"The Power to Overcome Gloominess & Despair" | Levi Lusko

Welcome to Gateway Church's Podcast.

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

What an honor to be at Gateway Church for the first ever good Friday service in this church's history.

It's a great joy and privilege to be with you every location.

Those joining online, those in overflow.

Come on, let's make some noise.

Everyone at church tonight.

And CeCe, so great.

I know the weekend's just going to be amazing.

Pastor Joachim and Carrie Job and Cody are going to be here all weekend.

It's just going to be better and better and better.

And it's an honor to get to be a part of it.

If you have a Bible, Isaiah 53 is where we're going to launch into this talk from.

The title of the message is The Power to Overcome Gloominess and Despair.

Come on in faith, who's grateful for the cross?

The power to overcome gloominess and despair.

In the Chronicles of Narnia, Aslan, who represents Jesus, that great lion, one of the great uh characters in literature, which of course is an illustration, an analogy, a symbol of the gospel.

In the last book, which is called The Last Battle, any Chronicles of Narnia fans up in here?

Parents, let me just encourage you.

If you haven't read this to your kids, the series to your kids, uh lately, do it.

If you've if you've never done it, get on that.

But just going through them again, it's so powerful, a chapter at bedtime.

But the last book, the last battle, which kind of lines up loosely with the book of Revelation in the Bible, Aslan has this line that he says to the children, and it it always gets me.

He's gone through the death for them, he's gone through the resurrection, the cracking of the stone table, he's done everything necessary to bring them into his land.

And then he says this line to them.

I'm gonna put it on the screen.

He says, You are not yet so happy as I mean you to be.

You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.

You see, he wants them to realize and to comprehend, to understand.

Paul would say in the book of Ephesians to fathom the depth of his love.

He wants them to understand and appreciate the magnitude of all that he has done for them.

He says, You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.

I think sometimes, I fear sometimes that we miss out on and don't fully understand all that is there for us in the cross.

Perhaps because we are in such a hurry to get to resurrection, we are in such a hurry to get to Easter that we skip over Good Friday, we skip over the events of Skull Hill, which is literally the name Golgotha, Skull Hill, where Jesus died.

And as a result, consequently, because we don't fully understand and appreciate the magnitude of what was done for us on that skull-shaped hill, we end up not looking or experiencing the abundant life that Jesus wants us to.

He would say to us today, Don't you know all I did for you?

Don't you know the power of what I unleashed for you through the cross?

Is it possible that Jesus says to us, You are not yet so happy as I mean you to be?

How do we get that joy?

How do we release that joy?

How do we walk in that under that abundant joy?

I think we need to understand the healing that can come through the wounds of Jesus that took place at the cross.

It's hard but important.

It's much more, you know, exciting to get to the resurrection, but to sit and look and stare and walk and understand what he went through for us.

Here's a few words that can help you get your head around the cross.

The cross was vicious, the cross was voluntary, the cross was vicarious, and the cross was victorious.

Praise God for that last part.

Amen.

That's the only reason it's Good Friday.

Vicious.

There is not a more painful death you could go through than to die the death of crucifixion.

It was not invented by the Romans, but it was perfected by the Romans.

And the goal was maximizing pain.

You know, when we and when we in our culture today think about the death sentence, the whole goal is for it to be as little pain as possible, for it to be as quick and over as fast as possible.

But the death of crucifixion was the exact opposite.

You could literally hang there on the cross, slowly suffocating in some cases for days.

Of course, we know Jesus hung for six hours on the cross, and each agonizing breath, as he would make his way up and down the cross, while you're hanging from your hands, your pectoral muscles, the intercostals, everything would be paralyzed, so you couldn't get a breath out.

You could inhale, but you couldn't exhale.

So in order to exhale, which we know Jesus spoke seven times on the cross, he would have to step up on those wounded feet, grinding his bloodied back up and down the cross each time to get to the top of the cross in order to speak.

It was vicious.

But make no mistake about it, it was voluntary too.

No one made him do this.

Yes, there were guards, yes, there were soldiers, but please, he could have at any moment dispatched 12 legions of angels, lightning bolts from his eyes.

There's no one that could take his life.

Jesus said to Peter, who thought he was going to defend Jesus with the sword in the Garden of Gethsemane by cutting off the ear of the servant of the least armed person there that night, right?

And Jesus said, Please, Peter, come on, bro, you're embarrassing me in front of my friends, you know.

I've got work to do.

He picks up the ear, blows it off, sticks it back on.

We good?

Go ahead, please proceed with your big scary arrest.

You guys are so powerful.

Oh, big strong soldiers, come to get me.

Yes, please do.

Please do take me.

At any moment he could have come down off that cross.

It wasn't the nails that held him there.

It was love.

It was love for you, it was love for me.

He voluntarily went through this.

He said, I have the power to lay down my life, I have the power to take it up again.

So this vicious death was a voluntary assignment agreed upon between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit from before the foundation of the earth.

Even before they created us, they knew we would go astray, and they knew what we they were willing to do to get us back, to purchase us back from sin and death and the grave.

This was always the plan.

It was voluntary.

Jesus, you might say, was like Katniss Everdeen.

He volunteered his tribute and went willingly to this gory death.

Then thirdly, it was vicarious.

You see, the vicarious death of Jesus was not for anything he had done, it was for what we had done.

2 Corinthians says, God made him who knew no sin to be sin for us, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.

It's like what happens when your teacher can't show up at school, students, right?

What happens?

A substitute shows up, and you get nothing done, the entire class, right?

That substitute stands in the place of the teacher.

They're not the teacher, but they stand where the teacher is, they do what the teacher should do.

That was Jesus on the cross.

It wasn't his sin that he was dying for, it wasn't him having done anything wrong.

It was my sin.

It was Levi's sin.

It was your sin.

He didn't just die for you, he died as though he were you.

And God the Father looked at Jesus as though he personally had committed every single sin that we've ever committed or will ever commit.

Why?

So that he could look at you and me and see the righteousness of God in Jesus Christ.

God doesn't even see your sin anymore.

It's been cast into the deepest ocean.

God looks at you and only sees the righteousness of Jesus because when Jesus was hanging on the cross, God looked at him and the Father had to turn his face away because he saw every vial, every horrific thing you and I had ever done.

And this, make no mistake about it, is the reason Jesus did not want to go to the cross.

In the Garden of Gethsemane, he said, Father, if there's any other way, let this cup pass from me.

But not what I want, what you want.

He's saying, I agree with what we planned before, but in my humanity, I don't want to be disconnected from you.

I don't want to experience the horrors of the wrath of God poured out against all unrighteousness.

I don't want to have you turn your face away.

But he was willing to do it for me and for you.

It was vicarious.

And then lastly, of course, it was victorious.

Jesus went into the grave like you and I go into an Airbnb.

Just need it for the weekend.

Hello, somebody.

I mean, how you like me now?

I mean, that is that is strong stuff here.

A borrowed grave.

You can borrow$5, you could borrow someone's truck, but to borrow a grave, those are usually long-term transactions.

You know what I'm saying?

Like, can I just borrow that casket for a few days?

That's punk rock right there, is what that is.

And through this vicious, voluntary, vicarious, and victorious event at the cross, everything truly changed.

No one can change their past, but God can.

At the cross, Jesus changed your past, taking all your sins which were as scarlet and making them white as snow.

The thing that you feel so bad about, I feel so horrible.

God's like, I can't even see it.

All I see is the umbrella of grace over your life.

All I see is the righteousness of my son Jesus.

Your past has been changed.

And check this out your future has been changed.

You were headed to hell, and you're not.

Please feel free to go nuts at any given point that you realize and fathom that you are not going to hell.

And that would be enough.

Simply not going to hell, but there's more.

You're going to heaven, baby.

You're going to walk the streets of gold.

And it won't even be the streets of gold that will make heaven heaven.

It will not be a sea of glass.

It will not be never dying again.

It's going to be being in the presence of Jesus.

It's going to be being with him, not needing faith, not needing a Bible study, just seeing him, whom all your life your soul has craved.

Every person overdosing on drugs, they were looking for Jesus, they didn't know it yet.

Every single time we looked to the ecstasy of pornography, we were looking for Jesus and we didn't know it yet.

He is pleasure.

He is life itself.

To be in his presence, his fullness of joy at his right hand, pleasures evermore.

One kiss from the mouth of Jesus, Teresa of Avila said, could make a thousand lifetimes of suffering seem as though one night in a bad motel.

There is that much goodness in the embrace, in the 10,000 charms in the arms of our Savior.

So your future has been changed, your past has been changed, but here's the part where I think it gets sticky and we forget, and we end up not looking so happy as he means us to be.

Your present is supposed to change to the wilderness years, the time in the middle, the difficult in between.

That's where change happens.

In the present, we are to be walking lives of joy.

Joy, C.

S.

Lewis said, is the serious business of heaven.

And so why would we wait?

Why would we not walk out lives of joy today?

Did you know that the president, if he gets on any plane, it doesn't have to just be the two blue planes the president normally gets on?

If he gets on a Cessna, the tiniest Cessna with two seats, that plane instantly becomes Air Force One?

Why?

Because the commander-in-chief's aboard.

God lives in you.

God lives, God lives in you.

Come on, having a president on board a plane, it takes on a whole new meaning.

It takes on a whole new power.

It takes on a whole new importance.

It takes on a different call sign.

What should the call sign of your life be if the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, the Prince of Peace and the Great I Am, the Alpha and the Omega, the star breather, the one who carried the cosmos and the cross lives in you, Christ, in you, the hope of glory.

Oh, come on, somebody.

Joy, joy, the joy of the Lord is our strength.

Joy, it's been said, should be the flag that flies high from the castle of the heart when the king is in residence there.

Go to Buckingham Palace.

If the king's there, there's a certain flag that's flying.

They take it away when he's not there.

The king comes into the building, flags goes up.

I'm telling you, joy should be the flag over our lives if Jesus is inside our heart.

Come on, let the redeemed of the Lord say.

There should be praise, there should be joy, there should be.

Aslan should never have to say, You do not yet look so happy.

Don't you know what I did for you?

Don't you know your future is secure?

Don't you know your sins have been forgiven?

Where's the joy?

In order to tap into all he has for us, we must understand what he accomplished for us.

So let's look, Isaiah 53, written hundreds of years before the cross would even happen.

And it's not the only messianic prophecy.

We could also turn to Psalm 22, right?

Which is one of the most detailed pictures of crucifixion, which was penned hundreds of years before the Persians even invented crucifixion.

That's God's eight-ball corner pocket sucker, right?

He calls out his moves in advance, so when he does them, we will be able to read it and go, dang, you called your move three moves ahead.

Checkmate.

Isaiah 53.

Surely he has borne our griefs, carried our sorrows.

Yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted.

But he was wounded for our transgressions.

He was bruised for our iniquities.

The chastisement for our peace was upon him.

And by his stripes we are healed.

All we like sheep have gone astray.

We have turned everyone to his own way.

And the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.

In the history of the United States, there have been eight presidents who have died in office.

Four of them have natural causes, four of them through assassination.

But only one of the four who were assassinated actually died, not because of the assassin's bullet, but because of the medical attention and intervention that was given trying to save his life.

We have a photo here on the screen.

This is President Garfield.

It's actually amazing.

He's the last log cabin president, meaning he literally grew up in a log cabin.

He had no reason to think he would ever achieve greatness in his life.

He had to put himself through college by working at the school as a janitor, to sit in the classroom, but then have to clean them up at nighttime.

And then, of course, you know, history had his eyes on him as he rose to the highest office in the land.

But tragically, after only four months as president, he was shot in the back while getting on a train trying to go for a vacation with his family.

Here's an illustration that was depicted in the newspaper of that day, where this man came up from behind him and shot him in the back.

And he managed to live for two more months before succumbing to his wounds.

But interestingly enough, when the autopsy was done, it was determined that the bullet wasn't really what killed him.

Because it avoided his spine and all major organs and cauterized the wound on its way into his body.

It was safely protected by the tissue it was in.

And so had they just left it alone, he likely would have been fine.

It was the doctor that killed him.

In fact, it was the same doctor that tried to save Abraham Lincoln's life that was the attending physician on James Garfield's medical help.

His name was Dr.

Dr.

Bliss.

That's right, his first name was Doctor.

So Dr.

Dr.

Bliss got there to the train station, and over the course of the next two months, everything was done to try and save him.

It's a crazy story.

Alexander Graham Bell, who invented the telephone, also invented the X-ray machine, but he invented the X-ray machine trying to get the bullet out and locate where the bullet was.

That all happened to try and save our president's life.

The Navy engineers were brought in because the Washington, D.C.

summers were so hot, kind of like today in Dallas.

Hello, what's going on?

90 degrees?

Wild, right?

It was 19 when I woke up yesterday in Montana.

I'm not prepared for this emotionally, okay?

You gotta warn a brother before you get so hot and humid.

So Washington, D.C.

summers are famously muggy.

And so Navy engineers actually invented what we know of today as the modern air conditioning unit to try and cool down the White House to make President James Garfield more comfortable during this period.

But the the thing that happened over and over again that actually is what ended up killing him was Dr.

Dr.

Bliss kept sticking his fingers unwashed into the wound, trying to get the bullet out.

Now there was medical understanding of germs at this point, but Dr.

Dr.

Bliss did not believe in bacteria.

He did not believe in germs.

His motto for his surgical units was actually the dirtier the better.

And doctors, like Dr.

Bliss at that time, prided themselves on white medical clothing covered in blood because then patients would see the blood and they would know, you're working really hard, right?

And so with unwashed hands, he repeatedly continued to stick his fingers in this wound.

And of course, a bacterial infection followed.

And uh when President James Garfield died, it was due to sepsis because of the infection.

And the autopsy report said this about the gunshot wound.

It was distinctly survivable.

He would have survived it had he not been touched in the wound with dirty hands.

Now think of it.

President being kept from his destiny, really getting a chance to actually be president.

I mean, he only had a couple months to even get his day his head around the job, and he's his days are cut short.

He ends up dying because of a wound being touched.

It's really the exact opposite of the gospel, isn't it?

Where our great physician invites us to reach out and to touch his wounds, and in touching his wounds, we receive healing.

We receive life where there was we we die, we were dying headed to hell, we're dead in sins, and we end up in heaven, end up in life.

How?

By touching with our dirty, unwashed hands.

Come on, the wounds of Jesus have the power to heal.

The wounds of Jesus and that's why there's so you know, you read the Old Testament, there's all this stuff about unclean, clean.

Is this animal clean?

Is this animal unclean?

Can we eat bacon?

Praise God, we can eat bacon today.

Anybody?

anybody?

We're all about that carnivore diet now.

Had some shrimp for lunch.

Unclean, clean.

Is this person outside the camp?

Can't be ceremonially defiled.

It's all for us to understand something.

The concept of touching the unclean and the unclean defiles the clean.

But not so with Jesus.

He's willing to touch sinners and he's willing to be touched by sinners.

Why?

Because the unclean doesn't make the clean unclean, the clean makes the unclean clean.

His power has his power can heal the leper.

His power can touch the defiled.

He will eat and break bread with tax collectors and prostitutes.

He's willing to sit down with Gentiles.

He's not scared of the Samaritan woman.

He's got no cooties to catch.

He can send his cleanness out.

We normally think about catching a cold or catching our death or catching pneumonia.

Jesus has never been worried about catching your sinfulness, but he knows if he touches you, if he touches you, his righteousness can go through his hand into your into your body, into your into your wound.

His this is crazy.

His wounds have the power to heal ours.

We can receive emotional healing through the cross, and make no mistake about it, that is indeed what we need and what we find.

The cross.

Maybe a provocative statement is not just about forgiveness.

No, of course, we start there.

Yes, there is a fount filled with blood from Emmanuel's veins, and sinners plunged beneath that flood, lose all their guilty stains.

Praise God for forgiveness.

Praise God for the handwriting of requirements being canceled out against us.

Praise God, the Ten Commandments broke and the stone table cracked in two.

Praise God, we don't approach him on the basis of what we do and how are we enough?

And do we measure up?

And have we kept enough commandments?

Like that's over.

It is finished, Jesus said.

The veil in the temple was torn, not from bottom to top, as though we earned our way up, but from top to bottom, because God from the top saw the blood of Jesus on the mercy seat and said, Come on in, on the basis of my son's blood, come on in.

You can be forgiven, you can be whole, you can be.

But forgiveness is just the beginning.

Hear me?

Sermon in a sentence.

And you need both.

And so do I.

Because sin is a traumatic event.

And the traumatic event leaves a process of healing that's needed.

We don't just need the forgiveness side of the cross, we also need the healing that He can bring into our emotions.

You'll notice the passage we turn to, Isaiah 53, does indeed speak about transgressions.

It does speak about iniquity, but it also talks about the cross treating our grief, addressing our sorrow, and bringing about peace or shalom, which is a quality of wholeness inside and outside that can only come about if what is wrong inside of us is set right.

And that is indeed what the great physician intends to do.

And so what I'm saying is that we can receive what we need, emotional healing, through the wounds of Jesus, and that's what Peter echoed.

Peter said, 1 Peter 2, 24, who himself, Jesus, bore our sins in his own body on the tree, that we, having died to sins, might live for righteousness.

And then he says this, by whose stripes you were forgiven.

No, no, that's of course implied.

But forgiveness is just a start.

He says, by whose stripes you were healed.

And so the stripes are, of course, referring to the whip marks across his back, just one part of the crucifixion process that can lead to a process of healing in our lives, spirit, soul, and body.

John 20, 20, notice, after the resurrection, as he spoke, he showed them, look, the wounds in his hands and his side, and they were filled with joy when they saw the Lord.

You are not yet so happy as I mean you to be, Jesus says, perhaps because we're not walking in the joy that will be unleashed in our lives, if we will look at his holes in his hands and the holes in his feet and the wound in his side.

If we look at the wounds of Jesus, we can receive the joy of the Lord to be our strength.

So let's take a closer look at the wounds of Jesus so we can walk in joy.

Let's see, as Isaac Watts said, from his head, his hands, his feet.

Sorrow and love flow mingled down.

Did e'er such love and sorrow meet, or thorns compose so rich a crown.

Seven is the number of places in the body of Jesus where he bled.

It's fitting and appropriate.

Seven is everywhere in Scripture, from the seven days of creation to the seven notes in the musical scale, the seven colors in the visible spectrum of the rainbow, the seven words he spoke from the cross, seven is all across the New Testament, the book of Revelation, seven, of course, is this number of fullness and completion and totality.

So, beloved, there is total healing waiting for you in the wounds of Jesus.

Seven places on his body where he bled.

And what can we find if we will look at them, if we will see them?

And what I what I just felt God telling me today was like the miracle in 2 Kings chapter 4, where the Shunamite's son died, and Elisha, the man of God, stretched his body out on the boy, hand to hand, foot to foot, head to head, heart to heart.

2 Kings 4 · chapter mention

Then the boy became warm, then the boy began to move, then the boy was healthy, as though nothing had ever happened to him.

I believe if we will stretch our bodies out on the body of Jesus, come on, head to head, hand to hand, heart to heart, feet to feet, we can experience, we can sink up with him and let his healing touch the parts of our hearts and lives that are dis-eased, diseased, parts of us where we're not walking in the ease, the wholeness, the rightness, the head-to-toe vitality, where from the top of our head to the sole of our feet we are blessed in Jesus' name, blessed to be a blessing.

So jot them down as they come, because there are seven and two of them are hands and feet.

We'll have two pairs, but each of the things can unleash healing if we will touch them.

Number one, Jesus longs to heal your distorted thoughts.

Your distorted thoughts.

And it comes from the blood that flowed from his head, where he wore a crown of thorns for you.

The text is Mark 15, 17, and they clothed him with purple, and they twisted a crown of thorns and put it on his head, with two-inch long spikes.

Can you think of it?

Being crushed down with a staff upon the brow of Jesus, the wounds, the wounded head of Jesus, such a symbolic, fitting gesture.

As in the book of Genesis, we are told that thorns came upon this world as a result of sin.

And so here Jesus is wearing the crown of thorns so that you and I could wear the crown of life.

And the wounds of the head of Jesus, I believe we can find what we need to ease the discomfort that comes from the distortion of thoughts in our lives.

They say 500 times every 16 hours, a negative thought runs through the average person's mind.

Each one lasting about 14 seconds.

But if you add that up, that's about two hours per day in negative thinking, intrusive kind of thinking, low-level kind of thinking.

And that's why from the beginning to the end, the Bible talks so much about the power of our thought life.

As a man thinks in his heart, so he you have to take control of your thoughts, set your mind on things above.

Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus.

So much of the misery that we experience comes from the kind of thinking, the stinking thinking and the rotten feeling that creeps in from the thoughts that we allow into our minds that are not thoughts from above.

The thoughts from above are where every good and perfect gift comes from.

Thoughts that are to prosper you, to give you a future and a hope.

These are thoughts that are thinking about things that are good and helpful and praiseworthy and noble and of good report.

No, I'm talking about the thoughts that are earthly, sensual, demonic, where it's all just about us and woe is me, and no one notices me.

And what about me?

And what about mine?

This kind of thinking needs to be crucified.

This kind of thinking needs to be healed by putting on your yourself, the mind of Christ.

Sin always starts in your mind.

Every sinful action begins inside your head.

And that's why scripture says that when God flooded the world, it was because every thought of man's imagination was continually only evil.

And similarly, if we want to walk in the victorious life where Jesus wants us to exist and to be, we have to choose to set our mind on things above.

We have to allow him to heal our distorted thoughts.

Number two, we need to have Jesus heal betrayals sting.

Betrayals sting.

Of course, I'm talking now about the bloodied back of Jesus.

The second wound that we know he received came from the Roman flagellum, where he was whipped repeatedly across the back with the cat of nine tails.

A wooden handle with long 18-inch long straps of leather, with at which which at the end there would be little bits of bone or bits of metal or bits of glass embedded.

And a professional ex uh torturer would whip the back repeatedly with Jesus' hands tied up above his head, so that his back muscles and skin would be tight like a drum.

And over and over again, the back would be whipped, exposing muscle, exposing soft tissue, Jesus's stripes across his back.

I believe they have the power to heal us.

From what?

From the people who have turned their back on us.

The ways that we've experienced betrayal and how it stings to have someone put a knife in our back, to have counted on someone who we thought would be there, or counted on someone to be who we thought they were, to be let down by someone we trusted or someone we needed, even if it wasn't their their choosing to have a father and mother abandon us by divorce or abandon us by death or by just simply not being there in the way that we need them to be there.

And we can end up with these wounds that we accumulate with an abandonment mentality where we don't trust anybody because someone we trusted deeply let us down and wasn't there.

And so our guard is always up, and we have almost this mentality of if I run out on you, you can't run out on me.

And so we're just at the first sign of conflict, the first sign of trouble.

We're gonna be the one to quit.

We're gonna be the one to leave the relationship because we have trust issues.

We have eventually a victim mentality, and what we need to experience is the healing that can come from the God who never goes away, from the God who will never leave you, the God who will never turn his back on you, who was willing to have his back bloodied to forever.

Listen to me, have your back.

He will always be there with for you, he will never leave you, he will never abandon you.

Lo, I am always with you, Jesus said, to the end of the age.

And so, what do we need to access the healing in our back?

We need, we crave time on our knees.

You know, even secular research is saying we need to kneel more.

The male clinic, listen to this, the male clinic has this report where they say, it seems, and I love the language, humans weren't designed to sit in chairs all day.

And I'm just wondering, designed by who?

The human body wasn't designed, we'll just allow that, leave that there for a moment, to sit in a chair all day.

You see, back in the day we would bend over fires, we would bend over a bowl, we would we'd have to be kneeling and squatting all the time.

But know in America, we sit in these plush, comfortable chairs all the time, where the posterior chain, which goes from your calves all the way to the traps at the top of your head.

So everything up your back, your glutes, your hamstrings, uh, your your your your entire posterior chain, your largest muscle group in your body, it's basically it goes slack when you sit in a comfortable chair.

But light kneeling, like I'm doing right now, it causes everything from my calves to the top of my head, literally head to toe, for there to be a using of these muscles.

And when you don't use a muscle, you lose a muscle.

It begins to atrophy.

And get this, some of you are gonna start kneeling when you pray.

Just when I tell you this, it seems when we activate the posterior chain, medical science says anti-aging chemicals are released into the bloodstream.

The report that was published in a book called The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter, put it this way.

We humans bloom through movement, and we were made to kneel.

So, what happens when we get down on our knees?

We listen to the Holy Spirit crying out, Abba Father, and all of the abandonment issues and daddy issues that we accumulate on this world from those who have turned their backs on us and stabbed us in the back, all of a sudden they're healed by Abba Father, who's always saying, Son, I love you, daughter, I love you.

I'm pleased in you, I delight in you.

Just like I delight in my two daughters in the front of a row.

I love them.

They they I adore them.

So your father wants to dote on you.

This will heal the pain in your back.

Number three, for both our left and right hands, we find him able to heal the lies and labels, the lies and labels.

Okay?

What happens in a courtroom?

You have to raise your right hand and tell the truth.

I swear to God to tell the truth.

We need Jesus to heal what deception has done to us on the inside.

We've all told lies, we've all raised our hand, promising one thing, but we've been duplicitous.

And every time we lie, it becomes easier for us to be deceived by our own lies.

And there's been damage done to us on the inside.

We eventually end up not even knowing our which of our version of ourselves are we?

Because sin splits yourself in two.

How did the man end up calling himself Legion?

Because he was many, one sin at a time.

Divided divided, division, right?

The disintegration of your own self.

And Jesus wants to heal it.

And that's why his right hand had a nail go right through it.

And from the blood of his right hand, he can take hold of yours and he can help you to be united on the inside.

David said, Unite my heart to fear your name.

I don't want to have a version of me waiting, wondering, did they find out what I did?

Had they looked into this?

Are they gonna do I did I clear my internet history after my late-night porn session?

No, I just want to have an upright heart before you, God.

I just want to have one heart.

Give me a clean heart by your Holy Spirit, God.

I want the deception to be healed, the lying to stop.

But we also need the left hand addressed.

The left hand, the left hand, the left hand.

You know there's left-handed people in the Bible, multiple different left-handed people.

And every single time they're identified as being left-handed, they're from the tribe of Benjamin.

Every left-handed person in the Bible, look, test me on this, is from the tribe of Benjamin.

Do you know what Benjamin means?

Son of my right hand.

In the biblical times, it was thought to be an embarrassment to be left-handed.

And I think a lot of us have had labels put on us that we're not enough the way we are.

That we're broken, that we're unwanted in some way.

And God wants to heal the left-handed parts of us where we pretend we're not who we are, we're pretend we're not what God made us to be.

And we believe the lies that if we were different, if we were gifted like them, if we were more like her, that we would be lovable.

And God says, I love you just the way you are.

Let me heal your left hand.

The most powerful left-handed person in the Bible was Ehud, and God used his left hand to kill King Eglon and deliver the children of Israel from the Midianite oppression.

Now, no one wanted to be left-handed.

They looked at it as a disability in that day.

But God looks at what the world says is your disability, and he says, It's my ability.

I'm gonna use that area.

I'm gonna use your uniqueness.

I'm gonna use the fact that you're different.

Listen to me.

What makes you weird also makes you wonderful in Jesus' name.

God doesn't wish you were more like somebody else.

He made you fearfully and wonderfully just like you are to walk in his unique plan for your God.

Come on, someone, let the Lord heal your left hand.

Lies and labels, and then troubles and triggers.

Jesus, heal us from the trouble we've gotten ourselves into when our feet have wandered from your path.

Prone to wander?

Lord, I feel it.

Prone to leave the God I love.

Why does the Bible call us sheep?

Because we are.

We get off path, we we think we know better.

So much of the trouble we end up in is us chasing what we already have.

Like the serpent says to Eve, you could be like God if you eat the fruit.

Girl, you could never be more like God than you are right now.

She tried to get what was already hers, and we do the same thing.

We go chasing after what's already ours in Christ in a far better way.

God needs to heal us from the troubles our feet have wandered into, and thankfully the nail went through Jesus' left and right foot as well.

And what about the triggers?

So many of the triggers, the things that trigger us, are connected to troubles we faced.

Troubles we faced because of our sin and troubles we face because of someone else's sin.

And we can end up traumatized because of unpleasant associations because of places our feet have taken us.

I think about Peter.

Moments after his feet were washed by Jesus, he ends up denying him three times.

What associations would kick in every time his feet were washed for the rest of his life, which happened at every dinner party, every place he went to, there would be a foot washing.

A servant would wash the feet.

It was normal, it was normative.

And so now he has to, for the rest of his life, associate his feet with his failure.

And I don't know what it is for you, the certain smell, the certain place that takes you right back to your worst moment, and shame begins to speak, and all of a sudden your your Christian witness goes mute.

God wants to deal with your triggers.

How?

Through the feet of Jesus.

How did Jesus deal with Peter's traumatic association with the smell of smoke, which he was smelling when Jesus, when he denied Jesus?

Jesus made a fire and cooked him breakfast.

So the smell of smoke would be in his nose when Jesus said, Do you love me?

Because I love you, do you love me?

Because I love you, do you love me?

Because I love you.

Now go feed my sheep.

I'm not I'm not quitting on you, I still love you.

And then Peter knew and had the sense to fall at Jesus' feet.

He plunged into the lake.

He swam even though he didn't need to, the boat was heading there.

All right?

And yet he plunged into the sea, having put on his outer garment.

What is the what is what is the matter with this guy?

Who puts on a jacket to jump into a lake?

It doesn't matter.

He just needed to get to the feet of Jesus.

And if you will get to the feet of Jesus, he will deal with your troubles, he will deal with your triggers.

You let him sort that out.

Well, how can I ever face it?

Let him worry about it.

Just get to the feet of Jesus.

Troubles, triggers, lies, labels, distorted thoughts, the sting of betrayal.

Lastly, he wants to heal your broken heart.

Our broken hearts.

For even after Jesus died, he continued to bleed.

For the soldier stuck a rib, a spear between his ribs.

And blood mixed with water flowed out.

A river of healing for a world of heartbreak.

And all of us are going to experience griefs and pains and hardship and sorrow.

All of us going through hard things can get traumatized by those things.

If I'm being completely honest with you, this is one of the most difficult years of my life.

Losing my father last Easter.

It was on Good Friday that his doctors told us he had days to live and may not make it through the weekend.

And to be a whole year without my best friend, without my father, without that place of strength, I'm confident.

I think about calling him every day.

My heart's still broken.

A tattoo artist once told me, tattoos only take a couple weeks to get to heal in a superficial way.

But it takes a lot longer than that to get to deep healing.

Because when Jesus showed up, what did he say to Thomas?

Stick your hand in the hole in my side.

The invitation this good Friday is for you to do the same, to take your pain, to join me taking my pain, to take our grief, to say, God, I'm hurting right now.

To take that pain and put it into the hole in Jesus' side.

And when we reach in there, we will be able to do what he said.

But do not be unbelieving.

Watch me heal.

It won't be quick.

It won't be in a moment, but watch me keep coming back, keep coming back to my my heart's.

The blood for you.

You watch as I bring you resurrection joy.

It's not a betrayal for you to heal.

It doesn't dishonor the person you miss, it honors them.

You can be connected to them through the healing just as much as you want to stay connected to them through the pain.

Now you going through this list of seven places where Jesus bled, seven areas in your life that Jesus wants to heal, you might be thinking, but you, you have no idea how much of a mess I am.

How could he heal me?

How could he touch me?

How could he bring me to joy?

How could I ever dance again?

Oh, you don't have a clue how much your father loves you.

My daughter Clover, who's here and I were once on the beach picking up seashells.

And she was finding all these seashells, and I couldn't find any.

I was like, I can't, all that I see is broken fragments of seashells.

Her bag was full.

She goes, Daddy, why don't you pick up any?

And I go, honey, I can't find any good ones.

She looked down at her bag, which was full of fragments as I could tell, and looked up at me, and she said, Daddy, broken seashells are beautiful too.

Father, we thank you for your love.

We thank you for your kindness to us.

We thank you that we're going in your bag.

To you, we're keepers.

You have set your love upon us.

And I thank you for that love.

I thank you for that kindness.

I thank you for that grace.

I thank you for what it's like to live with your light on us.

Come on, if you're here tonight, every location, church online, overflow rooms, and you would say there's parts of me that aren't as happy as God means for me to be.

My thoughts, my hands, my my feet, my heart.

I need that healing.

Can I just ask you to raise a hand up?

Raise a hand up.

Come on, we're stretching out on you, Jesus.

Hand to hand, head to head, mouth to mouth.

Thank you for the warmth that's flowing through your touch.

Thank you for your spirit.

Thank you for healing.

Thank you for taking off the spirit of heaviness and giving us a garment of praise.

Thank you, God.

You're taking off the ashes.

You're putting on anointing oil.

The robe on our shoulders, the ring on our finger.

We're do we hear it?

The music, the music from the feast.

We don't deserve it.

He says, I know.

You never did.

I still love you.

Thank you, Father.

You can put your hands down.

I want to now invite anybody who's here and you've never given your heart to Jesus.

You know things about the Bible, you know things about even the cross, but you've never trusted Jesus for salvation.

As we continue to pray, heads bowed and eyes closed, let me tell you that the Bible says that Jesus stands at the door of your heart and he knocks.

He knocks with his nail-scarred hands.

And if you open the door, he will come in.

Forgive you and heal you and dine with you, eat with you, become one with you.

Forgive you, yes, but then begin the journey of healing and freedom and peace.

If that's you I'm describing, and you would say, I need to give my life to Christ, I need to be set free, I need to be saved.

Today needs to be my day.

Let me tell you really simply, you need to believe in what He did for you on the cross and rising from the dead.

You need to turn from your sins, accepting his sacrifice and choosing to turn away from your sins.

It's what the Bible calls repentance.

You need to be willing to do it publicly.

Jesus said you need to be willing to follow me before people, and I'll acknowledge you before my father in heaven.

But he said, if you deny me before people, I'll deny you before my father in heaven, and you need to be willing to do it now.

Why now?

Because we don't have any guarantee we'll ever live another Easter, to see another Easter, another year, another service.

You could say, Well, I'll get right with God when I'm older.

You don't know that you live to be older.

The life that you're living is a vapor.

It's here now, but it will soon be gone.

So if you sense the Holy Spirit drawing you to the Father, the Bible says no one can come when they want to.

You can only come as the Father draws you.

Then today's the day, and now's the time to open your heart to Jesus.

So if that's you I'm describing, you say, I want to give my heart to Christ, leave.

I'm ready.

Today's the day for me.

Now's the time.

Would you just raise your hand up in the air?

Raise it up right where you are.

I'm giving my life to Jesus.

God bless you, and God bless you over here.

Hands going up over here, over here in the middle.

God sees you.

God sees you over here and over here and in the balcony.

God sees you all across the overflow.

We're praising God for the new life.

We're praising God for the new life.

Okay, you can put your hands down.

Come on, eyes up here, eyes up here.

Everyone stand up for a moment.

Everybody stand up.

If you just raise up your hand, I want you to get out of your seat and come to the front right now so I can pray with you.

Just get out and come.

Don't wait for someone else to come and break the ice.

This is your soul.

This is your decision.

Just come up here to the front.

Let me pray with you.

Every location, come up to the front.

Just make your way up here.

Come on, it's not about what someone else thinks watching you.

This is your decision to follow Jesus.

Come on up to the front.

We're gonna wait.

I'm gonna pray with you when you get here.

Come up now.

Praise God.

Praise God.

Just get up and come.

Just get up and come.

Come up to the front.

We're so excited for each of you making this decision.

Best decision you will ever make in your entire life.

Just leave your seat.

Let me pray with you.

Come.

Come on, let's just let's just continue to celebrate and pray.

God's doing work in hearts and lives.

Anyone else, you need to come?

Praise God for you, sister.

Praise God for you right there.

God wants to save those of you online.

You can make this decision as well.

We're just gonna wait a moment longer.

Anyone else need to come?

You need to you need to come to the fountain.

Come immerse yourself in the fountain.

Praise God.

Some of you right now are going, I know I need to make this decision.

I need to make this decision.

But you're wondering what will the people around you think?

Well, first of all, that doesn't matter.

But second of all, here's what they're gonna think.

They're gonna think you're making the best decision you've ever made in your life.

So you come, come, we'll wait just a moment longer.

If you need to get right with God, get out of your seat and come up here.

Anybody else?

Praise God for you.

Amazing, praise God for you both right there.

Amazing.

Come on, there's no greater miracle than someone who was dead coming to life in Christ.

Praise God for each of you.

You know, I have a good friend.

He got saved.

He was the last person to come forward at the invitation.

The last person, he almost didn't do it.

And I just I just look at all that God's done in his life and I wonder who's that last person who needs to be here?

You need to get out of your seat and come.

Is there anybody else?

We'll wait for you just a moment longer.

Praise God for you.

Amen.

Everybody else.

All right, for each of you at every location making this decision.

First of all, we're so honored we get to be here as this happens in your life.

It's such a joy to be witnesses to this great moment.

I'm gonna lead you in a prayer.

I want you to pray out loud to God after me.

We're all gonna pray it with you because this isn't about like the right words.

It's about you trusting in Jesus and us just cheering you on into the family of God.

Amen.

Okay, so pray this with me.

Let's pray together.

Dear God, please come into my heart.

Make it your home.

Thank you for the cross.

Thank you for the resurrection.

Thank you for the healing you want in my life.

Be my Lord and my Savior in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen.

Come on, praise God for each of these making this decision.

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.