Special Spring Break Message: The Supremacy and Sufficiency of Christ: Colossians 1.15-20; 2.9-10, Pastor Scott Pearson

Thank you, James, and Worship Team.

Those songs really minister to me today and hopefully to you as well.

Please stand for the reading of God's Word.

We're going to read from one of the most majestic descriptions of Christ in the entire Bible,

Colossians chapter 1, verses 15 to 20.

Colossians 1:15–20

You can read along with me if you please, but really it's okay just to close your eyes

and listen.

It's such a great passage of Scripture.

He Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

For by Him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether

thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through Him and for

Him.

And He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

And He is the head of the body of the church.

He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminent.

For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through Him to reconcile to Himself

all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of His cross.

And then chapter 2, verses 9 and 10.

For in Him the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily and you have been filled in Him who

is the head of all rule and authority.

You may be seated.

Go Hawks.

And Cyclones.

And Cyclones.

More and more our society is becoming dominated by an egalitarian impulse.

Wasn't it interesting that equity is all the rage in government agencies and academia,

but not in sports?

Because in sports, performance matters, results matter, winning matters.

Equity is not the desired outcome.

All teams in the same league finishing at 500 is not the desired outcome.

Can you imagine the Big Ten Women's Championship Game between Iowa and Nebraska being called

a tie rather than playing overtime to see who wins and who loses?

Or the Super Bowl being called a tie after the fourth quarter to preserve equity?

People are paying big bucks to see the goats.

Caitlin Clark, the Michael Jordan of Collegiate Women's Basketball.

They're excited to see excellence.

People greatness.

And you don't have to be a Hawkeye fan to acknowledge Caitlin as the goat.

There are metrics.

There are objective standards to prove she is the greatest of all time in Collegiate Women's

Basketball.

Yet, when it comes to religion, the claim of someone being the greatest of all time is

regarded as an offensive claim.

Many today would say, no, I believe that all religions are equally valid.

You can't believe that there's just one true religion to God.

You can't believe that there is only one way to heaven.

Surely, there are many different paths to heaven for many different kinds of people.

But here's the interesting thing.

The statement, all religions are equally valid, is as much a truth claim as Jesus is the only

way to God.

Extolling the supremacy of Jesus Christ is contrary to the cultural dogma of our day,

and it seems rude and arrogant and intolerant to the modern year.

Consequently, even many professing Christians have come to believe that Jesus is the Savior

and way to God for Christians, but there are other ways to God for people of other faiths

or no faith at all.

So just let people believe whatever they want.

They'll get to heaven somehow.

But here's the problem.

If Jesus is not the only way to God, as he himself claimed, how do we know for sure that

he is a way to God?

Jesus said clearly, I am the way and the truth and the life.

No one comes to the Father except through me.

It's a bold claim.

It's made by Jesus himself.

This is not something made up by Christians hundreds of years later.

This is more like, and this is not a matter of, well, for those who believe it's true,

but for those who believe it's false, it's false.

No, this is more like if you head south, according to a true compass, you will never reach Canada,

no matter how much your internal sense of direction says you're going north.

Or if you're in Milwaukee and you head east on I-94, you're never going to reach Madison.

You'll reach Detroit before you reach Iowa.

I wonder who would have done that.

Just last time we were in Milwaukee, actually.

Christians declare the supremacy of Jesus Christ not because we think we're better than

others.

It's not about us at all.

We declare the supremacy of Jesus Christ because of who he is.

There's no one like Jesus in all of the universe.

And when we declare his supremacy, we are simply acknowledging and telling the truth.

No other religion has anyone who can compare with Jesus, what he has done for our salvation

through his death and resurrection.

So to put Muhammad, or Buddha, or Moses, or any other prophet or teacher or religious

figure in the same league as Jesus is as irrational as putting a high school junior

varsity player in the same league as Caitlyn Clark.

So who is Jesus?

And what are the metrics that prove that he is greater than any man or woman who has ever

lived and is the only savior of the world?

Let's look then at acknowledging the supremacy of Jesus Christ.

He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation.

For by him all things were created in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether

thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things were created through him and for

him, and is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

So we see first of all that Jesus is Lord over all creation.

He is the image of the invisible God.

What is God like?

Look at Jesus.

Adam and Eve were created in the image of God, but Jesus is the image of God.

He is the visible image of the invisible God, the exact representation of God's being in

human form.

He is both true man and true God.

What did God create man to be?

Look at Jesus.

What is God like?

Look at Jesus.

The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being.

He is the firstborn over all creation.

Now Jehovah's Witnesses say that Jesus is firstborn over all creation in the sense he

is the first and greatest being that God created.

Even at that he would still surpass all angelic beings and all human beings, but firstborn

doesn't mean that.

It doesn't mean first of all created beings.

Firstborn over all creation means that Jesus is both prior to and supreme over all creation

as Lord.

Firstborn is a title of rank indicating Christ's primacy, supremacy, and authority over all

of creation.

Jesus is not Mohammed's or Buddha's peer or colleague or rival.

He is their creator and God.

Jesus is king of the universe.

He is the creator God in human flesh and as such he walked on water.

He calmed the wind and the waves.

He multiplied the loaves and the fishes and fed thousands.

He gave sight to the blind.

He raised the dead.

He cast out demons.

In many other ways he demonstrated his authority over creation and over all powers visible

and invisible.

For by him all things were created, the Bible says, things in heaven and on earth, visible

and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities.

The most beautiful and powerful and glorious of supernatural and jealous beings are not

his peers or equals.

They are his creatures.

Satan and all of his demons are not his peers or equals or rivals.

They are his creatures and conquered foes.

Jesus Christ is Lord over all creation and is the king of angels.

All angels and demons know that to be true even if some humans do not.

This text says that all things were created in him and through him and for him.

Let's look at those key words.

In him indicates he is the origin of all things.

Scientists agree that our universe is expanding and an expanding universe means that it had

an origin, a beginning.

And contrary to some scientists, the universe did not come from nothing.

The universe came from someone.

All things were created in him.

Contemplate that for a moment.

All the energy of the entire universe originated in Jesus the Son of God.

Energy is not eternal and self-existent.

All the energy in the sun and the stars and the galaxies, it all originated in Christ.

All things were created in him and in him was life.

Jesus is the origin and source of all created things and all living beings.

He is also the agent of all things.

All things have been created through him.

The Bible says through him all things were made without him nothing was made that has

been made.

Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ is the creative power and wisdom of God by which God designed

and spoke the universe into being.

Jesus is literally the brains behind the DNA code.

He is the brain behind the human brain.

An article in Scientific American a few years ago says the following.

A team of scientists from around the world are attempting to build a digital version

of the human brain.

A supercomputer that they say will replicate the workings of a human brain.

It's called the human brain project.

Then the lead scientist conceives that a human brain is millions of times more powerful than

the most powerful supercomputer that exists.

The human brain is also vastly more efficient.

If completed, the energy required to run an artificial brain would equal the megawatts

needed to run an entire small town in the middle of winter.

More incredibly complex brains hum along on the equivalent of a mere 20 watts of energy

or the energy needed for a small light bulb.

On a scientist's admit they have no rational or scientific explanation of the origin of

life.

Just as they cannot explain how everything came from nothing, they cannot explain how

life came from non-life.

But life did not come from non-life.

Life came from Jesus, in Him was life, and all things were created through Him.

Jesus is also the goal of all things.

All things have been created through Him and for Him.

Why did God create the universe?

For what primary purpose?

For Christ.

For His glory.

For His pleasure.

For His purposes.

All things have been created through Him and for Him.

All things includes you.

You were made by Him and for Him and will find your purpose in Him.

To live for Christ is simply to bring our life into alignment with the purpose for which

God made us.

What is the meaning and purpose of your life?

And where would you turn to find out the answer?

Rick Warren wrote in a purpose driven life, the search for the purpose of life has puzzled

people for thousands of years.

That's because we typically begin at the wrong starting point, ourselves.

We ask self-centered questions, like what do I want to be?

What should I do with my life?

What are my goals, my ambitions, my dreams for my future?

But focusing on ourselves will never reveal our life's purpose.

You didn't create yourself, so there's no way you can tell yourself what you were created

for.

You must begin with God, your Creator.

You exist only because God wills that you exist.

You were made by God and for God.

And until you understand that, life will never make sense.

It's only in God that we discover our origin, our identity, our meaning, our purpose, our

significance, and our destiny.

We are not only brilliantly engineered by our Creator, we are personally loved by our Creator

and designed to fulfill His purpose for us.

And then Jesus is before all things.

You know that God never began to exist.

The Son of God never began to exist.

He's eternal.

This is one of the most mind-blowing realities of God, I think.

Not only does His existence have no end, it has no beginning.

Jesus did not come into existence 2,000 years ago in Bethlehem.

He's the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last.

He's before all things, meaning before both in time and above in rank and supremacy.

Before the beginning of time, before the beginning of the universe, there was Father, Son, and

Holy Spirit, one God and three persons.

He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together.

He is the center and sustainer of all things.

God didn't just set the universe in motion and then sit back and see what happens.

In Christ, all things hold together.

All things continue to exist.

Jesus Christ is literally the personal force, the glue, so to speak, that holds all things

together.

When it comes to what and how and why atoms and molecules hold together, there's an element

of mystery that transcends scientific knowledge.

It is as if there is a spiritual force at work beyond the force particles and matter

and antimatter studied by science.

The Bible puts it this way.

All things were created by Jesus Christ and for Him, He is before all things, and in Him

all things hold together.

So Jesus is the origin, agent, goal, sustainer, and center of the universe.

Are you beginning to see why the statement that all religions are basically the same

and no religion is superior to any other is an insult to Jesus?

Christianity is unique because Jesus is unique.

There's no one like Him in any other religion.

So to speak of the supremacy of Christ is not arrogance or narrow-mindedness.

To speak of the supremacy of Christ is simply to tell it like it is.

Secondly, Jesus is Lord over the new creation, and He is the head of the body, the church.

He is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in everything He might be preeminence.

For in Him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell and through Him to reconcile to Himself

all things, whether on earth or in heaven, making peace by the blood of His cross.

He is the head of the body, the church.

None less than the Lord of all creation is the Lord of the church, His new creation.

The source of all created life is also the source of spiritual life of the new creation,

the one who directs and governs the created universe also directs and governs His body,

the church.

The one who gives order to atoms and galaxies gives order to the life and ministry of the

church.

Just as the universe was created by Him and for Him, so also the church exists by His

life and for His purposes.

The church exists to fulfill the redemptive purposes of Jesus Christ.

The church receives His direction, not from the opinions of its members, not even from

the convictions of its leaders, rather the church receives His direction from the head,

Jesus Christ.

The church fulfills this divine unity and harmony not when each member does what seems

right in their own eyes, but when the body listens to and obeys the head.

And every member lives under the Lordship of Christ.

He is the beginning of the new creation and firstborn from the dead.

Firstborn overall creation is the theme of 15 to 17 and firstborn from the dead introduces

the theme of 18 to 20.

Jesus is not only the first to rise from the dead never to die again, He's also the beginning

and head of a whole new humanity consisting of believers who are made spiritually alive

now and whose bodies will also one day be resurrected by Christ's resurrection, life

and power.

Everything that was ruined by sin and death in the original creation will be restored

by Christ's life giving power in the new creation.

The day of Christ's resurrection was the first day of a new beginning for humanity, the

beginning of a new creation.

As firstborn from among the dead, Jesus became Lord over the new creation, giving newness

of spiritual life as well as eternal life to all who become new creations by believing

in Him.

Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.

The old is gone, the new has come.

Did you know that a new creation is coming?

In fact, it's already underway.

That is the truth that gives hope that the best is yet to come.

Even in youth today, a whole generation is being inundated with bad news.

Bad news in a context of doom and hopelessness about the future.

But take heart, God has already revealed to us how history ends.

It's not with nuclear annihilation, it's not with global warming or any other act of

man.

History ends with the return of Jesus Christ to the earth at which time all evil and all

death will be destroyed and God will create a new heaven and new earth.

Our hope is in a sovereign God who still sits on a throne in heaven.

Our hope is in the Lord Jesus Christ who has already won the victory over sin, death,

and evil by His death and resurrection.

Our hope is in the promise of the Word of God of a new creation, a new heaven, and a

new earth.

A hope that is not mere wishful thinking, but rather is a certain hope grounded in the

resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

Jesus Christ is Lord over all.

He is Lord over life and death and the grave.

He is Lord over all angelic and demonic powers and our hope is in Him.

He is preeminent in all things.

It is God's purpose in raising Jesus Christ from the dead that in everything Jesus will

have the supremacy and preeminence as head over every power and authority.

The resurrection is God's proof, God's metric, God's objective standard of the supremacy

of Jesus.

Why do Christians proclaim the supremacy of Jesus Christ in an age of relativism that

believes there are many paths to heaven?

It has nothing to do with who we are.

It has nothing to do with some kind of a religious superiority complex.

It has everything to do with the truth of who Jesus is.

Who is like our Lord Jesus Christ?

There's none in all the earth.

There's none in all of human history.

There's none in any other religion.

All the fullness of God dwells in Jesus.

Jesus was and is God in the human body.

And this is not some spark of divinity.

This is saying that in Christ all the fullness of deity dwells in bodily form.

Jesus is literally God in human flesh.

And there's no one else like him.

To say that Jesus is just a prophet or a good man or a moral teacher is to rob him of the

glory that is rightfully his.

The answer to the question of the origin of life is not a chemical equation or a subatomic

particle or an impersonal force.

It's a person, Jesus.

The answer to the question, how can man live forever after death?

It's not a theory of reincarnation or the immortality of the soul.

It's a person, Jesus.

The answer to the question, how can sinners be reconciled to a holy God?

It's not a path of self-denial or acts of penance or obedience to a list of laws or

adherence to religious dogma or practice of religious devotion.

It's a person, Jesus Christ.

And God reconciled all things to himself through the cross of Christ.

In the beginning, God created all things through Christ.

In the end, God will reconcile all things through Christ.

The world has been corrupted, disordered, and ravaged by sin.

But God still loves the world.

And so he sent his only son to become a man and dine across and rise from the grave so

that we might not perish but have everlasting life.

And because of the cross and resurrection of Jesus, anyone who accepts Jesus as their

Savior can be totally accepted, fully pleasing, deeply loved, completely forgiven, and empowered

to live a new life in Christ.

But there's even more to God's purpose in the mission of Christ.

The final outcome of Christ's work of reconciliation will be nothing less than a new heaven and

a new earth characterized by love, righteousness, and peace.

So application question.

If Jesus is who we claim to be, if Jesus is everything this text teaches, then can we

trust Him to be everything that we need?

Let's look then at trusting the sufficiency of Christ.

For in Him, the whole fullness of deity dwells bodily, and you have been filled in Him who

is the head of all rule and authority.

All fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ lives in you, and Christ in you is

the hope of glory.

The Christ who was with God in the beginning when He created the heavens and the earth,

indeed the Christ in whom and through Him and for whom all things were made.

The Christ who is the eternal Son of God who became flesh to reveal what God is like.

The Christ who calmed the wind and the waves and multiplied the loaves and the fishes to

feed thousands and opened the eyes of the blind and raised the dead.

The Christ who loved you and gave his life for you to forgive your sins.

The Christ who conquered death and who holds the keys of death and hate ease and lives

forevermore.

The Christ who sits at the right hand of God with all spiritual rulers and authorities

and powers under His feet.

The Christ who is coming again to reign as King of Kings and Lord of Lords over a new

heaven and a new earth.

The Christ who is the great I am.

That Christ lives in you.

That Christ lives in you.

And that Christ living in you is the hope of glory.

The presence of Christ within us, changing us from the inside out now is the guarantee

that one day we will be like Jesus, sharing in His glory.

Every time Jesus makes a change in our lives, every time He makes us a little more loving

and a little less selfish.

A little more pure, a little less impure.

A little more honest, a little less dishonest.

A little more compassionate and a little less uncaring.

A little more patient and kind and a little less impatient and unkind and angry and unforgiving.

That evidence of the presence and power of Christ in us now is what gives us the hope

of glory of being like Jesus in heaven.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, fully man and fully God.

Jesus is all you need.

All you need for salvation.

All you need for becoming a mature disciple and disciple maker.

All you need for eternal life.

All you need for fullness of life here and now.

All you need for becoming a godly man or woman.

All you need for becoming a godly husband or wife or father or mother.

All you need for exhibiting the fruit of the Spirit, Christ-owned character qualities in

all of your relationships.

Christ is enough.

Do you trust Him to be enough to fulfill you with His fullness?

Let the fullness of Christ within you determine your identity and fill your inner emptiness

and empower a new life.

The fullness of Christ within us is the antidote to our inner emptiness.

You see emptiness breeds and attracts sin, for sin attaches itself to inner emptiness.

It's not enough just to confess sins and try to get rid of them.

The emptiness behind these sins must be filled or else that emptiness will simply continue

to attract other sins.

The fullness of Christ's life within us expels that inner emptiness and fills our soul with

love and joy and peace so that we can grow in the Christ-like qualities of compassion,

kindness, humility, gentleness, patience, and forgiveness.

This is the message of Colossians.

All the fullness of deity lives in Christ, and Christ lives in you, and so you have been

given fullness in Christ.

You have a new identity, a new disposition, and a new power in order to live a new life

and become a mature disciple growing to become like Jesus.

Since Jesus Christ is the fullness of God, and Christ lives in us by His Spirit, and

since we've been freed from the penalty and controlling power of sin and delivered from

all evil powers, and since we have fullness of life in Christ, therefore we have everything

we need for living a victorious and godly and satisfied and fruitful Christian life.

So the next time the devil tries to fill your mind with lies about your inadequacy or inferiority

or powerlessness to overcome sin and persevere through life trials and bear much fruit, claim

these truths instead and tell the devil to get lost.

I don't have what it takes to be a godly man and spiritual leader in my family.

No.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in me, and I am filled and

complete in Him, and I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life

in Him.

I don't have what it takes to be a patient and kind and compassionate and grace-filled

wife and mother.

No.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in me, and I am filled and

complete in Him, and I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life

in Him.

I don't have what it takes to overcome this addiction.

No.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in me, and I am filled and

complete in Him, and I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life

in Him.

I don't have what it takes to be a bold witness for Christ, or to lead a ministry, or to become

an effective disciple-maker.

No.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in me, and I am filled and

complete in Him, and I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life

in Him.

I just don't have what it takes to endure all these trials and persevere in faith through

all this suffering that I'm going through.

No.

The whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells in me, and I am filled and

complete in Him, and I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life

in Him.

I'd like to share a few examples of this truth that work in my life.

I was one of the last ones from my seminary graduating class to get a job as a pastor,

graduating in May, but not being called to a church, a small church in northern Minnesota,

nearly until that September.

So I was working in the machine shop that summer.

Good, honest work.

I was grateful for God's provision, but is that why we sacrificed four hard years to

earn the Master's in Divinity?

When I finally began my pastoral ministry in 1978, I was 26 and looked 16.

After a few weeks there, a woman who didn't attend our church from a community organization

came to the church and I met her at the door.

Hello, I'm so-and-so from such-and-such organization.

I'd like to meet the new Baptist pastor.

Is your dad around?

Half the people in the church were two or even three times my age.

How was I supposed to be their spiritual leader in shepherd?

Christ lives in me.

I'm filled and complete in Him.

I trust the sufficiency of Christ to make me adequate to fulfill His calling on my life.

That and God graciously placed me in a congregation that was patient and kind and long-suffering

of my many youthful mistakes.

Then in 1994, God led me to another grace-filled church here at a low point in my life.

Most of you know the story, so I won't retell it, but I will share something you may not

know.

For several months after coming here, I would have a recurrent nightmare.

In my dream, this happened many times, same dream.

In my dream, I would be overcome with panic that I was back in the stock market.

In my dream, I would be at a computer desperately looking for these stocks.

Sometimes I could even see the three-letter symbol of the stocks and I was trying to track

them and see if they were losing money and how I could sell them if I needed to.

And I was excoriating myself.

How could I be so stupid as to get back into the stock market after that's what just led

to my bankruptcy?

And the dream was so real that sometimes when I would wake up in the morning, I would actually

go to my real computer to see if I really did own some stocks.

I didn't, but the fear was real.

The fear of failing again.

The fear of letting everyone else down again.

The fear of repeating past failures.

The fear of getting sucked back into something addictive and destructive.

Some of you perhaps know similar kinds of fears.

And I had to remind myself, the whole fullness of deity dwells in Christ, and Christ dwells

in me.

And I am filled and complete in Him.

And I trust the sufficiency of Christ to empower me to live a new life in Christ free of past

bondage.

Nearly 10 years ago, Beth and I were getting ready for a 40th anniversary trip when I was

hospitalized with sepsis.

My temp was spiking to 105, my BP was dropping, I was feeling faint, I couldn't stand or walk,

I could hardly sit.

The ER contacted my urologist who prescribed two antibiotics and they put me on an IV and

admitted me.

My condition stabilized.

But later that day, the hospitalist dropped one of the antibiotics without consulting

my urologist.

And that evening, the understaffed nursing staff neglected to take my vitals.

So I fell asleep with a rising temp and falling BP.

A nurse woke me up in the middle of the night to take my vitals and saw that I was crashing.

High temp and dangerously low BP, I think it was something like 70 over 45.

They called my urologist, put me back on a more powerful antibiotic, and then gave me

two boluses of IV fluids, not at a drip, drip, drip rate, but more like a machine gun.

Then the nurse left, said she'd come back in a little while with someone to assess if

I needed to be taken to the ICU.

I'm alone in the middle of the night and I know I'm in trouble.

Or Jesus, I'm not alone.

Or Jesus, my life is in your hands.

You are the resurrection and the life.

You are my good shepherd.

You are everything I need.

And I fell asleep.

And when they woke me up, my condition had improved significantly and I was out of crisis.

In a much less dramatic way, I've been battling an illness the past two weeks.

You might have sensed that in my talk this morning.

Chest congestion and cough in low grade temp.

Not COVID.

I'm feeling better today with meds, but this made my sermon prep a bit of a challenge and

my talking today a bit of a challenge.

If you knew what I've been through this last week, you would know that getting through

this talk without coughing is a minor miracle.

But it's been an opportunity for me to practice what I preach before I preach.

An opportunity to trust Christ to be sufficient for everything I need.

How about you?

Where are you feeling inadequate?

Where have you resigned yourself to living in defeat?

Always falling short, never measuring up.

Will you decide today to affirm that Jesus Christ is who we claim to be?

He is who we claim to be.

Will you decide today to confess Jesus Christ as Lord, believing in your heart that God

raised him from the dead, that he died on the cross for your sins, but he lives today

and forevermore?

And will you receive him into your heart if you've not done that yet?

And then will you choose to trust him to be enough, to be sufficient, to be everything

you need in order to live out the reality of being a new creation in Christ?

Is there something in your life causing fear or anxiety or insecurity or shame or discontentment

or worry or frustration?

And you're struggling to trust the sufficiency of Christ to be all you need.

Today will you choose to trust the sufficiency of Christ?

Let's pray.

Father, we do acknowledge the truth of the supremacy of Jesus Christ.

He is the great I am in human flesh.

He is Lord over all of creation, and he is the beginning and head of the new creation.

And we bow our knees before him and confess him as Lord.

And if there's anyone here who has not done that yet, even now, would you bow your knee

before Jesus Christ in your heart?

Would you receive him into your heart as your Lord and Savior and be made new?

And for those who have done that, Holy Spirit, I pray that you would speak to them if there

would be anything in their life where they're struggling to trust the sufficiency of Jesus,

anything causing fear or anxiety or insecurity or shame or anything else that needs to be

turned over to the Lord Jesus Christ, believing that he is sufficient.

Holy Spirit, we ask that you would speak now to each heart.

You're going to close with a closing song, and I'm going to invite you to come forward

to the altar if there is something in your life that you need to turn over to the Lord

that you need to trust his sufficiency to take care of that issue in your life.

I'm going to ask that many of you will come forward to the altar.

I'll also ask the prayer team to come and stand alongside.

When you come forward, you can come directly to the altar and pray by yourself.

Amen.

Thank you.