Transcript

Sermon Transcript: Easter 2023 What's In The Gospel?

4/11/2023 Jeff Schwarzentraub 26 min read

Pastor Jeff:

Our father in heaven, we give you glory, honor and praise for who you are. We thank you for the gift of your son Jesus who came to this world and died for our sins and rose from the dead. We thank you for the gift of your Holy Spirit who indwells all of us who believe, and we praise you, Lord, that you have a message for us today. And so now for everyone here who's gathered, who desires to hear Jesus speak directly to you, who will believe what he says and who will by faith put into practice what he shows you. Will you agree with me very loudly this morning by saying the word amen?

Audience:

Amen.

Pastor Jeff:

Amen. This morning I want to talk to you about good news. The reason I want to talk to you about good news is there's so much bad news in the world that we need to be in a place where we hear good news.

Here's the good news. "For God so loved the world that he sent his only begotten son, that whoever believes in him would not perish but would have eternal life." There is no better news on the planet than to know that God had such a love for you that he sent his own son to this world on a rescue mission to find you in your place and to rescue you from your sin.

And that's what I want to talk to you about today. I want to talk about good news, and I want to talk about what you can expect with this good news in Jesus Christ. Because I know how some of you think this morning, sometimes you get dragged to church or you come into church and you're wondering, okay, what's the sales pitch here? It's his job to talk about Jesus. What's in it for me?

What's he trying to get me to do? And I know a lot of people come to church and think, well, the pastor just wants your money. The church just wants your money. They just want your time. They just want you to get religious. I want nothing to do with that. I want to tell you about a relationship that you can have with God, and what I want to do this morning is... Amen. I want to unpack what the Bible says, what you can expect in this good news. Now, in the church, we call it the gospel. G-O-S-P-E-L gospel means good news. You're going to hear that word this morning. I want to talk to you about what's in the gospel so you can know what to expect. When we don't know what to expect and somebody's trying to push something on us, we don't like it.

I was at Park Metals Mall this week, and I'm not usually there, but I was walking by a kiosk and some guy that saw me started walking up to me to hand me this packet of cream. He told me he liked my shoes and that my feet would really benefit from something like this. I said, "How would you know you've never seen my feet?" He's like, "I tell you what, sir, I'm going to do something extra special for you." He showed me this picture of a person that had their face split down the middle and one of the bags in their eyes hung really low, and one was like perfect. He's like, "Sir, I can do this for you." And I said, "I don't need it. I'm a good looking dude." And he said, "Well, you are a very handsome man." And I said, "Well, you are a very good salesman, but I'm not going to buy."

I don't like, don't like having things pushed on me. Nobody likes having things pushed on them. I mean, if it's really that good, you'll receive it. If it's really that good, you'll take it. If it's really that good, then that's what you can have. So this morning I want to do my best job to persuade you about what's in the gospel because sometimes when we come to church, we really don't know what's inside. It's kind of like Forrest Gump would talk about with chocolates. You never know what you're going to get, right? I want to be clear with you what you're going to get, and I want to do my best job of presenting because especially on a day like this on Resurrection Sunday, when I know we have some people that are visiting today, I want to be clear with you what the gospel means.

I want to do my best to persuade you as to why this book is true and why Jesus Christ is indeed the Lord and why indeed you need him. It reminds me of the country preacher that was getting up to preach on an Easter Sunday, one Sunday, and as he was making his way to get ready, he noticed there was a box under the bed that he had never seen before and he opened up the box and he noticed that there were three eggs in the box and there was about $75-ish worth of cash. And so he had never seen it before. He asked his wife, he said, "Did you know there's a box under our bed?" She's like, "Yeah, I kept it there. Our whole marriage all 40 years." He said, "Well, what's this thing? What are the three eggs in the box?" She said, "I've heard you preach all these years. Every time you preach a bad sermon, I put an egg in the box." And he started thinking, he's like four decades of preaching three eggs. That's not bad. He said, "Well, what's the $75-ish?" She goes, "Well." She goes, "Every time I got a dozen, I sold them for a buck."

So today, I hope I'm not going to lay an egg and can present to you the truth from the gospel here in just a few short minutes and talk to you about what's in the gospel. If you have a Bible, you can follow along in Romans chapter one. If not, it will be up on the screen behind you. And we're going to take a look at part of Romans 1:16, and here's what the text says. He says, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes." That's what we're going to talk about this morning. This one verse, let me read it again, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for the salvation to everyone who believes." Let me tell you one thing that you'll find in the gospel.

There's courage in the gospel. There's courage in the gospel. Now, keep in mind the one that the Lord has used to write this book, the book of Romans and about two thirds of the New Testament. Do you know what he did prior to his conversion? Prior to hearing and knowing the good news, he spent his life persecuting Christians. He spent his life dragging them off. If there's anyone that would have a story as to why they were unworthy to receive the gift of good news, it would be this guy. He was known as Saul of Tarsus. After he was converted, he had a new name. He was given the name Paul, and he spent his life going around and preaching the same good news that I'm telling you about today. And he was courageous in doing it. I mean, we read through the Bible and we see the courage of all these men, all the apostles that were once scared when Jesus rose from the dead, the apostles prior to him rising from the dead, they were scared.

They were wandering around, they were discouraged, they were doubting, they were confused. And yet we see this boldness and courage come upon them. I mean, when people have planned on beating them, said, "We're going to beat you if you don't stop talking about this Jesus person." And they said, "Well, you got to choose what's right for you to do. You're the government, but as for us, we cannot stop talking about what we've seen or heard and we will continue to proclaim Jesus." Then they would say, "Well, we're going to imprison you." And Paul would say, "Well, these light and momentary afflictions are nothing compared to the weight of glory that is to come." "Well then we're going to kill you." "Well, for me to live as Christ and to die is gain."

Where did they get this courage? Because there's courage in the good news. Well, what's the good news? We need to have clarity because when we have clarity, clarity is what brings conviction. Conviction is what brings courage. And what I find a lot of times even in the church, there's no clarity as to what the good news is so I want to tell you what the good news is. The good news means that there was some bad news, otherwise it's not good news. If you're healthy and you go to the doctor and go to your doctor's visit and a half an hour later the doctor says "You're healthy." You would say, "I know." If you have $20,000 in the bank and you go to your banker and they say, "You have $20,000 in our bank." You would say, "I know." That's not good news, but when there's bad news such as you go to the doctor two months ago and the doctor says, "You have stage four cancer and you have four months to live." And two months later you go back to the doctor and he says, "I don't know how to explain this, but we can't find one trace of cancer in your body."

That's good news. Or if you know that you've lost all your funds that you've been saving for retirement and you have nothing left, and then you get a letter from your former employer that says, "You didn't know this, but we were setting aside money for you, we have half a million dollars with your name on it and we just wanted to let you know that that belongs to you." That's good news. When we talk about the good news, we need to understand there's bad news. And here's the bad news of the Bible. The bad news is this, you're a sinner. The Bible says, "For all of sin and fallen short of the glory of God." And when we think of sin, sometimes we think about bad things we've done, which is a symptom of what sin is because everybody's done some bad things. But what we tend to do is think, at least it's not as bad as some of my friends.

We compare it, but we're comparing to the wrong one. Our sin is compared to a perfect holy God and all of sin and fallen short of the glory of God. If you don't think you've sinned, let me ask you a couple questions. Have you ever lied one time in your life? Have you ever taken something one time in your life that doesn't belong to you? Have you ever looked at somebody else that has stuff that you don't have and coveted it and wished it was yours? Have you ever had a lustful thought about somebody that wasn't your spouse? You already told me you were liars, so we don't even need to go there. I mean all of us have sinned, and here's what sin is. The Bible says, "Sin is a separation from God." It separates us because God can only embrace those who are sinless.

And so the problem is here's when you started sinning at conception. All the things that you've done are symptoms of the fact that you have a disease in your heart and the ways in which you've sinned either passively or going after it, have been the symptom of what's truly inside. And even if you're here today and say, "I don't think I'm really a sinner." Here's the truest truth about sin. Everybody that has sin in their life dies. And last time I looked, the death rate was one per person. So I think it's you. It's pretty safe to say, because the wages of sin is death. And no matter what kind of creams you put, or ointments you put, or how much you work out or how you eat, eventually you will die. It's happened to every single person that's taking their first breath and apart from Jesus Christ coming back in your lifetime, it's going to happen to you too.

But God loved us so much that he sent his son to be the Savior of the world, because you couldn't get to God, god came looking for you. God became a man. Now keep in mind he wasn't born in the natural way because he couldn't because if he would've been born of sinful parents, then they would've passed the sinful DNA onto Jesus. So he had to be conceived by the Holy Spirit. Why? Because Jesus Christ has always been God. He put on flesh some 2,000 years ago and then he came and did what you couldn't do. He fulfilled the law. He didn't lie. He didn't cheat, he didn't steal. He didn't do anything wrong. And yet he took your place on the cross. He was accused of one thing and one thing only. He was accused of blasphemy. Blasphemy meant he claimed he was God.

That's why he was killed. The truth is he was God. The truth is he is God. And when Jesus Christ died on the cross, here's why He died, because God was pouring all of his wrath and severity of sin out on his son because that wrath was intended for both me and you, and we would be separated from him forever. But God didn't want that. God wanted to bring you into relationship with himself. You see, there is a punishment for sin someday. Every single one of you that dies will stand before the Lord Jesus Christ to give an account for your life. Some will hear, "Well done good and faithful servant," and some will hear this, "Depart from me, you worker of iniquity. I never knew you." Some people think when they die, well, I'll just figure out what happens when I die. I know when I get to heaven I'll be good enough.

I know I'm better than other people. You'll stand there alone and wonder, what am I doing here? And there's only one answer that satisfies that Jesus Christ died on the cross for all your sin and that you placed your entire trust in him. If you'll turn from your sin and turn to Christ on this side of heaven, he will come and live in you right now. He will be your life both now and forever more. See, the problem is not that your sin makes you bad. I know there's a lot of good people here. I know a lot of good sinners. I was good at sinning too. Still am sometimes. It's not that you're bad. The Bible says you're dead. You're dead. Dead people can't live. It's the reason why you go looking for all these things in your life to fill you. Some people go to the mountains. Some people go to illicit relationships. Some people go to drugs and alcohol. Some people go to friendships. Some people go to influence. Some people go to money. Some people go to vacations. Everybody's looking for how can I find the life? And none of them satisfy permanently. The only one who will ever satisfy your longing that you have in your heart right now is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the way, the truth and the life.

And these disciples, when they went to a place where they had been dead and were made alive, they were changed by the love of God. 1 John 4:10 says, "This is love. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his son as a propitiation or an atoning sacrifice for a sin." Love is not what you're doing for God. If you ask most people in our culture, do you love God? Most people say, "Yeah, I love God." It's not that you love God. It's a God loved you. You don't have the ability to love God until he loves you. We love because he first loved us. How did he love us? By demonstrating his death on a cross. God loved you so much that he sent Jesus here to die in your place and to rise from the dead so that you who were dead would not have to stay dead anymore.

And when these disciples and all future disciples got that truth, they started living with courage. And they said this, "I'm no longer ashamed." Ashamed means feeling a loss of status or feeling embarrassed like, yeah, I wouldn't want to become a Christian. I mean, then I would feel like that's just a crutch. That's for weak people. No, it's for dead people that need to be made alive. That's what the gospel's for. I'm not ashamed of the gospel. I was dead, and Jesus Christ saved my life and gave me life. I'm not here telling you how to get religion. I'm telling you here today that Jesus Christ is Lord and he wants to invest his life into you. Amen.

Audience:

Amen.

Pastor Jeff:

There's courage in the gospel, for I'm not ashamed of the gospel. There's also power in the gospel. He says this, "For I'm not ashamed of the gospel for it as the power of God."

Like if you're dead, how are you going to be made alive? It's going to take some power. It's going to take some power. 1 Corinthians 4:20 says, "For the kingdom of God is not a matter of talk but a power." Well, what does he do? Well, for every single person that's turned from their sins and trusted Christ, it says that He transferred us from the kingdom of darkness and into the beloved, into the kingdom of his beloved son and whom we have redemption in the forgiveness of sin. It takes power to make a dead person alive. How does God do that? Because he's the only one who's ever demonstrated that he has power over death. Study any religion in the world and study any charlatan who says that they're God and they'll come up short on the death part. Study Confucius, he's dead. Study Muhammad, he's dead. Study Buddha. He's dead. He just got a bigger casket. He's dead. Study Jesus and here's his epitaph. He is not here. He is risen. He overcame death.

What good is a dead God? The answer is no good at all. That's why Jesus had to be fully human so he could identify with us and be fully God, which means he's always existed or we can't have relationship with the Father. He came because he loves you and there's power in the gospel. Here's what it means. No matter how far you've gone, and no matter what sins you've sinned, no matter how bad you think you are or how irreligious you are or how religious you are, Jesus Christ came and paid the penalty for you. For those of you who feel, there's no way God could love me, let me assure you on the authority of his word. There's nothing you've done that have that is outrun the love of God. He came running for you. He came for you. He wanted you to hear that today.

And then for others that are here that are scoffing and saying, "I don't need that. I mean my life's pretty good as it is. I'm healthy. I have a good family. I have a good job. I have great influence. I have a lot of money. I think things are going great. I don't need your little religious crutch." Here's my question for you. I'll just repeat what Jesus would ask you. What good does it do you to profit the entire world and forfeit your soul? Or what can you give in exchange for your soul? If you live 123 years on this planet and everything goes perfect for you, which I've never met anybody that it has, but assuming that it did and you died and you heard these words, the moment you died, "Depart from me, you worker of iniquity, for I never knew you." And God sent you to an eternal hell.

What good does it do to have a great life? You need your sin paid for. Now, some people think, well, God's mean, why would he create a hell no, God's loving and just that's why he did. If somebody brutally raped and murdered a close relative of your family that you loved and then killed them, and they stood trial and they said, "How do you plead? And they said, I plead guilty. I did it. I was having a bad day, I'm sorry." And the judge said, "Really? You're having a bad day, then you are free to go." What would you say? You would say, "That's not fair. That's not right. Justice needs to be served." And that's exactly the heart of God. And while God will weep, because God takes no delight in the death of wicked people, God is just and hell was never created for you.

Hell was created for the devil and his angels and for anyone who refused to repent and believe that Jesus was the way, the truth in the life, there's courage in the gospel, there's power in the gospel. You say, "What can this power do?" I mean, if God's going to take you from death to life, he can take your dead life and he can give you life right in this very moment that begins right now and lasts for all eternity.

But I want to give you a third one too. See, notice this. Jesus had the power to make the dead alive. Do you remember he had a friend named Lazarus that died. His sisters had sent Word, please come help my brother. You love my brother. Jesus didn't make it in time. Lazarus died. And when Jesus got there, he had been dead four days and his sisters came and says, "Pointless now, but if you would've been here, he'd still be alive."

And he said, "He's still going to live." And one of the sisters said, "I know he is going to live at the resurrection day. I know he'll rise from the dead, but right now he's still dead. That doesn't help me now." And here's what Jesus said in John 11. He said, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even if he dies, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die." Here's what he was saying. I'm the life you're looking for. If you believe in me, you're not going to die, if you believe in me. Your life just starts when you die. And those who believe in me truly will never die. For those of us who know Christ, Christ is in us, the very moment you breathe your last breath, you stand in his presence and hear well done, good and faithful servant.

And then he ask her this, "Do you believe this?" That's my question for you. Do you believe this? Do you believe that there's courage in the gospel? Do you believe that there's power in the gospel? Do you believe that God loves you like that? Those are two truths. Here's a third. There's also transformation in the gospel. There's transformation in the gospel. He says, "I'm not ashamed of the gospel for it's the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes." It's the power of God for salvation. What's salvation? Salvation is a changed life. Salvation means being set free from your sin. It means being delivered from bondage. It means having purpose and meaning in your life. When the Bible says you're born again is what the Bible says, it means that you were spiritually dead and now you've been made alive just like you were physically born.

You need to be spiritually born as well, and everyone's born dead. Nobody in here is born a follower of Jesus. Nobody in here is born a Christian. You may have been born getting drugged to church. You may have been born being religious. You may have been born being a good person, but you were dead in your transgressions and sins and your resume. You have a resume that dictates, yeah, I'm really good at my sin. I'm really good at living for myself. Every kid that comes out of the womb, that's all they think about is themselves. When they're going to eat, who's going to change them, who's going to take care of them? And if they don't like it, they cry and that never changes for the rest of their life. That's a sin DNA. But there's transformation in the gospel because God doesn't just want to save you. He wants to deliver you in salvation. Although it has a moment in time where it begins, it continues on for all eternity. There's transformation in the gospel. 2 Corinthians 5:17 says, "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he's a new creature. The old things have passed away. Behold, new things have come."

Here's what he says. He says, "If this is what you were, God can change you from the inside out and though you'll still look the same on the outside, God can change your heart from the inside. What's dead on the inside can be brought to life." And here's how it gets brought to life. You can go from having a meaningless dead life, searching for life everywhere but God, to having Jesus Christ come and dwell you on the inside through His Holy Spirit and know that you have life even if your circumstances haven't changed.

And you can know this, assuredly that when Jesus is on the inside, he will be with you forever more. It's good news. It also means this. As you continue to grow with Christ, those things that are weighing you down right now, they don't have to keep weighing you down anymore. There's transformational power in the gospel. God can change you. The one who wrote these verses was a murderer. The one who wrote these verses persecuted the church. The apostles that you read about were just everyday ordinary blue collar fishermen and they're out changing the world. And when people studied them, they said, "These are just uneducated, ordinary men." But they could tell this that they had spent time with Jesus. It means God wants to totally, radically transform your life, not through religion, getting you to do a bunch of stuff and jump through a bunch of religious hoops.

God wants you to personally know him, experience his love, and be transformed by his love so that you have hope and purpose on the inside. Amen. There's courage in the gospel. There's power in this gospel and there's transformation in this gospel. These ones who are living for themselves receive the Holy Spirit and they change the world. Acts 1:8 Jesus told him after he rose from the dead, "You'll receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you'll be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and Samaria into the ends of the earth." The reason we're here today is because of transformed lives. The one you're listening to today is a transformed life. Go back and talk to my friends in high school and college. They would say... If they would've had this spot in the yearbook, I mean at least likely to be a future pastor, my picture would've been there.

But what happened? Jesus Christ saved my life. Jesus Christ is still in the process of growing me. Jesus Christ is still in the process of transforming me, and I love him and I'm not ashamed of him. But here's the final thing that you need to know. You have to respond to him. See, we like to get around this by giving ourselves little pep talks and self-esteem pickups. Is like the kindergarten teacher I heard about one time that she wanted to help her students understand that everyone was valuable and had self-esteem. And so she said, just kind of off the cuff, she said, "Anyone who thinks they're dumb today just stand up." Said to a kindergarten class. She didn't expect anybody to stand. Little did she know little Johnny was going to stand up. So now she didn't know what to do because little Johnny's standing, she said, "Johnny, you don't think you're valuable, you don't think you're special?" He's like, "No, ma'am. I just didn't... I felt uncomfortable with you standing there all by yourself."

There's transformation in the gospel. Sometimes we identify ourselves by our sin. We call ourselves immoral, drug addict, drunk, prideful, successful, better than, needy, whatever we are. But when you're saved, then you start hearing the words that God says about you because God starts seeing you through the lens of his son. You start hearing these words about yourself. I'm forgiven and I'm holy, and I'm cherished, and I'm loved, and I'm special, and I have a new identity and a new hope and a new purpose, and I'm honored, and I'm favored because the God of the universe loved me enough to save me. That's transformation. Not anything you do, but what God wants to do through you.

But let me give you this fourth one. This may be the most important part. Not only is there courage, and power, and transformation in the gospel, but there's also faith in the gospel. There's faith in the gospel. Notice what he says, "For I'm not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation." To who? To everyone who what? Believes. To everyone who believes this gospel is for believers. This gospel is for people that are going to say, I believe. Now what does it mean to believe? Believe is not just believing facts about something. I believe Abraham Lincoln was the 16th president of our nation. I believe that he spoke the Gettysburg address and the Emancipation Proclamation. I believe that, but I don't believe in him. I don't talk to him every day. He definitely doesn't talk to me. I haven't placed all my future hope in him. I'm not honoring him. I'm not worshiping him. I'm not serving him. I believe he existed, but I'm not believing in him. But when I tell you about Jesus, I'm saying something different.

I'm telling you, Jesus Christ is alive and he saved me. And I listen to him daily through his word, and I hear him through prayer and he speaks to me, and I love him, and he knows me. And I'm placing my entire eternity and trust on the fact that I've repented of my sin and trusting him as my Lord and Savior. And I know when I get to heaven and I stand before Jesus, if he ever asked me, "Why should I let you in my kingdom?" It won't be because I'm a pastor. It won't be my resume of good works. It'll be this and this alone, because I know I was dead in my sin and I turned from my sin and I trusted you as my personal Lord and Savior. And it's only by your shed blood and death on the cross, and your resurrection from the dead that I have life.

And when I say that, he's going to say, "Welcome home. Well done, good and faithful servant." And here's the truth. That's what God wants from everybody. Jesus came so that all people could be saved. Jesus came because he wants you to know him, but you have to receive them. It's a gift. John 1:12 says, "But as many have received him, to them, he give the right to become children of God. Even those who believe in his name." You have to RSVP. You can't just be a generic. I think I'm kind of a Christian. You got to RSVP. I'm married. You know how I know I'm married because I pursued my wife, tricked her into thinking I was something more than I was. And then we had a ceremony with an officiant. We said vows to one another. I put a ring on her finger, she put a ring on mine, and we became married that day, and we've been growing as a married couple for some time.

Now, I didn't just roll over one day and look at her. I'm like, "Kim, who are you and what are you doing here?" In the same way, you don't just kind of become a Christian. There's a response to the gospel where you say, "I want you to be my Lord and Savior. I want you to be my God." It's not about getting religion. It's not about joining a church. It's not about giving money. It's about knowing there's a time in your life if you were born dead, which you are. When did you come to life? So I don't know that I have. Here's how you know that you have when you have courage in your heart, when you have the power of God in your heart, when there's transformation going on in your heart and there's ongoing belief and faith in your heart, and if those aren't the four chambers of your heart, you're still dead in your transgressions and sins.

Now, when you become a Christian, you won't be perfect immediately. You'll be perfected by God, and then you will grow increasingly into goodness. But it's not your good works that save you. The Bible says in Acts 4: 12, "There is salvation in no one else for, there's no other name among heaven that has been given among men, by which mean must be saved." You say, "How can you say that?" Because Jesus said that. He said he was the way, the truth in the life, and no one comes to the Father except through him. He's the only way to God. You say, "Jeff, what about all the rest of the people in the world?" He's the only way to God. Well, how come they haven't heard about it? You're hearing about it today. Now you're without excuse, and I'm telling you, I'm pleading with you. I'm telling you, Jesus wants to know you.

Now, there's two groups of people that are listening to my voice today, some that are saying, "I need this or I have this." And others are saying, "That's foolishness." And the Bible said, that's exactly how you're going to feel. 1 Corinthians 1: 18 says, "For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but just who being saved, it's become the power of God." Now, this is foolishness to you. Here's how you know it is because you think I'm a fool for telling you this, but I don't care what you think of me. I'm telling you the truth of all eternity. That there's one way to experience life with God. And it's not about adopting your parents' religion. It's not about going to a certain kind of church. It's about believing that Jesus Christ is the eternal son of God who died on the cross for your sins, and rose from the grave, and turning from your self-centered sin stained life and saying, "I need to be cleansed and I need to be washed, and I want it, and I want it now." That's the gospel.

Now, when Jesus called his disciples, he said, "Follow me and I'll make you fishers of men." And they immediately dropped their nets and followed him. Everybody Jesus called, he called publicly. There's no Secret Service Christians.

No kind of, I think I'm a Christian, but I just don't want anybody to know about it. Everybody he called, he called publicly. That's why here in a minute, I'm going to call you publicly. I'm going to call you publicly to stand to your feet if you want to receive this gift today, we had a hundred stand in the first service. I know there's several of you here today, but here's the truth, even if there's just one person here sitting and you're way up in the balcony somewhere, here's what the Bible says, "When there's one person who repents." That means they turn from their sin. "There is more rejoicing in heaven over 1 sinner that repents than over 99 that don't need to." And what you'll find here at BRAVE Church, these aren't good people here getting better. I'm not a good person getting better. We're dead people that have been made alive by Christ offering you the gift to experience his life today. And I love you enough to give you that opportunity to respond to the Lord Jesus Christ. Because here's what I know, if God's speaking to you and you won't stand for him here, you won't stand for him in the workplace. You won't stand for him in your family. You won't stand for him with your friends, you won't stand for him anywhere.

So I'm going to invite you, if you're hearing his voice today, do not harden your heart, and we'll cheer with the angels for those who need to stand. So if God's spoken to you today and shown you, we don't have a relationship, but you want a relationship, would you just stand to your feet right now and trust the Lord to do a work here in this place? Amen.

Audience:

Amen.

Pastor Jeff:

Amen. Friends, that's the good news of the gospel. I'm just going to keep, stay standing if you would, and with the rest of you just stand too. What I'd like to do is pray a prayer. Prayer doesn't save you. Standing to your feet doesn't save you. What Jesus Christ spoke to your heart today does. Don't leave here without getting things set in your life to have the life of Christ in you now and for all eternity.

I'm going to pray. If you just bow your head and close your eyes and you just repeat after me out loud, "Dear Jesus, I know I'm a sinner, but I believe you came for me. I believe you died on the cross for me, and I believe you rose from the dead. Right now, I want to turn from my sin and I want to confess you as my personal Lord and Savior, come into my life. Father in heaven, I just give you praise, glory and honor for who you are, Lord, for all those this morning who trusted you as their personal Lord and Savior, for all those who wanted to but didn't quite yet have the courage to stand but are saying it now, come into my life, Lord Jesus fill them afresh with your Holy Spirit. Father, do a work here. Lord, we just want to honor you. We want more and more of you and less and less of ourselves. God, we give you praise for every single life today that has been saved, not only at BRAVE, but in every other church that faithfully proclaims the true gospel of Jesus Christ. And God, we want to honor you, praise you, and sing to you as we close today. In Jesus name, Amen." And amen. Can we give God some praise for His perfect wonders?