The Kingdom Way | Luke 5:1–11 with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch podcast.

My name is Clayton.

I'm the pastor at MetaCurch, and I hope that today's message is inspiring and enlightening and really builds you up wherever you're at in life.

Just letting the Holy Spirit speak to us.

We've got kind of a special presentation for you today, and I'm so excited.

This is a passage that whether you grew up in church, you're new to church, or maybe you know nothing about the Bible, you may be somewhat familiar with this passage as we start Luke chapter 5 today.

Luke 5 · chapter mention

Let's read it together and we'll get into it.

It starts like this as the crowd was pressing in on Jesus to hear God's word, he was standing by Lake Gennassaret.

He saw two boats at the edge of the lake.

The fishermen had left them and were washing their nets.

And so Jesus got into one of the boats which belonged to Simon and asked him to put out a little from the land.

And then he sat down and he was teaching the crowds from the boat.

When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, Put out into deep water and let down your nets for a catch.

Master, Simon replied, We've worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I'll let down the nets.

And when they did this, they caught a great number of fish, and their nets began to tear, and so they signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full the boats began to sink.

And when Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, Go away from me, I'm a sinful man, Lord.

For he and all those with him were amazed at the catch of fish they had taken, and so were James and John's ebony sons, who were Simon's partner.

And Jesus told Simon, Do not be afraid.

From now on, you will be catching people.

And so they brought the boats to land, and they left everything, and they followed him.

Let me pray for us.

Jesus, we give you this time.

God, we know this is your word, and as we open it, I pray that it is you that is speaking, and that this passage, though it may be familiar, would breathe new life into us wherever we're at on our faith journey, whether we are still skeptics who are just kind of seeking to see if there may be something to you, whether we are new believers at the exciting starting line of our journey with Jesus, or whether we are seasoned Christians, God, I believe you have something in here for all of us.

We give it to you in Jesus' name.

And if you are with us in one of our venues, Helotus Petrenko, if you're with us online, would you say amen?

We're going to start walking through this text, but I just want to remind and warn you that there can be a danger with familiarity.

You become so familiar with something that you can start to take it for granted.

This happens in all areas of our life, and it especially happens in Scripture.

This is one of those passages.

It's the calling of the first disciples.

We know this.

We know that they're kind of hesitant, and Jesus takes them out on the lake, and they catch a million fish, and then they drop their nets and they become fishers of men instead of just fishermen.

We know the story, and that's the danger, because we cannot take God's word for granted.

And I believe there is more in here than meets the eye, and there's more in here than breezing through it as another Sunday school lesson that you're now hearing for the 1,000 and first time.

And so I want to walk through this carefully and understand all that God wants to unpack in our lives.

It starts like this.

As the crowd was pressing in on Jesus to hear God's word, he was standing by Lake Gennesaret.

Now, here's why we just have to slow down.

What we're doing in this series isn't magic, it's slowing down, paying attention, listening to the Holy Spirit.

There are four Gospels, four historical accounts of the life of Jesus.

Matthew, Mark, and John, the other three Gospels, they tell this story, but they say that Jesus was standing by the Sea of Galilee.

Not Luke.

Luke says he's standing by Lake Gennaret.

And so what is that?

Is that a contradiction?

Are all the atheist philosophers correct?

Can we just kind of throw out the entire New Testament because of this seeming contradiction?

It just so happens that today we are shooting at a beautiful lake.

It's called Lake Marble Falls.

And the reason it's called Lake Marble Falls is because it's a lake that's in Marble Falls.

We're at Marble Falls, Texas, in the hill country.

That's what this lake is known as.

However, if you talk to someone who is an expert on geography or the topography of Texas, technically, this exact same lake, Lake Marble Falls, is technically the lower Colorado River Basin.

And so which one is right?

Well, they're both right.

But you would use the different titles for different purposes.

No one who lives in Marble Falls, Texas, goes, hey, I guess I'm gonna go down to the lower Colorado River Basin.

They say, Hey, do you want to go out to Lake Marble Falls?

See, Luke is different than the writers of Matthew and Mark and John, who were Israelite men who grew up in the Jewish community, who were largely writing to their Jewish friends and family.

Luke is not from Israel.

He is of Greek descent.

Luke is a Gentile.

He is not ethnically Jewish.

And this is another one of those pieces of evidence that Luke is not just kind of a decent historian for his time.

He's not one of the good historians in the Bible.

That Luke is even known to secular historians as one of the greatest historians in the ancient world.

When we are reading the Gospel of Luke, we're not reading a fairy tale.

He doesn't say once upon a time in a land far, far away.

He nails down where Jesus is standing by its technical name that everyone outside of Israel would have known the Sea of Galilee by.

It's these evidences that are begging you, wherever you're at in your faith journey, to take the scriptures seriously, to take the gospel of Luke seriously.

And so Jesus has the crowds pressing in on him.

He's trying to share the word.

And here's what he does next: it says that he saw two boats at the edge of the lake, and the fishermen had left them and were washing their nets.

And so Jesus got into one of the boats.

Again, we know this story.

And so we breeze by this without a second thought.

But paint the picture in your mind and something should stand out to you.

It does not say that Jesus walked around asking person after person until he found the owners of those boats and then got their written documented permission to use their boat as a platform for his sermon that day.

What it says is that Jesus noticed two boats unoccupied on the edge of the lake, and without asking for anybody's permission, Jesus just went and climbed into one of the boats.

Now you might get trespassed for that.

Now, what we need to know, and we already heard it in the passage, is that Peter, James, John, these fishermen, they fished all night long.

And right now they're taking care of their nets, which is a long, tedious, arduous process that we'll talk about here in a minute.

So they are distracted, and as soon as they can finish with their nets, they can get their boats and go home, but they can't anymore because Jesus has taken it upon himself to climb into their boat.

This is an interruption.

These men are exhausted.

They are ready to go home.

They worked the night shift.

They're ready to go to bed.

And you just need to know this.

Jesus will interrupt your life.

And that's very difficult because nobody likes to be interrupted.

But Jesus is God and Jesus interrupts our life and he moves with intention to get your attention.

Jesus knows what is best for you.

Parents, sometimes we have to interrupt our kids.

Our kids are having a lot of fun and they're playing and they're having a good time, but it is their bedtime, and we know if they spend 30 more minutes before they go to bed that they will be a train wreck in the morning.

And so we interrupt their play.

Sometimes we have to interrupt our kids' words when they are being disrespectful or they don't know how they're coming across.

Sometimes we have to interrupt our kids as they're outside with their friends to bring them in so they can do their homework, so they can pass their class.

In the same way, Jesus will interrupt your life.

He'll interrupt the rhythms of your life.

He will interrupt your relationships.

He'll interrupt your work life.

And the question is, when Jesus interrupts, will we allow him?

Will we believe the best about his interruption?

Will we allow him to draw us into something better?

Will we allow him to speak into our reality?

Jesus interrupts and he doesn't just interrupt anybody because it says he went and he got into one of the boats.

He spots the boats.

He's like, you know, I've got an idea.

He climbs on without permission.

It says he got into the boat which belonged to Simon.

Now we know Simon as Peter because Jesus is going to change his name.

And I always want to be clear when I'm preaching, because when I'm preaching the word, that's revelation.

And every once in a while I share a speculation.

And I don't ever want to package speculation as revelation because these are now my thoughts, not God's thoughts.

But I have some speculation because our series is called The Kingdom Way.

Because every single thing Jesus does is demonstrating the way of the kingdom of God.

And so everything he does draws a question like, well, why did he do that?

So why Simon's boat?

The other boat belonged to James and John, but he didn't get in James and John's boat.

He got in Simon Peter's boat.

And it makes me wonder why.

And so I have a speculation.

There's kind of two broad types of people.

There's like 95% of the population who have the part of their brain that understands when things are awkward.

If someone says something that's kind of untoward at a dinner, these people, 95% of them, they know the room just got awkward.

And then there's the 5% of the world that are like Peter.

And just to be vulnerable, me.

And we don't really know when things are awkward.

And you gotta marry a great woman like Katie who will teach you and tell you when things are awkward or when you're making things awkward.

And Peter will make things awkward.

Just wait for the rest of Peter's journey with Jesus.

Peter will make things awkward.

Peter doesn't get awkward, he gives awkward.

Here's my speculation: Jesus knew what boat he was getting into.

And he got into Simon Peter's boat because Simon Peter is the one person at Lake Gennesaret that day who would have no problem standing up, scooting his way through the crowd, walking right in front of Jesus while he was preaching, pulling up anchor and awkwardly driving his boat home so he could get some sleep.

James and John wouldn't do that because nobody would do that.

But Peter might have.

And now he can't.

Whatever the reason, Jesus moves with intention, and he moves with intention to get your attention.

And now Simon Peter is a captive audience.

Now he has to sit with everybody else and he has to listen.

And when anybody sat and listened to Jesus, the response was the same.

They were always stunned.

They were amazed by what they were hearing.

Here's what happens next.

Jesus preaches with power and authority.

It moves everyone.

Peter has to be beside himself.

He's never heard someone speak like this.

And once Jesus is finished, it says Jesus got into one of the boats which belonged to Simon.

And before he preaches, watch, he asks Peter to put out a little.

I want you to hold on to that.

He asks him to pull out a little from the land.

And then he sat down.

And then he was teaching the crowds.

Now we know the passage, I've already read it to you.

And so by the end of the passage, there's going to be a huge ask.

The other gospels, they record it this way.

Jesus looked at Peter and said, Peter, follow me.

Follow me.

Leave everything you know.

Change your entire life.

That's a big ask.

But before Peter is given this huge ask, Jesus just asks if he'll make a little bit of room.

They are standing at Lake Gennesarat, and this is where my mind goes because when you look at what is commonly called the Sea of Galilee, it makes this perfect amphitheater.

And there's this thing about the Sea of Galilee where people's voices they carry unusually well over the water, almost like the water is an amplifier of sound, and it goes up into these Gardenesque hills.

And so everything is carved out perfectly.

And in John chapter 1, it says that everything that was created in the universe was created by and through Jesus.

John 1 · chapter mention

Which means in eternity past, as Jesus, the agent of creation, is shaping the world into existence, he knows that someday he will come and he will stand on that shore and deliver a message and he positions it as a perfect amphitheater for himself.

Before he asks for a big step of obedience, he just asks Peter to make a little bit of room.

And so Jesus sits down in the boat and Peter gets in and he pulls up anchor and they drift back a little bit and now he's preaching.

The boat is the stage, the stern is the pulpit, the water is the amplifier, the shoreline, the auditorium.

And Peter listens and he's moved.

And we know he's moved because Jesus asks him to do something next that Peter explicitly does not want to do.

Let's look at it.

We're in verse 4.

It says, when Jesus finished speaking, he said to Simon, Put out into deep water and let down your nets for a catch.

Fishing is fun for us.

On my drive to our shooting location, I passed by the marina.

I saw a bunch of boats that probably cost as much as my house, people with all of this gear, and it's a pastime.

You go out, you know.

I I don't I don't know a lot about fishing.

Uh when I go fishing, I'm really just chilling.

I just have a fishing pole in my hand.

You might be fishing, I'm chilling and I'm holding a fishing pole.

That's how we fish today.

Being a fisherman in the ancient world was brutal work.

It was very difficult and it was high stakes.

You didn't show up and get paid for your work no matter what.

You only got paid if you pulled fish out of that lake and could sell them in the market.

It was very painstaking, very difficult, tough schedule, and you're always on edge.

And the instrument you need is your net.

I've said it before that if you're a fisherman in the ancient world, your net worth is completely contingent on how much your net is worth.

You could have a rinky dink piece of crap boat, doesn't matter.

You've got to have a great net.

And so after a long night of fishing, you bring your net to shore, you wash it carefully, you mend it carefully, you dry it carefully, you fold it carefully because that net holds your livelihood in its capacity.

It is what puts a roof over your head, meals on your table, it supports your family, it keeps you alive, it pays your taxes, it keeps you out of prison.

Your net is everything, and it's a long, painstaking process.

And Peter's done.

He's cleaned the net, he's mended the net, he's dried the net, he's folded the net.

And Jesus says, why don't you undo all of that work, come back, throw your net in the water, start all over again.

Here's really what he's asking him to do.

He's asking him not to sleep that day.

He just fished all night.

Now it's the middle of the day, which means you gotta go back out, you gotta fish again, you gotta come back, you gotta put your nets up again.

It's gonna be nighttime again.

He's just saying, don't sleep.

But it's even crazier because Jesus says, put out into deep water.

Now, I'm not a fisherman.

I know nothing about fishing, uh, but I am a student of the word.

And so I knew I had to understand a little bit about what's going on under the waters of Lake Gennessaret.

And here's what I found: I found that the fishermen in Lake Gennessaret, the Sea of Galilee, they're fishing for tilapia.

And here's the thing about tilapia, they have incredible eyesight.

It makes them very good at feeding themselves, it makes them very good at avoiding predators.

The net technology in the ancient world, if you throw a net into the water while the sun is in the sky, the tilapia can see it from a mile away, and you will never catch one of them in the daytime.

But there's more.

During the day, the surface water becomes too warm.

And so the tilapia go down to the very bottom, the deepest part of the lake.

That's where it is nice and cool, that is where they can relax.

It's at nighttime that they come back up to the surface, and that is where they feed and avoid predators.

At night, you throw your net in the water, and without the sun in the sky, that net becomes invisible to the tilapia who aren't too low for your nets.

They're right up high where you can scoop them up.

I tell you all of that to paint the picture, not only of the miracle that's coming, but of the request that Jesus has made.

What Jesus is asking them to do, it's not just that it is a strategically bad idea from a fishing standpoint.

What Jesus is asking them to do is embarrassing.

To be out at the deepest part of the lake in the middle of the day trying to catch tilapia, it would be a miracle if you caught one.

People from shore would be like, is that Peter?

And has he lost his mind?

I don't know if kids do this nowadays because they have like iPads and stuff.

But for the rest of us coming up, at some point you had an older cousin or maybe like some older friends, and they would wait until it was dark, and you would go into some woods and they would take you snipe hunting.

And they would really build it up, and they'd make you feel like you're really gonna catch one, and they would describe it in detail, and eventually it would dawn on you, and it was so embarrassing when you finally realize that there's no such thing as a snipe.

The whole thing is a wild goose chase, it's kind of a hazing initiation into becoming an older child.

There was a better chance of me at nine years old catching a snipe than Peter catching a tilapia in the middle of the day of the Sea of Galilee.

It's just impossible.

What Jesus is asking him to do, it's it's not about Peter trying harder or having more skill or a better strategy.

It's just simply whether or not Peter will trust.

And sometimes that's just what Jesus wants.

He doesn't actually care if what he's asking you to do makes a whole lot of sense or not.

It doesn't have to make sense to us.

Sometimes Jesus is just wondering on our journey to follow him if we are or are not willing to trust him.

I gotta tell you, I love Peter's response.

Studying this passage, this is one of my new favorite verses, because it is so real and so raw and so relatable.

And so here's what Peter says in verse 5 Master, Simon replied, we've worked hard all night long and we've caught nothing.

He hits Jesus with the facts.

He's not sugarcoating it.

This isn't fake, soft spirituality.

This isn't like, yes, sir, Jesus, I actually want to do this, I promise.

Peter's like, I don't want to do this.

I've been here.

I was out all night.

I was at night when you're supposed to fish and I couldn't catch fish, and now I'm exhausted and my nets are already put up, dude.

He doesn't sugarcoat the reality, but listen to his response.

But if you Jesus, if you say so, you hopped in my boat, which by the way, you didn't ask to hop on my boat, but you did hop on my boat.

So I had to listen to your sermon.

And my goodness, I don't really know who you are, but I do know you're special.

I've never heard anyone talk like that.

I've never seen power like that.

I've never seen a crowd move like that.

So look, this seems really dumb to me, and I don't want to do it.

But Jesus, if you say so, I'll do it.

And maybe this is everything.

Like, maybe the path from all of your current dilemmas to the destiny that God has for you is just a willingness to face reality and still submit to God.

To say this doesn't really make sense to me.

But look, Jesus, if you say so, I'm in.

Like, look, I've done everything I can for this marriage.

I feel like it's pointless.

I feel like we're just we're on our way to divorce anyway.

But you know, if you say so, I'll try again, I will, I will love again, I will be selfless again, I will try again, I will go to one more thing, I I'll sign up for the counseling.

If you say so, it's like, man, I I've tried everything.

I've read all the books, I've done all the things I cannot get these kids to obey.

But God, if you say so, if I'm supposed to stick in here and hold boundaries and believe and trust and believe in their future, maybe a habit or even an addiction has the best of you.

It's like I've tried.

You know, I didn't drink for a little while, but I just I think that's just what I do now.

I went to a meeting and it was just it was kind of awkward.

And I I know I gave up too fast on it, but it's embarrassing to go back.

But if you say so, here's where some of y'all are.

It's like, God, I'm not sure you can love me because I know me pretty well and I know how screwed up I am.

But if you say so, there is power in being real and raw and still being able to surrender.

We fished all night, it makes no sense.

By the way, Jesus, I heard in Nazareth you're a carpenter.

I don't even know why you're giving me fishing advice.

I don't know.

You know what?

Jesus, if you say so.

And so they head out on the water.

And it says, when they did this, they caught a great number of fish, and their nets began to tear.

And so they signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them.

And they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.

And in this moment, a miracle of all miracles, remember, it would have been a miracle to catch one tilapia in the middle of the day, with the sun in the middle of the sky, with the fish at the bottom, with nets that can't reach them, one tilapia would have been a miracle.

They catch so many.

The nets are breaking, and two boats are sinking.

This is like an unbelievable moment because it exposes just how frivolous all of the things that we put our hope in actually are.

Peter's like, to keep a roof over my head, I gotta catch fish.

To pay my taxes and stay out of prison, I gotta catch fish.

To feed my wife and my family, I gotta catch fish.

And I gotta go every night, and if I don't catch any tonight, I gotta catch twice as many tomorrow night.

And he goes out with this man, Jesus.

And it's like, Jesus doesn't have to go chase the fish.

The fish come to Jesus.

Jesus is like, one afternoon with me, I'll buy you four houses with the fish that we catch.

And so it exposes how frivolous and that anything we are putting our hope in cannot bear the weight of our hope, and that our only hope is actually in God.

And everything that has ever been provided for me, and everything that has ever been provided for you, is only by the grace and mercy of God in the first place.

I think that's a huge lesson out of that, but I think it's incomplete.

Because Jesus is about to make a big ask.

The other gospels, Jesus looks and says, Follow me.

Follow me, you're a fisherman, I'll make you a fisher of men.

Before the biggest ask of Peter's life, Jesus gives him the biggest success of his life.

And sometimes discipleship isn't just about what Jesus can get you out of.

Sometimes discipleship is about what you're willing to walk away from.

And this is a pattern that I have seen in so many circumstances, and I've seen it in my own life.

My actual direct call to abandon my dreams and pursue ministry came when I finally had a success I had been chasing since fifth grade.

In fifth grade, I decided I wanted to play college basketball, and I worked every single day through my senior year of high school to accomplish that goal, and I did.

And when I finally got to college and was finally on a team, before I ever even put my school's jersey on, Jesus called me to drop the nets, do something else.

It's like, hey, you got your dreams.

Are you willing to give up your dreams for God's destiny?

When I went into ministry, man, God had a lot of favor on where I landed and where I ended up, and I worked very hard.

I ended up the interim senior pastor of a massive church, and it was in that season that Jesus called me to leave to go to something quite small, to start something brand new, something that would become metachurch.

For those two times I've got it right, there's probably 15 times I've gotten it wrong because sometimes God will give you the desires of your heart to see if your desires for the things of this world will trump the desires for the things of God.

Sometimes discipleship is not about God bailing you out.

Sometimes it's not picking you up out of the lowest of lows.

Sometimes God calls you out of a season of plenty and success and favor to see if you'll still choose him.

Peter's response is so instructive.

We see it all over Scripture.

When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees.

He said, Go away from me because I'm a sinful man, Lord.

For he and all those with him were amazed at the catch of fish they had taken.

And so were James and John, Zebedee's son, who were Simon's partners.

Some of us think like this: man, if God would just show his face to me, I would have all the confidence in the world.

I'd be walking on cloud nine, man, I would get rid of my insecurities.

I'd finally be good if I could just see God, if I could just see Jesus, if I could really like audibly hear his voice.

Every time God shows himself to someone in scripture, they are destroyed.

They're ruined.

And something about the contrast between the perfection and glory of God and our own brokenness, it unravels our reality.

The world isn't what I thought it was.

It doesn't function how I thought it functioned.

Success isn't measured how I believed it was measured.

My destiny is not like the desires of my heart.

It's actually ascribed to me by a God who created me and put a purpose in me.

And yet, when we come to the end of ourself, seems to be when we are exactly positioned to finally see all that God has for us.

And so look at what Jesus says.

Don't be afraid.

From now on, you'll be catching people.

Forgiveness and assignment.

You need to know this.

Jesus does not just want to forgive your sins and get you a get out of hell free card.

He wants to forgive you and then put you on assignment.

He wants to forgive you and then put you on a path of purpose.

He wants you to see all that life has, not just believing in him, but actually following hard after him.

And here's why Peter, James, and John became disciples.

Our final verse, and then they brought the boats to land, they left everything, and they followed him.

Brought the boats to land, left everything, and followed him.

We get this wrong.

We think they burnt the boats.

No more boats.

I don't need boats anymore.

Did you know Peter's boat just keeps showing up?

It shows up on a storm in the middle of the sea that Jesus calms with his words.

It shows up after the resurrection.

Peter did not put his boat on Craigslist that day.

He dropped his nets and he never picked them up again.

But he kept his boat.

It wasn't about relinquishing, it was about redeeming.

And no longer was it a boat to catch fish, it was a boat to transport Jesus as he went town to town catching people with the good news, the gospel of Jesus.

And so here's what I'd suggest.

There are some boats in your life.

There are some things that you're holding on to for selfish gain, for the desires of your own heart that aren't in line with the word and aren't in line with God.

You need to redeem those, give them to the Lord.

It's not about quitting your job.

It's about saying, God, this is the job that you have given me.

How can I use it for you?

It's not about divorcing your unbelieving spouse.

It's about saying, hey, this is the marriage I'm in.

How can I build this marriage to the glory of God?

It's not about abandoning your children, it is about embracing your children and the world that God has given you and letting God redeem all of these things that He's placed in your hands.

Peter did not lose his boat.

His boat was now used for a new purpose.

However, we have boats and we have nets.

And the nets are the things that God is asking you to drop and just walk away from.

The things that are not useful, they are not redemptive, they are not a part of your identity anymore as a Christ follower.

And I'm sure even as these words leave my mouth, the Holy Spirit is bringing those things to mind in your own life.

And so there's really two layers of application.

You need to know this.

Jesus is calling you.

For some of you, you do not know Jesus, you've never started a relationship with him.

And so the call is to come, to put your faith in him, and Jesus will forgive your sins and bring you into an eternal relationship with God.

Jesus says, if you just believe in him, you will never die, but you will have everlasting life.

And some of you are already believers.

And so the question for you is what are your boats and what are your nets?

What are the things God wants to redeem in your life?

And what are the things that God wants you to drop and walk away from?

God created you on purpose and God created you with purpose.

He forgives you and he gives you assignment.

And if we would make a little space, before the big ask of obedience, Peter just needed a little room.

And if you would give Jesus a little bit of room to operate in your life in this moment, I think he might change your life forever.

As we close, if you would pray across our venues and online, if you'd bow your head and close your eyes, create a little bit of space for you and for the people around you.

For those who are believers, I want you to ask the Holy Spirit, what are my boats and what are my nets?

When you know that, you will know fully what it means to uniquely follow Jesus.

For those who are not believers, I believe today is the day of salvation in your life.

And so, for you, what Jesus asks is not for you to start religious exercise.

He's inviting you into relationship with himself.

And so the way that this works is you believe, you become convinced in your mind, convicted in your heart that Jesus is who he claimed to be, and that he's done what he claims to have done, that he really is God, that he came to this earth, lived a perfect life, died for your sins, and rose again.

And when you put your faith in that as your only hope for today, and your only hope for eternity, you are saved.

Jesus forgives all of your sin and he brings you into a relationship with himself.

And so, with everyone's eyes closed across our venues, if you are at a venue today and you've never had a moment in time where you've put your faith in Jesus, I want to invite you right now to do that.

What we do at MetaCurch is I just ask you right where you're sitting to have a moment of courage where you just simply raise your hand up above your head.

This is a symbolic gesture.

And what it says is today I choose to put my faith in Jesus.

So right now, as hands go up around the room, I want to invite those who raised a hand to pray this with me to just affirm your decision.

Let's pray like this: Jesus, today I choose to put my faith in you.

I believe you are God, that you died for my sins and rose from the grave.

I thank you for loving me and forgiving my sins.

So glad you joined us for today's message.

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If you want to know more about MetaCurch, go to our website, metachurch.tv, where you can find out about all things MetaCurch.

And if you feel led, you can contribute to help push this movement forward.

We hope that you'll join us next week on the MetaCurch podcast.