Constant Friend

Good evening, everyone. If you have your Bible with you

tonight, you can go ahead and open it to Hebrews chapter 13.

Hebrews 13 · chapter mention

We're going to be in verses 5 through 8 in there.

We are going to be moving around Scripture.

Luckily, I have the TA team in the back.

They're going to be having the Scriptures up on the slides for

you as well. But Hebrews 13 is where I want

to begin and it's where we're going to get into the message.

It's also where we're going to come back to at the end.

Now, again, Pastor Blake did introduce me, but for those of

you who don't know me, I am Miriam Hernandez again, one of

the interns here at Liberty Church outside of the church.

A couple of you know me as Staff Sergeant Hernandez and very few

of you know me as Badger. I'm 26 years old and I've served

in the Marine Corps for about 8 years now.

And I've loved wearing the uniform, I've loved serving,

I've loved the people I've been able to lead and the

relationships that I've built while I've been in.

But unfortunately, that season is coming to a close for me.

And as I transition out of the Marine Corps, God has been

reminding me that while one season of my life of serving is

ending, there's another one that's just beginning.

And what's really special for me, especially here at Liberty

Church and getting to stand up here in front of you all today

is I less than a year ago, I actually got promoted to staff

Sergeant right up here. So thank you to the Liberty

Church staff who were able to make that happen.

But before I go any further, I also want to take some time to

thank Pastor Blake not only for giving us opportunities, the

interns and other leaders of the church to get up here and

preach, but for creating a culture where vulnerability

isn't seen as a weakness, it's seen as obedience.

He taught us that sometimes the greatest act of faith is not

standing up and pretending we have all the answers.

Sometimes the greatest act of faith is simply saying this is

what Jesus is teaching me. So thank you, Pastor Blake, for

sharing your pulpit with me today.

Now, when Pastor Blake gave us the assignment, he asked US1

simple question, What didn't you know then that you know now?

And I'll be honest, if I shared with a couple of you what I was

preaching on originally, that message changed in the middle of

it. Somewhere along the way God

changed the message and in some of it God changed me because

every time I sat down to write my sermon or make edits to it,

he kept bringing me back to one thing, one relationship, one

lesson, one person. So if you're following along in

Hebrews chapter 13, verse five, in the second part of the verse,

Hebrews 13 · chapter mention

it says, for God has said, I will never fail you.

I will never abandon you. And just a few verses later in

Hebrews verse 8, it says Jesus is the same yesterday, today,

and forever in church. These two verses have been an

anchor for me this past year. Hebrews 13 five tells me he'll

never leave me. And Hebrews 13/8 says he remains

the same. And if we can just sit with that

for a second, He doesn't say I'll stay if you're faithful

enough. He doesn't say I'll stay if you

stop struggling. He doesn't say I'll I will leave

you. He simply says, I will never

leave you. Never.

And there are people in this room who know what it's like to

be left, maybe by a parent, maybe by a spouse, maybe by a

friend, maybe by someone you were convinced would always be

there. People change, relationship

change, circumstances change. But our God makes a promise that

no human being has ever been able to perfectly keep.

I will never abandon you. And over the last year, I've

learned how much I needed both of those truths because

everything in my life started changing.

My career is changing, my health is changing, my plans are

changing, my understanding of myself is changing, and I even

I'm changing. But Jesus.

Jesus never changed. He remained my constant.

And I don't know about you, but I don't really like change.

If I find a restaurant I like, I'm probably ordering the same

thing. If I need to experiment, I

already know what works. And something we often say if it

ain't broke, don't fix it. And some of you are exactly the

same. Some of you are actually sitting

in the same seat you do every Sunday or every Wednesday night.

But life doesn't ask us if we're OK with change.

Jobs change. Relationships change.

Health change, plans change, the Marine Corps changes, people

move away. Sometimes people you love, like

Pastor Autumn and Pastor Anna and you have to learn to live

with what does that friendship look like this season?

And sometimes even a phone call can change your life forever.

So let me ask you, what in your life has changed recently?

Is it your health? Is it your marriage?

Your career, it's a a relationship, a friendship,

friend that's moved away. Maybe your family is growing, or

maybe you're entering something you never expected to walk

through. Or maybe everything around you

looks the same, feels the same, but deep down something and you

feels like it's changing. You see, we can make plans, we

can prepare, we can try our hardest to control what comes

next. But life has a changing when we

Life has a way of changing when we least expect it.

Somewhere in the middle of all that change, God began teaching

me something. The greatest comfort in a

changing life is an unchanging Savior.

And I think that's why the idea of Jesus as my friend has become

so important to me. Friendship has always been

something that's important to me.

Most of my life I've spent I'm in my adulthood has been single,

and the Marine Corps teaches you very quickly the value of

brotherhood and sisterhood. I have the kind of friendships

where people have walked through these different seasons with me,

the kind where someone knows when you're not OK, even when

you say you're OK. So when I really started

thinking about Jesus as my friend, it challenged me.

Because if I'm honest, I knew Jesus.

I knew him as my Saviour, I knew him as my Lord, I knew he loved

me. I knew he died for me.

I knew all the VBS right answers.

And even today when we sing about him as a friend, I don't

think I fully understood what it meant to know Jesus as my

friend. Because there's a difference

between knowing Jesus and actually knowing Jesus.

And we heard a little bit about that a couple weeks ago when

Brenda preached because there's a difference.

Friendship changes how you approach someone.

And if you think about your closest friend, when something

happens, who do you call? When your whole world feels like

it's falling apart, who do you call?

Your closest friend is probably who you call.

And when you call them, you don't have to rehearse

everything you need to say. You don't have to pretend that

everything is OK. You don't have to clean yourself

up before you show up. Why?

Because they know you. They know you're I'm fine means

you're really not. They know your history.

They know your personality. They know your struggles, the

things that make you laugh, the things that hurt you.

They know the parts of you that nobody else has seen.

Now imagine a friend who knows you even deeper than that.

A friend who knows every thought you've never said out loud,

every fear, every insecurity, every battle you fought in

silence, every question you've been afraid to ask, and they

know the parts of you that you tried to hide from everybody

else. He knows it all.

And instead of walking away, he stays.

That's Jesus, and maybe someone needs to hear this tonight.

You don't have to convince yourself that Jesus to Jesus

that you're hurting. You don't have to explain every

detail before he understands. You don't have to pretend with

him. He already knows.

He knows what you're experiencing.

He knows what you're running from.

He knows what you're battling and he knows what you're afraid

of, and he knows the outcome that you cannot see yet.

And still he stays. That's my friend, my constant,

and that's what I want to show you tonight.

Over the next 30 to 40 minutes, I'm going to invite you into one

of my hardest seasons. And it's a little bit difficult

to talk about because I'm still in the season.

I still have questions. I still don't know exactly what

comes next. But tonight I don't just want to

invite you into my valley. I want to introduce you to my

shepherd. Because the sermon isn't about

my pain, isn't a sermon about my testimony.

It's a sermon about the faithfulness of Jesus, my

constant friend. So if you remember one thing

tonight, don't remember my story, remember my shepherd.

Because what I'm about to share with you isn't ultimately a

story about what happened to me. It's a story about who Jesus has

been to me. So before I go into what I'm

going through, I want to share a little bit about what did my

relationship with Christ look like.

So in the beginning, before I knew Jesus as my constant

friend, I grew up a Catholic and my whole family is actually so

Catholic. And for almost 17 years I served

faithfully. I went through all the

sacraments. I even taught the school, the

school there for other children to earn their sacraments.

And I did what I thought I was supposed to do.

But looking back now, I realized I was approaching God more like

a checklist than a relationship. I thought if I served enough, if

I volunteered, if I did enough, if I was good enough, that maybe

one day I would earn salvation or what God wanted me to have.

But then in 2017, everything changed.

I ended up at a Bible college. And no, I wasn't there to study

theology. I wasn't even a Christian when I

attended. I was there to play soccer, but

God had a different plan for me. I thought I was joining a soccer

team, but turns out God was having me join his team instead.

And it was there that some friends explained the gospel to

me. Not just religion, not just

church. Jesus.

They showed me Jesus, and for the first time I understood what

salvation was. It wasn't something I could

earn. It was a gift.

And in Ephesians chapter 2 verses 8 through 9, it says God

Ephesians 2:8–9

saved you by his grace when you believed and you can't take

credit for this. It is a gift from God, a gift.

You don't earn gifts, you receive them.

But looking back, I realized something.

Even after I accepted Jesus, I still related to Him more like

an employee than a friend. I obeyed Him, I respected him, I

worshipped him. But did I actually spend time

with Him? Have you ever had someone who

called you only when they needed something?

It's like you see their name pop up on your phone and you're

already thinking, what does this person need?

Sometimes that's how we treat Jesus.

We come to him when life falls apart, when the diagnosis comes,

when the relationship ends, when anxiety shows up, when we don't

know what's next and he's gracious enough to meet us

there. Don't let him be your emergency

contact. I had to ask myself, if I call

Jesus my closest friend, does my life actually reflect that?

Am I spending time with him? Am I sitting quietly with him?

Am I opening His word because I love him or because I'm just

trying to check off another Christian box?

Because friendship takes time, and you can't call someone your

closest friend if you're not spending time with him.

Why would our relationship with Jesus work any differently?

So what does that mean for us? It means we can't wait for the

crisis to start building relationship with Jesus, as

Pastor Blake mentioned as we opened up today.

Get to know him now. Spend time with him.

Open His word, talk to Him when nothing is wrong, sit with Him

when you don't need an answer. Learn to be comfortable in the

silence because there will be values in life and you want to

know the voice of your shepherd before you find yourself walking

through one. Don't just know Jesus, know Him.

And I didn't realize how much I was going to need to recognize

his voice until I found myself in the valley.

I wish I could tell you when I started following Christ that

life immediately became easier. That following Christ meant that

you never had to struggle. And if that were true, this

would be a very encouraging sermon.

But that wouldn't be the truth. I think sometimes we do

ourselves a disservice by only sharing the good parts of our

story. Because following Jesus doesn't

mean we avoid hard seasons. It means we never walk through

them alone. And for a long time, I thought

strength meant being able to carry everything.

And if you know anything about the Marine Corps or the

military, you know we're taught to show up.

You lead, you take care of your Marines, you accomplish the

mission. You keep going when things are

hard. And honestly, that fit my

personality pretty well. I like being dependable.

I like being the person people could count on.

I thought strength meant being able to say I've got it.

And though I thought I trusted God, I thought I prayed enough.

I thought I worked hard enough and kept showing up.

I could handle whatever came my way, but God and His kindness

showed me something. I was depending on my own

strength far more than I realized.

Last year became one of the hardest seasons of my life, and

again, it's a season that I'm still walking through around

August of 2025. It started with loss, or in June

of 2025 I experienced losing someone I deeply cared about and

had known for years. He was my Junior Marine when he

entered the fleet, so I knew him from Japan all the way to North

Carolina. But unfortunately, he lost the

battle of his mind and committed suicide.

And I remember standing there outside the barracks room

parking lot, trying to process something that felt impossible

to understand. I remember the questions.

I remember the pain. I remember wondering, God, how

do I lead people through something I don't even know how

to process myself? And maybe you've experienced

that. Maybe yours wasn't suicide.

Maybe it was losing someone you loved for others is a diagnosis

or a relationship ending, A prayer that still hasn't been

answered, A season you never expected to walk through.

There are moments in life where people can say all the right

things, but there are no words to fix what hurts.

Grief doesn't disappear just because someone quotes a Bible

verse. Sometimes you just have to sit

in the presence of God and say, Lord, I don't understand this,

but I need you. That was one of the first times

God began teaching me that I didn't need Him to explain

everything. He was teaching me that

sometimes His presence is greater than any explanation.

And the next morning I still had to show up.

I still had to lead. I still had to be there for my

Marines. And I remember praying one

simple prayer. Lord, give me enough strength

for today. Not strength for next year, not

strength for every unknown thing that would come for the rest of

the year, Just strength for today.

And He did, because God doesn't give us tomorrow's strength

today. He gives us today's daily bread,

today's grace, today's mercy, because if He gave us everything

at once, we'd probably stop depending on Him, and instead He

teaches us to come back every single day.

A couple months later, we still had to continue our mission.

We left for training to Yuma, AZ.

I remember thinking, OK, Lord, I think I understand the lesson,

and I'm sure a couple of us have done that.

After a hard season, we're like, God, I got this, I got it, we

can move on. I thought I had learned how to

depend on him every day, but three days after we had arrived

in Arizona for training, we got another phone call and had to

hold another formation. Another one of our Marines had

committed suicide, and this one hit differently because I had

just seen him. Three days before we left, he

had stopped by my barracks room and I remember seeing his smile.

And now, three days into this two week, 10 week long training

exercise, here we are again. Another Marine, another loss,

another group of Marines looking to their leaders.

And leaders are grieving too. And once again we had to show

up. But something was different this

time. Not the grief, it still hurt.

Not the questions, I still had them.

I was different because the first loss taught me I didn't

have to carry everybody. I gave them to God.

I could bring Marines to him. I could bring my grief to him.

I could bring my questions to him and I could say, Jesus, I

don't know how to lead through this, but you do.

And then I could show up, not because suddenly I was stronger,

but because I knew where my strength came from.

And what's crazy is that shortly after all this happened, I had

prayed. God used me in the desert, but I

haven't had a different idea of the way that God would use me.

I thought God using me, Matt, I was going to do something great

with my job, but that was a little pride speaking.

God began using me in the very place I felt weak, which was my

faith. Marines started coming to church

with me. What I thought might be me just

going to church alone became a few of us driving every Sunday

together. We started opening God's Word

together. We had devotionals in our tents

and conversations started happening.

They started asking questions and I didn't have all the

answers, but I knew where to take them and often times they

also encouraged me to take him to him as well.

I realized God didn't need me to be everybody saviour, they

already had one. My responsibility was to point

them to Him, and that changed the way I LED, because sometimes

God does His deepest work in US before He does His work through

us. While I was trying to point

Marines back to Jesus, Jesus was reminding me just how much I

needed Him to. There we were literally in the

middle of the desert. And the desert has a way of

exposing what you depend on where you run to where you go

when your own strength runs out. Because you don't realize just

how thirsty you are until there's no water insight.

And that's when John chapter 4 started becoming very real for

John 4 · chapter mention

me. You see, in John chapter 4,

John 4 · chapter mention

Jesus is talking to the woman at the well.

And the woman came looking for ordinary water, but Jesus

started talking to her about something much deeper.

And Jesus says in John chapter 4 verses 13 through 14, anyone who

John 4:13–14

drinks this water will soon become thirsty again.

But those who drink the water I give will never be thirsty

again. It becomes a fresh bubbling

spring within them, giving them eternal life.

I had read that verse before, but now I was living it.

I was learning, learning. Leadership couldn't sustain me.

Being needing couldn't sustain me.

Even serving couldn't sustain me.

And those things aren't bad, but they were never meant to be my

source. Jesus was.

Jesus wasn't only the one who would lead me out of the desert,

he's a living water who would say me in it.

And being sustained by Jesus also started changing what I

thought strength looked like, because I used to think

depending on Jesus meant Jesus. Give me enough strength and I'll

take it from here. But sometimes we reach a place

where we just don't need strength to take the next step.

We need him to carry us through it.

If you think about a little kid riding on their shoulders of

their dad from a distance, they're both moving forward.

But that little boy isn't carrying the weight of every

step. He's not worried about where

they're going. The Father's carrying them, and

I realize that's me. I thought following Jesus meant

being strong enough to handle whatever came my way while He

walked beside me. But there were moments in the

season where I didn't even have any strength to walk, and my

father wasn't standing there disappointed in me because I

wasn't strong enough. He carried me on his shoulders.

And just when I thought I understood what God was teaching

me, my own health became my next unknown.

And that season brought a different desert, because

waiting is its own kind of wilderness.

There's something different about not knowing, not knowing

the answer, not knowing the timeline, not knowing what comes

next. I started dealing with health

issues that led to hospital visits, tests, appointments, and

a lot of uncertainty. And if I'm honest, that's a

place where anxiety and depression became very real for

me because I like plans and I like knowing what comes next.

I like preparing. And suddenly I couldn't prepare

for everything or anything. I was hospitalized 2 weeks

before the training ended in Arizona.

And I didn't know what my future in the Marine Corps looked like.

I didn't know what my health would look like.

I didn't know what came next. And that's a hard place to be.

And some of you may know that feeling.

You're waiting for a diagnosis, you're waiting for a

relationship to heal, waiting on a prayer you've been praying for

years and every war on everyone around.

You may think you're OK, but inside you're asking God, what

are you doing in my life? And to be honest with you, I

still don't have any answer and I still have very hard days.

I still have moments where anxiety gets really loud and I

still have so many questions. But here's what I do know.

I know the one who already knows.

He knows what tomorrow holds, He knows the outcome, and He knows

what I'm carrying before I even say a word.

And that's why first Peter chapter 5 verse 7 has also

1 Peter 5:7

become another meaningful verse to me.

And it says give all your worries and cares to God, for he

cares about you. It doesn't say carry it until

you're strong enough. It doesn't say figure it out

first. It says give it to him.

Why? Because he cares.

And then God reminded me of another truth, Second

2 Corinthians 12:9

Corinthians chapter 12, verse 9, which also happens to be the

verse right behind me and was a verse that Pastor Blake also

sent to me while I was in the hospital.

It says my grace is all you need.

My power works best in weakness, and I used to think God wanted

the strongest version of me, the version that had everything

together, the version that could handle what came next.

But God showed me that some of his deepest work happens in

places where we finally admit, I can't do this without you.

Weakness is not the end of usefulness.

Sometimes weakness is the place where we finally see just how

God, just how strong God has always been.

And that brings us to what I think God is asking us to do.

Release what you were never meant to carry.

Some of us are exhausted because we're carrying tomorrow, today.

We're carrying outcomes we can't control.

We're carrying people we can't save.

We're carrying diagnosis we can't solve.

We're carrying anxiety, fear, uncertainty, relationships,

career, grief, the future, and wondering why we're tired.

But Jesus never asked you to be your own Savior.

He already filled that position. So maybe your next step isn't to

try harder. Maybe your next step is

surrender. Maybe your prayer is simply

Jesus. I can't carry this anymore.

Again. I thought strength meant holding

everything together. And what I know now is that

sometimes strength looks like finally opening your hands.

I thought I needed God to change my circumstances, but God was

changing me through them. I thought I needed him to remove

the desert. Instead, He became my living

water. In it, I thought I needed all

the answers, and instead He taught me to trust His presence.

And He also taught me something else.

I was never meant to walk through this alone.

Through all of this, Jesus was teaching me to depend on Him.

But there's another part of dependence that was much harder

for me to learn. Letting other people help me.

I told you earlier that I was used to being the person who

showed up, the leader, the dependable one, the person who

took care of everybody else. But that season, this season has

put me in a position I'm not comfortable with.

I became the person that needed other people to show up for me.

And honestly, that was hard, and it still is, because there's a

difference between being willing to serve someone else and being

willing to admit this time I need somebody to show up for me.

And what I didn't expect was that sometimes his answer comes

through another person's obedience.

Because in the middle of everything I was walking

through, people showed up. And when I say people showed up,

I'm not talking about them sending me a text saying, hey,

I'm praying for you. They served me.

After losing the first Marine to suicide, I was supposed to lead

the recreation VBS group and I just didn't have it in me.

I didn't have the courage to stand up and lead like

everything was OK, and before I could figure anything out and

hold it all together, Jared and Beatrice took care of it.

Emily McElroy stepped up. Michael and Jake, along with

others, stepped in to finish the posters and help take care of

all the other things that still needed to get done.

I had the pastors and staff from the church calling me on my

drives away to just pray for me. The Davis family offered me food

at Casa de Los Davis, and that same kind of a community has

continued as I've navigated all these medical unknowns.

Friends and family brought me food in the hospital and drove

me to appointments so I didn't have to go alone, and I've had

people I can call in the church when I have medical questions

and tests that I don't understand.

I've had my therapist help me process the things I don't know

how to process on my own. And when I physically couldn't

be at work or miss a lot of work days, my Marines stepped up and

carried responsibilities and things that still needed to be

done. None of these people could fix

anything that I was walking through.

They couldn't change what happened.

They couldn't give me every medical answer.

They couldn't remove any uncertainty.

But they could show up and they did.

In church. I think that is serving.

Sometimes we hear the word serve and immediately think of putting

on a name tag for care team or joining a ministry team and

signing up for a position. And those things matter.

But serving is much bigger than filling a position.

Sometimes serving looks like you don't have the strength to do

this right now, so I'll fill the gap.

Those things seem small to the person doing them, but to the

person that's receiving them, they mean a great deal.

And looking back, I realized sometimes Jesus reminds you that

he's holding your hand through the hands of his people.

And that's the beauty of the church.

The church isn't just a place we attend, it's a place the family

that we belong to. In Ecclesiastes chapter 4,

Ecclesiastes 4:9–10

verses 9 through 10, which is a verse you commonly hear at

weddings, two people are better off than one, for they can help

each other succeed. If one person falls, the other

can reach out to help. And then it says, but someone

who falls alone is in great real trouble.

And I understand that Scripture differently now because there is

moments when I was the person who had fallen and someone

reached out a hand. And that's biblical community.

Biblical community is more than just people, just more than just

having people around you. It's having people around you

who point you back to Jesus. People who remind you and say,

remember who your God is when you forget.

People who remind you and say, remember what he has done when

your circumstances become louder than his promises.

People who pray when you don't have the words.

People who sit beside you when there's nothing to say.

People who step in when you're tired and don't have the

strength to keep doing everything yourself.

There were moments in the season when I needed people to do that

for me. And one day, somebody may need

you to do that for them. And that's why I want to

encourage you tonight to build community before you need

community. Don't wait until you're sitting

in a hospital room. Don't wait until your marriage

is struggling. Don't wait until grief hits.

Don't wait until anxiety becomes overwhelming.

Build relationships now. And one of the ways that we

build those relationships is by getting connected.

And for some of you, if you belong to Liberty Church, that

means joining a small group. And I can tell you from

experience just how much that's meant to me.

My small group leaders, Joya and Heather, have been a part of of

a community that has poured into me.

Because small group isn't just another event on your calendar.

It's another opportunity to be known to have people who pray

for you, people who notice when you're missing, people who

celebrate you when life is good and sit with you when it isn't.

People who point you back to your constant friend when you're

having a hard time seeing him yourself.

And your community may be built in different places.

It can be through small groups. It can be through ladies

ministry or men's ministry. Maybe the north of 50 even

Sports Ministry, which I had the opportunity to attend last

Saturday and pickleball was a lot of fun.

So I do encourage you guys to come out and maybe it's serving

behind the scenes in TA. And if Liberty isn't your church

home, hear my heart. I'm not asking you to build your

community here. I'm asking you to build

community where God has planted you.

If you belong to another church, lean into that church.

Find your people, join a group, serve.

Let yourself be known. And if you don't have a church

home, you're welcome to come join us here at Liberty.

And if not, find a Bible believing church where you can

grow, serve, be known, and serve others.

Because we're never meant to simply attend church.

We were created to belong to the body of Christ.

And serving doesn't stop when you leave the church building.

Serving is a posture. It's looking at the people God

has already placed in your life and asking God, who can I love?

Well, today maybe it's your friend, your Marine, your

student, your Co worker, your neighbor, a family member,

someone here at church, someone who's hurting quietly and needs

somebody to notice. Sometimes serving isn't showing

up, or sometimes serving is showing up.

Sometimes it's praying, sometimes it's volunteering,

sometimes it's simply sitting beside someone who's hurting

without trying to fix them. And here's what I have learned.

You don't have to do something big to make a big difference in

somebody's valley. Every act of service said

something to me. You're not walking through this

alone. And sometimes that's exactly

what somebody needs to hear. So here's your invitation.

Don't just attend. Belong.

Find your people, serve your people, and allow people to

serve you. Because sometimes that reminder

that your constant friend has not left you comes through the

people Jesus places right beside you.

And as I look back over the season, I don't just see the

hard moments. I see Jesus.

I see him in the valley. I see him in the waiting rooms.

I see him in the hospital, I see him in the unanswered questions,

I see him in the people he placed around me, not because I

was strong, but because he was faithful.

And again, if you've listened to my story tonight, I hope you

don't leave thinking, wow, Marian is so strong.

Because that isn't the point. This is not a story about how

strong I've become. It's a story about how faithful

Jesus has been. And there's something I have to

remind you and remind myself over and over again.

Life is not fair. Sometimes we look at what we're

walking through and ask God, why?

Why did this happen? Why did I have to experience

this? Why didn't you stop it?

And I wish I had every answer, but I don't.

But I know this. If life was fair, Jesus would

not have gone to the cross. If you think about that, if life

was fair, the only perfect person who had ever lived would

have never been mocked, would have never been beaten, would

have never been betrayed, and he would have never been nailed to

the cross. If life were fair, Jesus would

have received what he deserved. But instead, he took what we

deserved. He carried our sin, our shame,

our brokenness, our punishment. And because he did, we received

something we could never earn, grace.

That's the gospel Romans chapter 5 verse 8 says.

Romans 5:8

But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die

for us while we were still sinners, while we were still

sinners, not after we fixed ourselves, not after we became

worthy, not after we had everything together, while we

were still sinners. And that's the kind of friend

Jesus is. Some of you may be sitting here

tonight feeling like your faith is small.

You look around and think they have such strong faith they

trust God so easily. I wish I had that.

Can I encourage you? Jesus never asked you for

mountain sized faith. He asked you for mustard seed

faith. Matthew 1720 says if you have

faith even as small as a mustard seed, and a mustard seed is

tiny, but it is alive. And if all you have tonight is

enough faith to whisper Jesus, I don't understand, help me bring

him that. That's faith.

Faith is not pretending you have never have questions.

Faith is knowing where to take those questions.

Faith is not being afraid. Faith is trusting Jesus in the

middle of your fear because the power was never in the size of

your faith. The power has always been in the

Savior you're trusting. Hebrews 13, five says I will

never leave you. Hebrews 13/8 says Jesus Christ

is the same yesterday, today, and forever in church.

I still don't know what comes next.

I don't know exactly what life looks like after the Marine

Corps. I don't have a diagnosis or much

answers about my health. There are prayers I'm still

waiting on. There are things I'm still

trusting Him with. I still have moments when I

stress and I still have moments when I wonder.

I still have moments when I have to remind myself of everything

that I'm preaching to you tonight.

But I know Him and what I didn't know then that I know now.

It's again when everything changes.

Jesus remains. So whatever season you're

walking through today, trust Him.

Not because you know what comes next, but because you know the

One who does the greatest comfort in a changing life is an

unchanging Savior. And if you're wondering what to

take from all of this, I leave you with this.

Know your friend, release your burden, find your people, and

trust Him with the faith you have.

So what I didn't know then that I know now is when everything

changes. Jesus remains our constant

friend, faithfully carrying us, sustaining us, and surrounding

us with His people yesterday, today, and forever.

Thank you.