here's the good news! v2 (720p): Well hello, hello. Here's the good news. I'm back in Dixon. yeah. Hey. Hey, I see you, Steve. A year ago, this month, my wife and I made one of the most questionable decisions of our entire marriage thus far, and that is to to move to West Tennessee. that is where I grew up. her entire family is in Middle Tennessee. I never when when when we got married, I n I just I thought it was a foregone conclusion that we lived in Dixon County for the rest of our lives and that wa that was just fine. that was just fine for the both of us. my parents started burning up the road between Dresden and Dixon after after we had Judge. Judge will be two years old in January. And Chris got me to to cover for him a couple times and after that second time on the way on the way back home Kristen this is how I know that moving to West Tennessee was a good idea because it wasn't my idea. Kristen said, you really you really have a gift. Now that's that's the jury's still out on on me having a gift as far as as far as speaking and teaching, that kind of thing. but she said, I I would hate for you to to not, you know, pursue that. And that could have happened here just as well as it happens in West Tennessee. but between pursuit of of whatever that is and and my parents being in West Tennessee and probably a greater loss to Walnut Street Church of Christ than Kristen and I leaving her parents decided to go with us. but no life is life is good. Life is good in West Tennessee. there's not a week that goes by that we don't It it's it's trailed off to a week now. For a while it was there wasn't a day that went by that we didn't talk about Dixon and Walnut Street and and missing our our family here. so just know that you're loved and we love to be here. They would have loved to have been here tonight, but she didn't feel like A four hour round trip for a six-week old was the move to make. so they stayed home and you just got me, so I I apologize for that. I apologize for that, but I'll I'll tell them that you said hello. So I watched Chris's lesson this morning and you're going through the the ones, the ones. And Ephesians chapter four, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, you know. By now we should all be able to recite it just from just from Chris's sermons, but probably probably more so we we have heard that again and again throughout our lives in church. In church. I appreciated how he started out his sermon this morning with a show of hands of who enjoys pickled okra. My my hand would not have gone up. I just I don't get it. but that's fine. My wife gets it, she loves them. but he he introduced that one so he could come back around. to Nikanor and and his use of Bapt Baptiste and Baptisteo in immersion and all that. but also He just wanted to he said, we're teeing up something here that we have talked about. if you've been to church, if you've been to the church of Christ for any amount of time, baptism. So we're teeing up something here that that is talked about again and again and again and again, and for good reason, again and again and again. But he started out with pickled okra. to to kinda come at baptism from a new direction, I guess. I don't have a pickled okra okra illustration. That's the best one that there is as far as left field illustrations. so I'd wanted to say all that to say tonight we are going to talk about something that you have heard if you've been in church or read your Bible or anything for any amount of time you have heard again and again and again and again. And if you're like me, until the consequences of living in this broken world, until those consequences remind me that I need to look back to these elementary principles, to these foundational things, then I then I I I forget about I forget about the power. That is God's word and what's in there and what it means for my life. And ha and and how it is I'm I'm supposed to carry on in such a broken world. It is hard to stand here honestly and say and talk about a broken world because I have it so good, you know. I'm gainfully employed, I have a wife and two great kids at home. Both sets of our parents love us, love the kids. We live in the United States of America where, you know, we may not like it, you know, just exactly like it is, but from from a 30,000, 40,000 foot view, it's pretty good. It's pretty good. and in that respect, it is very easy, it is very easy to take what we're gonna talk about here tonight and not realize, not realize. the power that's in God's word, the power that propels us, should move us, should get us through every day, and it's not our bank account or our retirement or our family or our house or home. It's it's it's what we're going to talk about tonight. And I for so long. Tried to move through this world, move through my Christianity, operate within God's kingdom on my steam, on on Kevin's. grit, which turned out to to be not all that gritty. But I have two boys now at home, and I want to do everything that I can to equip them with how they're gonna make it through this world. It's crazy how kids do that. You know? Your mind starts doing wild stuff. Imagine in scenarios that, you know, Lord willing, never exist. you know, Judge can be in another room and you hear him whale and you think, awesome, the chandelier's falling on his head. No, he's just tripped and stubbed his toe. It's gonna be all right. You know. But I want to equip these boys with how with how they they can, how they have the opportunity to live in this world, this created world. And I hope this message tonight conveys that. There's a lot of scripture. You can listen, you can jump around, good luck. But I want to be able to communicate to my boys the gospel, the good news. Boys, here's the good news. I didn't know that wasn't bolted down. Boys, here's the good news. And the good news isn't you doing better or trying harder or anything like that. The good news can lead to that. But the good news is in Genesis chapter 1 and John chapter 1, we learn that the triune God, Lord of all exists, sovereign king of reality, speaks matter as we know it, and matter as, in all honesty, probably we don't know it. into existence. Genesis chapter one, twenty six through twenty eight. This creator creates us in his image. Have you ever thought about that? he's literally got any and everything to choose from. But he creates us in in his image. In his image. So from the outset, he wants us to know that we are set apart from the grass and the trees and the birds and the flowers and the bees and all that stuff. It's supposed the life on this planet is supposed to be different for us. Genesis chapter 2, verse 7, he forms me. Or Adam, man, out of the earth he just spoke into existence. Genesis chapter 2, 20 through 22, the God who sees, El Roy. We don't have that name yet. That name's coming later in Genesis chapter 16. The first person, consequently, in recorded scripture to ascribe a name to God, Hagar, who is on the run. Calls our creator the God who sees. He sees that I, man, need help. Not just any help, help fit for me, dirt boy. This help in Hebrew is easer easier. This should not be understood, this word helper, easier, should not be understood as secondary to a primary. That's how in our English, American, probably global context, a helper is seen as secondary to a primary. However, this word ezer is used 21 times in the Old Testament. Three of which refer to Israel's military allies. Two times refer to Eve herself. The remaining sixteen times in the Old Testament they refer to God as Israel's rescuer, protector, or deliverer. This is who God chose for me, dirt boy. A rescuer, protector, A deliverer liken to himself. So as far as males go. human beings made in his image. He made me out of the play-doh that he just spoke into creation. He saw I needed help. And he gave me someone to help me like unto himself and easer So if if if you're tracking so far, it's looking pretty good for us. It's looking pretty good. So God, fresh off of speaking, everything we can see, touch, taste, hear, and smell into existence, gives Adam two commands of which we are aware one, be fruitful and multiply, two do not eat of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil in the middle of the garden. We bat about five hundred on those two commands. We could spend a lifetime and somehow attempting to wrap our minds around what immediately comes next and all the excruciating nuances of what happened and why it happened, where it happened, how it could have gone differently. We could go round and round about how these two humans, Adam and Eve, made in the image of the Creator responsible for real reality as they knew it. While they listen to a talking snake rather than their creator. However, the Apostle Paul speaks to the who, how, and why of the fall in Romans chapter 8. Paul writes, To set the mind on the flesh is death. Well, God said if you eat of that, what's going to happen? You're going to die. You're going to die. But to set the mind on the spirit is life and peace, for the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile. to God. Remember that word hostile. For it does not submit to God's law, indeed it cannot. Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. The short answer to what happened in the fall is the mother and father of mankind set their mind on their own desire and trusted a creature with a word that did not come from God. Unbeknownst to them they declared war against God because the mind is set because the mind set on anything that is created will not submit to the Creator. Paul just said that. He says that kind of mind cannot please God. So immediately we've fallen out of out of grace with God. And it's easy to look at that and think, man, that that didn't take a whole lot. You know, that that seemed to have escalated quickly. R. C. Sprohl puts it this way: Sin is not a minor mistake, it is an offense against the infinite value and holiness of God. A creature made from the dust defied the Almighty. Adam and Eve committed an act of lawlessness and rebellion tantamount to cosmic treason against an infinite, infinitely holy and self-existent Creator. Sounds pretty bad. Sounds like we're in a real mess. Scripture says the next words our Creator utters are Where are you? Now this morning Whenever we got to the parking lot after service, Judge is not two years old yet, so I'm still I'm still in that arena of like how hard to lay down the law, you know. I mean he's still working on what's the difference between red and green. Well, one law we are trying to lay down is do not run just loose in the parking lot or out into the road, you know. When it comes to pavement, find a parent. You know. He doesn't grasp like cool sayings like that yet, so when he's when he does, I c I just made that up standing right here, so I can't wait to use that. But he ran away and I went and I grabbed his arm and I swatted his little bottom and he lost it. Probably because I scared him more so than he was hurt, you know, that whole thing, and I picked him up and held him. And every time I do that, every time that happens, like I think of this situation right here. Yes, God was he he he is a jealous God. He is jealous. There's no getting around that. There's no getting around that. But while we're declaring war and hiding, God takes a step in our direction, summons us out of darkness, pursuing sinners rather than abandoning us, immediately going after his lost sheep while we lie and blame and live in fear. Now I'm not saying we all lie and blame and live in fear all day, every day, anything like that, but or that Or that Adam and Eve were doing that immediately in this kind I'm saying we lie, we blame, we live in fear. I do that every day. Just get on the road, drive I forty. If you're not blaming and living in fear, you're not driving I forty. You're also lying if you said I never cut anybody off, so or at least I I I would be. Instead of starting over from scratch before things get worse, God stays our execution and promises ultimate victory over the adversary in Genesis three, nine through fifteen. His promises don't end in the garden. Repeatedly we see God double, triple, quadruple down on the fact that He is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness, keeping steadfast love for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, exercising justice but righteous justice, the justice of a good good father and not that of a warlord. Exodus thirty four six through seven. Despite the intention of man's heart being evil from youth, Genesis eight twenty one, God promises he will never again curse the ground and strike down every living thing as he did in the flood. God cuts covenant with Abraham, promising that even in his old age, Abram's old age, God will bless bless all the nations of the earth through Abraham's offspring. That's Genesis twelve through fifteen. If you wanna if if if you wanna dig into something cool, dig in to That cutting covenant thing. That wasn't something that God just made up there on the spot. That would that was that that was a a tradition, that was a ritual of the day. And if Charles and I decided that I don't know, he was gonna give me his house one day. Well to solidify that pact, to solidify that pact, Charles is gonna give me his house as long as I mow his grass for the rest of his days. Well To make that pact, he and I would go find some animal, preferably, you know, the more the more bigger the animal, the more serious it was. So I want his house. So I'm like, let's cut a bull in half. So you cut a bull in half, and the two of you walk through it together. That's the ritual. Well, the ritual God makes with Abraham, when he says, I'm going to multiply your seed more than. More than you can fathom in his old age. The bull is cut in half, laying on the ground. God puts Abraham to sleep, and this smoking sensor passes through the bull all by itself. All by itself. So what's that mean? That means God says, it doesn't matter if you hold up your end of the bargain. I'm doing this. I will do this. Your faithfulness, your faithlessness, you deciding that you should probably use your handmaiden Hagar. None of that. I will do this. God promises King David that a king that will his line will endure forever will come through his line. Second Samuel seven. Through Isaiah, God promises a suffering servant is coming, wounded for our transgressions, crushed for our iniquities. Isaiah 53. Through Jeremiah, God proclaims a new covenant in which he says, I will forgive their iniquity and I will remember their sin no more. Jeremiah chapter thirty-one. But what follows or surrounds? each of these promises. Well, we're involved. So failure, disappointment and in ad and inadequacy. I had trouble even when I practiced that earlier. surround each of these promises. Adam and Eve probably more reason than anyone in human history to take Creator God at his word. More than any probably. if you look around and don't see anyone else and don't know where you came from and God says I did this, all right. But they didn't. They didn't hold up their end of the bargain. Noah, the flood changes the world, doesn't change the hearts of man, as we see immediately following the flood. Abraham was many things. Perfect was not one of them. David, if God's faithfulness to his promises were dependent upon personal righteousness, this is who would have dashed the hope for mankind. Nevertheless, God is faithful. Isaiah, a man of unclean lips, what did he say? We don't know. We don't know because it doesn't really matter. His sins aren't the point. We know that when confronted by the Holy One, the prophet does not compare himself to anyone else. He just confesses, I am unclean. I I I'm un I'm unclean. Jeremiah was afraid to begin, desperate at times to quit, and capable of staring at his own weakness instead of God's promise. If none of those sounded familiar, the last one should have. I love staring at my weakness instead of God's promise. John writes, No one has ever seen God. God the only Son who is at the Father's side, He has made Him known. So we see the word in John chapter one as mentioned earlier, triune God. We've heard hints of this promise, of this covenant, of this king, this savior, this messiah. John tells us that Jesus is the one who reveals God to us. We were made by him and for him, but fallen sinners cannot stand unveiled before his holiness, and therefore we can't see God, our Creator, the Father. Although we like to think so from time to time, but when that happens, and usually just encounter his commands for our lives. We shrink and end up sounding more like the children of Israel standing at the foot of Mount Sinai when they begged Moses, You speak to us and we will listen. But don't let God talk to us anymore, or we'll die. Or we'll die. To encounter our Creator. It's I can't fathom that. I can't fathom that. So who bridges that gap? Who bridges the gap between an infinitely whole infinitely holy, self existent creator and man created in his image, who typically runs at the first sight of light and truth? Well, he does. Once again, through his son, Emmanuel, which is being interpreted God with us, Matthew chapter one, verse twenty three. Jesus of Nazareth, the Christ of God, his chosen one, Luke twenty three thirty five, God's power and wisdom, first Corinthians one twenty four, the image of the invisible God, Colossians one fifteen. Remember that word Ezer from earlier. Remember the weight it carried and The word Easer doesn't make Eve divine any more than Adam was divine. It tells us God gave Adam strong corresponding help fit for him. But after Genesis 3, our problem becomes something no human helper can solve. Sin, death, and the devil require more than an Easer beside us. They require Emmanuel, God, with us. A God who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men, and being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow in heaven, and And on earth and under the earth. And every tongue confessed that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father, Philippians 2, verses 6 through 6 through 11. That's news worth spreading. We're talking about here's the good news. While we're grasping for equality with God, Christ became a servant. While we look for help in what was created, Christ enters into his creation. While we covered our ears at the voice of God, Christ is healing the ear of someone sent to arrest him right before his death. While we curse the day our born we are born, Christ blesses the day we die in him. While we cling to our guilt and shame, Christ unbinds and sets free. While we are faithless, Christ is faithful. While we were still weak at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. But God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Romans 5, 6 and 8. After his crucifixion on the third day in the tomb, we read in Luke 24: Christ arose in his earthly body and decided to go for a walk with two men on their way to Emmaus. Christ wants to know what the two men have been talking about. One of them, named Cleopus, speaks to Christ like he's been hiding under a rock for the last three days. And without realizing it, summarizes everything Jesus had told the disciples would happen, had happened. At this opportunity, Emmanuel, God with us, began at Moses and all the prophets, and interpreted to these two on the road to Emmaus in all the scriptures the things concerning himself. Notice it does not read all in the scriptures the things concerning himself, but in all the scriptures. The whole story written in the back. Exposes our need for Emmanuel and bears witness to the Christ we meet in the front. The promise after the fall, Jesus. God's covenant with Abraham, Jesus. God's promise to David, Jesus. Isaiah's suffering servant, Jesus. Jeremiah's new coven covenant, Jesus. Since therefore we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more now that we are reconciled shall we be saved by His life. More than that we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation. Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin and death spread to all men, because all since For sin indeed was in the world before the law was given, but sin is not counted where there is no law. Yet death reigned from Adam to Moses, even over those whose sinning was not like the transgression of Adam, who was a type of the one who was to come, but the free gift is not like the trespass. Jesus isn't like Adam. For if many died through one man's trespass, much more Have the grace of God and the free gift by the grace of that one man, Jesus Christ, abounded for many. And the free gift is not like the result of the one man's sin, for the judgment following one tresp one trespass brought condemnation. But the free gift following many trespasses brought justification. For if because of one man's trespass death reigned through that one man, Much more will those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Don't miss that last part. Those who receive the abundance of grace and the free gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ. Can't do more, try better. Whatever. More than Jesus. He did that. That's what he did. That was his job. Notice Paul's movement in what we just read. Wrath gives way to salvation, condemnation to justification, death to life. Well, how? Not because Adam's children finally learn to keep the law, but because the free gift comes through one man, Jesus Christ. Acts 13, 38-39 says, Let it be known to you, therefore, brothers, that through this man forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. That cosmic treason against an infinitely holy, self-existent creator is forgiven because of Jesus Christ. And it goes on to say, and by him, everyone who believes is freed from everything from which you could not be freed. All that stuff weighing you down. This is the how. This is the how. All that stuff weighing you down, weighing me down. The power is Jesus Christ. Don't miss that. Forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you. And to those who take him at his word, we are freed from everything from which we could not be freed. That's good news. We are made in his image, fled from his light. And the light came into our darkness, dwelt among us, bore our sin, died for us, rose for us, so that we too can be certain of victory over that which has had our number from the beginning. From the beginning. Genesis 8:21 says that I am evil from my youth. Not here to argue over what youth means. I just know it's young. Now this sounds like the kind of news that upon hearing one time should change our entire life, right? d this should be the kind of thing where you get it once and you're like, I'm in, let's go. I was thirty seven years old when I checked into Discovery Place. Up to that point I had truly lived life on my own steam. Even though I was introduced to God's word and his people before I could walk or talk. Time here does not permit me to detail my resume as a Christian prior to June 2018. But suffice it to say I was adequately exposed to the text and to many who believed everything we've just discussed. But for whatever reason, all I heard. Was if victory over sin, death, and the devil were to be, then much of it was up to me. Christianity was about me doing more, trying harder, and being better at following Jesus. I had learned to hear Christianity as though my standing before God depended upon me doing more, trying harder, and becoming better. Search the Scripture for that as the ground for our justification, and you will not find it. You will not find it. We'll find commands, we'll find obedience, we'll find carrying a cross, but we'll never find a sinner making himself righteous before God by doing those things. What God's law demands for our righteousness, Christ fulfills for us. That's the mystery. Paul talks a lot about the mystery. That's the mystery. That doesn't make any sense. Any sense. If I do more, try harder, be better at work, I'm rewarded. If I do more, try harder, be better at home, I'm rewarded. If I do more, try harder, be better. Most places I'm rewarded. That's not how it works here. Blessings come from that. But this heart that I have that has been confused since youth has a pro has a has a real tendency to take the good that Kevin is doing and op and apply it to Kevin. That's my problem. And there's no power there because of trial. One of the first things One of the first things that discovery plays, recovery, that kind of thing, tries to get those who show up to wrap your head around is that you're powerless and your life is unmanageable. Now that's real hard, that's real hard to accept when You grew up like I did. And I'm not throwing any shade at all on how I was raised because my parents did a great job. Did a great job. But we grew up on a farm. we grew up in in the United States, we grew up in the South, and everything around me spoke to If I was to have it, I had to go get it. Now that stands to reason that falls apart, I get in business to an extent. But we're not talking about business. We're talking about standing before an infinitely holy, self-existent creator and saying, I'm enough. No, you're not. Forgive me for talking about you. No, I'm not. Christ had no former majesty that we should look at him, and no beauty that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by men, a man of sorrows, acquainted with grief, and as one from whom men hide their faces he was despised, and we esteemed him not. Surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows, yet we esteemed him stricken, smitten by God and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities, upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace, and with his wounds we are healed. All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned every one to his own way, and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all. He was oppressed and he was afflicted, yet he opened not his mouth, like a lamb that is led to the slaughter, and like a sheep that is that before its shears is silent, so he opened not his mouth. By oppression and judgment he was taken away. And as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people? And they made his grave with the wicked and with the rich man in his death. Although he had done no violence, and there was no deceit in his mouth, yet it was the will of the Lord to crush him. He has put him to grief. When his soul makes an offering for guilt for guilt, he shall see his offspring. He shall prolong his days. The will of the Lord shall prosper in his hand. Out of the anguish of his soul he shall see and be satisfied. By his knowledge shall the righteous one, my servant, make many to be accounted righteous, and he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore I will divide him a portion with the many, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he poured out his soul to death, and was numbered with the transgressors. Yet he bore the sin of many, and makes intercession for the transgressors. Start here. Start here. Jesus Christ is Lord. We serve an infinitely holy, self-existent Creator who loved us enough to send His Son to die our death, raised from the dead. so that we would have the promise of victory over sin, death, and the devil. That's the that's the power to go through every day. Remember my baptism. Chris talked a ton about that this morning. If my baptism was anything less than putting Christ on Then I miss the point. I miss the point. Because in Christ I can move through this world not without not it's still broken. It th this place is still broken until until God makes everything new, we're still dealing with the same old stuff. But the power to move through every single day is the fact that the creator that spoke it into existence sent his son. to atone for my cosmic rebellion against him, whether I like to call it that or not, that's what it is. I am hostile prior to Christ. That's what Paul says. I am hostile. Now I haven't met very many like hostile people in my life. So don't that that's not what he's talking about. Hostile means I might need God a little. Or I might not need him at all. C.S. Lewis says that those who enter hell will have to step over the body of Christ to get there. And the thing about it is they're willing to do that. That's hostility. I got it. That's hostile to God. Start there And baptism means that all that's all that's gone. Chris talked this morning about for fifteen hundred years immersion was just accepted and it was, it was. Leading up to that deviation fifteen hundred years later after Christ was the idea that penance could be purchased. Penance could be purchased. That I could buy my way into heaven. We don't like to think like that. We don't like to think like that. But that there was something that I could give that got me there. That's also kind of the same mentality of accepting Jesus into your heart. I have decided to follow Jesus. I understand what that means. I get it when we sing this song. But if I base my life off of whether or not I am currently in or out of deciding to be behind Jesus, I don't know about you, but I kind of wreck that. The good news is he is faithful. In spite of my decision. That's power to carry me through every day. Tonight, if you have not put on Christ in baptism, I don't know what you're waiting on. If we can if we can help you do that, if we can if we can pray with you, pray for you. We love you. We are glad you're here. I'm glad I'm here. Always great to see your faces come as we stand and sing.