In the beginning was the King (and he still is)

[SPEAKER_00]: very, very good.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you to our creative team for all of that.

[SPEAKER_00]: We are beginning a brand new series today in the Gospel of John.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I'd love you to turn to John chapter 1 verse 1 to 14.

John 1:1–14

[SPEAKER_00]: If you have a Bible, open it there.

[SPEAKER_00]: If you have a smartphone, you can pull it out on there.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we're going to begin at which is for John the beginning.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let's read together in the beginning.

[SPEAKER_00]: was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was with God in the beginning.

[SPEAKER_00]: Through him all things were made without him nothing was made that has been made.

[SPEAKER_00]: In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind.

[SPEAKER_00]: The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

[SPEAKER_00]: There was a man sent from God whose name was John.

[SPEAKER_00]: He came as a witness to testify concerning that light, so that through him all might believe.

[SPEAKER_00]: He himself was not the light.

[SPEAKER_00]: He only came as a witness to the light.

[SPEAKER_00]: The true light that gives light to everyone was coming into the world.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was in the world and know the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him.

[SPEAKER_00]: He came to that which was his own, but his own did not receive him.

[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, to all who did receive him, to those who believed in his name, he gave the right to become children of God.

[SPEAKER_00]: Children not born of natural descent,

[SPEAKER_00]: nor of human decision, or of a husband's will, but born of God.

[SPEAKER_00]: The word became flesh and made his dwelling among us.

[SPEAKER_00]: We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth.

[SPEAKER_00]: Amen.

[SPEAKER_00]: Today, we begin a brand new series called Jesus is Lord.

[SPEAKER_00]: We're saved by grace, grace, shapes us, and it forms us.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I wanna start today somewhere that might be a little bit,

[SPEAKER_00]: unexpected.

[SPEAKER_00]: There is a movie coming out this year by one of my favorite directors.

[SPEAKER_00]: The movie is called The Odyssey.

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know if anyone else has put the release date into their calendar like I have.

[SPEAKER_00]: But I will be there if there is a midnight showing, I will go to it.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, consequences be what they may.

[SPEAKER_00]: Christopher Nolan, you may have seen some of his work before if you've seen a movie interstellar or inception or tenet or dunker, any of those films, but for me, he's got like a, you know, Christopher Nolan has like a direct line into my heart somehow.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so I'm a big fan of all of that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some of you may have already seen the trailer.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, big sweeping shots, kind of landscapes, you battle hardened helmets and the clash of shields and swords.

[SPEAKER_00]: As we make this journey as we track Odysseus's journey, his Odyssey, back home.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's where the story goes.

[SPEAKER_00]: But behind the trailer, of course, if you've seen it, is a film that's probably going to be pretty long.

[SPEAKER_00]: It'll be over two hours, it might be closer to three.

[SPEAKER_00]: But behind the film is something else.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a poem.

[SPEAKER_00]: A poem written by a guy called, well, they say, a guy called Homer, which it's attributed to him.

[SPEAKER_00]: who also wrote a poem called The Iliad and that is one of the, I guess, literary masterpieces of humanity.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so, the trailer is the entry point to the movie, but the movie is the entry point to this wide, sweeping, expansive poem that has been gripping humanity for nearly 3,000 years.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the Odyssey wasn't written to be consumed in two minutes.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can't watch the trailer and go, you have seen the film.

[SPEAKER_00]: I know exactly what happens, I know all of the parts.

[SPEAKER_00]: I know you might get a bit of a general idea, a bit of a gist of what's going on.

[SPEAKER_00]: But the trailer leads to something, and then the movie leads to something else.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now,

[SPEAKER_00]: The thing is, here is how many of us meet the person of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: We meet Him through the trailer.

[SPEAKER_00]: a couple of sweeping shots, maybe there's a Christmas there, a little baby, maybe there's an Easter there, a cross.

[SPEAKER_00]: We go, yep, yep, got it, got it, got it, got it.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just give me the two minute download and I'll know everything that there is to know about the gospel, about what Jesus came to do and accomplish, just I just need the quick version cause I don't have heaps of time, I'm busy.

[SPEAKER_00]: A few powerful moments, a couple of big songs, a moving scene or two, just enough to inspire us to keep going.

[SPEAKER_00]: But we never go on to see the whole movie or read the entire script.

[SPEAKER_00]: And when that happens, following Jesus tends to feel a little bit like a small private drama, something that I can switch on and off whenever I want.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I can keep up to tabs with it.

[SPEAKER_00]: I can watch the next episode when it drops.

[SPEAKER_00]: But John, at the beginning of his gospel, does not give us the trailer.

[SPEAKER_00]: He presses play from the beginning of the entire film.

[SPEAKER_00]: He says, this is how John starts his gospel.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now,

[SPEAKER_00]: John's gospel is different to the other three.

[SPEAKER_00]: The other three are called the synoptic gospels.

[SPEAKER_00]: Matthew, Mark and Luke, synoptic means to see together in the Greek.

[SPEAKER_00]: We see those three together.

[SPEAKER_00]: They have, they share a lot of common source material.

[SPEAKER_00]: And those three gospels are quite, there's a lot of the same stories.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then, so,

[SPEAKER_00]: John's gospel is the black sheep or the ugly duckling.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's the one that sets it separately to the rest.

[SPEAKER_00]: It was written later than all of the rest as in later in time, than all of the rest.

[SPEAKER_00]: And it was written from a different perspective from a gospel writer who was perhaps in his last days thinking back to his time with Jesus and trying to bring all of these things together.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so he doesn't start in a manger.

[SPEAKER_00]: He doesn't start with Moses or with Abraham.

[SPEAKER_00]: He doesn't start with Mary and the angel appearing.

[SPEAKER_00]: Where does John start in the beginning?

[SPEAKER_00]: We've just celebrated Christmas, and when we think about where the story begins, I don't see a manger in here.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's no angels, no shepherds.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's none of that.

[SPEAKER_00]: What John is doing here is echoing something else.

[SPEAKER_00]: As soon as we know what that is.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's reminding us of something.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's another book of the Bible that begins with those same three words.

[SPEAKER_00]: The book of Genesis, which begins how?

[SPEAKER_00]: in the beginning.

[SPEAKER_00]: So John's not silly.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's doing something very smart, and he's taking us before the manger, before Moses, before Abraham, before Genesis 1, all the way back to the start.

[SPEAKER_00]: And here's the point, if you want to understand what Jesus has done for you in you,

[SPEAKER_00]: You've got to understand where he's come from.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can't begin at the cross.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can't begin with miracles.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can't begin with rescue.

[SPEAKER_00]: You've got to roll the film all the way back.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because John isn't introducing us guys to a savior who helps us cope with life.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's introducing us to a king who rules and who is always ruled.

[SPEAKER_00]: So you don't need to know much about John.

[SPEAKER_00]: He taught there's a John in this passage.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you might, you'd be forgiven for thinking John's talking about himself here.

[SPEAKER_00]: When he says, you know, there was a man who came.

[SPEAKER_00]: His name was John.

[SPEAKER_00]: He wasn't the light.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was a witness to the light.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's not actually talking about himself.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's too many John's going on.

[SPEAKER_00]: This John, the writer of the Gospel, is talking about John the Baptist or the baptizer.

[SPEAKER_00]: So it's a different.

[SPEAKER_00]: John, but the church already exists when John the apostle of the disciple of Jesus was writing, people already singing songs, people already telling stories, but so John here rolls it back and teaches us about a Jesus who always was.

[SPEAKER_00]: One of the interesting parts of this passage that struck me straight away, and I'm not sure what struck you as you read it.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this would be great for you to do and your small groups, to you just to explore this passage and what jumped out at you when we read.

[SPEAKER_00]: But one of the things that struck me as soon as I read was, oh my gosh, we're rolling this back all the way to the beginning, and yet there is this line that said he was in the world, the world was made through him

[SPEAKER_00]: Yet the world did not know him.

[SPEAKER_00]: He came to his own and his own people did not receive him.

[SPEAKER_00]: There is immediate resistance in this passage.

[SPEAKER_00]: In the first 14 verses of John's gospel, we understand that Jesus was ever present.

[SPEAKER_00]: There was never a time when Jesus was not.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was not created.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus always was, and yet he walks into the world that he created and people look up from their dinner plates and go, who are you?

[SPEAKER_00]: Can you imagine walking into your own house?

[SPEAKER_00]: You're walking at night, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You've come back from, you know, everything, you know what it feels like, the aspect when you open your front door, everything the way that it is.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know all the creeks and the floorboards as you walk through, there's one, you know where exactly where it is, as you walk through, you know how the light refracts off the windows, off the artwork that you've got hanging up, you know where the family portrait is.

[SPEAKER_00]: And imagine you walk into your house and this an entire group of people sitting at your dinner table.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just eating, just existing, hanging out, having a good chat.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you come in, you're like, ah, hey guys, it's going on.

[SPEAKER_00]: And they all look up and say, what do you do with you?

[SPEAKER_00]: And you'd be like, well, it's my house.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, you might feel like this sometimes if you've got teenagers, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: This is a kind of a common occurrence anyway.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a bit of a lucky dip, who's going to be in your house

[SPEAKER_00]: But how good?

[SPEAKER_00]: It's better your house than someone else's house.

[SPEAKER_00]: Let's say that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But Jesus walks into his own house.

[SPEAKER_00]: And he's greeted by a bunch of people who ignore him.

[SPEAKER_00]: Don't outright reject him.

[SPEAKER_00]: Just ignore him.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is John's grief.

[SPEAKER_00]: The world exists because of Jesus, but when he steps into it, he's treated like an intruder.

[SPEAKER_00]: John pushes on when he says, all things were made through him.

[SPEAKER_00]: And without him, not anything, listen to this.

[SPEAKER_00]: Without him, not anything was made that's been made.

[SPEAKER_00]: Nothing exists except by the word, except by Jesus,

[SPEAKER_00]: everything that was made has his fingerprint on it.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can see right down if you analyze the DNA code, Jesus knew it knows it.

[SPEAKER_00]: We can sometimes think that Jesus is like God's intern.

[SPEAKER_00]: Right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, like, as I'm doing my nursing training, they send you out on your first practice, and they let you do like the kind of small basic things.

[SPEAKER_00]: And, you know, you can take the pulse so you can do the blood pressure, and then there's still someone coming along behind you, making sure that you're doing it right.

[SPEAKER_00]: And we think our Jesus is like the Father's intern, sends out on little errands.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, he can help with the small things.

[SPEAKER_00]: Little, you know, kind of boy Jesus, he can't be trusted to do all the big stuff.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's not put John's pushing back on that here.

[SPEAKER_00]: Not anything was made that has been made that was made.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus has made it.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's gone through him.

[SPEAKER_00]: All things Carl just told us before from Colossians have been made by him and for him and through him.

[SPEAKER_00]: He doesn't sit.

[SPEAKER_00]: He is co-eternal and co-equal with the Father.

[SPEAKER_00]: And this is the Jesus that we want to invite into our heart to make us feel a little bit better about our circumstances.

[SPEAKER_00]: Guys, this is a worshipful moment where we say, no matter what is going on, Jesus is Lord.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's the Logos, when John says in the beginning was the word, this word is this word Logos, where we get logistics from L-O-G-O, Logos.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is not just the message that God speaks.

[SPEAKER_00]: He is the message.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus embodies what God is like to a broken and dying humanity.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is not Plan B.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is not Adam and Eve, since God sits back here, oh my gosh, what are we gonna do now?

[SPEAKER_00]: I don't know, let's just send Jesus, quick, that might fix it.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was always the plan.

[SPEAKER_00]: He was always going to be worshiped.

[SPEAKER_00]: Never forget, the angels don't need to be saved yet, they still worship Him.

[SPEAKER_00]: They don't worship Him as Savior.

[SPEAKER_00]: They worship Him as Lord.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is wonder, Jesus is not helping God run the universe.

[SPEAKER_00]: He is the one through whom the universe runs.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the early church fought for this.

[SPEAKER_00]: What I'm telling you now, this is actually like deep, deep theology that the church has been fighting for for 2000 years.

[SPEAKER_00]: The church fought for it, not because they enjoy theological arguments, but because everything was at stake.

[SPEAKER_00]: At the Council of Chalcedon, right, OK, just give me a sec.

[SPEAKER_00]: 451, AD, OK.

[SPEAKER_00]: They talked about who the person of Jesus was, and they said this.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's one person in two natures.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's fully God and fully human, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: So one person, this is the person of Jesus, in two natures, he has a divine nature and a human nature.

[SPEAKER_00]: And they exist without confusion, so they're not confused, but they also exist without separation.

[SPEAKER_00]: So one God, two natures, fully God, fully human, they exist without confusion.

[SPEAKER_00]: and without separation.

[SPEAKER_00]: Now why is that important?

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, here's why it's important.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because we need, we need, as Savior, to someone to save us, we need a God who is all powerful, but is also all human.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need God and man, we need fully both.

[SPEAKER_00]: Why?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, can you imagine if you had a life Savior, you're out in drowning, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You're out in the ocean, you didn't swim in the flags, ripped got you and you're going out.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then you look to the shore.

[SPEAKER_00]: And there's a lifeguard there, and he's got the badge.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's got his little hat, it's got a little speedos.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you're like, oh, for you, there's a lifeguard out there.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's got the authority, he's looking the part.

[SPEAKER_00]: But little did you know that that lifeguard can't swim.

[SPEAKER_00]: You're gone, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: That's why we need all powerful God.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need a God who can swim all the way.

[SPEAKER_00]: Okay, imagine now, on the other side of that, if you have, there's someone in your family who is the best deep sea diver ever, they can hold their breath like 20 minutes, and they could dive, they could plumb the depths down the bottom of the Mariana trench.

[SPEAKER_00]: They can go down and see all those kind of, they can just, soon forever, accept.

[SPEAKER_00]: The only authority, the only place they've been licensed to swim is your backyard swimming pool.

[SPEAKER_00]: Waste, waste of good power.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's what it would be like if God's not both fully God and fully man.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's fully powerful to save and deliver you, but He's also fully man so that He can relate to us in our struggles exactly where we are.

[SPEAKER_00]: to bleed, to be hungry, to be thirsty, to be tired, to be grieved, to be weary, and yet, not anything that was made has been made without him.

[SPEAKER_00]: So, it's no wonder that John

[SPEAKER_00]: segues in this passage to Jesus being light, in him was light.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that light was the light of all mankind for women and men.

[SPEAKER_00]: Why?

[SPEAKER_00]: Why would it use that metaphor?

[SPEAKER_00]: Why would he say that Jesus is like light?

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, let's come back to your house at night and you're coming into the intruders sitting around your, you're not going to see them.

[SPEAKER_00]: What are your first thing you do

[SPEAKER_00]: You go to the switch, flick it on, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: Now, in that moment, what happens if you've got power?

[SPEAKER_00]: Light turns on.

[SPEAKER_00]: Is there a discussion or an argument between light and dark, which one's going to kind of prevail on that given day?

[SPEAKER_00]: Do you switch the light on and then there's a conversation?

[SPEAKER_00]: Homeowner's just turned the switch on, so can we just have a chat about whether we make this room, like, able to see in.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the dark goes, hmm, not really sure, not feeling it.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'll just prefer to stay dark.

[SPEAKER_00]: It doesn't happen, it's silly because light doesn't argue with dark.

[SPEAKER_00]: It just is.

[SPEAKER_00]: When you turn the light on, it comes so when John says, in him was light, and that light was the light of all mankind, it means it does something in us.

[SPEAKER_00]: When Jesus is shed abroad in our heart, when there is room in our heart, when there is a faithful expectation of Jesus to do something in us, then in us, the dark doesn't, isn't negotiated with.

[SPEAKER_00]: There's only, it's a one-way street, it's in invasion, it's not a suggestion, grace and God coming to us isn't just helping us manage our darkness.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know what feels like we're just managing, just mitigating our sin, or if Jesus comes into my life, He can help me, maybe a couple of good strategies of managing this darkness.

[SPEAKER_00]: No, He comes into our heart to turn the light on.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then you see everything, everything, right, last time you took a torch and looked under your bed, it's dark for a reason down there, right, when the light gets switched on, you see it all, and that's what Jesus is doing, it's not helping you manage your

[SPEAKER_00]: We see it, we see it all, what's false is challenged, what's dead is raised, and then

[SPEAKER_00]: and dwelt among us, and we've seen His glory.

[SPEAKER_00]: Johnson, we've seen His glory.

[SPEAKER_00]: The glory of the only Son from the Father, full of one, full of grace, and full of truth.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is the Jesus that we worship.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've seen His glory, full of grace and truth.

[SPEAKER_00]: how incredible, what an incredible thought to think before all of this, before all of this began, everything that you can see, taste, touch, feel, smell, before it all, there was a, there was a ever present, fully consistent, self-sufficient God.

[SPEAKER_00]: sitting behind the darkness and the chaos, creating speaking things into being, speaking planets into being, speaking worlds into being, speaking life into being, all things coming through Jesus, not as the intern, but as the center of the universe.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then when the time was right, in the fullness of time, that God, for who everything was made,

[SPEAKER_00]: And appears to us in flesh, all of that into a baby's cry, who will need to be nursed and held and comforted and taught how to walk and how to speak.

[SPEAKER_00]: who would live sinlessly and righteousness and perfectly in the midst of our world to die a sinner's death upon a Roman cross and then be raised to new life on the third day.

[SPEAKER_00]: The one who reigns over creation is also the one who was entered into our suffering.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so here's the invitation today, not to just know more about Jesus, but to come under Him.

[SPEAKER_00]: A willing submission to the Creator and Lord of all, because John introduces us to a Jesus who always was.

[SPEAKER_00]: So this three movements away from a small Jesus that I want to lead us to the first one is a move from solution to sovereign.

[SPEAKER_00]: If Jesus is only a solution, we approach him when something breaks, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, when you, everything's going good, we treat God kind of like the workshop supervisor.

[SPEAKER_00]: God amongst your things, do the stuff that you need to.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then if you need a new tool or something breaks, you go and knock on the formance desk and say, hey, we've got a problem out here, you know?

[SPEAKER_00]: If Jesus is just a solution, you just jump out the airplane and once you get close enough to the ground, scared enough, you pull the rip cord.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, rip cord and you're saved.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've got to move from that, from Jesus being just a solution to being sovereign, to being over everything, every area.

[SPEAKER_00]: In him was light, and that light was the life of mankind.

[SPEAKER_00]: Sovereignty is different.

[SPEAKER_00]: To confess Jesus' Lord means he shapes how we live even when there's nothing wrong.

[SPEAKER_00]: Some of us have this kind of drama response to Jesus, where I only know how to engage in when there's drama going on in my life.

[SPEAKER_00]: So Jesus looks a certain way, because we only engage with him

[SPEAKER_00]: But what about when everything is good?

[SPEAKER_00]: What about when the water is calm?

[SPEAKER_00]: When the sea is a smooth?

[SPEAKER_00]: When things... You've got wind in your sails.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's when Jesus is sovereign, not just solution.

[SPEAKER_00]: Being saved by grace doesn't mean you can stay unchanged by his authority.

[SPEAKER_00]: Secondly, a move from advisor to Lord.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is where we treat Jesus a bit like the guru or the hermit in the cave.

[SPEAKER_00]: And you crawl up there, you're seeking wisdom.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, great teacher, tell me what I must do to make this change in my life.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then the great teacher from the cave are those timeless words of knowledge and wisdom.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: and then we go again.

[SPEAKER_00]: No.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's not self-help.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's not Tony Robbins in a different time.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is different to that.

[SPEAKER_00]: He's not advisor or life coach.

[SPEAKER_00]: Where we consult him, where we pray, we ask for guidance, and then we weigh it up with other voices.

[SPEAKER_00]: Well, Jesus says this, but then the other people I'm speaking to also say this, which one's right.

[SPEAKER_00]: To call Jesus Lord, is to obey even when we don't understand.

[SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to get it.

[SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to be like fully convinced of its veracity and its truth before you step in.

[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, like you do that with anything, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: John calls him the Logos.

[SPEAKER_00]: He means that he holds reality together.

[SPEAKER_00]: All of reality, the word, the message, that the order of our universe is captured and held in Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: So we've got to follow when we don't understand, follow before all the reasons make sense, step out while the questions remain unanswered.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's handing over control.

[SPEAKER_00]: You know, I trust Jesus, most days, most days.

[SPEAKER_00]: That if he knew where to place all of the stars and the right proportions of all the planets from the sun, if he knew how to do all that, he's probably gonna be trusted to help me run my life.

[SPEAKER_00]: And I submit to it.

[SPEAKER_00]: even when I don't understand.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thirdly, a move from gratitude to formation.

[SPEAKER_00]: It's a very different being from saying, thank you for the rescue to saying, shape me for the kingdom.

[SPEAKER_00]: Very different.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, we can be so grateful, Jesus turned up again.

[SPEAKER_00]: God showed up in my life.

[SPEAKER_00]: He showed up in a massive way.

[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, thank God for that.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank Jesus for that.

[SPEAKER_00]: But then what happens is, what lordship is allowing him to shape us in all the times where we're not crying out or being grateful, it's keeping us out of the mess.

[SPEAKER_00]: Moving from gratitude, I thank you, Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm so grateful.

[SPEAKER_00]: You turned up again, you did this in my life, which is excellent.

[SPEAKER_00]: We should do that, but also, Jesus shaped me, change me, form me.

[SPEAKER_00]: Because the blueprint here, from Corinthians, is that we're being changed.

[SPEAKER_00]: and we're being transformed by the power of the Spirit with ever-increasing glory to become like the one we worship.

[SPEAKER_00]: All right, team, you can come.

[SPEAKER_00]: Time is up.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus doesn't pull us out of darkness.

[SPEAKER_00]: He teaches us how to live in light.

[SPEAKER_00]: He doesn't just cancel our guilt, which he does.

[SPEAKER_00]: He can't soz our shame, which he does, which I'm very, very grateful for.

[SPEAKER_00]: He can't soz it, and a lot of you have come to faith, a lot of us come to faith, because we've come from something, we've run from something, right?

[SPEAKER_00]: And we've got ourselves in a big pickle, and we come to Jesus and say, Lord, I made a mess, help, that is perfect, that is a beautiful starting point.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that's what he does.

[SPEAKER_00]: He saves us.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's the beginning of grace.

[SPEAKER_00]: And then, what happens is, he shapes us and re-orders our priorities.

[SPEAKER_00]: Shapes our loves.

[SPEAKER_00]: He curates our desires so that they're more and more like his.

[SPEAKER_00]: That's logic.

[SPEAKER_00]: So a couple of questions as we close.

[SPEAKER_00]: Have we reduced Jesus to a solution?

[SPEAKER_00]: rather than surrender to him as sovereign.

[SPEAKER_00]: Do we consult him as an advisor or follow him as a Lord?

[SPEAKER_00]: Are we really grateful for the rescue or being formed for a kingdom?

[SPEAKER_00]: Because you can't downsize Jesus, like trail-or-rise him without distorting the gospel.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need to press play on the whole film.

[SPEAKER_00]: We need to go back and read the whole script.

[SPEAKER_00]: The word who was with God, the word was God, he was with God from the beginning.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is the king who was king before the manger.

[SPEAKER_00]: This is the creator who was created before the cross.

[SPEAKER_00]: And the crazy astonishing good news.

[SPEAKER_00]: is that the King who reigns eternally is also the one who would become flesh, so that rebels like us could become children.

[SPEAKER_00]: Children of God, let's stand together.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thanks, Theo, legit.

[SPEAKER_00]: Appreciate it.

[SPEAKER_00]: So let's take a moment, church, with you joining us online, with you joining us in the parents room this morning.

[SPEAKER_00]: Say hi to you guys.

[SPEAKER_00]: I would love all of us in this auditorium as well.

[SPEAKER_00]: To come under the Lordship of Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: And that might mean for some of us, that's the very first time where we say, Lord, I've been running, I've been in dark, but I know that in you is light.

[SPEAKER_00]: Is there anyone today who wants to submit their lives to Jesus for the very first time

[SPEAKER_00]: just lift your hand up so I can see it on a pray for you guys first.

[SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to give my life to Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: You can put that down.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you.

[SPEAKER_00]: Anyone else wants to just submit their life to Jesus today to his Lordship?

[SPEAKER_00]: Come on.

[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: Jesus we're grateful.

[SPEAKER_00]: But Lord God, we want to be formed, shaped by you.

[SPEAKER_00]: We know you have wisdom, and you give us your wisdom in double measure without finding foe.

[SPEAKER_00]: But Lord God, we want you to reorder our priorities, our desires.

[SPEAKER_00]: And Lord God, we thank you, you are our solution, you are our savior.

[SPEAKER_00]: But today, we submit ourselves under a sovereign.

[SPEAKER_00]: Our hearts were made to worship, our hearts were made to give honour.

[SPEAKER_00]: And so beyond anything else, me, the one thing that our heart loves most is you, Jesus.

[SPEAKER_00]: We've seen your glory, glory is the only sun from the Father, full of grace and truth.

[SPEAKER_00]: So church, I think the response this morning is to lift our hearts as to sing.

[SPEAKER_00]: I think the response this morning is to let the air reverberate

[SPEAKER_00]: with praise of the one true and eternal king.

[SPEAKER_00]: Can we do that together?

[SPEAKER_00]: Let's sing together, church, thanks, Leo.