Heaven is Bigger Than Your Pain - Heaven - Part 7

Have you thought of what it means to be through at all?

Because there's probably some of you guys that are in the middle

of it all right in this very moment.

You've walked through these doors and you didn't know where

else to be. I've heard some really some some

really cool stories about horror stories this week.

It's getting a little emotional because I think of where I think

of where people are and even the midst of that.

I love that phrase that we've just worshipped in it as well.

If you are a child of God and can say it as well, man, what a

blessing. What an awesome opportunity to

worship. If you're not here today and you

can't say that, my prayer is at the end of the day that you can

say it as well. So today, instead of a shout or

a praise, and can we just say a big Amen to it as well?

Amen, man. It is so awesome, man.

I love worship with you guys. Just to come in, in this moment

of community, just as a family, just to just to give some praise

back to God and be able to sell it as well.

Man, what a great thing. So I want to recognize some new

people today, man, we have a lot of new people in person or

online. Can we show those guys some love

real life? Give them a round of applause,

man. I'm so thankful you guys are

here washing it with this at this gathering at Kentucky Trail

of real life. Hey, take this opportunity.

Take 30 seconds and greet somebody around you, would you?

All right, you guys can go ahead and be seated, man.

Hey, as you're sitting down, you guys are getting ready to sit

down on something awesome called a connection card, man.

This is for everybody in the house today.

If you're if you call real life home, we love it when you fill

us out, man. Let us know what's going on in

your life. We love having conversations

with you guys. And one of the best ways that we

get to know what's happening is if you've got this connection

card, maybe it's a praise, maybe something you've been praying

for for a long time. God answered.

Maybe it's a prayer request. Maybe you're going through

something in the middle of it. You're through go trying to go

through it all right now and we would love to have it.

Our leaders get this in and they pray over these cars.

They reach out to you guys. So if you call real life home,

please fill this out. If you guys are new, I'm going

to make a promise. We're not going to ask anything

else from you today except for one simple thing.

We would love for you to give us an introduction and that

introduction is just a way for us to reach out to you.

You can fill out the top of the car to the level you're

comfortable with. We're not going to beat your

house or anything weird, but we want to know about who we are,

real life, what we're doing. And then we more importantly

want you to know that God loves you and we love you.

And everything that we do kind of filters out of this mission

statement that we have. And that mission is this is to

see people far from God discover their real life and their

purpose in Jesus. And when you're going through it

all, people get wrecked, the world throws them away.

And maybe you've been there where you, you, your friend

group has disappeared because of whatever reason.

Maybe you're sick or you're not as funny as you used to be or

whatever. And in the moment of our

loneliness and our, our, our, our isolation, you still have a

creator that's looking for you. So when we come in here, we get

to introduce people to Jesus and we gather not out of some other

common interest or just something belief other than

Jesus. And when we get to introduce

people to Jesus, we fulfill that mission.

We feel that Commission. So man, we are excited that

you're here with us today and we would invite you to be on that

mission with us. We're in the middle of an

awesome message series. For for.

For a lot of us, we look at our life and we look in the past.

We think, man, everything that is good and great has already

happened. Our best days are behind us.

And that's not true, absolutely not true.

And there's good things about having plans and goals and

aspirations, but what if our aspiration, really, if our goal

is to have clarity about what God has for us in our future,

for our eternity, what heaven looks like.

And there's very few times that you ever hear a sermon about

heaven other than in passing. And so it's been really an

awesome pleasure to hear, you know, Pastor Sean opened God's

word and just share with us a vision of what God has for us.

It brings clarity to our life and bring expectation, brings

anticipation to know what what God has for us.

We've talked about what heaven looks like, what we're going to

be doing there. And so today we're going to

continue in that message series. So real life, would you guys put

your hands together, bring up Pastor Sean as we continue.

Heaven. Good morning, guys.

Man, I'm glad to be back among the living.

Amen. I was sick a little bit last

week, just a little bit. We won't go in the details, but

first of all, it is well, Amen. I can just hear you guys

singing, which is amazing. This message today is going to

lean right into that. Before jump in, I'll say thank

you guys. They're a new or new to real

life. Can you guys give it up for

everybody's newer newer Come on, we just love you guys being

here. Last week we had our welcome

party and we had 19 like newer people to our to our church and

dine had been out of town for like a month.

So I introduced her and I was like, hey, just so you know, I

do have a wife. This is Diane.

So you haven't been better yet. But man, those guys just

blessing to share a vision a harder church.

A lot of them have jumped on our serve team today.

So see people serving their their new but give it to those

guys went to the welcome party. Amen.

Let them know you love them. There's one more group of people

I want to thank that are just making a tremendous difference

in this season. And it's those that are open up

their house, they open up the word of God.

They're open really their soul and their heart to you guys.

It's our life group leaders. And so give it up for our life

group leaders. Amen.

It's been fun. It's been 2 weeks in and to hear

the stories of all the people that have been going to groups,

I like to ask people, hey, how's it going and just people getting

back in the word of God spouses, there's a lot of ladies that are

kind of dragging their spouse along, which is kind of fun to

watch and people are open the Bibles and the way groups,

people memorizing the scripture. How many guys memorize your

first scripture this year that you may not memorize in years

and years near a show of hands. Some of you guys memorize some

scripture that's pretty good. Amen.

Come on, somebody. And it's amazing.

We go most of our life we don't read the Bible.

We're not in the Bible. And I'll encourage you guys to

jump into a group. We're not a group yet.

And not all the groups are are geared towards just going to the

Bible. But if you need to be cared for,

you need to jump in a group. And so I encourage you, if

you're not in the group, you come on Sunday, you sit, you go,

you're probably not going to receive the care you really need

unless you get into a group. Amen.

We have people that love you, they care for you, they'll pray

for you. That knows go on your life and

really show you things of God and that's how you grow.

You take leaps around people. So I encourage you guys, this is

the beginning of the third week got amazing groups and they're

they're full. There's a lot of people going to

groups. And so I encourage you guys to

jump in even even stay not behind the ball.

Amen. A few weeks in.

So I want to share something that's really cool and just

celebrate this a few weeks ago. We do not get to this very

often, so it's kind of like once in blue moon kind of thing, but

we got to donate a car that somebody done to us a few weeks

ago to somebody in need and it was really cool.

There's a young man that's been going to our church and it's one

of those stories it's hard for me to relate to because this

person started out in kind of the gang life and just has seen

a lot of loss, a lot of pain, a lot of things and has been

struggling. But it's like struggling

forward. And this person is like

motivated and striving and walking to work and, you know,

rain, sleet, snow, whatever, and just trying to make things work,

reading books, all sorts of stuff.

And so I talked to young man, I said, hey, look, I got this car,

but if you get a license, I'd get this car to you because he's

been between a license and he's been working on his license.

A few weeks ago, he showed up and had some paperwork.

He was super stoked. He said, dude, I'm right there.

That's OK, let's meet up this week.

I've been holding this car for a while and, and hold it for him.

He knew that. And so let's meet up.

And I made him up at his job and he had told me he's like, man, I

called my mom before you got here and it was just so excited

because that's what you do when you're excited, you call your

mom. Amen.

You know what I mean? And like mom, I got a car, you

know, and this person's really never received something to

really that level or anything really like that.

And it's my life. He was so thankful and we drove

around to drop the car and this kind of stuff.

And he just kept saying, I don't know how to thank you.

I don't know how to thank you. And I said, you don't have to

thank me, man. Like you just thank God, Amen.

Like this is a gift that somebody passed to us.

We're just passing on to you. And I told him, I said, the only

thing I'm going to ask you to do is that one day when you have

the opportunity and you will, and you have the means when God

puts in your heart to give something away that's irrational

to somebody else in need. And maybe it's a car and maybe

it's a home. Maybe it's some somebody moving

in. Whatever it is, I ask you to do

it because it's way more fun. I was actually in the back seat

at this point because somebody else is chauffeuring us around,

which is pretty cool. I'm in the back seat and I'm

like, hey look is so much more fun and so much more full of joy

to give than receive. And it's way more fun to send

the back seat this car and watch you be excited because I've been

in the front seat before. Amen.

I've had people give things to me I'd never ask for.

I'm not the kind of guy that's going to do that, but I've had

people bless my life. And I'm just telling you it is

way more fun to give than receive.

Amen. So this man was completely

humbled, you can tell. And I'm excited for him.

He can level up, get a different job because he's been walking

everywhere and there's excise what God's going to do and just

we get the opportunity to do that to people.

Amen. It's irrational generosity.

Like we we could have sold the car like we're we're saving

money for a building, right? But you see him, you're like,

man, I'm going to get behind that.

I'm going to plant some seeds in that.

I'm going to encourage that. Real interesting kind of side

note. Now I'm just going to say this

because I can, I'm the pastor, so we'll do that.

But last time I gave a car away, I got some Flack from people,

man, there was a few people like I didn't get a car.

Kind of heard that through the wind of the church and I was

like, so somebody's upset they didn't get a car.

That's interesting. So I'm just going to let you

know that somebody getting blessed doesn't take away from

your blessing. Amen.

God is not short on cars. Just so you know, he was Oprah

apparently too. The guy's not short on cars, but

he is short on people that he can trust with the car.

Like it's like the parable the, the 10 lepers or really a store

of 10 lepers and he heals all these lepers, only one comes

back. And I'm looking for people and

we're looking for people that have the heart towards God and

it it make it easy to get blessed, Amen.

But I will say this, and I've yet to see this, and this is a

rule of science, free maturity is instead of complaining about

not getting a car, you should be complaining about not be able to

give a car away. That's the level you need to get

to. It's like, man, I wish I could

be in the spot where I had the means and opportunity and I

could do that. And one day you will because

we're made to be conduits of God's blessing.

Amen. So this is kind of proof for

thought I'll put out there. So if I still get some Flack,

then you'll hear from me next time.

But just want to put out there. I'm, I'm excited to preach

today. We're we're back in the series

on heaven. We, we kind of had a little

thing last week, but I just want to encourage you guys, man, I'm

excited to preach. It's been a few weeks.

Are you guys trying to receive something today?

Sad to hear from, from God's word.

As always, I'm thinking about heaven.

I want the the things you see in the scripture to move you and

change the way you Live Today. And today's going with those

like deeper level kind of conversations.

Today's really dedicated those of you that are struggling in

your faith. And it could look a lot of ways.

It could be bad news at home with your kids or something

happened to family. It could be relationship that

blew up and you and you're wondering like, man, where's God

on this? Like is God still good?

Like you see pain and suffering and I'll give you some things

I've seen even this week. I I've heard about a lady that

went through a situation in childhood trauma that just, it

really ticks me off, you know, and you see that kind of stuff

and then you wonder like, OK, God, what are you doing?

And where are you at? Like, are you good?

Are you powerful? What's going on, right?

And you see these losses, maybe like natural disasters where you

see Camp Majestic, right? And you see these young girls

that are swept away to flood. And you're wondering like, OK,

God, like, I just don't understand.

Like, what are you doing? Like you see his things, like

there was a Marine that fell off the USS Iwo Jima just this last

couple days and they searched for him for an hour or a day and

they couldn't find him, right? They're like, Lord, man, this

guy's protecting our country and he's lost at sea.

And you see these things like wondering like, God, are you

real? Are you good?

And it today's just dedicate those that are struggling with

pain and loss and suffering. That's all of us.

And that's what was really encouraging to hear this song.

You're saying it is well. And like, Lord, help us to

really meet it because that song was actually written by a man

who journeyed over the sea and his wife and his kids were

killed as a boat sank. And so he didn't know about for

months. And he traveled over sea to go

to the funeral for his family. And he wrote those words over

the very spot where their ship sank.

And you say, I do a Lord of the winds and the waves.

And you'd as well with my soul. Like, that song is written

complete, utter brokenness. Amen.

Now as you want to see today, like how good God is and to

leave with those kind of words. And so we're going to jump into

our Bibles. We're going to be in Romans

Romans 8 · chapter mention

chapter 8. I want you to give you a big

view of the resurrection power of Jesus and our vision of

heaven. What is that?

I'm hearing something. Maybe it's just me.

I thought Siri was talking to me.

Romans 8, verse 18. This is Paul talking and it's

Romans 8:18

going to seem a little try at the beginning, but we're going

to get there. He said.

I consider that our present suffering that are earthly

suffering, that all the pain we walk through, he says, are not

worth what comparing with the glory that were revealed in US.

And Paul, if we taught us before, he'd actually been to

heaven, as he was with Jesus, Jesus brought him to heaven.

And so Paul knew like what we're going through now is like a

light affliction and it's a burden.

And he's like, this isn't worth comparing.

If you spent one minute in heaven or one second in heaven,

if you knew what that was really like and the glory that's been

revealed in us, we wouldn't be so worried about the pain and

suffering here on earth. And this is where Paul comes

from. And my encouragement for you is

to, to get this vision of heaven and what could be like.

And so I've been reading this book.

There's a buddy of mine, he he he mentioned it by John Burke,

imagine heaven. And he talks about near, near

death experiences and people have spent time who have passed

away and come back and they're, they're like, they're asking

from their body. They don't really know they're

dead. They see their body like whoa.

And they feel this overwhelming presence of God.

They see this light. And for those who come back,

there's a voice that tells them it's not your time.

And they go back in their body. Is that crazy?

Am I crazy? I'm just telling you like this,

this is y'all look at me like, dude, what's going on?

Dude, read the book. Amen.

He's got all these stories of Christians that have like lost

their life and give them back to them.

And there's this presence of God.

And and what you see is the overwhelming presence and joy of

heaven that awaits us. And we look at our temporary

life and we think this is it. And So what Paul is saying of

all the courage that he can muster, and I remember he's 8

chapters in. OK, so we're just picking this

out. But since I consider our present

suffering are not worth comparing with the glory that

revealed in us that what's happening right now is so minute

compared to the glory you can experience in heaven.

Verse 19 says for the creation. And he's going to make an

argument here, OK, He says, for the creation waits in what eager

expectation for the children of God to be revealed.

So he's not talking about us. He's talking about the creation

itself, the stars, the nebula, chromosomes, like every piece of

the universe is waiting with expectation for the resurrection

power of Jesus, for the children of God to be revealed.

And what he's talking about is us and our resurrection.

So mountains and atoms and trees and animals are waiting for

this. Verse 20 says for the creation

was what subjected to frustration.

Man, that sounds like a good definition of life, right?

Subjected to frustration. You think about when when Adam

fell, it's it's as Adam went, creation went.

And when humanity fell, God cursed the ground that Adam came

from. Adam was made from dust, and so

God cursed the dust and he cursed the creation itself.

And it wasn't its choice, right? Like creation itself didn't sin,

It was the creation of the creation that sinned.

It was us. And so it's not but its own

choice, but by the will of the one who subjected it, that the

earth or the creation itself was cursed by God.

But listen in hope. There's a reason that the

creation itself will be what liberated from its bondage to

decay. Like the creation knows that it

is a slave and it's in bondage, it's under curse and it's dying

and it wants to be resurrected and made whole.

And the creation knows this is true.

Creation is groaning and is expecting the resurrection power

to fix what is broken. It says and brought into listen,

this is pretty amazing, the freedom and the glory of the

children of God. How many of you guys knew that

the creation itself is actually looking forward to the

resurrection power of Jesus. It is looking forward to being

brought back to whole to to be perfected where there's no dying

and decay and it's looking to not just its own future.

It knows a timeline is set with us.

The creation and the animals and the trees and the wind and the

universe and the stars and the Galaxy are looking to us for

their freedom. You're looking for us in our

redemption to the glory of the children of God.

And so when you think about the gospel and you read the Bible,

the gospel is not just good news for us, it's good news for all

creation. It's not just freedom for us.

It's freedom for all creation. That's the same resurrection

power that saves us is the same resurrection power that's going

to resurrect our bodies is the same resurrection power that's

going to resurrect the earth in creation.

Amen. This is like a whole nother

level. How many guys are right now

going, OK, where's this guy doing?

Because we don't think about this very often.

We don't understand like how deep the gospel really goes.

Verse 22 says this. We know this is Paul talking

that the whole creation, we talk about every atom, every

particle, every star, all the black matter.

It has been groaning, as in the pains of childbirth right up to

the present time. To think about creation actually

in pain. To think about hurricanes and

tornadoes and floods and the brokenness end up creationist

crying out in pain as of childbirth.

Now you think about childbirth pain, right?

Like I can't speak on a whole lot.

I'm totally under qualified. Amen.

But I've never yet met a mom that said it wasn't worth it.

Like my kid was born but the pain was too great.

I wish I'd never had kids. And I'm not trying to minimize

the pain, Amen. I'm just trying to maximize the

prize. Like there's something being

born out of life. Like life is birthing life.

And there's an expectation that there's something greater to

come. And so these pains are not

without hope. Amen.

And so you see like the hardship that happens to you and the it's

just the stories are so crazy. Like as a pastor, like I hear

like. Things you should never know, in

the brokenness you should never see.

And I've got to give a hope and an answer to reason.

And all I can tell you is there's a curse on the earth

that has broken everything and it's so deep and it's so

entrenched, but we're longing with great expectation for a

hope of the resurrection power, Christ, Amen.

But if your hope is here and now, you're going to be

miserable. Some of y'all posts like that,

Amen. Some of y'all like have posted

as if heaven is even real. Like we're, we're hope is like,

well, the dream must happen now, brother, you're under the curse.

The dream happens later, Amen. And so we look around at our

family and the situations we want to fix it.

But here's the thing, if God is so patient to let all this junk,

and you can feel a lot of words in there happen right now, how

much must you truly love us to be patiently enduring?

Because He knows one day there's a resurrection power coming and

everything's going to be fixed. Amen.

That there's a plan behind the pain and we miss it so often.

And so when even the creation groans, it doesn't groan in

dreadful pain like in this bitter jaded pain.

It groans with expectation of hope.

Even creation knows that, and you think about us as humans who

should know scripture, who were created in the image of God.

When we grown, do we groan with expectation or do grown as

bitter as hell? Because a lot of us just grown

and we look out and we're so jaded and so bitter.

We stopped talking to people. We stopped going to church

because we've been hurt by somebody, which I'm not

minimizing because some people have been hurt so bad.

So I don't blame you, but we should never blame God.

And we have a really good night giving up on people because

that's what Satan wants us to do.

And we play right in the cards because our hope is found here

and now and not there and then. And we got to set our

expectation and our hope in heaven with great expectation,

with liberation and freedom, that there's a far better world

being born and it's coming through us.

Even creation, though, is not defeated.

Creation knows that the best days are ahead of it.

We can't forget that either, Amen.

Creation knows this is not as good as it gets.

Creation knows this isn't fair or fun.

Amen. That there's real pain and real

hurt, but it's like a childbirth.

Leave verse 23 so not only mentions creation, Paul's

saying, hey, if this light affliction or this momentary

pain is not to be compared with the glory to come in heaven, he

says, look, even creation understands this.

He makes a huge argument and he turns the corner and he's going

to talk about us In verse 23. He says not only so, not just

creation, but we ourselves, we should know this.

We have the first fruits of the spirit, and what Paul's talking

about is in that generation, this is all first generation

Christians. They're the first ones born by

the resurrection power of God. And the way you know that is

because the Spirit of God has come into us and has made us

alive to God. Our spirit is resurrected.

There's a party that's already made complete.

Amen. That's the soul.

That's your spirit. When you called on Jesus, that

party was made right with God. But there's this body.

Come on, somebody that's broken and decay is still under the

curse. And so he says we're the first

of the Spirit and says the spirit groans inwardly as we

wait. How eagerly, man, are you guys

excited for heaven? You're excited for the

resurrection power Christ? Are you excited for the day when

there's no sin, there's no pain, there's no evil?

We don't have to lock a door, look over your shoulder.

You don't have to vote for somebody because we have a king

already. You excited for that day?

Would all make sense. Like we don't have to suffer and

have anxiety and worry about medication.

We don't have to go to the doctor.

Hallelujah. Praise God.

No vascular surgeons. Amen.

He's over there. He's like, what am I going to do

in heaven? Oh, man, I'm waiting to see what

God puts you. Yeah, he's going to pour gold.

That's pretty good. But we wait eagerly for our

adoption to sonship, the redemption of our bodies.

We are sons of God now. But think about this and and,

and there's, there's two parts that we waiting for the adoption

of sonship. What he's saying is it's not

complete yet. OK, so like in the Roman

culture, you, you are legally adopted because of paperwork.

So the paperwork's gone through the the judge has taken the

gavel and said you're adopted as Christians, we, we have what we

call justification. It's just as if you'd ever

sinned. It's a judicial term.

And when Christ died for you and you believed in Jesus, he took

all those righteous and gave it to you and took all of your

wrongs and took it on himself. And he went to electric chair

for you and he paid your penalty, he paid your hell, he

sets you free. And because of that, they've,

you're declared righteous, Amen. So you're adopted into the

family of God, but you are not complete yet.

You're not brought home, Amen. There's a part of you when

you're baptized, and it's not because you're baptized, but

it's a picture when you're baptized.

Maybe you're resurrected and newness of life out of the

water. You don't, you know that That's

your soul and your spirit. It's a picture what God did in

your soul and spirit. That part is made right with

God, Amen. But this body, as sexy as it

looks, come on somebody, right? It's still under the curse.

It's a dust that came from a dust that shall return, that

there's still evil and brokenness that's in this body.

They say that Jesus lives in your heart, but grandpa lives in

your bones, Amen. I mean, it is true.

Like you just go back to like your sin nature and you wonder

like, why am I keep messing up? Why am I not good enough?

Why did this happen? Why is evil things?

Because we're under the curse, Amen.

And we're longing for the spirit inside is longing for and

creation for us to be fully adopted into the sonship under

God. And it look and it happens when

the redemption of our bodies happens.

So one day your soul is already made whole, right when you came

to Christ. But one day your body is getting

made whole tooth of the resurrection power of Christ and

they're going to come together. And that moment, that's when the

perfection happens. Amen.

So we eagerly wait for that moment because we're halfway

there. It's feel like I'm singing a

song, right? But we get so jaded and we get

so burned out. We look around and our hope is

here and now. Like what's wrong with these

people? What's wrong with that church?

What's wrong with the world? What's wrong with politics?

All this ice, all this Epstein dude, I'm so tired of all you

guys losing your mind, Amen. Like, where is your mind at?

Like, have you read the book? Like heaven is our mind, Amen.

That's the mindset. So we've got to change our

vocabulary. We've got to change what we're

thinking about. Like my dream to be fully

adopted in Christ. Here's the amazing thing about

it, The very fact that you're upset and you feel like there's

injustice because there real isn't.

There's real injustice and there's real pain and there's

real hurt. The fact that you've grown

inside of you for a better life and a better world is actually

proof that you know Jesus, Amen? Like you should not be happy

when you turn on the news. I don't care what channel you

listen to, Amen. There's like good parts and bad

parts. Like you like the Soup Bowl

halftime show, You like Charlie Kirk's halftime show.

They're both got some good things.

They both got some suck things. Amen.

Like, my hope is in the world. Like, I can look at and go, that

part's probably from God, but that's crazy.

That's cool. That's whatever.

But why am I getting bent out of shape?

Like I didn't put my stake down on the Capitol Hill?

Like, I'm not like, oh, make it work for me.

Do I? Do I trust the government to

save my soul? Are you kidding me?

Like do I trust any other person to save my soul?

Is my hope in like my close friends or my buddies or my

workplace or my bank account? The hope is in Jesus.

Amen. It's on Calvary's Hill so you

can't get you lose sigh of that and you lose your witness

because who wants to listen to somebody that has no hope be a

burned out, bitter Christian like me?

Come on, man, like we were salt and light, which means we're

taking heaven and we're preserving on earth.

We're saying there's something better like man, pray for this.

Some of y'all so burned out about ice you're posting all

this stuff. It's like brother, like we we

have you got one vote. Whether you use it this way or

that way, you got one vote. What are we going to do about

it? We pray, Amen.

We trust like our hope is not in anything in the in in the world.

We're round it's in Jesus and if we lose sight of that and if if

we do lose sight of that we're miserable and people know it.

You don't have to even say anything.

We just know verse 24 it says for in this hope next very nice

word in this hope. What's what's this hope the hope

and the resurrection power of Christ, the adoption of sons

that the our bodily resurrection for in this hope we what we're

saved. It's it's not in US hope we are

saved like you don't have to hope one day it's going to work

out like we were saved already when you called on Jesus, you

already put your faith and trust and the hope and the

resurrection power of Jesus Amen.

It was already a done deal signed, sealed and delivered the

finished work of Jesus on the cross.

You put your hope on that he resurrected your spirit and your

soul and now we're just eagerly waiting.

Lord, I know you're not done yet.

So all these problems that happen, it's like, Lord, I know

you're patiently waiting. I'm learning patience as I'm

waiting. I'm just trusting you because

this is so Jack crazy. Like I don't even know where I'm

at right now. But Lord, I'm just trusting you.

Amen. We eagerly await because we are

saved, it says. But hope that is seen is no hope

at all. I mean, if it's already done,

you don't need hope. You don't need hope it works out

if the check cleared we what who hopes or what they've already

have and so our hope is in the resurrection of power of Jesus

and it's 100% guaranteed future result as if it's already

arrived because that's the power of Christ.

It's already done. It tells us how to hope verse 25

but if we hope for what we do not yet have this resurrection

of our body, we wait for it. How what was that patiently?

How many of us have lost our patience?

Amen. Like we might know the most

impatient generations that ever walked the face of the earth and

we have this patience that we're waiting for God's plan to

unfold. And I see this so often as a

pastor. We're like, Hey, I'll just

buddy, but he won't go to church because he got hurt a long time

ago. And I'm like, well, how, how bad

what happened it it just OK, Like I've seen 10,000 times

harder, right? Like it's, it's real easy for us

to give up on people relationships.

We we had our life group launched like the the party we

did. And to be honest, as a pastor, I

was like, man, I don't think I'm really like feeling it with

their group. Like I kind of felt like, well,

I kind of gave up on people a while back, you know, just like

sense of like, I don't know about relationships.

I've been down the road before because you know, you're going

to get hurt. Amen.

How many y'all been hurt before, right?

I don't want any up again. I've been hurt in the past, blah

blah. It's like welcome to fall on

earth, Amen. Like it's going to take some

maturity in your part to, to, to to, to put up with sin to to to

like love covers a multitude of sin.

Like to choose not to be given even and to forgive and some

stuff like really small. We like to make it really big.

It's like these Christians weren't perfect.

I'm like, who told you we were? We're just forgiven, Amen.

We're not better than anybody. We're just forgiven by Christ.

But I see this all the time. We're not we're not patient with

people because we've given up. So we're not going to join a

group. I'm not going to get involved.

I got involved in lap church. So I'm not going to do that.

You know, like can't forgive people.

I mean, politics, patience and politics.

Come on, somebody, right. I'm going to give you a big like

level how this works. If you don't see me posting

about it, then you probably shouldn't post about it.

Because if I'm in a spot as a pastor where I'm going to hook

my wagon to a political party or person or a thing or a policy,

then I'm selling the gospel short.

And so if you're out there and it's like, hey, I can't help

myself, we'll start helping yourself because there are

people who need Jesus more than be Republican or Democrat, Amen.

And so I hooked my wagon to Jesus.

Now there are people on both sides of the line that go to our

church and both people are going to heaven.

Shock face, shocked, all shocked, right?

And we don't have to agree. Like we don't have to agree on

all those other issues. Now there's parts of things that

we can be very passionate about. There's parts of things seen in

Scripture. But I'm not going to go online

and spout my mind off and say agree with me about politics.

We're not even agreeing about heaven.

Like, let's agree about what really matters.

That's my call, that's my action.

So here's the thing, don't rob yourself by placing your hope on

fall on earth. Don't rob your joy by putting

your roots down and acting like this is your home.

Don't put your roots down and say, well, it's got to be a

certain way. It's got to work out.

Like I got to have my family this way, this way, this way.

It just may not work out the way you want it to because we're

still broken. We're still under a curse.

There's endurance, there's brokenness, there's pain.

You get you love and sometimes you you don't get love back.

It just happens. Here's the reality.

If your view of heaven is smaller than your present

suffering on earth, Satan will deconstruct your faith and he'll

put you in his toolbox and then make the most jaded individual

in history. We have to get a way bigger view

of heaven. Amen.

Because of our hope is here and now, we missed the thing

completely. I think we need to change some

of our vocabulary. Like, we need to have some

redemptive vocabulary. Like, we say it this way.

Words make worlds. OK.

So when you say like, oh, there's a natural disaster.

I nodded to it earlier. But the reality is it's really

not a natural disaster. It's an unnatural disaster.

It was actually never made to be that way.

Amen. There's a time and place before

there was tornadoes and there's brokenness and tsunamis that

wipes out hundreds of thousands of people.

There's times and places before rivers flooded.

There was even no rain where these kids weren't swept away

and can't majestic. There were times where the world

was perfect. Amen.

So when you start saying, well, it's a natural, it just

happened. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

It's not like God is not there. Don't you remember?

God cursed the earth. We got to go back to that, Amen.

Or we say this a lot. I heard this this morning even.

It's so great and we say it all the time.

You say, how you doing, man? Living the dream, living the

dream. And what's the next line?

I don't know who's it is somebody's dream, not my dream.

Who has said that? Somehow your e-mail, your e-mail

line was Sean Petrie Ltd Live in the dream, right?

Like we legit, it's just who we are.

And it's kind of interesting because it's almost like you

kind of expected this was the dream.

And so it's kind of a bitter statement like, well, live in

the dream. You know how it is getting

rolled over, getting kicked in the teeth.

Go and bury right the teeth, you know, and it's like, did you

expect anything different? So, so I would encourage you

instead of saying living the dream as if the dream should

happen now. That's the expectation that's

going to, that's not the right expectation.

It should be dreaming of heaven, dreaming of heaven.

What are you going through? I'm dreaming of heaven.

Because what that's saying is, hey, it's still real rough right

now. Still kind of tough right now.

But guess what? My hope's not in that.

My hope's in something else. Amen.

And so my dream isn't in this moment, in this affliction, in

this temporary world, my dream is actually somewhere else.

My heart is even here. My heart is already there.

Amen. Words make worlds, words make

worlds. And so when you have the

opportunity to say, hey, what's going on?

How you doing today? Dreaming to heaven?

What does that mean? It means like right now it's

kind of kind of a suck ball deal.

I found out some really crazy stuff, my family.

But guess what? My hopes in heaven.

Oh wow, that's crazy. What's that all about?

You just change the world, Amen. Just by changing the words, this

is how amazing it is. This is how far the gospel

stretches. You see this this hope of the

resurrection power even in John 316.

How many guys have John 316 memorized by the way, show hands

all right about to blow your minds.

You all know these I memorized this long time ago, right?

For God so loved the the world that he gave his only son that

whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have everlasting

life. For he not send his son into the

world to condemn the but to save the through him.

Right, 16 and 17 right? We memorize this.

I was like, oh, cool. So when you read this, the word

world is really cool. It actually is the word cosmos.

So it it means like all creation, but in the sense that

John's using it, we know it means the habits of the earth

that are humans. We know that when he says gods

of the world, he say he loves all humans in the world.

First, John 22, he's not just our perpetuation only like wrath

bearing sacrifice, but he actually paid the wrath not just

for us, but also the whole world.

Like we we know he's talking about paying the sacrifice, but

we've always put that in the box of humanity alone.

But what John is doing, he's actually nodding, tipping his

hat to all creation. He didn't just die for humans.

He died for every atom and every chromosome and every particle

and every nebula and every black hole.

Everything in creation, heaven and earth, he's going to redeem.

Amen. Have your mind went like this?

We all do the verse, but we never thought about to that

level. And John is nodding his hat to

this. Glory and redemption extends to

cultures and nations and arts and the good works that we make

with our hands that we actually get to take to heaven, which

we'll talk about next week, which is really, really cool.

Well, in with this, and this is pretty mind blowing.

Did you know that Adam and Eve don't actually have proper names

until after the fall? Think about this.

This is crazy. So Adam, his name before the

fall, it means humanity or mankind.

Like you're just human. That's what you are.

You're the creation. You're you're, you're mankind.

And then the fall happens and and Eve is beguiled by Satan and

and says, Hey, Adam, here's the fruit.

And then he eats it, right? And then sin happens.

I'll just read through the curse.

I don't want you to give. I'll show you some stuff here.

But Adam's name actually means ground or dirt or dust.

His his name Adam is actually short for Adam I, which means

ground dirt. Isn't that crazy to think about?

Like God already knew that mankind was already just going

to come. It came from dirt and it's

cursed back to dirt. That's Adam's name.

But think about this. Here is the curse.

This is what happens after ate the fruit of the tree.

Verse 14, Genesis 314. So Lord said to the serpent,

this is Satan himself, right? Because you have done this

cursed. Are you above all livestock and

all wild animals. If you'll crawl on your belly,

you eat dust all day of your life.

We have no idea what what this creature looked like, but now

he's going to crawl on his belly.

Verse 15, This is the first mention of hope.

And I will put enmity or strife between you and The Who, The

woman, she didn't have a name yet, just woman.

OK, so I'll put enemy between you and the woman, in between

your offspring and hers, her children.

And he being the offspring of the woman, will what?

Crush your head. At some point there's going to

be some offspring of this woman who's going to, he's looking at

the serpent at this point and he's going to crush your head,

Amen. He's going to break you and kill

you. It will strike and you will

strike his heel. This is the first mention of

hope. The Bible or scholars called us

the proto being first evangel, which means gospel.

This is the first gospel, Amen. And I'm thankful that Jesus,

when he is cursing humanity, when God cursed humanity, that

he gives us hope right here. He's making a way.

And we know because we have the whole Bible, right, that this is

actually talking about Jesus, that Eve is going to have

offspring. And you're going to Fast forward

16 generations to Moses and 16 or Abraham, 16 to Moses and 16

to David and 16 to Jesus. And you're going to end up with

Jesus who's going to die on the cross for our sins.

That's the one that crushes the head of Satan.

Verse 16 to the woman. This is God.

He says I will make your pains in childbearing very severe.

Boo. I wonder what was like before

this interesting conversation with painful labor.

You'll give birth to children. You'll desire will be for your

husband and he will rule over you.

Interesting desire. Before that was probably only

for God, but now it's for your husband.

Verse 17 to Adam, he said because you listen to your wife,

not the wife's fault and ate fruit from the tree.

Look at this about which I commanded you, who commanded

Adam, God commanded Adam, you must not eat from it.

He quotes it. You must not eat from this.

So here's the deal. The woman never received a

command directly from God not to eat the fruit.

The woman not knew not to eat the fruit because Adam told her

not to, because God spoke to Adam and Adam spoke to her.

So she was beguiled. But Adam, no, no, no Adam.

Adam willfully disobeyed and that's why the curse comes

through him of sin moved down from the man for all generations

because he knew he saw the face of God, listened to the words of

God and did complete obstacle what God asked him to do.

That's accountability guys. This responsibility is a man.

So he, he commanded them you must not eat from it because,

yeah, it says curse is the ground.

Here it is. Here's creation because of you.

And at that moment all of creation fell through.

Painful toil. You'll eat the food from it all

days of your life, right? How many y'all have to sweat

every day, right? Painful toil.

You'll produce thorns and thistles for you.

You'll eat from the plants of the field by the sweat of your

brow. You'll eat your food until you

return to the ground since from it you were taken for dust you

are and dust you'll return. Adam understood that he was

named after dust. Now this is really cool.

Very next verse, the first thing that humane does, the very first

thing after you're cursed by God from breaking relationship with

him and following this in the very first thing after hearing

this mention of the gospel and this hope that's going to come

in the future, what happens? Adam named his wife Eve because

she would become the mother of all the living.

Isn't that a weird time to name somebody?

You just got chewed out, You just got cursed and he's like,

OK, what? What's going on?

And it may be the very first thing he says because it says he

named his wife. It's a narrative backwards,

right? Like we don't know what he did.

He he may have looked right at his wife because she'd have a

name yet interesting time to name somebody because you

understand, there's no identity before the fall.

There was no me, my selfishness. There's no inward desire for

self. So they don't really even need

names. And so he looks at his wife.

He says Eve, which may be the very first word spoken after the

fall from humanity, and her word means her name.

Eve means life giver, not that she's going to give birth to all

these children, but with the expectation that one of these

children that they're going to give birth to is going to

reverse the curse. And so the very first word

spoken after the fall. And Adam understood this was

pregnant with hope. Amen.

But the very first name given was, guess what?

There's a day coming where it's going to reverse all that we

just broke. It's a nod to the future.

It's a nod to the gospel. It's saying this isn't my hope

isn't found here now. It's found the promise to come

that you just gave to her and that I'm going to live in the

very name Eve. My Eve is solidified the fact

that Adam was actually saved because he's pointing to Jesus.

Amen. It's incredible.

And so you think about this and the most broke, broken moment of

mutiny and despair. There was eager expectation with

a pregnant moment of hope. And he utters out Eve.

You think about our lives. I told you earlier, words make

worlds. Words make worlds.

And when you get a chance to speak, is it pregnant with hope?

Because what Paul was saying, creation itself that has the

pains of childbirth with eager expectation for the day of his

redemption. And not only that, but that

Spirit of God, the first for the spirit who lives in US, is

groaning for our resurrected body, for our redemption.

And we should have eager hope on our lips.

You think your family may be different if your life was a

little full of hope, If the world could see some real hope.

Hey, guess what? Yeah, the world's going crazy.

But guess what, Eve? I believe there's a day coming

where all that just happened, all it is messed up, is going to

be fixed. Amen.

How may y'all do that today? New, isn't it?

It's new, but it's not new. Humanity is built with the

relationship with God. And I'll look at this world as

if it's our hope. We look to God for our hope,

Amen? And so that's what Adam has

done, and that's what we do. It's not a coincidence that the

first two chapters of the Bible are the creation of God and

perfection and God's promise to us so strong.

It's not a coincidence that the last two Bibles are the

recreation of the brokenness with the resurrection power of

Jesus. Our hope is sure, Amen.

When you put our lips, we need to share it.

We need to be bold. If we don't have our hearts

around heaven, brother, get your heart around heaven, Amen.

Because we're so passionate about things that come that this

world cannot distract us and pull us down and get us defeated

and deflated and burned out. And we quit on people and we

quit on our country. We quit on our friends, and we

quit on groups. And it'll cause the whole no,

no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, with eager expectation,

Amen. With Hope even named his wife

Hope, right? It's amazing.

Like one day Hope is coming and Hope it come and it's coming

again. And so, Father, we come before

you, God, help us to be a church full of hope.

We see Romans 8 and we might be distracted, God by things this

world. Our heart may be tossed to and

fro because it's not built on Jesus.

And our hope isn't sure because we haven't locked in to the

gospel and its power. And so help us God, we beg you

God, to give us this kind of boldness and hope that our world

is desperate for. They are dying for people are

trying to find out who they are. They're changing identity and

sexuality and and gender and all this stuff because they don't

know the hope. So God make us people got full

of hope more than even the creation got the we be eagerly

waiting. How many today would say God is

just give me a passion today like I need to grow in my hope,

like my words are creating worlds that don't look like

Jesus. I need to have more hope in my

life and my words and to point people to Jesus.

If that's you and the spirit just moving you, we just raise

your hand eyes, that's me like I'm going to be full of hope

today. Thank you Jesus for moving.

Thank you, Spirit of God for showing us, God that we need to

be full of you, not full of ourselves in this world needs to

come to you. God, We're desperately for you.

We're waiting patiently for you. Lord, I want to pray for one

more group of people and that's those of you that need the hope

of Jesus today. Like we've talked a lot about

heaven, a lot about hope and maybe you're that person that's

walked in. You built your life on sand, you

built it on everything else around you and you've been

trying to find the answer. And today you realize it's

Jesus. That Jesus is hope that he came

and died on a cross for you and exchanged all your rights for

all your wrongs. And you've been made right

today, declared righteous because you believe in the power

of Jesus. The resurrection power of Jesus

still effects our lives today. The Bible says if you call on

Jesus, he will raise you out of your sin.

He will make you whole. He will forgive you and set you

free. He'll liberate you from the

curse and your soul and give you the power of the Spirit of God

in your life. And today if you need a humble

yourself, I'm calling Jesus. I'm not going to make it weirder

anybody call you out or anything.

But if you need Jesus, we just raise your hand in hindsight.

I need Christ today and the resurrection power of Jesus

today. Want to be honest, I see some

hands across the room just need Jesus.

If that's you, I'm gonna lead through a prayer.

The prayer does not save you, but it's just your heart towards

him. Just say, Father God, thanks so

much for sending Jesus. But this story is not made-up.

Lord, I see it, I sense it, I see the hope.

I hear the message of the gospel today.

And so God, I call on you. God is the only one that can

save me from this curse that set me free to liberate me from my

sin. God, I trust you down the cross,

and you rose again the third day.

And I trust that you'll do the same for me and my soul.

And one day you'll do that for my body.

And so God give me your hope. Today I prayed since Jesus name

the church said hey man come on give up.

So give it up for Jesus. Come on, it is well, Amen.