Worship + Communion Sunday

Welcome to the Awakening Church podcast.

We pray this message encourages you and provides the hope and light of Jesus Christ.

Thanks for tuning in.

It is great to be back with you, awakening.

Missed you.

Gosh, man.

Love you so much.

And like I've been ready to be back with you for a while.

So today you just need to know.

I just like full transparency.

Like, I'm nervous.

You know, I am a little anxious.

I was like, um, I was telling Miles as we were driving to church, that's uh my youngest son.

I was like, it's kind of like you're showing up for a basketball game that I'm moderately good at.

Um but you haven't played basketball for three months.

Um, so I'm gonna be a little rusty on this whole speaking gig.

I'm nervous about that.

I'm nervous just because I'm like, you know, like when you haven't seen somebody in a long while and you're just so excited and anxious and can't wait to be with them.

So that's me uh right here with you.

Uh before we dive in today, I just wanted to thank a few people that have done just an incredible job over the last uh couple months uh while I was away.

First, if you served in any capacity this summer, whether it was space, cafe, worship, college, prayer, and there's so many other spaces and areas that I didn't uh say.

If you served, even if it was just one time this summer, would you stand up uh for me?

Go ahead, go ahead, go ahead, stand up.

Thank you, guys.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

Go ahead and take a seat.

This summer is a really hard time at awakening because everybody's in and out uh and on trips and all that.

You showing up and serve prepares the way for God to work, changes a campus into a place where people that have a life-changing encounter with God, thank you for that and your consistency and faithfulness all summer long.

And then I just got to acknowledge our staff and our leadership council.

If you're here, would you stand up?

You guys go ahead, stand on up.

I can go.

Uh I'm looking around.

There's Roman.

Roland stand up, Molly, our leadership council, which is our elders.

There's Brian stand up.

Stay standing.

Let's honor them.

Let's honor them.

Dave, um, and Alex and Jesse and others, and I can't see everybody, but um thank you for your leadership.

Thank you for how you just showed up and your the way you uh pastored and ministered to our church this summer.

Deep honor and gave me full confidence, even while I was away.

You're in good hands.

And we had a great lineup of speakers this summer as well.

So um now you're back with me.

Um on Wednesday, we have a leadership advance.

I would love to share some of the like sabbatical learnings that I had, a fall vision, where we're headed, and then also just some key updates in the life of our church.

But I thought in this moment I would at least talk about the sabbatical elephant in the room.

You know what it is.

Some of you are like, what?

There's an elephant?

What is that?

Um, yes, it's the new ink that I have on my yeah, yeah, yeah.

And and some people are like, oh, that's sabbatical, Ryan.

Um I had somebody else do this.

This was uh uh last week.

They're like, oh, now you're the cool pastor.

Okay, if that's all it took, um, okay.

Uh let me explain them real quick.

Uh so uh before I get there, um my daughter graduated high school.

We dropped her off literally last Sunday at Westmont College in Santa Barbara.

Terrible place to visit, by the way.

Um and so as a graduation gift, she wanted to get tattooed.

We had a cool father-daughter moment where we went and got tattoos together.

Uh, this one is my family and uh Jenny, my wife, Ella Rider Miles.

And um originally, see, I got vetoed on this one.

Uh originally I thought it was kind of fun that it's spelled germ.

My family spells germ, and I was gonna just have in just really small print, but the Holy Spirit, I mean Jenny, um, came up with a new design.

And uh this is what I have, and I love it.

And some people have noticed that it feels almost directional, uh, you know, north, south, east, west.

Ella loves that her name Ella is in the east position.

Um, I don't know what writers in the south.

I don't haven't got any deeper meaning on that yet.

I do love as we're launching our kids out that Jenny is in the north position.

One of the advice when our we first had kids was uh that one of the greatest gifts you can give your kids is a great and healthy marriage, and just love that she is uh my North Star in so many ways in our relationship and next how we serve Jesus together.

Um, the other one is right over here, the cross on my right hand, and this has some deep significance to me, so I would love to share that with you for a little bit.

Um Psalm 16, 8 has been a verse, it really is the um the impetus behind this.

And I've been living in the Psalms all summer long, and I love Psalm 16, it's been ministering to me.

And so I'll give you a little background, but it says, Lord, you alone are my portion and my cup, you make my lot secure.

The boundary lies have fallen for me in pleasant places.

Surely I have a delightful inheritance.

And honestly, over sabbatical, I I felt that and was so grateful and woke up and thank God for this gift that you all blessed our family with.

I praise the Lord who counsels me.

Even at night, my heart instructs me.

And then I love this line: I will keep my eyes always on the Lord with him at my right hand.

I'll not be shaken.

If you, those who were around last year, our theme for our tenth birthday was eyes on you.

Uh, this whole idea as we step into the next decade, we want to be a church that simply keeps our focus and our eyes on Jesus.

And then I love this thought.

With you at my right hand, I'll never be shaken.

It's something that'd be fun.

You can look it up, you can go to Biblegateway.com and do this.

Do a little word study, just right hand, and see uh the significance of the right hand biblically and in the ancient Near East.

Uh, the right hand was the hand of strength, the hand of power, the hand of skill.

It was the hand upon which you made oaths and covenant and the hand where you blessed other people.

When you sat at someone's right hand, it was the place of highest honor.

Uh when we shook hands, we shake hands with our right hand today.

In the ancient day, when you shook or when you made an embrace, it was actually a sign of fellowship, intimacy, and vulnerability because you were giving up your hand of power.

You're giving up the hand of the sword and becoming vulnerable.

When it speaks of God, the right hand, it is the hand of justice that executes judgment, the hand of refuge upon which you come under and seek shelter, the hand of his blessing and favor upon you.

And I love this thought, this is incredible.

That it's not just that God's right hand is on us, but that he's at our right hand.

I mean, isn't that a cool thing?

He's like, yes, my hand is on you, but then I'm actually at your right hand.

The prophet Isaiah picks up this theme in Isaiah chapter 41 where he says, For I, next slide, for I am the Lord your God who takes, can you say that with me?

Isaiah 41 · chapter mention

Who takes hold of your right hand.

Who takes hold of your right hand and says, Do not fear, I will help you.

I love that picture.

The picture is of a parent taking hold of their child's hand.

When my kids were little and we'd be in a really crowded area, I'd take hold of my kids' hands.

When the street is busy and the cars are flying, I'd take hold of my kid's right hand as I got you.

I got you.

You're safe.

You're with me.

I'll lead the way.

You know what's amazing is we never outgrow our need for our Heavenly Father.

And our Heavenly Father says, I take hold of your right hand.

I got you.

And so, yeah, this is a sign of Jesus, you always have my yes and my allegiance.

But it's a daily reminder that God has taken hold of my right hand.

My perfect heavenly father, our perfect heavenly father's goddess.

And in that fact, I'll rest.

And in that fact, I'll move through my days, and in that fact, whatever the future may come, he's got it.

So those are the tasks.

If you were to ask.

If you weren't, you got it anyways.

Today is a worship and communion sundae, and I want to set up the table.

The Lord's uh supper and communion.

Uh the apostle Paul said it this way.

Hang on.

Okay, guys, this is embarrassing.

I wear contacts and readers now.

That's I was doing Glenn's wedding before sabbatical, and I couldn't read his vow.

I was like, this is bad.

I gotta get glasses.

The apostle Paul says it this way, for I received from the Lord what I also passed on to you.

The Lord Jesus, on the night he was betrayed, took bread, and when he gave thanks, he broke it and said, This is my body which is for you, do this in remembrance of me.

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

Do this whenever you drink it in remembrance of me.

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

There are two ordinances that Jesus left us with that we are to partake in and to do that he commanded us.

The first is baptism.

We're gonna celebrate that next week at our 11th birthday.

It's gonna be a party and amazing.

Yeah, it's our public four of you.

That's fantastic.

There's baptism and okay.

It's your public identification that you're a follower of Jesus in the community and family of Jesus.

The second is communion or the Lord's supper of this remembering his great love, his great sacrifice.

And so to set the table for us as we begin to dive into this communion moment, let me ask you a question.

What if there's a place that is so safe that the worst of you could be known and not loved less more?

What if there's a place where all of you, not just the you you present at work, and the you you present at church, and the you you present online, but the real you, the hidden you, the broken you, the ashamed parts of you, the secret you, the you that you don't want anyone else to see, and you're afraid if they did they would move away from you.

What if there's a place where the worst of you could be known?

And it's so safe that you're not allowed to less.

He chose them, he loved them.

He spent twelve years investing his life into them, or not twelve years, there's twelve of them, he spent three years investing his life into them.

And now he just has a few hours.

He knows that one of them that very night is going to betray him.

And yet that one he invites to this table as well.

Jesus, as he's setting this up, um, he understands that his disciples actually are looking at him as Messiah the way almost everybody in his day looked at Messiah.

When we look back, we we actually think his spiritual kingdom and what he's doing, when they looked at it, they thought almost uh solely politically.

And you as you read the New Testament and read the Gospels, you'll see uh and understand that there was this political excitement and energy around Jesus, that he was the coming Messiah, and his disciples believed in this.

They believed that he was actually going to overthrow the tyranny of Rome and reinstate Israel as this superpower.

This is their mental image and hope of a Messiah, so much so that James and Andrew, no, James and John.

I get confused on which one.

They ask, their mother, ask Jesus, when he steps into his kingdom, his literal kingdom, can my boy sit at your right hand, the hand of honor, and at your left hand?

She, I mean, this doesn't happen today in the work world.

There's no parents that go to the bosses and see it happened all the way back then, too, okay?

This isn't a new phenomenon.

Word got out to his disciples.

And so think about this.

They hear that they that their mother is asking them, James and John, like, hey, guess what?

You're trying to jockey for position.

And so hours before the Passover meal, which we now call the Last Supper, this was their Last Supper together, the disciples break out into argument who is the greatest among them.

And this is the context for which we pick up the Last Supper, where the communion table was shared, and Jesus has one final act.

This is his last act before he goes to the cross that left an indelible mark on their memory, so that every time they took communion, every time they sat at the Lord's table and ate the bread and the wine, they remembered this moment.

It was seared on their conscience.

If you got your Bibles, we pick it up in John chapter 13, verse 1.

John 13:1

It was just before the Passover festival, Jesus knew that the hour had come for him to leave the world and go to the Father.

Having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end.

I love that line, love them to the end.

Another translation, uh, we'll say it this way.

He now showed them the full extent of his love.

Like what's about to happen, Jesus wants to reveal to them, and yes, obviously the cross is the final revelation of his love for all of humanity.

This is the personal full revelation to them of how much Jesus loves these men.

The evening meal was in progress, and the devil had already prompted Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, to betray Jesus.

Jesus knew that the Father had put all things under his power, that he'd come from God, and was returning to God.

So he got up from the meal, took off his outer clothes, wrapped a towel around his waist.

After that, he poured water into a basin and began to wash his disciples' feet, drying them with the towel that he wrapped around him.

Jesus knew that his time was short.

He had a limited few hours.

And here's what's interesting is he orchestrated this moment.

And we know from the other gospel writers that he had actually orchestrated and found this really private room.

Everyone, the town of the city of Jerusalem, is just flooded with tons and tons of people, and everybody's wanting to be around them.

And he orchestrated this private affair.

And he actually orchestrates that there's no servants to wash the disciples' feet.

You would come in and the lowest of low, the lowest servant in the household would be the foot washer.

And you can only imagine as the disciples walked in one by one, there's a towel, there's a basin, but there's no servant.

And they walked all the way in and they then sit down.

And now the way they sat in the ancient day, it wasn't like the paintings we have.

You see them, they're all sitting at the table like this, right?

Um, they recline.

The gospels tell us they recline.

That was a normal custom for how one ate.

It was actually a lower table with a cushion.

They would lean on their left arm to eat with their right hand.

And if I I can't, I won't do it for you, but their feet would point away from the table, and then another person would be very close to them, uh close to their chest, and they would sit like this all the way around the table.

Now imagine this.

They all walked in, they passed the water, past the towel, and then they're leaning at the table.

Jesus gets up, walks over, takes off his rabbinic garb, lays it down, and then he wraps the towel of a slave around his waist.

I mean, that moment has to be one of the most awkward moments for the disciples.

They're going, what is going on?

A rabbi does not wash feet.

A messiah certainly would never.

In fact, a rabbi's disciples was never considered to wash a feet.

And here their rabbi takes on the very nature of a slave, goes behind them, and you can always imagine like how awkward that moment is as the disciples are kind of looking at each other, and they can see Jesus behind the other one as he bends down on his knees and he begins to touch their feet with his hand and wash it.

And he took his time.

Washing feet, it took time.

And one by one, he goes.

And then he gets to Peter, and Peter speaks up, and he's like, No, not me.

And Jesus says, Yes, you, otherwise, you have no part in me.

But I can only think that these disciples are looking at Jesus with his hands.

They're like, We know what those hands can do.

We've seen you, we've seen your hand touch the blind and they receive sight.

We saw you touch a leper and they're clean.

We saw you take Jarius' daughter, who was dead, and pick her hand up with your hand and bring her back to life.

And now those very hands are touching our feet.

Stooped low to the mess and the dirt and all of it.

The text goes on.

When they finished washing their feet, he put his clothes and returned to his place.

Do you understand what I've done for you?

He asked them.

By the way, I think that's a rhetorical question at this moment.

You call me teacher and lord, and rightly so, for that is what I am.

Now that I, your Lord and teacher, have washed your feet, you also should wash one another's feet.

I've set you an example that you should do as I have done for you.

Very truly I tell you, no servant is greater than his master, nor is a messenger greater than the one who sent him.

Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.

And all the arguments about who is the greatest, all the jockeying of the disciples of this newfound kingdom and this political power and influence they have was washed.

Away in a moment when their rabbi, the son of God, stooped low to take on the towel of a slave and wash their feet.

What if there's a place that is so safe where you can be fully known and not loved less, but more?

If you do a careful study of the text, you'll notice three places where it says Jesus knew.

Jesus knew that his time was short.

He knew he had a limited amount of time.

He's going to make the most of this with his disciples.

Then it says that Jesus knew that all power and authority had been given to him.

Jesus knew that literally all the power was in his hands.

Instead of leveraging power and authority to promote him and for his own gain, he did what Jesus does and what God always does is leverage his power, his authority, what he has for your good and my good to serve.

I mean, I just think about that.

We were just talking about the right hand of God and this power and might and strength.

And then Jesus, God incarnate, literally the right hand of God, stooping low, not just to hold your hand, but to wash your feet.

And then it says this Jesus knew that Judas Iscariot would betray him.

And he washed his feet too.

Brings a whole nother level when Jesus says, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.

A love so deep and so great that you can be fully known.

And the Savior, the God of all eternity, says, I am not repelled by you, but I'm compelled to come closer to you.

Jesus knew that Peter would betray him and deny him that night three times.

Jesus knew that the other ten would scatter and desert him in his time of need.

And all of them around that, he wants to reveal to them the full extent of his love, that all of your brokenness and all that you bring to the table does not change your belovedness.

I like how Henry Nowen says it.

He was an incredible thinker, writer, Dutch priest, professor at Harvard, Yale, all these sort of things, incredible, but he wrote this.

Being the beloved constitutes the core truth of our existence.

Just let that sink in for a second.

Being the beloved.

Not doing, not achieving, not performing, not earning, not measuring up, not trying to become more worthy, not any of those things.

Not what you wear, not how many followers you got, not your ethnicity, your nationality, your sexuality, your ability, whatever it is, not any of that.

Being the beloved.

Something you didn't even get to do.

It's just you're the object of his affection.

Not something that you can undo.

He still invites you to the table.

He's still the God that stoops low to wash feet.

In the presence of Jesus, friends, in the presence of Jesus, it is so safe that you can bring all of you.

And he does not love you less but more.

His affection and love for you never varies in any way.

There's nothing you can do to make him love you anymore, and there's nothing you can do to make him love you any less.

He loves you, he loves you, he loves you, and the cross declares his great love for you.

That you have a savior, by the way, that doesn't have a tattoo on his wrist.

He has the scar marks of love that declare, I will go to whatever lengths for you.

I love how the author of Hebrews says it.

It says in Hebrews chapter 12, I think verse 2 or 3.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

For the joy set before him, he endured the cross.

Who was his joy?

What was his joy?

It was you.

Me.

You are his joy.

He endured the cross, scorning its shame.

And now where does he sit?

At the right hand of the throne of the Father.

And then he gives us this call, church.

Remember that.

Now that I, your Lord and Savior, have set the example, now go and do.

The table where the disciples walked in just moments earlier, arguing about who is the greatest, and their rabbi got up from the table to wash their feet, and it wiped away all that pretense and all that pride and all that jealousy and all that positioning and posturing.

Now go and do likewise.

The communion table is to be the table where you are known fully.

We're known in community.

And not loved less, but more.

Jesus, just a few verses later, John 13, 34 and 35, bringing it all together, would say, a new command I give you that you love one another in the exact same way I have loved you.

So you are to love one another.

By this the whole world will know you're my disciples.

And if we're honest, we we we gotta admit that the church hasn't been the place consistently where you're fully known and loved.

And I'm sorry for that.

The church is to be a hospital for all of us, broken wanderers, sick and needing of a savior.

Too often we turn it into a country club with everybody trying to look perfect and hiding their real self.

What if, as we take communion, would you ask this question?

In this moment, what would it look like to bring all of me to Jesus?

I think oftentimes we bring most of us to Jesus.

Sometimes we only bring part of us to Jesus.

But what would it look like in this moment as the band is gonna come and Robbie's gonna sing, where you just took a moment and said, I'm gonna bring all of me to you.

I'm gonna bring my fear, I'm gonna bring my anger, I'm gonna bring my regret, I'm gonna bring my bitterness, I'm gonna bring my anxiety, I'm gonna bring the secret stuff that I don't want anyone else, and what I know is you in this moment fully love me.

See, when we do that, then we open ourselves to experience the healing touch of our Savior.

We allow him to do the work in us, to cleanse us, to strengthen us, to meet us.

But often what we do is we have this ideal version of us, don't we?

That we pose to other people and we often bring it to God, and God's going, I already know.

I like this quote from Thomas Merton.

And Thomas Merton deeply impacted Henry Nowan uh in his writing.

I want to leave you with this as we go to the tables, and I'll explain the tables in a second.

I meant to do that up front.

We practice an open table for those who are followers of Jesus to just simply come forward.

You take the bread, you dip it in the wine, spend a time of examination, of like, God, here's all of me.

And I just want to sit in the reality that this declares your great love, my standing, my belovedness.

If you need gluten-free option, it's in the back.

Thomas Merton says this God is asking me, the unworthy, to forget my unworthiness and that of my brothers.

Oh, could we do that today?

We're all unworthy.

We come in here unworthy.

Could we forget our unworthiness?

And could we actually not begin to look and because we feel unworthy, we either want to, you know, we think other people are down here and other people are up here.

And could we forget the unworthiness of my brother and sister and dare to advance in the love which has redeemed and renewed us all in God's likeness?

And then I love this next line.

And to laugh, after all, at the preposterous ideas of worthiness.

Like we would ever be able to somehow earn our way to worthiness.

It's just simply grace.

It's simply our being, it's simply God's unmerited, undeserved favor and delight.

That's how we come to the table.

Beloved.

Jesus, thank you for this moment.

We invite you to have your way.

God, I ask for my friends that you would allow this moment to be one where maybe for the first time or maybe in a long time, there is just the cracking open of their heart to say, God, you have you can see it all.

I'm gonna bring it all.

In the safety of knowing that you lean in, you stoop well.

Your grace meets us.

Would you overwhelm us with your love now?

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

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