Redemption: God's Story (July 23rd, 2017) - Daniel Meyer

And it's so good to be back with you.

Different location, but same people, right?

The church is not the building, the church is the people.

And so it is so good to be with you again.

Um, I went to New Market High, and this was actually a rival high school of ours, so it was a little bit shaky on if I was gonna come.

I'm just joking.

But I'm glad to be with you uh this morning.

Today we have a wonderful task.

We are going through the entire Bible.

All right.

I read online that it takes about 70 hours and 40 minutes to read it cover to cover.

So if we start now, we can finish up next week.

You guys don't like humor.

I'm just joking.

We'll get through this really quick, okay?

So we're going through the entire Bible this morning.

So if you want to get ready, go to Genesis 1 verse 1.

Genesis 1:1

Genesis 1 verse 1.

Genesis 1:1

So why are we doing this today?

Why are we doing this?

Because usually when we preach, and I know when Mike is preaching, we usually pick one passage of scripture and we kind of dive deep into that passage and we see what that passage has for us.

We see what it says about who God is, what it meant to the people at the time, and what it means for us today.

What how does it apply to our lives today?

And that's usually what we do in preaching, and that's good, and that's usually what we should do.

But every now and then it's good to just kind of take a step back.

Take a step, maybe I should take a step back, take a step back and see what the overarching theme is in all of Scripture.

What's the story from beginning to end?

What is God telling us through all of these little stories?

And you can think of so many stories in Scripture, I'm sure.

You can simply just look at uh Noah, Moses, Jonah, Daniel, Paul, um, Esther, Ruth, um, King David.

I mean, there's just so many good stories, but all of them are pointing to one grand narrative.

Sometimes we can get a little too close to the trees that we don't see the whole forest.

And so we want to take a look at this theme, and I think that this theme is redemption.

Redemption from beginning to end, redemption.

We need to know this because honestly, I think it'll change the way we do missions.

I think it'll change the way we think.

I think really, how can we know what we're to do or where we're going if we don't know where we've been?

How can we really appreciate the work of Christ on the cross if we don't know what it took to get him there?

And so we are going to go through the whole Bible.

When I was in school, probably grade three or four, and maybe you learned this too, they taught you how to write a short story.

Do you remember this?

And they give you five key elements to any good story.

And I'm sure any book you've read, that's any good, or any movie you've watched, has these five key elements.

Um, the first one is exposition.

You remember this?

The exposition of a story is kind of setting the scene of where the story takes place.

It's introducing us to the characters of the story and lets us know the world that the story is in.

The second part of a good story is the rising action.

Maybe things are starting to click a little bit more.

Get your head in your grade three brain, okay?

The rising action of the story.

There's a big conflict that happens, and then we start to see the results of that conflict, and the anticipation rises, and the story kind of crescendos up to the climax.

And at the climax, the hero of the story has a great victory, there's a great battle, there's a fight, or there's an epiphany, he realizes something, and then it leads into the fourth part, the falling action of the story.

And in the falling action of the story, it's the result of the climax, then we lead to the conclusion.

And so this is how I see, honestly, the word of God set up.

This is how God tells a story, and he is the master storyteller.

And so we start out in Genesis 1.1 with the exposition of our story, and it's this that Jesus is the creator.

Jesus the creator in the exposition of our story.

So if you're not there yet, Genesis 1.1, let's take a look at what the Word of God says.

It says this In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

The earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the water.

So quickly we learn two things right away.

We see where this story takes place.

Heavens and earth are created.

This is the place of the story, and we're introduced to God, the major player in this story.

If you flip over to John in the New Testament, uh chapter 1, verse 3, we learn that this creator is Jesus Christ.

It says this in John 1.3, it says, All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.

You see, Jesus is the creator.

Jesus is the one that speaks everything into existence.

There was nothing, and then there was everything.

There wasn't a little bit of darkness, and then it got lighter.

No, no, there was nothing, and then there was everything.

God takes six days and he creates everything in the world.

He creates the stars in the sky, the sun, the moon, uh, the seas, the land.

He creates the birds in the air, the fish in the seas, the animals on the land, the trees, the grass, everything that's beautiful, the rocks, the vegetation, the fruit.

He creates absolutely everything.

And then on the sixth day, he does something really cool.

He creates man and woman.

And he does it a little bit different, though.

And we see uh in, especially in Genesis chapter 2, uh, he breathes into his creation.

Genesis 2 · chapter mention

Instead of just speaking them into existence, he breathes them into existence and he creates them in his own image.

Do you know what that means when you create he's created in you're created in his image?

It means that, just like my son, who looks a lot like me, he's in my image.

He isn't me, but he looks like me, rather than a dog who doesn't look like me.

Or maybe you think he does look like me, but the dog is not like me.

And so my son is in my image, but the dog is not in my image.

And just like that, God creates man and woman in his image.

And he puts them in the garden of Eden.

And so the scene is set.

We have our major characters of the story.

Um, God, of course, who's Jesus creating all things, and man and woman, and things are perfect.

There's harmony, there's peace, there's joy.

Um, just imagine, put yourself in this position.

Put yourself in the garden just for a moment.

No sin, uh, nothing hindering your relationship with God, nothing getting in the way of your prayer life, um, no jealousy, no hatred, nothing.

Imagine the best day of your life, multiply it by infinity, and we're almost there.

What it might have been like in the garden, really, really good days.

And sometimes I think we wish that the Bible would just end at the end of two, Genesis chapter two, and we were just there, but we have 1,187 chapters to still go through, so we better get moving.

We see here that Jesus is the creator, and then we move into the rising action of this story.

And from Genesis 3, you want to flip over to Genesis 3 all the way to the end of Malachi, which is the end of the Old Testament, it takes up the majority of our story.

In my Bible, that's the Old Testament, from Genesis 3 to the end of Malachi about, and that's the bulk of this story.

This is where most things take place.

Just like in any good story, it's rising in anticipation.

There's there's things that are happening that are pulling us forward.

What's going to happen?

What's going to come?

God is the master storyteller, and he tells it so well.

Right at the beginning of Genesis 3, we are introduced to a new character.

The serpent.

Remember that guy?

The serpent?

We learn in Revelation 12, verse 9, that this serpent is the devil, that this is Satan himself coming into the garden and deceiving the man and the woman.

Revelation 12:9

Things go downhill really, really fast from paradise.

God had put man and woman in the garden and said to them, You can have anything in the garden, but don't eat of the tree of knowledge and good and evil.

Don't eat of that tree, or you surely will die.

Well, the serpent comes to the woman and says, Did God really say that?

He he deceives her and she sees the fruit and it's desirable to her, so she takes it and she eats of it.

And she gives it to her husband who eats of it, who was with her.

And in that moment, something incredibly terrible happens.

We can read past that scripture so fast, but the reality is in that moment there was a cosmic disaster.

The man and woman were separated from God.

They had allowed sin to enter their lives.

Sin enters human history, and we see the big issue, the big problem, the big um disaster at the beginning of our rising action.

They've separated themselves from God.

God can no longer be in their presence.

Instead of worshiping their creator, they want to be like God.

So they run.

Do you remember this?

They run and they and they hide and they clothe themselves and they hide from God as He's coming near them.

And God asks them, Why are you hiding?

and they go, We've realized we're naked.

Who told you you were naked?

God sees that they've sinned, but they feel the shame of their sin.

And I know everyone in this room can relate to that.

Because we've all sinned.

We've all felt the shame of our sin.

I know I have in my own life.

I know this because of me, but I also know it because I have a two and a half year old.

And uh just a couple weeks ago, um, I'm opening up the fridge, right, to get him some milk.

Open up the fridge, and you know the doors inside the or the the um shelves inside the door of the refrigerator?

Well, he's about this tall and he starts hanging off the door um uh off the shelf.

And I say, Levi, don't do that.

And he does it, Levi, don't do that.

And I turn around and I grab the milk, and sure enough, poof.

And I turn around and he's broken the shelf.

It's just it's a disaster.

And he looks at me stunned.

He's upset because he knows he did something wrong, and then mom takes him up to his room, and then daddy comes to talk to him.

And I come into the room and Levi sit on my lap.

And he wants to move past us really quick, right?

He just wants to get back to playing.

So he goes, Levi broke, he can't pronounce his own name, but Levi, he says Lili.

So he goes, Levi broke last.

Lili, listen, Daddy.

And he just wants to go off and start playing.

I'm like, Levi, look at me.

Look at me in the eyes.

And he's like, trying to avoid eye contact at all costs.

Why?

Because he feels the shame.

Why?

Because he knows what he did was wrong.

He he knows that his father told him to do something, and he did the opposite.

He feels it, Adam and F, Adam and Eve felt it, and we feel it still to this day.

So God starts to hand out punishments.

And we go over to Genesis 3, and in verse 14, he first goes to the serpent and he starts saying that you're going to be cursed above all livestock.

And then in verse 15, he says something really quite remarkable.

Genesis 3, 15.

If this isn't underlined in your Bible, I would suggest you underline it.

It says this I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and her offspring.

He shall bruise your head and you shall bruise his heel.

What's he saying there?

What's he saying there?

He says, between the serpent, between Satan and mankind, there is going to be conflict.

There's enmity between them.

There's going to be this big issue.

But from her offspring, one day, someone will come that will crush the enemy.

God lays out the promise of Jesus Christ before he even gives the punishment to man and woman.

The plan of redemption is spoken.

God sets out his plan for what he is going to do.

He will come and he will bruise your head.

Or you could translate it, crush your head.

One day things will be made right.

The man and the woman, they cannot do it.

I will have to send someone, and one day he will crush your head.

God lays out the punishment from the man and the woman, kicks them out of the garden, and through Genesis 3, 4, and 5, and into 6, we see that corruption on earth is spreading.

In fact, in Genesis 6, it says that the violence was so bad that God regretted that he had made man.

So he seeks to destroy mankind.

He just seeks to destroy his creation, and he does.

He sends a flood to wipe out everything.

But before he does that, he calls Noah.

Remember the story of Noah?

He calls him and he says, Bring your wife, your three sons, and their wives, and a bunch of animals on this big boat, the Ark, and I will save you from the flood.

The flood waters come and Noah is saved from the flood.

And even in that story, even in that story, God is pointing us forward, pointing us forward, because one day God will come and judge the world, and Jesus will save those who are is and carry them through the judgment to safety.

Jesus will be the last Noah.

So Noah lands on dry ground and people start spreading out all over the world.

And through Genesis, um, up to Genesis 11, we see the Tower of Babel and we see people going out and creating civilizations, and then in Genesis 12, God calls Abram, who is renamed Abraham.

And in Genesis 12, God gives another amazing promise.

And just to put this into historical context, at this time when God calls Abram, there are already the pyramids in Egypt.

So civilization is happening.

There is people out there going about their business.

Lots of things are happening, and God calls Abram.

And in Genesis 12, read it for yourself.

Genesis 12 says that through Abram, God will bless all the families of the earth.

God will bless all the families of the earth.

From the time of Adam to Abraham is 2,000 years.

2,000 years, and God made a promise, and now he says it's getting more specific.

It's getting more specific.

Through Abraham, through you, I will bless all the families of the earth.

Abraham has a son, Isaac, the son of promise.

Isaac has a son, Jacob.

Jacob grows up, his name is changed to Israel, and he has 12 sons, the 12 tribes of Israel.

I know that Mike just preached through the story of Joseph, is that right?

And so you probably know this better than I do, but Joseph, the second youngest son, gets sold into slavery by his brothers.

And we're coming through the end of Genesis now, and he gets sold into slavery by his brothers, and he ends up in Egypt.

He ends up in Egyptian prison.

And by God's grace, God raises him up to be second in command over all of Egypt.

Through famine and some circumstance, he's reunited with his brothers.

There's reconciliation, and all of Israel, and all that is Israel's, moves into Egypt and settles in the land of Goshen.

And there they are, living together again.

And in Genesis 49, I want you to flip over there to Genesis 49, key passage in Scripture.

We see another promise by God.

Jacob, who is Israel, is lying on his deathbed and he's handing out the blessings to his children.

And so for his first three sons, Reuben, Simeon, and Levi, because of sin in their lives and violence, they kind of have foregone the blessing.

And so the blessing lands on his fourth child, Judah.

And in Genesis 49, verse 8, it says, Judah, your brothers shall praise you.

Genesis 49:8

Your hand shall be on the neck of your enemies.

Your father's sons shall bow down before you.

Judah is a lion's cub.

From the prey, my son, you have gone up.

He stooped down, he crouched as a lion, and as a lioness, who dares rouse him?

And in verse 10, we see something very remarkable.

Check this out.

So what's a scepter?

Who holds a scepter?

A king.

A king holds a scepter.

And so what is Israel doing saying that his son, um, there will be a scepter that will eternally hold, or a person that will eternally hold a scepter.

There will be this king.

He's living in another man's land.

He doesn't even have his own kingdom.

Who is he to give this out?

But it goes on, he says, nor the ruler staff from between his feet until tribute comes to him, and to him shall be the obedience of all peoples.

Israel is foreshadowing the coming of Christ.

What will happen through the line of Judah?

One day there will be a king.

One day there will be a king where the scepter will not be removed from his hand, and the obedience of all people will be under him.

From the promise given in Genesis 3 to the calling of Abraham, and now more specifically through his great-grandson Judah.

The promise will continue.

The suspense is rising.

The story thickens.

God is building this anticipation.

Who, who will come?

Who will come and give us relief?

Who will come and give us relief from this sin?

One day, one day, someone will come and the scepter will not depart from him.

This leads us to the end of Genesis and into the book of Exodus, chapter one.

And in Exodus chapter one, there's actually hundreds of years of history in Exodus, just chapter one.

And what happens is Joseph and his brothers and his dad, they've all died, and now their offspring is multiplying in the land of Egypt.

And a few hundred years pass, and there's a new king in town, a new pharaoh who takes over Egypt.

And he doesn't know Joseph.

He doesn't know what he did for his kingdom.

And he sees the Israelites and he fears them because they're great in number and they're doing very well in his society.

And so he puts them to hard labor.

In fact, he he puts them to hard labor and he tries to kill all of the male sons.

He tries this twice, and on the second time, he succeeds, except for one little boy named Moses.

Remember Moses?

Well, God raises up Moses to lead his people out of slavery, out of Egypt.

If you read Exodus 1 through about 15, you see these amazing stories of what God did to bring his people out of the land of Egypt.

God does this and he leads them into the wilderness with the promise of the promised land.

All of these Israelites with Moses as the leader, and God gives Moses the law.

Do you remember the Ten Commandments?

Well, there was actually about 613 laws that God gave to Moses and to the people.

And even in these laws that are given, we see the promise of a Messiah.

Have you ever tried to fulfill the law?

It's impossible.

It's impossible.

We cannot fulfill the law.

In fact, in Romans 7 7, we learn that the law wasn't to make us righteous.

The law was actually to point out that we are sinful.

The law didn't create righteousness in us, it just showed us that we don't meet the mark.

We cannot live up to God's standard.

We cannot make ourselves righteous.

We cannot make ourselves holy.

And so God put this system in place, the sacrificial system.

And the Israelites would have to slaughter lambs, goats, and bulls and their blood to atone for their sins.

But none of that blood saved them.

None of that blood forgave their sins.

It was just pointing forward.

It was pointing forward to the one person that would come through the line of Judah that we now know, who would fulfill the law, who would be the perfect sacrifice, and would die for the forgiveness of the sins of the world.

The law didn't save us, it pointed out that we need Jesus.

In fact, in 1 Samuel 15, 22, it says, Has the Lord much delight in burnt offerings or sacrifices as he does in obeying the voice of the Lord?

It was about obedience.

And in Isaiah 1.11 it says, I do not delight in the blood of bulls, lambs, or goats.

No, no, no.

Pointing forward to the Messiah, to Christ who is and will come.

Christ would be that sacrifice.

God is building his story.

God is laying out the suspense.

Who will come?

Who will come?

It was from the line of Eve, it was through Abraham, and it was specifically through Judah.

Who is this king?

Who will come?

Well, Moses dies at the end of Deuteronomy.

Deuteronomy literally means the second telling of the law.

He's laying out for the Israelites what they are to do.

And he dies, and then Joshua takes over.

Joshua, his second in command, takes over and leads the people of Israel into the promised land.

And if you read the book of Joshua, which comes right after Deuteronomy, if you read that book, you'll see the amazing things that God did to defeat the people in the promised land to give it to the Israelites.

Joshua dies, and that generation dies, and we move into the time of the judges.

And the time of the judges, which comes right after Joshua, is a period of 350 years.

350 years.

And if you read through Judges, there's amazing stories in there too.

Do you remember the story of Ehud or Gideon and his 300 men?

Or Samson, the really strong guy?

Great stories to share with your kids and show them the Bible and just amazing stories of God's grace and provision and the sinfulness of man as well.

Amazing stories.

One of my favorite books of the Bible is Judges.

Also the book of Ruth is written in that time frame as well.

So at the end of 350 years, the people cry out to their prophet Samuel.

And they say to Samuel, Give us a king.

Give us a king.

We want to be like other nations.

Give us a king.

And Samuel and God says through Samuel, You don't want a king.

You don't want a man ruling over you.

He will oppress you.

And they say, Give us a king, give us a king.

And so God relents and he puts in place the first kingdom.

Of Israel, Saul.

And we move into 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel.

The first king of Saul, uh, the first king of Israel is Saul.

He reigns for 40 years.

He does, though, what is evil in the sight of the Lord, and God kills him in battle, him and his sons.

And God raises up David, King David.

And David becomes the second king of Israel and reigns for forty years.

And David writes some pretty amazing things.

If you do your devotions sometimes, maybe in the book of Psalms, he wrote most of the book of Psalms, not all of it, but most of it, and he writes about this coming king.

Not himself, but looking forward to this perfect king that would come.

I'll give you a couple passages out of the Psalms that he wrote about this coming king.

In Psalm 2, he says, He will be begotten by God, and we should take refuge in him.

In Psalm 23, it says, He is the shepherd who restores the soul and leads his people in paths of righteousness.

In Psalm 51, it says, He washes us clean with his blood, that we may be whiter than snow.

In Psalm 91, it says, The angels obey him and would come at his aid, but instead he bears the cup of God's wrath.

In Psalm 110 it says, He is a priest forever in the order of Melchizedek, and will sit at the right hand of God, and enemies are his footstool.

In 119, it says, He is the word of God incarnate and the only lamp for our path.

This is written 1000 years before the time of Christ.

From Adam to Abraham was 2,000 years, from Abraham to David was 1,000 years.

And David was 1,000 years before Christ.

So David has a son, Solomon.

Solomon becomes the third king of Israel, and he also reigns for 40 years.

He writes some great literature as well.

We have in the Bible, the book of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Solomon, and we think he might have written Job as well.

He has a son, Rehoboam, and Rehoboam is not as wise as his father or his grandfather, and he makes some foolish decisions.

And in the year 931 BC, the kingdom of Israel splits.

You have the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom in 931.

The ten northern tribes become the northern kingdom, and the two southern tribes become the southern kingdom.

The northern kingdom has 19 kings, and all of them were evil in the sight of the Lord.

Every single one of them did not obey his commandments.

And the northern kingdom falls to the Assyrians in 722.

God sends the Assyrians to come in and absolutely wipes out the northern kingdom from the face of the earth, never to hear from them again.

The prophets in the northern kingdom were Elijah, Elisha, Jonah, Amos, and Hosea.

The southern kingdom had twenty kings, twelve of them were evil, and eight of them were good or kinda good.

And the prophets in the southern kingdom were Joel, Isaiah, Micah, Nahum, Hababkuk, Zephaniah, Daniel, Ezekiel, and Jeremiah.

Those were all in the southern kingdom.

And during this time, 700 years before Christ, Isaiah prophesies.

Have you read the book of Isaiah?

It's all about Jesus.

Let me show you.

In chapter 7 of Isaiah, he says this: he will be born of a virgin.

In chapter 9, he says, He will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, everlasting father, prince of peace, and the government will be on his shoulders.

In chapter 11, it says, He's a shoot coming from the stump of Jesse.

Jesse was David's father in the tribe of Judah.

You see, he's coming through Judah.

In chapter 40, it says, In his coming the glory of the Lord is revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

In 42, he is the Lord's servant in whom his soul delights, and with whom he is very well pleased.

In 43, he is Israel's only savior, and there is no other.

In fifty-three, he was despised and rejected by men.

He was oppressed and afflicted, yet didn't open his mouth.

He bore our grief and carried our sorrows, wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities.

He brought us peace, and by his stripes we are healed.

In sixty-one it says that he is anointed by the Lord to preach good news to the poor and bind up the brokenhearted, proclaiming liberty to the captives, proclaiming the day of the vengeance of our God and comforts all who mourn.

And in 65 it says he creates a new heavens and earth and will dwell with his people, his people there forever.

Seven hundred years before Christ, God continues to add suspense, promising this coming Messiah.

Who is he?

Who is he?

Seven hundred years, Isaiah perfectly prophesies who this Jesus Christ will be.

Jesus is the promise.

And even though they had some good kings in the southern kingdom, because they had killed the prophets of God and disobeyed the Lord, God wiped them out as well.

And in 586, God sends in the Babylonians and he takes the Jewish people into captivity.

And they go to Babylon.

And this is when Daniel, Ezekiel, Esther are written.

Jeremiah is written, and all of these books are pushing us to, showing us the coming Christ.

Daniel says in chapter 7 that the Son of Man, whom the ancient of days has given all dominion, that all people and nations and languages should serve him.

Jeremiah in chapter 31, verse 31, great place in Scripture to know.

It's the new covenant.

All other covenants God has given, man have failed at them, but God gives this new covenant, and he says, That I will write my law on their heart, and I will be their God, and they will be my people.

And the sign of this will be the forgiveness of sins, all pointing to Jesus Christ as the new covenant, sealed with his blood and marked by the forgiveness of our sins.

After seventy years of captivity, the king is allowed to, or the king allows the Israelites to return to their home.

Seventy years of captivity, and Ezra and Nehemiah lead this charge, and the temple is rebuilt.

Zachariah, Heggai, Joel, and Malachi are written in this time.

And Malachi says that Elijah will return.

He's talking about John the Baptist, and then there's 400 years of silence.

400 years of silence.

From Adam when the promise was made, to Abraham 2,000 years, another thousand years leading his people, promising the Messiah to David, foreshadowing the coming of God, promises his people, uh saving them through captivity, not letting them be wiped off the face of the earth because God's promise is so good, bringing them back to the homeland, they're there for 400 years with no profit in silence.

Okay, let's take a deep breath.

All right.

That was 4,000 years of history.

All right?

Good job.

You made it.

A plus, everyone.

All right?

4,000 years of history we've gone through, and the question is, well, now what?

Now what?

Will we come to the climax of our story?

There's anticipation building.

The story is thickening.

Who will relieve us of this sin?

Who will come?

Thousands of years of false worship and false sacrifice that has led to no one, led to led to nothing.

Civilizations have been built up, kingdoms have come and gone, empires have risen and fallen, millions of people have walked the face of the earth and died.

And now Jesus steps onto the scene.

Jesus steps on to the scene.

And here we see the climax of our story: Jesus, the fulfillment.

Jesus, the fulfillment.

The first four books of the New Testament, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, commonly known as the Gospels, tell of the birth, the life, the ministry, and the death, resurrection, the death, burial, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus.

I would highly recommend if you haven't read those, read them, especially Matthew or Luke, really laying out what Jesus did.

At about the age of 30, Jesus is baptized and he starts his ministry.

He calls 12 men to himself to become the 12 disciples.

And for three years, he does extraordinary things.

He heals the sick, he raises the dead back to life.

He's teaching scripture with authority like no one had ever done before.

He's fulfilling all the prophecy of the Old Testament.

He's commanding the sea, he's commanding creation itself, and it obeys him.

He performs miracles in front of thousands, and he casts out demons.

And he does extraordinary things, but he makes extraordinary claims.

He says that he is the great I am, that he and the Father are one, that he and he alone is able to forgive sins, that he and he alone is the only way to God, and that he and he alone can give eternal life.

And lots of people follow him.

People were amazed as they should be, he is God, but a lot of people also didn't like him.

And in the day, the religious leaders hated him.

They hated him.

Why?

Because they were committing the same sin that Eve and Adam had committed so long ago.

They wanted to be like God.

They wanted to earn their own righteousness.

They didn't want to worship the creator, they wanted to worship themselves, they wanted power.

And so when the creator of the world came down to save them, they saw him and they hated him.

And they sought to kill him.

They sought to destroy him.

And one of Jesus' own disciples, Judas, betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver.

And whenever I read that passage of scripture, I just always think, God, let there never be a price that I would take to give up my Savior.

This is the climax.

Jesus is here, he's betrayed.

Judas leads the guards to Jesus.

He's arrested.

He's put before the high priest and they spit on him and they slap him and they accuse him falsely and they beat him.

He doesn't answer them back.

They take him to the governor of Judea.

His name's Pilate of the Roman Empire.

And Pilate can find no guilt in him.

But and he says that to the Jews, but the Jews say, Crucify him, crucify him.

He relents, he gives Jesus over to be crucified.

And they beat him, and they put a crown of thorns on his head, and they scourge him, and they whip him almost to death.

And they put a cross on his back and they make him carry it.

And he goes up to Golgotha, which is the hill just outside of the city of Jerusalem, and there they nail the creator of the world, the savior of the world, to a cross.

They nail his hands and his feet to a cross made out of wood from a tree that he created.

They put him up on the cross, they rip off his clothes, they spit on him, they mock him, they cast lots for his clothes as prophesied in Scripture, and he hangs on the cross to die.

And while he's hanging there, just before he dies, Jesus says these amazing words.

He says, It is finished.

It is finished.

All of the promise, all of human history, the entire scripture being fulfilled, every promise God made, saving Israel, saving them again and again, even though they didn't deserve it, to preserve the line of Judah so that Christ could come and save those who hated him.

And he said, It is finished.

The climax of our story, the greatest thing that has ever happened in human history, the Savior, the creator of the world, came down and died so that we can have life.

It shows his character perfectly.

He was most glorified on the cross.

And although there was a great victory, the disciples thought it was a great loss.

And he died on a Friday, but he was raised from the dead on a Sunday.

And I heard it once said really well that if the purchase was on Friday, then we received the receipt on Sunday.

Because Jesus proved that he has power over Satan's sin and death.

He has proven that he has crushed the head of the enemy, like he said he would do 4,000 years earlier.

He has proved that he and he alone can forgive sins.

And he's raised from the dead in his new resurrected body, and he appears to Mary first and then to the twelve, and he walks with them for 40 days.

And the New Testament actually tells us that hundreds of people saw him.

Hundreds of people heard him.

At the end of 40 days, he takes his disciples and he ascends into heaven.

And now we're left with the question: well, now what?

Well, now what?

The work has been done, the climax has been completed.

Jesus has one, he ascends into heaven.

Well, just before he ascends, he says to his disciples, he says, All authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.

Go therefore, make disciples, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, and I will be with you always to the end of the age.

And so we come into the falling action.

And it's this it's Jesus' mission.

Jesus' mission.

Jesus puts his disciples on mission.

He says, I have done the work and now go tell everyone what I have done.

Spread the gospel through the world.

Go to the ends of the world and make disciples.

Baptize them.

I will be with you always.

And honestly, this is probably the greatest application for all Christians ever.

The application of our existence is: are you fulfilling the commission that God has put you on?

Are you making disciples?

So often I talk to people, and I'm like, you know, I'm struggling with this and I'm struggling with this and really the first question should be well, are you out doing the work God has put you to do?

Because if we were out busy making disciples, we probably wouldn't be caught up in so much of the sin that drags us down.

Are you fulfilling the commission that God has put you on?

Are we moving forward?

How can we sit idly when God has worked all of human history, all of these things together so that we could be saved?

Redemption is in full swing, and we come into the falling action of the story.

Jesus paid the ultimate price.

And after the ascension, uh the Holy Spirit fills the apostles, and Peter preaches a message, and 3,000 people come to a saving knowledge of Jesus Christ.

The church is growing like crazy.

People are at it every single day.

And you go on in the book of Acts and you see the conversion of Paul and his missionary journeys, and he plants churches, and the gospel is thriving.

And from Romans until the book of Jude, you have the epistles.

They're letters to churches and to individuals, and Paul writes most of them, but also James, Peter, Jude, and John write as well.

And something cool happens at this point.

God's great narrative, his story that's been going on for thousands of years intersects with our present-day reality.

We are the church.

We are on mission for God.

We have the opportunity to be a player in God's story.

God is working.

Will you accept the call?

Well, we haven't reached the conclusion in real time yet, but God, in his graciousness, and his goodness and his kindness tells us what's going to happen.

And in the book of Revelation, and actually even through the Gospels and the Epistles, we see what's going to happen, what this conclusion of this story will look like.

And the conclusion is this it's Jesus' return.

Jesus' return.

Now, many of you might be scholars of the book of Revelation.

Maybe you listen to a lot of preachers that talk about end times, and nothing wrong with that.

You read a lot of books on it, you're trying to figure out the years and the thousand-year reign and your pre-trib, post-trib, mid-trib, trib, trib, tribity trib, I don't know all the tribs, but you've kind of sided with one camp.

And the reality is, is one thing that all Christians can agree upon, and nothing should divide us on this, is that Jesus is coming back.

That's the truth about Revelation.

Jesus is coming back.

If we've read Revelation and we've looked too deep in it that we missed the point that it's about Jesus' character and that he is coming back and it's about who he is and his church and the redemption story, we've missed the point.

Jesus is coming back.

And he's coming back to judge the world.

Remember that serpent we met back in Genesis 3?

Jesus is coming back to take that old serpent, the devil, Satan, and he's going to judge him and throw him into a lake of fire and into hell for eternity.

He's also going to come back and he's going to gather all those who are his, all those who have called on the name of Jesus, all those who have trusted him for their salvation, and he's going to bring them into his kingdom.

And he even says, Jesus even says, I've prepared a place for you.

Individually, you.

I prepared a place for you.

He's also coming back to judge all of those who have rejected him.

All of those who have turned away from Christ, all of those who, like Eve, wanted to be like God, like the Pharisees and the religious leaders of the time of Jesus hated him, despised him, wanted to work on their own righteousness.

And he will throw them in the lake of fire and in hell for eternity.

And so knowing the conclusion of this story, we need to decide what side of history we're going to be on.

You see, the story's not done yet.

The conclusion hasn't happened.

Right now we're still in this falling action of the story.

The conclusion's going to come.

We don't know when, we don't know when, but it's coming.

And right now, the grace, this glory is not out of reach.

We can still call on the name of Jesus Christ and be saved.

We can still call on his mercy and he will be so kind to forgive us of our sins.

And right now, we have a choice to make.

When I was in grade two, my favorite book was one of those choose your own adventure stories.

Do you remember these?

And I specifically remember this one.

It was about a deer.

And so in the story, you were the deer.

And so you'd go to the first page and it would give you an option.

It would say, All right, to go down this path, you know, to the left, go to page six.

And to go down this path to the right, go to page 16, for instance.

And if you went to page six, um there was grass and bunnies and flowers and food and everything nice about the world.

And if you went to page 16, there was a hunter waiting there and he would shoot you, and then you'd have to start again.

I love those stories.

I love those stories.

The reality is that we all have a choice to make.

And so will you choose the path and turn to the page that leads to eternal damnation?

Or will you choose the path and turn to the page that leads to forgiveness and eternal life in Jesus Christ?

What side of history will you be on?

We already know what is going to happen.

Will you accept the free gift of salvation from Jesus Christ?

The glory is not out of reach.

If you only knew my life, I need Jesus every day.

Any believer in this room, if you're a believer in Jesus Christ, they'll tell you they're not perfect.

They'll be the first to tell you that they're not perfect.

But they rely on the grace of Jesus Christ.

And one day we'll all stand before God, and either you will say to him, I don't deserve it, but because of the work of Jesus, because of the work of Jesus, I can come in.

Or you will say, Well, I thought I lived a pretty good life.

I fulfilled as much of the law as possible.

And he will say, Depart from me, I never knew you.

And so, right now, right now, if you've not believed in Jesus Christ as your Savior, if you've not believed that the one thing that all of human history is pointing to, if you've not believed that you and yourself cannot provide salvation, but you need a savior.

And the Holy Spirit right now is knocking on your door and he's saying, Let me in.

And you have a wall of pride there.

Drop your pride, drop your self-reliance, your self-dependence, and allow Jesus Christ to change your life.

If you want to accept Jesus Christ as your Savior, if you want to be on the right side of history and where this is going, you can do that right now.

You can do that right now.

I'm gonna pray to close the service, and I'm gonna include in there just a little prayer.

And you can follow that prayer, but you repent of your sin.

You turn to Jesus Christ, you you call out to Him as your only Savior.

Lord, I see that everything is pointing to you.

You And you alone can save me.

I need you desperately.