The Habit That Will Heal Your Heart - August 3, 2025

It is my privilege to invite you to today's sermon podcast.

I have made the Apostle Paul's prayer request my own.

When he states in Ephesians 6, 19, pray also for me, that whenever I open my

mouth, the words may be given to me so that I will fearlessly make known the mystery of the gospel.

May today's sermon come alive to you and aid you in your understanding of God's plan for your life.

I've got a question to ask you as we begin this morning. And it's simply this,

when you lie, who do you think you lie to the most?

Oh, pastor, what are you starting with that for? Let's think about it for a minute.

When or if you lie or when you used to lie, maybe I should say it that way.

Who'd you lie to the most?

Was it, hello, boss? Yeah, I'm sick today. I won't be able to come in.

Yeah, I'm going to be out visiting the greens today. No, the green is my doctor, not the golf course.

Maybe it was your kids. Hey, Dad, let's go to Disneyland. Okay,

let me think about it. When you really have no intention that you want to do that.

Maybe it was your spouse. Does this make me look fat?

You can't answer that. You've got to eat a Snickers bar, I'm told, on TV.

When you think about it, who do you lie to the most?

Maybe it's your friends. Oh, you know, I can't go over to your house today.

Boy, they make the worst food ever. I'm not going to go have dinner at their

house. I mean, who do you lie to? Maybe it's social media.

On Facebook, you put these great and wonderful pictures of how happy you are

when maybe deep down inside, you're not so happy.

Now, I got accused that I'm a vapor today. I think I need to address this.

My family and I went to the races last night, the Meridian Speedway,

and we sat in the vape-free zone.

But when I looked at the picture we posted on Facebook, it just says vape,

and there's Pastor Mike's family right there.

So you can't believe everything you see on Facebook there, even the happy pictures of watching races.

Boy, things can get twisted quick, can't they?

I won't tell you about the time I was in Walmart and rested my arm on a stack

of beer when some church people showed up.

Hey, I was just having a good time just sitting there. And anyway,

who do you lie to the most?

When we think about it, and when you think about it, the results might surprise you or they might not.

But the research is conclusive.

When you think about who you lie to the most, the person that you do lie to

the most is you, yourself.

When you think about it, you're like, man, the yard needs mowed.

I'll do it tomorrow. And you know you're not going to do it tomorrow.

There's other stuff that's going to come up. You might tell yourself,

I've got this habit, but I can stop any time when really you're so far deep

into the habit that you can't stop anymore.

Healthy habits are unhealthy habits.

You might say, I'm fine. Everything's okay when really you're not.

When life is not fine. when you're going through hard times,

when you need support, but you don't want to admit it.

You might tell people, I don't care.

Yeah, c'est la vie. Whatever happens, happens when really you do care,

when really you are invested in whatever it might be.

Or maybe the lie you tell yourself is it's not a big deal, when really it is

a big deal, whatever that might be.

Why do we lie to ourself? Why do we get ourself in these situations to where

we can't even be honest with who we are.

Well, I think it goes back to the scripture in Jeremiah 17, verse 9.

Jeremiah 17:9

The human heart is the most deceitful or the most wicked of all things.

And desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad that it is?

Or as the King James puts it, who can know it?

When we think about the statement of this, it implicates all human beings because

looking around, I think all of you are human.

Unless you're an alien and really good at disguising it.

But you all look like human beings to me. It means I think all of you have a heart.

Whether your spouse is accused, you have different at times in your marriage.

That's a little different story. But it says here the human heart is deceitful.

God didn't create us that way,

but through the fall of human beings everywhere, we've developed that.

And generationally, down the line here, the human heart is desperately deceitful. wicked.

You know, one of the major reasons why most New Year's resolutions fail is because

we focus on changing the external habits without focusing and changing on the internal.

We want our external behavior to stop, but we can't have external behavior stop

until we fix what's on the inside.

And we say we're going to get more organized. We're going to quit procrastinating.

We say we're going to read our Bible all the way through.

We say we're going to eat better. We're going to start exercising.

We're going to give up bad habits. We're going to stop yelling at our spouse.

But the problem is that we're not focused on what's inside.

We're just focused on what's on the outside. When it comes down to it,

where are behaviors born?

Behaviors are born in the heart.

In that central emotional spot of our being, where our motivation comes from,

where our oomph comes from.

And so I want to tell you this morning that if you want to change your life, change your habits.

But if you want to change your habits, you got to let God change your heart.

Today is the first day of a new sermon series we're going to do all through

the month of August called Habits of a Healthy Heart.

I'm going to talk about five habits and starting today, Hey.

Five habits that will help you have this heart change that God can manifest within your own life.

And the first change I want to talk about this morning is self-examination.

Later on, I'll talk about simplicity, solitude, sorrow, and then slowing down.

And so as we look today at the scripture, we're going to read the scripture

that Dave referenced earlier in the song.

Psalm 139, verses 23 and 24. Would you stand for the reading of God's word if

Psalms 139:23

you're willing and able?

Only two verses here. The psalmist David, listen to what he says.

Search me, O God, and know my heart.

Test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me

and lead me in the way everlasting.

Father, thank you for these two verses. Two verses which we will discover in

the life of King David, how much of an impact they made on him.

And Lord, this morning, I pray that these two verses will make an impact on

us as we invite you, God, through your Holy Spirit to search our hearts.

And so, Lord, be glorified, we pray this morning in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Well, when we think about this scripture passage and we think about the discipline

of self-examination, we can see surely that this is something that David,

over time, began to understand.

Because David, like us, had the propensity to lie to himself,

had the propensity to not see things as they really were.

And really, David discovered it at one of the most lowest points in his life,

the need to examine himself in the light of who God is, in the light of what reality is,

in the light of what truth is.

In 2 Samuel 11, verse 1, we read this, In the spring of the year,

2 Samuel 11:1

when kings normally go to war, David sent Joab and the Israelite army to fight the Ammonites.

However, David stayed behind in Jerusalem.

Now, I've often wondered why this is. King David was a warrior.

He was a soldier. He was a mighty leader.

David, we are told in the scripture, had some mighty men that followed him.

Mighty men, and as you read, look it up sometime in your Bible study.

David's mighty men. You can see these were incredible guys, incredible soldiers.

These were kind of the guys that today they would make action movies about.

You know, one of the guys was in a pit with a lion on a snowy day.

Boy, there's some kind of Hollywood show there, right?

I mean, can you imagine battling a lion? the snow's coming down.

And there he is going toe-to-toe with the lion. What a David's mighty man.

And David was supposed to be the mightiest of them.

And here was David, sending everyone else off to war, but he stayed behind. I don't know.

Maybe David told himself, I've fought enough.

I'm just so busy. I need a break. I mean, I'm not just a warrior. I'm the king after all.

I've got treaties to negotiate.

I've got this to do. I've got that to do. I just want to kick back for a little bit.

I deserve a break. Maybe he told himself that.

Maybe he said, as the king, I need to stay safe. And so I'm just going to stay

behind this fortress here.

Well, the story unfolds about David as you go through chapter 11 here of 2 Samuel.

And you can And see, he goes upon the roof, and he's taking a break while everyone

else is out fighting, all of his men, the armies.

And he's surveying his kingdom. Oh, what a great kingdom this is.

This should be called the city of David sometime.

And as he's surveying, his eye passes by a woman. We later find out that her name is Bathsheba.

Guys, I want to tell you, it's not the first glance that gets you.

It's the second one. David saw a woman in passing. Oh, whoa.

But he chose to look back again.

The second glance gets you. The second glance begins to work something in your

soul. And here it did for David. Nothing good.

David saw Bathsheba and he sent for her. Not just to get to know her.

He had something wrongful in mind. He had something else in mind.

And the story unfolds that he takes her and he sleeps with her.

Only one time, no one will find out. Nothing bad can happen from this.

I'm the king after all. I deserve this. She's one of my subjects in the kingdom.

David was lying to himself. From that one time, that one nightstand,

daystand, whatever time of day it was, we know that this lady was pregnant. And then panic ensued.

Scandal was afoot. Something bad was happening with God's chosen nation and

the leader of this nation because of the sin that he participated in.

But David came up with a plan to fix it.

Isn't that great when you tell God, I got a plan to fix this, God.

You see, remember, all of the army was gone fighting.

David's mighty men were out there.

Well, Bathsheba had a husband who was a soldier. His name was Uriah.

Uriah was out fighting. That's why his wife was left home alone.

David calls for Uriah, says, come home. You need to be with your wife. You fought so hard.

Uriah, come and just spend some time with your wife. Take comfort in her.

Well, Uriah comes home, but guess what? Uriah is an honorable man.

He doesn't think it's right that his comrades are out there fighting,

and he gets called home to have some time with his wife.

And so he does not sleep with his wife.

Well, David's plan that he had all figured out, lying to himself that this is

going to fix everything, was not coming to pass.

He did not sleep with his wife.

So instead, David came up with plan B.

Instead, he comes up with a nefarious scheme to send David out to the front

lines and then for everyone else except Uriah to pull back.

And so this unfolds and Uriah is killed.

And so David says, okay, this is solved now, but it wasn't solved.

See, David was lying to himself. David had abused his power.

David violated Bathsheba.

David committed adultery.

David weakened his own family. He murdered Uriah, the baby that was then born, became sick and died.

These are the horrible consequences of a king that did not go with his army

to lead his nation, but instead lied to himself. I need a break.

I'm just going to stay back and surveyed his kingdom.

All from one choice.

David did not recognize his own sin.

I got to tell you, sometimes we're the masters of our own self-deception.

Remember what we said at the outset, who's the one you lie to the most? It's yourself.

Psychologists call this cognitive bias. I'm not a psychologist,

so I can't really explain that, but I know what the Bible calls.

The Bible calls it flattering themselves.

The Bible calls it deceiving or being deceived by your own deluded heart.

That's exactly where David was at this moment.

In Psalm 36, 2, the scripture says, in their own eyes, they flatter themselves

too much to detect or hate their sin.

And guess where David was? He was right at that point, right there, deceiving himself.

One pastor did some research and he said that our self-deception manifests itself in five ways.

Maybe you can relate to some of these,

or maybe some people you know have related to these or even now are.

First of all, how do we manifest our own self-deception? The first way is that

we are addicted to distraction.

Rather than look at ourselves in a mirror, we like to distract ourselves from

examining who we really are. I mean, think about it.

We have a whole industry called the entertainment industry that's not just there

to make good things, but they're there to distract you from your life,

from what's true and what's right.

People turn to pornography and they become distracted and addicted to that.

People turn to the news of the day and they become addicted even to having to

know the latest things of what's happening.

Man, that's a far cry from when I was growing up and they had cable TV and they

had C-SPAN. No one watched C-SPAN.

Now people are watching it all the time. They want to know what's going on in

the world. What's going on in our government? What's going on with this and that?

It's not just bad things that people distract themselves with or that are addicted to.

With work, people can just throw themselves so much into their work that they

never take time to take a time out and to say, hey, I've got to contemplate

who I am in light of the truth and in light of who God is.

Other people throw themselves and they become addicted to substances,

alcohol, illicit drugs.

We could go on and on But I think you get the idea The truth is Rather than

face ourselves And who we are Who we are in light of God In light of scripture We distract ourselves.

Another way that our self-deception manifests ourself is we just become these

manic, cheerful people.

Well, Christians aren't supposed to have problems, and so we're not going to have any.

And we convince ourselves that we don't, and so we're just going around with

a fake smile all the time.

Life is great. Everything is awesome.

And we're just, anyone that meets us, we're just so happy and so much so that it's annoying.

So much so that we know it's not right because other people see your life and

you're saying you're happy, but you're, why are you happy?

Because your life stinks. There's problems in there. We know you're not happy.

But again, it's self-deception manifesting itself by this manic cheerfulness.

The kind of opposite of that is this idea of judgmentalism.

Our self-deception manifests itself as being judgmental of other people.

A lot of times when we're judgmental of other people, it means that we're vulnerable

on the same issue that we're judging others about.

We see this in politics all the time and with one party, but I won't get into that.

One party's saying, oh, you're doing this and you're thinking this,

and this is why you're trying to do this when we know they're being judgmental

and casting the blame because that's what they're thinking themselves,

is they want to do this, that, and the other thing.

Christians we do it too If we're vulnerable on an issue We point the finger

at somebody else Because it takes attention away from us.

Our outrage at their sin blinds us from what we're guilty of.

Our own vulnerability, maybe even the same sin.

Other people, I want to tell you, they just get offended. They're defensive.

Their defensiveness is this reaction because of their self-deception.

Any suggestion that they have a problem, well, how dare you say that?

How dare you? There's this offense that always shows up. I'm offended that you

would even think that I could do that.

They become offended, defensive.

Not even the mere mention that they might be struggling with the problem.

Well, that's just your own problem. That's your fault you're thinking that I'm

fine. Everything's fine.

Or they begin to blame others. Well, it's his fault that I'm this way.

One woman said, well, Pastor Mike, look at the man God gave me to marry.

It's all his fault, and I've heard it the other way too. I think it started

in the Garden of Eden, if I'm not mistaken, back in Genesis. with a man named Adam.

It's that woman you gave me, Lord.

Cynicism is the fifth way that sometimes our self-deception manifests.

We just become cynical. Everything is wrong.

Everyone else is the problem. I'm fine.

It's this kind of things, these kind of ideas King David was guilty of.

David deceived himself and his life fell apart. When we look a chapter over

in 2 Samuel 12, we kind of see the continuation of the story.

You see, the Lord didn't leave King David there, the leader of his chosen people,

to flounder or to destroy what God had set out the purpose for his kingdom.

God intervened by sending Nathan the prophet to David.

Want to tell you, if you're deceiving yourself, God's going to send you someone.

It might be a prophet. It might be a preacher. It might be your spouse.

It might be someone in this room, but God's still got a plan for you.

He doesn't want self-deception to rule your life.

And so he sent Nathan to David, and Nathan tells the story about a guy who had everything,

who had all these lambs, and then one guy that just had one lamb,

and the rich guy who had all these lambs,

Nathan tells the story that he had a guest come, and rather than kill one of

his lambs, he went and took the only lamb this one guy had to sacrifice and to eat for their meal.

Well, upon hearing this story, and I've just told you the short,

not exciting version of it, David is enraged.

He is outraged, and he wants to know who this man is because David's going to take care of it.

How dare this rich guy who had all of these lambs go and get the only lamb this

other family had, this other man had, so he could entertain some guests,

so he could look good, so he could have a fattening good meal.

Well, it's interesting what the prophet says. When David is furious,

this man deserves to die, David thinks.

David says, Nathan says to David in verse 7 of chapter 12, you are the man.

You are that man. This morning, I just want to ask you, what problem are you denying?

What sin are you trying to rationalize or what issue are you hiding?

Pastor Mike, you should have went and had a better vacation.

You're coming back and you're just bringing this to us. We need to send you away longer.

No, I'm good. What I'm saying today is in love.

What I'm saying today first has to come through this heart of self-examination,

before I have the privilege of sharing it with you.

What is it that gets in the way? There are secret addictions.

Pornography is a big one. Alcohol, drugs, these are the easy ones to pick on.

Anger, the temptation, maybe even like David, we've become too close with someone

of the opposite gender that's not our spouse.

Maybe flirtation has ensued.

There's an affair pending. Maybe not physically, but emotionally we're already attached.

Maybe we just eat our feelings. We're overeating.

We're overspending. We're overdoing it. We're trying to numb ourselves because

we don't want to feel the effects of our own choices, of our own sin.

And whatever we do, it doesn't seem helps.

Maybe we think we don't need help, but we really do. And maybe even you're sitting here this morning.

You've come to church, but you don't feel close to God.

These are real things. These are real issues. And folks, I want to tell you,

these are issues that have solutions.

These are issues that can be fixed. But I just want to tell you some warning signs really quickly.

First of all, watch out for what others have tried to tell you.

If there's more than two people that you know love you, and they're telling

you have a problem, then maybe you have a problem.

And you don't want to see it.

Maybe you're working too much. You're not present with the family.

Maybe you're on the phone so much.

You're playing these video games all the time. You're just so engrossed in sports,

on TV, or other movies or programs that you're distant from everyone else around you.

And your family's saying, hey, we're right here.

We want to have life with you, not just with you in the room,

on your video game, on your phone, watching Bonanza.

That's a self-admission.

We think about it.

All got things that we deal with, and let's deal with them. Honestly,

that's what this discipline of self-examination is all about.

See, when you ask God to search your heart, you need then to watch out because

others will be His mouthpieces.

If you don't want to admit it yourself, your family will be the ones that God

will use to say, hey, there's a problem here.

What are we going to do about it? Another warning sign is not just watch out

for what others have tried to tell you, but watch for what you rationalize.

Isn't it shocking how good we are at rationalizing some of our behaviors?

I noticed this on my drive to the Oregon coast last week.

Man, there's some crazy drivers on I-84 between here and Portland,

and don't get me started on Portland.

Man, and I thought I was good, and I think I'm a good driver.

I've been driving since size 14. So, you know, a little before that, maybe.

But boy, can I rationalize my bad driving behaviors, especially when put up

against some Oregonians on the eastern side of the state.

Oh, wait, that would be western side. Sorry, eastern Oregon folks.

I love you that you're here from Nyssa and Adrian and Ontario. I'm sorry.

I meant western. Really did.

It's easy for me to rationalize why I had to speed around five cars to get in

front of that slow-moving SUV or trailer.

But when someone else does it and they get to it first, man, I get angry.

How dare they do that to me? I got a family in this car. And we can rationalize

why we do what we do. It's easy for us. We're masters at that.

But sometimes we rationalize, oh, this isn't a big deal what I'm doing or what

I'm going through. I can handle it. It's not hurting anyone.

Stay out of my business. I don't have a problem. I know what I'm doing.

You guys would do it too if you were in my shoes. You would just totally do that.

See King David maybe saying some of those same things for why he did what he

did. Well, watch out for what others want to tell you.

Watch out for what you rationalize. But third warning sign is watch for where you're most defensive.

I already talked about this, so I won't spend long on this point,

but we think about it. We don't have a problem here. Why are you pointing this out?

A lot of times what we do if we're good at it is we point out the fault in other people.

Well, you do this. We try to deflect away from the attention that's focused on us.

Leave me alone. It's none of your business. Stay out of my life.

Folks, the more convinced you are that you don't have a problem,

the more likely it is that you do.

I'm not trying to burden you with things that aren't real this morning.

I don't want you leaving and saying,

man, Pastor Mike says I got all these problems. What am I going to do?

I want you going to pizza and getting heartburn because you're trying to think

about all these problems that you have.

But in reality, if there is something that's not right, as you ask God to search,

as other people have pointed it out to you, then it's something you need to

deal with. Don't wait till tomorrow.

Don't wait. Deal with it today. Deal with it while the Holy Spirit is pointing it out to you.

Hear me clearly again. You cannot change what you cannot or you won't confront.

If you're not going to confront it, it's not going to change.

If you're involved in some bad behavior, it's not going to stop until you confront

that bad behavior and make a change.

Even if it's exterior, it has to start interior. Say, I'm going to stop.

I'm not going to do this anymore.

I'm tired of getting involved in these things.

I'm tired of yielding to the same temptation over and over again when God promises

in his word that he will provide a way out if I cannot stand up under it.

Being tempted with something, God believes as a believer in Jesus Christ through

the power of the Holy Spirit, you can overcome that temptation and you don't have to yield to it.

Well, Mike says the human heart is wicked.

Who can know it? I surely can. I might as well just give in.

No, you don't have to do it.

The devil's not making you do it.

You've been provided with an opportunity to overcome that temptation.

Jesus showed us how in the gospels.

Jesus overcame three. I know there are more temptations that came his way,

but Jesus showed us how to overcome through the power of his word,

getting into our hearts, keeping the right things right.

So this morning, I don't want this to be a downer, but I do want us to consider,

this idea of self-examination, of saying, God, what is it?

What is it in me? Search me with your Holy Spirit. I don't want anything to

be between me and you, God. find it interesting.

Sarah's not here today. I hope she doesn't watch this. If it's interesting when

you're young and in love, you always want to be with that person all the time.

When you go on vacation, you want to sit by him in the seat and no one else better get your seat.

That's right by the one that you want to be with all the way driving to Portland and beyond.

You just want to be close. You just want to be there. The giggles.

The silly laughter all that stuff i've got some that can testify to it this morning,

seven hours we had to take pit stops and go look at waterfalls just to get away

from that a little bit when you love someone you want to be close to them you

don't want anything getting in the way,

when god loves us and he wants to be with us when we love god and we want to

be with him We don't want anything getting in the way of that relationship.

That's why self-examination is so important. It says, God, is there something

that's coming between me and you?

Is there something coming between me and the mission that you've given me to

love others as I love you, God?

There's any sin, we got to pluck it out as quick as we can.

Now, I've given up trying to pluck gray hairs out of my head,

or white hairs, because I'd be bald.

This comes from my mom's side of the family. And early on, I think my wife,

she would say, oh, you've got a white hair. Pluck it out. Okay, plook.

Well, I think as soon as she did that, it brought all the rest of them to the top.

And now they're just sprouting out everywhere. I got weird hairs come out the

ears. Okay, that's too much information.

When it comes to sin, you got to pluck it out. You've got to get rid of it.

What's our remedy in that? 1 John 1.9. If we confess our sin.

He, God, is faithful and just to forgive us of those sins and to cleanse us

from all that unrighteousness.

The solution is to seek the forgiveness of God. What comes with forgiveness is repentance.

It means we turn our back on that sin.

We don't go back to it. What should David have done? Oh man,

look at this great kingdom. Whoa.

Ooh, God, look at that lady over there. Instead of taking another look,

he should have said, oh Lord, forgive me, help me.

He should have turned his back and walked away.

He should have went and got his armor on and went out to join his men that were

fighting for God's kingdom, for the kingdom of Israel.

But he didn't. You see that sin multiplied?

Sin has that multiplicative effect in our lives if we let it in.

That's why the New Testament says don't let the devil get a foothold.

Don't let sin get in there, even just one little thing. Well,

it's just entertainment, Mike. It's just fine.

Look at where our entertainment's gone. Look how entertainment has affected

our society and what's acceptable now on TV that wasn't even thought of back in the day.

Just a little, little at a time.

This is the moment of truth, guys. If we're going to do what David did,

we're going to say, search my heart, O God.

Brave enough to pray that prayer? It means we're ready to change.

If we say, test me, oh God, we're ready for God to test us. Do you really mean

it when you ask for forgiveness?

Did you really mean it when you say, God, forgive me? Have you repented?

How do we know? Well, a temptation will arise again. Are we going to yield to that temptation?

Are we going to say, no, I meant it when I asked God to forgive me.

And so I'm not going there.

Test me, God. See if there is any wicked or offensive way in me.

We're asking God to shine the big spotlight on our heart and our life.

We're asking God to lead us in the way everlasting.

Are we ready for God to do that in our hearts, in our life?

And so I'll just ask you this morning before we take the Lord's Supper,

what is God saying to you?

What is God showing you this morning?

As you've heard me talk about many and various things today,

is there something that he's pointed out in your own heart, in your own life?

Don't be afraid of God. Don't fear God this morning.

He already knows. And really, we shouldn't be afraid of God,

fearful of God, because what we should be afraid of is what sin and self-deception will cost you.

Example from David's life today. Now, David sinned. It's right here in the pages of Scripture.

Boy, how many of us would like our greatest sins to be displayed for other people to read? Not me.

Probably not you either, right? But here's David. Everything about his life is laid bare.

While we're tempted to run away from God, we really need to run to God,

fall at his feet, and pray what David prayed here in Psalm 51.

After all the events of the story I portrayed to you today about King David,

listen to what his heart's cry was.

Psalm 51, verse 10 and 12.

Psalms 51:10

Create in me a pure heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit to sustain me.

The powerful words of David to create in me a pure heart.

That desire again to say, I don't want to be involved in sin.

I don't want to suffer by continually doing the same thing over and over again

and letting sin destroy my life.

He came to that place of repentance. He came to that place of sorrow.

Judgment was pronounced upon him and his family because of his own sin.

No wonder David, when he prayed, Search me, O God. Know my heart.

Test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me

and lead me in the way everlasting.

When he prayed that, he wanted God to move.

God did move. Folks, I just want you to remember this morning,

if you want to change your heart or your life, change your habits.

If you want to change your habits, let God change your heart.

And would you let him do that today? This morning, as we conclude before our

closing song and benediction, we come to the time of the Lord's Supper,

a time, as we'll read in just a moment,

that we are given to remember Christ's sacrifice for us, to remember how Jesus

paid the price for your sin and for my sin,

for the sin of King David, for the sin of everyone who's ever lived or who will

ever live, Jesus paid the price.

And we remember as we take this morning, we take the wafer that represents the

bread that was broken, that represents Christ's body that was broken for us

because of the punishment of sin.

We remember the blood that was poured out, Jesus' pure blood,

the blood of an innocent one, of an innocent man that was poured out, that blots out our sins.

Say, well, man, I had a rap sheet a mile long. But after Jesus' blood covered

it, you couldn't see anything.

Jesus forgave all that. Isn't that great? That Jesus forgives us.

We don't have to have all of our sins displayed on a nice video projector wall to be forgiven.

Well, Jesus forgave it. He knows you. He knows what you've done wrong.

But yet Jesus died on the cross so you could be forgiven.

We celebrate this today to remember what Jesus did for us, to remember what

Jesus wants to do for others.

So let's stop fooling ourselves.

Let's just get real with God and even get real with him right now.

Those of you who are believers in Jesus this morning, which I hope is everyone,

doesn't mean your life is perfect. Doesn't mean maybe your relationship is perfect.

But what it means is you know where to go to correct things after having examined

yourself and asking God to examine yourself.

If there's things that aren't right, what do you do? You go to the Lord and you take care of them.

And that's one of the purposes of this Lord's Supper this morning,

this communion time this morning.

Every time we do this, almost every time, I read from the book of 1 Corinthians, but I stopped short.

I just want to read a little bit more this morning before I call the ushers up.

You see, the scripture says, For I received from the Lord what I also passed

on to you, The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread.

And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body,

which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.

In the same way, after supper, he took the cup saying, This cup is the new covenant in my blood.

Do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of me.

For whenever you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.".

Then. Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner

will be guilty of sinning against the body and the blood of the Lord.

Everyone ought to examine themselves before they eat of the bread and drink from the cup.

There's the sermon encapsulated in the Lord's Supper. Examine yourself this morning.

Every time we do this, I might not read the rest of this passage. It's powerful.

But every time we do this, it says, examine yourself in the light of who God is.

Take care of what needs to be taken care of. Remember, we're doing this because

Jesus said, do this in remembrance of me. Well, what are we remembering about Jesus?

We're remembering that he forgives us, that he dies on the cross for us, that he rises again.

He's risen again for us, and he empowers us to live as he wants us to live,

not in our own strength and our own power, But when we submit our will to His.

Boy, we have the strength to do that, to live above the fray of sin,

to overcome temptation, to live as Jesus lived.

That's the power of the Lord's Supper, and that's the power of the Lord's Supper this morning for you.

So as I invite the ushers to come, I'm going to pray over the elements.

They're going to be distributed.

Would you just take a moment as the music plays and as everything's distributed

just to examine your heart? If you need to come to the altar, it's here.

If you need to make right where you're at, your own altar. Do it right there. This is special time.

Special time together. Let's pray. Father, thank you for the opportunity we

have to take of the Lord's Supper this morning.

Lord, this is a memorial, but it's not just a memorial.

It's an opportunity for your Holy Spirit to do just as David proclaimed in the

psalm, to search our hearts, O God.

We ask you to do that this morning. Lord, you have great and mighty things planned

for each and every person in this congregation.

No way we want sin to get in the way of that, to mess it up.

Father, as a whole body, you have great things planned for this church.

And God, we want to see them accomplished. We want to see new people reached.

Father, we want to see your word continue to go out through the world.

We don't want any sin to encumber it.

And so, Lord, we're grateful for this time that we can examine ourselves.

Where we can hold you true to what you've said in your word.

That if we have sin, we can confess that.

Lord, as we turn our back upon that, Lord, we know that you forgive us.

We know, God, that you love us. That's why Jesus died. That's why we celebrate this.

Lord, would you help us as we examine our hearts this morning?

Bless the elements today, the bread, Lord, and the juice, the wine.

God, I pray that as we take this this morning, and we take it with a clear conscience.

And if there's something we can't solve right now in this very moment,

God, I pray that you would help us to do that as the day goes on or as this week goes on.

Father, we just submit this time to you. May your Holy Spirit search us and

move about in our heart, we pray. In Jesus' name, amen.

I want to thank you for joining today's sermon podcast. You can find a copy

of today's sermon, as well as other sermons, and the sermon outlined from today

on our church's website,

www.mvcnaz.org.

It is my prayer also that you will seek out a church home that recognizes the authority of the Bible.