God's Good Will

No, super excited about what we're gonna talk about to start this year.

We are starting a series today.

We'll be doing this all of January.

It's very simple.

It's called a really good year.

I would like to have a really good year.

I don't know if anyone else is with me.

Is it if some of you are like, actually, okay, good.

Um, it's not that 2024 was a bad year, per se, but I just want 2025 to be to be good.

Like as I thought about it, prayed about it.

I had a very interesting January or December rather, a very interesting end of my year last year, and spent a lot of time reflecting on what's ahead, and I'm like, all right, Lord, I just want this year to be to be good.

And I'm sure all of us do.

I don't know anyone who's like, I'd really like a mediocre year.

I'm hoping actually for a bad year.

I think I've had too many good years, I'm ready for a bad year to bounce out.

I don't know anyone who's like that.

But what's interesting is that that word good is problematic.

Even as I as I prayed through it and thought through the year ahead, as we stepped into 2025, I just want this year to be good.

And it's like, well, what does that mean?

Jesus speaks to this in Mark chapter 10.

Mark 10 · chapter mention

Verse 17 says, as Jesus was starting out on his way to Jerusalem, a man came running up to him, knelt down, and asked, Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?

Why do you call me good?

Jesus asked.

Only God is truly good.

It's an interesting response that Jesus has, and he says, Hey, you called me good teacher.

What do you even mean by good?

Only God is truly good.

And Jesus in this moment identifies a problem that we as human beings have with that concept of good.

We often struggle to even know what it is.

It's hard for us to define what's good.

I'll give you an example from my life.

I remember many years ago in my early 20s.

We were new to his hands, actually, started coming here when I was 23 years old, 41 now, so it's almost like half my life has been here.

And we were young, married, no children yet, which meant that we did things at 9 p.m.

Some of you are still in that stage of life.

Some of you have things on your calendar that begin past 7.30.

That's I remember those days.

It's amazing.

You eat dinner at crazy hours, like 7.

Um, you know, we used to meet our friends.

Hey, let's let's have dinner at 7, go to a movie at 9.30.

And if you said that to me today, I'm like, you're you're crazy.

You're insane.

But back then we did that.

And so one night we had a late dinner with some friends that we met here at the church, and we didn't know them very well, just kind of getting to know them.

They seemed like good options for friends.

And then they're like, hey, let's watch a movie, and we looked, and there weren't any movies at the theater that seemed to be good.

And one of them said, Oh, I know this awesome movie.

This movie's so good, let's go rent it and watch it.

And so we went to a store called Blockbuster Video.

Uh still around at the time.

That was my first job, was at Blockbuster Video, so I was very familiar.

We pick up this movie on the recommendation of this person, and she said, It's so good.

And so we go to our house, our apartment, and we start watching this movie.

And guys, I'm just gonna be honest, like it was it's one of the worst movies I've ever seen.

It was so bad.

And and I'm not gonna say the movie because I know that some of you might like it.

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

You can't make me do anything.

So, okay, I'll tell you a movie.

Um, there was a Nicolas Cage movie in the like early 2000s called Next, where he like sees in the future, but only a few seconds in the future.

And if you're I you I used to work at Blockbuster, I used to consider myself a movie buff.

If you're a movie buff, Nicolas Cage, he's he's strange because he can be amazing.

There are some Nicolas Cage movies that are like, that's one of the greatest movies.

I'll watch that movie every day, and there's other Nicolas Cage movies that you're like, Why did you make this movie?

He's he's an interesting guy, and if you love that movie, good for you.

You're part of the 28% of people on Rotten Tomatoes that like the movie, okay?

Just know that you're you're in the minority.

So, I uh we're watching this movie, and from my perspective, some of you right now are like, I'm never coming to this church again.

Um is that anyone's favorite movie of all time?

Good.

Alright, at least I didn't at least I didn't shred on your dreams or anything like that.

But I'm watching this movie and I felt bad for the lady who suggested it.

I was like, oh, that's gotta be so embarrassing.

Because surely she's watching what I'm watching and going, this is not nearly as good as I remember.

And I just felt bad, I felt bad for her.

I was like, this is embarrassing.

And then the movie was over, and she goes, wasn't that awesome?

And the first thought that ran through my head is, I don't think, I don't think I can be friends with this person.

I don't think this is gonna, you know what?

I'm teasing, I wasn't that severe, but it just it reminded me, I thought about that this week because I'm thinking about so many opportunities in my life where someone tells me something is good and I trust them, and it's from my perspective, the opposite of good.

They think it's good, I don't think it's good.

We as people can't even agree on what's good and what's not.

And so here we are if we say, yeah, I'd like this year to be good, but what does that even mean?

What does it look like to have a good year?

We have an issue with the word good, and this is by the way, like a biblical problem.

So, for example, in the earliest story we have in the Bible, Adam and Eve, Eve gets tempted by the serpent and she eats the forbidden fruit.

You probably know the story, even if you're new to church, you know the story.

And it actually says in Genesis chapter 3, when the woman saw the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye.

Genesis 3 · chapter mention

In other words, it looked good.

She looked at it and said, That looks really good to me.

And it was also desirable for gaining wisdom.

She took some and she ate it.

She also gave some to her husband who was with her, and he ate it.

And as we know, if you know the story, that's like a disaster.

This opens up this whole can of worms and life gets crazy after that.

But it looked good.

She thought she made a good choice.

But it wasn't.

Not even close.

Isaiah, a prophet in the Old Testament, was talking about a time when when the world wouldn't even understand what was good.

He actually says in Isaiah 5.20, what sorrow for those who say that evil is good and good is evil, that dark is light and light is dark, that bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter.

Isaiah is identifying that there can be entire times and eras of history and in entire cultures that are so backwards in their thinking that what they see is good is actually evil, what they think is evil is actually good.

And there could be a lot of people right now saying, Man, I want this year to be good, and what good means to them might be the complete opposite of what good means to God.

We have a problem with understanding what is good, and all of us have experienced this.

There have been tons of times in life that we could look back and say to ourselves, I thought that was a good idea, it wasn't.

I thought that was a good opportunity, it was a disaster, I thought they were a good person.

Like I thought we were a good match, and it wasn't.

And so it's challenging for us because we can say things like, I want to have a good year, what does that even mean?

And what I want us to understand first and foremost at the start of this year is that God fully understands what is good.

There's never been a moment where God has thought, oh, I thought that was good, but it wasn't.

Oops.

I thought it was a good idea to pull 300 chairs at the third gathering for Christmas Eve.

And uh, nope.

Seemed good at the time.

I thought it was brilliant.

No, it was stupid.

I have a lot of examples of that in my life.

So, in other words, we did we need help with good.

We need help understanding what is good, discerning what is good.

And so, what if in 2025, what if it was our mission and our purpose to discern what God's good is in our life?

What if right now we said, you know what, before I make my goals and before I chase after these things and I go after these things, even if we're confident, no, no, the things that I've got on my list this year, the things I want to experience, I know they're good.

Even if we're confident, Eve was confident that that fruit was good.

It was not.

What if we paused and said, Lord, help me understand what is good from your perspective?

I want to have a really good year, but I don't want it to be my definition of good because I have proven time and time again that my definition of good can actually be bad.

I want your good.

I want to give us a few scriptures to sort of guide us as we start this conversation.

These kind of go together, they communicate much the same thing.

Both very classic short passages from Scripture.

Romans chapter 12, 1 and 2 says, And so, dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you to give your bodies to God because of all that he's done for you.

Romans 12 · chapter mention

Let them be a living and holy sacrifice, the kind that he will find acceptable.

This is truly the way to worship him.

Don't copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.

Then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.

Matthew chapter 11, 28 and 30, Jesus says something that very much lines up with what we just read from Romans.

Matthew 11 · chapter mention

Jesus says, Come to me all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest.

Take my yoke upon you, let me teach you, because I'm humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls, for my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden that I give you is light.

Paul says, Give yourself completely to God.

Jesus says, Come to me, and I'll show you what's good.

I want us to nerd out for just a couple seconds and look at some Greek words.

It's important to remember that the languages that we're when we read the Bible in English, it's not the language that it was written in.

Most of the Old Testament was written in Hebrew, a few parts in Aramaic, the New Testament written in Greek.

And our translations do an amazing job of communicating what it means to us, but words have a way of changing over time, their meanings change over time, and we can sometimes get the right or the wrong idea rather.

And so I want us to look at a couple of words.

Um there's this word krestos.

Krestos, it's a Greek word, and it shows up when Jesus was saying in Matthew 11, come to me and I'll put my yoke upon you, I'll teach you, I'll lead you, and he says, My yoke is easy.

Uh, that word in the Greek for easy is this word crestos.

And it's funny, easy to us usually means problem-free.

If something is easy, it means there's no issues, there's no problems, there's no challenge.

I mean, a lot of us, if we're honest, when we think about having a good year, what we would define as good is easy.

That's what a good year was, a year with no problems, a year with no challenges.

And maybe your 2024 was so jam-packed with challenges that you're like, yes, that would be good.

I just need a break.

But that's that's how we tend to define good.

It's just, it's, it's easy.

But that's not what that easy means.

That word crestos, it actually means well fitting.

It means something being like tailor-made to fit you perfectly.

So that like putting it on is is easy.

If you've ever had a shoe or or some type of piece, some piece of clothing that it fits you perfectly and it's just easy to put on because it fits you.

That's actually what it means.

And so when Jesus says that if you come to him, it'll be easy, he's not saying, hey, come to me, follow me, and you won't have any problems, you won't have any challenges, everything will go well for you.

There are churches and pastors who teach that sort of a version of the gospel, and it's just not true.

And Jesus' own life clearly shows that.

He was absolutely in the will of God, and his life was hard.

But what it's saying is that if you will give yourself to Jesus, if you will give your life to him and offer yourself to him completely, you have a chance to discover what fits you, what suits you, what works for you.

Almost like something was custom fit, tailor-made for you.

There's another word, it's this word uh teleos, which shows up in Romans when it says that God's will is good and pleasing and perfect.

The word for perfect there is this Greek word teleos.

This word, if you'll nerd out with me for just another second, it doesn't mean perfect like we tend to think of perfect.

We think of perfect like something is flawless, it has no visible imperfections.

That's not what this word means at all.

In fact, many times in scripture we're told that God will perfect us.

And that doesn't mean that you'll have zero flaws.

If you think that's what it means, you're gonna have a really difficult life where you'll feel like a failure all the time.

Because you're not even aware of most of your flaws.

If we're honest with ourselves, like I'm usually working on a few known flaws that I have, and I'll get some of those worked on and figured out just to discover that there's others I wasn't even aware of.

You know, that's how life goes.

No, that that word, that Greek word for perfect, it means complete.

It means having all that it needs to function properly.

So it's it's like a perfect fit for you.

It's very similar to that other word.

These are these are connected, these ideas.

Something being well-fitting.

It's like if you meet someone and they're perfect for you.

Some of you might have friends who have started dating someone or gotten married, and that person that they married is perfect for them, but you know that'd be a nightmare for me.

I could never be a match with that person.

Our personalities would clash, but oh, they're perfect for you.

Or a certain job, a certain career is perfect for someone that you know, but if you were in it, it's like it'd be a nightmare.

I mean, my little brother is brilliant, super intelligent, extremely smart, hardworking, and for years he worked in logistics.

So his whole world was all about details and coordinating complex things.

If you know me, like no one gives me a logistical thing.

In fact, there's times where people will hand me things at the church and someone else on staff will be like, here, I will take that.

I will take that.

Because I like I lose everything.

I I my mind doesn't work with details.

I once lost my keys here for like an hour after church.

I just walked around trying to find my keys and they were in a door.

I I'd put them in a door to unlock a door, and I just left them there.

Like, who does that?

Has anyone else ever done that before?

My people.

You were my people.

None of us should be in charge of logistics, right?

No, it's like, and my brother and I from the same family, same genetics, but totally different.

That the jobs that are perfect fits for him, not for me.

That's what the word means.

It's it's not flawless, but it's it's for you.

It is it's what you need, it's what completes you, it's what works for you.

So this idea with God's will, that if we give ourselves to Jesus, if we surrender ourselves, what we have a chance to discover in God's will is what is what is perfect for us, what is easy for us, what fits us, what suits us, what gives us the purpose that we need.

And it might be different for each of us, but God knows it.

That's what I want to discover this year.

What is God's good for my life?

What is God's will for my life?

His good, pleasing, and perfect will, what's gonna be custom fit for me?

I want that to guide me this year.

And if that became our pursuit, it would change so much of how we approach this year.

If we could pause and stop blindly pursuing what we think is good, what we have did what we've determined is good, what this world has told us is good, if we could just pause that for a second and be like, Lord, I want to see your good.

Help me discern your good.

It would change everything for us.

I'll give you three things I know it'll change.

Number one, your prayers.

Your prayers will change if you begin to discern what God's version of good is, what his will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will is.

I discovered about six months ago that my wife and I pray very differently for our kids.

We were at a basketball game for one of my kids, and uh I was praying before the game, and she was praying, and I'd never asked her this before.

I was like, What do you pray?

And she told me what she prayed, and it was like one of those instant regret questions because it was so much better than what I prayed, and she's like, What do you pray?

I was like, well, let's just change the subject, let's, you know.

So I always pray like obvious stuff.

Lord, let them win, let them perform well, let them dominate.

You know, let them let them score 20 points, let them just shine.

Like I pray that stuff, because clearly that's what's good, right?

And so I asked Megan, what do you what do you pray?

And she says, I pray, Lord, give them what they need.

I was like, well, crap, that's way better than when I pray.

And it is, it's so much better than when I pray because sometimes you need to struggle.

Sometimes you need the shots not to go in.

Sometimes you need to learn some endurance, some adversity.

Sometimes you need it to go poorly.

You do.

There's times in life where you can all look back and see moments where that went really poorly, and I needed it.

I needed it.

When I was in the eighth grade, I've shared the story before, I'm not gonna go into detail.

I got, I mean, I just got beat up, royally beat up in front of my friends, in front of my girlfriend.

Uh, fortunately, eighth grade girlfriend.

I mean, what were the odds of that working out anyway?

Uh, but like, I ran my mouth and I got beat up, and it's one of the best things that ever happened to me.

It truly was one of the best things that ever happened to me in life.

I don't know who would have prayed, like, Lord, let him just get a fist to the face.

That would just, maybe my mom was praying for that.

He needs it, Lord.

He needs it.

Send a bully, a really big kid, to punch him really hard.

Uh-huh.

I doubt she prayed that, but but instead of praying for things to work out and go smoothly, my wife prays that my kids get what they need, whatever that might be.

And there's a trust there.

There's a trust that she has with the Lord where she says, Lord, I trust you.

You know what's good for them.

You know what they need.

I don't.

So, what if this year you prayed for what you need?

What if this year you said, Lord, I think this is what I need, I think this is what would be good for me, but I don't know.

Give me what I need.

And let me receive whatever you give me in such a way that I'm I'm ready to learn what you want me to learn.

If your passion this year, if your pursuit is God's version of good, your prayers will change and you'll stop praying for everything to go perfectly, and you'll begin to pray in this sort of trusting, faith-based, surrendered way that God gives you what you need and you're ready to receive it.

And then maybe some of the things that would happen to you that you might think are a disaster, the worst thing ever, maybe you realize in those moments, oh God, I see what you're doing.

Thank you.

You can actually thank God for the hardships because you recognize that he's teaching you and that you're growing.

Your prayers will change, for sure.

Your perspective will change.

Your perspective will absolutely change if you begin to pray for God's will, for his good, not just your own.

If that's what you seek.

We get a little bit of this in Romans chapter 12, the second verse that we read in that section says, Don't copy the behaviors and the customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by what?

Romans 12 · chapter mention

By changing the way that you think.

Then you will learn to know God's will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.

This is so interesting.

Because what it's basically saying is, unless God changes the way you think, unless he changes your perspective, you won't even recognize his will.

You can't recognize God's will, his good, pleasing, and perfect will, if you don't learn to think more like God, essentially.

So the only way for you to even discern what is really good is to surrender yourself and to let God change the way that you see things.

I've seen this happen so many times in my life.

I've experienced it where what I think is best, what I think is right, the way I see the world, come to find out I'm wrong.

And it's not just about owning mistakes or whatever, it's about God changing my perspective and changing the filters that I have.

There have been so many times in life where I've judged someone really harshly, and then I've learned their story, and I've I've gotten to experience a little bit of what they've been through, and I'm like, oh man, I was I was so harsh.

And I think if I had been in that person's situation, I probably would have done worse.

Truly.

And I I needed God to change my perspective.

I remember years ago, and this is a little bit maybe specific to what I do here at the church, I was I was having a really stressful day because I had the message to write.

I don't have a big to-do list every week, but one of the things on my to-do list every week is write the message.

It's like this giant, and it's just kind of high pressure sometimes, you know, because if it's like bad three weeks in a row, you're not coming back.

It's just true.

Um I'm teasing, maybe, but probably.

Uh so I I'm just sometimes later in the week I can be a little bit obsessed with the message.

And my family and everyone around me, it's like I'm here, but I'm not here.

I'm talking and I'm nodding my head, but I'm actually like trying to write a message in the back of my mind.

And this particular day, I was very much in that state, like, gotta write the message, gotta write the message.

And a person that I I know through the church had they had to go to the hospital.

And it was kind of a crisis situation.

And I got a call saying, Hey, can you come to the hospital?

And I was like, honestly, it's a bad day for this.

It's a bad, it's bad for me that this person had a medical crisis today.

It's not convenient.

It's not a good time for me.

That's how I felt.

But obviously I didn't say that because that'd be that'd be horrible and wrong.

And oh my god.

So I go there and I'm in the hospital.

And I'm in the room.

And I'm so like distracted.

I mean, I'm there and I obviously love these people and I want to be with them, but also I'm just I feel all this pressure because I gotta write the message.

And this isn't helping me to prepare for the message, right?

That's what I'm thinking.

And I was like 26, 27 at the time.

So thankfully, hopefully, I've grown a little bit.

The situation was really interesting.

The person had had sort of a they had essentially overdosed.

And their spouse was with them in the room.

The spouse didn't know they had an issue with a substance at all.

So it was this very, very interesting scenario where the spouse is distraught but also confused because they had no idea that this person was struggling so much.

And I'm in the room as the gentleman who had had the near-death experience because of the substances that he was using wakes up and like I'm there.

And he wakes up and there I am, and there's his wife, and I'm there for like the first moment of that, and him breaking down and crying and sharing with his wife, I'm so sorry, I I I didn't know how to tell you this, and I've been struggling, and I'm just and I remember walking out of the hospital that day, and it was like God was saying, Hey, do you think that maybe this is message preparation?

You think maybe Justin that seeing things like this and being in these experiences and being with people, and you think you think maybe that makes you uh better at communicating and understanding what people actually go through?

It was a very humbling experience.

Like I walk to my car extremely apologetic, like telling the Lord, I'm so sorry for being so silly.

And and Lord, anytime something like this pops up, I'm I'm help me help me put that thought away immediately where I think, oh, this is this is in the way of me.

No, that those are the moments in life that have prepared me the most for what I do.

But I needed God to change my perspective to see that.

If you pursue God's good, he will change your perspective, he will change the way you think.

And certain things that in the past have been a nuisance to you, a bother to you, a frustration to you, have have made you angry, have made you upset, those things all of a sudden might fade away, and you recognize them as gifts.

That God gives you incredible opportunities to grow.

If you pursue God's good, it'll change your perspective.

One more.

It will definitely change your purpose.

If you are in pursuit of God's version of good, it will change your purpose.

It will change what you commit yourself to, what you give yourself to, no doubt.

I became the lead pastor here.

We don't really have titles, but for the sake of that, like I was the person in charge uh when I was 30 years old.

So I'm 41 now, and I was 30.

And uh my first couple of years here, I will say that the main thing I tried to do was make the church get bigger.

That was my focus.

How can we get bigger?

Because in my mind, bigger is better, right?

Bigger is always better.

So I thought, and so for the first few years of me being in this role, this would be back in like 2013, 2014, you know, everything was just about how do we get bigger?

How do we grow?

And we added a service.

And then it was like hype it up.

And and some of you, and this isn't bad, but if you've been in church for like a long time, you you might recognize that there was a period of time in like the early to mid-2000s where lots of churches were trying to just like it was marketing and hype and buzz and trying to do all kinds of stuff just to fill seats and all that kind of stuff.

And I'm not saying that was bad, I think a lot of people probably came to churches and and met Jesus through that.

But if you've ever been part of that, you also know that that runs its course pretty quick because it can become very manufactured, very forced.

But for my first few years, I was just pursuing that because in my mind that that is what's better.

So, how do we get bigger?

How do we grow?

How do we get bigger?

How do we grow?

And a couple years into that, I found myself a little bit in a rut where we had grown.

We had added a service and we've grown, and it was great.

It was also a lot more work, a lot more energy, uh, a lot of things.

And I was tired, and I I was praying at my house, really struggling.

And for me, when I struggle to pray, sometimes I just like literally struggle to pray.

I start praying things and I can't even get through sentences because it's just like I run out of sting.

I don't know.

And I was praying, God, please, like this thing.

I had this big thing that I was planning, and we were gonna launch this thing, and it was gonna be epic, and it needed to be epic, it needed to be huge, and hyped, and all this kind of stuff, and I was praying for it, and I just felt like something was off.

And in that, sometimes when I say this, I I when I say like God speaks, I don't mean I heard a voice with my ears.

For me, the moments where I feel like God has spoken to me the most directly, and I where I can confidently say I feel like God spoke to me, it's just a thought in my head that I know isn't me.

Um and the joke is always that it's because it's smarter than me.

I know what my thoughts sound like, I know how dumb my thoughts sound most of the time.

And every once in a while a thought will come in, and like, well, that's not my voice, that's not my internal voice, right?

It's too smart.

And so what I heard in my heart, my mind was very clear.

And it was like, Justin, you spend so much time trying to convince me to get involved with what you have planned, and so little time asking me what I have planned.

And again, humbling, kind of like when I walked into the hospital that day.

And this is sort of your prayers, your perspective, and your purpose all changing at once, and I can say this with confidence.

I spent a lot of time with the Lord having these conversations in that moment, and for the first time ever, I stopped praying, Lord, help us get bigger.

And I never prayed this before.

Lord, what kind of church do you want us to be?

Like, what do you want his hands to look like this year?

What do you want us to focus on?

What do you want us to teach?

Not not what do I think we could teach that would like really be a home run or whatever, but I started praying different.

What do you want us to be?

And the filters began to change and the conversations began to change, our staff culture began to change, and I can tell you this, and our staff would would back this up.

Um we've we've never had a conversation in a staff meeting in the last 10 years, not once, of how do we get more people to come.

And we have grown, and that's been great.

We've had seasons of growth and and seasons where there wasn't growth, but we've not had one meeting about how do we create a buzz or how do we get the word out or how do we create momentum or how we don't talk about that at all.

That all stopped.

And our our conversations as a staff became how do we help our people grow?

How do we help our people get through the struggles that they're going through?

How do we help our people, you know, in the areas of life that they need the most help?

How do we connect?

All of it changed from how do we get bigger to how do we help the people that God's given us now?

And it's amazing to see some of the things that have happened.

What's funny is that more people started getting baptized and more people started, like we had all kinds of unprecedented things that started happening, and I believe it's just because our purpose shifted from frankly, from being what our version of good was to what God's version of good was.

And my purpose as a pastor changed, and our purpose as a church changed a little bit.

Not that it was it was way off.

Our church has been a I've loved this church from the moment I walked through the doors.

But at least the way I saw things and the way I was trying to lead the church, that changed.

And it changed for the better, and all because God, I believe, got a hold of me, and I I exchanged what my idea of good was for God's.

And instead of me pursuing my version of good, which was just bigger, it was like let's let's see what God wants.

And what's funny is that actually led to us years later uh going to one gathering, and we're a one-gathering church, and I would have never done that, ever, in that previous mindset.

And funny enough, we're actually we have more people now at one than we had at two before, but that's a whole different story.

Um, and that's why many of you park at lows and thank you for that.

Um but that's what God told us to do.

So that's what we did.

And that was so antithetical to what I would have done in the past, but it worked because God's version of good is better than ours.

So, worship team, you guys can make your way back up.

We'll we'll wrap up.

We're gonna take Lord's Supper here in a second.

And so when you walked in, we've got these cups with bread and juice.

If you didn't grab one at the tables in the back, feel free to do that now.

You're not gonna mess anything up if you need to.

Um here's what I want us to finish with.

In the next few weeks, we're gonna talk about what good really looks like.

There are there are some things that scripture teaches us that are good.

So we're gonna help define that a little bit.

But today I just want us to get in the mindset of understanding that God knows what is good and God is good.

His will, his will is good and pleasing and perfect.

That's what we're told.

And I've experienced that, I believe that.

And if if we right now, today would say it's early in 2025, it's so early, we have so much of the year left that from the the outset of our year, I want more than anything, I want to discern, Lord, what good is to you.

What do you want for my life this year?

What would be good for me this year?

What would help me?

What would fit me?

What would complete me?

What would give me what I need this year, Lord?

I want to figure out what your version of good looks like for my life.

And then when that when that's figured out, when I discern that, I want to commit my life to it.

I want to give everything in pursuit of your good.

And that might mean I need to let go of what my good looks like.

Because that's what it ultimately is about.

It's about surrendering, it's about trusting.

You know, Romans 12 began by saying, Dear brothers and sisters, I plead with you.

Think about this.

The Apostle Paul, he's he's begging, he's pleading to give your bodies to God because of all he's done for you.

Give everything to him.

Let them be a living and holy sacrifice, the kind that he will find acceptable.

This is truly the way to worship.

You give everything of yourself, you surrender.

And it's not about giving up.

We hear surrender, we think give up.

No, it's not give up, it's it's give over.

It's in trust.

And as we take Lord's Supper, it's always amazing how this connects because this is exactly what Jesus did with the Father when he went to the cross.

He trusted, he surrendered, and he gave himself entirely over to the purpose that God had for him, to what God had determined was good.

And in the garden before he was arrested, Jesus prayed, Hey, Father, I'd rather not do this.

I'm paraphrase it.

But he said, I'd rather not.

If there's another way, if there's another option to deal with sin and death, it doesn't involve me dying a horrible death on a cross, I'm very open to that.

It's essentially what Jesus prayed.

But then he did something powerful, and this is very much in line with what we're talking about.

He said, But not my will.

Imagine this for a moment.

Like, really hear this.

Jesus.

And if you're like me, like Jesus, you're Jesus' follower, you've committed your life to Jesus, there's no one better than Jesus.

Jesus is awesome, he's incredible, he's he's I mean, he's he's Jesus.

Jesus recognized that even for him in that moment, the father's perspective might be different than his own.

And this gets into an interesting theological conversation.

Jesus is God and was God, and and but on earth he was he was limited in ways that he had purposely, by becoming one of us, he wasn't pretending to be a human, like he actually was one of us.

And so even though he had such a direct connection to the Father and he could do things that that no one else could do because of that, he also had things he had to depend completely on the Father for.

And here we find him in one of these moments that's so interesting.

But he's saying, hey, here's what I would prefer, here's what my version of good would look like, Lord, and it doesn't involve dying on a cross.

But your will, not mine.

And obviously, surrendering to the Father's will meant Jesus had to go through something really, really horrible, really terrible, really hard, but he also came out the other side of it victorious, and he defeated death, and he defeated sin, he defeated that on our behalf, and now we have hope and life because of him, and he lives eternally, and he's been glorified because of what he accomplished and did.

It's it all worked out, but it started with Jesus, this moment that we we take every single week as we get our eyes on Jesus, it began with Jesus giving control over to God and recognizing that the Father may have a different definition of good than he had.

And he surrendered to that, he trusted that.

And we wouldn't have any hope if he hadn't done that.

And we have that same opportunity, although typically in a less intense manner, we have that same opportunity every single day, like Jesus, to say, Lord, here's what I want, here's what I think would be good.

I've got some great ideas for 2025, God, and I'd love to pitch them to you.

And you're free to do that, by the way.

Hey Lord, I I mean, let's let's just agree.

This looks pretty good.

But whatever that is, whatever your goals and your aspirations are, whatever your resolutions are, whatever your plans are for 2025, as good as they may seem to you, just be open to surrendering all of it for what God says is good, if it happens to look different.

And if that is the if that's the approach you take this year, as you seek out what God has for you in 2025, your prayers will change, your perspective will change, your purpose will change, but it will be good.

And you will have a really, really good year.

So, with that said, let's take the bread.

Father, we thank you for this bread.

This is the the body of your son Jesus, and he surrendered his body over, just like the apostle Paul said, as a as a sacrifice.

He gave his body willingly as a sacrifice and a living sacrifice because he lives to this day.

Thank you, Jesus, for modeling for us in such an intense manner what what we need to do on a daily basis as we live out our lives, that we need to give our whole selves over to what the Father says is good.

And Holy Spirit, we ask that we ask, Lord, that you, that you shape us, that you change us, that you work within us to help us trust you and surrender to your will when it's really difficult for us because we're so used to doing things our way.

Let's take the bread.

Father, we thank you for this juice.

We thank you for what it represents, what it means.

This is your blood spilled for us.

A payment.

We have all kinds of words to try to understand the fullness of what this is, but this cleanses us and it wiped away our debt of sin.

And none of this would have been possible if you hadn't, Lord, if you had not modeled for us exactly what we're trying to do.

This wouldn't have been possible if you hadn't surrendered.

So help us surrender.

Help us trust, help us not give up, but give over control to you.

I pray this in your name, Jesus.

Amen.

I want to show you guys one more quick thing to help maybe solidify this in your mind before we leave.

Um, you know, one of the things that always blows me away here at our church is how many talented people we have.

Like we had a lot of talented people, but sometimes like hidden talent, like Madison are you pastor?

You guys know Madison, right?

We like Madison.

Madison's great, clap for Madison, cheer for Madison.

Yay, Madison.

I have a lot of, I can tell you the things that aren't so joking.

Madison's amazing.

Did you guys know that Madison's a really good artist?

Anyone know that?

I'm gonna show you a couple paintings that let me put these up real quick.

So, like Madison he paints people's dogs.

I'm I may be giving him business he doesn't want, but uh he he does this as like a little side project.

He'll he'll paint portraits of dogs.

Uh Madison did a painting of the Holy Ghost, like the Holy Spirit, this painting right here, like super isn't that good?

Who knew Madison could do that?

Okay, uh where's he at?

Matt is Matt hiding?

Is it where's he at?

Uh oh! Hey Matt, way in the back there.

Matt, I didn't ask your permission, man.

I'm sorry.

Um did you guys know that Matt is like an incredible artist?

He really is.

So, like, there's a hallway that goes to our youth area, and this is what it looks like.

Um Matt Matt did that.

Isn't that amazing?

That's really, really cool.

Yeah, go Matt.

Okay, it's another angle to it.

Um, kind of a graphic design thing.

Matt can paint as well.

Uh this is one of my favorite paintings that Matt's ever painted.

It's of a warrior.

Uh little little warrior squirrel, right?

Okay.

And I just know Matt probably hates that I'm showing this because all artists hate whatever they painted 10 years ago.

It's like a thing.

Here's why I share this.

And I think this will help us as we leave.

Uh, for a lot of my years knowing Matt, he worked and did graphic design here for us at the church before he was the worship pastor, and he would be creating things for us to use in, you know, on Christmas or whatever online.

And what I found was the times that I liked what he created the least were the times that he gave me exactly what I asked for.

The more I dictated to Matt what to create, the more I said, I want these colors, and I want it to look like this, and I want it to be like that, and he would give me exactly what I asked for.

I'd be like underwhelmed.

And so, like, if I was imagining an image of a warrior, I probably wouldn't have picked a squirrel, for example.

But I love the warrior squirrel, right?

The times where I was most blown away were when I said, Hey, you know what, you're the artist.

I kind of, this is my perspective, this is what I think we're trying to accomplish, but I want to see what you create.

And he would show me something that I would never have thought of, I would never have imagined it.

Ephesians 3.20 says, All glory to God, who is able through his mighty power at work within us to accomplish infinitely more than we might think or ask.

As we walk out of here, I just want to remind us that everything we prayed for during Lord's Supper, everything we've talked about, is this year.

If you commit yourself to discovering what God's good is, discerning what that is, it will be more than you could ask or think.

It wouldn't be what you might ask for, but I promise it will be better.

And so maybe learn a lesson from me.

Don't let God be limited by what you ask.

Ask him what he has in mind and see what it is.

All right?

All right, let's do it.

Let's have a really good year together.

Let's seek God's good.

Love you guys.

Thank you for being here today.

Have an amazing uh rest of your Sunday.

Have a great start to 2025.

We will see you next week as we keep discovering what a really good year looks like.

Love you all.

Let's do it.