SALT co. Kick off | Zaccheus' story | Micah Hales

I literally cannot see anything.

I see like two of your heads, but you can go ahead and take a seat, whether that's on a blanket or on that nice wet grass from the rain earlier.

Well, thank you for coming to the Saw Company kickoff tonight.

If we haven't had a chance to meet yet, my name is Mike and I get to serve here on staff with the Saw Company.

We're so glad that you're here tonight.

A little bit about me, if you uh haven't met me yet.

Uh I am married to my beautiful wife, Madison.

We have two uh little kids, uh Bo and Bella.

They're adorable.

I didn't put a picture up on the screen, um, but they're the cutest kids in the world.

Um and so I get to serve here uh on staff with Salt Company.

And uh this is the first time we've done an outdoor kickoff.

So thank you for coming, braving the bugs uh and the heat and the wet and all of those things.

We're so glad that you're here.

Um, like Max said, uh the Salt Company is the college ministry of Ambassador Church, okay?

And we meet every Tuesday.

Max said every other Tuesday, I just want to clarify it's every single Tuesday during the school year.

Uh we meet every Tuesday at 8 o'clock at our church building down the street, like she said, on Bellevue and Farwell.

Uh, we would love to have you join us every single Tuesday, um, not just tonight.

Uh if you're 18 to 22 or you know anybody that's 18 to 22, if you're in college, we would love to have you come and join us each week on Tuesdays at 8.

Um, but like I said, Saul Company is the college ministry of Ambassador Church.

Okay, Ambassador Church is a next generation focused church here in the city of Milwaukee.

So, what that means is that Ambassador Church loves college students.

Okay, not just college students, but also the generations before.

But we really truly do love college students.

So if you're looking for a place where you can come to church on Sundays, this is the place for you.

Ambassador is the place for you.

Why?

Because there's tons of other college students that are there, and the church is really there to love you well.

Um, so come and check us out at 9 and 11 a.m.

Uh Welcome Back Sunday was last Sunday.

How many of you were at Welcome Back Sunday?

Yeah, you're gonna have you're gonna have to make some noise because I legitimately can't see you.

Um we gave out free uh culver scoop coupons.

So if you didn't come last Sunday, that's what you missed out on.

So free culverts next time come.

Um but we would love to have you join us on a Sunday as well and beyond.

So uh at Ambassador and Saul Company, what we do each week is we open the Bible, okay, and we cover a lot of ground in its books and certain topics within it.

So what I want you to do now is if you brought a Bible, I'd like to invite you to open your Bibles up uh to Luke chapter 19.

Luke 19 · chapter mention

Okay, if you don't have a Bible, we actually have to give one to you.

I know it was like super dark when you came in, it's still super dark over there.

We actually have free copies of the Bible that we want to give you tonight.

Okay, so we want you to have a physical copy of God's word, but if you don't have a physical copy, you can also download the Bible app on your phone.

Believe it or not, there's tons of Bible apps out there.

Pick one, download it, but you can start turning in your Bibles to Luke 19.

I believe the verses should be up on the screen.

Um but first, what I want to do is I want to start with a question.

What do you think of when you hear the word lost?

Okay, what do you think of when you hear the word lost?

Some of you might think of being lost with directions.

Any directionally challenged people here?

Yep, you know who you are.

You're not most of you aren't brave enough to say it, but a lot of you are because you rely too much on your phones, okay?

That's true.

That's an old man quote, but that's fine.

Um maybe when you think of lost, you think of lost items, okay?

Who loses their keys a lot?

Any any key losers in here?

Yeah?

Okay, yeah.

Find my is your favorite app, okay?

You're losing all sorts of stuff.

Maybe when you hear the word lost, you actually think of the feeling of being lost.

Like maybe that feeling of like, where do I go from here?

For me, I've had that lost feeling many times in my life, but at one particular point, I felt it more than ever.

Um, the year was 2014, okay?

So you were like, how old?

Maybe like six, some of you, eight, somewhere in there.

I don't know.

I'm not gonna say what you think I'm gonna say.

I'm not gonna say six, seven.

But I was a freshman at Iowa State University.

Okay, I know that was, yeah, come on, somebody.

Let's go! Roll clones, baby.

Come on.

Love that.

I have no idea who that is because I can't see, but that's amazing.

That was 12 years ago.

Yeah, I know.

That's shocking because of how young I look.

I get that.

Um, no, a freshman actually this week told me I look super old before I uh shaved my beard down, so I'm still figuring out how to process that.

But when I entered my freshman year, just like a lot of you here tonight, I remember feeling like full of optimism and excitement for college.

Like I was so excited to like get the full college experience after dreaming about it for years.

Like all I had heard from people that were old that were older than me is like, college is the best.

Like college is the best four to maybe six years of your life.

Like, live it up while you can because afterwards life sucks.

Okay, that's all I had been told.

Okay, so I was determined to live it up while I could in college.

And so what I did was I sort of became a yes man when people would invite me to things.

Okay.

My first yes to a new college experience invitation was from some of the guys in my volleyball class.

Yes, that was a class for credit at Iowa State, and they invited me to a party that they were hosting.

Okay, hey man, we're throwing a party tomorrow night.

Like, you should pull up.

And I was like, dope, I'll be there, broskies.

And uh I had no idea what I was walking into.

And yes, that was the real lingo that I said.

Um, and I was still like dabbing and stuff at that point, so I'm behind the times.

But uh, I finally got an invite.

Okay, I finally got my opportunity to go all out with the college experience.

But what you wouldn't know from my story so far is that I actually grew up in a great Christian home.

Okay, I actually had never gone to a party before, ever in my life, other than birthday parties, okay?

Uh I had never really had the courage to like actually talk to a girl before that I liked.

Okay, that's where we're at at this point.

So, what I thought this party would be like is like me, the bros, a 12-pack of Mountain Dew, an Xbox, and an all-nighter playing Call of Duty zombies.

Okay, that's what I thought I was gonna walk into.

Sounds like a great time, Matty G.

I know that's you.

But when I walked into that apartment, okay, I didn't walk into what I thought I was walking into.

I I walked into a dark, like sort of like black-lit apartment.

Okay, all I could see were these weird neon lights.

There's not even a TV in the was like a sketchy, like 20-gallon clear storage tote with like mystery liquid in it, a bunch of red solo cups, and liquor bottles all over the place.

So I had been bamboozled.

Okay, I was not about to stop my full sense college experience, but this was not what I thought it was going to be.

So when I walked in, one of my buddies from said volleyball class poured me a cup, okay?

And I had my first drink of alcohol.

And after about like 15 minutes, uh I was drunk for the first time off of that one cup.

And despite never having experienced before uh the feeling of being drunk, um it felt really good in the moment.

Can I be honest with you?

It felt really good in the moment.

Like I was feeling loose, I was talking to girls without like shaking with nervousness.

Like I was all of a sudden feeling like I was kind of on top of the world.

Okay, and the next thing I remembered was waking up to my alarm and feeling like somebody had just like karate chopped me like right in the middle of the head.

Okay?

Like I had an awful headache.

I felt like I wanted to throw up, like, and immediately I felt this sense of like confusion on what happened the night before.

Was this like the the peak college experience for me?

Like, was this what it was actually like?

Like having fun for like an hour and then like passing out and waking up feeling like you want to die?

Like, was that the college experience?

Like that couldn't be it.

But I had to make sure.

Because after all, I did have some fun, right?

Like it was fun in the moment.

Maybe I just like didn't drink the right way.

Or like maybe I just didn't drink enough, or maybe I needed to add some things in to make it feel like it was supposed to.

Maybe I did it wrong.

And what happened after that night was days and weeks and months, and eventually three years of living up the college experience.

And you want to know what happened after three years of doing this?

I never found what I was seeking.

I never felt truly satisfied.

I was more lost than I was when I arrived on campus as a freshman.

I had what I thought was supposed to be the peak of life itself.

That's all I heard from people growing up, but I was still lost and searching.

Now, why do I tell you that story?

Well, because I imagine in a group this size that at least some of you can relate to my experience.

Okay, even if you can't directly relate to like the partying or or being a yes man or a yes girl, like what you've likely experienced is what it feels like to feel lost.

Okay, like maybe you're a freshman.

Okay, and you've actually just had your first weekend in college.

We've met a lot of you this weekend.

Maybe you've had your first weekend in college, maybe you even went to your first party.

Okay, you had your first drink, and you're thinking, was that it?

Like, was that what it was supposed to be?

Like, or maybe you're the returning student, maybe you've actually you've been to parties, you've been living it up in other ways, even, and you're thinking, man, I feel so great in the moment.

I feel so alive, but then as soon as I feel like absolute garbage.

And I regret so many things, but I feel stuck, and I don't think I can get out of this cycle.

Or maybe you're the person who's come to the point where you're done with the college experience.

Or you don't want anything to do with it, and you you still feel lost, and you're searching for something greater, but you aren't quite sure what it is yet.

Wherever you're at, whether you're you're lost and searching, whether you feel caught in a cycle of like highs and lows, or you're feeling like there has to be something greater than this, I believe, without a shadow of a doubt, that you can find what you've been looking for in this passage tonight.

And I know that because I found what I was looking for in our passage tonight.

So even though it was a decade to ago for me, it's just as relevant now as it was ten years ago and as it was 2,000 years ago.

And in our verses tonight, what we're gonna see is a story of a man who was lost, but ends up finding the way to be found.

Now, hopefully that was enough time for you to turn in your Bibles if you got them to Luke 19, verse 1, if you can even see your Bibles.

Luke 19:1

So if you got it, say got it.

Okay?

I'm gonna read Luke 19, verses 1 and 2 for us to start with.

Luke 19:1

Okay, he, this is Jesus, entered Jericho and was passing through.

There was a man named Zacchaeus who was a chief tax collector, and he was rich in the text.

The first two verses of our passage were actually introduced to the two main people in the text.

Okay, the first is Jesus.

It says, He entered Jericho and was passing through.

Okay.

He is him.

Okay?

He is Jesus.

Okay, and if we look at the context of where we're reading in, we know that Jesus' mission here on earth and finished the most important task in the history of the world.

And so he's just and if you're familiar with the Bible, that is the same Jericho where the walls come tumbling down.

Maybe you grew up in church and you've heard like you maybe sang a song about that or something.

Okay, but Jericho is where Jesus is traveling through when he meets our second person that we meet, and that is Zacchaeus.

Okay, there was a man named Zacchaeus who was a chief tax collector, and he was rich.

Okay, somebody say Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus.

Okay, so it's it's pronounced like Zac E-Us.

Okay, so you can call him Zach for short if you want.

But Zacchaeus was a tax collector.

And what tax collectors did was collect taxes.

Right?

I know, not super creative, but what you might not know about tax collectors is that they were Jewish men who were employees of the Roman Empire who had control over this land.

And at the time they ruled this area of Israel and a large portion of the world too.

Yeah, fellas, we're talking about the Roman Empire, okay?

So lock in.

I don't know if that's a thing anymore, but it used to be you think about the Roman Empire like once a week, okay?

So that's what we're talking about.

And the tax collectors, their sole purpose was to extract a certain percentage of taxes from the Jewish people in order for Rome to make money off of Israel.

Okay, and these Jewish tax collectors, well, like they weren't just doing their bare minimum job description.

Okay, they were actually extorting money from their own people on top of the required tax percentages to Rome.

Okay, they were embezzling money from people who had less money than they did also that they could be more wealthy and pursue the riches that they had always dreamed of.

Okay, like they were the ancient equivalent of like Jordan Belfort or Bernie Madoff for you finance bros out there.

Okay, and no, they were not looked at as cool because they stole money from other people and got away with it for so long.

But they were actually looked down on as sellouts by their own people.

These guys were spit on.

They were yelled at, they were mugged, they were abused, etc., because of what they were doing.

And Zacchaeus, he was not just like a normal foot soldier tax collector, but he's described as a chief tax collector.

So you know what this means?

It means that he was embezzling from the tax collectors who were embezzling.

Okay?

Zacchaeus is at the top of this pyramid scheme here.

Okay, and it means that he was at the top of the food chain, and he's described as rich in our text, which would be a gross understatement.

So tax collectors were some of the most wealthy people in all of the Jewish world, and Zacchaeus would have been one of the wealthiest of them all.

He's like the 1% in Israel.

Okay, and Zacchaeus had to work hard to climb the ladder in his career to get where he is in our text.

So we don't know his age, but we know that he had risen up the ranks and was considered extremely wealthy because of what he had done.

So I would imagine that if you would have met Zacchaeus before this passage we're reading happened, Zacchaeus would be someone that would say he like had it all in this life.

Like, other than the public ridicule from people that he would collect money from, like he was rules to ride around on.

He likely had a family, like a big house, like a sick wagon and mules to ride around on in the city.

Okay, maybe he would have been on an ancient Israel equivalent to MTV cribs.

I don't know.

That probably predates you guys, but that's okay.

But Zacchaeus is living large.

Like Zacchaeus is making decisions for him, and it is going well for him.

Like when things are going well for Zacchaeus, and he when he was riding this like high of riches and success in his career, he probably was even happy most of the time.

Like enjoying his life.

But what Zacchaeus didn't know when it was going well is that he actually was lost.

See, on the surface, Zacchaeus looks like he has achieved success.

Like it looks like he has all that the world has to offer.

Like he has almost everything that so many of us, even here tonight, desire.

But what happens to Zacchaeus is that eventually his happiness from his successes like runs out.

Okay?

Eventually, the wealth, the possessions, the career success, they simply just like aren't doing it for him anymore.

Like he's at the peak of his life and his career, and he likely says to himself, once he gets there, is this all there is?

Like, like, is this all that life has to offer?

Like this was supposed to be the pinnacle for Zacchaeus.

This was supposed to be the peak of his life.

He's worked so hard to get here.

So how does he get to the place where he is lost when he's supposed to be at the top?

He has been lost the time.

See, Zacchaeus was successful in his pursuit of wealth and career success and of resources and possessions.

He was successful in all of that, but Zacchaeus wasn't successful in finding what would truly fulfill him.

See, Zacchaeus' story.

My story, and a lot of your stories are similar in this way.

Like we can find success in what we want to achieve.

Like we can get the fancy internship, right?

We can get invited to the parties, we can date the person that we've always dreamed of.

We can get all that the world would tell you to go and get for yourself.

But at the end of the day, once you actually get them, you feel just as lost as you felt before, if not more.

And the reason for this is because you're trying to fill a giant, eternal-sized void with shallow, short-lived substitutes.

Okay, let me say that again.

You're trying to fill a giant, eternal-sized void with shallow, short-lived substitutes.

Okay, Zacchaeus had come to the realization that he actually was not filling the deep void like he thought he was.

Okay, when he realizes that this is true, what happens with Zacchaeus is he goes from lost to seeking.

Okay, so now Zacchaeus doesn't just sit in this like lost state.

Okay, he doesn't just wallow in how he feels, but Zacchaeus actually takes the same work ethic that got him to where he was in his career and puts it into seeking what can actually fulfill him.

And we know that by the time Zacchaeus enters the scene in this passage in Luke, that Jesus, his fame, had spread far and wide about his authority, his power, his grace, and his reputation had reached the city wherever he could go to.

So there is a crowd that's surrounding Jesus wherever he goes, to the point where you had to battle just to get close to him.

Okay, verse 3, it says this.

It says he, Zacchaeus, was trying to see who Jesus was, but he was not able to because of the crowd, since he was a short man.

So running ahead, he climbed up a sycamore tree to Jesus since he was about to pass that way.

Okay, so Zacchaeus, he was a short king.

Where are my short kings at?

You're gonna have to make some noise.

Come on.

There's a couple of you out there.

Listen, I saw you.

Come on, raise those hands, don't be shy.

Love you guys, love you, short kings.

Never been one, but I can emphasize with your pain only when I'm around someone monstrously tall guys like Jared, honestly.

That's about the only time that I feel like you.

But that's besides the point.

So Zacchaeus was a short king.

Okay, but Zacchaeus was a determined short king.

Okay, Zacchaeus had channeled his work ethic and clever mind into like finding a way for him to actually see Jesus with his own eyes.

So when he's walking through his city in his own neighborhood, Jesus is there, so he shimmies up this sycamore tree.

Okay, I don't know anything about sycamore trees.

They probably look pretty similar to some of these trees around here.

But Zacchaeus works his way up that tree, he shimmies up there, all in anticipation of seeing what all the hype about Jesus was about.

See, Zacchaeus, he likely heard about Jesus, whether it was like in passing from other people he knew, or hearing the crowds chanting, or the rumors spreading about Jesus.

But Zacchaeus was he doesn't want to just take people at their word and let their opinion form his own.

Instead, he wants to actually seek out Jesus for himself.

Okay, isn't that something?

Zacchaeus doesn't just believe what he was hearing from other people, the rumors, and just automatically believe that it's true.

But Zacchaeus takes what he has heard and begins to think independently, so he starts to investigate for himself and seek Jesus.

Like he wants to experience what he has heard about Jesus for himself.

Okay, and here's what's true for us tonight.

Most all of you here, you have heard some things about Jesus.

Okay, like maybe you've heard some rumors.

Maybe you've heard some strong statements.

Okay, you've heard that he has the power to heal the sick, or the power to put back what was broken, or the power to cure people from their addictions.

Okay, or maybe you've even heard that he has the power to forgive the sins of anyone who believes in him.

But maybe just like Zacchaeus, those things about Jesus that you've heard, you don't just want to like accept them as truth or even dismiss them as crazy, but you want to experience him for yourself.

And if that's you, what we're gonna do later is we're gonna address exactly how you can do that tonight.

But first, let's see what happens when Zacchaeus actually experiences Jesus for himself.

Verse 5 says this when Jesus came to the place, that's where Zacchaeus was, he looked up and said to him, Zacchaeus, hurry and come down, because today it is necessary for me to stay at your house.

Okay, so Jesus, amongst all of the crowds following him, people all around him, what he does is he looks up at Zacchaeus in that sycamore tree, clinging on to the tree branch, just to even get a glimpse of who Jesus was.

I'm experiencing him even from afar.

He looks at Zacchaeus and he says, Hurry up, man, I'm hanging at your crib tonight.

Jesus, the man who claims to be the savior of the world, who many people around Zacchaeus believe is the promised holy one of God, looks right at Zacchaeus, our lost chief tax collector, short king, and invites himself over.

And did you notice what Jesus actually said there in verse 5?

He says, Today it is necessary for me to stay at your house.

Necessary?

Like for Jesus, the man who has divine power, who is looked at as holy, is saying that it is necessary for him to stay with a guy like Zacchaeus.

Okay, that part of verse 5 is not there on accident.

Okay, see, Jesus, he sees Zacchaeus, a man who is looked down upon in stature and in society, who embezzled money for his income source, a man who is spit on and yelled at and despised by his own people, and he says, It's necessary for me to do this.

Why?

Now we'll get more into this later on in the message, but what I want us to realize here is two things.

Jesus says this very intentional wording of necessary, with a huge crowd around him for all to hear and see, because he doesn't want anyone to get confused as to whether he meant what he said to Zacchaeus.

He wants to emphasize that he means what he says here.

And the second thing is Jesus selects Zacchaeus, one of the most controversial, hated people on purpose, because he wants to give the crowd a glimpse into part of his mission here on earth.

Picks Zacchaeus and undesirable in the eyes of the people intentionally.

Verse 6.

So he, Zacchaeus, came down and welcomed him joyfully.

He jumps off that tree with pure joy.

Like he welcomes Jesus into his house.

Zacchaeus is elated that Jesus would look at him, the tax collector that nobody loves, the tax collector that thought he had it all.

He looks at him and invites himself over.

And Zacchaeus is psyched.

He goes right down that tree and welcomes Jesus into his house.

Like Zacchaeus, the man who was lost.

Okay, this is the man who is seeking the answer to his eternal sized void in his life.

He hears about Jesus and he goes to experience Jesus for himself, and he takes the leap of faith to go near him, and Jesus invites him right in.

That is how Zacchaeus is received when he seeks Jesus.

Like Jesus doesn't reject him.

He doesn't check his record and turn him away for all he's done.

And instead of telling him to clean his life up before coming to him, he just welcomes him.

And he spends time with him.

And he shares a meal with him.

But the people around him that saw this, they didn't have the same reaction.

Verse 7 says, All who saw it, that's this interaction with Zacchaeus and Jesus, began to complain.

He's gone to stay with a sinful man, they said.

Like they see Jesus embracing Zacchaeus, a man that they all think is so far lost and so far from God, a man that they think isn't worthy to be near a holy man like Jesus, and they get incredibly upset with him.

Like all this time, they're seeing people who are being healed of their diseases, even forgiven of their sins, coming to Jesus in droves.

And time and time again, Jesus is doing what he does best in healing people of their physical and spiritual brokenness.

But when it comes to Zacchaeus, the man who likely defrauded some of them of money, the man who they spit on because they can't even stand the sight of him, that's where they draw the line.

Him, Jesus?

Really?

Zacchaeus?

And notice what we don't see at the end of verse 7.

Okay, we don't see Jesus walk back on his decision.

Okay, we don't see Jesus change his mind on who he wanted to spend time with and to seek after.

Like even amongst unrest from the crowd, he stands by what he says and who he wants to pursue.

And look at the response from Zacchaeus here.

Verse 8.

It says, But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, Look, I'll give half my possessions to the poor, Lord, and if I have extorted anything from anyone, I'll pay it back four times as much.

Like in the middle of the crowd yelling and complaining to Jesus that Zacchaeus is a sinful, undesirable man, in the middle of the hatred that people are showing Zacchaeus, he stands there in the thick of it and says to Jesus, Jesus, I'll give half of my possessions away.

And anyone that I've cheated out of money, I'll pay them back four times what I took from them.

While people are looking down on Zacchaeus, while people are hating him, he looks at Jesus and he does three things here.

Okay, the first thing he does is he releases.

Okay, Zacchaeus doesn't continue to have like a tight grip on his possessions after this interaction and Jesus welcoming him in, but instead he sees the value of who Jesus is, and he looks at his possessions that have brought him nothing even close to what Jesus has, and he says, I'll give them away if it means I get to follow Jesus.

He releases that.

The second thing he does is he repays.

Because you wouldn't give away more money than you need to unless you were compelled to.

Okay, so Zacchaeus sees that Jesus wants to him.

He sees that Jesus wants to spend time with him.

He sees that despite his past, despite his feelings of being lost, despite his shame and his brokenness, that Jesus wants to pursue him of all people.

So Zacchaeus decides to turn from his lifestyle that he was living.

He decides to stop pursuing the things that have left him feeling lost and empty.

The things that have overpromised and under-delivered, and he turns towards Jesus.

And what happens when Zacchaeus repents and turns to Jesus?

Verse 9.

Jesus says this.

Today, salvation has come to this house.

Jesus told him.

Because he too is a son of Abraham.

So Jesus declares that Zacchaeus, the lost, the broken, the sinful, hated tax collector, has been given the free gift of salvation.

Okay, or in other words, Zacchaeus was no longer lost, but he is now found.

See, Zacchaeus wasn't just lost, but Zacchaeus, like every other person on this planet, is actually a sinner too.

Zacchaeus and the rest of mankind have been committing sin their entire lives, and sin just means anything that goes against God and his word.

And when Zacchaeus gets declared that he has received salvation from Jesus, what is happening here is Zacchaeus is repenting for his sins that he's committed in his life.

His stealing, his hatred towards others, his anger.

And he's turning from his old sinful lifestyle, and he's realized that what he has been seeking, what he has been yearning for to fill that void in his life, is right there in front of him.

And it's actually not a what, but a who.

And that person is Jesus.

See, Jesus looks at Zacchaeus in his lost, in his broken, and his sinful life and says, That's who I came to save.

That's the kind of person that I came for.

The lost, the broken, the tax collectors of the world, the sinners, the college students who are pursuing the party lifestyle like I was.

The students who are trying to fill their eternal size void in their life with anything else but Jesus.

That's who I came to save.

That's what Jesus declares.

Jesus is saying that he's come to save people like you, like me, like all of us here.

And in his words in verse 10, for the Son of Man has come to seek and to save the lost.

See, one of the most incredible aspects about what Jesus has come to do here on this earth is he came to save the lost, yes, but he came to seek the lost.

The whole time that Zacchaeus was seeking worldly things, when he was seeking the money, possessions, and the career advancement, Jesus was seeking him first.

Zacchaeus was lost, sure, but Jesus was pursuing him the entire time.

What's true about Jesus pursuing Zacchaeus, even in his sin, even in his feelings of lostness, is also true for you.

See, right now, no matter where you're at with your relationship with Jesus, whether you have experienced Jesus for yourself already yet or not, Jesus is seeking you first.

He's seeking you even when you couldn't care less about him.

He's seeking you even when you're running in the complete opposite direction.

He's seeking you even when you think that you have nowhere else to go, that you don't have any direction, when you're feeling lost, he's seeking you.

See, my story, just like Zacchaeus, is that when I felt lost, when I felt like I had gotten to the peak of life itself, as people told me, and it wasn't anything like I thought it would be, Jesus was seeking me.

And when I finally experienced him for myself, when I went from being lost to being found, there was no other experience or response other than to turn from my sin and to trust in him.

See, I was compelled to leave my old life behind because I had been given new life in Jesus.

And I didn't clean myself up.

I didn't have to get right before I went before Him.

All I did was Romans 10 9 says.

And it's simply this I confessed with my mouth that Jesus is Lord.

And I believed in my heart that God raised him from the dead.

And what that did was it changed my life forever.

And listen, there's no magic in the exact words that you say, it's not a specific chant you repeat or anything like that, but it's simply the heart posture of knowing that you are a lost, broken, and sinful person.

Knowing that Jesus is a loving, perfect, and sinless God who has died for you, who defeated death for you, who has been seeking you.

And what he wants is for you to simply seek him.

And when you do, you too can go from being lost to being found.

So I want to close by giving two groups of people a next step as you leave here tonight.

First, for the non-Christian.

I know that there's some of you here.

You don't know what you believe, you don't know if Jesus is who he says he is.

Maybe somebody has told you about him, but you came here to see for yourself, just to rule it out.

If you're the non-Christian in not the room, but the field, my charge to you is this stop trying to fill your eternal-sized void with short-lived substitutes.

Stop trying to fill the void that can only be filled with Jesus with temporary things.

Like I'm begging you, if nothing else, learn from my story, learn from Zacchaeus' story, and experience Jesus for yourself.

Turn from your old lifestyle and trust in him tonight.

I'm begging you, there's nothing better.

There's nothing better than Jesus.

And for the Christian in the room, you've already experienced Jesus for yourself.

You've already gone from being lost to found.

And you already know that even in your sin, even in your lostness, even when you were running away from him, you remember what he has done for you.

My charge to you is to completely sell out for him.

Bring his relentless grace and love to those that are still lost and broken around you.

Take the good news of the gospel to the people that God has uniquely placed next to you.

Don't wait.

Christians, you have thousands and thousands of students your age, 18 to 22, almost a hundred thousand students in this city alone, right here in Milwaukee, that don't know the good news of the gospel.

They don't know Jesus.

They're still searching, they're still trying to fill that eternal size void with temporary things.

And you know who's best equipped to tell them about the good news of the gospel?

You know who's best equipped to tell them about Jesus and what they've done for him?

It's you.

It's college students.

And you know what would happen if each and every one of you here tonight decided to sell out for Jesus and take the gospel to the city of Milwaukee, take the good news to the good land.

What I believe is that the lost would be found, that the seeking would be saved.

The city and its campuses would be forever changed.

Let's pray that this will be true as we go from this place.

Heavenly Father, I thank you.

God, I thank you for each and every person that you have brought here tonight.

God, wherever they're at, whether they're feeling lost, whether they're seeking, whether they know you, Lord, I pray that tonight would be the night that they turn to you, that they sell out for you.

God, I pray that the lost would go from seeking to found.

I pray that the people that here that have not experienced you for themselves would come to you tonight and experience your love and your grace and your forgiveness and a new life in you.

God, I pray that this would be a field full of students that are sold out for you.

God, that they wouldn't leave here without selling out for you in this life, in this college experience, that they would turn it on its head and use it for you.

That they wouldn't waste it.

That they bring the good news of the gospel to the good land of Milwaukee.

I pray that this would be true.

All in your name.

Amen.