The Verdict That Changes Everything - Pastor Chris Kouba

Turn your Bibles to Romans chapter three.

Romans chapter three.

Love being able to introduce that song to you.

Uh Oh But God.

It is by Shane and Shane and the Worship Initiative.

Encourage you to find that on uh whatever you listen to and be able to put that as a part of your uh story and a part of your normal rhythm.

It is an incredible song.

The words of it truly do speak and help us as we transition today into a brand new series from some bad news.

It's been kind of rough the last few weeks as we've been honest with you, talking about some ugly truths.

And then today we're gonna transition and those words, but God truly are appropriate as we begin to consider and think about all that God has done for us.

I want to give a word of greeting to all of the men at the Ramsey Unit and all of the women at the Plain State Correctional Facility.

We are so grateful for you and so thankful for the chance to be able to bring this message to you today.

When's the last time that you were in a courtroom?

When's the last time that you were in a courtroom?

If you're not a lawyer, I hope the answer is not recent.

Uh however, uh I did it not too long ago.

I had jury duty.

Uh, and if you've ever gone to uh jury duty, that was my last uh time.

Again, I'm not in a courtroom much, I'm not around a courtroom much, and so therefore, uh you kind of forget what it's like when you go to a courtroom.

I mean, it's definitely different than normal life in every way, right?

I mean, one, you've got a dress code, you've got to make sure that you wear certain things to the courthouse.

You're not allowed just to kind of wear whatever it is that you want.

You have to instead have to dress in a certain way.

You usually have certain entrances that you are required to go in, and whenever you walk into those certain entrances, you you have very clear protocol that you're supposed to follow when you're in the courtroom.

Kind of when you first walk in, it just kind of breathes of stiffness, right?

It's just real formal.

Everything about it just feels really, really formal, and so you're not really kind of sure, at least if you're like me, just doesn't do it very often, how I'm supposed to act, where I'm supposed to go, what I'm supposed to do.

You can't misbehave in a courtroom because you'll get yourself thrown out of the courtroom, all right?

I mean, you can't you can't just do whatever it is that you want to do, speak whenever you want to speak.

Instead, it's very clear when you are allowed to speak and when you're not allowed to speak, and if you're allowed to speak at all.

In fact, most of the time you're told to be quiet.

Most of the time you're told not to say anything.

Usually there's there's rules related to the phones in courtrooms.

They're not allowed to have them on, you're not allowed to be looking at them.

Of course, when you're in a courtroom, there are certain places depending on your role in that specific courtroom that day, where you sit and where you're not allowed to sit.

In addition to that, there are also very clear protocols on when you are to stand, because there are gonna be times whenever a man walks in or a woman walks in and they're wearing a robe, everybody's gotta stand up.

And it doesn't matter whether you like or not the person that is standing there in the robe, guess what you're gonna do?

You're gonna stand up.

You wanna know why?

Because you're gonna get thrown out.

Because there is an idea all around the idea of a courtroom of honor.

There's an idea all the way around the idea of a courtroom of significance is taking place in here.

You just kind of almost feel it.

You know, there's some big stuff going down in this room.

Like there are life-changing decisions happening inside of this courtroom.

What I want you to know is that a courtroom is a place of significance, so much so that literally a gavel being declared down can change the course of a family forever.

Perhaps it can change the course of a family because now the divorce, which has been talked about, is now final.

It's over.

Or perhaps it can change because you may have a child who has just been with a family who now, because that gavel has been beaten down, now has moved and changed their status from having one last name to now having an entirely new last name with all the legal rights that come along with an adoption.

You have families that go to a courtroom seeking justice.

Maybe they've been wronged or mistreated in some way, maybe there's been something that has happened to them, and they are hoping that this can be a source of respite for them in the midst of their sorrow or their loss.

They're hoping for justice to take place.

A courtroom is a place where people go and they present their cases as to why they've been wronged or why they need justice.

It's also a place where defenses are presented and people are able to say, This is why I didn't do it.

This is why I need to be declared innocent.

And ultimately, what comes down is a verdict.

That verdict changes people's lives forever.

I want to bring you for the next three weeks, as we start this new series in Romans called All Rise into the divine courtroom.

I want you to know when you go into a courtroom just like you do today, in the same way as you walk into this divine courtroom, there's gonna be things that are gonna be argued and statements that are gonna be made that you're gonna think, I'm not positive I know exactly what that means.

You may need someone to help interpret or explain for you what some of these things are.

And so as we walk through a very technical portion of the Bible, please know this: even though you may not necessarily be able to understand all that's going on when that gavel has been hit, life change is gonna take place.

And ultimately, depending on what you choose to do with the information that you will hear, will determine not only your eternal life, but also what your life will look like here on the earth.

This passage of scripture that we're about to read has literally been said to be one of the most important, significant passages of scripture in all of the Bible.

I would argue it is a passage that summarizes what we have been accused here at United City Church of talking about each and every week.

I talked to a guest this past week, he's been coming for the last few weeks, and before that, he said he'd been watching us online for about six weeks, and he said, You guys talk about the same thing every Sunday.

I took that as a massive compliment.

I said, What is it?

He goes, This Jesus died on the cross and rose from the dead.

That's exactly right.

And what I want you to see is this passage in legal jargon, if you will, begins to articulate for us the significance of the verdict.

Martin Luther, he wrote this when he talked about this passage, we're gonna look at in Romans 3.

He said, it is the chief point and the very central place of the epistle and the whole Bible.

Leon Morris, commentator, he wrote, it is possibly the single most important paragraph ever written.

Romans chapter 3, verses 21 through 26 are the foundational document or the foundational paragraph that launched and led to the Protestant Reformation in 1517, October 31st, when Martin Luther nailed the 95 thesis on the door of All Saints Church.

Romans 3:21–26

And it led to a break.

And now, literally, we today as Protestants are coming as a result of the influence of this passage.

Here's what I want to ask you to do: something we don't normally do, but in honor of what we are reading, would you stand as I read Romans chapter 3, verses 21 through 26?

Romans 3:21–26

It says, But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it.

The righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.

For there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith.

This was to show God's righteousness, because in his divine forbearance he had passed over former sins.

It was to show his righteousness at the present time, so that he might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.

You may be seated.

We could spend weeks on this one passage, but I want to just break it down for you today by defining some terms, and then after that, I want to give you a couple of points of application as to why it matters.

First term that I want to identify is the word sin.

It's the word sin.

We see it referenced in verse 23.

We know the context means that passage Romans 3.21 through 26 is coming off of three chapters, if you will, the end of one, all of two, and the beginning of three, that talks all about this idea of sin.

And what essentially it tells us in Romans 3.23 is a summary of this, that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

We learned the last few weeks in the Ugly Truth series that there is no distinction.

If you are someone who is like a pagan, you are an obvious, everybody knows that you're a sinner, or if you are a moralist, or if you are religious, all of us, there is no distinction.

We all have this problem called sin.

It's not just that we're born into sin, but it's also that everything that we do is tainted with sin.

As a result of this, what it means is that we just don't need a tweak or a tune-up, we need a rescue.

Some of you here may be pretty good swimmers.

Some of you may be on the swim team, maybe you were on the swim team.

I am not much of a swimmer, but let's just say that we were to go to Galveston.

And we decided to set out from Galveston, and our goal was to both swim all the way down to Corpuscus Christi at one of the beaches down there.

Okay?

And let's just say that we both set off at the same pace and we both set off on the same way.

You, as being someone who is a very gifted and good swimmer, would be able to swim much further and much faster than I would, who swimming is something that I can do, but it is not something that I enjoy or do very often.

Now, you would look up and you would see, based upon the fact that you are further than me, you could say, I won.

The problem is that wasn't the goal to begin with.

The standard all along was that you swam from Galveston and you swam all the way down to Corpus Christi.

And just because you swam further than me doesn't make you any less drowning than I am, even though I'm further back than you.

Okay?

What I want you to understand is this all of you drown.

All of you.

All of you are in need of a rescue.

And it's important that we see the reason why this passage is so significant is because it's universal.

All of us are in the exact same situation.

All of us are in need of being rescued.

Here's what the Bible tells us.

Another word that I want you to see that it needs to be defined is the word justified.

It's the word justified.

You see this in a couple of different ways in the midst of this legal brief, if you will, is how you could word it.

The gospel is this God is the judge, and he would not be just if he overlooked sin.

You see, there's a lot of talk about justice these days, but but a lot of times the idea of getting justice is to make someone else be down so that you can be just.

That is not at all what the Bible says.

Instead, the just the judgment of God is not the fact that he ignores sin, but instead that God deals with sin.

The word justification, it's a theological term that is very important in the midst of these three chapters, the end of three, four, and five, it means this just as if I'd never sinned.

Just as if I'd never sinned.

What this means is that when Jesus dies on the cross for our sins, he forgives us of our sins because he was our substitute.

2 Corinthians 5 21, it says this, for our sake, he made him to be sin, who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

I want you to picture it like this.

Let's act like you were in a courtroom and you had a judge that was sitting up on his bench.

And that judge was hearing a case that was being presented to him.

The case involved a the prosecution who was saying that they need to make sure they get paid for the debt that was owed to them.

The defendant who was on trial is presenting his case and arguing why he should not have to pay.

And ultimately, the judge makes his decisions, he slams that gavel down, he declares the defendant guilty as charged and orders him to pay the financial debt that he owes to the prosecution.

The judge then, after making that declaration, he then walks off of his bench, he walks back to his chambers, he takes off his robe, he goes into his own personal wallet, he pulls out of his wallet a cash in the amount of the debt that the defendant owed.

He then walks into the courtroom, he walks over to the prosecution, and he hands them the money and he says, This is the debt, I am paying it in full.

He is free to go.

What this shows is that the judge was both the one who declared justice, and he also was the very same one who paid the justice.

This is what Jesus has done for us.

I'm gonna tell you why in just a moment, why this is so significant, but I want you to see is this.

This means sin isn't just, ah, it's not that big of a deal.

It's fine, I just won't care that much.

Instead, he absolutely 100% declares you as needing justice, but at the very same time, he provides that justice on the cross.

Folks, let me tell you why this is significant.

This means that here in just a moment, whenever we celebrate the Lord's Supper, we can begin to reflect on the bloody, gruesome cross Jesus died for, knowing that it was because of that cross that all of my sins have been paid for.

It is something that I can reflect on as rough as it was and still celebrate because I know ultimately what it means in my life.

This idea of the righteousness of God that has been given to us is something that was so significant in Martin Luther's life, it led him to start the Protestant Reformation.

He says this, these this article is the head and the cornerstone of the church, which alone begets, nourishes, builds, and protects the church.

Without it, the church of God could not subsist for one hour.

The righteousness of God, instead of being God's judgment, actually means that the righteousness of God is given to us, which means when God looks at you, he doesn't see how well you've performed.

When God looks at you, he sees the perfect righteousness of Christ that has been applied to your account.

That, folks, is a massive difference because what so many different religions and what the idea of religion will tell you is that you only are seen by God based upon how well you've performed.

And what Christianity says and what Jesus is saying is that I see you as completely and utterly perfect based upon how I have performed on your behalf.

Another idea I want to present to you and explain is the idea of propitiation.

Propitiation, it's in verse 25.

Some translations say a sacrifice of atonement.

The word means that at the cross, both the love of God and the wrath of God were on display.

Literally, God's wrath towards sin, which is the only way that justice could be met, was paid for at the cross.

This is helpful because some of you have been wronged along the way and you want justice.

You want there to be wrongs to be made right.

And I want to tell you that forgiveness doesn't mean that they get away with it.

Forgiveness instead means that God paid for it.

There's a foundational distinction between those two things.

And because we know that Jesus at the cross not only paid for all of the former sins that have been committed, but he also paid for all of the present sins.

I also know that he's paid for all of the future sins, which means this my assurance is not based upon how well I respond to all the laws of God.

Let me tell you why that's good.

Because there's times along the way whenever I've assumed that God looks at me, I've received his grace and his mercy.

He sees the way I've responded, he sees the way that I've acted, and I have to wonder if he's like, you know what?

I want to redo.

I didn't know you were gonna do that.

I didn't know you were gonna respond that way.

I didn't know you were gonna react that way.

And instead, I know my assurance isn't based upon how I do.

My assurance is instead based upon the fact that Jesus paid the penalty for my sin.

All of my sins, all of the sins that I will commit.

And so, because of that, I can live with confidence.

This is why we celebrate the Lord's Supper here and reflect on the sacrifice that was given for us because we know the sacrifice is good news.

Let me give you then two quick points of application, then we're gonna take the Lord's Supper together.

What does this mean and why does this matter?

Number one, you can't pay back what you didn't earn.

You can't pay back what you didn't earn.

There's a movie called Saving Private Ryan.

It's an incredible movie, won all kinds of awards along the way.

The two primary characters that you probably would know about are played by Tom Hanks, who plays Captain Miller, and Matt Damon, who plays the character of Private Ryan.

Spoiler alert, I'm gonna tell you kind of what happens, but it's still worth seeing the movie if you've never seen it.

It is a very, very, very good movie.

Uh very gruesome, for sure.

It tells about the reality of war.

However, the the storyline of this movie goes that basically you have this family who has four sons.

The older three sons all were discovered to have died in battle.

And the army notices this, and they're concerned because they realize that there is a fourth son who is still out on the battlefield, and in order for them, this family, not to have to experience a total loss as a result of the war, they go and they give an assignment to eight men who are led by Captain Miller, played by Tom Hanks.

And these men, their assignment is very simple.

They are to go and to find Private Ryan and get him home safely so that this mother will not lose her fourth child.

Part of the movie and the drama that goes along is the tension that exists between the fact that Captain Miller and these eight men do not understand why they would be given the mission that they were giving, knowing that they could potentially lose their lives in battle, all to save this private Ryan who they don't even know.

Yet it goes along that as they move towards trying to go and find Private Ryan, they did in fact take casualties along the way.

They had sacrifice of life.

They finally find Private Ryan, and as they're making their way back to go home, on the way, they encounter a few more battles, but for the most part, they would not allow Private Ryan to engage in these battles because ultimately their mission was to bring him home, yet they went and helped out their the folks that they were with.

There's a scene at the very end of the movie where they are trying to uh keep a bridge, which is a stronghold for the Allied armies at the time.

And the scene shows that the the team of eight, a few of them had already passed away, began.

To take on incredible firepower along the way.

And Captain Miller, that is Tom Hanks, begins to be shot in the chest, and he begins the process of dying.

He reaches down onto his vest that is now soaked with his own blood, and he puts his fingers in that area where he was shot, pulling out his blood-soaked hands, and he goes up to Private Ryan, and he simply shakes his fist at him and he says, earn this.

The movie then shifts to a scene of Private Ryan, who's standing there at the grave of Captain Miller at the end of his life.

He's got tears in his eyes.

He's distraught.

And he looks over at his family and he says with despair, Do you think I earned the sacrifice that was given for me?

It's a touching, moving moment.

It's one that I believe so many believers in Jesus Christ.

This is how they live.

You see, they know the sacrifice that has been given for them.

They understand the justification which was purchased on their behalf.

And in light of the cross of Jesus Christ, they have bought into this lie that it is their responsibility.

No, it is their obligation to earn the sacrifice which was given for them on the cross.

For some of you, maybe this is exactly the way that you live.

It's really easy to get into.

It's this idea that ultimately it was the cross of Jesus Christ along the way which was given for me.

I've received the grace and the mercy of God, but I don't live my life with the grace and the mercy of God.

Instead, I live my life with grat and with regret and obligation and duty.

And so therefore I've been told, because Jesus died for me, can't you serve a little more?

Because Jesus died for you, can't you give a little more?

Because Jesus died on the cross for you, can't you respond to him in like kind?

And what happens is, is we begin to get on a treadmill headed nowhere.

Where we just do spiritual activity after spiritual activity.

Maybe some of you even grew up in a tradition or grew up in a denomination or grew up in a way where you were simply told, unless you did A, B, C, and D, you were not worthy of the sacrifice of Jesus.

And ultimately the cross of Jesus Christ was used as a bat to hit you with instead of a blessing that you were to receive.

Folks, legalism is an easy trap to fall into.

This is easily where me as a lifelong believer can naturally go to.

That I think that my identity and my acceptance with God is all dependent upon how well I deliver these words to you, how many people I shared my faith with this past week, and how many quiet times I had.

And so, therefore, if all of a sudden I look up and I didn't perform that well this week, that must mean that God is not happy with me.

Do you live there?

I want you to know that you can't the treadmill that doesn't exist.

You didn't earn it in the first place.

So the idea of you spending all of your life trying to earn something that you never deserved to begin with is a fruitless exercise that will instead of you experiencing a Christian life full of joy and obedience, instead, it will be a Christian life that is filled with dread and duty.

I just described some of your lives.

You see, here's what happens when that becomes the case.

What takes place is that now I've got to make sure I do whatever I possibly do to ensure that I look the part.

And so therefore, I'm never gonna be honest about my sin because if I'm honest about my sin, then you're gonna think less of me.

God's gonna think less of me, and I don't want that because ultimately it's all about making sure that I perform for him instead of recognizing that the entire point of this is that he performed for me.

I'm not gonna get into a small group because in a small group they're gonna like ask you to share stuff.

I don't want to share stuff because then I'll look and show that I may not know enough, or I'll I'll look and show that I'm still in process and I'm still working on things, and I don't want anybody to be able to see that because it's all about outward appearances.

Throw in Houston, Texas, and in this region, folks, it is advantageous for your business to say you go to church.

It is an attractive thing here.

It's not do you go to church, it's where do you go to church?

And so, therefore, it's all about appearances, it's all about making sure that I look and act the part, and basically, as long as I perform for God, then God is going to be happy with me.

Please hear me.

That is a lie.

Instead, my assurance and my identity is in the fact that Jesus Christ died on a cross for me and he rose from the dead, which allows me to be honest with you, standing here before you as the pastor of United City Church, and tell you this: I am in just as much of the need of grace that I am telling you about in my own life as you are.

There's no special category here.

Hillary and I are actively involved in re-engage every Wednesday night because we want to make sure that our marriage honors God and we are not above getting poured into.

I don't tell you that as a source of pride.

I instead tell you that here's why.

Because I know that I am my tendency is gonna be to go home today, and my entire afternoon will all be dependent upon how well you liked what I said.

That is where my heart runs to.

I struggle with contentment.

I'm constantly wanting more.

I want more so much, so many, so often, I very rarely am able to enjoy what it is that I actually have.

I'm a work in progress.

I'm a mess.

And I would tell you this the reason that I can confidently say that is because I know my assurance and my identity has already been secured even before any of you knew what I just said.

Folks, for some of you, you need to understand and revel in the grace and the mercy of God.

Which he already knows how much of a mess you are.

Which is why he says to confess your sins one to another, not because you want to somehow make sure to compare and do whatever else, but instead because there is freedom when that happens.

That's when grace can show up.

That's when the community of God, that's when the community of believers can step in as I am able to be with other people and experience the benefit of iron sharpening iron.

Why?

Because I know I don't have it all together, and I don't want to act like I do.

But instead, the story of our lives can all be the same, which is this we're a mess, but man, Jesus, he is not.

He is perfect in all things.

Let me read for you the next passage, Romans 8.

Look at what it says.

Continue.

In verse 27 through 31, then what becomes of our boasting it is excluded?

By what kind of law?

By a law of works.

No, but by the law of faith.

For we hold that one is justified by faith apart from works of the law, or is God the God of Jews only?

Is he not the God of the Gentiles also?

Yes, of Gentiles also, since God is one.

He will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith.

Do we then overthrow the law by this faith?

By no means.

On the contrary, we uphold the law.

Let me give you a second point of application, which is this you shouldn't compare what you don't deserve.

You shouldn't compare what you don't deserve.

I found when I play the comparison game, I typically try to go look for people who are worse than me.

And when you compare your righteousness to somebody else, you're probably gonna find either somebody that you win or you're gonna look and see compared to somebody else and think you don't add up.

Maybe you give and you give, you sacrifice and you sacrifice.

Here's what happens something goes bad along the way.

Uh you you find yourself not getting the breaks that you would hope.

Your house doesn't sell, somebody else's does.

You find somebody else think seemingly gets things easier for them than you, and so therefore you begin to become bitter and you begin to become frustrated.

Ultimately, let's call it what it is.

When you find yourself angry and mad at God, what you're saying is this I've done more for you and I don't deserve this.

The problem is you've misunderstood Romans 3, 21 through 26, and all of the summation of what it says before that, which is this, you don't deserve anything other than the wrath of God.

And so that trial that you're going through is a blessing because it actually should be way worse.

And here's the beauty of God's grace is that he will even use those trials to be able to work in us.

We're gonna learn about this more in Romans 5, work in us to bring about endurance, which produces character, which produces faith, which produces hope.

Meaning, this is why we can read passages of scripture that says he will take the things that were intended for evil and he will use them for good.

Why?

Because ultimately we know that God doesn't owe us anything.

So we need to get that idea just flat out of our heads, but instead, we can allow the fact that Jesus gives us his mercy and his grace to be the very thing that allows Christ to be lifted up, to be exalted, and to be glorified.

Jerry Bridges is an author and writer.

I love him incredibly, and anything he writes, I would encourage you to read.

He says, Your worst days are never so bad that you are beyond the reach of God's grace.

And your best days are never so good that you are beyond the need of God's grace.

God's love and grace in our lives is a continual reminder to us to interpret the victories in light of God's grace, and for us to interpret our defeats as gifts of God in his grace.

You see, the doctrine of justification is not just something that you do in order to get into salvation.

The doctrine of justification, the fact that it's just as if I never sinned, is also what allows you to live this Christian life.

B.B.

Warfield, a Princeton theologian, he says this there's nothing in us or done by us at any stage of our earthly development, because of which we are acceptable to God.

We must always be accepted for Christ's sake, or we cannot ever be accepted at all.

This is not true of us only when we believe, it is just as true after we have believed.

It will continue to be true as long as we live.

Our need of Christ does not cease with our believing, nor does the nature of our relationship to Him or to God through Him ever alter.

No matter what our attainments and Christian graces or our achievements in behavior may be, it is always on His blood and righteousness alone that we can rest.

As we receive the Lord's Supper of the Communion today, I want you to realize that it always has been, it always is, will always be about Jesus.

What separates Christianity from every other religion is the fact that every other religion tells you what you must do.

Christianity tells you what has been done.

And so today, as we receive the elements of the Lord's Supper, there's a bread, there's bread and there's a cup.

They're gonna be in the same, they're gonna be stacked on top of each other.

We're gonna pass this down.

I encourage you, if you're a believer in Jesus, that you go and take the elements of the Lord's Supper today and just hold them there until we have a chance to everybody to be served, and we'll take them together.

I encourage you though, just to pray.

Let this be a time of reflection.

We're gonna worship and sing the hymn, Jesus Paid It All.

Let these words speak over you and be sung over you.

If maybe today, in the midst of this time, as you have these elements, you need to confess the fact that you've been playing the comparison game and you've been thinking God owes you.

Would you just come to the realization He doesn't owe you anything, but you got everything?

For some of you, you've been playing the performance trap, trying to earn something you never could earn.

Would you confess that today and press into this time?

And let it be a time of gratitude where your heart can be so full because of all that Jesus has done for you.

Father, we come before you and we ask that you would move in these moments.

We thank you for the amazing truth.

That you paid it all.

All my sins in the past, all my sins in the present, all my sins in the future.

Paid it all.

And so, Father, as we receive these elements today, I pray that gratitude would overwhelm us, conviction would lead to repentance, and you would be made much of.

It's in Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.

On the night when Jesus was betrayed, he was up there with his disciples.

And he told them something that would be life-changing.

Something that we still even repeat and celebrate today.

He took the bread and he broke it.

And he said, This is my body which was broken for you.

As often as you eat of it, do it in remembrance of me.

Jesus took the cup, which was filled with the fruit of the vine.

And he said, This is the blood of my new covenant.

As often as you drink of it, do it in remembrance of me.

I'm gonna ask you to bow your heads and close your eyes.

There should be a little spot in front of you if you want to put your cups so they're not becoming a distraction to you.

Please, no one leaving or shuffling or moving around in these few moments that we have left together.

Had the opportunity this past week at Skeeter's over in Kingwood to ask a guy that's been coming to our church for a little bit the most important question.

Do you know if you died today or you'd spend eternity?

He knew about Jesus, he knew he was interested in Jesus, he definitely appreciated Jesus, but he'd never given his life and received him by faith.

And right there, he repeated some words at a table and he gave his life to Jesus.

His life, the Bible says, in that moment was forever changed.

That could be your story today.

This morning on October 2nd at 12.03, God can change your life forever if you would just give all that you know of yourself and turn from those things and instead give all that you know of Jesus.

The Bible says he died on a cross for you.

The Bible says that he rose from the dead, and he offers you the opportunity to have his righteousness given to you.

You don't deserve it.

There's no reason for you to compare yourself to somebody else.

We're all in the same boat, but we can all have the same story.

That's the story of Jesus.

Do you need to give your life to him today?

I want to invite you, if you've never done that before, that you would right now pray this simple prayer of faith with me, just right where you are.

Just say these words.

Dear God, I know I'm a sinner.

And the consequences of my sin is death and separation from you.

I believe you sent your son Jesus to die on a cross for me.

And that he rose from the dead.

And right now I receive him into my life.

I want his righteousness in me.

Thank you for forgiving me, saving me of all of my sins.

It's in the name of Jesus that I pray.

Amen.

Would you look up here if you just pray?

God really is our everlasting God.

He's so faithful in times of trial, in times of triumph.

He is here for you, he's here for me.

It's an amazing truth that we can cling to today, that God is with us.

You do not navigate this season of your life, no matter what you may be going through alone.

The Bible tells us that God is never too far away for us to reach out to him.

In fact, it tells us that we need to consistently reach out to him, knowing that he is our ever-present help in time of need.

He has fearfully and wonderfully made you and I, and we have the opportunity today to respond to his blessings, his grace, and his love for us in a unique and meaningful way.

So today, if you heard that message about God being our everlasting God, and you would like to make Jesus the everlasting God of your life by placing your faith and trust in him, you can text the word you see next to the number 5549A.

There is nothing that we would love to do as a staff more than to hear your story, hear about how Jesus is moving in your life, even how you navigate the season, your next step, maybe whatever God may be leading you to do in your future, whether that be baptism or joining the church, maybe jumping into our growth track process.

I just want to let you know we have been where you are.

And it is so, so important that you allow us the opportunity to link arms with you on your faith journey, coming alongside of you right where God has you, to disciple you, equip you, and encourage you in your faith.

We're so, so thankful for how God is moving in your life.

We're so thankful that uh He has given you a purpose.

We're so thankful that that purpose is being made known more and more in your life.

If there's anything that we can do for you, we want you to reach out to us again.

You can text UC Next to 55498.

We're so thankful to bring you this service.

I pray that you have an awesome week.

As we look ahead to this next week, I want you to cling to the truth that God is our everlasting God in times of trial and times of triumph.

And as we look ahead to this next week, I just want to pray a blessing over you and your family this morning.

Lord Jesus, we're so thankful for you.

We're so thankful for who you've called us to be.

God, we're so thankful that you have met us exactly where we are at our greatest moment of need.

God, we're so thankful for the grace that you have extended to us even right now on this Sunday.

God, thank you for the word that Pastor Chris just gave us.

Thank you for your holy Bible.

God, I pray that your word would be written on our hearts and would be so close to our tongues that we speak it throughout our week.

God, whatever we may come in contact with, whatever we may be going through this week, I pray that you would meet us exactly where we are with grace and mercy.

Would we glorify you in all that we say and all that we do?

It's in Jesus' name I pray.

Amen.

United City Church, I'm thankful for you.

We will see you next Sunday.

God bless.