Mark 14:26-42 || The Book of Mark || Pastor Joel Holm

We're jumping into the Gospel of Mark again. And here's

the deal. Sometimes when you read the scriptures, they are

there and they really inspire you. Sometimes they give you

a new revelation. Sometimes they're incredibly practical and to kind

of give you a direction of what you.

Got to do.

The passage we've come up to now Mark fourteen is

highly practical, not in the words of Jesus, but in

the example of Jesus. What he does in this window

of scriptures is what he wants us to do, which

means at the end of it, our application is not

so much what we'll do tonight, but what will do tomorrow. Now,

in order to really understand this passage in Mark fourteen,

we actually have to start all the way back in

the Old Testament in Nexus twenty. Because the Nexus twenty

God gave the ten commandments, and the second commandment was

this don't make any other graven images. So in our mind,

we're thinking, in the ancient world, somebody making like this

stone statue and say I'm going to worship you God

by worshiping this stone statue. And maybe in the ancient

world that's what it kind of looked like. But that

commandment is still ill valid today because here's what the

commandment says, don't put an image on God that is

not accurate. Now, the first commandment is don't worship other gods.

But the second commandment is, when you're.

Worshiping God, do not impose upon him an image. When

you're in a relationship. We do this all the time.

You meet somebody and you begin to have an imagination

of who they are, and you impose upon them that image,

especially if there's romance involved. I want this lady to

be like this, so I'm gonna impose upon her that image.

And then you get married real fast and you're one

year in your marriage, going what happened to this person?

Because we will impose our image of what we want

that person to be like. And when we impose on them,

this is what I want you to be like. We

do not let them speak for themselves. And this second

command is God is not a statue. He is a

person to be revealed. And in this passage in Mark,

we have a revelation of the person of God, the.

Son of God, giving for us a role model.

And it's going to challenge us in some ways because

we all have the tendency to want to imagine Jesus

in a certain way.

That we want him to be.

And our imagination isn't necessarily always wrong, but it can

be really incomplete. And Mark, what is beautiful about the

Gospel of Mark, one of four writers, is Mark is

probably the most down to earth of all the Gospel writers.

He's the one that really shows the Son of God

in his humanity. Matthew is like the son of God

as the king John is kind of like the son

of God internally. But Mark says, here is what Jesus

as a.

Human really looked like.

And we're gonna study this passage of scripture to understand

by his example, here's what he taught us.

Now we have to go out and do it.

And the truth that we're gonna discover is Jesus was

engaged in relationships of a specific kind.

That he wanted and he needed.

We always think of him only on the divine side

of being the son of God who needs nothing, that

is the deity side.

But on the human side, if you.

Study the Gospel of Mark, as we have all year long,

you discover he got frustrated. He never sinned, but he

got frustrated, got angry sometimes ask questions, and.

He had these relationships with people.

And so we're gonna look at this and we're gonna

discover that our relationships are inherently very important to us

as Christians, but which relationships we have really matter. Christianity

was never designed to be an individual sport.

It is not golf, it is football. It's a teams.

But the Bible drills down even more specifically with Jesus

about the kind of relationships you need. And we're gonna

read a passage where he illustrates for us there are

three specific people you need in your life. And as

we study this, it's really practical. You've got to do

like a self inventory. Do I have these three voices?

Are these three people in my life? And you may

discover you have one or two, but not all three.

And your response is, am I gonna follow his role

model and allow him to architect for me the relationships

I need. So open your Bibles to Mark chapter fourteen.

We're gonna read these verses. The setup is he's on

the night of his death.

He's gonna be arrested.

It's an intense time, it's an emotional time, it is

a really charge time. But the whole story here is

about his relationships with his people. Starting in verse twenty

thirty two, they went to a place called Smine, and

Jesus said to his disciples, sit here while I pray.

Then he took Peter, James, and John along with him,

and he began to be deeply distressed in trouble. My

soul is overwhelmed with sorrow, to the point of death.

He said to them stay here and keep watch. Going

a little farther, he fell to the ground and prayed,

if possible, the hour might pass from him. Ahbah, Father,

he said, everything is possible for you. Take this cup

from me. Yet not what I will, but what you will.

Picture the scene. They come out of the upper room.

It's Jesus and his twelve followers, and he takes the

twelve and he sets him down in the forest and

he says, listen, pray.

That's one group.

Then he takes three farther up the mountain, Peter, James,

and John. We know that the gospels teach us that

they were a tighter group than the twelve were. They

knew each other. One of them was actually nicknamed the

one he loved. They were best friends, and he looks

at them, and he says something to them that he

doesn't say to the twelve.

To the twelve, it's pray. I need you to help

me out. Pray.

To the three, he says this, my soul is full

of anguish to the point of death. That's kind of religious,

biblical language. Here's what he's saying in contemporary Joel revised version.

Guys, this is really hard for me. Guys, I'm really

struggling with this.

He opens his heart to the three in a way

he does not with the twelve. He doesn't make that

statement to the larger group. He makes that statement to

a tighter group of friends, but he is fully transparent

with them.

He opens his heart to them.

Then he goes farther up alone by himself, to the

Father and he says something different to the father. And

what he says to the Father is listen, if there's

any way I don't have to do this, could this

cup pass by me?

But then he says, not my will, your will be done.

Three different pictures of Jesus in a relationship, and it's

a pattern for us of three different people we need

in our life that will allow us to walk.

In the fullness of everything. God has because you.

Will never discover everything the Lord has for you and

the fullness of your faith until you do it in

relationship with others. But there's these three groups. First, there's

the twelve. They're defined by if you'll study the disciples.

These were just broken people. They were messed up. We'll

talk about them in a second. But you need in

your life broken people. We spend most of our time

trying to protect ourselves from broken people. Jesus invited them

into his life. Then the three. You need somebody in

your life that you can be transparent with, somebody you

can open up your heart and soul to and talk

honestly about.

You.

Don't do that with the twelve because it'll up, but

you do that with these three. Then you need somebody

in your life who has a voice of authority over you.

Not just somebody who will give their opinion, but somebody

because of the nature of who they are. In relationship

with you, you actually.

Honor a measure of authority.

And oftentimes sometimes God will still be the authority, but

he speaks through a human intermediary so we can hear clearly.

These are the three relationships that are modeled by Jesus,

you need in your life a broken person, broken people.

For what they do.

You need in your life people that you can be

transparent with. And then you need in your life somebody

who you acknowledge has authority over you that helps guide you. Now,

let's look at these three relationships, and while we're describing them,

you got to do an inventory. Do I have that?

Do I have a transparent person? Do I have somebody

who has authority over me. Let's take a look at

these and we're gonna look at three things. Why is

the relationship so hard, how does each relationship benefit me?

And where do I find these people? It's very important

you do not confuse the relationships. If you become transparent

with the wrong people, wow, you gonna be in a

lot of trouble. You will find things on Instagram you

did not expect to find on Instagram about you. So

you got to have a whole lot of wisdom as

to who you're gonna be transparent with.

But that leads us to not say anything and we

don't have that relationship. If you give the wrong.

Person a place of spiritual authority in your life.

And they function out of the flesh.

Then you're gonna be messed up again. So these three

are very distinct in that way. First, somebody you serve,

who is it you are serving because they are broken

and they need you.

To serve them. Think of the twelve Disciples and how

broken they were.

It's almost like is Jesus recruiting a team to build

the kingdom or is he developing a hospital, and these

are his first patients.

Peter was so arrogant. He always had a better idea

than Jesus. He was always fighting against Jesus.

Jesus wanted to do one thing. No we're not gonna

do that. No you're not gonna wash my feet. He's

the guy who pulls out the sword and cuts the

soldier's ear off. I'll do it my way, and Jesus going,

you don't get it.

Peter, the scriptures have to be fulfilled.

He was broken inside because he was always kind of

fighting for his rights. James and John two brothers who

dealt with such insecurity and such pride, so much so

that one story says they went to their mom and said,

would you talk to Jesus so that you could elevate

our status in the team and we would be like

the executive directors at his right and left hand. If

you got to ask mommy to talk to your boss,

you have insecure problems. You got serious issues. These are

broken people. They don't get it at all. You take

Matthew the tax collector, who comes out of a past

that he is so ashamed of.

And he just doesn't know what to do with that past, and.

He's ridiculed and he's just all the baggage from the

past broken. You take Simon the zealot, who basically was

a terrorist and just wanted to kill every Roman there was.

There was so much anger inside of him, just pent up.

When Jesus gathers these twelve together, he gathers them not

just for the kingdom, but for them, and he's going,

how do I serve them?

Do you have.

Broken people in your life that you are not trying

to avoid? Are they there? Because if we're honest, we

just tried to avoid them. I mean in anyway, I'm

walking down the street and I see this guy walking

towards me, and he's got long hair and he's talking

and he's going like this. I'm going, this guy is nuts.

And I walk as far away as I can, but

as he gets close, I realize he's just got an

air button and he's listening to music and talking on

the phone. But I so prejudged him. This guy I'm

gonna stay away from. And we have that mindset sometimes.

Why is it so hard to intentionally follow the model

of Christ and put broken people in our life because

they take time, they don't change overnight. There's a parable

that Jesus gave of a vineyard manager and there's a

tree and it's not very fruit and the owner comes

and says, cut it down.

Get rid of it.

And the vineyard manager says, just give me one more year,

and the owner goes, okay, one more year. And we

oftentimes talk about grace and truth, but what the Bible

teaches is grace.

And truth and time.

Jesus working with his disciples for three years, helping them heal,

helping them be restored, helping them discover faith. And it's

hard sometimes because broken people deplete you. We think, so

we isolate ourselves and protect ourselves from broken people, but

they actually give us this enormous benefit if you get

into it.

And the benefit is this. There's a statement in the

New Testament.

Says people who are a kind of at the crossroads

and the eternity and Jesus saying welcome, because you fed

them and you clothe them and you help them, and

they're going, when did we do this? And they said,

when you did that to broken people, when you served it,

you served me. We think we bring Jesus to broken people.

Do you know what they bring Jesus to us?

And we discover a revelation of who Jesus is.

When I was in my previous church as a pastor,

there was somebody in my congregation. They were broken and

they ticked me off as a pastor, I just like,

I had no patience for this person. They were just

a pain. And I'm talking to my wife one time

and I'm just complaining about this broken person, and she

said this to me. She said, Joel, what are you

missing from Jesus that that person can get under your

skin so easily? And she said, Joel, Jesus put that

broken person in your world so you would discover more

of who he is and you would get a resource

from him to be able to do that. If you

shield yourselves from broken people, you will never discover the

Christ in.

You that will grow in you to serve those people.

You have got to have this relationship, and it would

take time and it won't necessarily be easy. But that's

I want to become like Christ. And if I surround

myself just with really easy, glorious people, I won't become

like Christ very quickly. So one of the relationships is

broken people. Where do you find them? You don't look hard,

They're already there. You just need new eyes because you've

seen these people, and rather than broken people that Jesus

has brought to you, you've labeled them as just a

pain in the butt, I got a pray away.

You've labeled them in ways.

That have already judged them and convicted them and removed

yourself from them. It's my contention that most of us

have broken people in our world. We just don't see

that Jesus has actually brought them to us for them

and for us. And our response is this response of

prayers saying, God.

Give me the eyes to see them the way you

see them, give me.

The faith and the courage to engage with that. Of course,

there are health the boundaries, but you need a relationship

like the Son of God had a relationship. You need

somebody in your life who won't be easy. They'll take time,

they will stretch you, they will frustrate you, and.

You'll become like Jesus because he had that person in

his life. That person's already there.

Some of you parents that have children, God's given you

a broken person, especially if it's an adult child, and the.

Tendency is just to create that space. Jesus say no.

If you will lean into my grace and into the

power in the presence of the Holy Spirit, you are

going to grow by volumes. When you have that relationship

in your life, then you go to a second relationship,

which is somebody you are transparent with. I think it's

amazing that Jesus would say this to Peter and James

and John, that he would bear his soul to them.

And the role model illustration for us is you are

not wired to follow Christ alone, that there is this transparency.

What are you transparent about? Let's just follow the example

of Jesus. There were two things he was really transparent

about with his followers. One in this case, he's really

transparent about the battle he is having in that moment

with his call that when you are a Christian, you

have a father who blesses you and watches out for you.

But make no mistake about it. Within that context, Jesus

also said, you're gonna follow me, You're gonna pick up

your cross, and there will be a sacrifice that you

have to make. The sacrifice may be with that broken person.

The sacrifice may be when he says, you know, I

would like you to give a donation to this ministry.

The sacrifice will be something and you have a battle

with that. Jesus had that battle. It's okay to have

that battle. But if you don't have somebody to talk

to about that, you open yourself up for the enemy

to begin to whisper into your mind about how unfair

the sacrifice is, how wrong it is. But if you

can take what is in shadows and bring it into light,

because you have Christian friends who love you and you're

safe with and you can share that with All of

a sudden, now God just kind of smiles on that.

You gotta share your hardships. Jesus said, you will have hardships.

They will be there. Do you have somebody that you

can share that with. But then there's a second thing

that Jesus shared, which is a real challenge for us.

Real challenge for us.

He goes into the wilderness and he's tempted by Satan

and he says, I'm gonna let the world know. And

in the Gospels is a story of Jesus being tempted.

When was the last time you told somebody about the

temptations you are facing? Because we see temptation wrongly as sin.

It's not sin. It will lead to sin if you

don't deal.

With it, and then you really get messed up. But

while it's there as temptation, it is not sin.

But because we have this idea that it's.

Sin, we just shut up about it wouldn't be great

right now, I said, turn to your neighbor and tell

them the biggest temptation you're facing.

Jesus did that.

You read the account and here's what he said. You

know how I was tempted. I was tempted like I

had to prove myself if you're the son of God,

turned the stones to bread.

I had to validate my identity. And for Jesus, make.

No mistake, it was a very real temptation he had.

It was not subtle, it was blatant. It temptation was

so strong that the angels had to come and minister

to him after the temptation. So whatever temptation your face

and the Bible says, he gets it. He's just more

honest about it than we are. And he comes to

the Peter James and I gotta tell.

You what I'm really struggling with here.

And it is so important for us to find a

liberty when we have a couple of friends. And he

can say, you know, this thought went through my mind

and I know it's wrong.

It just keeps popping up.

The moment that word of confession of a temptation comes

out of you, Man, you are positioned for healing and

strength and that temptation goes away. But if that relationship

isn't there, there's a great probability that temptation morphs into

bad choices.

And you know, my.

Heart, gang, there are some of you here and making

bad choices, and you're trying, by your own conviction to

change it, and you're not succeeding because you got to

start beforehand. And when there is a thought or an

idea or temptation, if I just change a number on

the tax forms when it's due, man, that'll save me

four hundred bucks. And it's real. And if you have

a friend you can talk to about that, all of

a sudden you are.

Freed from that. Why is it so hard?

Because we have been influenced by the enemy to put

shame on temptation. And there is no shame on temptation,

none whatsoever. When it comes to sin, you are forgiven

and you are set free, but especially at temptation, and

you gotta go no. I will not allow the enemy

to define my relationships because of a false understanding of

what's there. I will take what's in the shadows and

I will bring into the life. What's the benefit those

of you who have this relationship.

You know the moment you can share what a hardship.

Is or what a temptation is, there is immediate freedom.

You shall know the truth, and the truth shall set

you free. There's immediate liberty that comes into that because

you're going it's in light. I don't carry it anymore.

But you have to have somebody that you can talk to.

Where do you find your people? Jesus said this, pray

the Lord of the harvest to send forth workers.

You know what I'm saying. You pray them in.

You need somebody in your life that you pray him

in and you act that way, will always be up

here encouraging you. Get in relationship, Join a ministry team,

join a small group, do something that positions you for relationships,

and out of that you'll discover, Oh, there's beginning to

be a connection with these two people. I feel safe

around them. I feel secure around them. And God is

at work and he's positioning you and he's positioned them.

But you gotta put yourself in that place where you

discover those kinds of relationships. And when you do, and

many of us.

In you're contestify to this.

They are the most God send gift that you will

never be without again. If you're here and that's the

relationship that's missing. I want you to be full of

hope because there is freedom coming to you. There is

joy and life coming to you. There is victory coming

to you because the temptation will lose his force and

it will never turn into sin. But you need those

relationships that are there. Then you get to the last one.

The last one is the hardest one.

Okay.

I know I need somebody broke in my life and

they're gonna sharpen me and I'm gonna serve them.

And that's gonna be good.

I want somebody transparent my life because I need to

get this off my chest, and I want to talk

to them and I want to be have that blessing

of freedom. But somebody who has authority over me, somebody

who actually carries a word that I'm going to let

have a weight in my life. We live in a

society that says, don't ever put yourself in that place.

We live in a society that strongly echoes, do not

ever let anybody tell you what to do. You are

the independent, free one. You belong to nobody. And yet

in this model, the Son who is fully God says,

not wi your will, Now listen to me. I am

not saying that there is a human person you need

in the life who's your boss and controls everything you do.

You understand that.

I'm saying that we all all have blind spots and

we need people, somebody in our life who understands that.

Here's why we need this role in our life. Number One,

we all have wrong beliefs. None of us have this

perfect theology. Saul persecuted Christians, and he needed Barnabas in

his life right now. Some of us, in one way

or another there's something we're thinking wrong. We're thinking something

wrong about ourselves. It may be a false guilt, it

may be we don't see ourselves rightly in Christ. And

we need an authoritative voice that will correct that wrong thought.

Not just a transparent voice that will let us echo it,

but an authoritative voice that says, Joey, you're wrong. The

Bible doesn't actually teach that about what Jesus has.

Done in your life. Because we have these wrong beliefs.

We also need it because sometimes the reality is we

don't see our shortcomings. If this was true of King David.

Remember King David, he has the affair with Basheba. He's

so clueless about it that when the problem comes in

talks to him about somebody doing something wrong, he goes,

oh nail him.

And the prophet goes, it's you. He wasn't even aware

of it.

If King David, who wrote the Book of Psalms, is

unaware of some of his shortcomings, trust me, we're unaware.

And I want to live a life that is holy

and glorifies God. So I need a voice that I

will listen to, that I invite and give permission to,

that says, if you see.

Me, ever being a little squirrely.

Let me know, because on my own I can't be

the only guardian of my actions.

I have that voice. A couple of them.

So one of them is a pastor, and he was

in a meeting with me with a group of other pastors.

And I was having a rough day and I was

not in.

A good mood, and these pastors were just they were

just idiots.

They were just idiot. I'm sorry.

I shouldn't say that about pastors, but they were just idiots.

After the meeting, I'm walking out and this friend of

mine was there, and he was the pastor who said

I meet. He goes, Joe, can I talk to you

for a second.

He said, I.

Noticed in the meeting and you're kind of edgy. Now,

if anybody else says that to me, I kind of

blow it off.

But this is a man.

I have given permission to speak into my life.

So when he says it, it carries weight, and I go, oh, man,

you're right. I did not behave in the best way

in that meeting.

If I didn't have that voice, I wouldn't have seen it.

If you were the one that had told me that,

I would have blown it off. But because I had

given permission to a spiritual leader, a real man of God.

When he pulls me aside and said, Joel, you okay

that carries weight. Do you have that voice in your life?

And it's not your spouse, it's some other voice that

is there because you don't see everything. We all have

these blind spots. It's not just about wanting their opinion.

This happened to me as a pastor where a man

came to be in front of our churts, really affluent guy,

him and his wife made a lot of money.

He said, Joel, could I see you? I said yes.

We met for coffee and he had this binary and

opened it up. He said, we're thinking about building a house,

but I want to make sure it's not too opulent.

And I don't know what's right or wrong.

And he laid out all of his finances, and he

laid out the design of the house, and he laid

out the budget for it. And I was so grateful

in that moment that there was a Christ follower who

was not going to assume they could make this decision

on their own, and they wanted to make the right

decision that would honor and glorify God. So they came

to me and they said tell us. And they had

put me in that position as their pastor speak into us.

And if I had said, you know, guys, it's a

little over the top, they wouldn't have built it. Now

I was able to counsel them say no, it's fine,

it's good. Do you have that voice, because if you're

making some big decisions all on your own, none of

us have the capacity to navigate life's big decisions by ourselves.

And it's not just we need a couple of other opinions.

We actually need an authoritative voice so that when somebody

pulls me after a meeting and says, Joel, I'm listening.

And when somebody says should we build the house, they're

actually gonna kind of follow.

What's there? Why is this so hard? Honestly because we

don't want to let go of control.

It's the God complex in every one of us. We

want to be the ones who dictate our lives.

Because that's a scary place to be because.

What you're doing is not saying, John, you're in control

of my life, just saying John, I trust God, and

I need to hear from God, and I can't hear

from God alone. So I need your help with this,

and I am inviting you and giving you permission to

speak into my life so that I can more herely

hear the voice of God. That individual doesn't replace God,

but sometimes they are a mouthpiece for God. So you

can hear more clearly in that way. And that is hard,

but the benefit you get is untold wisdom. You will

become so much wiser, so much more aware, so much clearer.

You will discover things about you, both good and challenging

that allows you to move forward, and the grace and

faith that's there. Where do you find this person? I

find with these people, you grow into them. They don't

just start there, but they grow into that. The three

or four people in my life I've known him from

twenty five years. They didn't start there, but they've grown

into that. And it's come to a place where I've

said I need you and I'm giving you permission to

speak into my life that way. And there are some

of you here on the flip side be willing to

say yes when you're asked. I would rather not because

now you're in that role where you have to really

do that. But if God asks you to do that,

to help a brother or sister.

Then be willing.

Yeah, Lord, help me give me wisdom, not to control them,

not to dictate them.

But if you want me to be.

Somebody who's been at this ro while to speak into that,

I will do that. Three relationships that Jesus had, and

as a role model he lays it out for us,

the broken, the disciples whom he served, the transparent, who

he was honest with. I've been tempted, I'm having a struggle.

This is really hard. And then the.

Authoritative, what do I do about this? Who's missing in

your life? No condemnation. The reason why we study Mark

all year is to have Jesus, through his word, teach

us how we can get better, how we can grow,

how we can have a greater identity. Who may be

missing in your life? Because for many of us in here,

I discover we usually have two, but not always three.

And the response is not to run out find some

broken person.

You're it.

And the response is not to run out and say,

please speak into my life. No, but it is to say,

you know, Mark in recording Jesus as being really practical here,

and so my practical response is to begin to make

this a matter of prayer, a matter of discussion, and

a matter of expectation. This I'm gonna need some help

from you Lord. This find the right people.

This one. Wow, you find a voice.

Of authority in your life, you will be so much

better off.

You will be in such a healthier place.

So I'm gonna ask you to do this. Just close

your eyes and bow your head. I'm gonna give you

a moment with the Lord.

Just a moment. It's all God needs.

For some of you when it comes to that first relationship.

All He wants you to do is see that person differently.

Stop praying them away, serve them. And you say I

don't have the strength to do with that, That's okay.

That's when you lean into Jesus, just in the quiet

of your own spot there on your chair, Just tell Jesus,

give me your eyes to see that person.

That coworker, that family member. Give me your eyes to

see them.

And know that as you serve the broken person, you're

going to be radically transformed into the image of Christ.

Maybe for some of you you're missing that transparent relationship.

Just ask the Lord right now in this moment, pray, pray,

the Lord of the.

Harvest to send forth the workers. Jesus.

I pray for anybody who is in this room and

they just don't have a good friend, a safe friend,

a trusted friend that they can share their deepest struggles with.

I pray Lord Jesus.

That even in the couple of weeks to come, you

would give them the courage to position themselves here in

Patria as a family, and you would begin to highlight

those people.

You would bring into our lives, really good friends.

That love us and don't judge us, and let us

share what's happening. Lord, I pray there would be an

expectation that the things we stay hidden in our hearts

could come into the light and we would find freedom

through our friends. And lastly, they may be some of

you here and you don't have that voice of authority.

That's the tough one game. And tonight, your position, if

you're gonna respond to Mark and the role model of

Jesus is really it's really a position of okay, God,

a position of submission. You acknowledge that you do not

have the goods to navigate the Christian life alone, that

we all have blind spots. Lord, I pray for each

person who is here and they are missing that voice.

I pray, Lord God that there would not be a

fear or an anxiety around this, but.

There would be a hope and an expectation of godly.

Wisdom spiritual authority that would help us see parts of

our lives that we don't see. I pray, Lord God,

whatever relationship that we are missing, would you bring it

into our lives. We thank you for the model of Jesus,

the practical role model of the Son of God, who

chose to have these relationships. So we choose tonight to

follow him. And from here forward, Lord, we will work,

we will trust, we will position ourselves. But as we

live this life of faith, we will have broken people,

transparent people, and a voice of authority that we welcome

into our lives so that we can become more like you. Jesus,

we thank you and we praise you in Christ. Then

we pray Amen, Amen.

Got to let you all, Hey man, let's get pastor

choel a round of applause for that strong, practical message

before we dismiss.

I want to stay in that same posture. So if

we can bow our heads and close our eyes and

can just continue in that posture as we're listening to

this message, and we recognize the relationships we need. The

ultimate relationship that will give us the surrender to seek

to serve broken people, to be transparent and to have

an authority in our life is to allow Jesus to

be the savior and the lord of our life.

And for some of us, we would confess that we're

that broken person and Jesus wants to serve you right now.

Right now, we're just reminded of the gospel story that

Jesus loves you as is. You don't have to change

anything about who you are to receive his love. It's

just a confession that, yes we are broken, Yes we

have sin, yet we believe that Jesus died.

On the cross for all of our sin.

From that revelation, we start our relationship with Jesus. For

some of us, we've started our relationship with Jesus, and

there's certain things that have occurred in our life that

cause us to pause or stop in our faith journey.

Why don't we continue that with Jesus tonight? So as

we are seeking to.

More healthy, some of us are going to start our

faith journey with Jesus. Some of us are going to

declare tonight we're going to continue our faith journey. I

would like all of us to repeat this prayer together

as a community to encourage those that are praying.

This prayer for the first time. It may not be

the first time you heard the prayer, be the first

time that you prayed this prayer. Sincerely to give your

life to Christ or to rededicate your life. Repeat this

Please after me say, Dear Lord Jesus, I believe that

you died on the cross for all of my sin.

Thank you for forgiving me. From this moment forward. You

are my savior and you are my Lord. Teach me

to trust you. Surround me with people that continue to

point me to You in power me to serve broken people,

to be open and transparent with the right people, and

have safe authority in my life to guide me. In

Jesus' name, we pray