Fulfilled: The Chosen King: The Firstborn with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the MetaCurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at MetaCurch.

And my hope is that today's podcast finds you at the perfect time in your life that God uses it to inspire and enlighten you.

I hope that you enjoy today's message.

It is so so good to be here with you.

I want to welcome you into MetaCurch.

If you are new with us, my name is Clayton.

I'm the lead pastor here at Meta.

And uh wherever you're joining us from, if you're with us online, I'm so thankful for this ministry, uh, for all the talented people who make that a possibility for us so people can tune in from anywhere.

Uh, if you're here at one of our venues, I want to welcome you.

If you're here at Petrenko, if you're here with us in Holotas, I want to take just a second today and honor our Holotus venue, which this month will come up on one year in existence, one year of ministry at Holodas.

We have volunteers who were there from the jump with us.

They were getting together last August and September, getting trained up.

You guys are working very hard, and God is bringing momentum.

We're only a year in, and we are going to baptize some people in Holodas already this year.

So we're very, very excited and we're very grateful.

And uh we are in this great adventure through the book of Luke.

The whole thing we're calling fulfilled right out of the words in Luke chapter one.

Um, but it's a long journey.

We'll be in it for several years, so we've broken it down into sub-series, kind of mile markers as we go through.

This first subseries is called The Chosen King.

And we're gonna wrap that up in the next couple of months.

But for now, we've looked at the birth narratives, we're in the introduction of Jesus' ministry now, we've already seen him baptized.

We've spent the last two weeks in the genealogy of Christ, the family tree, from Jesus all the way back to Adam, all the way back to God.

And if you're here for the first time and you can't believe we're about to spend three weeks on a genealogy, I can just promise you it has not been boring.

These have been two of my favorite weekends out of the entire year.

That's me personally.

We're gonna wrap it up.

We're gonna look at part B of the genealogy, and then we're gonna zoom out.

We're actually gonna look at the entire thing and what it means for our life.

But first, I want to get into the back half of the genealogy.

We're in Luke chapter three, especially, especially for the genealogy.

It really helps to have the Gospel of Luke up in front of you.

If you don't have access to that, we want to give you one after service at our venues.

You can go to the connect area.

We have a Gospel of Luke for you that you can not just read, but take notes in.

If you're gonna go get one, they were very hard to find.

All right, we had to like shake people down to get some of these books, all right?

So if you're gonna take one from us, please bring it back, open it up, take notes, and start taking your faith really seriously.

Get in the word with us.

Um, but I'm gonna go through these names that nobody knows how to pronounce, and I'm gonna say them with confidence, and we're gonna see how it goes, okay?

Uh, we're gonna start it at 31, the end of 31.

It says the son of David, son of Jesse, son of Obed, son of Boaz, son of Salmon, son of Nishon, son of Aminadab, son of Ram, son of Hezron, son of Perez, son of Judah, son of Jacob, son of Isaac, son of Abraham, son of Tarah, son of Nahor, son of Sarug, son of Rue, son of Peleg, son of Eber, son of Shalah, son of Canaan, son of our fax ad, bro.

If my name was our fax ad Tyner, I'd be in the NFL putting up 200 rushing yards again, bro.

Arfax ad Tyner?

That's a strong name, bro.

If you have a baby boy, a hundred dollars a birth certificate with our faxad as a first or middle name.

Son of Shem, son of Noah, son of Lamek, son of Methuselah, oldest man to ever walk the earth.

Son of Enoch, son of Jared, son of Mahalel, son of Canaan, son of Enos, son of Seth, the son of Adam, and the son of God.

Now, last week we looked at part A of the genealogy, and besides Jesus and Joseph, nobody knew any of those names because nobody knows any of those names.

They're names that are just lost to history.

But at part B of the genealogy is where we have big, big hitters, like the heroes of especially the Old Testament of our Bible.

We have King David, who is the king who unites all of Israel.

He is the preteen who defeats the giant Goliath.

He is the child who is anointed king by the great prophet of Israel.

He is known as a man after God's own heart.

We have Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

These are the patriarchs of the nation of Israel.

Abraham is the one who God chooses out of all the people on the earth, and he calls Abraham to himself, and he promises he will make him into a great nation.

And he does that because Abraham has this radical faith that will just follow God into the unknown when he is called.

He leaves behind everything that is comfortable and everything that is known to follow God.

He says, I'll make you a great nation.

And not only that, but one day, through your lineage, the chosen king will come and bring redemption and salvation to all the peoples of the earth.

We have Noah.

We know the story of Noah.

We all owe a debt of gratitude to Noah according to the biblical narrative, because he, through a radical act of obedience from all kinds of opposition, people making fun of him day after day for years and years and entire lifetime, building an ark to save all of humanity, all the way back to Adam, who is the progenitor.

He is everyone's greatest grandfather, and not only that, he is the only human to ever live inside God's design for the world.

These are the great heroes of the text.

And yet, one of the things that is so fascinating about scripture is it does not mythologize our heroes.

And so you read some religious texts that are obviously fake and obviously over-mythologized, and the great heroes of the religion almost come across as perfect uh per perpet.

Here we go, rewind.

Perfect, there it is.

Can't even say the word perfect perfectly, okay?

There's uh ironic moment number one, mark it down.

They come across as perfect, and of course, we know that's not true because nobody is perfect, and yet in scripture that's just not the case.

These heroes are deeply, deeply flawed, sometimes painfully flawed.

And uh, some of you grew up in church, some of you did not.

I grew up as a good Southern Baptist boy, and so in the Southern Baptist church, you have Sunday school.

That's what a kid wants.

They want another day of school, you know, to get excited about.

We go to Sunday school, and we had a felt board, and you don't know what that is, and that's fine because we didn't have TVs, and and and so they would put little caricatures on there, and they would tell you, here was King David, and they'd hit all of his highlights and none of the failures.

Here's Noah, all of the highlights, none of the failures.

And we would almost mythologize these heroes of scripture.

And then you grow up and you just start reading in Genesis, and by the time you get to Deuteronomy, you're like, is anyone in here not just completely screwed up?

Like everyone is failing in ways that are atrocious even to our modern sensibilities, and it just doesn't hide it from you.

Because what you will learn, especially those who are unconvinced by the claims of Christianity, and you're not sure that you can trust the word of God, is if you actually read it and you read it for what it is, and you study it, and you look at the surrounding extra-biblical evidence, what you will find is that this isn't lying to you because it's telling the truth.

And that so far there's not a single word from God that has fallen to the ground, which you wonder why we have so much confidence in the future promises that Scripture gives us of a chosen king who is coming back for us.

It's because we just look back at history and we see all of the prophecies that have already come to pass, and some of them in very short time frames, and some of them very specifically.

And so now the words from God fall to the ground, they all come to fruition, and so we have faith in what is still to come because it has a track record, it hasn't failed us yet, so we can trust that it won't fail us in the future.

If you believe that, say amen.

Amen.

And so we get into this and we see that, yes, King David was a man after God's own heart, and he was just a child when he was anointed king, and he was just a preteen when he defeated Goliath.

And then he comes in and he's a middle-aged man and he unites the entire kingdom, but then he grows heart of heart in his older years, and he starts marrying multiple wives.

And if that wasn't enough, then he sees a woman who's not his wife, and she's married to one of his lead soldiers, and he wants her, and so he takes her.

But then she becomes pregnant, and so he puts a plan together to put her husband out on the front lines and draw everyone back, and he doesn't kill him with his own hand, but he might as well have.

And his generational sin is passed down to his son Solomon.

David had a few wives and committed adultery with one woman.

Solomon was like, Hold my beer, Dad.

You know, I'm gonna marry hundreds of women, I'm gonna have thousands of concubines.

David's generational sin, David, who is supposed to have a lineage that sits on the throne of Israel forever, he gets one son on the throne and the lineage is cut off.

His life ends in failure.

We go and we look at Abraham and we know that he is chosen because of his radical act of faith, but then you fast forward the story and he loses faith.

And he tries to usurp God, he tries to be his own God, he's gonna make his own plan.

God has promised that he will give him a great lineage, but he's getting older and he doesn't have any kids.

So he takes a woman that is not his wife, who is a maidservant in his house, meaning there's a significant power imbalance, and he produces a child with her.

Doesn't trust in God.

This is a part of his lineage.

We look at Noah, we owe a debt of gratitude to Noah, but no sooner does the boat land on the mountain than he comes out, he gets drunk and disgraces his family.

That's how his story ends.

Of course, we know Adam, our greatest grandfather.

We also know that it is Adam that plunged all of us into death, destruction, and ruin.

It is through Adam and his decisions that the world fell.

And we all live in the chaos therein.

And so if you actually look at your physical genealogy, it starts with Jesus and it ends with God.

And every single person in between, which is from Adam to Joseph, is stained with sin.

The genealogy represents a family tree of failure, a succession of sin.

That's what it's that's what it is.

That's what's in there because that's what's in us.

And that's a painful reality to look at all of these great names and every name in between and realize that they were far from God, that they went their own way, they tried to be their own gods, they rebelled against the most high, and that their lives ended in brokenness.

But there's a harsher reality, and the harsher reality is that it isn't from Adam to Joseph that we see a family tree of failure, it's from Adam to me.

And yes, it's from Adam to you.

And we have a real uphill battle culturally because we are programmed that you are perfect just the way you are.

Don't make me sing a Bruno Marsong right now.

You have got it together, you have everything that you need, you just need to block out the outside voices, you need to find your own truth, you need to find your own center, your own peace, your own chakra.

All you need to do is know that Jupiter is in retrograde and Pluto is no longer a planet, and you'll just be confused and on your way to living a miserable life.

We teach in our culture, all the way from Sesame Street to Cardi B.

Here's what we're told: you can be your own king, you can be your own queen, you can be your own God.

And there is a barrier culturally for us.

And I don't think we understand the immediacy of putting this lie to death because you cannot even understand the gospel, which is the Greek word evangelion, which just means good news.

You cannot understand the good news until you are ready to confess and come to terms with the bad news.

And the bad news is that you are a sinner who has estranged yourself from God, that you are broken at a fundamental level.

We said last week, we are living as exiles in exile, apart from our Heavenly Father.

We do not have security because that's found in him, so we are insecure.

We are separated from truth, so we live in lies.

We are separated from hope, so we are despondent.

We are separated from direction, so we are anxious.

We become liars and manipulators and controllers and gossips and angry and put aside.

We can't build relationships, we cannot organize ourselves, we are more broken than we can admit because the culture tells you you're amazing just the way you are, and don't listen to anyone who tells you otherwise.

People are offended by the gospel.

Not because they hate the idea of a God who loves them enough to die for them, they like the good news part.

It's because they won't admit the bad news part.

We think, you know, I'm pretty put together and I'm pretty alright and I'm a pretty good person.

So maybe Jesus can make a down payment and I'll do the rest by myself.

But that's missing the entire point.

We broke this world.

We sinned against the most high.

We come to Okay, Medicur, you're gonna look at me like I'm the only sinner who showed up to service today.

And I've got the microphone.

I grew up and I knew Jesus.

I was raised right, good godly parents.

And yet there was a rebellious streak in me, and we all have pain, and my pain's not like your pain, and some of you have much, much, much more painful stories.

I had good parents, they were together.

They raised us well, they loved us, they showed up for us.

But I had my own pain, and we've always said at MetaCurch, your suffering is scalable.

You know, like when your mom would be like, There are starving kids in Africa, and it's like, but I'm full, you know.

I thought I believe that, and I'm full.

Your suffering is scalable, and your pain is real.

And so I knew Jesus, but around preteen, I allowed my pain to drive me and start instead of building strengths for the purpose God had in my life, I started building coping mechanisms to just try and get out of the pain.

And so I start rebelling, and I want to be my own God, and I'm believing the lies that the culture is always programming in that I should be my own king, and and I should build my own castle, and I should make my own name, and I should get my own status, and I should be known for who I am.

And so I start pursuing that.

And you fast forward five or six years later, I'm so far from God, I have not heard from God in forever.

I don't believe God loves me anymore because I've rebelled against him so long and so hard, and I'm a fraud, bro.

I am a fraud because I'm raised right.

So Monday to Saturday, as I get a little older, Saturday in the wee hours of the morning, I'm rebelling every way I know how.

Sunday morning, I'm in the church and I'm in the seats, and I'm putting on a front to keep my parents off the scent, to keep my pastors off the scent, to keep the authority off the scent.

That's how I'm living.

Now, let me tell you something.

It made me a hypocrite, but I thank God that my parents weren't like modern-day parents who are like, I don't know, I'll see if my kid wants to come to church.

This is the most quiet it's ever been.

Hiddener.

I'll see if my 11-year-old wants to come.

Who's in charge?

Who's in charge?

This is the supernatural body of Christ.

This is where healing happens, this is where clarity happens, this is where conviction happens, this is where the word of God is proclaimed, this is where Christian living is modeled, this is the body of Christ.

It's the one thing our children in rebellion need, and we make it optional for them.

I know Susie wasn't feeling like it.

Bro, I don't care.

It matters or it doesn't, you're the parent or not.

I was made a hypocrite by my parents who sat me in the seat.

If I had the option to stay home, I would have stayed home because every time I came, I was under conviction.

And if I never would have came and got under conviction and been made a hypocrite by my parents who didn't even know, bro, I was so good at this.

My kids don't get away with anything because, bro, my eyes are open.

And they don't get it.

It's because I was so freaking bad.

It's like you, you, you can't, you can't trick a trickster, bro.

I'm on you.

My parents trusted me, which is really it's heartbreaking now to think back, but they trusted me.

They weren't even onto me, but they had me in the seats.

And they had me under conviction.

And who knows where I would have been if I never had to face the conviction of the body of Christ Sunday after Sunday as I'm living in sin.

And so what we're not going to do is come into the body of Christ and play games.

And if you think you're alright and you're pretty good, if you think Jesus needs to help you out a little bit, but you pretty much got it, you don't know yourself.

You are more simple and broken than you could possibly imagine.

And you are more powerful and more loved by God and more valued by Jesus Christ than you could possibly imagine.

And in between those two is a transformational work of the Holy Spirit.

I was exposed to pornography really young.

And so in my later teen years and in my early 20s, I would cope with my pain through pornography.

And it was destroying my brain, it was destroying my relationships.

This is when I had come back to Christ.

And so publicly, I'm in it.

Publicly, I'm very Christian, very open.

Publicly, I'm doing some ministry.

And privately, I cannot communicate to you how much I hated myself.

And I'm trying to stop this habit by my own strength, and I can't do it, and I literally despise myself for it.

Or more broken than we can imagine.

It's not just when I was a kid or a preteen or a teen or in my early 20s.

Last Tuesday, I'm under so much stress.

I'm allowing all this BS to just lay on me.

All day long.

My wife is trying to connect, and I'm just short.

All day long.

And we get to the end of the day, and she lets me know the whole day, it was just like I didn't want her around.

I need every man to understand this.

You should hope and pray for a wife who will love and support you half as much as my wife.

I I hit the lotto of all lottoes.

We are not promised tomorrow.

Life is short, and I spent a whole day making her feel unloved and unwelcome.

That wasn't when I was 15, that was last Tuesday.

We're more broken than we want to admit.

I had to wake up Wednesday morning and tear open my heart and pour out my thoughts to her, write her a letter, and seek her forgiveness, and repent for my behavior.

Let her know.

That's not real, that's not how I feel about her.

If we're paying attention, we realize that this cultural lie, that we're just this close.

You know, you got a little things off, you get a little anxious sometimes, you got a little temper, bro.

You got a little temper, you know, but other than that, I'm pretty, you know, you're a little promiscuous, but other than that, we buy we buy this lie, man.

And it's straight from the pit of hell.

Some of you are believers, and you can't really cling to the assurance of the cross, not because you don't believe Jesus did it, but because you haven't actually come to terms with how broken you are in the first place.

You haven't been able to fully receive the good news because you haven't yet fully confessed the bad news.

You didn't kind of need Jesus.

You were dying on your way to eternal damnation, and Jesus scooped you out of the fire until we can get there and address the bad news.

We cannot fully understand and fully walk in the good news.

We are in this genealogy, it started with Adam and it comes all the way to me and you.

Broken, sinful, confused, and so we walk in here and we see in the whole history of humanity, everyone, a family tree of failure, except for one.

There is one who walked among us 2,000 years ago.

The only one to get it right, say his name.

Say his name.

The only one is Jesus.

We have one exception.

And what I want to show you, what I want to show you is not just a broader view of the purpose of Jesus, it's laying right here in the genealogy for us.

I also want to help you understand how you can walk in true new life today.

And so I want to go to a hymn we've already looked at today.

It's in Paul's letter to the Colossians, it's in chapter one.

We're gonna take this hymn all the way back from the first century and we're gonna lay it right on top of the genealogy.

We're gonna lay it right on top of the genealogy.

So I want to start breaking this down.

Now, sometimes, and I give feedback like this, I could never study the Bible like this.

I don't know where these sermons come from, I don't know where.

It's it's that I go slow and pay attention.

Can I tell you the the best thing about me being your pastor is I don't have a single fancy degree hanging on a single wall anywhere.

If I can get this out the text, you can get this out the text, okay?

I could bring you my GPA and you'd be like, zang.

I'm finding a new church.

My guy shouldn't be driving like this.

Is crazy.

Let me show you something.

We're gonna slow down, and here's something I look for: repeating words in the same passage.

Isn't that easy?

It's like the author is using the same word multiple times.

Sometimes it doesn't mean anything, sometimes it does.

Let me show you.

It says this He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

The firstborn.

Now, this term firstborn, uh, this has caused a lot of controversy in the church.

Because there are scholars, especially agnostic scholars, who have taken this to say if Jesus is firstborn, then he cannot be God, because God is eternal.

And if God is eternal and Jesus is created, then he cannot be God.

So maybe he's a very elevated deity, but not.

God Himself.

The problem is we often read the scripture through our post-Enlightenment Western eyes, and that's not how it was written.

And so we gotta look at how scripture uses this term.

Not only pull this out when it's an important word, but if you're a note taker and you care, that word in the Greek is prototokos.

Firstborn.

Proto-tokos.

Now, firstborn can mean the eldest child.

It can mean that, but it is not how scripture typically uses it.

When it's talking about someone created first chronologically, it uses first created.

The firstborn is not usually about chronology, it is about power, authority, and status.

Power, authority, and status.

Can I give you some examples?

It is said in Scripture that Israel is the firstborn among the nations, okay?

Israel, the firstborn among the nations.

Let me tell you the problem with that.

The idea of Israel does not show up until Genesis chapter 12, when God comes to Abraham, promises to make him a great nation.

Genesis 12 · chapter mention

Israel itself does not form as a nation until after 400 years in Egypt.

That's Genesis 12, all the way to Exodus.

Genesis 10 is called the table of nations.

There were many, many, many nations that existed before Israel chronologically.

However, God says they are the firstborn among the nations.

That is rank, status, power, not chronology.

Scripture says King David is the firstborn among the kings of Israel.

Here's the problem: King Saul was reigning as Israel's king before David was ever even born.

It's not chronology, it is status, authority, and power.

Does that make sense?

So, how do we determine whether this is about the eldest child in a family or whether this is its typical usage of power, rank, and authority?

We do what we always do, we look at the context.

Paul is not hiding this from us.

He's gonna tell us what this means.

Let's look at it again, verse 15.

He's the image of the invisible God.

The God who we cannot see, we have now seen in the person of Jesus Christ.

He is the firstborn over all creation.

Verse 16, for everything was created by him.

This is basic logic.

If everything was created by him, he cannot have been created.

Everything in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities, all things have been created through him, and all things have been created for him.

Now Paul's like, if you don't get it yet, one more verse.

He is before all of the things, and by him, all of the things are held together.

It's interesting, we don't know whether Paul and John, the apostle, were able to read each other's writings, but what we do know is John's gospel in Colossians 1 hold hands and synthesize with one another.

You may know that John opens his gospel by saying, In the beginning was the Logos, the organizing principle of the universe.

In the beginning was the o the logos, and the logos was with God, and the Logos was God.

And all that was created was created through him.

And then John is like, if you don't know what that means, let me say it this way: every single thing that was ever created was not created apart from him.

And then he says, the Logos became flesh in Jesus Christ and dwelt among us.

What does it mean that he is the firstborn of all creation?

It is acknowledging that yes, Jesus was born into our reality, and yes, King David chronologically was born before him.

Abraham chronologically was born before him.

Everyone in the genealogy was born before him, all the way down to Adam, and yet, saying he's the firstborn who's over all creation.

And in fact, all creation came from him and through him, and all creation is made for him and to him.

And what this means is that Jesus has another thing that only he can do, which is that Jesus is duplicated in his own genealogy.

If you were looking at the genealogy, it starts with Jesus as he began his ministry, Luke 3, 23, Jesus, and it ends with God.

Verse 23, Jesus.

Verse 38, God, Jesus, who is God.

All the way down, God, Yahweh, God, who in the beginning created the heavens and the earth, and the earth was formless and void, and the Spirit of God hovered above the chaos.

And God said, Let there be light, and there was light, and the chaos came into order, and the cosmos was put into the expanses.

And there is not one single molecule, one single atom, one single quantum quark.

I don't even know what that means.

There's nothing that has been created apart from Jesus Christ.

He is at the beginning of his genealogy, and he is God at the very end of his genealogy, is the firstborn over all the creation.

And here we begin to develop a picture of the gospel that is implied in Luke's genealogy.

And for my note takers, it goes like this creation.

Devastation.

It's the story of the gospel.

It starts in creation.

Jesus is the firstborn over all creation.

He created all things.

And you notice it says, on earth and in the heavens, thrones and dominions and rulers and authorities.

You need to know this that in the very beginning, God in eternity past, he created.

He created our world, but he also created the spiritual world.

And we have a very flat view of the spiritual world.

Most Christians just have pictures from cartoons when we go.

So this is what we think.

It's like there's there's God, who is like the Father, Son, and Spirit, and we don't really understand that, but we believe it.

And then there's just like a bunch of naked babies with harps, right?

And like that's heaven.

Like to us, that's heaven.

And we could not be more off base.

As diverse and interesting as the physical realm is, so is the spiritual realm.

There is a spiritual hierarchy of beings, they are multiple and diverse and more than we can imagine.

And Jesus created it all.

He created the spiritual realm, he created the physical realm, and he created the world.

And the world, the intention, was the domain where the spiritual and the physical could coexist.

No veil between them.

And you need to know this: humanity was created to be the kings and queens who manage and govern this universe.

I did not say this world, I did not say planet Earth.

We were created to be the kings and queens who governed this universe, the physical universe that God created.

God showed himself to us.

We walked hand in hand.

Adam is the only human to see God face to face and not fall over dead, and only because he was in a perfect state.

And so God places them and he gives them dominion.

And he goes, Look, you're gonna have everything that you need.

You have full access to the supernatural realm.

You have everything that your physical needs will ever require.

And I'm gonna have a rule, and here's why: because I'm here for relationship.

God doesn't want to manage you, you are not an automaton, you are not a robot, you have a soul, and God wants relationship with you at the level soul to soul.

And you need to know this.

In order to have a relationship, you must have a rule.

Every relationship requires rules.

This is why all these like newfangled attempts at having an open marriage, we don't have any rules for each other, they never ever work because relationships require rules.

And God is like, I want relationships so bad with you, and I do not want to burden you.

And so I'm going to give you the absolute limited number of rules, just one.

Like there's every tree, there's every fruit, there's every food, there's every resource, you have everything you need.

There's gonna be one tree.

And I'm not even gonna trick you, bro.

I'm gonna put it right in the middle so you know exactly which tree it is.

It's gonna be easy to avoid.

You know, uh, the story doesn't give us a sense of time.

So it could have been seven years, it could have been seven months.

When you read it, it feels like seven seconds later, Adam and Eve were like, I really want some of that fruit.

And so they go.

And I want to remind you what God said.

When you eat from that fruit, death is coming.

What's the problem?

It's death.

Before this moment, God, death was not present.

So the only thing to keep their eyes on was their God and the purpose that He had placed on them.

When they ate, death came, and brokenness trailed right behind it, and sin trailed right behind it, and despondence and shame and insecurity right behind it.

And so we moved from creation to devastation, and the world just gets darker and darker and darker.

And we're seeing that again as the light of Christianity gets dimmer and dimmer in our own society, and the society gets darker and darker and darker.

And it isn't because we don't have enough churches on enough corners in America, it's because too many churches are playing games and playing religion and playing politics and are hiding our light under man-made bushels where nobody can see the hope that we have because we want to be king, we want power, we want authority as the church instead of picking up a cross and showing the world who Jesus is.

And so God watches and he keeps reaching out his hands to his people, and he sends them judges, and he sends them prophets and he sends them kings, and they will not listen.

And so God could have written us off, pulled back his hand of mercy.

You need to know this.

As much evil as we are experiencing, God's hands of mercy are holding back evil in ways that you cannot imagine.

And he could just let it go, but he loves us.

So when nothing else worked, he went to the next step of his plan, he got up off of his own throne.

Here is another first century hymn.

As a matter of fact, scholars have tracked this down to within maybe even five years of the resurrection of Jesus.

This is a hymn that was spread and was being sung in the first century church.

It's in Philippians chapter two.

It says, Adopt the same attitude as that of Christ Jesus, who existing in the form of God did not consider equality with God as something to be exploited.

Isn't it funny?

We get bro this much power and we try to find out how I can leverage this power.

Jesus is God Himself.

He doesn't see all of that power as something to leverage or exploit against us.

Instead, he emptied himself by assuming the form of a servant, taking on the likeness of humanity.

And when he had come as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even to death on a cross.

You see, we went from creation, he is the firstborn of all creation, Jesus created it all.

We broke God's heart, we broke the world, death entered, we live in devastation.

Here's where we have our family tree of failure, and into that steps Jesus.

He doesn't stand on the sidelines in heaven and try to coax us along.

We are in exile, so he's born into it to lead us out.

And as Jesus comes, we ask a question: Why?

What is the ultimate purpose of his mission?

Did he come to preach?

To teach?

Sure.

To heal, to cast out demons?

Yes.

Did he come to die and rise again?

Of course.

But what if there is more from an even cosmic standpoint?

You see, I think to begin to understand the actual good news, we have to understand where we were, where we are, and where we're headed.

I want to give it to it to you this way.

The one who made the world from the heavens, the firstborn over all creation, the one who made the world from the heavens came down to remake the world from the earth.

The one who is the firstborn over all creation stepped into his creation.

The one who made us in his own image came down to rescue the broken image bearers, to come under our pain, to come under our brokenness, to come under our humanity, to hurt like we hurt, to ache like we ache, to desire like we desire, and yet to live in perfection so that he could be the ultimate sacrifice that would cover the cost of our sin.

Our sin, which leads to our death.

Death is the problem.

It led us from creation to devastation.

And if death is the problem, resurrection is the only solution.

Here's what Paul goes on to write to the Colossians.

In verse 18, he says, He's also the head of the body, the church.

He is the beginning.

Put a pin in that.

The say it with me, firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything.

We see two words like that in close proximity, and we should stop and we should pay attention.

This is the exact same word, prototokos, the firstborn from the dead, the firstborn over all creation.

That's Luke 3, 38.

He is God, he is Yahweh, He is eternal, He created it all, and He is the firstborn from the dead.

That is Jesus Christ incarnate, who came and took on humanity and lived a perfect life and went to the cross and then went to the grave and three days later walked out of the grave.

And here's what we know we have been taught these watered-down, silly versions of this gospel were the only reason he died, the only reason he bled, and the only reason he was beaten, and the only reason he walked out of a grave is because you're headed to hell and he's the only one who can punch your ticket to heaven.

So you better put your faith in him because hell is hot and it lasts a long time.

That's true, but it is so limited in scope.

It says he is the beginning.

What's Paul calling us to?

He's calling us all the way back to Genesis chapter 1, verse 1.

Genesis 1:1

In the beginning, when there was no world, when there was no creation, when there was only chaos, when he finally spoke, and just by speaking, let there be light, and there was light, and let there be separation from the seas, and there was land and there was a sea, and let there be stars in the sky and moon, let there be a sun, let there be vegetation, let there be man made in our image, all of it in the beginning.

He calls it all the way back.

You see, when Jesus came to earth, he didn't just come to preach, he didn't just come to heal, he didn't just come, he came because in creation we saw the intention of God, and we broke it when death entered.

And because death broke creation, only resurrection could restore it.

And the real purpose of Jesus coming is to stake his claim as the chosen king who can rightfully recreate the cosmos.

That is the purpose of God.

It will come to pass.

We believe it when he returns that he will usher in a new heavens and a new earth.

He's not just firstborn of the creation that is broken, he is firstborn from the dead.

Here's what he goes on to say: He's the head of the body, the church, he's the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything.

19, for God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile everything to himself, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross.

Jesus has come to make all things new.

He has come to redeem our fall in a garden and to point us back to the paradise that he will rebuild.

And it starts with us.

Paul wrote to the Corinthians, he said in 1 Corinthians, as it is, Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who have fallen asleep.

This is a very similar phrase, the firstborn of the dead.

Here's what it means.

If you have put your faith in Jesus, that he is the first one to walk out of his own grave, but he will not be the last.

I will be coming behind him because my destiny is secure in Christ.

If you know Jesus, you will be coming behind him.

More graves will open up, and everyone who confesses the name of Jesus will follow the firstborn out of our graves and into eternity.

You should put your hands together for that.

That is the good news in front of us.

What about right now, Pastor?

The world is broken, it is dark, it is getting darker.

Here's what Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians.

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.

The old has passed away.

And do you see it?

The new has come.

The promise was that Jesus will return.

Jesus came the first time as the suffering servant.

He's coming the second time on a white horse, not a broken down donkey, like he walked into Jerusalem the first time.

A white horse this time.

He will have a sword in his hand, he will have a scepter in his hand, he will rule and reign with power.

He came as the lamb the first time, he will roar as the lion the second time, he will make all wrongs right, all injustices will be ironed out.

At the end of his reign, there will be a new heavens and a new earth, and the intention of God and Eden will come to pass, and the great deceiver, Satan himself, will be bound forever.

And we will dwell in the house of the Lord, and we will live out our created purpose.

That is coming.

But what about now?

The new creation has already begun.

And it starts with every single one of us.

And the way that we reach others and see revival and move the spirit is when we put off the old and we walk in the new.

And people realize that we are somehow in devastation.

But we're living in recreation.

We are somehow in a world of sin.

But we are walking, as this scripture over and over and over again calls us saints.

We are in the middle of chaos, and yet somehow we are living with clarity and direction.

We're in the midst of darkness.

But we are bright, bright light.

The new creation starts here and now, and it starts with us.

And our marching orders are clear.

We have been given new life in order to share that message with as many people as possible while we have breath in our lungs.

And so often, you see, there's this uh there's this truth.

It's taught all through the New Testament.

There is justification, faith, and there is sanctification, faith.

Justification is a legal term.

This means there are sins held against you in the heavenly courts.

And God, who is perfect in his very being, cannot be in the presence of sin or sinners, and so something must happen.

The reason Jesus went to a cross and bled and died is to pay the price of your sin.

And when you put your faith in Jesus, you are covered by that blood and clothed in his righteousness.

When God looks at you, he does not see your sin, he sees the righteousness of Christ.

Justification means in a moment in time, you become convinced in your mind, convicted in your heart, that Jesus is who he says he is, that Jesus has done what he claims to have done, that you have no hope outside of him.

You put your faith in him and you are declared righteous in the sight of God.

That's justification.

From justification, someday your life will either expire, that's a nice way of saying you gonna die, or Jesus will return, which could come at any day.

But what happens in the middle?

And in the middle is where we learn sanctification.

Your eternity is secure, your salvation is secure, but what are you going to do about it?

Sanctification happens over time as we die to ourselves, deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow Jesus.

And it's very hard.

People wanted to follow Jesus, and he said, if someone wants to go out and build a tower, before building the tower, they should sit down and calculate the cost.

You should know what it costs before you really endeavor to do something great.

It's costly to follow Jesus.

Jesus.

To really go after him with your whole heart.

And yet it's where life actually happens.

You might be living, but if you are not living with Christ in you, following him every day, you're living, you're not alive yet, though.

You've been given everything that you need and you're still on the sidelines.

And the harsh reality is you can be headed for heaven and still experiencing hell on earth.

And really, it's just a simple question for those who are believers in the room: are you living in the old?

Are you walking in the new?

I know you know Jesus, you are justified.

You know the Father, the Father has you in his hand, John 10, and no one and nothing can take you out of his hand.

The love of Jesus is on you, and nothing in all of creation, no height, no death, nothing can separate you from the love of Christ.

You have your ticket punched, congratulations.

What are you gonna do with the rest of your time on earth?

You need to come to the academy because we'll show you in the academy, sanctification, how you live, is attached to glorification, how you are rewarded on the other side of this life.

And how you live right now matters, and your witness matters, and there are people who I believe you have their names assigned to you.

You're gonna be the only Jesus they meet.

And some of us are so busy walking in the old that we are missing divine appointments every day of our life.

It is difficult following Jesus, but you will also walk into an unimaginable adventure as who you were created to be begins to be expressed in the world around you, and the gifts that God has laid latent in your heart all of a sudden show up, and you have giftings that you didn't even know about.

The Holy Spirit begins to speak to you and prompt you, and you live in a world of darkness, but you have a peace and a hope and a stillness that no one can explain.

For those who do not know Jesus, here's what I believe.

You can argue with me, it's fine.

Um, I don't think you have any option.

I think you can only live in the old.

I think you're stuck in devastation, and you will try to satiate that with the things of this world, and you will have some success, and it will satisfy for a short time, but ultimately it will leave you empty.

You will try to be your own God, and you will not be able to bear the weight of your own hope, your own faith, or your own future.

And today you have an opportunity to step out of the old and into the new.

It's not an offer of religion, it's someone who loved you enough to step off the throne of heaven and come and give his life for you and walk out of a grave to remake your life and ultimately someday to remake our reality.

He offers it to you, it's absolutely free.

And all you have to do is give up putting your faith in yourself and your faith in this world and put your faith in Jesus.

I'm gonna end in Romans.

Romans chapter 6, verse 4 says this Therefore, we were buried with him by baptism into death.

Romans 6:4

Let me remind you, October 26th, we are baptizing at both of our venues, in order that just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, so we too may walk in newness of life.

Paul's like, is that confusing?

Let me give you another verse.

For if we have been united with him in the likeness of his death, we will certainly also be in the likeness of his resurrection.

If Jesus is in fact the firstborn from the dead, then those of us who have also been born again will walk out of our grave someday.

And what are we going to do in the meantime?

And if you've put your faith in Jesus and you haven't been baptized, it is time to obey Jesus.

He commands us to do that, and here's why, because it is a real, tangible, visceral, physical sign of what you are choosing, which is I know the old.

I know the weight of it, the anxiety of it, the anger of it, the depression of it, the confusion of it, and I'm dying.

I am dying to what's old.

I am burying it in the water so that I can walk in what is new.

And let me make you a promise.

As you walk in what is new, you will stumble, you will trip, you will fall, bad habits, bad patterns, sins will pop up.

But if you connect yourself to the body of Christ, if you get in community, if you get accountability, they will just pick you back up and get you back on the path.

Because God has created you on purpose and He's created you with purpose.

And it's time we take that seriously and let the firstborn of creation and the firstborn from the dead have a hold in our life that moves us forward.

As we close across our venues, let's pray right where you're at.

If you bow your head and close your eyes, here's what I want to do in these last moments.

If you are here and you have never had a moment in time where you have made your own decision, not your grandma's decision, not your spouse's decision, your own decision to put your faith in Jesus.

I want to give you the chance to do that today, to step into the new.

What it requires is a moment of surrender, choosing that your only hope for this life and your only hope for what is next is Jesus Christ.

That he is God, that he died for you, that he rose again, and that he's coming back for you someday.

My guess is the Spirit of God is already heavy on your heart, drawing you to this decision.

So with everyone's eyes closed, I want to ask you to be brave.

In this moment of courage, if you're ready for the first time to put your faith in Jesus, and you're here at one of our venues, I want to ask you right now to just simply raise your hand.

By raising your hand, you are saying, Today, I choose to put my faith in Jesus.

Praise God.

Praise God.

For those who raised a hand, I can say with confidence because of scripture that God sees your faith, accepts your faith, forgives all of your sins, past, present, and future, and has given you everlasting life with the Father.

That is a gift that no one and nothing can ever take away from you.

What I want to do is help you acknowledge this moment.

If you raise your hand, I'm gonna ask you to pray this with me.

I'm gonna ask all the believers that are venues to pray this out loud as well.

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 for giving my sins.

Thanks so much for listening to the message today.

If this was helpful to you and you want to help us get the word out, you can subscribe to this podcast.

You can rate and review or share it with your friends.

If you want to get connected further with what MetaCurch is doing, you can go online to metachurch.tv.

There you can learn how to take next steps.

You can learn where our different venues are at if you ever wanted to visit, and you can also give financially to help push this movement forward.

Man, I love you guys and I hope you have a great rest of your day.