Jesus Picks a Fight

Well, we are in a series right now called New Roads.

And this is part of a year-long study that we are doing in the book of Matthew.

I'm really excited about what we're talking about.

In fact, next week, I'm going to give you a little preview.

I don't do this very often, but I want to show you one of the main scriptures we're going to look at next week as we wrap this series up.

It's Matthew chapter 12, verses 30 through 32.

Matthew 12:30–32

This is Jesus talking.

He says, Anyone who who isn't with me opposes me.

And anyone who isn't working with me is actually working against me.

So I tell you, every sin and blasphemy can be forgiven, except blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which will never be forgiven.

Anyone who speaks against the Son of Man can be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will never be forgiven, either in this world or in the world to come.

That's an interesting one.

Right?

We're going through the whole book of Matthew this year.

We don't get to skip the hard stuff.

We don't do that.

We don't play a little slalom course through all the difficult scriptures and just do the fun, happy stuff.

We go through it, and next week we're going to talk about one of the most challenging things that Jesus ever said.

This idea of an unforgivable sin.

What is that?

And if that's something that interests you, uh be here.

If it's something that scares you, be here.

If you're scared, you should really be here next week.

I mean, honestly.

No, seriously, this is, I think it's going to be a really insightful conversation.

I've been doing a lot of research and prayer and study, and I can't wait to share about that.

This is tough stuff.

And so, like I said, this series, uh, we wrap it up next week.

We're not, you know, we're in it today.

It's called New Roads because we're at this really interesting moment in the ministry of Jesus.

He is, he's become official, so to speak.

Like he's no longer just this sort of uh hiding behind the scenes, doing a few miracles here and there, uh teacher, rabbi, messiah.

He has come out full force.

His reputation is known.

He's done things that have gotten the attention of everyone, everyone knows who he is, everyone's looking at Jesus.

And at the same time, he's doing things that no one expects him to do.

He's not walking the well-worn paths of those before him.

He's not doing the things that the religious leaders of his day have done, so they're confused.

He's not really even doing the things that people expect the Messiah to do, so even his disciples and close friends are a little bit confused.

Last week, Fred did a great job teaching, and he talked about how like whole, you know, whole cities sort of rejected Jesus because they're like, you know, hey, we can't deny how incredible the things that you're doing are, but you're just, you don't fit the mold of what we thought the Messiah would be, so we'd rather not.

A couple weeks ago we looked at John the Baptist, Jesus' cousin, the one who baptized him, the one who predicted his coming and was preparing the way for people to come, and even pointed to Jesus and said, He is the Messiah, you should follow him.

But Jesus did things differently, and even John the Baptist had a moment like, hey, are you sure you're the Messiah?

Because this is not the way I expected it to go.

Jesus is not walking well-worn paths, he is building new roads.

And when you're doing something different, it's always going to catch some people off guard.

It's always going to throw people off.

That's the way that it goes.

And we actually have to be very careful as believers, even today, that we don't become so entrenched in what we're used to or what we think things ought to be like, that we that we miss when God is doing something new and different.

It's very easy to do.

And we have to have open and honest hearts to say, I sometimes can get so stuck in the way I want things to be, the way I think they ought to be.

And if that's our mindset, we often miss the new things that God is doing.

Jesus is building new roads.

And it throws people off.

Now, today, we're going to see this intensify.

Today and next week, the rubber really meets the road, and it's kind of gone from people just going, hey, this doesn't make sense.

Jesus, you're you're not doing what I think you ought to be doing.

Help me understand.

It's going from that to accusation and outright opposing Jesus.

We're going to see Jesus pick a fight today.

Like he's going to pick a fight, and it's a big one.

So actually, in that in that frame of thinking, um, I love a show of hands if you guys wouldn't mind, and so you don't have to participate.

Uh, how many of you, think back to like school time, like elementary school, middle school, high school, how many of you got in a fight at some point in your school days?

All right?

An actual fight.

Okay, keep your hands up if you're the one who started the fight.

Not as many of us.

Notice my hand is still up.

Um, keep your hand up if you won the fight.

Okay.

Take a look around, church.

These are the people you don't want to mess with.

All right?

No.

No, like, notice also that my hand went down on the last one.

I had a few fights in elementary school, like just like recess, tumbles, that kind of stuff.

But uh, but in eighth grade, when I was in the eighth grade, same age that my oldest is now, I got in a full-blown fist fight.

And I've talked about this before.

It was a silly situation.

Um, I was in eighth grader, I went to a school that was seventh, eighth, and ninth in Wisconsin at the time, and our eighth-grade basketball team beat the ninth grade team.

And when that happens, you should just walk away and be like, good game, good game, good game.

But this is gonna shock you.

I was mouthy as a kid.

And I started like talking, and there was a boy on the ninth grade team, I didn't know him at all.

I actually hadn't lived in that area very long.

He was a big dude, like 6'1 in the eighth grade, big guy.

I was like, not, I am not 6'1, uh, and nor was I in the eighth grade.

And I decided to like just poke at him.

And then he said something back, and I just, you know, being mouthy and cocky and stupid, I kind of raised it a little bit.

And so afterwards, a few of my teammates were like, dude, what are you doing?

And I was like, no, I'm just kind of you know messing around.

He's like, no, no, you don't know that guy.

Like he is, like he'd been suspended from school multiple times, he was super rough, and I was again, not only was I not 6'1, my mouth did not match my experience level when it came to toughness, and you know what I'm saying?

So the next few days at school, every time this guy sees me, I mean I haven't really noticed him before, other than him being huge, but he noticed me now, and uh, and he kind of would he'd walk toward me and bump me in the hallway, he'd give me looks, and I didn't know what to do.

So my my best idea was just a posture to be like, bring it, you know, because I didn't want to show him that I was afraid, and it all culminated like two weeks later.

He comes up to me at my locker, he corners me, and it's it was clear like we're going to have a we're fighting.

So I just decided, why not?

Throw the first punch.

Like, come on.

There is a phrase the bigger they are, the harder they fall.

No.

That is a lie.

No, no, no.

It's the bigger they are, the harder it is to make them fall.

It's the bigger they are, the harder they punch you in the face.

That's what it should be.

And so I I I punched him, uh, he punched me.

Different results in terms of how it affected us.

And I I just I got I just I got absolutely beat up in front of my friends, my girlfriend.

It was a great day.

Uh got suspended from school because I threw the first punch.

It was wonderful, kicked off the team.

It was great, great way to finish eighth grade.

Um, but the truth is I picked a fight, and I picked a fight with a very strong opponent, and I paid a price.

Today we're gonna see Jesus pick a fight.

And as I've said, he's he's building new roads, he's doing things differently, but today it comes to a head where it's no longer just, hey, Jesus, we don't understand, help us figure this out.

And now it's like we're against you.

We're not we're gonna try to stop you from doing the new things that you're doing.

So, with that said, let's open up Matthew chapter 12.

Matthew 12 · chapter mention

Verses 1 through 8.

It says, At about that time Jesus was walking through some grain fields on the Sabbath.

His disciples were hungry, so they began breaking off some heads of grain and eating them, but some Pharisees saw them do it and protested, Look, your disciples are breaking the law by harvesting grain on the Sabbath.

And Jesus said to them, Haven't you read in the scriptures what David did when he and his companions were hungry?

He went into the house of God, and he and his companions broke the law by eating the sacred loaves of bread that only the priests are allowed to eat.

And haven't you read in the law of Moses that the priests on duty in the temple may work on the Sabbath?

I tell you, there is one here who is even greater than the temple.

But you would not have condemned my innocent disciples if you knew the meaning of the scripture.

I want you to show mercy, not offer sacrifices, for the Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath.

So here's the situation.

Um the Sabbath was a big deal in Jewish culture.

Many of you know this, but if you if you don't, it was a huge deal, it still is a huge deal.

And the Sabbath was a day that God had set aside to be holy.

It's a day to honor the Lord.

And it's a day not to work.

This is cool because it means God invented weekends.

Like you need to know that.

If you're new to church, just know that if you like weekends and having days off, that was God's idea, okay?

Human beings did not say, hey, what if we just didn't work?

Because in this day and age, you know, you don't work, you don't eat.

There's no way to store food.

You're living day by day the idea of take a day off.

What are you crazy?

But but God instructs man to take a day off.

And he's he says, on that day, do not work.

Don't work on the Sabbath.

But the language in the law was a little vague.

Well, what constitutes work?

There's a few specific provisions that are given in the law, and then there are certain prophets like Jeremiah, notice people kind of skirting around that, and uh, and he said, Hey, you guys have to stop that.

But in general, the word work, it's just sort of it's open to interpretation.

Well, what is work?

And so at the time of Jesus, the Pharisees, the religious leaders, they were they were super, super focused on trying to define everything in the law, and what they ended up doing was adding a lot to it.

And their heart was, well, we don't want to break God's law, so essentially we have to define everything so that no one even gets close to breaking God's law.

So they had come up with 39 things you were not allowed to do on the Sabbath.

All of these things constitute a work.

And I want to show you the list real quick.

It's gonna come up on screen.

These are the 39 things.

No, carrying, burning, extinguishing, finishing, riding, erasing, cooking, washing, sowing, tearing, knotting, untying, shaping, plowing, planting, reaping, harvesting, threshing, winnowing, selecting, sifting, grinding, kneading, combing, spinning, dyeing, chain stitching, uh, warping, weaving, unraveling, building, demolishing, trapping, shearing, slaughtering, skinning, tanning, smoothing, or marking.

None of that.

That's all work.

And so the situation is the disciples are hungry and they're walking through a grain field, and this was very normal practice in this day and age.

In fact, the law actually had a provision for this that if you were hungry and walking through a grain field, you were allowed to sort of just pick some of the wheat off of the grain field and just pop it in your mouth.

And the Pharisees saw that and they were like, they're harvesting.

That's harvesting.

You can't do that.

And this is this is the way the law went with the Pharisees.

Like, if I've used this analogy before, if you had an apple tree in your backyard and you were hungry on the Sabbath, you could not pick the apple off the tree.

That's that's work.

You just harvested.

Right?

And we look at that and go, that's silly, and Jesus did too.

And he's like, You guys have missed the whole point.

You've missed it.

You don't understand.

Now, again, to the Pharisees, this is Jesus doing something he's not supposed to do, like building a new road.

Now it's breaking the law in their mind.

Mark's gospel gives us a little bit more detail of something else that Jesus said.

It says in Mark chapter 2, verses 27 and 28.

Mark 2:27

Jesus said to them, the Sabbath was made to meet the needs of people, not people to meet the requirements of the Sabbath.

So the Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath.

Now, this is a big deal what Jesus says here.

I mean, on one hand, he's saying, you guys have missed the whole point.

Like, the Sabbath was meant to be restful, it was meant to be enjoyed.

Yes, you honor God, but it was meant to bless people.

And making it so restrictive, making it so ridiculous, it doesn't bless people, you've actually made the Sabbath a burden.

You've made this the hardest day of the week.

And it was meant to be the easiest day of the week.

Everyone was obsessed with, like, oh, what if I do this?

And oh no, should I do that?

Like, if you drop something on the Sabbath, how heavy does it have to be where you can't pick it up.

But like, seriously, that's the level of anxiety that the Pharisees created around the Sabbath, and it was so ridiculous.

And Jesus, he cuts against it, he says, You've missed the point.

The Sabbath was meant to bless people, and you've made it a burden.

Human beings, religion definitely does this, turn blessings into burdens very easily.

And we we we don't need to do that.

But then Jesus says something bold.

He says, The Son of Man is Lord even over the Sabbath.

Now, this can be interpreted a few different ways.

Son of man is a phrase very often used in Hebrew literature and scripture that just means a person, a human being, a son of man.

You'll actually see that language in the Old Testament, a son of man.

And so Jesus is basically, you could say he's saying that any son of man is Lord over the Sabbath, any person, because the Sabbath was made to bless the person.

And so if it blesses you to, if you like a brisk walk, go for a brisk walk on the Sabbath.

If you hate that, don't.

Because it's meant to bless you.

That's one way to read it, but the more typical way to read it, son of man is a phrase that Jesus uses if it's if it's capitalized, and we try our best to figure out with translations of scripture when to capitalize and when not to, it's a little challenging, but when it's capitalized, son of man, this is Jesus doing a direct hyperlink to a prophecy in the book of Daniel.

And the son of man is a phrase he uses very often of himself.

The son of man was a prophetic figure in the Old Testament, the Messiah.

And so when Jesus calls himself the Son of Man, these Pharisees who know the scriptures very well are like, is he saying that he's the Messiah?

And he is.

And he's saying, Listen, not only is it okay for my disciples to eat this grain, because you guys have missed the boat completely on what this is supposed to be, and in many ways, you're actually hypocritical, he says, because you guys, you're Pharisees, you work on the Sabbath, you do all the church stuff.

So you're holding people to a standard you don't even have to live by.

This is silly.

But he takes it a step further.

He essentially says, look, the Sabbath, if you guys believe it this way, is the Pharisees, truthfully, if the Sabbath is meant to honor the Lord, if it's meant to honor God, that's me, Jesus says.

And so if this is what pleases me, to have my disciples eat, I'm the Lord of the Sabbath.

That's a big deal.

Jesus is claiming an authority over even this holy day, because if the holy day is to honor God, he's God.

So what do you do on the Sabbath if God tells you to eat and enjoy something?

You eat it and you enjoy it.

And that's what Jesus is saying.

And so the Pharisees, you know, they're leaving this conversation going, Did he just say what I thought he said?

Like, I'm sure they had a debate.

Was he saying, you know, any son of man is Lord of the Sabbath?

Because the Sabbath is meant to bless people, or was he saying that he's the Son of Man?

And if they had any questions about what Jesus was saying or the kind of challenge that Jesus was willing to give them, he makes it especially clear right after this.

So we're going to keep reading in Matthew chapter 12, starting in verse 9.

Matthew 12 · chapter mention

It says, Then Jesus went over to their synagogue.

So right after this, he offends them and then he goes into their church.

Where he noticed a man with a deformed hand.

The Pharisees asked Jesus, Does the law permit a person to work heal to work by healing on the Sabbath?

They asked this question to Jesus.

They see what's going on.

This is like a trap.

They were hoping he would say yes so they could bring charges against him.

And he answered, If you had a sheep that fell into a well on the Sabbath, wouldn't you work to pull it out?

Of course you would.

And how much more valuable is a person than a sheep?

Yes, the law permits a person to do good on the Sabbath.

And then he said to the man, Hold out your hand.

So the man held out his hand and it was restored, just like the other one.

Then the Pharisees called a meeting to plot how to kill Jesus.

So Jesus offends them, goes into their temple, directly defies them, right in front of them, to their faces.

He picks a fight with the religious leaders.

And in this moment, this is a defining moment in the life of Jesus, the Pharisees, this official group of religious rulers, have gone from questioning Jesus, not liking Jesus, not understanding Jesus, to we have to kill him.

And we're actually told in scripture that they go and they begin to plot with a group called the Herodians on how to kill Jesus.

The Herodians would have been never aligned with the Pharisees.

Herodians were those who served Herod Antipas, who was the ruler over that area set by Rome.

And so the Romans and the Pharisees didn't get along, but in this moment they agreed, hey, we've got a mutual enemy.

Let's figure out how to kill Jesus.

The Pharisees were willing to let go of almost all of their convictions, to break their own laws to kill Jesus.

They've decided it's time for him to go.

So Jesus has just picked a fight, and it's a fight with a very powerful enemy.

And he is going to pay a price.

Because that's what happens when you pick a fight with someone big.

But there's so much we learn about Jesus here.

And I want us to understand, guys, this is the whole point of this year as we go through the book of Matthew.

It is to better understand and know Jesus.

There is no one like Jesus.

There has never been anyone like Jesus.

No one will ever come close to Jesus.

And you can't study Jesus too much.

You can't understand Jesus too much.

You can't be too familiar with Jesus.

You can't be too close to Jesus.

And so if Sunday by Sunday, all we do is get a clearer picture of Jesus in our minds, we win.

And that is what I pray happens on Sundays this year as we go through the book of Matthew.

Because we learn so much about Jesus here.

And I want us to understand who we're dealing with, the kind of man, the kind of God.

Notice first and foremost the courage of Jesus.

I guess it's pretty bold.

He very much could have done the whole thing with the grain and given those Pharisees something to ponder and question and debate about and then walked away and been done.

And that would have been fine.

Still would have been pushing the envelope.

But Jesus goes into their synagogue and there's this man with a deformed hand, and they actually considered healing to be work.

In fact, it's known that at that time doctors were allowed to only heal up to a certain point on the Sabbath.

So if you came in with an injury, they would like keep it from getting worse.

That was permissible, but we can't do anything to make it better until tomorrow.

Because we just don't want to offend God.

And God would be really offended if you got better today, right?

It gets silly, I know.

But Jesus, oh, we see so much about him in this moment.

I want to focus first off on the courage of Jesus.

It there is a courage, there's a boldness, there's an ability to take a risk that Jesus has that all of us honestly ought to A, be grateful for, but also be inspired by.

You know, we're actually commanded in Scripture to be courageous.

There's a man, for example, named Joshua, and he's the one who led the Israelites after Moses died, and he actually had to do some really difficult things like right away.

He had to basically become the leader, lead an army, uh, fight a battle, like day one, essentially.

And God has a conversation with him.

We see it in Joshua chapter 1, verse 9.

Joshua 1:9

He says, This is my command.

Think about that.

Not an encouragement, not a suggestion, a command.

He says, This is my command.

Be strong and courageous.

Do not be afraid or discouraged, for the Lord your God is with you wherever you go.

And that's a theme that we see pick up.

Why should you be courageous?

Because God is with you.

We see this in the most famous Psalm.

Right?

Probably the most famous Psalm.

Uh the Lord is my shepherd.

I shall not want.

It goes on to say many other things, and it says, Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.

Why?

For God is with us.

There's a courage that comes from knowing that you have people with you.

In fact, if I go back to that story when I got beat up by the big guy because of my mouth, one of the things that emboldened me, and emboldened me to like keep that going, was I had friends that promised if things went down, they had my back.

Like I had friends that said, hey, dude, don't worry about it.

If he man, if he comes at you at school, we're here, we got you.

And I trusted those friends.

And they were there.

And I actually remember a moment where like I looked at one of them when he came, and the dude sort of just was like, you know, in that little shameful step back, and I got abandoned.

And so my confidence was very much connected to who was with me.

Those people let me down.

God does not let us down, but we have to understand this, guys.

He is with us.

The last thing that Jesus said before he ascended to heaven, after he rose from the dead and he ministered and he showed up and he revealed himself to his disciples and to hundreds of other people over the course of several days, the last thing that comes out of Jesus' mouth before he ascends to heaven is this.

It's Matthew chapter 28, verse 20, at the very end of it.

Matthew 28:20

He says, be sure of this.

Be certain.

I am with you always.

Even to the end of the age.

I don't know what's going on in your life this morning.

The Lord does.

But I have no doubt that there are many of us in this room, many of us watching from home, that are dealing with something right now that requires some courage.

It requires you to make a bold decision.

It requires you maybe to have some conflict.

It requires you to take a stand.

And it might rub some people the wrong way.

It might not go well.

What do you do?

Maybe it's just making some major changes in your life or in your family because you know things aren't healthy.

But even when things aren't healthy, sometimes we get so used to the unhealthiness that changing it makes people mad.

And you have to make some bold decisions to say, you know what, it's not going to be like this anymore.

Things need to change.

We're going to do things differently.

And you think, man, this may not be received well.

I don't know how this is going to go.

What do I do?

Well, you be strong and courageous.

Because God is with you.

Jesus has promised that He is with us.

And there is no situation that you will ever walk in in life where you are truly alone if you have the Lord in your heart.

If you've given your life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit is part of you.

We don't always feel it, we're not always aware of it, but God is with us.

And we can walk into any situation, no matter how difficult, no matter how hard, no matter how unlikely to succeed, and say, you know what, this might be the hardest thing I've ever done, but I have strength and I have courage because God is with me.

And you can do it.

So if you're in a situation like that, you are not alone.

And maybe today you just needed to be here to hear that.

You're not alone.

You can be like Jesus.

And he knew that his father, God the Father, was with him in that moment.

And we see the courage of Jesus to walk into the synagogue and to heal that man's hand right in front of the disciples.

I also want us to notice the intensity of Jesus.

This is something about Jesus I appreciate very much because sometimes depictions of Jesus have him to be so so mild-mannered that it's almost like he just sort of is like, I don't know, he's just soft.

And there's a there is an approachability and a tenderness and a gentleness to Jesus that cannot be overstated.

Jesus is gentle, but he's not weak.

Not in the slightest.

And so uh it's one of the great reasons we have multiple versions of the gospels, they all give us an extra little detail.

So I want us to look at um Luke chapter 6.

Luke 6 · chapter mention

Same story.

Jesus is in the synagogue, but it gives us this one extra little detail.

Before he heals the man, he looked around at them, the Pharisees, one by one.

And then said to the man, Hold out your hand.

So the man held out his hand and it was restored.

Just imagine that for a moment.

This group of Pharisees, they're asking Jesus this question, you know, they're talking, hey, is it is it according to the law?

Are you allowed to heal on the Sabbath?

And Jesus is so incensed.

He's so incensed by how far their hearts are from the Lord, claiming to be the ones who speak on behalf of God, claiming to be the ones who shepherd the people in God's ways.

They they are so far from God that they think God would be opposed to restoring a man's life, like his livelihood, his ability to function and work, that God would somehow be against that because it's the Sabbath, and he looks at them one by one, appreciate the intensity of this moment.

In fact, try it.

Try it this week.

Find a moment where you're at work or home and someone says something that bothers you, and just stare them down.

And then look at the next one, and the next one, and the next one, and then boom.

I mean there's an intensity to Jesus.

That's why if you ever anyone grow up reading the Chronicles of Narnia?

Those are good books.

I read, I loved those books when I was a kid, and then they made movies that were okay.

Uh the first one was pretty good, but then they said, you know, not everything could be a masterpiece.

But the books are.

And if you're not familiar, C.S.

Lewis, an amazing Christian author, amazing intellectual thinker, just an incredible man, uh, he depicts Jesus in the Chronicles of Narnia as what?

Those of you who are familiar, what is he?

He's a lion.

And there's an amazing line in the very first book where the lion's name is Aslan.

And the question is asked, is he saved?

And the answer given is oh no, no, no.

He is not the same.

But he is good.

Jesus is not the same.

And he was willing to risk direct conflict with an incredibly powerful and influential group of people to do good, to restore someone.

Jesus is a big fighter.

And he makes fights with the big enemies.

Like the Pharisees are nothing compared to sin, to death, and to Satan himself, and he does it to restore us.

He makes fights on our behalf.

The intensity of Jesus, we have to we have to appreciate it.

Jesus is courageous.

Right?

Jesus is intense.

And ultimately, Jesus is dedicated to our healing.

And in worship team, you guys can make your way out.

Jesus is completely dedicated to your restoration.

Now, in stories like this, and it makes sense, we tend to focus on physical healing, and physical healing is a thing that God does.

I've seen it, many of you have probably experienced it, and many of you have probably not experienced.

You prayed for it, and physical healing is amazing, and we can have long conversations about how God heals and why he heals, and does God heal all the time?

If our faith is enough, and if we pray, we can have a long conversation about that.

But what I want us to understand is that physical healing is always temporary.

Right?

If if if someone is sick and God heals them completely, that is amazing.

That will not last forever.

Something I've thought about and joked about before.

I I love the story of Lazarus, and Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead, and then Lazarus had to die again later.

And what would that be like?

You have died for days, Jesus brings you back, and then some at some point later on, we don't know how long, 10 years, 20 years, I don't know, Lazarus is like, oh, doing this again.

So the resurrection of Lazarus' body was a powerful miracle, but it was also a temporary solution.

See what I'm saying?

But there's a deeper restoration that Jesus is focused on, deeper than physical healing.

Colossians puts it really well.

Colossians 2, 13 through 15 says, You were dead.

It's an interesting way to start a conversation.

Remember when you were dead?

You were dead, spiritually dead.

Think about the way we describe our phones.

When our phones don't have any power, we're like, it's dead.

And what we mean is it has no life, it's not able to function as it's meant to.

Essentially, it's saying, That's us.

We were dead because of our sins and because of our sinful nature having not yet been cut away.

And then God made us alive with Christ.

For he forgave all our sins.

He canceled the record of the charges against us and took it away by nailing it to the cross.

In this way, he disarmed.

Think about that, he disarmed.

He stripped away the power of the spiritual rulers and authorities.

This is talking about Satan and demons.

He shamed them publicly by his victory over them on the cross.

An author named Stephen Wedgeworth put it this way: Indeed, Satan was made a spectacle in the cross.

Believing that Jesus had been defeated, Satan made his grandest boasts, and yet the death of Christ was the greatest victory.

The cross crushed Satan's head for good.

His boasting became foolishness and his glory shame, as the justification of all God's people now makes plain.

And so, as we wrap up, I'd like us to take Lord's Supper together.

If you're new, we do this every Sunday.

You're welcome to join us.

There's tables with bread and juice at the back of the room.

You can go grab those.

You are not messing anything up if you want to stand up right now and go get bread and juice.

Not a thing.

In fact, we're grateful that you're joining us in this.

Correct.

So it's amazing how much this connects.

Because this moment connects to what we're talking about today.

Because, you know, this is the death of Jesus.

That's what this represents in many ways.

And that death was initiated the moment that Jesus healed that man's hand in the temple.

The very story that we looked at today, at that moment, those people leave and they're like, we're gonna kill them.

And it takes a good bit of time for that to take place, but but that process, that planning, that plotting culminates in what we celebrate and what we remember in this moment.

Jesus picked a fight.

And he picked a fight with a powerful foe, and he picked that fight on someone else's behalf.

It's the same for all of us.

Jesus picked a fight with sin and death.

That's a powerful enemy to fight.

And he picked that fight for your restoration, for my restoration, so that you could be forgiven, so that you could be cleansed.

And typically we would see death as a loss.

We would say, well, Jesus picked a fight that he couldn't win, very much like me in the eighth grade.

But that is not the truth.

Death thought it had won.

Satan thought Jesus was defeated.

But the resurrection proved that there is no fight Jesus picks that he does not win.

This is a moment not of defeat, this is a moment of victory.

Where Jesus gave his life as a sacrifice for you and for me.

And he experienced death.

He took it full force, and he came out on the other side of it, proving to us that when we put our faith in Jesus, we have life to look forward to.

More and more life, greater and greater life, abundant life, forever life.

But this is a fight that only Jesus could win, and we have to put our trust in him.

None of us has the power to defeat sin, to defeat death, to defeat everything that comes against us.

We're not strong enough, but Jesus is.

And so what I'd like to do is I'd like to take this meal together like we always do.

And then I have just a few other things I want to say before we wrap up this morning, really quick.

So if you don't mind, let's uh open up the bread.

Jesus, this is your body.

This is a representation of your body on the cross.

Lord, I know that you knew when you healed that man in the synagogue, you knew that it would lead to this.

You told your disciples that many times.

You understood exactly what you were doing.

You were not getting in over your head.

You weren't picking a fight, you couldn't win.

You understood completely what the result of that courageous, bold, intense, and loving action of restoration would result in for you.

It would be pain and it would be death on a cross.

But you didn't stop.

You didn't backpedal, you didn't apologize, you didn't try to make amends, you kept going, you kept healing, you kept loving, and you kept restoring until they took your life.

Or so they thought.

And Lord, as we take this piece of bread as we eat it, we thank you that this is not a moment of defeat for a battle that you lost.

But just like we began by singing this morning, Lord, you win every battle.

And this is victory.

And it's victory on our behalf.

By taking this in, Lord, we recognize that that victory belongs to us.

Victory over sin and death itself.

Let's take the bread.

This is your blood spilled, poured out on our behalf.

Lord, you won.

You win.

And your blood is still active, Lord.

Your blood still covers our sin, covers our iniquities, Lord, and reminds us that you are victorious.

Lord, you have won freedom for us.

You have won forgiveness and mercy and grace and life and belonging in the family of God.

And we are so grateful to you, Jesus.

Thank you.

Let's take this.

Well, here's a really quick takeaway before we walk out today.

And then I have kind of a quick thing I just want us to mention, and just kind of like a cultural recognition of something here at His hands.

It's interesting.

So takeaway, be courageous this week.

Be bold.

Don't be afraid.

Right?

If something, if you see something that in your spirit you know is not right, it's okay for that to bother you just like it bothered Jesus.

Be bold, be courageous, and ask the Holy Spirit to give you the courage to do whatever needs done in love, right?

In love always.

But follow the example of Jesus this week.

Right?

Jesus isn't afraid to pick a fight from time to time.

One thing I want to finish on, it's kind of an odd thing.

I've never really ended something like this.

So you may have noticed, what do we normally do at the end of a service?

Baptisms, right?

This is an interesting thing.

We haven't had a baptism for like a month.

Has anyone noticed that?

Yeah.

And so um, it's kind of a cool thing, though, to talk about for a second.

So last year, I think we had two Sundays without a baptism the whole year.

The year before that, about the same.

People get baptized all the time.

We actually have several people signed up to be baptized.

But, and if you're new to his hands, it's good for you to know this.

If you've been here for a long time, it's good for you to know this.

One of the things we're really committed to is not trying to make things happen in the flesh that only God can do in the spirit.

And that's very Christianese.

I understand that.

In other words, we do not force anything.

So our approach to baptism has always been simple.

When people are ready to be baptized, we'll baptize them.

And what that has translated to is almost every single Sunday, someone's like, I'm ready to go.

And we don't force it, we don't, we don't create emotional moments where we say, right now, in this moment, who's ready?

And sometimes people say, hey, you should do that.

And I'm not saying it's wrong to do that, but that's not our way.

We are so committed to never doing something, to never creating a manufactured moment that puts pressure on someone to make a decision so that later on in life they go, Man, was I really in that?

Was that me, or was that just me responding to the pressure of the moment?

The way I like to think about it is I'd rather be in the ocean than be in a wave pool.

Like if you've been in the ocean, like you don't make the waves.

God makes the waves and you just ride them.

And when the wave is done, you find another one.

But a wave pool is like a man-made manufactured version of that, and sometimes church can become a wave pool.

So I say all that to say this.

If you've been wondering, like, are we not doing baptisms anymore?

We are.

As soon as someone is ready.

But what we will never do is force it.

What we'll never do is if it goes a couple weeks and it's like, man, it's people are gonna think that God's not doing anything here anymore, they're gonna leave.

Like, I don't care.

No, no, no.

All we've been doing the last few weeks is like, Lord, if anyone's ready, send them to us.

But I just wanted to take a moment and mention that because I think it's important for us to know the culture here that when God moves, we respond.

And if there's a few weeks without a baptism, it's totally fine.

Totally fine.

We're just like, all right, Lord, in your time, sometimes it's a flood.

We had one Sunday with 17 people get baptized one time.

I don't know why.

Like it was God, right?

We didn't do that, we didn't make that happen.

Um, I just wanted to share that.

I know it's a little thing, like I say, kind of an odd thing to finish on, but our culture is always going to be wait till people are ready and celebrate it, but never push.

Just wanted us to know that.

Okay, so I'm gonna pray one more time and we're gonna get out of here.

Lord, thank you so much for this morning.

Lord, thank you again for all the awesome moms that we have here.

We have such a great family at his hands.

I just pray, Lord, that you be with all of us as we go out into our week.

Remind us, Jesus, that you're a fighter.

Remind us, Jesus, that you're not afraid of anyone or anything, and that you pick fights on our behalf, that you're with us, so we can be courageous because you're with us always, Lord.

Lord, we can trust in your goodness, your strength.

And Lord, I just pray that whatever you lead us into this week, if it does require us to make some big decisions, to take a stand, Lord, that you would give us the strength and the courage to do that just like you did in the synagogue that day, Jesus.

We thank you so much.

Um, we love you, Lord.

Amen.