It’s on the Way

This podcast is presented to you by Pastor Jason and Liz Burns in Access Church in Lakeland and Bartow, Florida.

For more information, visit Access.tv.

Thank you so much for being here today.

I love Access Church so much.

I love Pastor Jason and Pastor Liz so much.

Have a lot in common with uh Pastor Jason.

We both married Liz's, so I've got a Liz who's with me as well.

And so my wife Liz is with me.

Um we've been married, is it 17, babe?

We'll be 17.

Don't feel bad.

She doesn't know either.

All right.

We just grateful to God that we're still in this together.

And so something like that.

Anyway, um, it really is a privilege to have Pastor Jason as a friend.

Um I I've said this to him privately, I'll say it to you publicly.

Um, his impact in my life and uh not just as a pastor, I'm super impressed as who you are as a pastor, but I think even more as a parent.

First time we really, really got to hang.

You were in the middle of a man cation, which if you're a first-time guest, let me just explain that really quick because we live in a crazy times.

But that's when he takes his sons out.

Uh uh is it once a year?

Once a year, and just disciples them and pours in them.

You're just a great parent, bro.

Better parent than you are, a pastor.

And um, but that doesn't mean that he's a bad pastor.

Wow, it's not going well today.

He's a great pastor and an even greater parent.

And uh and uh and I'll tell you what, also, if you are just kicking the tires and looking for a home church, I think you walked into an amazing, amazing one.

It takes a special kind of leader to to be a part of what I've been a part of for nine years.

Our church will celebrate nine next week.

But if you're new here to Access Church, you need to know that you are in your 18th year and with the same pastor.

We started this church out of a out of a Bible, a college Bible study.

And so it takes a special kind of leader to stick with something for 18 years.

And when I'll tell you that, if you're looking for a church, because you need a pastor who's gonna stick with you when the times are tough.

And uh, if he could stick with a church for 18 years and it wasn't always looking like this, um, he'll stick with you when you're not always looking like that.

You know what I'm saying?

And so, all right, y'all ready to get into the message today?

All right, at my church I can go as long as I want, but I can't do that here.

I'm a guest, and so I gotta jump into it.

If you have a Bible, I'm gonna ask you to open up to the book of Luke, chapter 24.

Luke 24 · chapter mention

We're gonna be in the 13th verse.

It's uh a bit of a Palm Sunday passage, but I think it'll uh bless you today.

Palm Sunday being the Sunday before Easter.

This is the Sunday after Easter where this takes place.

Luke 24, 13.

Now that same day, two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem, and they were talking with each other about everything that had happened.

What did what happened?

What happened was the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.

So these are disciples of Jesus who are walking on the road.

Everything that had happened was Jesus, who was fairly well known in Jerusalem at that time as a prophet and a teacher, had just died, was just killed, was crucified.

And uh and they're talking about it.

Verse 15.

And as they talked and discussed these things with each other with each other, Jesus, the one that they were just talking about, himself came up and walked along the way with them.

Now, this is the resurrected Jesus.

If if you're not familiar with church, this is your first time, he came back to life.

Three days after being dead, and and and they're this is on Easter, this is Sunday morning, Easter Sunday.

They're walking with them.

But look at verse 16, this really sticks out to me.

But they were kept from recognizing him.

Now they were disciples of Jesus, so they knew what Jesus looked like, but when Jesus walks up alongside them, they can't recognize him.

And I've been studying the Bible my whole life, and I can't tell you why.

I don't know why.

I don't know if Jesus was wearing a hoodie when he resurrected.

I don't know if when Jesus got resurrected, the first thing he did was get a haircut.

Maybe he trimmed a beard.

They didn't recognize, I don't know.

They didn't recognize him.

That's what the Bible says.

Verse 28 and 29.

And as they approached the village to where they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther, but they argued with him strongly.

Stay with us, for it is nearly evening, the day is almost over.

So he went in to stay with them.

And when he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it, and began to give it to them.

Verse 31.

Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him.

I don't know why then.

Maybe it was the way that he prayed, maybe it was the way that he said amen.

Maybe it was the way that he raised his hands.

Maybe when he raised his hands, they noticed, hey, look, he has holes in his hands.

I'm not sure.

But when he did and they recognized him, the Bible says he disappeared from their sight.

Verse 32, they asked each other, Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road, which was when we recognized him, and opened the scriptures to us, not for seven miles, but on the road.

Then they got up and returned, verse 33 and 35.

Then they got up and returned to once Jerusalem, and the two told the disciples what had happened on the way.

Someone say, On the way.

And how Jesus was recognized by them, not for the seven miles, but at the end of the journey when he broke the bread.

Even though he was with them on the way, they only recognized them at the end.

Let me say this as our story comes to a close here.

Don't assume, like I assumed when I was first reading this Bible, that it was God who had somehow supernaturally kept the disciples from recognizing Jesus.

It might not have been God, it might have been grief.

You got to remember that these were Jesus' disciples.

These were the people who had put their hope in him, they put their trust in him, they believed in him, and they were sad that he had passed away.

They were so sad, they were so grieving, not unlike the week that we've had in America today.

And it's possible that grief can blind you.

It's possible that sadness, that that trauma, that tragedy can actually convince you, listen, that Jesus is not there.

And then, like most people, like the disciples, they often only recognize Christ at the end.

Right?

It's when you've been in that infertility battle for many years and then the baby comes and you go, Oh, I'm so glad God came in in the end.

It's when you've been sick for a while and you go to the doctors and hey, you're finally cancer free.

Oh, I'm so glad God showed up at the end.

Well, I've got news for you today, Access Church.

Praise God that he showed up at the end.

But he didn't just show up at the end, he was there the whole time.

He was walking with you the whole time, he was with you in the sadness, he was with you in the grief, he was with you in the tragedy.

We got to be able to see God in it and not just at the end of it.

And a part of me cannot help but wonder how the disciples' reaction would have been different if they would have just noticed that Jesus was there all the way.

They could have traded seven miles.

The Bible said they walked seven miles, seven miles of sorrow for seven miles of singing.

They could have traded seven miles of anxiety for seven miles of peace.

They could have traded seven miles of being angry at God for his absence into seven miles at being in awe of God's presence.

Ain't nothing wrong with giving God praise at the end of your battle except that you miss out.

Because what you experienced for a moment, you could have had for seven miles.

For seven miles.

I want to speak today on a message.

I want you to tap your neighbor, tap three people.

Well, two, left and right.

I tell them the title of my message, tell them it's on the way.

It's on the way.

If you only thank God when you get there, listen, you're gonna miss the blessing of God on the way.

I live in Florida, I live in Orlando, um, but I wasn't born here.

I was born in New York City.

And every summer, or almost every summer, my parents would take us to uh Orlando on vacation, ironically enough.

And we would um, I don't know what plane tickets were like back then, but we never flew.

We always drove.

And I'm gonna tell you, I don't remember anything about our Orlando vacations.

I was so young when we when we did it, don't remember Disney, don't remember any of it.

The only thing I remember about our trips were the road trips.

The road trips is what I remember.

They have been uh etched into my brain forever because they were adventures.

I remember loading up our our beige minivan and driving down to Orlando, and I remember there was a blue cooler in the back full of mayonnaise sandwiches.

How many people know what I'm talking about?

Yeah, we didn't stop for food.

Drive-thru was for rich people.

We had mayonnaise sandwiches, which, if you've never had a mayonnaise sandwich before, it is what it sounds like, okay?

It's two pieces of white bread with mayonnaise in it, and they are delicious, all right?

Mayonnaise sandwiches.

And I remember my dad who um who was like a handyman, he uh he he wanted to keep us entertained on the ride, and so he he bought a VHS player, if you know what that is, and and he and he he like hotwired it to the car battery.

And then he got a TV and hotwired that somehow to the car battery.

Listen, we had car TVs before car TVs were a thing.

I need you to know this, okay?

I'm not and someone would be like, oh, he had a car TV.

No, I had a TV in my car, it's totally different.

All right, and and and then we would play the alphabet game, and and and I loved those road trips so much, it was a lot of fun.

What's crazy to me is that as much as I enjoyed road trips when I was a child, I hate them now.

I hate them with such a passion.

You know, I'm here in Lakela today because this is one hour from home, okay?

This is why I'm here, and because I love Pastor Jason and Liz.

But that's why I'm here.

If this was five hours away, guys, I wouldn't be here today.

I just need you to know this.

I wouldn't drive, I wouldn't make the trip.

I I don't like road trips.

I won't go anywhere if it's over four hours anymore.

And I don't know what happened to me because the road trip used to be adventure.

Listen, but somewhere along the way, the way turned into delay.

I used to be excited about the journey, but now all I can think about is the arrival, so much so that the that the adventure of the journey is lost on me.

Here's the question I wanted to pose to you today, Access Church.

Are you aware of the adventure or are you just awaiting the arrival?

Are you aware of the adventure or are you just awaiting the arrival?

I love a church that takes notes.

I heard all the pens click at one time.

I think that's powerful.

This is a church that's going to heaven.

This is great.

Because there are a lot of adventures and arrival moments in our life, and if we're not careful, we'll get so focused on the arrival, we'll miss out on the adventure.

I think for a lot of single people in the room today, I'm just curious how many single people are in the room today.

Okay, we got one person in the back.

This is uh you showed up to the wrong service time, my friend.

All right, you think better service time.

I think if you're single or watching online, if you're single, I don't know our campuses, if you're single, then uh then I think for you the adventure is is is, or the arrival, I should say, is marriage.

But you can't be so focused on the arrival of marriage that you miss the adventure of being single because being single is an adventure.

If you've ever been on a dating app, you know exactly what I'm talking about.

It's an adventure.

I think if you're if if you're unemployed and you came to church today, I think that the arrival is the job.

But if you're so focused on the arrival of the job, listen, you would miss the adventure of being unemployed.

Let me tell you, it's not an adventure that I suggest you stay in for a long time.

But there is something about going three, four months without a paycheck, and your bills somehow still get paid, and your kids somehow still have shoes, and there's food somehow still in your fridge, so that you can recognize that God is your provider, not the government, not a boss, not an employer, not a client.

You got to go through that so that you can learn some things.

I think if you rent home ownership is the arrival, but renting is an adventure.

Just meet your neighbors, they are wild, all right?

Just you I think if if you're if you're childless, then you can think that the arrival is is having kids, but but let me making kids is an adventure too.

And so you just gotta know.

Don't be so focused on the arrival that you miss the adventure.

Because I think for most people in life, listen, there are really just two places in life.

Here, somebody say here and there.

Okay, say there.

I didn't ask you, but I'm glad that you jumped in.

Most people, can I be honest, are not happy to be here.

And will tell themselves this when I get there, and they spend their whole life getting there.

But then when they get there, something happens.

Because when you get there, you'll be there.

Become here.

Because you never learned to be happy here, you will never be happy when you get there.

If you do not learn to be happy here, whatever it is you're hoping for, whatever it is you're waiting for, whatever it is you're praying for, let me help you, you will never be happy when you get there.

Now you have to be careful that you don't get too comfortable here.

Because then you'll stay here.

You gotta be able to be happy here without getting too comfortable here.

In fact, here's what I've learned God will often disrupt here to get you going there.

How many people have experienced that?

That's what the breakup was, by the way.

Oh, there's no single people here, so let me let me find another example.

That's what getting fired was, that's what getting laid off was, that's what the diagnosis was.

It was God to get you moving.

Not because God is the God of there, or because God is the God of here.

You want to get real theological about it, God is neither here nor there, He's everywhere.

But because what God wants to do in your life, listen, it's not here or there, it's on the way.

The thing that God wants to do in your life is on the way.

If you're taking notes, here's my first point.

Arrival, it's not a place.

Arrival is on the way.

Arrival is on the way.

What God wants to do in your life is in the process, it's on the way.

Nobody, I think, in the Bible illustrates that more in his life than someone named Jacob.

Genesis chapter 25, verse 23.

Genesis 25:23

Jacob was a twin, and something's happening in the womb of his mother.

Two nations are in your womb, two peoples will come from you and be separated, one people will be stronger than the other, and the older Esau will serve the younger Jacob.

Now, Jacob gets a prophetic word that he's gonna be the leader.

Jacob gets a prophetic word that he's gonna be blessed.

But what Jacob does is he tries to take it into his own hands, he tries to steal the birthright of his brother by deceiving him, dressing up as his older brother and deceiving his father and stealing that blessing.

And look what he's trying to do.

He's trying to find a shortcut to there.

And there are no shortcuts on the way.

You gotta go the long way.

And shokarts always blow up in your face, and that's exactly what happens to Jacob.

And his brother now wants to kill him, and now he becomes a fugitive, and so now he goes to Haran, and on the way, he's going to another city to go with his uncle to find some other family because now he has to get out of home.

And so, on the way there, someone say, on the way, verse 16, when Jacob awoke from his sleep, this happened on the way.

He thought, Surely the Lord is in this place, and I was not aware of it.

I didn't know that it would happen here.

I thought it might happen there.

He was afraid and said, How awesome is this place?

This is none other than the house of God.

This is the gate of heaven.

And now he develops a relationship with God that he would need in his next season.

Because even though he's gonna spend time with family, that family ain't family.

That family's gonna deceive him, that family's gonna pretty much put him in enslavery, and he's gonna need a relationship with God to sustain him when he has no family.

Here's what I'm trying to tell you.

What he needed to survive in that season, he found on the way.

Someone say, on the way.

It wasn't there, it was on the way.

And now he finally gets out of that situation and he leaves.

The Bible says that he's going to a place called Gilead, but but Laban, his uncle, follows him and tries to kill him.

And Jacob has another encounter while he's on the way.

Verse 1 and 2.

Jacob also went on his way.

And the angels of God met him.

And when Jacob saw them, he said, This is the camp of God.

So he named that place Mahanaim.

God has an encounter with Laban and with Jacob and says, Laban, you better get off my boy Jacob.

He's anointed by me, he's separated by me.

And then Jacob learns in that moment that God is his defender.

This is important for him to learn because when he learns this, he switches his direction.

He was gonna go to Gilead, but now once he has this encounter with God on the way, the Bible says he switches his direction towards Sehir.

Why is Seir important?

Because his brother Esau lives in Seir, and Jacob knows that I can't step into my future if I don't deal with my past.

But the only reason he's able to face his brother face to face is because now he has the confidence that he's not gonna go face his brother alone, that God is with him.

But he learned that.

Are you seeing what I'm talking about?

On the way, and so on the way to Sehir right now, he has another encounter with God.

Genesis chapter 32, verse 27.

Genesis 32:27

The man asked him, and this is no man, this is God in the flesh, who begins to wrestle Jacob in the middle of the night.

What is your name?

Jacob, he answered.

Jacob means deceiver, it means liar, it means heal, it means someone who steals.

Verse 28.

Then the man said, Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and humans and have overcome.

At this moment, Jacob no longer becomes plagued by who he was or what he did, but he steps into who he is now.

And this identity is going to be something that lasts with him throughout the rest of his life.

I don't know if you're noticing it or seeing it, but every significant moment in Jacob's life did not happen at the destination point that he was headed to.

Every significant encounter moment in his life happened on the way.

On the way.

On the way.

This is what happens in the gym all the time.

I don't know if you've ever been to the gym, if you ever worked out, and then one day you hit a PR.

PR means personal record.

And you lift that weight and you go, oh my gosh.

You start looking at the mirror, you start flexing at yourself, but not too much because you don't want other people to think you're you know self-conceited or anything like that.

But you do it as you're walking out, you do a little tricep flex and all that stuff, you know, and you look at yourself and you go, oh my gosh, and you say, I'm so much stronger today.

That's a lie.

You didn't get stronger today, you recognized it today, but you got stronger on the way.

It was months of lifting that weight, it was months of pushing that, it was months of developing that.

You have to recognize this, listen, who I am today is made on the way.

Who I am today is made on the way.

It's the process, it's the path, it's the journey.

And if you don't go through it, you're not gonna have what it takes to live in that season that you've been praying for.

A lot of people find shortcuts to the destination, and when they get there, they can't stay there because they skip the season of their life, listen, that was designed to deposit things inside of them that was supposed to be developed on the way.

This is why you get people who get famous too fast, and then the fame actually kills them because they didn't spend enough time in obscurity developing the humility that it would take to sustain this.

This is why people who win the lottery and get there so fast go broke for so long because they didn't know how to bogo at publics, which they should have learned on the way.

If they had spent enough time in poverty, they'd have known that.

When you get there too fast, you don't have all the tools in your toolbox to stay there.

Are you with me?

And God's not just trying to get you there, he's trying to keep you there, and so he wants to develop it inside of you.

Listen, God is not about arriving, he's about becoming.

He's about becoming.

Here's the second thing that's on the way, you're gonna find joy is on the way.

Someone say, Joy.

Joy is on the way.

If you'd open up your Bible to the book of Psalms, you're gonna find 15 different chapters, Psalms 120 to Psalms 134.

And this is a group of Psalms in your Bible known as the Song of Ascens.

And the reason why it's called the Songs of Ascents, the Psalms, by the way, are songs and prayers, is because the Jewish people would take three trips to Jerusalem a year.

There were festivals that everybody would travel to, and they'd have to travel to this city no matter how far you lived.

And it was a road trip.

It was a road trip.

And Jerusalem was a city on a hill.

So it's a song that every Jewish person had memorized.

15 different of them they had to memorize, and they would sing them.

And the reason why I love it is because they didn't wait to get to Jerusalem to praise God.

They didn't wait to get there to praise God.

Every once in a while, my my kids will get on me because I'll be driving to church in the morning and I'll put on worship music.

And they'll be like, Dad, we get it.

You love Jesus.

It's like, but you're gonna be singing three songs in about five minutes, and you got four services.

You're gonna sing 15 to 12 songs today.

There's a lot of worship.

And I'm like, listen, this is different than what I'm doing at church.

He's like, What do you mean?

It's worship.

I go, uh, when I go to church, that's my praise.

This is my pre praise.

How many of you will pre praise before you got here?

Yeah, because God's just not good at church.

He's good before you get here, he's good at home, he's good when you go through good times, he's good when you go through bad times.

You praise them all the way.

You gotta learn how to praise them all the way.

You can't just praise them when things get good.

My son turned 13 this year.

It was a big year for us.

And uh we took him on a I took him on a rite of passage ceremony, which if you don't know what that is, it's a celebration of his journey into manhood.

And we're supposed to do something hard together, overcome it.

And so with a hard thing that we wanted to do together, um, that he didn't know, he had a fear of heights, so I wanted to kind of mix it in there.

Um, there's a thin line between discipleship and trauma, but I wanted to really walk that line, and so I took him, I took him to the Grand Canyon.

Took him to the Grand Canyon.

We were gonna hike the Grand Canyon.

And so we get to the Grand Canyon, and our guide shows up and and and our guide asks us, he said, Why'd you pick this trail?

And I was like, Well, my son just turned 13, we're gonna write a passage ceremony, and we're supposed to overcome something hard, and so I want to do this together with him.

And and the guide looked at me and he's like, Well, you picked the right trail.

I had no idea what trail I picked, I just like the hard trail, and I would pick that one.

He goes, I never do this trail.

I was like, Well, that concerns me if you're the guide.

He's like, No, I mean like I've done it.

He's like, but your average person doesn't sign up for this trail.

And then he pulls out like these things that you put on your shoes to like keep you from slipping off the side of the mountain.

I was like, Oh my, what are we doing?

But I can't be freaked out in front of my son because he's already freaked out, and so I'm like, You're a beer man.

And so we start going down this mountain.

It was a mile and a half hike into the center of the Grand Canyon from the top, a mile and a half, not a mile and a half that way, a mile and a half that way, and we're going this way.

It's like three, four hours.

This is listen, I became a man on that trip.

Okay, it was wild.

And we get to the bottom, and I'm just having a miserable time, and then and then we get to the bottom, and I'm like, oh yeah.

And then when we got to the bottom, it hit me.

I was like, what now?

He was like, we go back up.

I was like, the helicopter don't meet us here.

This is an escalator, we can take an elevator.

No, we're gonna hide back up another.

It was three, four hours on the way down, there was four or five hours on the way back up, and up is way harder.

Then on the way down, and my son is looking at me, and he's and I'm having a I'm just having a really bad time.

I'm regretting my decision.

You ever do something you thought would be cool, and then you're in it, and you're like, oh, I should have showed him Rudy or something like that.

It would have been easier, it would have been a lot more convenient, and and so then we start going up the mountain.

He looks back at me every once in a while, and he's like, Dad, you good?

I'm like, Yeah, and then he looks away and I'm like, I'm just this remember, and then I'm just complaining to the to the Lord, like this is tough, this is hard.

And and and as I'm complaining, I look to my right and I see this.

Yeah, that's not stock photo.

All right, I took that with my phone.

I I I and I and I'm overwhelmed by the beauty.

And then I I look to the left and I see this.

That's my son staring off into the distance, enjoying the view, and and and I just and I felt the Holy Spirit speak to me.

And this is what I felt like God tell me.

He said, Hey, you're not gonna die.

The second thing he said was, you're gonna get there.

Because I was looking at that topic and he said, You're gonna get there.

The third thing really stuck to me.

He said, The only question is, are you gonna enjoy it?

Stop and I took this picture.

And that's not a fake smile, that's a real smile.

That's a real legitimate smile.

Because I just it just hit me.

Yeah, it was hard, yeah, it was tough, yeah, it was exhausting, but this is a blessing.

And I have to understand and listen, Access Church, I have a qu I have a prophecy for you and a question for you.

And here's the prophecy.

Ready?

Whoever you are in this room who needs to hear it, here it is.

I don't know your story, I don't know your situation.

Prophecy means to speak truth, to speak future truth into your present situation.

You are going to get there.

I'm gonna say it one more time.

You are going to get there.

Now lean in.

The only question is are you gonna be mad on the way there?

Are you gonna be sad on the way there?

Are you gonna raise your fist at God and be angry on the way there?

Or are you gonna have joy on the way there?

And if you need some motivation to find your joy, just look around at this amazing life you have.

Look around at your wife, your your husband, your your kids.

You single for the one person in the back of this room?

Look around at your job, your career, your finances.

You broke.

Look around at the trees and the sun and the sun.

You live in an apartment with no view, then look around at your body and your mind and your breath.

You dying, look around, you ain't dead yet, you still got breath in your lungs, and my Baba says that everything that has breath, praise the Lord.

If you are alive today, you got a reason to praise God.

I don't know what the situation is, I don't know what's the issue going on, but you got a reason to praise him, you got a reason to love him, you got a reason to have joy.

You got it in your life.

Here's the other thing I want to tell you.

Listen, the miracle is on the way.

The miracle is on the way.

This is what the Bible says on the third day, John chapter 2, verse 1.

John 2:1

On the third day a wedding took place at Cana in Galilee.

Jesus' mother was there, and Jesus and his disciples had also been invited to the wedding.

And when the wine was gone, Jesus' mother said to him, They have no more wine.

And Jesus looked at her and said, Woman, why do you involve me?

Jesus replied, My hour has not yet come.

I tell people all the time, that's how you know Mary wasn't a Puerto Rican.

Don't you ever score your mother woman?

They would have had to resurrect him right there.

Verse 5, his mother said to the servants, Do whatever he tells you.

Verse 6 and 9, nearby stood six stone water jars, the kind used by the Jews for ceremonial washing, each holding twenty to thirty gallons.

Jesus said to the servants, Fill the jars with water, so they fill them to the brim.

Then he told them, Now draw some out and take it to the master of the banquet.

And they did so, and the master of the banquet tasted the water that had been turned into wine, and he did not realize where he had come from, though the servants who had drawn the water knew.

I just want to read verse 9 again because there's something happened.

It'd been turned into wine.

So the so the master of the banquet tasted the wine, but the servants knew they had drew water.

That's really important.

It's 20 to 30 gallons in a stone jar.

The Bible only mentions those kinds of details if it's trying to give you clues.

And what they're trying to communicate to you is that there's no way that those stone jars are moving to the master of the banquet.

And we know that the master of the banquet did not come and sip the water that had to be turned on wine here because the Bible says that to bring it to the master of the banquet.

Why do I say all that?

Because in order for this water to get to that master of the banquet, they weren't gonna move the jars and he wasn't gonna go out, and he didn't come here because it said bring it to him.

So that means that that the that they had to draw water, and he drank wine.

So he he drew water, and he drank wine.

Now I know what happened.

My only question is when did it happen?

But let me preach it.

We know what happened.

But we don't know what, but we do know when somewhere on the way.

And by the way, this is exactly how God changes your life.

This is exactly how God changes your life.

And I want to tell you today, if you are carrying something in your heart today, God is gonna turn it.

God is gonna turn your water into wine, God is gonna turn your brokenness into blessing, God is gonna turn your struggle into a story, he's gonna turn the breakup into a marriage, he's gonna turn the depression into a miracle, he's gonna turn it, he's gonna turn it, but here's how he's gonna turn it, and I'm gonna tell you when he's gonna turn it.

Here's how he's gonna turn it.

John 2, 5, as long as you do, as long as you do whatever he tells you, and here's when he's gonna turn it.

I can't I I don't know exactly, but here's how I know.

One day you're gonna be up here at Access, giving your testimony, sharing your story.

Yeah, God changed my life.

He's been doing it, and someone's gonna raise their hand and go, hey, but but but when did he change your life?

When did everything turn around?

When did everything get better?

And your response is gonna be, you know what, now that you think about it, like when was my last panic attack?

I don't even remember when the last when was the last time you looked at pornography?

I don't even know exactly when the last time, I don't even know when it happened.

All I know is I kept coming to church, I kept reading my Bible, I kept praying, I kept fasting, I kept worshiping, I did what he told me, and somewhere along the way, God changed me.

I'm gonna tell you God's gonna do it, and when he does it, you're not even gonna recognize it.

But one day, you're gonna wake up and taste wine and have no idea how God turned that water into a wine because all you did was be faithful.

All you did was be faithful.

If you keep coming, keep giving, keep believing, keep praying, keep having faith, God's gonna do it in your life.

Here's my thing, I'm gonna tell you listen, you're not waiting for a miracle, you're walking towards it.

You're walking towards it, you're walking towards it.

Here's my last point.

Listen, John chapter 12, verse verse 12 through 13, and we'll close here.

John 12 · chapter mention

The next day the great crowd that had come for the festival heard that Jesus was on his way.

Verse 13, they took palm branches and went out to meet him, shouting, Hosanna, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.

Blessed is the King of Israel.

Here's my last point, and we're gonna close here.

Jesus is on the way.

I love that they shouted Hosanna, the king is here.

Because they shouted it in the midst of their Roman oppressors.

This is Passover, and Passover in Jerusalem is a pretty big deal.

A million people showed up, and because of it, the Romans would have extra security present.

And so, unlike the disciples who did not recognize Jesus, you have a bunch of people who are hurting, desperate, sick, in need, and and please catch this.

Guys, they're shouting at my king when they're currently being oppressed by an emperor.

They're talking, they're declaring a freedom that they are not currently experiencing.

But they're speaking it.

Are you seeing it?

It's powerful.

Here's what I'm trying to tell you.

Just because you're not there doesn't mean Jesus isn't here.

A lot of people have a hard time believing that Jesus could be in America, that Jesus could be here because of all the events that took place this week.

How could Jesus be in that?

How could Jesus be in this?

How could Jesus be in there?

A lot of people who showed up at church today, Jesus can't be here.

Because if Jesus was here, my marriage would be better.

If Jesus was here, I wouldn't have to be looking for a job.

If Jesus was here, my kids would be serving the Lord.

If Jesus was here, I wouldn't wrestle with depression.

If Jesus was here, I wouldn't be contemplating taking my life.

Because if Jesus was here, then then I would know everything would be would be different.

Because here's why.

Because we think that Jesus is a destination.

We think that Jesus is an arrival moment.

But Jesus is not an arrival moment.

Here's what Jesus said he was in John chapter 14, verse 6.

John 14:6

Put it on the screen.

Jesus answered.

I am the way.

You, I am the way you overcome your grief.

I am the way you overcome your trauma.

I am the way you overcome your pain.

I'm the way you get through it.

You think I'm not here because you're going through it?

The only reason you're able to go through it is because I'm with you and I'm breathing life into you and I'm giving you strength.

He said, I am the way.

And if you put your trust in me, I can walk you through this thing.

I can get you through this thing.

I can lead you through this thing.

For those who've been praying about that arrival moment, I've got good news, guys.

Jesus is here.

And listen, and if Jesus is here, then you're already there.

I don't I don't need more campuses at our church or more people to show up.

I praise God for all of the things that He's done.

But if I just have Jesus, I'm already there.

I don't need to make another dollar.

I don't, I'm already there.

I wish that you would see the beauty of Jesus in your moment right now.

Every head bowed, every eye closed in this room today.

I want to praise two pre prayers and I'm gonna walk off the stage in the next 60 seconds.

Listen to me first if you're going through it right now.

Like every American is, and like a lot of mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters are today.

Would you be encouraged with the fact that Jesus is here and he's working in this and he's moving in this, he is on the way, he is already here, he is the way.

And there is gonna come a day, listen, where he is gonna show up, not just in our situation, but the Bible says on a white horse with a sword coming out of his mouth to bring righteousness to every unjust situation.

This world will be restored in the name of Jesus by the blood of Jesus with the saints on his trail.

And so I'm grateful for that second coming, but I don't have to wait for that second coming to start experiencing heaven on earth right now.

So if you need that peace, would you just begin to ask the Lord right now?

Would you just I know you're here, just remind me, just show me, just speak to me.

At that same prayer, there's people in the room today who are far from God, people who are at our other campuses, watching online, who are far from God.

Listen to me.

Jesus is here.

He just needs you to let him in all over this room.

If if if you don't have a relationship with Christ, if your relationship has been religious at best, on the count of three, I'd love for you to raise your right hand high, saying, Jesus, I need you in my life.

All over this room.

Jesus, I need you in my life.

I'm ready.

I need you all over this room.

That's you on the count of three.

I need you.

I need you to my Lord and Jesus, my Savior.

One, two, if that's you, just raise your right hand.

Nobody's looking.

One, two, three, all over this room.

One in rooms online.

Come on, I see your hand, ma'am.

I see your hands, sir, in the back.

I see your hands, sir, in the back.

I see your hands, ma'am, in the back.

Praise the Lord.

I know there's hands at our campuses.

But everybody pray this prayer out loud.

That's how we do it in our church.

We just want them to know that they're not alone.

Just repeat after me.

Say, Father God, today I open up my heart and I let you in.

Don't just be my savior, be my Lord.

I'm ready to live life your way.

Change my past.

Prepare me for my future.

Be with me in my present.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.

And amen.

Come on, can we put our hands together?

Welcome all those to the family of God.