking sad.

And one of them named Cleopas answering, said unto him, dost thou alone sojourn in Jerusalem and not know the things which are come to pass there in these days?

Are you the only one that don't know what's going on?

And he said unto them, what things?

And they said unto him, the things concerning Jesus of Nazareth, Nazareth, which was a prophet, mighty indeed, and word before God and all the people.

Now the chief priests and our rulers delivered him up to be condemned to death and crucified him.

But we hoped that it was he which would redeem Israel.

Yea, and beside all this, it is now the third day since these things came to pass.

So it was Sunday that they're walking.

Moreover, certain women of our company amazed us having been early at the tomb.

And when they found not his body, they came saying that they had also seen a vision of angels, which said that he was alive.

And certain of them that were with us went to the tomb and found it even so as the women had said, but him they saw not.

Now this is going to be Jesus speaking again and he says, and he said unto them, O foolish men, and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken.

Behove it not the Christ to suffer these things and to enter into his glory? And then beginning from Moses and from all the prophets, he interpreted to them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself.

So as Jesus was walking along, he goes back to the Bible and he explains through the Old Testament how it all makes sense, how it all lines up, how the Old Testament was pointing to this Savior.

This reference of these two men on the road, this is our reference from 1 Corinthians 15, 5.

This is where Paul essentially picks it up when he is explaining the truth of the Gospel back in 1 Corinthians 5, 15, 5.

And he says, and that he was seen of Cephas.

Then he says, and then the twelve.

So now it's going to continue.

And the others get to see him too.

And Jesus appears amongst them.

Okay, let's go to the same chapter as we were just in Luke 24.

Sorry for those of you who tried to flip back to 1 Corinthians 15.

But 24, verse 37.

24, 38, 24, 37.

And as they spake these things, he himself stood in the midst of them and saith unto them, Peace be unto you. But they were terrified and affrighted and supposed that they beheld a spirit.

So now Jesus appears to the twelve where they're hiding out in the upper room.

And they think he may be a spirit.

And he said unto them, Why are you troubled?

And wherefore do reasonings arise in your heart?

See, my hands and my feet, that it is I myself, handle me, and see, for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye behold me having.

And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.

And while they still disbelieved for joy, so they're still struggling to believe, because they're so excited, this is so awesome, it's happening.

He said unto them, Have you hear anything to eat?

And they gave him a piece of broiled fish, and he took it and did eat before them, thereby establishing his non being a ghostness.

Right? That he wasn't a ghost or a spirit.

And Paul writes, 1 Corinthians 15, 5, and that he was seen of Cephas and then of the twelve.

And verse 6 says, And after that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.

So now Paul is picking up from this moment on as the disciples have begun to believe.

They are accepting, having seen him, having the chance to touch his hand, to see where the spear ran in his side, to see him eat fish alive again.

So 6 again in 1 Corinthians 15, 6.

After that he was seen of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep.

And I ask myself, why does it say, of whom the greater part remain unto this present, but some are fallen asleep?

This is what's called an apologetic.

There were five hundred people plus that were there that saw Jesus and he was speaking.

And many of them are still alive.

So Paul was saying, don't just take my word for it.

Go see people, talk to people if you really want to.

There are people who will testify and say they saw Jesus alive after his death.

And there were many others, by the way, historians record it.

Verse 7, After that he was seen of James, then again of all the apostles.

And last of all, he was seen of me also, as of one born out of due time.

He says, for I am the least of the apostles, that I am not meet to be called an apostle because I persecuted the church of God.

See, Paul is reminding them that he used to be someone who just didn't believe.

But through believing in God's grace, he's been transformed.

In fact, in 10 he says, but by the grace of God I am what I am.

That's the Popeye verse, if you don't remember who that was, you can look it up on YouTube.

But by the grace of God I am what I am.

And his grace, which was bestowed upon me, was not in vain.

But I labored more abundantly than they all.

Yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me.

Therefore, whether it were I or they, so we preach and so you believe.

Now listen, that's it.

He summarized everything they needed to believe about the miracle that God had done.

12 says, now if Christ be preached that he rose from the dead, how say some among you that there is no resurrection of the dead?

See, this is the problem.

There had become people amongst the Corinthians who had started to say that there's no coming back to life after death.

They were saying they believed in Jesus.

They were saying they believed what God had done.

But they were saying they didn't believe in life after death.

And Paul is pointing out to them that that's a contradiction.

They had twisted the gospel that much.

But if there be no resurrection of the dead, then Christ is not risen.

And if Christ be not risen, then is our preaching in vain and your faith is also vain.

Yea, and we are found false witnesses of God because we have testified of God that he raised up Christ whom he raised not up.

If so be that the dead rise not.

Four verses left.

For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised.

And if Christ be not raised, your faith is vain.

You are not yet, I'm sorry, you are yet in your sins.

Then they also which were fallen asleep in Christ are perished.

And if this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men more miserable.

So Paul was saying is this miracle of God that God has done, it is part of the gospel.

And now you are warping it just slightly to say not so much.

And the end effect of that he was saying no gospel, no salvation.

So the question we began with is what if Jesus does a miracle and your response is disbelief.

And we would say no, I mean if God starts doing a miracle, I'm going to see it, I'm going to believe it.

In fact, we say this, in order for it to be a miracle, we have to know, and I read this in a book somewhere,

that number one we have to know that it brings glory to God, it has no other physical explanation,

it can't be found to have been done another way, and it breaks the natural rules, right?

Otherwise it's not a miracle.

I submit to you that the glory that miracles bring to God is in the belief of those who see them.

Remember it said that we will do our good work so that in the second coming of Jesus, God will be glorified, right?

They were told, they saw evidences, they were then told by trustworthy individuals.

And let's be really realistic, these ladies that told them were trustworthy individuals.

Mary Magdalene had had seven devils, or demons, devils in the old language, demons in the new, cast out of her by Jesus.

From the day that she had had seven demons cast out of her by Jesus and she had been declared as clean, she had been a Christian.

They had never once found fault with her.

She had never lied, she had always been respectful, she had always honored God,

they had no reason to suspect that she would ever fabricate anything.

Yet the day that she came and told them the truth about the miracle that God had actively done, they didn't believe her.

Maybe they believed that when Jesus died, the miracle that he had done to cast demons out of her would be no more.

That's not how it works, but maybe that's what they believed.

Maybe they believed that Jesus now was not who they thought he was.

Guys were on the road and said, well we thought he was the one who was going to redeem Israel, but now he's been slain.

For whatever reason, their faith lagged enough that when Mary Magdalene, who had no reason to distrust her, came

and told them not only that the tomb was empty, but that she had clung to the feet of Jesus himself risen,

they didn't believe her.

She was a trustworthy witness, and yet they didn't believe her.

There was evidence, and yet they struggled to believe her, when Jesus stood in their midst and said, look here.

In their joy, they were disbelieving.

I submit to you that it is the human condition to yet not believe when something amazing, miraculous, coming from God is happening.

That's our normal condition. That's the way we normally handle it.

I was living in Michigan with my family, and Alicia was little, Molly was little, Aaron was not born yet.

Sherry lost her job, and we were looking for jobs.

I was looking for a job. I was in Bible College. I was going to drop out of Bible College.

I was working part-time, but it wasn't going to be enough. I was going to get a full-time job.

I put out 128 resumes and applications looking for a job. I had a couple of interviews, and I went to the interviews.

I never got offered a job. I thought I interviewed well, and it just didn't happen.

Sherry put out 300, over 300, like 308 or 316 or something like that, resumes and applications.

She had some third interviews for jobs, and yet no job offers.

I'm driving home from school on the expressway across town. I think it was 496, across town in Lansing.

I'm begging God. I'm like, God, I just don't understand. I don't get it.

We think we're doing what you want us to do. We've prayerfully considered everything.

You told us we're supposed to be in this house. You told us what house to be in.

I missed the fact that we weren't supposed to buy the house. That was my mistake.

We were supposed to pursue renting it, even though it wasn't up for rent.

But the people who owned it, in order to sell it, they had to take a loss.

They would have gladly rented it, and their mortgage payment was a little over half of what our mortgage payment wound up being.

So we could have rented it for way less money and lived there for the two years that we were there and never had to pay for it.

But just because we thought that's where we were supposed to live, and that's what we thought you do when you're supposed to live somewhere, is buy a house.

We bought the house. But we weren't supposed to do that.

But I was telling God, I'm like, we know we're living where we're supposed to live. We're serving. We're pressing hard to serve. We're studying.

I'm going to school to be whatever it is that you want me to be. I'm following my calling. I'm like, God, what is happening?

And as if God were sitting in the passenger seat of my car, my little Datsun B210, stick shift on the floor.

And fifth, fifth, you didn't have a fifth gear, fourth gear, and the expressway, it sounded like that's going down the road.

Like my dad used to joke about it being like one of those mighty mow toys. You rev up the engine because that's what it sounded like going down the road.

I'm going down the road and the engine, I'm on the expressway, it's going, all of a sudden I hear God in the passenger seat.

God says to me, I want you to move back to Toledo. And I said, I don't believe that's right. I don't think that's true.

Because I'm doing all the things I'm supposed to do and I don't think God would do that.

And so of course, when you hear a voice in your head and you're not sure it's God, you do what you always do. I pray back to God.

I said, God, is that you? I mean, how can this make sense? He said, I want you to move back to Toledo.

And he said, Stuart, which is Sherry's grandfather, and I knew him by his first name, Stuart is going to get sick.

And I want him to know his grandchildren before he comes home.

Well, Stuart was not sick. In fact, Stuart was what you'd call crotchety.

Like he was never sick a day in his life. If he was sick, he denied it.

He used to work on cars in his garage all day long. He made out of hardwood, not out of balsa wood, but out of hardwood.

He carved an entire dollhouse and all the furniture, including little lamps and everything for the grandkids to play with when they came to his house out of hardwood.

Amazing woodworker. He built from scratch airplanes that you could fly by remote, built them out of metal from scratch, built the engines from scratch, molded the pieces himself.

We have a picture of the vehicle that he got from a junkyard. It looked like a pile of old rusty metal when he got it.

And he totally renovated it. It was like a 57 Chevy or something.

And I'm like, man, he's this strong guy. He'd be out there cursing up a storm with his hammer banging on stuff.

And everybody just leave him alone for 10, 12 hours at a time to work on whatever he's working on.

And I'm like, I'm having a hard time believing that. And he says, Stuart's going to get sick. And I want him to see his grandkids.

And I thought, man, if that's true, this is really important conversation.

And I said, OK, God, what does this look like? And he says, don't worry about it. I'm going to take care of everything. Just do what I tell you.

And when he said that, I heard my own words. How many times did I say to God, just God, just tell me what to do and I'll do it. Whatever you say, I'll do it.

And I said, OK, God, so I'm having a hard time believing. But whatever you are going to do, just do it and I'll follow your lead.

And of course, my face is all red. I'm bawling like a baby, probably dehydrating myself. My lap's all wet.

I go home and we have inside our house up there, there was a little office to the right inside there and it was like 4 feet by 12 feet.

And our computers were set up in there. And she comes walking out of that room and she's got some papers in her hand and she's like, I want to talk to you. I want to talk to you.

And I said, OK, I want to talk to you too. I said, this is really important. And she said, OK, well, you go first.

And I said, are you sure? I said, you go first. She goes, no, you go first. I said, no, you go first.

Because I didn't want to say what I was saying. I was still in my mind contemplating telling her about Stuart getting sick because I didn't want, you know, I knew how she felt about her grandfather.

Her grandfather had rescued her from a bad parenting situation when she was very little, pulled her out and stopped her from being abused.

And so her grandfather was a really big deal to her. And I knew that. And I was still debating in my mind what I was going to do.

And she said, well, I wanted to ask you. She said, would it be OK if I put in some resumes in the Toledo area?

She said, I put in resumes in applications everywhere I can find up here. So could I put some in in the Toledo area because I found six or I think it was eight.

Yeah, I found eight online and I'd like to put them in. Some are fax and some are email and I'd like to put a resume in.

And I said, yeah, you can do that. She said, are you sure?

Because just a couple of days ago, you told me that you knew for sure this is where God wanted us to live. And we were going to be staying here.

And I thought so, too. But now I'm like, we've got to pay our bills. So I'm thinking maybe.

And I said, no, I said, let me tell you what God just told me. And I didn't tell her Stuart was going to get sick.

I couldn't bring myself to do it at that time. But I told her, I said, God told me we're going to be moving back to Toledo.

And she said, OK. And she ran right away and put the resumes in. She's like she was ready. She just didn't want to do it without talking to me first.

Eight resumes. We had a luncheon that afternoon at our church building because we had gotten involved with the children's ministry up there when we didn't have ministry to do.

And we asked them if they let us do ministry. And we knew that was the church God wanted us in. And they didn't have anything for us to do, which is churches should never be like that, by the way.

If you want to work in a church, you come. There's always something to do in this church. We work our butts off around here.

But that's the way it was. The assistant pastor came up and said there's nothing for us to do. So we kind of went and we went our way into the children's program.

And I began transporting kids to the point that I got to the point where on a Wednesday night for a one hour long Bible study, I was transporting 23 kids.

We had this big blue conversion van that would seat like nine because it had extra row. And I was taking two and a half trips picking up kids and bringing them.

I made sure everybody had a seatbelt. I was taking two and a half trips and bringing them.

And so the last group wouldn't get there until like 20 minutes after they had started. But they were there for 40 minutes. And the children's leaders loved it. The children loved it. It was going great.

Anyway, they recognized us at this banquet. We didn't know they were going to do that. And they said, well, we love you. And we're so grateful for you.

And we're looking forward to what see what God's going to do. And it called on me to say a word. And I had to say, well, we've been so glad that we're here.

And God has really grown us while we're in this church and like that. But I got to tell you that just today, literally today, just two hours ago, God told me that we're going to be moving back to Toledo.

That took a lot of faith for me to do that because they were giving us accolades. And I was a young Christian. They were telling us how awesome we were and how great it was going to be.

Of course, we didn't have a job. So we didn't compare bills. And the church was aware of that problem. They were praying for us. But no one was offering us a job.

And so I made the announcement and they committed to pray for us that God's will be done, whatever it was.

We went back home and six of the eight had responded and asked for an interview. Four of those when come down to Toledo.

And she went to the interview of the four that she interviewed at three of them went to a second interview. Two of them offered her a job.

And one of those jobs came with a free apartment. And five weeks to the day from the day that God told me we're going to be back in Toledo, we moved into our free apartment in Parishburg.

Our church members, some of whom are in this room, came and helped us move our stuff into that apartment.

This is how miraculous our God is. Even though I was disbelieving, God did exactly what he said he was going to do.

God was already doing it. It goes this far. They helped us assemble my daughter's bunk bed so they could have slept in their bunk beds because we did it that day.

But we slept on a water bed so we couldn't sleep on a water bed. You know what? When you fill up a water bed you have to wait a couple of days.

Otherwise you'll wake up in the morning feeling like you have bad arthritis. Because if the water temperature is not right on a water bed it will cause all your joint stake.

So we're filling up the water bed off the faucet in the hallway at Prairie Lake Village Apartments. And I'm an impatient individual by my nature even as a saved person.

When I got saved I inherited some patience from the Holy Spirit. But other than that I lack impatience is the general reality of it.

And so I'm like, well we've got to do something. There's nothing else to do in the apartment. So we go out to Frish's on 20 to go to Big Boy to go to dinner.

And then we go back and I'm like, hey we better hurry up and get back now because the water bed is going to be full.

We go back there and it's full. We got back just in time and it was full. And I had to push down a little bit to screw off the cap.

And I thought, this water bed feels warm. It's warm. I think it's warm enough we can sleep on it. We checked the thermometer. Sure enough it was body temperature warm.

What the heck? And so I screwed it off and I closed it up and I told Sharon. She says, no we already made arrangements. We have to stay.

My kids are staying at my mom's and we're staying at your friend's house because we can't sleep on that water bed. It will make us ache in the morning.

Trust me. I had only slept on a water bed for about a year but she slept on one for about 10 years. So she says, trust me that's weighted.

I said, no you need to look at this. You need to look at it. And she put her hand on it. She said, yeah that does feel warm.

Look at the thermometer. It does feel warm. We laid on it. It was fine.

And then we would find out that what had happened was that faucet that was in the hallway had been plumbed incorrectly. Instead of being on the cold water it was on the hot water.

So what had happened was as we were filling up the hot water bed we ran all the hot water out of the hot water tank.

And the hot water tank kept struggling to keep up the whole time as it was filling up. And it just worked out.

I mean it just worked out that the water temperature was perfect.

God said to me, I'm going to do this. Just follow my lead.

I submit to you that every miracle that God has ever done, that's the two part action plan.

Let him do it and follow him.

Even Jesus Christ himself said while he was alive on the earth, I only do that which I see my father doing.

You have a goal. I have a goal. We need to look at God and figure out what God's doing and do that.

But they were told, they saw evidence. They had a trustworthy witness.

And they were still struggling to believe. Even after they saw him physically they were struggling to believe.

So if you're giving yourself some kind of credit thinking I'm always going to trust, I'm always going to believe if it's miraculous and there's obviously no other explanation I would get it.

I submit to you when it's miraculous and there's no other explanation you still would not get it.

Because that's our normal condition.

In the faith with the testimony of the Holy Spirit inside us, having been blessed by him and reminded that we are saved, maybe it's different.

But most of the time you're going to respond with disbelieving.

The second thing I want you to see in these texts that we read, and I know there were quite a few of them,

was that in 1 Corinthians 15 text some had let perverted doctrine trick them into what Paul calls unbelief.

But notice they said it was belief. They said they believed in what God was doing.

They said they were Christians and they were trying to share the gospel.

But they had begun to believe that there was no resurrection, no life after death.

And didn't accept or didn't realize that that was a massive contrast between the truth of the gospel and what they were teaching.

In my lifetime then after we came back to Toledo I saw this play out this way.

We felt called to start this church.

And it had a rough start.

The church was persecuted in the early days.

We were first meeting at Perrysburg Heights and the Catholic Church essentially persecuted on us.

We went on a Saturday afternoon and we had even some people pray to accept Christ and some people pray to recommit their lives.

And then we found out later that the nuns had gone around behind us and said all kinds of slanderous things about us

and told them not to have anything to do with our church.

So all the people that we made contact with said they were coming to church.

I think one was going to get baptized and one was thinking about it.

When we went back to them they were all like, no, no, no, no, we can't have anything to do with you.

And we didn't know why. They didn't tell us why.

What we found out later was that the nuns had gone around behind us teaching that our doctrine was not godly.

And all we teach is the Bible, which is what the Bible says.

And we didn't understand that.

And then they got involved or someone got involved with the committee out there that was letting us rent the building

and they said you can't rent the building anymore.

That happened right after we said we wouldn't work at the beer tent at the festival.

That could be a coincidence.

But the bottom line is we were persecuted in the early days.

We met in my house and we tried to air-condition my house.

I never had air-conditioning. We tried to air-condition my house.

We had 40 people sitting in my living room and the teenagers going up the steps and nobody was dry.

Everybody was soaked in sweat trying to praise the Lord and preaching the word.

And we were all soaked in sweat, all of us.

We were persecuted in the early days.

But we set out to, and this is going to hurt, and so for those of you who are from that day,

I apologize, this is going to hurt a little bit.

We set out to create a church.

We set out to create a church that would be the church seven days a week.

We had been part of a church that largely was the church Sunday morning,

sometimes Sunday nights, and sometimes Wednesday nights.

But when we read the New Testament, we realize that you're supposed to be the church seven days a week.

All your waking moments should be about serving the Lord Jesus Christ,

who is Master and Head of the church.

And we did that, to a degree, or God did it through us.

But I think there was some disbelief that it could ever really be done.

However, now some of us, some of our folks, are not with us anymore who were there then.

And some of our folks can't make it to Tuesday night Bible study.

Some of our folks can't serve throughout the week for whatever reason.

It's a perverted doctrine that says that you can be a Christian on Sunday mornings,

and anything else the rest of the week.

I know this is a heavy load to bear.

Thankfully, if you're a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ, you don't have to bear it. You can give it to Jesus.

We're in the midst of our study emphasis.

So once every six months, we focus on a spiritual discipline.

And this six months, for another roughly a month, is study.

And I asked the church to make a plan for how you would use the study discipline,

some way that you could plan to how many every days of the week the Lord led you to study your Bible on your own.

And it's study when you read your Bible and write something down.

We have a couple of teenagers who very faithfully come in here on Sunday morning and keep notes.

And then I'm scanning those notes and emailing to our gym and him and I are typing it up.

We're going to make a book out of them here.

But the bottom line is that's study.

You've got the Bible, you're writing something down, now you're studying,

as well as maybe Bible intake and preaching and so on. Those things are going on.

Roughly half of the faithful or what I would call faithful, they call themselves,

let's say that those who call themselves faithful members of the church,

roughly half of them said that they had a plan for how they would study their Bibles.

It is a perverted doctrine of Jesus.

It is a perverted gospel that says that you can be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ without studying your Bible.

That is a perverted doctrine.

How do I know? Because scripture commands it all over the place.

And Jesus said, I only do that which I see my Father doing.

And how are you going to figure out what your Father is doing if you don't read the Word, if you don't study?

So not meant to bring specific conviction or guilt to anybody, but it's meant to be an illustration to us.

In Paul's day, he said that some had perverted the doctrine and started to think that there was no life after death,

but they thought they could still be Christians.

I'm submitting to you now that there are those living in our day who are claiming to be followers of the Lord Jesus Christ,

but because there is an aspect of following Jesus that is too much work, it's too troublesome,

they are partially invested believers, and hear me now, a partially invested believer is not a believer at all.

You can say God must be first in it, but if God is not first in it, then when you say God must be first in it,

you have said nothing at all.

Because you're not even talking about the God of heaven.

Because if you really believe that God must be first in it, then the God of heaven would be first in it if you're a believer.

I own a Fitbit. It's been a huge blessing to me.

I've used it to help with my weight, my sleeping patterns.

There's some really good science that goes into these things, but I know other companies make them too.

Just this last week, I saw a commercial. I started playing on TV. It's actually on the Roku channel.

I'm watching this police series that's rated PG, no cussing in it. It's pretty cool. I like that.

They started playing this promo that is quite obviously LGBTQ plus agenda. It's non-Christian agenda.

Their slogan is, follow your body. Do what your body wants. That's what they're saying.

I began to talk it over with Sharon. I said, you know, I'm using this for my health, but under these circumstances, I couldn't buy one.

I could never buy one now knowing what agenda they're putting out there.

I said, so I've begun. Last night, I was sick the last couple of days, but last night I began to research and find another fitness tracker.

But no, no, no. You're going to say, now you're being legalistic. That's too much, right?

It's too much to go, well, they're preaching a doctrine that is anti-Christ, that goes against Christ, and so I have to cut them out of my life.

That's too much, right? It's too much to cut movies out of my life that show lifestyles that are ungodly.

That's too much? Or does the word say focus on that which is pure?

I submit to you that we are living in a day where a perverted doctrine has tricked some into thinking they believe the miracles of Jesus,

believe in the resurrection of Christ, and they are partially invested believers.

Solomon tried it. The book of Ecclesiastes said, here's what I suggest is wise to you.

Keep one foot in both worlds, faithfully in the kingdom of God, faithfully in the kingdom of man, because that way you get the best of both.

Here you can praise God, love God, worship God, stand for God. People will respect you in the temple, right?

Over here, you can still taste, eat, do whatever you want.

And then a little while later he says, I was totally wrong about that. In doing that, the best you're going to do is rip yourself in two.

So what you need to do instead is pull the foot out of the world and put both firmly in the kingdom of God and be all about God all the time.

No exceptions. It is a perverted doctrine that says that anybody can be a partially invested believer.

All your money, all your time, all your talents, all your breath, all your strength, all your hope, all your food, all your jobs, all your bills, all your friends, all your family,

it's all invested in the resurrection power of Jesus Christ.

The third thing there is that Paul made a statement that not believing the miracle essentially makes the miracle useless enough.

You remember that phrase? He said, unless you believed in vain.

And I mentioned how believing in vain, if you're believing, the only way you can be believing in vain is if you're believing in something that isn't quite right.

It isn't the truth. It isn't the gospel. And if you do that, if you're actually believing, and if you do that,

Paul was saying that makes the miracle essentially useless in us.

Oh, pitied and worthless are we who believe that Jesus makes us better in this lifetime and there is nothing more than that.

That you're all going to the graves and rot. That is not the truth.

There is a life after this one and you will spend it in heaven for an eternity praising God, healed of all your maladies, comforted in every way.

Or you will spend it in hell for an eternity burning away from God.

Having been unsaved and having a good memory of what it was like when I was unsaved before I was born again,

I realized that I got a tiny sample of that every day, yearning for my relationship with Jesus that I never had.

I was always seeking, always hurting, always hoping, always vacant.

And then when Jesus saved me, I was born again, filled, finally whole.

There is plenty of evidence for hell and plenty of evidence for heaven.

And if anybody convinces you otherwise, if you ever accept that maybe there is an alternative reality to that which God has portrayed in His Word,

watch out because your believing may be in vain.

Miracles are fast food apps or quick delivery. They are feasts and open source code and just in time delivery.

Christianity is like this. Wait for it. Believe God is going to do.

Believe and then request and then believe.

We make it out to it's believe and then receive and then request and then believe and then receive and then request

because we are used to shopping and internet and drive-thrus and being told as a small child that you have to say please

before you can have something that your parents should love you enough to want to give you anyway.

Right? That's not it. Christianity is believe, request, believe, request, believe, request until the belief and the request are one.

And there is no difference anymore. And I am saying God, do whatever you want to do.

And that's what I want. This is what I think you want.

And you pray for someone's healing. I am insulted when I pray, Lord if it's your will, when someone prays, Lord if it's your will, heal them.

Are you kidding me? The God of heaven? That He should ever not want to heal somebody who is sick.

Of course He wants to heal. And ultimately if they believe in Him, they will be healed of all of their maladies.

The paralyzed will dance in heaven. The blind will see. It's all going to be healed.

He has already healed all our wounds by the stripes He has taken.

What's going on right now that we are struggling through is temporal.

So you request. You request their healing. You say God, please heal them.

And then you believe that God will heal them. And the truth is He will.

And if they get saved, if they are saved and they get to heaven, they will be fully, once and for all, permanently healed.

If they are not saved, then maybe your prayer should be that they be saved.

Oh, but we want their lives to be good even if they are not saved.

Nobody whose life is lived outside the grace of God has a good life.

Nobody. You say, but no, but I know rich people and they seem to be doing okay.

Trust me, you don't see them in their darker hours. You don't see them alone with themselves.

You don't know what they are going through. Why do you think that the suicide rate is higher in millionaires than it is in paupers?

Miracles aren't fast food, apps, or quick delivery. They are feasts.

They are open source code. They belong to everyone. And they are just in time to live.

They will be there when you really need them. That's our God.

He has the resurrection power to take a dead body and make it alive.

It really isn't most of the time beneficial to do that.

Because when someone dies and they have gone to heaven, and you pray for them to come back to life,

you are literally asking them to leave heaven and that's not what they would want.

So most of the time it's not beneficial, but it has happened.

And if you believe it's what God would want and you pray, He may do it.

Recap these three real quick and then the conclusion.

Number one, they were told, saw evidence, and they were told by trustworthy sources, and yet they did not believe.

They even saw Him physically in the room with them and struggled to believe for their joy.

It has happened as early as the church has existed that some let perverted doctrines trick them into unbelief.

And Paul made the statement that not believing the miracle essentially makes the miracle useless in us.

Maybe the miracle that we are having trouble believing right now,

the miracle that we are having trouble trusting right now, is the miracle of our own resurrection.

There are still trappings of this life that concern us, things that we are worried about, point of view,

the way people will think about us, money, if we will have enough, will we get enough stuff?

We are so worried that our kids will grow up and be jerks that we tell them they have to say please before they can have their sandwich.

Maybe the things of this life are affecting us so that we are forgetting that if you are a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ,

if you have believed in Jesus as the Son of God, believed that He died and rose again,

the channel between you and God has been opened and God will never fail to deliver His grace, He has done it.

He has done it whether you believe or not.

You say, whoa, now wait a minute, now that is a universalist doctrine.

If everybody is saved with that, I didn't say that, remember, if you won't believe, the miracle that God has done becomes made useless.

It doesn't mean He hasn't done the miracle.

As part of the conclusion, we are going to read this text from John chapter 15 and one verse from Luke.

John 15 · chapter mention

Here we go, John 15, my apologies.

It says, I am the true vine and my father is the husbandman.

Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he taketh away, and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring more fruit.

Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Did you hear that?

You are clean because you believed, right? No, that's not what it said.

It said, you are clean because you did stuff, because you heard what I said.

No, that's not what it said.

It said, you are clean, it said, you are now clean through the word which I have spoken unto you.

It happened. He said, now abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine.

No more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches.

He that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit.

For without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch and is withered.

And men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.

If ye abide in me, and my word abides in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.

Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit, so shall ye be my disciples.

As the Father hath loved me, so have I loved you. Continue you in my love.

If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love, even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and abide in his love.

For these things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be made full.

Jesus taught them every... you know what that means?

That means that Judas Iscariot, the betrayer of Jesus, knew everything that he needed.

It even means that Jesus, and you know this, died for Judas' sins.

It's true. You already knew that. Because Jesus died for everyone's sins.

So why didn't Judas Iscariot get saved the way John or Peter or one of the others did?

Because he believed what he believed, which was not actually the Gospel, the teachings of Jesus Christ.

In his case, it looks like up until a point, he was more concerned about the money.

Or maybe the prestige. Because there were a lot of people getting kicked out because they were talking about Jesus.

And now our other verse, Luke 7, 22. And it says,

Then Jesus answering said unto them, Go your way, and tell John what things ye have seen and heard.

How that the blind see, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised.

To the poor the Gospel is preached.

And then he says, And blessed is he whosoever shall not be offended in me.

Here's the reality. John was in prison and began to doubt, began to wonder if Jesus was the Messiah.

Was he really the one? And so he sent some messages to Jesus and Jesus sent back that message.

And what was the message? Don't doubt. Don't disbelieve.

Look at the facts. Look at the power. Look at the outpouring of God's love.

Look at the grace delivered to people. Look at what I'm doing. Don't disbelieve. Don't doubt.

Then he goes on to say, But blessed are all those who are not offended of me.

Remember we said the Gospel is offensive.

In this room are people who have done all sorts of things that if you knew what they had done, you would not consort with them.

In our church are people who have done all sorts of things that if you knew what they had done, you would not consort with them.

If you had been there in my dark moments before I got saved, you would say, I don't want anything to do with that person.

I can't have them be around me because they're caustic, negative, they're a bad influence, etc.

Does it make any sense at all that Jesus wants to take the old broken down husk of a human being

and bring him to life and make something incredible out of him or her?

That no matter what you've done, that this week when you were in your secret sin, you were doing the thing that nobody knows about,

that you don't tell anybody about, that in that moment Jesus was pleading with you, that he loves you,

that he desires you to come away from that thing and truly be resurrected, to really be reborn and be a new person away from that?

Does that make any sense at all? That the God of heaven would love us so much that he would do that?

No, it's offensive. The fact that we're messed up other than Jesus, pretty worthless people, is the problem that the world has.

They're like, well I'm a better person than so and so. If anybody should go to heaven, I should.

I give more money, I'm nicer, I'm more honorable, I'm a better businessman, I treat a lot of people with respect.

I gave money to build a new hospital wing or to put food on table. I did all of this.

Why should Pastor Dan, knowing what he's done and what he's been through, why should he get to go to heaven and I don't get to go?

And there is only one reason. Because I have believed in the miracle that God has done.

And the one that he's doing. And the one that I am.

Will you, will we be found believing and trusting in what Jesus has done?

Or will we be trying to do it in our own strength? The passage that we just read.

If you try to go outside what Jesus has given you and do it in your own strength, you can do nothing.

If you do not abide in him, follow his commands and love him back the way he loves you, you will be cast aside like a branch.

I didn't say it, Jesus said it. And men will come and burn all those branches.

You have to believe in the gospel the way it's written. And it's not that complicated because people will go,

we have to believe how you should dress. No, that wasn't in there.

You should have to believe how you were taught. No, that wasn't in there.

It was about the fact that Jesus Christ was the son of God, died on the cross for our sins, buried, rose again on the third day,

was seen alive by so many, eventually ascended into heaven with the Father, makes intercession for us.

Now, that's the gospel. Now having believed that, you should develop, as Paul said, I developed good works out of that.

I did things out of that. I proclaimed the truth. I lived accordingly for God.

You live according to what you know. And someone will go like, well Tommy, you need to live a certain way according to what you know of the gospel.

I know you need to change that. Tony, I know you need to change that. I see that in you and it needs to change.

But that's not in the gospel. If God tells you to change, you change. God leads you to do, you do.

And all the while, believe. And make your request known to God.

And believe, and make your request known to God. And believe, and make your request known to God. Again, and again, and again.

That's what it means to follow Jesus.

Come to a time where we normally have a hymn of invitation.

So I'm going to ask those who are here to lead us in a worshipful response to do that.

I'm asking you today to go back to the original gospel.

To believe what Jesus commanded us to do.

You're going to be lured.

You're going to be distracted.

Your brain might get programmed when you're not looking.

It can happen by what you're watching or listening to or whatever.

But this you can always do.

You can always go back to God through His Son Jesus Christ and say, God I screwed up.

I didn't know how I got here. Maybe it wasn't me. Maybe it was something I went through.

I always tell people, you don't only repent of what you've done.

You also repent of what's been done to you.

Why should I have to repent of what's been done to you?

Because to repent is to turn back to God. Somebody does something to you and it hurts.

You've experienced pain, you're suffering, you're still going through stuff.

You have to repent of that and turn to God.

Say, that thing, my pain is not going to rule me anymore.

My pain is not in charge of me. My situation is not going to be in control of me.

My God is going to be in control of me. You repent and you turn to God.

That's not just returning from sin.

You're turning to God by the way you can't turn to God without also turning from sin.

There's so many people who have been trying to turn from sin.

All they do is turn from a bunch of sin and turn to some other sin.

You don't turn from sin, you turn to God.

I'm asking you to turn to God today.

Those of you who are here, who are in the church, I'm asking you to turn to God today and be the church undistracted.

The church focused on Jesus.

The church reaching in Christ in Jesus every day.

The church serving as a first and foremost power in your risen Savior.

For those of you who are here today who are not in the church, I'm asking you today to put Jesus above everything.

Literally say, Jesus is my Lord. He's going to tell me what to do and I'm going to do it.

Jesus is my Savior. I recognize He died and across my sins and my spirit rose again.

If you need help, if you need evidence, there's been a lot here today, but I can give a lot more.

Our stories, the combined stories of this church, that's incredible evidence.

Incredible evidence.

God has been at work.

God is at work.

And He will be at work.

Until Jesus comes again.

What remains to be seen is will we join Him in the work.

We haven't given the ministry of reconciliation. We must spread this truth.

Stop telling people, I mean, that's not major anyway in telling people how they might live better.

Or what they need to be for their health.

Advice is...Advice is...

It might help somebody along a moment in time.

But the gospel is the gospel. It saves and resurrects a soul.

Let's share that everywhere we go.

Let nothing hold us back.

So we're going to pray together. We ask you to pray with me and then in a moment I'll give you an opportunity to respond.

Father, we see...

Looking at the examples of people gone before us...

It's been alleged that Mary Magdalene wasn't a very good woman.

That she got seven demons inside her somehow.

But healed of Christ.

Whole.

Saved.

No longer a slave to her sin.

She came and told them.

We see that they didn't believe.

We see the Peter and maybe it was John.

They needed just enough to grow. They wondered what it could be.

They knew how to go and check at the tomb.

There might be somebody in this room who's like that.

They know how to go back to you.

And say, okay, God, is this what I need to do?

Are you calling on me? Are you speaking to me?

Are you pulling me back close to you?

Saved or unsaved, they might know that. They might know that's all it takes.

Just to go around for you and that you're always there and never far from us.

Lord, I'm asking you if there is somebody here like that today.

Would you help them just now?

Help them do just that?

I wouldn't say okay, God.

I believe.

I want what you want.

I want to walk out the rest of my days the way you would have me do.

The way you would have me do.

You just do the work and I'll follow.

Lord, we know there might be somebody in this room

who hasn't ever seen it as clearly as they see it right now.

Maybe it's not been that simply put or just because you're working on their heart thing

that they can interpret and understand.

To be saved.

It's just to trust in you.

Let your grace do the work.

Lord, I'm asking you if there is someone like that here right now.

Just help them just say okay Lord, I'm trusting you.

And I think while I've done a lot of work, I've changed my assault a lot.

I'm not going to be more like a Christian.

Lord, help them just say just now in their heart, you're trusting in you Lord.

Let your grace.

Father, we've seen just one example.

We know there are a dozen even in scripture and a thousand or a million in our lives.

How the gospel gets belittled, doctrine gets perverted.

And people will accept it and think they're still following you through Jesus.

I pray to Lord if there's one of us here today or more than one.

I realize this is the enemy has been afoot.

He's been about that, trying to make us think or see something different from the gospel of Jesus Christ.

We've assimilated some belief, decayed some excuse.

I want to really repent.

Turn to you again.

Let you hit the reset button.

Let you revert us again.

Do what we're supposed to do.

Jesus did what he ought.

Be who we're supposed to be.

Resurrected in you.

Father, if there's someone who needs that today, if someone is in that place today, ask them to repent.

Or if there would be anybody in this room today who can earnestly say that they love you,

that they've received your grace, that this sermon was more a confirmation of what they already know to be true

and they're already at work serving you, already loving you, already not distracted,

not having consumed a perverted version of the gospel, not having added things to it, subtracted things from it,

inferred things by it, they are nonetheless abiding you.

How do we give you all praise?

We give you all praise and all glory for that resurrected soul.

Just thank you for the amazing work that you're doing.

Lord, help us be.

Let's pray all this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

We are near to concluding our services.

We'll have a closing prayer in a moment.

But if you are here today and you made some kind of a decision, I'd like you to acknowledge that decision.

We're not going to have anybody come walking forward because you can see I'm still suffering cold symptoms

that I'm not sharing today.

But right where you are, are we going to sing?

We're going to make the song our closing prayer.

The song is our closing prayer.

But right where you are, as you're singing this song, if your response is either A, I repented of some perversion of the gospel

that I know I'm aware of, or B, I am turning to the Lord again a fresh today, going aside,

but I'm distracting, I'm following Jesus and Jesus alone, or C, I would never say it before,

but I'm being saved for the first time now, that as we're singing, you're going to stand and raise your hand where you are.

And then I'll be praying for you during that time.

And then we close out this song as we close out our service.

Would you stand where you are, sing with us, we've got to celebrate.

The resurrection is real.

The power of resurrection is real.

He is a miracle worker.

He works in miracle and you.

This is the air I breathe.

This is the air I breathe.

Your holy presence

living in me.

This is my daily bread.

This is my daily bread.

Your very word spoken is your will.

And I'm just going to pray for you.

And I'm lost without you.

This is the air I breathe.

This is the air I breathe.

Your holy presence

living in me.

This is my daily bread.

This is my daily bread.

Your very word spoken is your will.

And I'm just going to pray for you.

And I'm next before you.

And I'm lost without you.

And I'm next before you.

And I'm lost without you.

The verse goes a bit, the song goes really well with John 15, doesn't it?

We abide in Christ.

We are lost without him.

Just think for a moment, Jesus is in the tomb.

You know when that stone fell in the way?

It got very dark.

And very quiet inside that tomb.

Sound and light, deprivation.

Of course Jesus was dead, so it didn't matter much to him.

But at the moment that Jesus began to come alive, do you think he doubted the miracle?

He did not.

He so didn't doubt it that he believed in it before the crucifixion.

And you say, man, it would be hard for a human being to ever be that way.

Jesus, you know, he was God in the flesh, so he had kind of an upper hand.

But I ask you, when God called Abraham to sacrifice his son, do you think Abraham believed God could do a miracle?

Yeah.

And that's what God attributed to him for righteousness.

He saw his faith and called it righteousness.

And he didn't kill his son, and God would never want that.

But Abraham believed that if he had had to kill his son, God could have resurrected him.

Please, I implore you, believe in the miracles of our God.

Without them, without the miracles of our God, it ain't the gospel.

Okay, so let's pray, and then we'll go off and celebrate this miracle that God has done through Jesus, in Jesus, in us,

and let's say through us to the world, I hope.

Arjun, would you pray for us a little bit?

Dear Father, I want to thank you for this time together.

Thank you for everyone here.

God, I just pray that you're here with us always, and pray that we realize that you're always here with us, you're always keeping us safe.

Even in trials, God, that you're still here with us, and you still love us.

No matter what kind of stuff we go through in our life, God, we have to realize that with your power, we can overcome anything.

Any sickness that anyone's facing, we can overcome it with your strength.

God, I just pray for everyone here that is under the weather, because there's a lot of that going around.

I also pray for safety that others may not get sick.

I just pray for everyone to stay safe and just remember you and everything we do in Jesus' name, Amen.

Thank you very much. This concludes our services today. Go be there for and be the church.