“The Shape of a Spirit-Filled Life” by Dr. Derwin Gray

Welcome to Gateway Churches Podcast.

Wherever you're tuning in from, we hope you're encouraged by today's message.

I want to take a moment and just say welcome to all of our guests who are tuning in from campuses all over the place.

Gateway, I'm sure you guys know about your new campus that you opened on Neptune and Saturn as well.

So congratulations.

Seriously, welcome, welcome, welcome.

And especially welcome those who maybe you think you've gone too far, done too much.

This is kind of like your last shot at God.

Please understand this.

You can't outrun God's grace.

And if you think you are, he's already waiting for you.

Not with clenched fists, but an open embrace of grace to say, come home, son, come home, daughter.

So I want you to know you haven't gone too far, you haven't blown up too bad, that his grace is sufficient.

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Have you ever wanted to go to a party, but you didn't get an invitation?

Now I know you guys are really cool, so that probably never happened to you, happened to me on occasion.

But I want to tell you about the greatest party ever.

But this particular party, we can't find it by going somewhere because this party exists in a dimension where wear does not qualify.

As a matter of fact, before clocks ever went forward, there was no time.

That before time ever began, before the mountains were born, before the seas ever roared, God, and as we know, for those of us who follow Jesus, God reveals Himself as the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.

Now, middle schoolers and high schoolers, one of the questions that we get is what was God doing before God created him?

Who created God?

Well, let's answer the second one first.

No one created God by necessity.

God is the uncreated creator of everything.

God needs nothing.

You know why?

Because God has never been alone.

God has been an eternal celebration of God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.

Teenagers, think of a triangle, three points, one triangle, one God, three persons.

And what were these three persons doing?

First John 48 says this God is love.

So the Father is the lover, the Son is the lovee, and the Holy Spirit is the spirit of love.

And so what was God doing for all eternity?

God, in his essence of I amness, was simply loving himself, never bored, never needing anything.

And salvation is actually an invitation to the celebration.

Salvation is not simply about God saying, when you die, you get to go float off somewhere in heaven.

Salvation is about entering into the eternal love fest with God now and for all eternity.

King Jesus said it this way: do on earth as it is in heaven, and what is happening in heaven, Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit have been feasting on love and are saying, That's what I have created you for.

You've been created by love, for love, to love.

God, the Holy Spirit reveals the beauty of Jesus so that the Father can have glory in our lives.

What does glory mean?

You know, that's kind of a word that we really don't use a lot.

Um, think of this.

Now, this may be hard to do because it's been so long.

Think about when the Dallas Cowboys actually won.

It's been a long time.

So for some of you, you're like, well, is that even possible?

Now, now, before you get mad, I'm from San Antonio, Texas.

I went to Converse Judson High School.

I played football at BYU, played five years in the NFL.

So I know that which I'm talking about.

I've lost to the Cowboys personally.

By the way, 1993, that's when I stopped being a fan of the Dallas Cowboys because I couldn't be like Emmett Smith.

Let me tackle you and get your autograph.

No, so that's when my cows, so, so, so glory is back in the days when Dallas used to win and all the fans would show up.

Well, well, God's glory is we are showing up in Jesus to say, Father, live in me and live through me.

And God, the Holy Spirit, wants to shape our lives.

So, so what is it, what does it look like, teenagers?

What what what is it what does it look like for God to shape your life?

Now, um, so if I was at Transformation Church where I'm the lead pastor at, what I would say right now is if you're new to Transformation Church and you hear me talking to middle schoolers and high schoolers, is because uh um God is not a respecter of age.

He he wants to use you now.

You don't have to wait till you're 40 and blow through a marriage and figure out that stuff don't make you happy.

Like like God used a teenager named David to jack up Goliath.

God used Mary to bring the Savior into the world.

Most of Jesus' disciples, except for Peter, were most likely teenagers.

So if you are a teenager right here, right now, I'm not calling you out, I'm calling you up to the grace of God that God wants to use you right here, right now.

So, so a a spirit-filled life, number one, a spirit-filled life delights in the love of God and Christ.

Delights in the in the love of God and Christ.

I've been walking with Jesus since 1997.

I've been in pastoral ministry now like gosh, like 26 years now.

Man, I'm getting old.

And one of the common denominators that I've seen is followers of Jesus that that flourish and are just filled with the spirit.

Oh man, they delight in Jesus.

Big old grown men start crying at the name of Jesus.

Their hearts are tenderized by Jesus.

When I was a kid, I was taught men don't cry, so don't cry.

And as a football player, you bet not cry.

Man, I came to Jesus, y'all.

I start crying about everything.

When my kids was little, watching finding Nemo, I started crying.

My little daughter has no clue.

I'm like, sweetheart, he left.

But his daddy came for him.

He was trapped in a fishbowl.

Oh, but his daddy, I mean, God tenderizes our heart.

We we delight in the love of God.

As a matter of fact, I would say it this way: followers of Jesus who are filled with the Spirit think more about what Jesus has done to them than what they have to do for him.

Let me say it again for the people in the back and the campuses on Jupiter.

They're more delightful in what God has done for them instead of what they do for Jesus.

Because when we delight in what Jesus has done for us, the overflow is his life being expressed through us.

They they delight in being loved by God.

Now, I didn't grow up in church.

So grew up in San Antonio, Texas, grew up on the west side.

Uh, from middle school on up, I primarily lived with my grandparents.

Um, both my mom and dad had various issues, mental health issues, substance abuse issues.

Um, we didn't go to church, we didn't pray together, but in my home, football was the religion.

Now understand this.

Uh, you may not be a follower of Christ, you may be exploring who Jesus is, but please understand this.

Everybody worships something.

Worship is simply this.

Where do I find love?

Where do I find identity?

Where do I find significance?

And where do I find purpose?

Well, football was that for me.

My my home life was so chaotic and violent.

Like I had normalized chaos and violence because that's all that I knew.

But the one place where there was stability was the football field.

Our coaches told us things like this if you work hard, study the playbook, play hard, you can do well.

So, what did I get?

I started doing those things, and all of a sudden I got stronger, I got faster, and then there was an element of control because you know what control is?

Control is really this I'm afraid of being hurt, so therefore I want to control my environment.

And so football gave me a measure of control.

So, senior year in high school, Converse Judson, man, we are crushing teams.

And then we get to the 1988 5A.

Back then it was only 5A.

Now it's like 20A in Texas, everything's big here.

So so we get to play a team called the Dallas Carter Cowboys.

Lord have mercy.

I'm still in trauma over that game, y'all.

Them dudes from Dallas Carter, 1988, Jesse, man, they were grown men.

We walked out to the middle of the field, I was one of the team captains, I was like, grown men.

They beat us.

However, we won on a technicality, but nevertheless, on the football field, it wasn't even close.

So I get a football scholarship to Brigham Young University.

Schools like Texas and Texas AM didn't recruit me, TCU did, Kansas State and but I went, I took my gluteus maximus to Provo, Utah.

Culture shock.

Anyway, I meet a girl in my freshman year.

We end up getting married, end up having uh a legendary career.

I got a big banner at the stadium.

Uh one of my former teammates actually is in the front row.

His name is Irvin Lee.

By the way, he doesn't want a lot of people to know this, but in 1990, Irvin Lee actually helped us beat the defending national championship, Miami Hurricanes.

Google him.

He is Googlable, y'all.

Google that brother.

And Irvin and I in worship, we're looking at each other, going, if you would have told us at BYU we would be at this church worshiping God, we both would have laughed because that's impossible.

Well, I got some good news.

Our God is a God of impossible, and the love of God will chase you down.

He will chase you down and get you in a bear hug of grace.

So, anyway, football career is going great.

Get drafted by the cults.

And I'm like, I've made it because my worship told me that if I make it, then money would fix my family problems.

It didn't, it made it worse.

It was never enough.

Um, money would uh make me feel better about myself.

Like I grew up poor and I shopped at a store called Hand Me Downs.

You guys ever heard of that?

Uh it wasn't on Amazon, it was actually in your house because your big cousin would hand you down his clothes.

So I shopped at hand-me-downs.

And so I was like, man, when I when I make it, I'm gonna I'm gonna wear suits and I would have these incredible suits, and on the outside I look good, but on the inside I was still insecure.

I was still afraid.

You know what's I you know what I was afraid of?

Who would I be when my NFL career is over?

Because if I if you build your life on what you do, what happens when you can't do it anymore?

You're a nobody.

I grew up as a compulsive stutterer, so I was afraid of talking.

I didn't do well in school, I just did just enough to pass.

So I always live with that anxiety.

We didn't use words like anxiety back then, but I was filled with anxiety.

I couldn't love my wife the way she deserved to be loved.

And the reason why I couldn't love her is because I didn't love myself, I didn't know what love was.

But God, first year, yeah, second year, better.

Third year, I'm a team captain with the Colts.

We almost go to the Super Bowl, but it was at the end of that third year, I distinctly remember looking in the mirror, going, something's wrong with you.

Why are you not happy?

Why can't you love your wife?

Why can't you love yourself?

And then, like, there were things I needed forgiveness for, but I didn't know that's what I needed.

I just knew the more good stuff I did was like taking a shower, revealing that you're only dirtier.

But I had a teammate.

Uh, his name is Steve Grant, but his nickname was the naked preacher.

True story, I don't make this up, true story.

Every day after practice, Steve Grant would take a shower, dry off, wrap a towel around his waist, and get his Bible.

And then he would walk through the locker room like this with his Bible.

And he would go, Do you know Jesus?

Do you know Jesus?

And in my mind, I'm like, Do you know you're half naked?

I mean, true story.

So in training camp, I literally tried to avoid him.

I wanted nothing to do with him, but one day I'm in the locker and I hear, and no one else is in there.

And I turn around and he's coming towards me with his Bible.

And we started a conversation that put me on this stage today.

This is what he said.

He said, Rookie D Grade, do you know Jesus?

And like most people who don't know Jesus, I said, I'm a good person.

And he said, Well, good compared to who?

He said, Because the standard of good is not other people.

As a matter of fact, you're showing you're a bad person because if you say you're good based on another person, you're pulling them down to lift yourself up.

So that actually is judgmentalism.

And Jesus said, Don't take the speck out of someone else's eye when you got a log in your own eye.

So by you saying you're good, it's because you deem somebody's not as good as you.

But our standard is God, only God is good.

I said, Naked preacher, what do I need to do?

He says, You can't do anything, but Jesus has done everything.

I said, What do you mean?

He said, Jesus came to earth and for 33 years he lived a good, sinless life because you couldn't.

And then he died on the cross because you couldn't live a sinless life to forgive you, and then he rose again to live through you.

And like a six-month-old Chihuahua, I went, hmm?

It takes time.

So it was a five-year process.

And on August 2nd, 1997, fifth year in the NFL, training camp with Indianapolis Colts, Anderson University, Anderson, Indiana.

After lunchtime, I'm walking back to my dorm room.

And the best way I can describe it is this way there was a chasm in my soul.

It was like I was walking with a wedge in me.

And when I got to my dorm room, I called my wife on the phone and I said, Sweetheart, I want to be more committed to you.

And I want to be committed to Jesus.

And it was at that time that it dawned on me that I was loved.

Now you gotta understand, my whole life was this.

How big are you?

How fast are you?

How strong are you?

How good is your game film?

How in the NFL they say say this, you're only as good as your last game.

And I met someone for the first time in my life who said, Derwin, I have seen all of your life, your game film, and you are a sinner, and I want you anyway.

Derwin, I have seen how you've lived and I love you anyway.

My grace is for people like you who are busted up, toe up from the flow up.

Translation, sinner in need of God's grace.

And I was overwhelmed with the love of God.

I was stunned by the love of God.

I began to delight in the love of God.

Wait, wait.

And I would talk to Christians and go, hey guys, do you know that God loves us unconditionally?

They were like, Oh, you'll get over it.

Well, I got good news.

I got some really good news.

I haven't gotten over it, and the symptoms have gotten better and better and better and better.

So, so so um I scored a 16 on my ACT to get into BYU, which is very low.

So, parents, there's hope for your kids.

Trust me, the Lord will do work.

So, today I have a doctrine in the New Testament and context.

I've written nine or ten books, I speak over the world.

I was a compulsive stutterer.

Why am I telling you this?

Because God will not only save your soul, but he saves the whole of us that we delight in the love of Jesus.

Hey, are you delighting in the fact that God delights in you?

Now, teenagers, you you just you just need to chill here.

Put this in your pocket.

When your parents get all weird, like when you're getting ready to graduate high school and they're all sappy and crying, you're gonna do the same thing, I promise you.

Because you gotta understand, we seen you when you looked like an alien and we said we loved you.

Like when the babies come out first, you're like, it's so beautiful.

But do you notice, like, when the baby comes out, you don't say, Wow, I can't wait to you to grow up so you can work really hard.

No, you love that child because it's yours.

So, so, so, so I'm excited to preach here with you guys.

I really am, but I must confess, I was more excited to see my 24-year-old son.

So, he's a first-year law student at Penn.

Y'all, that's Ivy League.

From the ghetto to the Ivy League in one generation.

Tell me God ain't good.

Okay, okay.

Anyway, anyway, anyway, so so so he's doing what's called his one L uh internship of federal clerkship here in Dallas.

So I I love preaching the gospel, but man, when that six foot two, 215-pound, thorough looking man came through the door, man, I melted like, ooh, that's my love creature right there.

I'm like, that's that's hey guys.

How do you think God feels about you?

Hold on.

You didn't do something to elicit his love.

He didn't, God didn't in his eternity go, you know what?

I'm gonna love you because no, no, God is love, love is what God does.

He cannot help but love.

It is his essential nature.

We didn't earn it, we didn't elicit, we didn't wake up and say, God, would you love me?

God has always loved us, he will always love us, he will never ever stop loving us.

Romans chapter 5, verse 5 says this.

Romans 5:5

Teenagers, listen to this, put this in your pocket, you're gonna need it one day.

This hope will not disappoint us.

Because listen now, God's love has been poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who was given to us.

God, the Holy Spirit has been poured.

Notice the language.

Like, God ain't stingy with love.

Like, there's no recession on God's love.

He he pours it out.

So the Holy Spirit doesn't just empower you, He assures you you're loved.

Many of us are striving for love.

But the Holy Spirit is saying, No, I want you to rest in God's love.

Some of you, this is where you are.

You're burned out and you're tired.

And the reason why you're burned out and tired is because you're striving for something God already gave you.

God is not gonna love me more if the sermon is decent.

He's gonna not gonna love me more because I'm a decent dad and husband.

His more is found in Jesus.

Jesus is your more, Jesus is.

My more.

Can I say this lovingly?

Uh, I know I'm not your pastor, but just right now, in this moment, let me pastor you.

Hear this get your eyes off yourself and behold the cross.

Behold the king.

That's where the transformation is.

A spirit-filled life finds their self-worth in Christ.

Hey, teenagers, uh, I learned something.

I have a 29-year-old daughter, but at one time uh she went to this war called middle school.

Man, boy, boy, boy, middle school girls.

Woo! You need to know Kung Fu.

Man, that was rough.

Wow.

People will project onto you how they feel about themselves.

If you find an angry, mean person, it's just a mirror into their souls.

I used to get mad at them.

Now I pray for them.

I'm like, oh, you're just a wounded little bird.

Here, I'm gonna use a word that the young people use because I want to be hip.

I'm not gonna match their energy.

Teenagers, come on.

Hey, I did I did I do good?

Thank you, thank you.

I'm not gonna match their energy.

I'm not.

Why should I descend into your self-pity when I have been seated in the heavenlies with Christ?

So, so when people come at you and attack you, don't respond in kind.

Pray and be kind.

So, so our self-worth.

There is a liar and a deceiver, and his lies and deceiving is so effective, he doesn't change them.

With Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, the dark power did not make Eve get up and go eat from the tree and Adam follow her.

It was a lie.

Did God really say, there you go?

Hey, there's some conversations you don't need to have.

There's some conversations you don't even need to have.

And by the way, where was Adam at?

He was gaming.

He was gaming.

I don't have anything against gaming.

Fishing is my thing, right?

But if I know how to fish better than pray, if I know how to game better than pray, there's a problem.

You see, Satan saw Eve as his prey.

Adam should have been praying and said, nah, homie, you don't roll up on my woman like that.

But nevertheless, how did he get them to do it?

He didn't push them, it was a word.

And in the nation of Israel, when God freed them from slavery in Egypt in the book of Deuteronomy, chapter 6 and chapter 8, there are three temptations, and Jesus had the same three temptations in Matthew 4, 1 through 11.

Deuteronomy 6 · chapter mention

But I want to zero in on this.

Listen, I promise you, if you get this by faith, it will be a game changer.

Here are the three lies.

Here's the three lies.

Number one, I am what I do, performance-based living.

I am what I do.

Question, how do you know you've done enough?

And when do you ever do enough?

And who becomes the hero of the story if you do think you're doing enough?

There's a word for that, y'all.

It's called idolatry.

You've turned yourself into a God.

So I am what I do.

Here's the other one.

I am what others think about me.

That's called popularity-based living.

It is how do people perceive me?

And if you're a people pleaser, a recovering people pleaser like me, that makes it difficult to have boundaries in life.

Now, I know none of you at any of the campuses will relate to this at all.

Like you get mad because you're doing stuff that you know you shouldn't have been doing, because you don't have energy to do it, you're spread through, then you're mad at the people who asked you to do it when the reality is it's your fault for not having boundaries, but you can't have boundaries because you're a people pleaser, because you want people to like you.

Can I tell you something here?

Here in my heart, there's gonna be people that don't like you, and you're gonna be okay.

Here's another one.

Here it is.

I am what I have, possession-based living.

The more I have, the more I am.

Now, let me summarize these three things.

We tend to think of sin as what I did.

What we do is the fruit of what we thought.

The root is I am what I do, I am what others say, I am what I have.

That's the root that produces the fruit of sin.

Let me even codify it a little bit more.

Sin is this there's something or someone who can fulfill me more than Jesus.

There's something or someone who can fulfill me more than Jesus.

I'm a Trinitarian, someone said one more time.

There's something or someone who can fulfill me more than Jesus.

Sin flows out of, okay, uh, I have to impress people and I have to do and do and do, and you overfunction and you sin.

Or they have to think about me this way, so therefore I have to have more possessions, and then we sin.

And God is saying, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Your self-worth is not found in what you do, it's not found in what others think, it's not found in what you have, it's found in what Christ has done for you.

It's found in being Christ's possession, and it's found in being what God thinks of you.

But the question is, do we even know what that is?

This is what I teach our church at Transformation Church.

You're gonna help me here.

I'm gonna say it and you're gonna say it with me.

The scene of the crime is your mind.

So I'm gonna say the scene of the crime and you're gonna say your mind.

Here we go.

One, two, three.

The scene of the crime is your.

At all of the campus, the scene of the crime is your.

So we wanna wallpaper our mind with God's truth.

So my wife, the greatest Christian I know, love of my life, my best friend, um, co-church planner transformation church.

She is phenomenal, the greatest human being that I know.

I've known her since she was 18 years old.

I was 18, she was 19.

I mean, that is my ride or die.

We've been married 33 years.

Like we fully grown people up in here.

And you know what she does?

She has sticky notes all over the house.

Reminding her of who she is in Christ.

You don't have sticky notes over the house, but you got sticky notes in your head.

And they tell you, you are what you do, you are what you have, you are what others think.

It is time to rip those sticky notes off and remind yourself, no, no, no, I am the Father's beloved.

How do we know?

Look what the scripture says here in Galatians 4, 6 through 7.

And because you are sons, God sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts crying, Abba Father.

Let's look at the back of this verse.

Abba is an Aramaic word and it means like daddy.

Listen, I get it, man.

I get it.

Some of us had some messed up parents.

I get it.

But please don't project your earthly dad or earthly mom on God.

That's not fair to him, and it's not fair to you.

I used to be that way towards my dad.

That man was one of 17 kids.

Probably had various mental health issues.

They didn't talk about stuff back then.

He was doing the best that he can.

What's my bitterness gonna do other than poison my soul?

So before you beat up your parents, why don't you pray for them?

And don't be like, well, it's because of them I did this.

And God is going, well, regardless of what your parents were or were not, I'm the greatest parent.

Look to me.

Let me back up to this word, sons.

The word sons here, Paul uses it exclusively, and here's why.

As a Jewish scholar, he understood that in the Old Testament, the nation of Israel was called God's Son.

Men and women were called God's Son because it's a Hebrew word that means beloved.

You are my beloved that I keep my covenant with.

You are the one that I love.

So just as men are called the bride of Christ in the New Testament, men and women are called sons, not because of a misunderstanding of gender, but it's a Hebrew understanding of belovedness.

So when God calls us sons as men and women, what he's saying is, you are my beloved.

You can call me Abba.

You can, you can, you can you can call me Abba.

You like like I'm a good father, I'm I'm reliable and I'm dependable.

Now understand this.

That doesn't mean you're not gonna go through some stuff.

Jesus went through some stuff, even Disney movies, they go through some stuff.

So us going through stuff doesn't mean that God is absent.

God is in the stuff with us, God weeps with us, God cries with us, but that's not all he does.

He dies on the cross for us and he raises again so that we can be more than conquerors in him who loved us.

Verse 7 says this.

So you're no longer a slave but a son, and if a son, then God has made you an heir.

You and I are heirs to the kingdom, the new heavens, the new earth, glorified, resurrected bodies.

Let me just do just a little eschatology.

That means in times, just for a minute, I'm gonna dab, then I'm gonna dab back out.

Check this out, check this out, check this out.

In the new heavens and new earth, some of y'all getting y'all hair back.

You can have a resurrected body, some of y'all getting y'all hair back.

Praise God.

I'm keeping mine as long as I can.

Some of you gonna get your abs back, man.

I used to have an eight-pack, I just got a barrel now.

Um, I mean, we're gonna have glorified, resurrected bodies, no more sickness, no more pain.

We are co-heirs with Christ.

Your identity isn't earned, it's received by grace and sealed by the Spirit.

In Christ, we don't perform for worth, we live from our worth.

Number three and lastly, a spirit-filled life that lives from the power of Christ.

Lives from the power of Christ.

Teenagers, let this soak into your soul, let it, let it drip in you like some good coffee.

Ephesians 3, 16 through 19.

Paul says, I pray that he may grant you according to the riches of his glory, to do what?

To be strengthened with power in your inner being through his spirit.

Oh, ooh, I gotta stop.

I gotta stop just for a minute.

I want to put you on notice today that the same power that raised Christ from the dead lives in you.

Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on.

There is no addiction greater than the infinite power of God, there is no trauma greater than the power of God.

There is no hurt greater than the power of God.

Call on the power of God, call on the power of God, call his name, call his name, call his name.

It's Jesus, and he will show up, and he will show up.

I know it, I know it, I know it.

Not simply because I read it, because I experienced it.

Listen, listen, listen, I get it, man.

I do like I'm an academic nerd, I love that stuff.

I do, but sometimes you just gotta snotty nose cry and say, God, help me.

Strengthen me.

He will answer that prayer.

Verse 17, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.

The heart is not your muscle.

In the Hebrew understanding, your heart is the control center of your life.

He says, I pray, watch this now, being rooted and firmly established in love, and may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the length and width and height and depth of God's love, and to know Christ's love that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be what filled with all the fullness of God.

The mark of a Christian is L O V E.

You will know my disciples because they love one another.

And the greatest of these is love.

The Holy Spirit shapes us into a pupil of love.

So, teenagers and preteens and and young adults, you you don't live for Jesus in your strength.

You live through Jesus by the Holy Spirit, and you're not powerless.

The same power that raised Christ Jesus is working in you and through you.

You know, for some of you, you feel like, man, the devil has buried me.

Well, I got some good news.

The devil may have thought he's been burying you, but God planted you.

And his power is gonna grow a garden of grace.

Check this out.

Imagine this, okay?

Teenagers, I need you to roll with me.

Imagine this.

Everybody, now the older you are, the more this is gonna hit home.

You're in court, and the prosecuting attorney has a highlight tape of your whole life and my whole life.

Woo, Ely, Lord have mercy.

So you're sitting there and you're looking for your defense attorney, and the prosecutor is just going on and on.

I mean, it's undeniable.

Sinner.

And the prosecutor says, Judge, the case has been made.

Derwin here is a sinner, it is beyond the burden of it is a fact, and you and I are just we're just sweating bullets because it's right there.

We can't edit it, it ain't no AI.

Like it's there.

Then all of a sudden, you hear the courtroom doors open, and there's a holy gas, and you begin to hear whispers.

He's here, he's here, he's here, he's here, he's here.

And as you look over, you you see a man walking down the aisle, not in an Armani suit, but in a blood-drenched robe.

As he's walking, he gets closer and he doesn't have on platinum cufflings, he has holes in his wrists.

He's not wearing a tie, he has a hole in his side from a sphere.

He doesn't have on alligator shoes, he has blood-stained feet with holes in them.

And the prostitute says, No, no, no, no, no, no, you can't be here.

They can't afford you, they can't afford you.

And he walks up to the judge who happens to be his father, and he says, Hey dad, Derwin and the rest of them, they're with me.

I'm their advocate.

And the judge looks up and stands up and he grabs his gavel and he slams it down, and all of heaven shakes and trembles.

And the prosecutor, the liar, the deceiver, the Satan goes, No, he can't do that.

And the judge says, Shut up, my son has spoken.

And he says, Not only, Derwin, are you forgiven, oh, but you're blameless, you're holy, you're righteous, you're mine.

Because the advocate, first John 2 1 says that Jesus is the advocate.

And the judge says, Not only are you forgiven, but you are free.

Go, my child, go.

And by the way, and by the way, as you're going, remember this that John 14, 26 says, and that the helper will come, the parakletos, the advocate.

So we have God the Son, who's the defender of us, and we have God the Holy Spirit, who's the one who empowers us to live the life we were forgiven for.

The very righteousness that God gives us, the very love that God gives us, the advocate, the Holy Spirit says, Now I want to live through you.

So, family, today we shake off guilt, we shake off shame because we've been clothed by the Advocate in his perfect love.

What is the shape of a life of the Holy Spirit?

It's a life of love.

Will you pray with me?

Let's pray, God.

The Holy Spirit, would you take these feeble words and your mighty scripture and do a work in our hearts?

Mend back the broken pieces, gather them and collect them, and make a mosaic of grace.

May we delight in your love.

May we know our self-worth is found in Christ as his beloved sons and daughters.

And may we live from the power of the Holy Spirit because we have an advocate who makes us innocent.

We have an advocate who makes us powerful and holy.

You know, I don't know what your hurt, your wound is, but give it to Jesus.

Don't hold on to it no more.

Just give it to him.

The Holy Spirit will will will minister to it and heal you over time.

You might do it right now by faith, trust him.

And right now, I don't want to assume that everybody at every campus is a follower of Jesus.

If you've never bowed your knee to Jesus and given him your whole life, not parts of your life, but I'm talking about everything that you've said, Jesus, I come to you as I am.

I don't come to you with an agenda other than to be forgiven.

I don't come to you with a plan other than to follow your will.

I need to be forgiven.

I need a new life.

I need this guilt and shame to be lifted.

I need you.

Hey, today, give your life to Jesus.

If that's you, in the silence of your heart, in the power of the Holy Spirit, I want you to say this to them.

Teenagers, this is your moment.

You can't rely on your parents' faith or your grandparents' faith.

You got to make Jesus your own.

Right here, right now, today, in the silence of your heart.

Say this King Jesus, today I behold the cross, that bloody cross.

It should have been me on that cross, but it was you.

You took my place and poured down grace.

That grace forgives, that grace shows love, that grace transforms.

I believe that on the third day he rose again to give me new life.

So I turned from my sin and I turned to the Savior.

Thank you, Lord Jesus, for saving me.

In Christ's name we pray.

Amen, amen, and amen.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you'd like to connect with us, text Connect to 71010 or visit gatewaypeople.com.

We hope you have a great week.