Jesus is the Center - BIG SUNDAY with Tony Cooke

Welcome to Go Church Beirut, your place to love, grow, and go.

Get ready to hear an inspiring message recorded during a Go Church Beirut gathering.

Thank you, Pastor Matt. Appreciate you. Thank you.

Thank you.

Well, Pastor Matt and I are not only from the same state, we are from the same town.

And when we get our internet working, we're going to find out how far his house was from my house.

Because I don't think it was very far. I think we were pretty close, maybe 10, 15 kilometers, something like that.

So, but I so appreciate what God is doing in Beirut. I've gotten to meet many of the pastors here and so many of the students.

And now to be able to be with you at the church is just a real honor and a privilege.

I believe this is my number four time to be in Beirut, and I've just so enjoyed it.

And I'm going to be sharing with you a message today that's been really big on my heart for many months.

There are so many things that people can associate with Christianity or the Christian faith.

And sometimes people, they get their eyes on the wrong thing.

They think about, well, I knew a Christian once and he wasn't very nice.

Or, you know, I went to a church and they weren't very friendly.

Or they associate different things with the Christian faith.

And I understand we tend to do that.

But what I want to share with you this morning is the only thing that ultimately matters about the Christian faith is Jesus himself.

People can misrepresent Jesus.

People who claim his name may or may not be walking in light and obedience and things like that.

But Jesus will never, ever fail.

And one of the great truths that I've learned over the years is that Jesus is not,

not only does he need to be the center of my life, but he really is the center of the Bible.

And when we have Jesus in his proper place in our lives, it's just amazing how much better our spiritual life goes.

I want you to turn to your Bibles to Luke chapter 24.

Luke 24 · chapter mention

And we're going to begin looking at a particular verse, verse 27.

And this is establishing the fact that Jesus is the center of the Bible.

I've often wondered if a person who had no background in the faith just picked up a Bible and began to read.

And they began to read in the book of Genesis and Exodus and Leviticus.

They'd have to come a long way all the way to the New Testament before they actually begin learning about the person of Jesus who lived on this earth,

who was manifested in the flesh, who demonstrated the love of God and the character of God and the nature of God.

So what would a person do with, you know, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, all the way through to the prophets and so on?

And Jesus gives us a little bit of insight on this in Luke chapter 24.

Luke 24 · chapter mention

This is after Jesus was raised from the dead.

And Jesus being raised from the dead is the most, in my opinion, the most important fact in all of human history.

You could say, well, Jesus being born was the most important.

Well, certainly it's tremendously important.

But if Jesus was born and died but was not raised from the dead,

and some people likewise will say the crucifixion of Jesus is the most important thing that ever happened.

But if Jesus died, was born and died, but did not resurrect, was not raised from the dead,

then his birth really doesn't mean that much and his death really doesn't mean that much.

You may think that, well, Tony, why are you saying that?

I'm not really saying it.

The Apostle Paul in the New Testament said it.

He said if Christ has not been raised from the dead, then our preaching is worthless and your faith is in vain.

Because he said if Christ has not been raised from the dead, then we are still in our sin.

So we want to focus on the resurrection of Jesus.

Of course, he couldn't have been resurrected if he hadn't been born,

and he couldn't be resurrected if he had not died on the cross and shed his blood for our sins.

So I'm not trying to pit these against one another competitively.

Actually, it's kind of part of the same package, him becoming human through the virgin birth,

him being born in Bethlehem, him living a sinless life, him dying a substitutionary death.

What do we mean by that?

We mean that when Jesus died, he died in our place.

The only sin that Jesus ever knew was our sin.

He took our sin upon himself on the cross.

He bore the punishment and the penalty.

He was the sinless, spotless Son of God.

He was the righteous one who was dying for the unrighteous.

The only sin that Jesus ever knew was our sin when he took it upon himself on the cross.

And then when he was raised from the dead, when he was given new life,

then he extended to us forgiveness, righteousness, acceptance, and so on.

And we can say it this way, too.

The only righteousness that we have ever known is his righteousness.

So he took our sin on the cross and gave us his righteousness in the resurrection.

I think we got the good end of that deal, don't you?

So Jesus was raised from the dead.

And Jesus told his disciples during his earthly life,

he told them many, many times that he was going to die.

And they just couldn't, it didn't sink in.

He told them many times that he was going to be raised from the dead.

And that just didn't sink in.

It just, you know, they heard it and they heard it, but they didn't absorb it.

And so finally, at the end of the Gospels, Jesus is crucified.

He sheds his blood. He dies for our sins.

And then he's raised from the dead.

And what we're reading here in Luke chapter 24 is that Jesus finds two of the disciples

Luke 24 · chapter mention

walking on a road that's called the Road to Emmaus.

And Jesus, I don't fully understand this,

but the Bible says that somehow Jesus kind of concealed his identity.

So they didn't know who they were talking to.

I don't know exactly how that happened.

But so Jesus begins to ask them questions.

Why are you so sad? What's going on?

And they start saying, are you the only person that doesn't know what happened?

You know, Jesus of Nazareth was a righteous man, and he, you know, taught many wonderful things.

And they just killed him.

And so Jesus is just thinking, you know, I told you several times this was going to happen.

I told you many times I was going to be raised from the dead.

But he understood their hardness of heart, their being slow to believe and things of that nature.

And finally, in Luke chapter 24 and verse 27, the Bible says that Jesus,

Luke 24 · chapter mention

then Jesus, excuse me, took them through the writings of Moses.

That's Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy,

explaining from all the Scriptures the things concerning himself, oh, and all the prophets.

That's Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, all the way through to Malachi.

So basically what Jesus does, and it says he explained from all the Scriptures the things concerning himself.

I want to give you an example of what this would look like today.

Let's say you came to church. Maybe this is your first time.

Maybe you've been here many times.

And I come up to speak after Pastor Matt's gracious introduction.

Don't you love and appreciate Pastor Matt and Julie?

They are so wonderful.

They're not just wonderful because Pastor Matt is from my hometown.

They're just awesome, wonderful people.

I appreciate you guys so much.

Thank you for being faithful and being great teachers and pastors and servants of God.

So Pastor Matt gives me this gracious introduction.

And I bring my Bible up here and I say let's all open our Bibles to the book of Genesis.

So we turn to the very beginning of the book of Genesis.

And I say, and we're going to go through all the Bible from Genesis all the way to, let me find Malachi here.

I mean that's most of the Bible and it's actually even more than this.

Let me get back to Genesis chapter 1.

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

Okay, so I'm holding up my Bible. Can you see how much Bible that is right there?

That's a lot of Bible.

And I say now here's what I want you to know.

Everything that's written from Genesis to Malachi, all of the writings of Moses,

all of the writings of the prophets, it's all about me.

It's describing me. It's promising that I would come.

It's prophesying that I would come.

Everything from Genesis to Malachi is about me.

Now what would you do if I said that?

I hope you would get up and run for the door as fast as you could run for the door.

Because somebody that would say that other than Jesus is a very, very deceived person,

a very narcissistic person, a person who thinks he's the Messiah, you know, that type of thing.

There's only one person that can take the Bible and start in the book of Genesis

and go all the way through the book of Malachi and honestly and accurately say it's all about me.

The only person that can say that is Jesus Christ.

One way to kind of look at the Bible in different categories

is to understand that the Old Testament is all preparing the way for Jesus.

It's all preparation for him.

In Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, what we call the four gospels, it is the manifestation of Jesus.

It's when the one who is promised in the Old Testament actually shows up here upon earth.

Genesis through Malachi is preparation for Jesus.

The four gospels are the manifestation of Jesus.

The book of Acts is the proclamation of Jesus going throughout the world,

including up in the book of Acts chapter, I can't remember which one,

but it talks about how they came up to Phoenicia preaching the Word of God.

The Bible talks about how they went to Turkey and to Greece and eventually to Rome.

The gospel was proclaimed everywhere throughout the world.

So you have the Old Testament is preparation for Jesus.

The gospels are the manifestation of Jesus when he actually shows up on the earth.

The book of Acts is the proclamation of his message.

The epistles, the letters of the New Testament, Romans all the way through the book of Jude,

the epistles or the letters are the explanation of Jesus' work.

It explains in the gospels we see what happened, but in the epistles, the letters, we find out what it means.

What does it mean for me as a believer? What does it mean for us as a church?

And finally, the book of Revelation is the consummation of Jesus' kingdom.

So you have the Old Testament, the preparation for Jesus, the gospels, the manifestation,

the book of Acts, the proclamation, the epistles, the explanation,

and you have the Revelation, which is the consummation of Jesus' kingdom.

It's when he's going to bring all the, what we would think are loose ends,

he's going to bring all the loose ends together.

So if you read the gospels, if you read the Bible, any part of the Bible,

without realizing that Jesus is the central theme of the Bible and that everything revolves around him,

you're going to miss the most important part of the Bible, because the Bible is about Jesus.

One person wrote a song, I am not a singer, so I will read the words, I will not sing them.

Didn't you appreciate the worship team and how they picked up when the sound system went up?

Pastor Matt, I preached in 31 nations, and something always goes wrong with the sound system

all over the world. It's just a universal thing.

But anyway, very good job by the girls and the ladies.

But this person writes this, talking about how Jesus is the theme of the Bible.

In Genesis, he's the breath of life.

In Exodus, he's the Passover lamb.

In Leviticus, he is our high priest.

In Numbers, he is the fire by night.

In Deuteronomy, he is Moses' voice.

In Joshua, he is salvation's choice.

In Judges, he's the lawgiver.

In Ruth, he is the kinsman-redeemer.

In 1 and 2 Samuel, he is our trusted prophet.

In Kings and Chronicles, he is sovereign.

In Ezra, he is the true and faithful scribe.

In Nehemiah, he is the rebuilder of broken lives, broken walls and broken lives.

In Esther, he is Mordecai's courage.

In Job, he's the timeless redeemer.

In the book of Psalms, he is our morning song.

In Proverbs, he is wisdom's cry.

In Ecclesiastes, he is the times and the seasons.

In the Song of Solomon, he is the lover's dream.

In Isaiah, he's the prince of peace.

In Jeremiah, he is the weeping prophet.

In Lamentations, he is the cry of remorse.

In Ezekiel, he is the call from sin.

In Daniel, he's the stranger in the fire.

In Hosea, he is forever faithful.

In Joel, he is the Spirit's power.

In Amos, he is the arms that carry us.

In Obadiah, he is the Lord, our Savior.

In Jonah, he's the great missionary.

In Micah, he is the promise of peace.

In Nahum, he is our strength and shield.

In Habakkuk and Zephaniah, he's pleading for revival.

In Haggai, he restores the lost heritage.

In Zechariah, he is our fountain.

And in the book of Malachi, he is the son of righteousness

who rises with healing in his wings.

Now that's kind of an artistic presentation,

but you can see those themes in all of those books.

But the reality is that in the Old Testament,

Jesus is prophesied from the very beginning.

When Adam and Eve committed sin,

just on the first couple pages of the Bible,

they immediately felt shame and they immediately felt guilt,

and they felt they had to hide from God

because sin consciousness, you know,

keeps you from coming to God.

Our brother shared this morning about how that,

reading from the book of Hebrews,

how Jesus gives us access to God,

but sin creates a barrier.

So when Adam and Eve had sinned,

they were full of guilt and shame and condemnation,

and they felt, we're unworthy, we have to stay away from God.

And then God said, Adam, where are you?

God is calling out to lost humanity.

God is calling people to come close to Him.

When God said, Adam, where are you?

It is not because God did not know.

We played a game with my daughter when she was very little,

and when she was still in her high chair,

probably before she could walk, I don't remember,

but she discovered that she had a bib.

You know what a bib is, that you keep your clothes clean

and keep the food from getting...

And she discovered that she could take her bib

and pull it up over her face and hide.

And so we would say, where's Laura?

And then she would pull it down and laugh, ha ha,

and she thought she was tricking us.

And then she'd pull it up again, and we'd say, where's Laura?

And she'd pull it down and laugh.

And we'd say, there she is.

We knew where she was.

The reason we were saying, where's Laura?

Is because we were trying to have fellowship with her.

We were trying to interact with her.

And when God said, Adam, where are you?

He knew where they were.

They were hiding from Him because of sin, shame, and guilt.

And they had done something to try to cover up their sin

and their guilt.

They were embarrassed.

They were ashamed.

And so what they did was they took leaves and sewed them

together and made themselves a garment made out of leaves.

And God did two things.

Number one, He said, there is coming in the future,

the seed of a woman who will crush the head of the serpent.

God prophesied before man and woman were even kicked out

of the garden, He talked about a seed of woman.

Isn't it interesting that Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary?

God talked about the seed of a woman who would come and crush

the head, the authority of the serpent.

And that's exactly what Jesus did.

Born of a virgin, lived a sinless life.

In His death, burial, and resurrection, He conquered death.

He destroyed the works of the devil.

He rendered Satan's works inoperable and ineffective.

Jesus fulfilled a prophecy that was given about Him before Adam

and Eve ever got kicked out of the garden.

And then God did something else.

God looked at them wearing that garment of leaves that they

had made.

Do you know what that represented?

That represented their human effort to try to cover up their

own guilt.

Did you know that is the basis of every human religion?

Every human religion is based on man's works, man's efforts to

try to somehow make himself presentable to God.

And God looked at that and said, you know what, that represents

your attempt to clean up yourself, to save yourself.

And God said, that's not going to work.

And in Genesis we see that God took an innocent animal or more

and blood was shed and God took the coats of skins and put it on

Adam and Eve.

What God was saying is the leaves won't work because they

represent your own effort to save yourself.

But there's going to be an innocent life taken.

There's going to be innocent blood shed.

And from that, I will give you a covering.

And what did that symbolize?

It symbolized that man could never save himself by his own

human effort, but God sent an innocent one.

God shed the innocent blood, had the innocent blood of Jesus

poured out on the cross, and then we now receive a covering of

righteousness that is not of our making, but it comes from the

innocent life and the innocent blood.

And the Old Testament is loaded with prophecies and prophetic

images all through just like that.

And many of those are reflected in that song that we just

quoted a few minutes ago.

I want to share with you this morning a few thoughts about why

did Jesus come.

The first thing we've established is that Jesus must be

the central theme.

He must be our primary focus.

You know, so many times people, they get kind of focused on

maybe the side benefits of knowing Jesus.

In other words, they come to Jesus because they want peace.

And that's okay.

But don't just use Jesus to get what you want.

Come to Jesus for who He is.

And don't just, you know, some people, they come to Jesus when

they have a crisis because they want Jesus to give them peace.

But as soon as they get peace, they ignore Jesus until they

have another crisis.

So we don't want to just use Jesus for what He can give us,

although He certainly gives us some amazing things.

But we don't want to receive the benefit but not love the

benefactor.

Jesus is the one who gives the blessings.

And yes, He wants us to enjoy the peace and the joy and the

righteousness and the blessing and the assurance and the

provision, but He doesn't want us to love the things He gives

us more than we love Him.

So I want to share with you just a little bit today about why

Jesus came.

Why did He come?

And I'm going to give you a few reasons.

Number one, and this is so important, Jesus came to reveal

the Father.

Jesus came to reveal the Father.

What you think about when you think of God is the most

important thing about you.

Because how you perceive God is going to determine not only how

you see Him but how you see yourself, how you see your

purpose, your role in life.

I know as a kid growing up when I was young, for some reason I

always thought that God was mad.

I always thought that God was angry.

And I remember part of that was because, you know, I would think

about Jesus even on the cross and Him crying out, My God, My

God, why have you forsaken me?

And I thought, wow, if God doesn't come to the help of Jesus,

why would He ever come to my help?

Why would He ever assist me?

And then reading all the things in the Old Testament, it just

seemed like God was angry.

And I remember finding this passage when I was a little bit

older and Jesus saying, this is John chapter 14 verse 9 in your

John 14:9

Bibles, Jesus said, Anyone who has seen Me has seen the Father.

And I used to believe that the Father was the mean side of God

and Jesus was the nice side of God.

So I didn't really want to deal with the Father.

I just wanted to deal with Jesus because He's the nice one.

The Father must be the mean one, the angry one.

And then I found this, that Jesus came to show us what the

Father is really like.

I want you to know God loves you.

The Father loves you.

Jesus one time said, There's coming a day and you won't ask

Me, you can ask the Father because the Father Himself loves

you.

I heard someone say when I was first getting started in walking

with God, and this helped me so much to understand the love of

the Father and the compassion of the Father and the mercy of the

Father, they said, If you want to know what God is like, look at

Jesus because Jesus, and there's so many Bible verses, in

Hebrews chapter 1 verse 3 it says the sun radiates God's own

Hebrews 1:3

glory and expresses the very character of God.

Colossians chapter 1 verse 15 says that Christ is the visible

Colossians 1:15

image of the invisible God.

So one reason why Jesus came is He came to reveal the Father to

us.

Number two, Jesus came to carry out the will of the Father.

One of the things that Jesus taught, and this is found in

John chapter 6 verse 38, is that Jesus said, I did not come

John 6:38

down from heaven to do my own will, but the will of Him who

sent me.

Jesus modeled perfect obedience.

Jesus modeled perfect submission.

Because Jesus had taken on flesh, and this is what we

celebrate at Christmas, is what we call the incarnation where

the Son of God who existed from eternity past with the Father

and with the Holy Spirit through the conception of the Holy

Spirit, the Son of God took on flesh.

And when Jesus took on flesh, He took on, the Bible says He was

made like us in every way except that He was without sin.

Jesus was 100% man, He was also 100% God.

Now some people say, well could Jesus really be 100% human?

Could He really be fully human if He had no sin?

Absolutely.

Adam was fully human before He sinned.

He was just pure human.

He wasn't corrupted, tainted human.

And Jesus, the Bible says, was made like unto us in all ways

except that He was without sin.

And so because He had human flesh, He had a human will.

He had human emotions.

You know, when He knew that He was going to face dying on the

cross for our sins, He knew how badly He would be tortured,

how severely He would be beaten and whipped, how He would be

nailed to a cross, how He would pour out His life blood.

And not only the physical aspect of it, but He knew that

He was going to be...Jesus died physically, fully, but He died

to death like no one else has ever died, a very unique death

in that He not only died physically, but He bore the sin

and the consequences of human sin.

And this is why Jesus had to cry out, my God, my God, why have

You forsaken me?

It's not that God was not faithful, it's that this was part

of the plan because Jesus took our sin upon Him.

God had to turn His back on that sin.

And Jesus experienced separation and rejection and alienation

for that moment so that we would never have to.

I never have to face rejection from God because Jesus

experienced it for me.

I never have to experience abandonment by God because Jesus

was abandoned as our substitute.

He took our sin and all the consequences of it, and He died

an effective death.

And then when He rose, He took all of our problems, we get all

of His blessings.

But Jesus knew that He was going to have to go through that

horrible time that we call the Garden of Gethsemane, that we

call the scourging, the crucifixion.

He knew He was going to have to go through all that.

And in agony, He said, God, if there was any other way that

this could happen, let this cup pass from me.

But then what did Jesus say?

He said, nevertheless, not My will, but Your will be done.

Jesus was totally surrendered, totally submitted, totally

committed to the will of God.

And not only at the moment of His death and the moments leading

up to that, but all during His life.

If you want to know what the will of God is, look at what

Jesus did.

He went around healing people, comforting people, encouraging

people.

People blame things on God all the time.

Well, God did this and God did that.

Somebody's barn burns down.

Well, God must have burnt your barn down.

Well, did Jesus go around burning down people's barns?

Jesus did the will of the Father.

If God wanted to burn people's barns down and things like that,

then Jesus should have been doing some of that.

He never did that.

But He was doing the will of the Father.

Number three, the third reason that Jesus came was to testify

to the truth.

I don't know what it's like here in Beirut.

Things have gotten a little bit crazy in my country.

There's a whole lot of people that don't know what the truth

is anymore.

There's a whole lot of people that think that truth is a

human construct, that I can decide what truth is.

And they act like there is no absolute truth in the universe.

I believe there are moral absolutes.

The Bible says time and again throughout the whole Scripture

that God's Word is true and that God is not a man that

He should lie.

Jesus said in John 17, I think you're working from that

passage in some of your teaching, Jesus said,

sanctify them through the truth.

Your Word is truth.

But we live in a world where many,

many people have rejected divine authority and said,

no, we don't want that truth.

I want to fabricate my own truth.

And Jesus said, I am the way.

I am the truth.

I am the life.

Truth is not something that each and every person gets to

decide.

Now, people can say, well, this is my truth.

In reality, that's your preference.

That's your opinion.

That's your perspective.

But in the absolute sense, it's not the truth.

You know, I can say, well, I don't believe in the law of

gravity.

I don't believe it.

And actually, my truth is that I believe in floating.

That's my truth.

But there comes a point in time where we have to deal with

reality.

I can say I believe in floating all I want,

but the minute I step off this stage,

notice how Pastor Matt just leapt up here in one mighty,

I wish I could still do that.

I went around and came up the safe way.

But anyway, if I say I don't believe in the law of gravity

and I'm going to floating is my truth,

I can say that all I want.

I can think that all I want.

But the second I step off of this stage,

I'm going to find out that the law of gravity is absolute.

When Jesus stood before Pontius Pilate,

and Pilate was asking him these questions,

and Jesus said this in John 1837,

he said, I was born and came into this world to testify to

the truth.

And Pilate, probably being cynical,

probably had seen so many dishonest people and everybody

with their own personal agendas and people willing to lie

and distort and Pilate just mockingly said,

what is truth?

And you know what?

The world still doesn't know what truth is.

Jesus said, I am the way.

I am the truth.

I am the life.

And he said, I came into the world to bear witness to the

truth.

And until we accept Jesus Christ as the truth of God

manifested in the flesh, we're going to be bouncing here and

bouncing here and in the darkness here and confused over

here.

It's only when we get our bearings in Jesus Christ as the

truth of God that we're going to have the stability and the

solidity that comes.

Jesus said, if you continue in my word,

you will know the truth and the truth will make you free.

So Jesus came into the world to bring and bear witness to

truth.

Number four, Jesus came to shine as a light.

We've heard it so many times.

You know, we've heard Jesus saying in John chapter 8,

John 8:12

verse 12, I am the light of the world.

He who follows me shall not walk in darkness,

but will have the light of life.

The concepts of light and darkness are,

I mean, on the first page of the Bible,

God said, let there be light.

And there was light.

And then the Bible says God separated the light from the

darkness.

And at the very end of the Bible,

in Revelation chapter 21, verse 23,

Revelation 21:23

I mean, almost the very last page of the Bible,

it says the city, the heavenly Jerusalem,

had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it,

for the glory of God illuminated it.

The Lamb is its light.

God is light.

Jesus is light.

When you live in a place like Lebanon, Beirut,

you're right here on the beautiful Mediterranean.

You get the sun all year round.

I'm sure you have some foggy days or hazy days.

But if you live in a place like north of the Arctic Circle,

like way up in Norway or somewhere like that,

I've been in those countries.

And thankfully, I was there in late March and they had the sun

like 23 hours a day or 21 hours a day, I think, in March.

It was only dark for a couple hours.

But if you go that far north and you're there in December,

January, you might have 30 minutes of sunshine and 23 hours

and a half of darkness.

I think of people, every once in a while you'll hear about a

situation that's happened in many countries where there is a

mine where miners are digging out coal or diamonds or copper

or something like that, and part of the mine collapses.

And those men are trapped there in total, hundreds of meters

below the surface of the earth.

And if they're blessed to have a rescue attempt,

sometimes they'll drill a hole for air.

But some of these have gone on for 20 days, 30 days,

and these miners are down there in absolute darkness.

And if they take their hand and do this,

they can't see their hand.

It's absolute darkness.

There is no light whatsoever.

But the Bible says that God is light,

and in Him there is no darkness at all.

Jesus, He said, I am the light of the world.

He's the one by whom we're able to see all things accurately.

And His light is very beautiful.

Number five, this is so powerful.

Jesus came, He said, this is a direct quote from Luke

Luke 19:10

chapter 19 verse 10, Jesus came to seek and to save the lost.

Jesus came to seek and to save the lost.

That's one of the things I've always appreciated

about this ministry.

And even today, who said the theme of the go, grow?

You said that, Melissa, go, grow, go, right?

What is it?

Love, grow, thank you very much, I got all turned around.

Love, grow, go.

Well, it's good to start with love because God is love.

It's good to do with grow because God wants us to mature.

But if we're going to grow into the fullness of God's heart,

we will never continue to be self-centered.

We'll never only think about ourselves.

It's good to think about yourself.

It's good to, you know, the Bible says examine yourself,

make sure you're in the faith.

You know, let God show you what you need to focus on

for your next stage of growth.

There's a proper focus on oneself.

But if you spend your entire Christian life only focused

on yourself and your own growth and your own blessing

and your own peace and you never embrace this third concept

of go, in English, two-thirds of God is go.

That doesn't work in Arabic, I'm sure, but in English.

Jesus came to seek and to save that which was lost.

Jesus didn't just come so that we could have comfortable,

enjoyable lives, although He does want us to have peace

and blessing and things like that.

But Jesus said in John chapter 20, maybe 21, 22,

John 20 · chapter mention

He said, as the Father has sent me, so I send you.

We're people with an assignment.

We're people with a mission in the earth.

Not only is Jesus the light of the world,

but then He turns around and says,

now you are the light of the world.

So we have an assignment.

Jesus came to seek and to save that which is lost.

We have to love humanity.

We have to love others.

And we should never forget what we are forgiven of.

I think Brother Chance said something about,

did you say something, Brother Chance,

about you remembered what you were before Jesus?

And we don't need to dwell on that and wallow in that.

We need to know who we are in Christ.

But who we were outside of Christ is not pretty.

The Bible says that Christ died for us

while we were yet sinners.

A friend of mine, a person I know,

was preaching at a conference,

and this conference was being held at a huge hotel.

And they probably had many different kinds of conferences going on,

but he was preaching for a group of Christians.

And after one of the evening services

where he had preached the gospel,

he went to the hotel in the main lobby

and he pushed the button, the door opened, he stepped in.

And before the door closed, two men stepped in,

and they were drunk, I mean, falling down drunk.

And they were cursing, and they were, you know,

obnoxiously loud and things like that.

And my friend is standing there,

and he just kind of moves to the corner of the elevator

to get away from them.

And he's just thinking, they are disgusting.

You know, they are humiliating themselves,

acting so terribly in public.

And he realized, you know, when the Lord spoke to him,

the Lord spoke to him and said,

Son, the only difference between them and you is me.

And he realized, I can't be judgmental.

I was lost.

Back in the 1700s, a famous preacher was walking

and he saw a man being walked to the gallows.

He was going to be executed.

He was going to be hanged for crimes that he had committed.

And just up out of his spirit,

welled these words there,

except for the grace of God.

That's me, except for the grace of God.

So we need to take ownership of God's heart for the world.

The next reason why Jesus came is very, very similar.

Jesus came to call sinners to repentance.

He came to call sinners to repentance.

In Mark 2, 17, Jesus said,

Those who are well have no need of a physician,

but those who are sick.

I did not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.

And see, this is where it really helps us to understand the Bible

because we may think, well, I'm not a bad person.

Yeah, I've made a few mistakes.

I've told a little lie here and there,

but I've never murdered anybody.

I've never robbed a bank.

So I'm a pretty good person.

And the truth of the matter is,

nobody's good enough to be accepted by God

because the Bible says we've all sinned.

We've all come short of the glory of God, Romans 3, 23.

The Bible says if we keep the whole law

and yet offend in one point,

we're guilty of the whole thing.

So what that brings us to is when Jesus said,

I did not come to call healthy people to repentance.

I came to call sinners to repentance.

We all have to acknowledge that without Jesus, we're all lost.

We've all sinned.

We've all come short of the glory of God.

So Jesus came to call sinners to repentance.

Number seven, Jesus came to serve

and to give his life as a ransom for many.

That's Mark 10, verse 45.

Mark 10:45

Jesus came to serve.

You know, Jesus, he was the eternal Son of God.

The Bible says he laid aside,

he never ceased being God,

but he laid aside his divine privileges and became human.

And when he came, he wasn't born in Rome,

you know, the capital, the empire.

He wasn't born in Athens where man's philosophy reign.

He was born in a stable with animals.

And even in his death, he died between two criminals on a cross.

Jesus said, I did not come to be served, but I came to serve.

And what he demonstrated when he washed the feet of the disciples

was the heart of a servant.

If we want to be like Jesus, and that is God's goal for our lives,

we will learn to serve, not to exalt ourselves above others,

but we'll learn to serve.

But Jesus didn't just come to serve,

he came to give his life a ransom.

Those two are very far apart.

I can, if you're walking into the building,

I can serve you by opening the door,

and you know, so you don't have to open the door.

That's an act of service.

If you're thirsty, I can bring you a drink of water.

That's an act of service.

That's one thing, and that's really good.

But Jesus didn't just come to serve,

he came to give his life as a ransom.

So let's pretend we're on a boat out in the Mediterranean,

and you fall overboard and can't swim.

You're in trouble.

I can serve you by throwing a life ring out,

letting you lay hold of it, and then I pull that back,

and you could even say, you saved my life.

I did it by serving you, but I didn't give my life for you.

But instead, let's say that we're out on the Mediterranean,

it's a storm, and you fall in the water,

and the water is really rough,

and there's no life ring to throw,

but I think I can swim, and I can save this person,

I can save you, but I may not have enough strength

to pull myself back up.

And let's say I know that I have just enough strength

to save you, but then I'm going to pass out and drown.

That's more like what Jesus did.

He didn't just throw us a life ring.

Jesus threw Himself in the water,

knowing that we would come out alive, but He would not.

So Jesus died so that we could have life,

but then God gave Jesus life again.

That's not the best illustration in the world,

but it works a little bit.

In verse 8, Jesus came to destroy the works of the devil.

1 John 3, and verse 8, Jesus came to destroy Him

that had the power of death.

Hebrews 2, verse 14 and 15,

Hebrews 2:14

Jesus came to destroy Him that had the power of death

and destroy Him who through fear of death

had kept us in bondage.

But when Jesus rose from the dead,

the Bible says He triumphed over principalities and powers.

That's why we don't ever have to fear the enemy.

That's why we have a more powerful name, the name of Jesus.

One of my friends told me he had been on a missions trip in Africa,

and the tribe was gathered and worshiping Jesus,

and he said they sang the most powerful song,

and the words of the song went something like this,

Under the blood, under the blood,

where the devil can do me no harm.

And they just sang that over and over again.

We need to understand that Jesus destroyed the works of the devil

and that He has no authority over us.

And Jesus in one place said,

I'll give you power to tread upon serpents and scorpions,

and nothing shall by any means hurt you.

We have absolute and complete victory in Jesus Christ.

Number nine, Jesus came to die.

It was His purpose.

When He was facing the agony of Gethsemane,

when He knew He was about to go and travail in prayer

to prepare Himself for that,

He said now, this is in John chapter 12, verse 27,

John 12:27

Jesus said, now is my soul troubled.

Going to the cross, being scourged, being beaten and whipped,

was not easy.

Bearing the sin of the world was not easy.

As Jesus faced it, He said, now is my soul troubled.

But what should I say?

Father, deliver me from this hour?

He said, for this hour I came.

There was nothing accidental about the death of Jesus.

He was not in the wrong place at the wrong time.

He was not a helpless victim.

The Bible says in Acts, Peter said that Jesus was delivered to you

by the predetermined purpose and the foreknowledge of God.

Jesus' death was 100% intentional.

It was 100% deliberate.

It was really a trap to destroy the kingdom of darkness

from the inside out.

In 1 Corinthians 2 it says,

if the princes of this world had understood what was going on,

they would have never crucified the Lord of glory.

Jesus willingly, voluntarily, deliberately allowed Himself

to be taken to the cross and die

so that He could not only save us, get us forgiven, get us accepted,

but so that He could then destroy the kingdom of darkness

from the inside out.

And finally, number 10, this will be our last point,

Jesus came to give us an abundant life.

Jesus said there's a thief in this world

who comes to steal, to kill, and to destroy,

but Jesus said, I have come that they might have life

and that they might have it more abundantly.

When we are born again by the power of God,

God's very life and nature transforms us from the inside out.

Now sometimes it takes a while for it to get fully manifested

through our mind being renewed and our flesh being affected by that,

but Jesus came not to make us miserable,

not to take everything away from us.

Jesus came to give us spiritual life, eternal life,

a blessed life.

There is no happier life.

There is no more fulfilling life.

There is no more peaceful life or satisfying life

than knowing Jesus Christ.

That's why He came.

He is the center of the Bible,

and He needs to be the center of our lives. Amen.

In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.