Four Cups – Finally Free

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

For more information, visit Access.tv.

We are in part three of a five-part series that I'm really, really excited about.

The series has been really helpful as we've kind of explained who we are as a church and what really matters, why we do the stuff we do.

The series is called Four Cups.

And in this series, we're really looking at God's promises to humanity.

And here's one of the things I love.

If you open the Bible, there's over 7,400 promises of God from the beginning to the end.

And the promises are for you and they're for me.

But in the book of Exodus, chapter 6, it's interesting because God gives some promises through Moses to the people of Israel.

Exodus 6 · chapter mention

And these are what scholars call perpetual promises.

They keep on keeping on.

And the reason we know that is we can find them from Exodus all the way through to the end of the Bible.

They are the promises of God for us.

So what we said early in the series is when those first century Jews would get together, when they would take their communion or celebrate their Passover meal, they wouldn't have communion the way we do.

We have communion with one cup of juice or wine and then a little piece of bread.

They would have had four cups of wine, and each one they would sip from was a reminder of one of God's core promises to them.

We'll get after that together in just a moment.

I don't know if you ever had this moment, but you ever felt stuck in a moment?

Like honestly, you ever just felt stuck?

Like you couldn't get yourself out of a problem.

About five years ago, I told you two weeks ago, five years ago, I was in the nation of Israel, and this was a bucket list dream trip kind of trip for me.

The reason it was such a special trip is number one, I've always wanted to go see the places that I preach about every Sunday, so that was cool.

But the double blessing in it for me was the leader of the trip is one of my heroes.

Like if I had a Mount Rushmore of influential leadership voices in my life, the leader of this trip would have been on the Mount Rushmore, and all I wanted was to go on a trip to Israel with him as the leader.

I wanted to hear him talk about the places in the Bible.

I couldn't wait to go.

Now, this is important for you to know.

I love this man.

I respect this man.

This man knows me.

He knows my family, he knows my history, he he has my phone number in his phone, he knows me.

And when we got to Israel and we ran into him, we did one of those handshake hugs, and he said, Pastor Jason, so glad you're here.

And it was awesome.

And for the first couple days, everything was flawless, everything was awesome.

But then on day three, something awkward happened.

We were on the bus, and he had asked me to do something to help him throughout the trip, and he goes to say my name, but instead of saying my name, instead of saying Jason, he said, and as the J was coming out, it was like he glitched.

You ever had this happen to you, or you've ever seen someone that he's like kind of blinked?

And instead of saying Jason, the name Josh came out.

And I don't know why he said Josh, because like let's make it very, very clear.

My name is Jason, not Josh.

I'm never unclear about this.

If you follow me on Instagram, my name is at IMJasonBurns, not I am Josh Burns.

And he says Josh, and I think, no big deal, temporary glitch, it'll just be a moment.

But from that point on, he would only call me Josh.

The problem for me was I love this guy so much that I couldn't correct him.

He was a hero.

We were always in front of 30 or 40 people, and I couldn't be like, Dave Hoss is Jason, not Josh.

I know it seems simple, but I respect him too much.

I respect him so much that I thought about just changing my name to Josh.

It's like a Chick-fil-A.

If I go through the Chick-fil-A drive-thru and they mess up, I just think they know better than me and I eat whatever they give me.

I thought maybe he knew better than me.

Maybe I'm a Josh.

Maybe Jason is here and Josh is here.

Maybe that's what this is about.

And so I was like, I'm gonna go with it, but for days I couldn't correct it.

Well, then to make it worse, Pastor Ryan was on the trip with me, and I love this guy.

This guy has always had my back.

We are in the foxhole of life together, fighting together with each other.

But this jerk made it his personal mission to make me Josh the whole rest of the trip.

If I messed up, he'd be like, such a Josh move.

I'm like, oh, Josh is about to attack you, is about what's gonna happen right now.

You know, he would walk up to me when I was with the leader of the trip, and he's like, Sir, uh, Josh.

He would just say my name as Josh.

I was so mad, and there was just no way to ever correct him without making me and him feel dumb.

And so I just rolled with it.

Okay, now that is so silly.

All of us have had that experience where we're called the wrong name or where we call someone the wrong name.

I hate it when I do that.

We all understand what that feeling is like, right?

But today I want to ask a bigger question if you've ever felt this.

It's what do you do when you feel stuck?

Like, like not just with a name, not just with an awkward situation, but what do you do when you feel stuck, trapped in life?

Stuck in sin?

What do you do when you feel stuck in your shame?

What do you do when you feel stuck with condemnation or guilt or remorse?

What do you do when you feel stuck in a habit and you've tried everything you can possibly do to break the habit, to break the addiction, to break the generational cycles of sin in your life?

What do you do if you feel stuck?

If you are here today and you feel stuck in something in your life, today is for you.

And here's the truth.

All of us at one point or another, if not now, we get ourselves stuck.

One of the things I love about the four cups that represent the four promises of God is cup number two is for every person who might feel stuck.

If you have your Bibles or your message notes, pull those out.

Let's go to Exodus chapter six and let's read the verses that to this day the Jewish people will read as they come together for their Passover meal or what we might call communion.

Exodus chapter six says this.

It says, Therefore, say to the Israelites, God says to Moses, tell the Israelites, I am the Lord.

I've said this a few times, but when you see Lord in all caps, it was a reminder to the Jewish people of God's covenant name with them.

And God says, I am that I am.

I am Yahweh.

He says, I am the Lord.

And here's the first of the four promises.

Each one starts with I will.

So sometimes they're called the four I wills.

God says, I will bring you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians.

God's like, you're in slavery.

I'm literally gonna rescue you and get you out of it.

The second I will is God says, I will free you from being slaves to them.

Now, if you're honest, this almost feels redundant.

God's like, I'm gonna get you out, and then I'm gonna get you out again.

Like, what does that mean?

Well, these are two incredibly distinct promises of God.

I'm gonna spend all of our time today talking about how God doesn't just want to get us out of the captivity of our hearts, but he wants to get what is in our hearts out of us.

You see, here's what God understood about the people of Israel.

For hundreds of years, they and their generations of families had been held in slavery and in captivity in Egypt.

And God got them out of Egypt, but then he realized that if he didn't help them, they would still be stuck in those same cycles.

Their heart would still be enslaved.

Even though they were out of Egypt, it was like Egypt was still inside of them.

God says, I will free you from being slaves to them.

And then here's number three, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and mighty acts of judgment.

This phrase, I will redeem you, literally means God wants to restore you to your original intent.

God's like, I want to heal your heart to the place that it was before sin or guilt or shame or condemnation convoluted and messed everything up on the inside.

Next week we're gonna talk about this, how God wants to set your heart back to the way it was intended to be.

And then the fourth promises of God is I will take you as my own people.

Now I've said this and I want you to hear this.

The first three promises of God are for you, the individual.

But the fourth one, and really this is God's goal for all of us, is that he's not talking to you the individual, he's talking to you plural.

All of us, all the followers of Jesus.

He says, I will take you, all of you followers of Jesus, as my own people.

I'm gonna take you out of slavery.

I'm gonna get your heart free from the captivity it still lives in.

I'm gonna restore your heart to what it was intended to be, and then I'm gonna set you in a family.

I'm gonna do something with you that you could never do in your own strength and in your own power.

I'm gonna put you in with a group of family, of fellow believers, and together you will be my people, and you're gonna do something that is so fulfilling.

Then I love this phrase.

And he says, and I will be your God.

And this is so interesting.

It's like, it's not, it's not that, and not until you get to this point that you'll really know God to be who He really is.

He says, Then you will know that I am the Lord your God who brought you out from under the yoke of the Egyptians.

So here's what I want to do today.

Last week we started with cup number one, and this is so important for you to understand what these cups mean because each one of these is a promise from God that, in my opinion, is connected to every single person's spiritual journey.

You say, what does it mean?

It means that every person, whether you're a Christian, you've been a Christian longer than you can remember, or maybe you're here and you're only here because someone invited you and promised you a meal afterwards, but you're skeptical and cynical.

All of us are on some sort of a spiritual journey.

And what I love from Scripture is this is the journey God wants to take his people on.

Here are the four cups, and this is the language that the ancient Jews would have used to describe them, and each one has a promise of God associated with it.

The first one is called the cup of sanctification.

We talked about this last week.

And what God promises is he's gonna save us, he's gonna get us out of that condition of our hearts.

The second cup we're talking about today is called the cup of deliverance.

And this word feels weird because we think of deliverance as like exorcism or getting something nasty out of us.

God just wants you to be free, for your heart to no longer be enslaved and trapped in sin.

The third is what we'd call the cup of redemption.

God promises restoration for your heart to return to what it was before sin ever got in and enslaved your heart.

And then the fourth cup that I love so much is called the cup of praise.

And here's God's promise to you fulfillment.

That every day you can go to bed and say, that's how you do it.

That every night when your head hits the pillow, you say, Yes, this is living.

This is actually living.

And what does it look like for us to get here?

And as your pastor, let me say this to you: this is my goal.

In fact, you need to be here the next two weeks because most people never get past step number two.

But if you can get past step two, God's gonna use you in a way that literally changes the world.

Today, we're on the cup of deliverance, and I want to wrestle with this question for all of our time together.

Here it is.

So, how do you get the Egypt out of you?

Remember, the people of Israel were in slavery for hundreds of years.

God miraculously saves them.

He parts the Red Sea to set them free.

And then they're on their way, but even though they're physically free, their hearts are still trapped.

Their hearts are still stuck.

Even though they're out of Egypt, Egypt is still inside of them.

Now, to understand this, you need to understand the difference between salvation and God really fully freeing you.

In fact, a lot of Christians can get skeptical.

They're like, well, is it really true?

Like, am I actually really saved?

Like, don't I have to get everything together and everything fixed and everything right for God to love me?

Let me show it to you like this.

In the book of Ephesians, Paul says this, Ephesians 2, 8 and 9, he says, God saved you by his grace.

Not based on you, not based on your effort.

God saved you by his grace when you believed.

Not when you got it all figured out, not when you got it all together, not when you worked out all your rough edges, not when you figured out how to live a clean, healthy, perfect, sinless life.

He says, God saved you by his grace when you just simply believed.

And I love this.

And he says, and you can't take credit for this.

It is a gift of God.

Let me tell you why this matters about salvation.

If you could do something to earn your salvation, then you would take credit for it.

God wants you to understand that salvation is a gift that comes freely from Him.

In fact, look at the next line.

He says, salvation is not a reward for the good things we have done, so that none of us can boast about it.

Pause here for just a moment.

If you could earn your salvation, you would walk through this life proud of yourself, celebrating you.

But salvation is a free gift, freely given by God.

It is a measure of his love and his grace for humanity.

Now, this is where people get tripped up.

God saves us by his grace, but then he wants us to do something with that.

God saves us, but then he wants us to begin to actually work out our salvation.

God saves us, not because we've got everything perfect and together, he saves us because of his grace, but once he saved us, then he wants us to start doing the work of becoming more like Jesus.

Same author, Paul, in the book of Philippians says this.

He says, so now work hard.

Like do your part, put in the work to show the results of your salvation, obeying God with deep reverence and fear.

Like now that he saved you, now you've got to do something about it.

Then he says, For God is working in you, giving you the desire and the power to do what pleases him.

Now, this is an important thing for you to understand.

God saves us by his grace, but then there's a result.

There is our part in the process.

God saves us, but when he saves us, step two, the second cup, the cup of deliverance, is now we gotta put some work in.

Like there's something that you and I need to do.

Now, the reason this gets tricky for people, and this is one of the theological things people get all tripped up over, is they don't understand what this means.

Let me try to explain it to you like this.

Genesis chapter 1, 2, and 3, God creates the world, and we see in the creation narrative that God is what we would call a tri-une God.

Genesis 1 · chapter mention

Three parts God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit.

The book of Genesis says that God creates us, humanity, in his image as tri-une beings.

Here's what this means: it means that every person is made up of a body, soul, and a spirit.

You are you, but what makes you you is the combination of your body, soul, and spirit.

Let me try to explain it to you like this, and I'll give you very simple definitions.

Your body is the physical part of you.

This is the part you can see.

Here's the funny thing about your body.

It might be awesome, but it's got issues.

And if you don't believe me, get into your 40s, everybody.

Like you already got some issues.

Things stop working.

You start making weird grunting sounds every time you stand up.

Like your body is awesome, but over time it starts to break down.

It's great, it's not perfect.

The second part of us is our soul.

Our soul is the mind, the will, and the emotions of us.

And you might have an awesome soul, but here's the funny thing is that this whole part of you can get all messed up, can't it?

You can be ravaged with anxiety, you can struggle with depression.

And all of these things happen in our soul, but then there's the third part of you, which is your spirit, and your spirit is the part of us that is like God.

So let me try to explain the salvation process in cup one and two as best I can.

When you make the decision to follow Jesus, when you declare Jesus, you're the Lord of my life, I believe in you, I receive your gift of grace and salvation.

Instantly your spirit is made clean.

It's made new.

It can be received by God.

God is so holy that none of us can be in his presence with sin.

And so God makes our spirit new.

The problem for so many of us is that these other two parts of us aren't immediately made perfect and made clean.

So here's where it gets dangerous.

All of us probably know someone whose life is run by their body.

They're addicted to things, addicted to food, addicted to sex, addicted to pleasure.

And it has this way when you're led by those selfish desires of running your life off course.

Others of us know someone whose life is run by their soul.

It's so emotional, it's so driven by depressive thoughts and uh anxiety and fear and worry.

And here's what happens: a lot of us make the decision to follow Jesus, but then it doesn't immediately change our body and soul, and so we get frustrated.

That Jesus saves us and he makes us new, but then there's some work that has to happen.

What does it mean?

Well, what we just read a moment ago says that Jesus changes us, he makes our spirit new and makes our spirit clean, and he begins to give us the desires of God.

What is that?

It's that our body and our soul would also become subject to the leadership, or here's a better word, to the Lordship of Jesus Christ.

Now, this is a big deal at our church because our hope for you is that you'll make a decision to follow Jesus.

Cup number one, the cup of sanctification.

You'll receive God's gift of salvation.

But once God has saved you, then you've got to start working through the other issues that are not like Jesus.

You've got to start becoming more and more like Him.

Let me tell you why this matters to us.

As a church, we are so committed to this.

We want you to find freedom from your issues, freedom from your past, freedom from your yesterdays, that this is the reason that we do access groups.

And I want you to see this.

Access groups are a huge, huge deal here.

Why?

Because the way we get free is in community.

The way that we experience freedom once and for all is to allow God to save us and to change us, but we've now got to do something, and I want to tell you this: you really can't do the stuff that you need to do to finally get free once and for all on your own.

Let me show it to you like this, okay?

Let me give you three of my pastoral goals for you as you jump into an access group.

I want you to see these quickly.

Number one is we want you to get victory over sin.

Victory over sin once and for all, no longer driven by your lust, no longer driven by your desires, no longer feeling like you get run over by those habits and those addictions.

You get victory once and for all over sin.

Let me define sin this way.

Sin is what I do to myself.

It's when I mess up, it's when I make choices that put me in the direction of harm.

It's what I do to me.

And if you feel this way, I want you to see what Paul said.

Remember, Paul wrote like half of the New Testament, one of the heroes of the Bible, and in the book of Romans, chapter seven, and as we read this, I want you to earmark this because we're going to come back to this verse in a moment.

Romans chapter seven, here's what Paul says.

He says, So I find this law at work.

Although I want to do good, although my heart desires to do the things of God, although my spirit wants my body and my soul to cooperate, although I want to do good, evil is right there with me.

Anybody remember the old cartoons where an angel would pop up on one shoulder and the devil on the other shoulder?

This is essentially what Paul is saying.

He says, For in my inner being I delight in God's law.

My spirit wants what God wants for me, but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind, and making me a prisoner to the law of sin at work within me.

I feel stuck.

My spirit wants to do what's right, but my body and my soul don't always act the way I am.

And then look what he says about himself.

What a wretched man I am.

Like all of us are messed up.

All of us got issues.

And by the way, if you don't think you've got issues, that is your issue, everybody.

We've got issues.

And Paul's like, what a wretched man I am.

And then listen to this question.

Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?

Who's gonna step in and help me deal with the parts of me that feel out of my control?

And then listen to his response.

Thanks be to God who what's this?

Delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord.

I want you to once and for all walk in freedom from sin, freedom from your shame, freedom from your yesterdays.

I want you to get victory over sin.

That's the first thing I want for you.

The second thing I want for you is this not just freedom from my sin, but secondly, I want you to experience healing from your wounds.

What's the difference?

Well, sin is what I did, but wounds are what others did to me.

People that hurt you, said negative words over you.

It's that uncle that you trusted who abused you.

It's that assault that happened to you.

It's that marriage that he or she walked out on you.

I could go on and on and on with examples.

All of us walk with wounds.

You've been hurt, slandered, betrayed.

We all have been hurt by others.

But real freedom isn't just about getting over your sin, it's about also getting over the sin that happened to you.

So, what does it look like?

What are we supposed to do?

In the book of Ephesians, Paul says this.

Paul says, he says, and don't sin by letting anger control you.

Easier said than done, Paul.

Come on, anybody else?

Everybody, anybody else get so mad at people because people are the worst sometimes?

Come on, let's be real in church.

And he says, Don't sin by letting anger control you.

And then he uses this phrase don't let the sun go down while you are still angry.

For anger gives a foothold to the devil.

Every time I teach this verse, I think about this moment that happened when my boy Boys were young.

And my younger son Gavin has always been my jokester.

He's always been like the one who likes he finds joy in picking on his brother and sister.

And when he was little, he was exactly the same.

And there was a moment when he did something and he messed with his older brother, Joey, and Joey goes, Oh, I'm gonna get you, and they take off running.

And as they're running, Gavin gets into the room first, and Joey slams his foot in the door, and he says, I got you, sucker! And in that moment, all he knew was that because he had his foot in the door, he was eventually gonna get in.

Here's what Paul says that sin does to you and to me.

It's when we harp on those things, when the wounds become something that we carry from season to season in our life.

The enemy has a foothold, and if he has a foothold, eventually he'll get in and take over your life.

Part of walking in freedom is getting past your sin, but it's also getting over your wounds so that Satan can't get in and destroy.

Here's the third point that I want for you when it comes to finding freedom.

I want you to experience authority over the enemy.

Nobody likes this, but I want you to get this.

According to Scripture, the devil is a very real and active force in the world.

His whole intention is to steal worship from God and to destroy your purpose.

That's all he wants to do.

If he can get the attention off of God and onto you, and then secondly, if he can get you focused not on others but on yourself, it'll wreck your life.

In the book of Ephesians, Paul says this, Ephesians chapter 6, he says, Finally, be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power.

Ephesians 6 · chapter mention

Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil's schemes.

And he says this, for our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world, and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.

What he's saying is, there is a very real war being waged all around you.

And if you are not careful, you will find yourself succumbing to the pressure of the schemes of the work of the enemy in your life.

And God's like, I don't want that for you.

And as your pastor, I don't want that for you.

So let me speak to every person in the room who maybe today feels like they're trapped in their sin.

They find themselves still licking the wounds from their past, or they find themselves feeling like they're constantly under attack from the enemy.

If that is you, today's the day that I want you to drink from the second cup, the cup of deliverance.

This is it.

Now, do you do you remember earlier we read Romans chapter 7 where Paul says, I'm such a wretched man, like I want to do the right thing, and my spirit wants to do what is right, but the truth is my body just won't do what my spirit wants.

Romans 7 · chapter mention

If you literally go to the next verse, Romans chapter 8, verse 1, here's what he says.

Romans 8:1

So there is now no condemnation for those who belong to Christ Jesus.

Okay, you don't have to walk under the weight, under the oppression, under the enslavement of condemnation anymore, because there's no condemnation in Jesus.

He says, and because you belong to him, the power of the life-giving spirit has freed you from the power of sin that leads to death.

God wants to set you free once and for all.

He says, Those who are dominated by the sinful nature think about sinful things.

But those who are controlled by the Holy Spirit think about the things that please the Spirit.

So letting your sinful nature control your mind leads to death.

But letting the Spirit control your mind, your life leads to peace.

What would it look like if all of us just made this decision that I don't have to be in the driver's seat anymore?

That I can trust that God's way is better than my way, and I no longer have to live subject to the captivity of pain, of sin, of wounds, of unforgiveness, of betrayal.

I can once and for all walk in freedom that God has for me.

Statistically, I want you to hear this.

So they'll never experience the fulfillment that God has for them.

So what is the secret?

Like, what is the secret sauce?

If you're gonna get past your yesterdays and step into your tomorrow in freedom, what is the secret sauce?

Let me tell you this as a pastor who's pastored for almost two decades now, as a person who's had hundreds and hundreds of counseling sessions with people who feel so stuck in their sin.

Here it is, ready?

Right relationships are the key.

I'll say it to you like this: show me your friends and I'll show you your future.

Like your friends have the ability to help you experience freedom or to keep you trapped in the bondage of your own sin.

In the book of Proverbs, I love this.

Solomon, the wisest man to ever live, said, He who conceals his sins does not prosper.

But whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy.

We gotta confess our sins, and here's why this matters God will not heal what we conceal.

Come on, we do this, don't we?

Like some of you came to church today and you fought with your family the whole way here.

And you walked in the doors and you said, kids, get it together.

How are you?

Oh, brother, I'm so good.

We say church and think, glory to God.

No, no, no.

What if you were just real?

Like, there is something powerful about confession.

It breaks the stronghold of sin on our lives.

Now, let me show it to you two ways.

This is important.

Because God gave us a recipe to get out of the bondage of sin.

Here they are.

First of the one is 1 John chapter 1, verse 9.

1 John 1:9

It says, if we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us of our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.

Pause here for just a moment.

And this is where a lot of us stay.

A lot of us, oh God, forgive me.

Oh God, I messed up again.

Oh God, I gave into that habit.

Oh God, I gave into that addiction.

Oh God, I gave into that cycle of sin again.

Oh God, forgive me.

And here's what 1 John says.

If you confess to God, He's faithful and just.

He forgives immediately.

Your spirit is washed clean.

But your body and your soul might still feel at odds with what your spirit is feeling.

So how do you get final and full freedom?

You ready?

James chapter 5.

James 5 · chapter mention

This is so uncomfortable.

James 5 says this.

Therefore, confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you might be healed.

Okay.

So we confess to God, and Scripture says that He's faithful and just, and He'll forgive us and cleanse us, but it's not until we confess to someone else that we find healing.

Okay.

I wonder how many of us we've asked God to heal the thing that we're concealing.

I wonder how many of us were frustrated at God, oh God, I've tried everything, but we've never taken the step of full confession to someone else.

So look, I like to be very practical as a pastor.

My goal is to give you very clear next steps.

And I want to talk to you for just a moment with three simple ideas for how all of us can actually walk in freedom.

Like, like how incredible would it be if you got past that thing that kept hanging you up?

Like how amazing would it be if once and for all you could step over the issue in your life that keeps tripping you up?

How free would you feel if you no longer felt in captivity to your yesterdays?

Here's three things I want to challenge every person with.

The first one is this if you haven't done this, I want to challenge you to go public with your faith through water baptism.

What is water baptism?

Water baptism is a public declaration of the personal decision you've made to follow Jesus.

Let me be very clear.

Water baptism doesn't make you a Christian any more than my wedding ring makes me married.

My wedding ring is a symbol of the fact that I am married and that I do love my wife and that I am fully committed to her, but the ring is just a symbol.

It's all it is, it's a symbol of my commitment.

Water baptism is a public declaration of the personal decision you've made.

It doesn't save you, but it publicly declares it.

Why does the public declaration matter?

If we confess to God, he forgives.

If we confess to others, we find freedom.

This is a public step.

So here's what I want you to do.

Next slide for me, please.

I want every person in our church who has not gotten baptized to stop playing games.

October 20th, just a few weeks from now, we're having a big baptism.

First time we're having baptism in South Lakeland and North Lakeland.

It's going to be unbelievable.

We're so excited about that.

And it won't be complete without you.

So if you have not taken this step, pull your phone out and go to access.tv slash info.

Access.tv slash info and we'll get you all the details.

We'll get you signed up.

I want you to go public and something profound happens in you when you publicly confess what God has done in your life.

Second thing I want you to do is this.

I want you to make this decision to join the church.

And I probably should have said join a church, because if it's not access, I get it, but I want this for you because something powerful happens when you find your life in community.

Remember, we become the sum of the relationships in our life.

The key to finding freedom is being in the right relationships.

You need to be around the right people.

And let me be very clear about this.

I hope it's access.

I like our church a lot.

But if it's not access, find a church and just go all in with the church.

Why?

Because you make it better.

One of the great mistakes I see from so many people is they think to themselves, I don't really need it this week.

Everything's good in my life.

You may not need it this week, but someone might need what you bring to the table.

You need to be there to love people.

Listen to me, don't just blow out of church as soon as it's over.

Find someone, connect with someone, pour your life into someone else, and you never know when you'll need to be on the receiving end of being in the church.

Let me take it a step farther.

How do you officially join the church?

Well, every single month on the first and second Sunday of the month, we have an event at our church called the Next Steps class.

Our Next Steps class is two steps.

Step one is about our church, step two is about you.

I want you to be a part of it.

And for the first time ever in North Lakeland, shout out North Lakeland.

This is awesome.

We're having it.

You can register today again at access.tv slash info.

I want that for you.

But here's really the point, okay?

As a church, we do four things.

They're tied to the four promises of God.

The first thing we do is we do weekend worship service so you can know God and get out of your sinful life and into relationship with God.

But the second thing we do is we do whatever it takes to help people find freedom.

And the way that happens is when we get into an access group.

What is an access group?

It's when we get out of rows and we get into circles.

Access groups literally start today, and we don't do this to give you one more thing on your calendar.

We don't do this so that you'll have more stuff to do, or so hopefully you can find some more relationships.

We do this to build community.

That's a part of it.

But can I tell you the real part?

Is I want you to find freedom.

I no longer want you to take one more moment of your life living in captivity.

I don't want you to live in sin.

I don't want you to live in shame.

I want you to live in freedom.

Let me ask, answer a couple quick questions that people have.

Sometimes people are like, Do I really, do I really need to?

Like, I'm not the most personable person.

You need relationships.

You need people who love you, people who you can be honest with, people you can stop pretending everything is good and fine and you can just love them.

Why why do we do them in homes?

Why don't we just do it at church?

Why don't we do Sunday school?

Let's do them in homes.

Like, why do we do that?

Can I tell you why we do that?

It's because there are some people who will never darken the front step of a church door, but they're comfortable coming to your house.

Can I tell you one of my goals?

I dream of a day when access is thousands of people, and more people are connected through our city through access groups than are even coming to the church.

Why?

I see them as an evangelistic opportunity.

It's an opportunity to share your faith.

I literally heard a story this week of an athlete at one of our local colleges who made a decision to follow Jesus, but she's had some church hurt, so she's not quite ready to come to church yet.

And it's perfect because there's a group already for her.

Let's make this decision.

Let's open our homes.

I want you to find a group.

I want you to push past your comfort zone.

And I want you to find a group because I want you to find freedom.

I don't need you to do one more thing.

I don't need your life more full.

It's already plenty busy.

But this is worth it.

Your freedom is on the line.

I want you to go to access.tv slash groups today.

And I want you to find a group.

And then I want to speak directly to those of you who have been a part of this church for more than like six months.

Okay.

I want to challenge you to be the answer for someone else to maybe the prayer that you're praying now or you've prayed in your past.

What is that prayer?

God help me get free.

What does this look like?

I'm gonna challenge you right now.

Pull your phone out.

In fact, everybody pull your phone out.

And I want you to go to this website.

We we want you to lead a group someday.

And so we came up with a really simple website, access.tv slash leadlader.

We've said to you many times, we want you to lead a group, we want you to lead a group.

And many of you like, I don't know, I got questions, I don't know about house, I don't know, whatever.

Like, we'll answer all the questions for you.

We want you to lead a group.

Here's what this means.

If you go to this QR code or go to access.tv slash lead later, here's what we're going to do for you.

We want to challenge you to get in a group that literally starts this week.

And I want you to get into the group with one extra intention.

The first one we want you to connect, we want you to find freedom.

But the bonus intention is I want you to pay attention and learn because I'm challenging you to lead.

Why does this matter?

It matters because people matter to God.

It matters because we've been having 2,500 people a weekend show up to church here.

We've got over a hundred groups, which is awesome.

But if everybody showed up to a group, our groups are not small groups, they are big groups.

We need like 250 to 300 groups right away.

I challenge you to take a step of obedience.

I challenge, I'm not asking you to lead right now.

I'm asking you to go to the site, put your name, phone number, and email address in, and just commit to learning, commit to paying attention, and we're gonna come alongside you and help you.

We're gonna resource you, we're gonna give you everything you need.

Why?

Because people matter, because freedom matters, because Christians will never take hold of the life that God has for them if they're constantly tripping over their sin and stuck in their shame and stuck in condemnation.

So, what if you made this decision to say, God, I'm willing to be the answer to the prayer that I've prayed at one point in my life?

But Jason, I love my group, I understand, but you can be in on mission and in ministry with our church.

What would it look like if all of us just made this decision together?

I'm in access.tv slash lead leader.

Would you do this?

Would you bow your head and close your eyes all across this place?

We only do four things as a church.

Today I want to challenge you to take that massive second step.

I want to challenge you to drink from the cup of deliverance.

I want to challenge you to find freedom from your yesterdays.

God saved you.

Now he wants to help you work those issues out of your life.

And that happens when we stop pretending.

We get in community, the right relationships.

So, God, would you give us courage in this moment to push past our comfort?

For some of us, God, we've been so trapped in sin.

We believe that when we make the decision to follow Jesus, our spirit is instantly made new.

But we've struggled with sin and habits and addictions and shame.

God, I pray that everyone that comes through the doors of this church will once and for all experience true freedom, the kind of freedom that only you can give.

God, give us courage to take a step towards community and a step towards freedom.

May we confess to you and find freedom from our sin, forgiveness from our sin.

But may we confess to others, as James 5 says, so that we can find freedom once and for all healing in our hearts.

Thank you, God, for that.

With your head still bowed and your eyes still closed, maybe you came today.

And whether you're here or joining us in North Lakeland or tuning in at Church Online, anywhere in the world, and maybe you examine your heart and you know that you haven't even taken the first step.

The first step of the spiritual journey is letting Jesus be the Lord and Savior of your life.

Maybe he's never saved you, or maybe you just feel like you prayed a prayer when you were little, but you just be real.

You walked away from it.

If this is you and you need to take a step to start or restart a relationship with Jesus, this moment's for you right now.

If this is you, would you raise your hand right now?

Jason, this is me.

Thanks.

Yep, thanks.

This is your moment.

If this is you, I'm gonna ask you to pray this with me.

Praying a prayer changes everything when you mean it with your heart.

Would you say, Jesus, today I give you my life?

Would you be my Lord and my Savior?

Thank you that you save me from my sin.

You forgive me once and for all.

Jesus, today I make this decision.

I receive your gift of salvation.

I believe you died on the cross to pay for my sins, and I receive that gift.

It's a gift that comes from your grace alone.

So, Jesus, thank you that you save me, make me new, and from this day forward I'll follow you.

I love you, Jesus.

I give you my life, and it's in your name I pray.

Amen.

Church fam, we just had people pray to make that decision.

Let's celebrate together.

Love it.