Life: Own It

That is a good start to a day.

Man.

Yeah.

So uh so Easter's kind of a big deal.

Especially like in the church world, this is a big deal.

And I'm I'm like a pastor or whatever, and so I'm supposed to be really focused on Easter.

This time of the year, Easter should be like my primary focus.

I should be locked in from mid-January on.

But I actually have a really hard time being focused on Easter at this time of year.

I just do, being honest, because uh you don't have to know me well to know this, but I I love like love college basketball.

And so it just so happens every year that Easter is inconveniently, Jesus had to get back up again the same time that this basketball tournament's going on, and that's really inconvenient for me, really bothers me.

So I have to fight this pull to pay attention to this when I'm just like I want to watch that, and I want to watch it late at night.

And and I'm just curious, not sports fans, but at least it's something going on in culture.

So just bear with me for a second.

I'll try my best to make this connect.

But who filled out a bracket this year?

Anyone do a bracket?

Not like five people.

Wow.

Um what that probably means is I did, but it's really bad, and I don't want to raise my hand.

See, this year has been harder for me than ever to like focus on Easter because if you followed the basketball tournament at all this year, it's been nuts, it's been crazy.

Things have happened that should not happen.

Like there's a team, Texas AM, and they they had a comeback win against Northern Iowa, and that's not a very exciting thing to say in and of itself, Texas AM versus Northern Iowa, right?

But Texas AM was down by 12 points with 30 seconds left.

And if you know anything about basketball, that that should not happen.

A great college basketball team can score 100 points in a game.

If you score 12 points in 30 seconds, which is what they did, if you average that for a game, it's 960 points a game.

I mean, it's like impossible.

It shouldn't happen.

There have been all these shocking moments, but the biggest moment, the biggest shock, and if you're like me and you fell out of bracket and you take a lot of pride in how well you know college basketball, this one ruined you.

Uh, first round of the tournament, Michigan State lost to Middle Tennessee State.

And I'm pretty sure that's not even a real college.

Like, I I lived in Tennessee.

I lived in Tennessee for years.

I've never heard of that school.

Ever.

Never heard of it.

I think it's made up.

Like if you were watching a movie and it was a movie about a college called Middle Tennessee State, you'd be like, that's not real, but a really good generic name for a college.

And see, Michigan State, they were supposed to be, they were supposed to be like the team that won it all, and and like 25% of everyone that filled out a bracket picked them to win it.

It's the biggest upset in college basketball history, and the thing that makes it even harder for their fans, and if you are a fan, I'm so sorry, but it's it's how confident they were going in.

Like their coach, Hall of Fame coach, said that in all of his years of coaching, he's only had three teams that he thought were were good enough to win the whole thing.

And this was the fourth.

He said that.

And then they lost in the first round to Middle Tennessee State.

Not even a school, pretty sure.

I guess it might be an online school.

I don't know.

And then, and then their star player, like their their senior captain, their star player, he said on record, he said this out loud in an interview, he said, hey, mark it down.

I guarantee we win the championship.

And then they lost to Middle Tennessee State.

And see, here's the reality about anyone who makes a bold statement.

We see it a lot in sports, we see it in politics, we see it a lot in our culture, but anyone who makes a bold claim, who sort of puts it out there, makes a big prediction about who they are or what they're gonna do, there's gonna come a moment in time when they have to back it up.

There's gonna be a put-up or shut-up moment, and if they can't back up their big talk with actions, the world's gonna see.

There's a lot of different ways to think about Easter, but but for me, Easter is like the ultimate put-up or shut-up moment in history.

Because, see, there's never been anyone that's made claims about themselves more bold than Jesus.

I mean, forget about some athlete saying they're gonna win or some politician saying they're they're gonna be the next president.

Forget about all that.

No one has ever said the kind of audacious things about themselves that Jesus said.

Look, for example, in John chapter 14, verse 6, Jesus said this.

John 14:6

I am the way, the truth, and the life.

No one can come to the Father except through me.

That that's bold.

That's saying that no one has access to God unless they come through me.

I mean, you either better be right if you say that, or you are so arrogant it's offensive.

I mean, really, he said in John 15, 5, yes, I'm the vine and you're the branches.

Those who remain in me and I in them will produce much fruit.

For apart from me, you can do nothing.

I mean, think about that.

Think about what your reaction would be if a person in your life said, Hey, apart from me, you can't do anything of value.

I mean, you'd you'd look at them and you'd laugh, more than likely.

Who says that?

John 3.16, this is like the Bible verse, right?

For God loved the world so much that he gave his one and only son that whoever believes in him will not perish, but have everlasting life, will have eternal life.

Now Jesus is making a bold claim about himself and he's talking in the third person.

So anytime someone starts doing that, like, you better be able to back it up.

That's all I'm saying.

You start talking.

If I came to you and said, you know, Justin believes this and Justin really thinks this, you'd be like, Justin, better not be full of it.

Because you don't talk in the third person unless you can back it up.

I mean, Jesus made claims about himself that are so bold that they're really audacious, they are.

And we live in a world that that has a dilemma with Jesus.

It's a big dilemma.

Because the world really loves the teachings of Jesus.

His teachings are so popular.

They're so popular that they've they've even bled into our culture and our world, and people forget that Jesus is the first person that said that.

Like, Jesus is the first person, first person ever, that said, do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

No one, no one said that before Jesus in history.

And so that's become just a normal thing in our culture.

Yeah, it's the golden rule, right?

You should do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

That's Jesus.

The world loves that.

They love the turn-the-ther cheek stuff, they love all the stuff about love that Jesus said, but the world also wants to ignore the claims that Jesus made about himself.

Try to separate the teachings of Jesus from the bold claims that Jesus made.

But the reality is you cannot do that.

It doesn't work.

You cannot separate the teachings of Jesus from who Jesus said he was, because Jesus constantly pointed to himself when he taught.

He constantly said, Hey, I am what you need.

Not my philosophy, not my ideas, not my advice.

He said, No, no, I am what you need.

You need me.

I'm the solution for your life.

And if Jesus is not that, if he's not who he said he is, if he's not the son of God, then we might as well take everything he said and just throw it away because he's just another lunatic that thought he was God.

There have been plenty of those.

See, that's why Easter is the ultimate, the ultimate put-up or shut-up moment.

Because if Easter doesn't go the way it goes, if if Jesus dies and he stays dead, then he was just a crazy guy.

Or someone really misinformed or misunderstood.

But but because Easter goes the way it goes, because Jesus died, and then on the third day He got back up.

Now, now if we we have to look at what he said, we have to look at what he said about himself and we have to deal with that.

Even if in our minds there's just one inkling of a shred of belief that it's possible that Jesus rose from the dead.

Maybe we're not full on in faith with that, and that's fine, but even if there's just one small part of us that feels like maybe that happened, we have to examine Jesus, we have to examine our lives, and we have to deal with Jesus.

That's something the world has been trying to do for 2,000 years, to figure out how we're gonna deal with Jesus.

There's so many different approaches.

And this morning, that's really what I want all of us to do together is to deal with Jesus.

To look at our lives and to look at who he says he is and what he's promised us.

And in light of Easter, in light of this moment in history where Jesus did the unthinkable, to examine him and to take stock and come to grips individually with where we're at with him.

And I want to do that by looking at one more bold promise that Jesus made, another one of these bold statements that he had to back up on the cross, that he had to back up in that tomb when he rose from the dead.

It's in Matthew chapter 16, verse 25.

Matthew 16:25

This is a statement Jesus made about life.

He said, I have come, I haven't read that yet, never mind.

He said, if you try to hang on to your life, that's a spoiler, that's gonna come, just wait.

Um, if you try to hang on to your life, you'll lose it.

But if you give up your life for my sake, you will save it.

So Jesus says, if you try to hang on to your life, you'll lose it.

But if you give your life to me, if you give your entire life to me, then you'll save your life.

Again, very audacious thing to say, to claim that the key for really having life is to give your life to me.

That's what Jesus said.

See, Jesus said this because he wants to change your life.

Please understand that Jesus came to this world to fundamentally change your life.

See, in church, we we get fixated sometimes on this whole life after death thing, which is really important.

Like, I love the idea that I'm gonna go to heaven, I think that's gonna be awesome.

And Jesus promised us life after death.

He did.

And it's one thing to say that, it's another thing to get back up after you die.

When you do that, people look at your life after death statements and go, oh, okay, maybe there's something to that.

But see, we do ourselves a great disservice if we just put all of the whole Jesus thing in this box that's life after death.

We forget that Jesus wants to change your life before death too.

That Jesus did not just come to give you some insurance ticket, that one day when your life is over, you're gonna be okay.

No, Jesus wants to change your life today.

He wants to change your relationships, your relationship with your wife or your husband, your relationship with your family, your friends, your kids.

He wants to change your career, not maybe what you do, but how you do it and how successful you are in it.

Jesus, Jesus wants to change your life.

And I'm not talking about changing your life in this add-on way where he's just another good feature that you have.

He's not a cup holder, okay?

Jesus wants to fundamentally change the way you live life for the better.

And that's this promise that he's making us here.

Matthew 16, 25.

If anyone tries to hang on to their life, they'll lose it.

But if they give their life to me, if they're willing to give up their life for me, they'll save it.

One of the things that I love about Jesus is his ability to, in a very short statement, completely capture the human condition.

It's like he knows us really well, like he made us or something crazy.

And the statement that he makes, hey, if you try to hang on to your life, you'll lose it.

It's kind of a downer statement, right?

If someone said that, you're like, hey, thanks for bringing us all down.

It's Easter.

Come on.

We're hiding eggs with the kids, and you're talking about losing life.

What's wrong with you?

But at the same time, it's very accurate.

It's very accurate.

What Jesus is saying is essentially this hey, life's kind of a losing battle.

Because no matter how hard you fight, you lose life in the end.

And Jesus is saying, hey, you can try to hang on to life, but you'll still lose in the end.

And when Jesus says that, he sums up the way that most people in this world live life every day.

Most people hang on to life.

And that's the best we can we can do.

That's the best we can figure out as a culture.

How can I hang on to life?

How can I hang on to life a little tighter?

How can I hang on to life a little longer?

Think about how many products and diets and lifestyles are sold to you constantly with this one promise.

If you boil it all down, buy this, have this, do this, and you'll be able to hang on a little bit longer.

It's not even that much longer.

Like, you don't see people that never eat carbs and do crunches when they drive and this crazy stuff like this say, hey, like you don't see anyone say, hey, I'm 212 years old.

And if you'll do this, you can live like me.

That would get attention, but everyone's like, oh man, you might be able to live like five more years.

And so I'm saying, if you tell you telling me that if I never eat pizza again, I can live five more years.

If I never eat pizza and I spend half my time in a gym, I can live five more years.

I'm taking pizza every day.

I mean, if my choice is you can be 85 with no pizza or 80 with pizza, I'm just going, I mean, what's life without pizza, right?

Come on.

I mean, so we can try to hang on to life, and there's nothing wrong with living healthy.

I mean, I'm making light of it, obviously, but it's good to live the right way.

There's a quality of life.

Yes, if you own a gym or work at a gym, I'm not trying to put you out of business.

I go to one.

Shockingly, I do.

Um but but what I'm saying is the best the world offers us is a chance to hold on a little longer, to hang on just a little bit more.

That's what Jesus is saying.

He's saying, you can choose to live this way, like the rest of the world.

You can choose to hang on to life.

But no matter how tightly you hang on, in the end you lose it.

See, when we live hanging on to life, what we essentially do is we give life all the control.

We basically tell life and all the circumstances and all the situations that come with life, we tell life, hey, you're in charge.

My joy, my ability to have passion for living, that is up to you, life.

So please be kind.

Please don't throw many curveballs.

Please don't have the power go out at eight o'clock during our first ever eight o'clock service at church, you know.

Just be nice, life.

Be good.

Please don't let me get sick.

Please let my finances be okay.

Please let the economy be okay.

Please keep my family safe.

Just life, if you'll just be really good to me and make sure my circumstances are always rosy, that would be helpful because life, I'm relying on you for my joy and my happiness.

That's how most people live.

Letting life and its circumstances have all the power.

But it's a bad way to live.

So you should never live your life at the mercy of life itself because life is not very merciful.

And why would you ever put yourself at the mercy of something that by nature is not merciful?

Life is life is hard.

Life is hard, and when we live life that way, what happens is we're we're owned by life.

We give the ownership of us to life itself, and we're owned by life.

And if you're owned by life, what happens is you get owned by life.

Are you familiar with that phrase, get owned?

You've never gotten owned before?

I have before.

If you're not familiar, getting owned is like getting beaten by Middle Tennessee State in the first round of the NCAA basketball tournament after saying you're gonna win the whole thing.

That's getting owned.

So I've gotten owned many times in life.

I'm really good at getting owned, actually.

Um, for example, when Megan and I got married 11 years ago, we got Scrabble as a wedding gift.

And you might be thinking, that's an odd wedding gift.

Why would someone get you that?

I registered for Scrabble for our wedding.

Um I went to the store to Target with Megan.

We were doing the whole thing where they give you a scanner and they just tell you to scan stuff, and people are supposed to buy you these things.

And I thought that was really cool.

I thought it was a little bit of a waste that we're only scanning like appliances and spoons and ladles and stuff I don't care about.

And so there was this five-minute window where Megan had to go take care of something, and I had the scanner, and I just went nuts.

I just went nuts.

Like I scanned, I scanned TVs, I scanned all kinds of stuff.

I was 21.

I'm like, I need this stuff, I can't afford it.

And one of the things I scanned was Scrabble.

I was just walking by, I was like, I like Scrabble, boom, there it is.

And it's it's the only thing that I scanned that we got.

So when we opened, when we opened our our gifts, I was I was ecstatic that we got Scrabble because we were broke college kids, we couldn't afford cable TV or anything like that.

So we're like gonna need to do something to fill our time to entertain ourselves, and I thought I was pretty good at Scrabble.

Now I made a fatal mistake.

I should have played Megan in Scrabble prior to marrying Megan.

I'm not saying I would have like walked out at the altar or anything like that, but I would have had a conversation and I definitely would have scanned a different game.

All right?

I'd have scanned Monopoly or something like that.

Because it's it's not, it doesn't make sense how good my wife is at Scrabble.

It makes no sense.

You know, the first time she beat me and she destroyed me.

Like I didn't get beaten, I got owned, and I thought it was just luck of the draw.

I thought, well, she got better letters than me, and so we'll play again, and and it'll it'll even out.

But no, no, no, every time we played, every time we played, she she murdered me at Scrabble.

And she was so annoying the entire time she did it.

So annoying.

Like, guys, put yourself in my shoes, just understand my pain.

Um, this is what Megan would do.

She would jump out to some crazy lead, like an impossible lead for me to come back on.

And then she would look at me, she would do this, she would look at me with all sincerity and say, Um, do you just want to be done?

Are you just like we don't we don't have to finish the game?

And I'm I'm going, are you like my manhood is at stake here?

Come on.

You know, I'm I'm your husband.

I I'm not gonna quit.

I'm not gonna quit at Scrabble.

What kind of message does that send to my children one day to know their father forfeited a game of Scrabble to his wife?

Can't do that.

And so I would I would decide to be a glutton for punishment, I'd keep playing, and then she would do this constantly.

She'd put down some amazing word, either some long word with like two Z, or she'd put two letters on the board that connected eight words together.

Crazy stuff.

And then she would look at me and go, I'm so sorry.

So annoying.

Horrible.

I haven't played Scrabble with Megan in eight years.

Eight years.

And I do not intend to.

I just I won't do it.

I won't do it, because see, I don't I don't like to get owned in life.

I don't enjoy that experience.

I don't like it when when something just beats me up.

But if we're all being honest with ourselves, how often, how often does life just beat you up?

How common is it to go to bed at night, to hit the pillow, and just to think, man, this day ran me over.

I'm spent, I'm wiped out, I'm I'm burned out.

Sometimes that happens because life throws us a curveball that is so difficult to deal with.

Something tragic, something horrible, and it's it's a lot.

And sometimes it happens because there's just enough little things that add up throughout the day.

This didn't go the way it was supposed to.

I was late to work, you know, traffic was terrible, boss was in a bad mood, forgot to pack lunch, so I had to go out to eat, and I overspent my budget.

And it's none of those things in and of themselves are big deals, but they add up.

And at the end of the day, we we hit the pillow and we're just like, oh man.

Life just punched me today.

Life, life beat me up.

Life owned me today.

And that happens to me all the time.

It really does.

It really does.

And there's this thought in the world that that that's okay, that the best we can do is hang on.

The best we can hope for is to survive.

There's even a thought that that's what God desires, that God wants you to commit your life to Him so that then you'll have the strength to get by.

What a lie.

Jesus said this in John 10, 10.

I almost read this one earlier, so you already know the first four words.

I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.

Jesus says, I have come that they may have life and have it to the full.

Does that sound like Jesus promising you that with him in your life you'll finally be able to hang on a little longer?

Is that Jesus saying, hey, with me, you'll be able to get by.

You'll be a survivor if you have me in your life.

No, Jesus says, I have come to give you a life that is abundant.

Other translations say rich and satisfying, not necessarily rich financially, but but rich in the sense that life is full, life has meaning, life has purpose, and you can wake up in the morning and love the life that you're about to live, and you can go to bed at night, and regardless of your circumstances, regardless of how well life has cooperated with you today, you can love your life.

That God wants to give you a life worth living, a life that you love, a life that has passion and meaning and abundance.

That's the life Jesus offers.

This world says, hey, hold on a little longer, squeeze another five years out of it.

And Jesus says, no, no, no.

Have a full life.

The world says, live as if today is your last day.

And Jesus says, no, no, live as if you're never gonna have a last day.

It's a completely different way to live.

Please understand, Jesus does not want you to hold on, to survive.

That's not his wish for you.

He wants you to have a different kind of life, and the only way you can have it, according to him, is to give your life to him.

Anyone who hangs on to his life will lose his life, but anyone who gives their life to me, who gives everything to me, they will save their life.

Other translations say find it.

We could say own it.

In other words, Jesus wants to take you from being someone who is owned by life, and he wants to make you into someone who owns it, who owns life, who takes an ownership of life that you can never take without Jesus.

And see, the only way to own life is to have Jesus.

It's the only way, because he's the only one that owns life.

You cannot own life if you cannot defeat death.

I mean, if death beats you in the end, you don't own life.

You're just renting life.

But if you defeat death, if death can't overcome you, if that's how powerful and bright your life is, that death itself can only slow you down for three days, well then you don't rent life, you own it.

So Jesus is the only For us owning life.

And what he's telling you is this.

He's saying, hey, if you will give your life to me, I'll give my life to you.

That's the promise.

If you give your life to me, I'll give my life to you.

2 Corinthians 5.17 puts it this way: anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created anew.

Sometimes we call that being born again.

You give your life to Jesus, and he gives his life to you, which means that you have him.

He becomes part of your life.

The Bible says that his spirit joins with our spirit.

That seems weird to us, but you are a spiritual person.

There's something beyond blood and bones that makes you who you are.

And the spirit of Jesus joins with you, and you begin to live a new life.

And it's not like overnight your IQ goes up by 10 points and you have abs.

And you look at your bank account, you're like, where'd all these zeros come from?

This is amazing.

I should have made this decision so much earlier.

No, no, you still have problems.

Life is still just as uncooperative as it ever has been.

But now you have a power in your life that those circumstances cannot stand against.

And now your circumstances don't dictate your joy and your passion for living.

Jesus does.

Jesus does.

He says, hey, give me your life and I'll give it back to you, but it'll be better, it'll be more.

And please know this this is one of my favorite things about Jesus.

He never asks us to do anything that he didn't do himself.

And in fact, a lot of the promises, the bold, audacious promises that Jesus made, they're not only backed up by the cross, by Easter, but they actually live out on the cross.

That Easter is actually the moment where they come to fruition.

Like one time Jesus was hanging out in the temple.

This is in John chapter 2.

John 2 · chapter mention

And he tells everyone, destroy this temple and I'll raise it up in three days.

And everyone, even his followers, were like, that's nuts, because this temple took like 40 years to build.

Three days, Jesus?

What are you talking about?

And then they destroyed Jesus, they killed him, and three days later he raised up, and all of his followers were like, oh.

The temple, he was talking about himself.

It was a metaphor.

He talked to metaphors a lot.

See, Easter, it's that put-up or shut-up moment.

It's the backup moment, but it's also the moment where these promises of Jesus just come to life.

And so Jesus says, Hey, give your whole life to me, and you'll get it back.

On the cross, end of his life.

Luke 23, 46 says, Jesus called loudly, Father, I place my life in your hands, and then he breathed his last breath.

So here Jesus says, Give me your life in the very last moment of his life.

What does he do?

The same thing he's always done, he placed his life completely into God the Father's hands.

And if you're thinking, well, then he died, so he got gypped, please understand that he got back up again, and when he got back up, he had a greater life than he had before.

In Matthew 28, 18, shortly after the resurrection, he tells his disciples, I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth.

In other words, now I own life.

Because I defeated death, I own it.

And I want to give it to you.

And so there's two different categories of us in the room today.

I'm not trying to put a label on you.

Don't worry about that.

And worship team, if you guys want to want to come up and get ready to send us out.

There's some of us that have given our lives to Jesus before.

A lot of us have, honestly.

A lot of us have made that decision at some point in time, but it's interesting because even as someone who's passionate about Jesus and I've given my life to Jesus, there's always this pull, this pull of the world for me to give my life to other things.

When Jesus says, give your life to me, he's just asking us to live like we already lived.

We all give our lives to something.

And so sometimes I try to give my life to myself.

I get really tired and burned out, and I just want to focus on what would make me happy.

I need a me day.

And I take me days from time to time, and they're usually my worst days.

You ever have that?

Like all the pressures, they're like, I have to enjoy the day.

Today needs to be awesome.

I need this.

And then it's not.

Because the more fixated you become on your own happiness, the less happy you are.

The more you focus on the lack of happiness you have, the more elusive happiness becomes.

And so me days are bad days.

I can live my life trying to give my life to me, and it's just a bad deal.

I could give my life to my career.

Many people do that.

You might have done that.

You can give your best years, your passion, your talent, your time, your energy to your job, and maybe your job will thank you.

Maybe they'll give you a raise and they'll pay you, and maybe, maybe they'll throw you a party when you retire and they'll have cake, and it'll be amazing and wonderful, and that cake will make it all worthwhile.

Or they might misspell your name, but whatever.

But if you give your whole life to your job, your job can't give it back to you.

Your job will take it and be grateful that you gave it, but it can't give it back to you.

You can even try to live and give your life to your family, to your community, to your church, to whatever it is you're part of that's bigger than yourself.

But here's the problem this is what happens in my life all the time.

I have three amazing kids.

I have an incredible wife.

I have parents that I love.

I have family.

I have a community that I love being a part of.

And I can try to give my whole life to all those people, but I only have a little bit of life in me, in my own strength.

And so when I try to give it to everyone else, I tend to run out pretty quickly.

And then I'm out of patience.

And I start snapping at my kids, I start snapping at my wife, and I get grumpy, and it's not because I'm trying to be selfish, I've just I've given all that I can give.

I don't have anything left.

So leave me alone.

But anyone relate to that?

But if you give your life to Jesus, he gives his life to you.

His life is infinite.

He never ran out of patience.

He'll never run out of patience with you either.

If you give your life to him, he gives his life to you.

And you have an abundance inside of yourself that allows you to have more than you to give.

That allows you to give life out of an overflow instead of a deficit, instead of trying to squeeze every drop out.

Just try to wring out a little bit more joy and passion to give to other people.

You can you can soak in the life that God has for you, and it can just come out because Jesus never runs out of life.

Death didn't even snuff it out.

And so, even if you know Jesus, if you've made this commitment before, if if you've gotten sort of tricked like I have so many times and so many days to try to give your life to something else that can't give your life back to you, just be reminded today.

Give your life to Jesus every single day.

Give your life to Jesus.

Wake up in the morning and say, Jesus, my day is yours.

Take it.

Because I know you're gonna give it back to me.

There are also some of us in the room that have never made this decision before.

And we're all at different places.

That's totally fine.

I just believe Jesus loves you.

And to whatever degree you might be sick and tired of life owning you, he's even more fed up because he created you and he has a hope for you, and he has a plan for your life.

And he's tired of watching life own you and you just get bombarded.

He's tired of watching your circumstances have power over you.

He's tired of watching you hit the pillow at night, exhausted and worn out, and he wants to look at you and say, I have life for you, and I want you to have the life that I have because I'm tired of seeing you, I'm tired of seeing you at the end of your rope.

I want you to live, I want you to live a life worth living.

That's what he wants for you.

And it's yours if you want it.

Do you want to own life?

You can.

You're meant to.

He did not create you to hang on.

And so today I just want to ask you, I want to put this out there.

It's up to you to take it or leave it.

But if you've never given your life to Jesus, if you've never taken his advice, if you can look at your life and say, hey, that way you're talking about life, Jesus, that's me.

I'm hanging on to life.

But I feel like it's a losing battle.

If that's you, Jesus, he's calling you to give it to him.

And all you have to do in your heart right now, it's just one thought, it's one prayer, it's the same thing Jesus prayed on the cross.

It's God, I place my life in your hands.

I place it in your hands.

And if you feel a stirring in your heart right now, a tug, a realization that that is what you need, just go with it.

It's an adventure, just go with it.

And I'd recommend something to you as you leave today.

As you walk out, before you get your kids, just first thing you do, as soon as we're done, walk up to that connect desk where you see the all-in signs for baptism and just sign up to be baptized.

Don't hesitate.

Don't hesitate.

Just go all in with Jesus so that you can experience what it's like to have him be all in with you.

So that you can go from having life own you to owning life.

Just go all in.

Don't hold back.

Don't wait.

Don't walk out of here today and go to O'Charlie's and get bread and go, man, I missed it.

Don't do that.

They're gonna have bread all day long.

They have to.

But there are moments in life where we have an opportunity that we should not waste.

And there should be nothing in your life keeping you from having the life you're meant to have.

So take it today.

Go all in, make that decision.

Sign up to get baptized.

Be here.

Let us celebrate you as a church.

We want to do that.

We want to celebrate you going all in with Jesus.

We want to surround you with love and support and help to help you grow in this new life that God's given you.

That's all we want to do.

But you've got to take that step, you've got to make that decision.

We're gonna wrap up with some worship and just reflect one more time today on what Jesus did for us on the cross.

We're gonna thank him for the fact that when it came time to back up his bold claims, he did it.

And pray with me as we as we move into that moment.

Jesus, thank you so much for being bold enough to tell us who you really were, who you really are, and being bold enough and brave enough and real enough to back it up.

You are not a God of empty promises.

You don't tell us things that we want to hear, unable to deliver.

You never overpromise and underdeliver.

You always come through, you always give us what we need, and Lord, we need to own life today.

Every one of us needs to walk out of here knowing that it's ours.

We don't want to hold on anymore, we don't want to hang on, we don't want to survive and get by, we want to thrive, we want to live, and we need you to do it.

So, Lord, just move us, compel us, wake us up so that we can give it all to you, so that you can give it all back.

We love you, Lord.

We pray all this in your name, Jesus.

Happy Easter.

Amen.