MetaChurch Six Year Anniversary with Pastor Clayton Tyner

Welcome to the Medichurch Podcast.

My name's Clayton.

I'm the pastor here at Medichurch.

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.

MetaCurch, how's everybody doing?

Yeah.

Well, I want to welcome you in to our six-year anniversary.

If you're new with us, my name is Clayton.

I'm the lead pastor here at Meta.

I'm so glad that you joined us at one of our venues.

Those of you who are here at our Holotus venue or Petrenko are joining us online.

Six years ago, a handful of us set out to start something brand new here in San Antonio.

Some of you were here from day one.

Last night, Katie asked me kind of an interesting question.

She was like, how does it feel?

Like, does it feel like it just started, or does it feel like you know Medichurch has been here forever?

And maybe if you were here from the beginning, I wonder if you feel similarly.

My answer was kind of both, you know, like it feels like we just planted MetaCurch yesterday, and like MetaCurch has been a part of my life forever.

Somehow it feels in both directions.

And we have a lot to celebrate today.

Over six years, we've seen 568 people baptized.

That's 568 lives, transformed by the power of the gospel.

We now have two locations as well as streaming online to many people.

Over the years, I've had people who have DM'd me who are faithful attenders, uh, whether they're in Baltimore or in Boston, they're with us every week, being fed, a part of the community, giving generously here.

God has been moving.

And today we're also going to be honest.

That's one of the things that kind of sets us apart as MetaCurch is we come here and we're brutally honest.

And as the leader, I try to always keep it 100.

Like I'm not going to hide the fact that if you've been paying attention the last six years for us as individuals, for us as a community, for us as a country, for us as a world, they have not been the easiest six years.

We have been through a lot.

We've been through a lot together, and yet God has been faithful.

And I think my message today will speak to the full experience of believing in God and following Jesus.

I'm very excited for my message.

Uh, the title is Just Past Six.

Just Past Six.

Would you pray with me?

Jesus, we love you.

We thank you for loving us.

I thank you for Metachurch.

Uh, an idea that you sparked in our hearts to be a faith community for all people, no matter where they are at on their faith journey.

And so, God, I thank you that you have helped us establish that.

We believe for even greater things in our future, and we look forward, Holy Spirit, to what you're gonna say to us today.

We love you.

We pray these things in Jesus' name.

And if you're ready to get just past six, say amen.

Amen.

Uh, last month I had a first in my life.

Uh, I ran my first official marathon.

I was very excited about it.

Yeah.

Don't clap yet, that's premature, I promise.

Uh, I trained all year, and I ran it in December, and I'm new to endurance running.

Um, it was challenging, it was challenging to work up to it.

And at heart, I am a strategist.

That's that's my gifting, that's my strength as a leader.

And so I had a great strategy and I had a great plan and I had a clear goal.

And those are good things to have if you want to accomplish something.

My goal was to run the marathon 26.2 miles in less than five hours.

I really wanted to accomplish that.

And so, to do that, I I know I can't run a very fast pace.

I'm new to the sport, but if I could run an 11-minute per mile pace for all 26 miles, that would bring me in just under five hours.

And so that's what I set out to do.

I'll just lock my pace in 11 minutes, mile after mile after mile, if I can hit 11 minutes, then I will do it.

Now, what I didn't anticipate is the absolute electricity of a marathon environment.

First of all, the night before the marathon, I did not sleep for one second.

I was so nervous.

Then you get to the start line at like six in the morning, and there are 30,000 other people there.

My adrenaline was at level 11.

Like, it was just coursing through me.

And so I'm like, let's do this.

I'm so ready.

I'm in my short shorts, you know?

Like, let's get this going.

Mile one, I run a nine-minute mile.

Two whole minutes faster than I want to.

And I'm like, okay, Clayton, you have to slow down, right?

Uh you can't run nine-minute miles for 26 miles.

So I'm like, okay, I'm gonna slow down.

The second mile I ran in 845.

By the fourth mile, I was getting angry at myself.

I was no longer having pep talks, I was chastising myself.

Clayton, you have to slow down.

You're going to die.

Mile five, I ran in 830.

And what was crazy is I felt fantastic.

I held an 830 pace through mile five, through mile 10, through mile 15, mile 16, I was still at an 830 pace.

And then it happened.

At the beginning of mile 16, I pulled my left hip flexor.

It was my body's cry for help.

On mile 18, my hamstrings started cramping, seizing up.

By mile 20, which was a huge hill, I had hit what they call the wall.

Now, I did a lot of research before running my first marathon, and one of the things that really shocked me was that the majority of people who drop out of a marathon drop out between miles 20 and 21.

Six months ago when I read that, I couldn't believe it.

You're telling me you've already run 20 miles and you can't tough out six more?

You can practically see the finish line.

I couldn't imagine someone dropping out on mile 20.

And then I got to mile 20.

With a pulled hip flexor and seizing, cramping hamstrings, and I was like, okay, I get it.

The next six miles took me a long time.

As a matter of fact, the last six miles took me longer than the first 20.

And they were very slow and very painful.

One of the hardest things physically and mentally that I have done up until this point in my life.

I remember on mile 23, someone was on the side of the road, a woman had a sign that said, Can I call you an Uber?

And I thought, is that an option?

This is embarrassing, but true.

For the last six miles, there's police officers kind of like managing the race on the side of the show.

For the last six miles, every police officer I saw, I asked them if they would arrest me just so I could stop running.

It was really painful.

And the last six miles took me a very long time, and I had a lot of time to reflect.

And I thought about all kinds of things.

I thought about other really difficult times in my life.

And these seasons that we all go through where you're just enduring so much suffering or so much anxiety or so much depression or so much hopelessness that you just don't know how you're gonna get through it.

And sometimes you don't.

Sometimes you tap out, sometimes you quit.

It's kind of dramatic, but it is true.

Every step for six miles, I thought about quitting the race.

It's all I wanted to do was stop.

There's this concept that we're gonna use today.

I'm calling it getting stuck on six.

You see, in the Bible, numbers carry a lot of meaning, especially in the Old Testament.

The number six in scripture is the number of humanity.

And it has kind of a wide range of meaning.

The number six stands for things that are incomplete.

The number six stands for struggle and work and suffering.

And we all know what it's like to get stuck on six, to get stuck in a season of your life where you are suffering and angry and sad and lonely and overwhelmed and depressed, and it feels like everything is hopeless.

Did you know that statistically, the sixth year of marriage is the number one year where people file for divorce?

They actually have a term for this, they call it the seventh-year itch.

Where people get that far into marriage and they just don't think they can maintain it long term.

You know, it's kind of like uh how I ran the marathon.

It's like things start out really well, things start out quickly, you know.

You you date because you like each other, and then dating goes so well that you get engaged, and engagement goes so well that you get married, and most marriages have a bit of a honeymoon period where everything's good and you're happy all the time, and then reality checks in with you.

And there's differences of opinions, and those create hurt feelings, and those create tension, and the tension creates anger, and the anger leads to distrust, and the distrust leads to differences that seem unsolvable, and all of a sudden you're stuck in a season of six, just suffering and pain and hopelessness.

We get this way in our careers, it's really common, especially now, for people to kind of bounce from job to job and career to career.

And for sure, it takes a while to kind of find your purpose.

That's different than always changing jobs anytime anything gets hard.

Always tapping out before breakthrough can come or before you can level up or grow or mature because you feel like you're getting stuck on six.

This happens in parenting, this happens in our finances, this happens with our habits and our addictions, it happens in our spiritual life.

It's like Jesus meets you in this difficult season of your life and he breathes new life into you, and you give your life over to him, and you get baptized, and you join the class and you get on a team and you start serving and you're using your gifts, but things don't line up like you thought they would, and God doesn't show up like you expected he would, and his timing isn't what you wanted his timing to be.

And there's people who don't even believe in God, and they're succeeding in areas that you're not succeeding in, and it just doesn't feel fair.

You feel like in your spiritual life you're stuck on six, just in a cycle that is helpless and hopeless and out of control.

We all want to finish the race, we all want to accomplish our goals, we want our relationships to work out, we want to find success and purpose, but we are all capable of getting stuck on six.

There's a contrast because in biblical terms, the number six is the number of humanity, but it contrasts with the number seven.

And the number seven represents God.

And so while the number six represents things that are incomplete, the number seven represents perfection.

And while the number six represents missing the mark and suffering and struggle, the number seven represents things that are whole and finished and perfect.

In the creation narrative, God works for six days, but on the seventh it is complete and he rests.

And because of this, God's people in the Old Testament are told to take the seventh day and to rest and to set it apart as holy.

Even in the New Testament, Peter asks Jesus, hey, how many times do I have to forgive somebody?

And Jesus says, You must forgive 70 times seven.

Perfection multiplied by perfection.

It's interesting, six years ago, the very first Sunday service at Metachurch, I taught on Joshua crossing the Jordan River.

And now, six years later, we're gonna pick that story up, like right where we left it from our first Sunday.

And we're gonna look at Joshua, the new leader of Israel, his first major obstacle, which was the massive fortified city of Jericho.

And if there was ever a story that teaches us how we can avoid getting stuck on six, it is Joshua and the battle of Jericho.

Now, Moses was the leader of all leaders, he just died, and Joshua has taken his place.

Jericho is his first major obstacle.

In order for them to inherit the promised land, they have to get past Jericho, but Jericho is huge, and Jericho has huge fortified walls surrounding the city, and inside those huge fortified walls is a ferocious military.

There really isn't a good answer for how the Israelites are going to defeat Jericho.

And so Joshua, who's a good leader and loves the Lord, he does what we should do.

He seeks the Lord, and the Lord responds.

In Joshua 6, verse 2, the Lord said to Joshua, Look, I've handed Jericho, its king, and its best soldiers, over to you.

Joshua 6:2

March around the city with all the men of war circling the city one time.

Do this for six days.

God's plan for the defeat of Jericho is going to require huge faith and huge endurance.

See, there have already been a couple of battles on the other side of the Jordan River, and they won these battles.

This is crazy, they won these battles by fighting the battles.

They didn't just go for a stroll every day for six days around the city.

They liked hand-to-hand combat and defeated these people and won the war.

And now the instructions are every day you're gonna wake up, you're gonna walk directly towards your problem, directly toward the thing that you're terrified of, directly toward this massive fortified city.

You're gonna snug right up to these massive walls, and then you're going to walk all the way around it.

And this is not a casual evening stroll.

This is a massive city.

Walking around it one time would be incredibly difficult.

And on the other side of that is a military who wants to kill you.

It would have been incredibly intimidating, maybe even a little bit embarrassing.

And the further instructions we get in Joshua are that you are to walk around it in complete silence.

Six days, one lap around the city, every day, and it only gets harder from there.

In verse four, he says, have seven priests carry seven ramshorn trumpets in front of the ark.

And on the seventh day, march around the city seven times.

Seven, seven, seven, seven.

This is real marathon energy right here.

Remember, a marathon, 26 miles, what they say is that the last six are harder than the combined 20 that you've already run.

Think about the actual game plan here.

Every day for six days, you're gonna wake up and walk around it one time.

Then on the seventh day, you're gonna march around it seven times, which means on one day, you're gonna do more laps than you have on the other six days combined.

That means on day six, you're not even halfway done.

So, what's the game plan?

How do we win?

We're gonna do some light calisthenics, and then somehow we just get in verse five, when there is a prolonged blast of the horn and you hear it sound, have all the troops give a mighty shout, and then the city wall will collapse and the troops will advance, and each man will go straight ahead.

That is the game plan.

It's like at the end of this marathon, you're gonna holler real loud.

I hope that had I been in Joshua's army, I would have had enough faith to be like Joshua, I trust you, and I trust the Lord, and so let's walk some circles, baby.

Let's do it.

I'm afraid, knowing myself pretty well, that I would have been like, are we sure the Lord said Joshua?

Is there a Jonathan?

Is there a Jehoiakim?

Like, is it Joshua for sure?

Don't get me wrong, I'd be ready to fight.

If Joshua was like, hey, it's time to take Jericho, I'd be like, Joshua, guess what?

I've been in the gym.

Let's get going.

But to hear this plan, gather up, gather the troops, and Joshua's like, here's what we're gonna do.

We're gonna walk.

I'd be like, let's do it.

A little warm-up before we, you know?

No, no, no.

We're gonna walk in silence.

Again, and then tomorrow, again, and then tomorrow, again.

We don't know this, the Bible doesn't say.

There had to be one soldier who was looking around like, is everyone, we're okay with this?

This is the plan.

This is exactly in our own lives how we get stuck on six.

I don't know the plan.

I don't understand the timing, it's taking forever, I'm exhausted.

Why won't God move sooner?

Why are we wasting all of this time?

Why hasn't God changed her yet?

Why hasn't God changed him yet?

Where is the breakthrough?

Where is the miracle?

We get stuck on six.

It happens in our relationships, it happens in our marriages.

We start thinking things like, dude, we have gone around in circles on this.

How many times are we gonna talk about this problem?

How long do I have to endure this?

We start rationalizing, it's like, dude, everybody gets divorced.

It's fine.

The kids will be fine.

You know, I shouldn't have to sit here in misery.

We do this in our finances, you know.

The Bible asks us to steward our finances in a specific way.

It's very countercultural.

And so maybe you try, but it's hard.

It's like who lives like this?

You know?

It's like you want something, so you get it.

Or you want something and you don't have money, so you just swipe a card, and then you can get the thing you want.

It's like I have some debt, okay.

I have a lot of debt, okay, I'm crushed to debt.

But everyone's being crushed by it.

What does Dave Ramsey know anyway?

You know?

We think about this in our careers, we think about it with our kids, we think about it with our habits, with our addictions.

It's like everyone has an addiction, right?

No one really needs to know, it's nobody's business.

I'm not going to a meeting, I'm not talking to people about this.

That's crazy.

We're experts at rationalizing why we should tap out, why we should quit, why we should quit walking.

The finish line is out there, but we give up.

I don't want to walk around this stupid city one more time.

I can't spend another month married to this person.

I can't take the weight of this leadership.

I can't deal with these difficult children.

Let me make something really clear.

I'm not here today to pretend like when you are stuck on six, stuck in a season of suffering and hopelessness.

That that is not some special kind of hell.

I'm not here to sugarcoat it or to tell you to just pretend and put on a front like you're too blessed to be stressed.

I'm here to acknowledge if you're in a season like that, you are probably incredibly stressed.

It probably hurts like hell.

It's confusing and infuriating and humiliating and heartbreaking.

Feeling like you're on lap number 100 around a problem that you do not currently have a solution to.

Six is the number of humanity.

Our problems, our suffering, our struggle, our incompletion, our incompetence.

But what did the Lord promise Joshua?

The promise was that if they kept walking, that if they kept their faith, that if they could endure, a miracle was coming, and it would come just past six.

This is the template.

Just past six, seven is coming.

Just past your suffering, miracles are coming.

Just past your heartbreak, breakthrough is coming.

Just past your weakness, God's faithfulness will renew you.

Just past your failures, Jesus will make something beautiful out of the ashes of your life that are left behind.

Just past six, Jesus is there and ready and waiting to move on behalf of his children, whom he loves, the problem is.

We can't always see where six ends.

We don't always know when seven is coming.

And we live in a bubble of Western Christianity who kind of lament.

We don't see miracles anymore.

We don't see God breaking through between heaven and earth.

We're not experiencing a move of the Holy Spirit.

And so, you know, you can pay someone like 1999 and they will teach you the right words to say and the right ten spiritual disciplines to put into your life.

It's like, what if it's as simple as we don't see God breaking through because we live in a culture of so much convenience that as soon as something is painful, there's always a way out of it.

You know who sees miracles today?

Our brothers and sisters in China under persecution.

Our brothers and sisters being beheaded in parts of the world.

They're seeing biblical miracles in their time because they have no other option than to keep circling the city until the walls fall down.

If you've been a Christian for any amount of time, you have seen too many marriages who no one thought could be healed, experience healing, and get to a level of joy and satisfaction that they had never grasped before to give up on someone when divorce is such an easy option for them.

And the difference is who will stay in the fight?

Who will say this plan seems stupid?

I don't understand it.

We're just walking around the city.

Oh my gosh, the walls just fell down.

Who will just keep walking until God moves?

Imperfectly.

So how do we do it?

I'm not here to pretend like these seasons aren't incredibly taxing.

I am here to give you a new perspective.

When we think about this story from the angle of our problems, we see the fortified city of Jericho and we imagine it from Israel's perspective.

It's like every morning I gotta wake up and I gotta walk back up to this intimidating, excruciating experience, embarrassing experience, where I'm just silently circling these guys.

We think of it how scary it would be to be Israel.

But if you read it in context, you get a different picture.

Just a few chapters earlier, Joshua sent spies into Jericho.

They ended up at the house of a woman named Rahab.

Here's what we read in Joshua chapter 2, starting in verse 8.

Joshua 2 · chapter mention

Before the men fell asleep, Rahab went up on the roof.

And Rahab said to them, I know that the Lord has given you this land, and that the terror of you has fallen on us.

And everyone who lives in the land is panicking because of you.

She goes on to say, We have heard how the Lord dried up the water of the Red Sea when you came out of Egypt.

We have heard what you did to Sihon and Og, the two Amorite kings you completely destroyed across the Jordan.

When we heard this, we, Jericho, lost heart, and everyone's courage failed because of you.

For we know that the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on earth below.

Do you see it?

We think that the Israelites should be afraid of Jericho.

Meanwhile, Jericho is terrified of Israel.

Let me give you a new perspective.

You live in Jericho.

You have heard about an army who has come that crossed the Red Sea on dry ground, and then the Red Sea swallowed up its enemies.

You have heard of a God who causes miraculous defeat of armies ten times the size of Israel.

And now Israel is at your front door.

One day they begin to approach your city and you think, here it comes.

Fire from heaven, tornadoes, thunder from the sky.

Instead, they walk silently all the way up to your walls.

And for six days, they just circle you.

As you sit waiting for the hammer to drop.

That would be creepy, right?

Like if you're Jericho, be incredibly unsettling.

Can y'all at least say something, please?

What's true for Israel, I believe, is true in your life.

The problems you are encountering and the forces that are against you, they seem overwhelming.

It feels like there is no way other than defeat.

And yet, if we believe in the same God who rescued Joshua from Jericho, what it means is that the problems that you are so terrified of are terrified of you.

That the problems that you're worried you won't get through, you sitting stuck on six, wondering whether or not you should give up and quit walking.

Those problems already bow in reference to the God who has guaranteed you the victory.

This is the perspective that gives us the faith and gives us the endurance to continue walking even when it seems like we should quit.

Satan doesn't care if you get a fast start to the race.

Go ahead, sprint your first 20 miles.

He does not care.

As long as he can convince you to quit in the final six.

Have the best dating experience, the best engagement, the best first three years of marriage you can, as long as he can get you to divorce by year seven.

Go ahead, handle your finances so well, invest richly in the workings of God, as long as he can convince you the world isn't fair and cause you to start hoarding your money later.

Satan can't win.

We are fighting a defeated foe.

And so the best he can do is convince you to be distracted and to derail you before you experience the promises of God in your life.

Let me connect some dots.

Jericho's freaking out.

They know who the God of Israel is and that their days are numbered.

Israel had clear instructions, weird instructions, but clear.

Six days of walking in lap.

On the seventh day, they're gonna walk seven times.

They're gonna blow some trumpets, they're gonna yell really loud, and the victory will be theirs.

It's already written, it's already promised as long as they keep walking.

The difference between those who see breakthrough, who see miracles, who see God move, who see purpose, who see impact, and those who do not is whether or not they have the endurance when things get hard in a season of six to just keep walking.

Here's what Hebrews 10 says do not throw away your confidence, not in yourself, your confidence in God, which has a great reward.

For you need endurance, so that after you have done God's will, you may receive what was promised.

A few verses later, he encourages his listeners like this we are not those who draw back and tap out and give up and are destroyed.

We are those who keep walking, who have faith, who keep circling, and eventually we are saved.

This is the promise.

If you're stuck in six, seven is coming, and I know you want to kill him today, but just keep walking, and you have no idea if your kids are ever going to get it.

And it may take five years, and it may take 45 years for your kid to finally understand who they were made by and the purpose placed on their life.

But just keep walking in obedience.

It's a new year, new me.

You might have 50 pounds to lose today and 55 pounds to lose next month.

Just keep walking, and God will show up in your life.

Today marks the end of our six years.

That's what a six-year anniversary is.

We have been through six years together.

Which means tomorrow, meta church, we wake up just past six.

And we have seen unbelievable things in our six years.

But I will be honest with you, as someone helping to lead this movement, these six years have felt like managing a series of emergencies with brief respite in between them.

And so, how is it when seasons of six come so regularly that we still see more and more people come to Jesus every year, more and more families healed every year, more people going to the academy, more people on life teams, more hope, more joy.

It is not because, as a movement, we are like the smartest church in the world.

You know that's not true.

It's not because we're the most resourced church, you know that's not true.

It's because come hell or high water seasons of plenty or seasons of drought.

This movement, that's you.

You are this movement has just kept walking.

And if God has declared the victory, as long as we're walking, we're winning.

Last month, the last six miles of my marathon was one of the most excruciating experiences of my life, but I knew this to be true.

If I just keep moving, no matter how slow, if I just keep moving, I will finish eventually.

Just past those last six miles was my goal.

It was proving to myself that I could overcome.

And more importantly, just past six was what was waiting for me at the end.

And for me, it wasn't the finish line.

I was excited about the finish line, but that isn't what motivated me.

It wasn't what I kept at the forefront of my mind the whole time.

I'm gonna show you a video of me uh right near the finish line.

But before we do, uh a couple of things.

Number one, you you're about to see me in really short shorts, like viewer discretion advice.

For that reason, you're gonna find out just how pale your pastor actually is.

It's not good.

There's nothing good about it, but it makes my point.

And so we're we're gonna show it anyone.

I want you to check this video out.

This is right before the finish line, but I don't run to the finish line.

I run to my finish line.

I run to the thing that kept me motivated and me going.

Because the whole six miles, I knew somewhere right by the finish line, Katie would be there.

She had run the half marathon, and she killed it, and she ran it like an adult with a brain.

Isn't that impressive?

Like the same pace the whole time.

And so I knew she was there and she was somewhere near the finish line.

And I knew she'd be proud of me regardless of my time or effort or anything that happened.

And so every time I wanted to quit, which was basically every step for six miles, I just thought, I'm just gonna get there and I'm gonna see Katie.

And it kept me going.

You have to know what your finish line is.

And your finish line is not just escaping the suffering you're in.

And your finish line is not just like the next instant gratification that you can achieve.

Your finish line isn't even your worldly successes, as exciting as they may be.

Here's what Hebrews 12 says.

Therefore, since we have such a large cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us lay aside every hindrance and the sin that so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance, the race that lies before us.

You want to know the key?

The key to running with endurance is knowing your finish line.

Here's our finish line: keeping our eyes on Jesus, the pioneer and the perfecter of our faith.

Here's why Jesus gets to be our finish line.

For the joy that lay before him, he endured the cross, despising the shame, and he sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

When we are stuck on six, we have to have faith that Jesus is there and with us, that seven is coming, that salvation is coming, that eternity is coming, that reward is coming.

Only that perspective will allow us to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Jesus is our finish line.

He's with us now, and he is holding our promise in eternity.

And we say all the time, we must develop a pilgrim's perspective.

The realization that this world is not our home, we are pilgrims simply passing through, that our home is an eternity.

Our home is where Jesus is.

And by keeping our eyes on Jesus and the promises that he offers us, we can hold on to our faith.

By keeping our eyes on our finish line, we can endure the seasons where we feel stuck on six.

When Jesus is our finish line, we can keep moving.

Keep circling the city.

We can stay in the fight for our marriage, for our children, for our finances, for our faith, for our health.

We can remember that as scary and intimidating as our problems may seem in those seasons, that every one of our problems bows down to the God who holds your future.

And as long as you're walking, you're winning.

As we close, would you pray with me right where you're at?

You just bow your head and close your eyes, create some space for reflection and for application.

I wonder, as we get really brutally honest with ourselves, I wonder if you find yourself today in a season where you are stuck on six.

You feel trapped in a season of suffering, you don't know how it could end, you feel hopeless, helpless.

What would it look like for you to endure?

What perspective needs to shift for you to keep walking in faith?

The Israelites didn't walk how they wanted to, they walked in perfect obedience to God's commands.

God has given us his word, he's revealed for us how to live.

Are we willing to walk even when it's difficult?

I wonder if there's anyone who is at one of our venues or has joined us online who has not taken the first step.

And the first step is coming into relationship with Jesus.

If Jesus is our finish line, you have to know him and be in relationship with him.

Jesus changed everything because even when things became the most difficult, he just kept walking.

When the world despised him and shamed him, he just kept walking.

He told his disciples, We're gonna go to Jerusalem, and when we get there, they will kill me.

And Jesus set his eyes towards Jerusalem and just kept walking.

When they arrested him and beat him and put his own cross on his own shoulders, he set his feet toward Calvary and he just kept walking.

And as long as you're walking, you're winning.

And when he breathed his last and they thought it was over, they put him in a tomb.

And three days later, he just kept walking.

Jesus is not inviting you into a religion.

Jesus is inviting you into a relationship.

It isn't about your work or your perfection.

It is about the perfection of Jesus and the work he did for you.

All he asks is for your faith.

And if you're ready for the first time to believe that Jesus is who he says he is and has done what he says that he has done, then you have everything you need to come into relationship with him, which means your sins will be forgiven, all of them, past, present, and future, and you'll be given the gift of eternal life.

Something that no one and nothing can ever take away from you.

If you're at one of our venues today and you're ready to put your faith in Jesus for the first time, with everyone's eyes closed, I want to ask you in this moment of courage to just simply lift your hand up.

And by raising your hand, it's a symbolic gesture saying, Today, I choose to put my faith in Jesus.

Amen.

For those who raised a hand, I want you to know that God sees and accepts your faith, that your sins are forgiven, and that you have been given eternal life.

And what I want to do is very simply help you acknowledge this moment of belief.

And so for those who raised a hand, I'm gonna ask you to repeat a prayer after me.

And I'm gonna ask all the believers across our venues to pray this out loud with us 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.