Winning the War - New Kicks New Tricks

If you want to click, flip in your Bible, we're going to be in Ephesians chapter six in just a moment.

We are in a series.

We're talking about winning the war.

The reality is, God has called our life on earth to be a victorious life.

That we don't have to wait to win when we get to heaven.

We have an opportunity to win right now.

And we've been going through the armor of God.

And so this week's series is entitled, this sermon is New Kicks, New Tricks.

Right?

New Kicks, New Tricks.

If you grew up in the 1900s like me, in 1984, there was a game-changing movie that came out.

It was called Karate Kid.

Come on.

Some of y'all need to introduce this next generation to a 1984 movie this afternoon.

But there's one scene that I want us to take a moment to look at, and let's see how many of you guys know what's about to come up in this scene here.

Tweak the leg.

You have a problem with that.

Sweep the leg.

Why would he say that?

Because here's the reality: you take out their legs, you take out the fighter.

Like you can know everything, but he understood one thing that, man, if you take out the legs and he can't stand, he can't win this fight.

And like I love to watch fighting, like you can judge me for it later on.

It's okay.

Like I'll get over it.

You can practice a little forgiveness and we'll all be okay, right?

But the thing I love about MMA fighting, if you watch, like it took me a little while to get this, but you see these grown men sometimes as they go to square up and they're kicking each other in the thigh.

And I'm like, that's dumb.

Like, why wouldn't you just punch him in the head?

Like, but then you begin to realize as the fight wears on, oh, like they're like actually ruining their ability to fight because they're taking out the legs.

That if I can keep kicking and I can keep pounding, that somewhere eventually I'm gonna wear him down where he can't move as fast as he needs to, he can't react the same way he needs to, that he can't throw the punches that he needs to throw.

And I didn't have to beat him up here, I just had to wear him out down here.

And the reality is for some of us, the enemy understands the same game plan.

The enemy shows up in our life and he just says, sweep the lace.

Because we're all standing on something.

The question is, what are we standing on the moment when that happens?

I think a lot of us, like we talk about standing on something or standing on God, but one of the pieces that we're often standing on, if we're honest, for some of us, we stand on fear.

I'm afraid something bad may happen.

And so we are standing on fear, which makes it really easy for the enemy to take our feet out.

Fear, man, FOMO, I'm gonna miss out on something, right?

Anyone else have that fear?

Like, I gotta be a part of this, or I gotta have my kids a part of this, because if we don't, man, we're gonna miss out and we're not gonna be good parents, and our kids aren't gonna make it into the right college, and then they're gonna, and we we kind of play this whole game out somewhere.

And so we make a lot of decisions based on something we're afraid of.

None of you guys do it, but I do.

We have moments where we're afraid of failure.

One of the greatest fears that I have is to fail.

And so a lot of times we just won't try anything because I don't want to fail and look bad, so I'm just gonna do nothing and play it safe.

We have moments where for some of us we stand on anxiety.

I love this definition of anxiety.

It's just fear stretched out over time.

Some of you know what I'm talking about.

It's not just one moment, it's like suddenly I've stretched that thing out for 30 days, 60 days, two years, five years.

And suddenly anxiety is the thing that's shifting everything that I do based on how anxious I feel or don't feel.

When the reality is for some of us, we feel anxious because all we do is sit on social media and doom scroll.

And if you haven't figured out by now, all that machine is made to do is just create anxiety inside of you.

That's it.

Because news and society has found something that sells better than sex.

It's called fear and hate.

And so we go searching the things we're afraid of or the things that we hate, and all it does is create more and more anxiety in our lives because we're stretching out one moment of fear over time.

Maybe we stand on control.

We talked about this a little bit last week for you control freaks out there.

It's okay.

Some of us are recovering, some of us are still trying to get to the point where we can admit it.

But man, you stand on control.

As long as I can control my circumstances, as long as I can control my surroundings, and everything happens the way I predetermined, I'm good.

Until the moment it doesn't happen the way you planned, and then life falls apart, and what happens?

The enemy sweeps the lakes, and I'm down.

And so for me, the the challenge, the question is what's carrying our life?

Because I believe the greatest place the enemy will attack us is your peace.

The enemy wants to destroy your ability to find peace in this life because if he can destroy your peace, he can take out your legs.

And so this is why in our world today we talk about it's so hard to find peace.

It's not an accident, it's a design by the enemy trying to do everything he can to remove your ability to find peace in Christ in this world.

Because he understands when I take away people's peace, I can take out their legs and take them down.

And so we're gonna look here in this moment because the greatest attack from the enemy becomes fear, it becomes anxiety, it becomes all those things.

Why?

Because you can't honor God when all you do is respond in fear.

You can't honor God when all you do is respond in anxiety.

You can't honor God when all you can do is respond to being in control.

If you haven't figured out yet, part of salvation is you and me surrendering our life to be in his control.

And that means you're not in charge anymore.

And so this is the place the enemy loves to press his finger.

We're going to look at today, Ephesians 6, starting in verse 10.

If you want to read along, we keep building these every week because I think we need to hear them over and over again.

Verse 10: a final word, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power, put on all of God's armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all the strategies of the devil.

For we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies, but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world, against mighty powers in this dark world, and against evil spirits in heavenly places.

Therefore, put on every piece of God's armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil, and then after the battle, you will stand firm.

And so we've been looking at what Scripture calls God's armor that we should be equipping our life with over the past few weeks.

And so this is where we're picking up here in verse 14.

Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God's righteousness.

And then here we go.

For shoes, the feet, the place where you stand and make your stand, put on the peace that comes from the good news, so that you will be fully prepared.

Hear me, peace from God prepares us for whatever we face.

And so it should shape where we stand.

That that all of these pieces of armor play a piece in how they work together.

And if you haven't been here for this series, you can go back, you can catch it on podcast or YouTube and catch up if you want to.

But peace to me is very pivotal because it's the place that prepares us to be able to stand no matter what life throws our way.

Why?

Because he said it's because of his good news.

If you don't know what the good news is, it's called the gospel.

It's the story of Jesus dying for your sins and then conquering death and being rose again on the third day so that we could be saved.

You want to know why you can have peace?

So many people struggle to have peace because they think I'm still trying to earn it with God.

The story of the good news is you can have peace because Jesus has already purchased your peace with God.

You want to know how you can stand in peace?

Jesus has already paid the price for your peace.

I've said this from the get-go.

This is so important.

It's built into everything we're doing.

We're not fighting to gain victory.

We are fighting from a place of victory.

We've already won because of what Jesus did, and he's trying to position us to fight from that victory, not fight to win.

And so peace plays a vital role in everything that we do.

If you understood a Roman soldier's shoes in the way it makes up, then you would understand this.

Peace equips us for life.

If you were to look at a Roman soldier that he's describing here, it's not just the shoes, but actually the entire piece started at the knee and went down the calf all the way to the shoe.

It was a piece of metal that wrapped the whole lower leg and attached to the shoe so that it could protect the entire leg.

Because listen, if you were in hand-to-hand combat with somebody and I couldn't overpower you physically, then the next best thing I could do would be take your legs out.

Because a person who can't stand can't fight.

And so Roman soldiers learned that we had to protect the legs as best we can so that when the enemy would come, he couldn't take us out and disqualify us from the fight.

And so they would have these metal shin guards from the knee basically all the way down to be able to make sure that no matter what, they could stand.

And then on those shoes, if you understood the way those shoes worked when they went to a battle, they were usually anywhere from one to three inch spikes built into those shoes.

Think metal baseball cleats on steroids.

Why?

Because then it didn't matter if it rained, it didn't matter if it was muddy, it didn't matter what conditions they found themselves in when they went to fight.

They had footing they needed so that they could fight the fight and win.

This is why the enemy wants to destroy our peace.

He's trying to take out the very thing that's meant to equip us to fight, to find solid footing so that no matter what we face in life, we can overcome.

I played a little bit of baseball growing up.

And one of the things I remember my baseball coach telling me all the time when we would get into batting practice, when we were standing in the box, is to keep that back foot planted.

Here's what I can tell you: every little kid I've ever watched in the box that starts moving that back foot around can't hit the ball anywhere.

Because they don't have any power.

When you move that back foot, you lose the very footing that's trying to create an opportunity for you to be offensive.

Pitching, you want to know how a pitcher pitches so well?

I mean, sure, the arm strength is built into it and there's mechanics, but it all starts because he has footing on a mound and he has good footing to push off from to begin that entire process.

There's something about the footing that equips us to be able to do what God has called us to do.

That peace to me isn't just a defensive standpoint, it's an offensive standpoint as well.

That word peace in the Greek, if you study it, it's a peace that prevails.

It's a conquering peace.

It's not a passive peace, it's not a quiet peace, it's not a silent, play it safe peace.

It's an all-encompassing peace.

I say that because the peace that God gives us isn't meant to be conditional on your circumstances.

The peace that God gives us means whatever the enemy throws my way, I can still find peace with God.

And so many of us, we think the circumstances around us determine our peace.

And that's because we're letting it determine our peace rather than letting our relationship with Jesus Christ influence the situation we're in.

We let the situation influence us.

And so here we sit in this moment.

How do we win?

Let God's peace equip you for the rest of your life.

Peace is probably one of the most important things I fight for in my life.

Every major decision that I've ever made to follow where God is leading me in my life has been based off a sense of peace.

One of the biggest things I tell people all the time is how do I figure out God's will for my life?

Move where you have peace.

Because where you have peace is where Jesus is at.

He is peace.

And so peace plays a pivotal role in equipping us to do everything God has called us to do.

It protects us.

But the problem is for so many of us, we allow emotions to steer our life, not God's peace.

We can be honest here today.

I'll be uncomfortably real.

I'm about to point out some real life scenarios where we do this, okay?

We allow emotions to dictate the way we live our life.

Our entire society is suddenly becoming built on the way I feel.

And the enemy loves it because that means we have no protection and he can sweep the feet.

And you have nothing to stand on.

Because peace isn't about the way you feel, it's about where you're positioned by Christ.

And so peace is the place.

You want to learn some new kicks so you can get some new tricks, understand that peace is the first thing that equips us, and then it begins to rule our life, and then it begins to guard our life.

And so if you want to take notes, this would be the thing I would encourage you to jot down.

Why is peace important?

Because peace equips you to face the rest of life.

And then peace is one of those things that we're about to see.

It guides us in our life.

Colossians 3:15 says this, and let the peace that comes from Christ do what?

Colossians 3:15

Rule.

Rule in your hearts.

For as members of one body, you are called to live in peace and always be thankful.

See, peace is meant to guide our life.

It's meant to rule everything that we do.

But for most of us, if we're honest, fear rules what we do.

Anxiety rules what we do.

Anger rules what we do.

Bitterness and unforgiveness rules what we do.

But peace, where does peace fit in determining the way we live the rest of our life?

Because scripture calls us to live from a place of peace.

It's not an option, it's the best case scenario to overcome everything that we face in life.

Peace is meant to guide us and lead us so that we are able to follow Christ.

And so listen to me, if you had to ask yourself this question and be brutally honest, what rules most of the decisions that you make in life?

If you had to be brutally honest today, you don't have to say them out loud, but just ask yourself.

I think if we were honest for a lot of us, it would be fear.

So I won't ask any of y'all to raise your hands.

I'll just say this.

For all the helicopter parents in the room, you don't have to raise your hands.

Don't worry, it's okay.

Be careful.

It sounds so good because I'm trying to protect our kids, but the problem is if we're not careful, we disciple our kids how to live in fear instead of live from God's peace.

And as a helicopter parent, I understand the heart and intention is so good, but I'm telling you, I've seen a generation that is more anxious and afraid than any other generation that's existed in history.

And I love you as parents enough to tell you this.

I think part of the reason is because as helicopter parents, we've discipled that anxiety into our kids.

Because we've taught them what we're afraid of and why we respond because of things we're afraid of or anxious that might happen to us.

And then we wonder why our kids are afraid and anxious of everything.

It's because we've trained them how to think.

And they're supposed to think about all the bad things that could happen that they're afraid of.

Instead of teaching them how to live from a place of peace, we teach them how to live from a place of anxiety and fear.

So then what do I do?

Great question.

Don't respond from fear, respond from peace in God's wisdom.

It's really easy to shape a situation in one of two ways.

We're not going to do this because we're afraid, or we're not going to do this because the wisdom of God's word says this, and we're going to respond out of wisdom.

One produces fear and anxiety, one creates peace.

Both create an outcome that protects your kids.

Which one do you want?

Don't lead with fear, don't respond with fear.

Lead with wisdom and from a place of peace.

That's what God's called us to.

This is how we set up and let it rule our life is by responding from a place of wisdom.

For some of us, we just respond from a place of anger.

You guys know the person, man.

Angry at everything, full of bitterness, full of resentment, full of past hurts, and everything that comes out of them is irritable.

And it ain't just IBS, right?

Like they have it all the time.

They're just irritable.

Irritable attitude syndrome.

I A S.

Like it just doesn't matter, man.

Don't respond from anger, respond from peace.

Because that's supposed to be our footing.

Don't let anger be the thing that drives you.

Let God's peace be the thing that drives you.

I'm gonna let you in on a secret.

Here, I figured out the trick to most people that are angry and irritable all the time.

They're really just scared.

They're scared or they're insecure.

One of the two.

And their anger is just a shield that they try to put up around them to protect themselves because they've been hurt somewhere before.

And all an angry person is, man, I had a boss once that, like, man, they just all they knew was to elevate the voice and pound the table and make sure everybody knew when they were mad.

And man, I just learned, man, that that dude is just a scared little kid that's just insecure.

Man, our life could be so different if we moved from a place of peace instead of moving from a place of anger.

Because that's what our footing is called to be.

Some of us, man, all we do, you you move from a place of insecurity.

You're afraid somebody's gonna find out you're not as good as you think you are.

You're not as good as what I put up for everybody to see.

And if they got to know the real me, so what we do in those moments is we gotta find a way to make sure we elevate ourselves and push somebody else down in the process, because I gotta overcome my insecurity to look good.

That's not moving from a place of peace.

And you're allowing the enemy to take you out every time that you do.

See, what scripture called us, that word rule, I thought is a really important word.

If you study what it means in the Greek, it was literally a word that described a referee or umpire in ancient games.

You know what Paul's trying to say?

Peace should be the umpire in your life.

Peace should be making the call in your life.

In a moment when you're stuck trying to figure out what to do, and and the Holy Spirit pulls the yellow flag out, and y'all have one of those moments you typed up that text, man, you are mad.

I'm ready to hit the send button, and you try to hit it, and it's like the Holy Spirit says, yellow flag, man.

Hold on, hold on.

Let me rule for just a minute here, and then you have that split second.

Who's in charge?

Because peace is meant to rule our life, not fear.

It's meant to be the ref, the umpire that's calling the shots.

That's how we protect ourselves from the enemy taking us out.

Let peace make decisions from a place of peace.

Well, I'm not at peace.

Well, then make a decision once you find a place of peace.

Don't make a decision when you're afraid.

Don't make a decision when you're angry.

If you haven't figured that out yet, I'm gonna give some of y'all a piece of advice in marriage right now.

Are y'all ready for this?

Hey, listen, sometimes it's okay to just call timeout and let everybody cool down a little bit.

Like, it might actually be a better thing to do than just continue to duke it out.

I just saved somebody's afternoon.

You're welcome.

You're welcome.

Listen, I've learned it firsthand, man.

I used to be early on in marriage, man.

If we were having a uh what do we call it, an intense conversation, right?

We try to make it sound better, don't we?

Right?

Man, I just we were gonna finish this, babe.

Like we are not gonna leave business unfinished.

And every time I tried that, all I did was make things worse.

But when I when I would just call timeout, hey, whoop, yellow flag, let's take a break.

And then we would circle back around later on.

It's crazy.

Like how much better things got.

How much we were able to actually navigate through it because we weren't responding out of anger anymore.

We weren't responding out of fear, we weren't responding out of our insecurities.

The emotions had dissipated, and we were making some decisions based on peace and not the way we were feeling.

Tell me, man, it's meant to rule our lives.

I have a personal rule in my life that I try to follow.

This is a hard one for me, but I try really hard.

Is the decision I'm about to make based on faith in God's wisdom, or is it based on something I'm afraid of?

How often do you really stop to evaluate why you make the decisions you make?

Most of us make a decision because I'm afraid, I'm anxious, I'm insecure, I'm angry.

I'm trying to learn in this moment to ask God that question.

What's driving the decision I'm making right now?

Is it because I trust you and I'm gonna move in your peace?

Or is it because I'm just trying to respond to my emotions?

If we could ask that question first, I think it would change so many decisions that we make in life.

And we could find the ability to walk in God's peace.

Ephesians 4.7 says this.

We're gonna keep our Philippians 4.7.

Says, then you will experience God's peace, which exceeds anything you can understand.

His peace will do what?

Guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.

Peace equips us, peace guides us, peace guards our life.

I think the reason for some of us, emotions rule everything we do is because peace isn't guarding our heart.

We've taken the shoes off, we've taken the shin guards off.

We've given up on God's peace and we're letting something else guide and guard our life.

But peace, this is one of the scriptures I go to so many times.

When people reach out to me and say, Man, Pastor, can you pray for me?

Or somebody's up here and I'm praying for them.

I'm telling you, at some point, I promise, probably 90% of the time, one of the scriptures I pray.

Man, God, would you let the peace that passes all understanding guard their hearts and minds?

Because even if God doesn't answer the way you want Him to, He can still give you peace that can guard you from being influenced away from God in the situation you're in.

Peace guards our life.

It is a thing that protects us spiritually.

It plays into everything that we do.

If you want to have more faith in God, how many of us here wish I could have more faith in God?

Yep, okay.

Man, the rest of you guys, we're gonna keep praying for you.

All right, it's okay.

But tell you a trick to having more faith in God.

Live in peace.

Because where I'm at peace with God, I always have more faith in God.

But where peace disappears, my faith disappears every time.

If you haven't figured that out now, read the story about Jesus on the boat in the middle of the storm.

He's asleep.

They're about to drown and die, and he's asleep.

And his disciples are doing what?

Freaking out.

They've lost faith because peace is not present in the moment they're in, even though he's sleeping in the bottom of the boat.

You want to have more faith?

Learn to live in his peace, and you will find more faith come.

We talk about some of these pieces of the armor.

You want to learn to understand God's truth better for your life and live it out.

Find peace in his truth, and you would actually begin to live that truth out more and more in your life.

Peace affects the way that we live so much so.

You want immovable faith, it's connected to unshakable peace.

To live in truth is connected to Isaiah 26, 3 says this you will keep in perfect peace, all who trust in you.

How many of you guys wish I could just live in perfect peace all the time?

There's your answer.

It's not complicated.

All who trust in you.

You want to know when peace goes away?

When you stop trusting the truth of God's word and you start trusting yourself or your situation more.

Yeah, but you don't know my situation, Pastor.

If you knew my story, you would know why I can't.

Man, listen, I've heard about every story.

I promise.

And I'm telling you, the one thing the enemy uses to move people faster than anything is to take away peace.

Because when he takes away your peace and my peace, he can take us out.

It disarms so much of God wants to do in your life and my life.

Because peace is equipping us, peace is guiding us, it's protecting us, it's meant to help us.

So much trust is connected to truth, and we struggle to trust the truth when we don't have peace.

And so instead of our thoughts being fixed on Jesus, our thoughts are fixed on fear, anxiety, anger, lust, envy.

Take your pick.

We struggle because we've lost peace.

And I love what Paul said at this moment.

He said, as you live in Christ, we go back to what we said last week.

We're talking about righteousness and this idea, Paul said, to live is Christ and to die is gain.

And yet here we are again, Philippians 4, reminding us of this same idea that as you live in Christ Jesus, peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.

Hear me, you can't live in Christ and be anxious.

You can't live in Christ and be led by fear.

Am I still saved?

Oh, 100%.

But you're letting something outside of that relationship influence the things that you do.

So live in Christ means to stand in his peace for your life.

That means I give up making decisions based out of fear.

It's why I ask myself that question all the time.

Why am I doing this?

If I'm doing it because I'm afraid, it's time to stop.

As a pastor leading this church, here's what I can promise you.

Every church I've seen go in a bad direction is when a pastor starts leading from a place of being afraid something bad's gonna happen instead of living out of wisdom and faith and trusting God.

The other one that gets real bad is when pastors start leading out of their insecurities.

I can't be exposed, and so I gotta, and we give up peace and we give up the things that God wants to do because we allow those things to lead us.

Listen, you can't have a good marriage if your marriage isn't built on the peace of God.

And I can tell you, if your life isn't built on the peace of God, it's gonna be really hard to build your marriage on the peace of God.

And I've yet to see a marriage that can sustain long term without his peace somewhere present in their life.

You want to have a family that follows Christ?

Build it on the peace of God that passes all understanding to guard your hearts and minds.

And it will shape the things that happen in our life.

Peace is meant to be something tightly bound to our life.

And so in this moment, peace is not meant to come and go with feelings.

Hear me, I'm gonna say this again.

Peace is not meant to come and go with your feelings.

Peace is not meant to come and go by the circumstances of your life.

Why?

Because Jesus isn't moved by those circumstances.

If you haven't figured this out yet, there is nothing that's going to happen in your life that surprises Jesus.

Not one thing.

Why can I be at peace?

Because God already saw it coming.

God already made a plan for me.

And he's already working, even though I don't see it yet.

And so, man, what would happen if in our life we moved from a place of peace instead of a place of fear or anxiety or insecurity?

How would it begin to reshape so much of what we struggle with in life?

Because he's given us his peace for our victory, for our good, for the way he's created us to overcome.

What's stealing peace in your life right now?

A marriage crisis or a family crisis that you don't know how to fix?

Maybe you've created it and you're struggling with guilt and shame.

Maybe you realize that it's out of your control now and you don't know how to fix it.

Sounds like a great time to give something back to Jesus and invite his peace to come rule what you do instead of all of those fears and anxieties.

A financial crisis that's stacking up against you.

Control because you think that if I can just keep all of the environment together just right, then everything will be okay and I'll have peace.

Maybe for some of you, just to be honest, like peace is more about, man, if I could just get one more glass of wine.

And life is hard right now.

I just give me a little peace.

We turn to social media to distract us.

Because at least if I'm distracted, then I'm not thinking about it.

And so I can find peace.

Except the problem is when you close the phone up and put it away, it's all still right there waiting for you.

Some of you got kids, college is rolling around, you're sending them off.

I got a kid in a foreign country right now.

I get it, man.

Like there are moments as parents where it's like, man, it just fear or anxiety can rule, or I can just trust that God loves my daughter more than me and He's gonna take care of her better than I ever could.

People ask me all the time, man, how do you just stay so calm?

It's not me, it's Jesus.

But I've I've predetermined in my life that I'm gonna make decisions from a place of peace.

I'm gonna operate from a place of peace.

And that's the invitation that Jesus brings to us today is to operate from a place of peace.

If I can be honest with you, like in my life right now, man, I feel the pressure building and I feel the fear and anxiety wanting to take over.

Like it's easy in this season to see how things are growing and doing good.

But I listen, man, success will mess a person up as much as failure will.

And there's a moment, even as we get ready to buy land right now, if I can just be honest with you, there's part of me that's like fear wants to creep in.

Man, am I making a mistake?

Are we ready for this or are we not ready for this?

Man, Jason, like you, you're you might be making a bad decision here, leading us in the wrong direction, and you're gonna ruin everything that God's doing here.

Like, I know that's not God's voice, but I'm just being honest.

That's the voice of the enemy I hear in my one good ear right now.

That there's a moment here where it's really easy to start wanting to play it safe.

There's a moment here where I could exchange the peace of God for the anxiety and worry of the moment.

And I'm sure for every person in here, there's something in your life, if we would be completely honest, right now that weighs on my heart and my mind, weighs on your heart and mine.

And so I have a really simple prayer that I pray.

And I say it all out loud most of the time because I think I need to hear it more than God does.

And I've said it before, but I'll remind you one more time.

In these moments where something other than peace tries to lead you down a path where the enemy wants to destroy what God is doing in your life, I pray this simple prayer.

Jesus, you have a problem, not me.

How are you gonna solve it?

I don't have a money problem to figure out how to pay off that land.

He does.

You just tell me whatever your plan is, and I'm gonna follow.

I don't have to figure out how to lead this thing.

It's not mine, it's his anyway.

I'm just stewarding what he's trusting to us.

So, Jesus, you have a growth problem.

You figure out the problem and then give me the answer when you got it figured out.

Because it's not my weight to carry, it's his weight.

My job is to just trust and obey him.

He's the one who's supposed to carry the weight.

And so maybe the invitation for you today is you got a problem you don't know how to fix?

That's okay.

But instead of carrying the weight yourself, maybe what you need to say is, hey Jesus, you got a problem here.

And I don't know how to fix it, but you do.

Would you come carry this weight?

Would you come problem solve this for me and then give me the faith to trust you as you do?

That would be my invitation to you today.

If we could stand all across this place.

If you're getting baptized today and you want to slip out to get ready for that, we're gonna head over there in just a minute.

But more than anything, here's my invitation to you.

I say this all the time.

The thing that scares me to death is it's so easy to walk into a church, pretend like I have everything together because I don't want somebody else to know about my problem.

I don't want them to think something might be going on in my life.

And so I just carry my fear, I carry my anxiety, I carry my worry, I carry my insecurity and doubts, and I go right back out the door with them.

When the whole purpose of coming together in this moment is to surrender them to Jesus and say, help me with this so that I can live my life from a place of peace.

And so I got some friends that are gonna come down front here.

We're gonna get ready to sing a song one more time.

And if you're here in this place and you're going through anything at all, it's not any of my business, it's business between you and God.

But don't leave here carrying the weight of that.

Find peace today, it's what he wants for you.

And peace isn't getting the problem answered the way you want, peace is recognizing Jesus is walking with you in this moment.

That's the peace that passes all understanding that guards your heart and mind.

It isn't you figuring out how to fix the problem, it's you trusting Jesus while you walk through the problem with him.

That's the biggest source of peace.

And sometimes we just need to find somebody else to pray with us to walk us through.

So as we get ready to worship, as they sing this song, if you have anything in your life, you don't have to carry it out by yourself.

I'd encourage you to come down, find one of my friends down here, let them pray with you and begin to ask Jesus to give you peace as you navigate through the struggle that you're facing.

And if that's you, as we sing and you need prayer, come down.

Take a moment, let somebody pray with you.

Otherwise, worship and enjoy some time with Jesus.