Latest / Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive / August 30, 2015 | Finding Good News

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August 30, 2015 | Finding Good News · Topeka Bible Church Audio Archive

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Good morning Topeka Bible Church.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: My name's Tim Collins and I am on staff with Trash Mountain Project.
• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: And from time to time I get the chance to uh fill in for Pastor Jim when he's out of town, and today's one of those days.
• 0:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm excited to be here with you.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to share with you before we get started on our sermon this morning.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: I wanted to share with you an opportunity that Trash Mountain Project is going to be bringing here in two Sundays, two Sundays from today, on September 13th at 6 p.m.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_00: over in the CAB Auditorium.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to be having an event that everybody can come to free of charge where we want to kind of update you on what's been going on over the last year and kind of let you know where we're headed in the year to come.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Many of you of you are aware of our annual benefit that we do every October called Spoken.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: How many of you have been to Spoken before?
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, quite a few, and you're aware of it.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_00: It's, you know, picked up a lot of momentum, which is a great thing, but it comes becomes increasingly more of a problem at Spoken to be able to have a seat for everybody.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: Not everybody gets a chance to come.
• 1:07
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of people don't even get a chance to buy tickets because tickets sell out very quickly.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, as you may be aware of, over the last couple of years, we've tried a couple of different solutions to create more space at Spoken.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: So this year we just decided we're going to hit pause on Spoken.
• 1:21
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to have Spoken next year, but this year we're going to take a year off.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: And instead, we're going to kind of bring the Trash Mountain story back to some of our partner churches, some of our main churches that we partner with really around the country.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: Brett Durbin, who is our executive director, is speaking this morning at a church in Washington State.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: And so throughout the fall, we're going to be doing that.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_00: The neat thing about this opportunity is we're going to be able to hang out and talk with everybody afterwards.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: So to be at 6 o'clock, it's going to last from an hour to maybe an hour and 15 minutes.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_00: It's not going to be a very long thing, but we just want to give you an update and it's free.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_00: You don't have to buy a ticket.
• 1:59
  SPEAKER_00: You can just come and hear about all the things that we've been able to accomplish and the kids that we've been able to feed and the programs that we've got started and then where are we headed in the future?
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_00: So if you're curious at all, it won't cost you anything, just show up.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: We would love to see you there.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's in two weeks, September the 13th at 6 p.m.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: This morning, I want to talk to you about a very important subject, a very relevant subject and a very powerful subject.
• 2:24
  SPEAKER_00: But before I do that, I want to talk about something that's a little more fun.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: I want to talk about the first day of school.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 2:31
  SPEAKER_00: It's that time of year, first day of school.
• 2:38
  SPEAKER_00: That's always an interesting thing.
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: I actually see a couple of hands.
• 2:41
  SPEAKER_00: You see that, especially if you have little kids when it comes time for them to go to school and they go to their first day of kindergarten.
• 2:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's a big deal.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: It can be very traumatic.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: It can be very traumatic for mom when she takes the child to drop them off.
• 2:55
  SPEAKER_00: You often see mom crying, and maybe they're trying to pretend like they're not crying, but they are crying, right?
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Because my baby's growing up, and I can't believe my baby's gotten older, and my baby, my baby, my baby.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a baby, I know, right?
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, and especially if it's the youngest, which that's what I am.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: So if it's the youngest, that can even be more traumatic.
• 3:17
  SPEAKER_00: So mom's upset, and then sometimes you actually see kids are upset, uh, maybe because mom's upset, or maybe because they don't want to go to school.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: They like being at home or wherever they were before they went to kindergarten.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_00: So then you sometimes you have mom crying and you have the kid crying, and then a lot of times too you have the teacher crying because you know, summer's over and they have to go back to work, and many of them work throughout the summer anyway, but uh that's kind of the way it goes.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: So I remember my first day of kindergarten actually pretty vividly.
• 3:49
  SPEAKER_00: Um my mom had taken me a few days ahead of time to orientation and had uh we met the teacher, and I saw where the room was, so I kind of understood the layout of the school and I knew where I was supposed to go and where I was supposed to be.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: And so my mom gets me up the first day of kindergarten and she takes me to school, gets me out of the car, and I remember as we're walking in to the school, we walked through the gate, and I stopped and I told my mom, I know where the classroom is.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: I don't need you to walk there with me.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: So my mom, who was already upset, at that point just starts crying.
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: You know, she loses it because this is her baby, this is the last child that's gonna go through, this is the last first day of kindergarten, and he just said he doesn't need me and he's independent, and oh my goodness, I had no idea what I was doing.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: She walked me to class anyway.
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, and it was fine.
• 4:43
  SPEAKER_00: We went to class, we had our experience kind of the first day of class.
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um, they talk about what you're gonna cover that year, which was cool.
• 4:51
  SPEAKER_00: I was glad to hear it.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: We we I learned that we were gonna be learning that year how to tie our shoes, and you know, you're gonna learn the ABCs, and you know, maybe count 10.
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_00: And uh, so I went home, and so that what I really want to talk to you about this morning was the second day of kindergarten.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: That's kind of our jumping off point for today.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because the second day, my mom wakes me up and she says, Hey, it's time to go to kindergarten, and I said, I'm not going back to kindergarten.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: She said, Why not?
• 5:19
  SPEAKER_00: I said, I've learned everything they're teaching.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: I already know all of those things.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: I know my ABCs, I know how to count to 10, I can tie my shoes, I'm good.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't say it exactly like that, but it was probably pretty close.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: You know, I'll catch you in first grade, but I'm good to go here.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: Kind of a scary thing, and my mom and her wisdom, you know, she had the wisdom beyond a five-year-old, uh, kind of slowed me down.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know, she knew that if I continued with that attitude, I would miss some pretty important things, and that could come back to really bite me later.
• 5:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so what we're going to talk about today is a really foundational subject.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: It is the foundational subject for our faith and how we relate to God.
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: And yet, if we're not careful, kind of like my attitude that second day of kindergarten, we'll just blow right by it and go, you know what, I've learned all that.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: I know everything there is to know about that.
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: That's no longer relevant to me.
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: And that can actually be a really, really dangerous thing.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: So this morning we're going to talk about the gospel.
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to talk about the gospel.
• 6:20
  SPEAKER_00: Uh, the word that's translated gospel, and gospel's kind of a church word, right?
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_00: Uh maybe you're not a church person or you're not sure, or you're wondering.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: Gospel's one of those church words, and that's valid because it actually is in the Bible.
• 6:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's where we get it from.
• 6:33
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the rid the original word is Yuangaleon, and you and I both know, if you've been in church any length of time, you know that the gospel really is just as good news.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: Um, that it's good news, and in fact, it's great news.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's the best news that we've ever heard.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: And the news is this, just to be clear, because the word gospel sometimes can get a little distorted, and when I say gospel, you may not know what I'm talking about.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: So just to be clear, the gospel is the idea that in our relationship with God, we relate to God not based on our performance, but on his grace.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's the essence of the gospel.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: The teaching of the gospel, the belief of the gospel, is that when we relate to God, we relate not on our performance, but on his grace.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Did you know that that's what the gospel means?
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: Did you know that that's the basic essence of the gospel and what the gospel is?
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: It's summed up really well in Ephesians 2, two verses, 8 and 9.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: These are verses that you've probably heard before.
• 7:30
  SPEAKER_00: It says, by grace you have been saved through what?
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: Okay.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_00: You're gonna have to work a little harder than that.
• 7:37
  SPEAKER_00: By grace you have been saved through what?
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: Nice.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not of yourselves, it is the gift of God.
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: What's a gift?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: A gift is not something that's earned.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: A gift is something that's just plainly given.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's the gift of God, not as a result of works, and then say these last few words with me, so that no one.
• 8:03
  SPEAKER_00: In other words, if there ever comes a point in our faith journey when we begin to depend even just a little bit on our performance, or to be proud of the things that we've accomplished or the things that we've done, we have blown right by the gospel.
• 8:22
  SPEAKER_00: That the essence of the gospel is that you and I don't boast.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: We have nothing to boast about.
• 8:29
  SPEAKER_00: That God Himself gave us this free gift of grace.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: If we're not careful, we have kind of these two dangerous responses.
• 8:40
  SPEAKER_00: Like I said, you know, my second day of kindergarten, I've learned that.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: I know that, I've outgrown that.
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_00: If we're not careful, those of us, especially if we've been Christ's followers for any length of time, uh, we can fall into that trap of having that attitude of saying, oh, gospel, well, the gospel is what you present to people who don't know Jesus, right?
• 8:59
  SPEAKER_00: The gospel is what they have on a track so that when people respond, they can follow through.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Or, you know, if somebody wants to start a relationship with God, that's what we give them.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: But, you know, I've been saved, you know, years, Tim, or maybe decades.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: I don't need that.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: That's a very, very dangerous thought process, but I've fallen into it more than once.
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the second, very dangerous response, and this would really be the response of a lot of skeptics.
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe some of you in here are skeptics, you're not sure about the God thing or the church thing.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_00: The response of skeptics often to the gospel can be, well, okay, yeah, that's important, but it's not that important.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I want you to think about.
• 9:41
  SPEAKER_00: How did we get here?
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_00: How did you and I wind up in a church today worshiping some guy that lived 2,000 years ago on the other side of the planet?
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: How did we get here?
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: And many of us were here last week, and we'll be here next week.
• 10:02
  SPEAKER_00: So this is like a regular thing that we do, right?
• 10:06
  SPEAKER_00: This church thing is a regular thing that we do.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_00: How did we get here?
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's the gospel.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: Two thousand years ago, the gospel message started spreading.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: And it turned the world upside down.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm telling you, it literally changed the course of human events.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_00: And if it's powerful enough to do that, then there's a really good chance that if you and I dismiss it quickly, we missed it.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: We don't understand it.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: We've minimized it.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: We've removed its power from it.
• 10:44
  SPEAKER_00: So this morning, we're gonna step right into the middle of a parable that Jesus told.
• 10:48
  SPEAKER_00: Uh if you want to turn in your Bibles to Luke 15, that's where we're gonna be.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna read four or five verses.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Now I'll go ahead and warn you, we're not gonna read the whole parable.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have time to read the whole parable.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna kind of give you verbally kind of the intro, and then we're gonna read a few verses, and then we're gonna unplug from this parable because we don't have time to do the whole thing.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: But there's a really important part kind of right in the middle.
• 11:08
  SPEAKER_00: A parable is just a story.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is not a true story.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: This is a story that Jesus told.
• 11:13
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus was a phenomenal teacher, maybe the best teacher that's ever lived.
• 11:16
  SPEAKER_00: He was a great communicator.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: So he knew that stories are a great way to communicate with people.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: And so he told a story, and this was a story with a point.
• 11:24
  SPEAKER_00: It was a story with a moral.
• 11:26
  SPEAKER_00: It was that maybe you would call it an illustration, but it's a very, very powerful story.
• 11:30
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, you've probably heard the name of this parable before, even if you've never been to church before.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_00: You've probably heard the name of this parable.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_00: The parable is called, We Know It as the Parable of the Prodigal.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, well, there you go.
• 11:43
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, see, that was easy.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: The parable of the prodigal son.
• 11:46
  SPEAKER_00: I don't really like that title because the story's about two sons.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_00: Um, my Bible says uh the parable of the lost son, that's a little bit better, but really the story is about two sons.
• 11:57
  SPEAKER_00: However, you and I this morning are really gonna kind of focus on the one son, who is we know as the prodigal son, even though that may not be the best way to describe him.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: That's where we're gonna kind of jump in.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_00: So let me give you the background to the story, and let me say this.
• 12:11
  SPEAKER_00: If you're a church person, if you're a Bible person, and maybe you know this story and you've known this story for a long time, and maybe you've taught Sunday school and you've taught lessons about this story, or you've heard sermons about this story, just do me a favor and this morning hit pause on that and let you and I kind of rediscover this story together because I think it's pretty powerful.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: Um, so here's how the story goes.
• 12:34
  SPEAKER_00: There's a man who had two sons, and the older son uh was a rule keeper.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_00: He was a rule follower, he was obedient, he liked to perform, and that actually comes back to get him later on in the story.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: But for the purpose of this story, this is the older son.
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: He's a good kid.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_00: He does what's asked, he does what's expected, you know, tries to do it even before it's asked, and so that's that's fine, that's great.
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Then you got this other kid, right?
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not gonna ask for a show of hands.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: How many of us were the other kid growing up, right?
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: Not rule followers, but rule breakers.
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 13:15
  SPEAKER_00: We were the ones who uh didn't necessarily like to be told what to do, didn't want to be told, you know, when we could go to bed and when we could get up.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so this kid or this young man uh was kind of that way.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: That's the way his mind worked, that's the way he thought.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_00: So he goes to his dad and he says, Hey, when you die, I'm gonna get one-third of your stuff.
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: That's my inheritance.
• 13:42
  SPEAKER_00: So, let's pretend you're dead.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: When you die, I'm gonna get part of your money, and then I don't have to listen to you anymore.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: You don't get to tell me what to do.
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: So let's pretend that you're dead now.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: And just go ahead and give me my inheritance, and I'm out of here.
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: I'm tired of this.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_00: In some cultures, when they hear this story, they can't believe that this young son wasn't put to death on the spot because he was so incredibly disrespectful to his dad.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: So, for whatever reason, in the story, dad gives him the money.
• 14:18
  SPEAKER_00: Sure, go ahead.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: And he takes off with a pocket full of cash and he lives it up.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: Parties like a rock star.
• 14:29
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, just throwing money around, doing whatever he wants to do, fulfilling every whim until he runs out of money.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: And it wasn't long after he ran out of money that because of his decisions, he ran out of dignity, and he found himself as a Jewish person feeding pigs.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: That's pretty significant, isn't it?
• 14:56
  SPEAKER_00: Here's why it's significant.
• 15:00
  SPEAKER_00: Because he bottomed out.
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: He experienced his worst moment.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe you and I have never been in that exact situation, but we have experienced worst moments, haven't we?
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: You have them, and I have them, and I'm not going to tell you what mine is, and you don't want to tell me what yours is either, do you?
• 15:20
  SPEAKER_00: Because they're embarrassing.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: We don't want people to know.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe your worst moment was public, and maybe everybody knows.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it was 10 years ago, maybe it was 50 years ago, maybe it was this week.
• 15:31
  SPEAKER_00: But you have a worst moment, and maybe you have several.
• 15:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I have a worst moment.
• 15:37
  SPEAKER_00: And we don't like to think about it.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: We don't like to think about that night or that weekend or that trip that we shouldn't have gone on, that spring break that we wish we could have stayed home from, that date that we wish we hadn't gone on, the job we wish we hadn't accepted.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_00: We could all do this, right?
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, if I could get hand you the keys to my DeLorean time machine right now and let you go back in time, this is the first place you would go and you would fix it.
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: You would change what you did, you would change what you said, you would change what you thought.
• 16:10
  SPEAKER_00: But we can't change it.
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_00: And you and I have worse moments.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: And we bottom out.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason I did all that is to remind us all what it must have taken for this son who's feeding pigs to think to himself, I'm gonna go home.
• 16:36
  SPEAKER_00: I'm gonna go back.
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of courage did it take?
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of faith must he have had?
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: For this son to be able to say, even my father's employees have it better than this.
• 16:56
  SPEAKER_00: And I know I've squandered my birthright and I've squandered my inheritance, and I've squandered any uh status that I may have with my family, but I'm gonna go home anyway.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe he'll just treat me like an employee.
• 17:09
  SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine what that must have taken?
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_00: And so we read these pivotal words in Luke 15, verse 20.
• 17:18
  SPEAKER_00: So he got up and came to his father.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: Here's my question.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_00: What would you expect your father's reaction to be?
• 17:34
  SPEAKER_00: What would you expect?
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: We all have baggage.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us have been burned, some of us have been judged, rightly or wrongly.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_00: What would you expect your father's reaction to be?
• 17:48
  SPEAKER_00: Because this was the reaction.
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_00: While he was still a long way off, his father saw him and felt what?
• 17:57
  SPEAKER_00: Not anger, not judgment.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_00: He felt compassion for him.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_00: And he ran and embraced him and he kissed him.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_00: And this Jew had just walked out of a pig pen, and his Jewish father just grabs hold of him.
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_00: Can you imagine what that must have been?
• 18:15
  SPEAKER_00: This is scandalous.
• 18:18
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 21.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_00: And the son said to him, Father, I've sinned against heaven, and I've sinned in your sight.
• 18:28
  SPEAKER_00: I'm no longer worthy to be called your son.
• 18:38
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't just come home.
• 18:40
  SPEAKER_00: He came home broken.
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_00: See, here's the thing, and I think we miss it.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_00: If the gospel really is good news, then in order for the gospel to be good news, it has to invade bad places.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: And the reason we think the gospel is ho-hum is because we don't understand what kind of place we're in.
• 19:04
  SPEAKER_00: And what kind of place we came from.
• 19:07
  SPEAKER_00: And there's two ingredients to the gospel, and the first one is right here, and that is a deep spiritual need.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: That's always the starting point of the gospel, a deep spiritual need.
• 19:19
  SPEAKER_00: And you say, Tim, I get that, and I gave my heart to Jesus when I was five years old, and now I'm five, and so, you know, I've been a Christian forever.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: I don't need to hear this.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you do.
• 19:32
  SPEAKER_00: Because even this week, you have had a deep spiritual need.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't go away.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: Just because your worst moment is gone doesn't mean your deep spiritual need goes away.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's just a representation of it.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: In order to be good news, the gospel has to invade bad spaces.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: Well, think about it this way.
• 19:57
  SPEAKER_00: What if the prodigal son came home with a little bit different attitude?
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_00: Just slightly.
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: If we could change the story just slightly.
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_00: What if the prodigal son came home and said, Well, Dad, you know, want to come home and, you know, sorry for what I did.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_00: But you can't really blame me.
• 20:18
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you've got all these rules.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_00: There's all these rules here that I have to obey and I don't enjoy.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: That's no fun.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody wants to be told what to do.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_00: So, Dad, I think most people probably would have done what I did.
• 20:33
  SPEAKER_00: Well, that's a different story, isn't it?
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_00: That story doesn't carry the same punch.
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: Because we've reduced his deep spiritual need.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: What about this one?
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: What if the prodigal son came home and said, Dad, sorry for what I did.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_00: I'm glad to be home.
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: But I only took a third of your money.
• 20:53
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you still have two-thirds.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, you still have the majority of your money, and you're a really smart guy, so you'll probably earn most of it back anyway.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, let's pretend it never happened.
• 21:08
  SPEAKER_00: Well, suddenly the gospel becomes ho-hum, right?
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 21:12
  SPEAKER_00: Because deep spiritual need is the starting point of the gospel.
• 21:17
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't just come home, he came home broken.
• 21:20
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, this story really is a story about two sons.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: And I would challenge you to go home today and finish reading this story.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's not going to take you very long.
• 21:28
  SPEAKER_00: Finish reading this story.
• 21:30
  SPEAKER_00: Because what you're going to find at the end of the story is that the rule keeper was a bigger problem than the rule breaker.
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 21:39
  SPEAKER_00: Because the rule keeper still had some confidence in himself.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_00: It's another parable that Jesus told.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_00: Just a little parentheses.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_00: Luke 18.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_00: Jesus said two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee, and the other a tax collector.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: These are kind of opposite ends of the spectrum.
• 21:58
  SPEAKER_00: The tax collector is that person.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Who's bottomed out?
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_00: There's nothing holy, there's nothing good, they're an outcast, no, there's nothing good spiritually about them.
• 22:06
  SPEAKER_00: The Pharisee, however, was regarded as somebody who knew how to keep the rules.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: They were the ones who knew where you're supposed to park and when you're supposed to stand up, when you're supposed to sit down.
• 22:16
  SPEAKER_00: And when the pastor says, turn to the book of Amos, they just flip right to it.
• 22:19
  SPEAKER_00: They know right where it is, and the rest of us are looking like in our table of contents, right?
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_00: What is that again?
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_00: Was it Hezekiah?
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_00: They know right where it is, man, and they can turn there and they know all the words to all the songs, and they're good.
• 22:31
  SPEAKER_00: This is what Jesus said.
• 22:32
  SPEAKER_00: The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself.
• 22:35
  SPEAKER_00: God, I thank you that I am not like other people.
• 22:44
  SPEAKER_00: He knew it was wrong to swindle.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_00: This is what he said.
• 22:46
  SPEAKER_00: Swindlers, unjust, adulterers, he knew all of that was wrong.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: Or even like this tax collector.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_00: I fast twice a week.
• 22:53
  SPEAKER_00: I pay tithes of all that I get.
• 22:56
  SPEAKER_00: But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift his eyes to heaven, but was beating his chest, saying, God, be merciful to me.
• 23:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not a sinner, I'm the sinner.
• 23:15
  SPEAKER_00: Specifically me.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm a sinner and I deserve nothing.
• 23:20
  SPEAKER_00: But I'm asking you to have mercy on me anyway.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: I tell you, Jesus says, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other.
• 23:28
  SPEAKER_00: For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.
• 23:34
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, he who humbles himself will be exalted.
• 23:38
  SPEAKER_00: Not because suddenly we get all our stuff together, but because when you humble yourself, you are a perfect candidate for the gospel message.
• 23:47
  SPEAKER_00: No matter how many times you've heard it, you're a perfect candidate for it.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: The story works because he was at his lowest point.
• 23:55
  SPEAKER_00: And you and I don't like to think about our bottom-out moments, but they exist.
• 24:00
  SPEAKER_00: And there's nothing we can do about them.
• 24:02
  SPEAKER_00: And sometimes they just keep happening, don't they?
• 24:05
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us don't have to think very far back to remember our bottom-out moment.
• 24:11
  SPEAKER_00: So, it's interesting.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_00: Verse 22.
• 24:17
  SPEAKER_00: The father said to his slaves, quickly, bring out the best robe.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_00: Time out.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_00: I like to pretend in my mind that the father said, first give him a bath.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_00: And then bring out the best robe and put it on him.
• 24:31
  SPEAKER_00: Put a ring on his hand and sandals on his feet.
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_00: I love you, son, but you stink.
• 24:35
  SPEAKER_00: You need to go take a bath, right?
• 24:37
  SPEAKER_00: Bring the fattened calf and kill it and let us eat and celebrate.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_00: For this son of mine was dead and has come to life again.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_00: Say it with me.
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_00: He was lost and has been caught.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_00: No?
• 24:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's not what it says, is it?
• 24:58
  SPEAKER_00: He wasn't caught.
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_00: He didn't say, we found him, and he's in the pig pen.
• 25:04
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm going to tell you this.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_00: We've got footage.
• 25:07
  SPEAKER_00: There was a security camera that caught the whole thing on tape, and we're going to nail him to the wall.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: My son was lost, and now he's found.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: I'm going to tell you this.
• 25:19
  SPEAKER_00: You and I don't want to be caught, but it's great to be found.
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_00: The difference is love.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_00: The difference is love.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_00: Here's the question.
• 25:34
  SPEAKER_00: In your worst moment, do you really believe that the grace of God is sufficient to meet you there?
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because the two elements of the gospel are pretty simple.
• 25:46
  SPEAKER_00: You have a deep spiritual need, that's the starting point, but thank God we don't have to end there.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: You have a deep spiritual need, and then you have abundant grace.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_00: Abundant grace.
• 25:58
  SPEAKER_00: What kind of grace?
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_00: Abundant grace.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_00: Romans 5.20 says this.
• 26:05
  SPEAKER_00: I love this verse.
• 26:06
  SPEAKER_00: Love, love, love this verse.
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_00: The law came in so that the transgression would do what?
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_00: The purpose of the law is to reveal to you how guilty you are and to make you feel guilty.
• 26:19
  SPEAKER_00: It's to make you be broken.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: It's to make you bottom out.
• 26:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's to make you go again, no matter how many times you've done this before.
• 26:27
  SPEAKER_00: It's to make you go, you know what?
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: There is nothing for me to hope in in myself.
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: The law came in so the transgression would increase.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: Look at this.
• 26:40
  SPEAKER_00: But where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.
• 26:46
  SPEAKER_00: Where sin, literally, where sin abounded, grace superabounded.
• 26:53
  SPEAKER_00: Superabounded.
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_00: And that's not even a word.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: I just made it up.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: How phenomenal.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: This is such good news.
• 27:01
  SPEAKER_00: We have to make up words to communicate it.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: That everywhere that you sin, and listen, sin has permeated every part of your being.
• 27:11
  SPEAKER_00: You are a sinner.
• 27:13
  SPEAKER_00: Say, Tim, I've been a Christian for 75 years.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_00: You're still a sinner.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: All of us are.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_00: And the good news, the gospel message, is that we're sin increased, where sin abounded.
• 27:27
  SPEAKER_00: Grace superabounded.
• 27:30
  SPEAKER_00: Grace came in and overtook it.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_00: It washes into all the cracks and crevices of our life and the parts that we're trying to hide and the parts that we're trying to cover up and the parts that we're trying to make sure nobody can see.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_00: Boy, I don't need to let anybody see that.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, it's a good idea to not post it on Facebook.
• 27:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
• 27:47
  SPEAKER_00: Don't post your worst moment for everybody to see, but it still exists.
• 27:52
  SPEAKER_00: And goodness, how good is the news that we're sin abounded.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: Grace superabounded.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: Hey, listen.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_00: Just take a deep breath and relax.
• 28:09
  SPEAKER_00: Quit trying to minimize your sinfulness.
• 28:14
  SPEAKER_00: Quit trying to pretend like you have it all together because you don't.
• 28:17
  SPEAKER_00: You're a hot mess, and I am too.
• 28:21
  SPEAKER_00: We are messed up.
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_00: And that makes us perfect candidates for the gospel message.
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_00: So what's the response?
• 28:33
  SPEAKER_00: In this story, in the story of the prodigal son, what's the response?
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_00: How are we going to leave the story here today?
• 28:39
  SPEAKER_00: Here it is.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_00: And they begin to celebrate.
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 28:45
  SPEAKER_00: Because where the gospel is present, there is celebration.
• 28:49
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter if you've heard it once or you've heard it a million times.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: It doesn't matter if you've never responded to it or you responded to it decades ago.
• 28:57
  SPEAKER_00: Where the gospel is present, there is celebration.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: That's why when we get together on Sundays, what do we do?
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_00: Vote on it and get back to me.
• 29:09
  SPEAKER_00: What do we do?
• 29:11
  SPEAKER_00: We celebrate, right?
• 29:13
  SPEAKER_00: How much fun is it that we get to sing?
• 29:15
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm just gonna, whatever they put up there, man, on the screen, I'm singing it.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_00: I'm just gonna sing, and I may not know the words.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_00: I'll just I'll make a joyful noise, right?
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: Loud, joyful noise.
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 29:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because it's a celebration.
• 29:30
  SPEAKER_00: This is the gospel story.
• 29:35
  SPEAKER_00: This is as plain as I know how to say it.
• 29:37
  SPEAKER_00: Where deep spiritual need meets abundant grace, good news is found.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_00: Where deep spiritual need meets abundant grace, good news is found.
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_00: So if you think the gospel is just kind of okay news, you either don't understand the depth of your spiritual need, or you're not really convinced of the abundant grace of Jesus Christ.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_00: Wonderful grace of Jesus, greater than all my sin.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_00: How can my tongue describe it?
• 30:17
  SPEAKER_00: Where shall its praise begin?
• 30:19
  SPEAKER_00: Right this is what we came for.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_00: This is what we're here for.
• 30:24
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I'm telling you.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: While you're dirty and nasty and unlovable, your heavenly Father is seeking you out.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_00: He's seeking you out.
• 30:39
  SPEAKER_00: Not because you've done anything worthwhile, but because you are worthwhile.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I want you to open your heart and just let that rush in.
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: It's not because your performance.
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_00: Your performance is a mess, and mine is too.
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_00: That's why Jesus went to the cross to deal with the performance question.
• 31:07
  SPEAKER_00: You want to hear another incredible message of the gospel?
• 31:11
  SPEAKER_00: When you surrender your life to follow Jesus Christ and you get forgiven of your sins, you know what that means?
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_00: That means when God looks at you, he sees the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: He doesn't put Jesus in us, he doesn't only put Jesus in us, he puts us in Jesus.
• 31:26
  SPEAKER_00: So that when God looks at us, he sees the righteousness of Jesus Christ.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_00: No matter what we've done, we get perfect righteousness imputed to us.
• 31:37
  SPEAKER_00: If that's not good news, I don't know what it is.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's what your soul has been thirsty for.
• 31:46
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us have been in church our entire lives.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_00: And we've missed it.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying you don't have faith in God.
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not saying your faith isn't authentic.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_00: But we still have some things we're trying to hide, don't we?
• 32:01
  SPEAKER_00: We still have some things that we're not so sure God's grace will reach.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_00: Guarantee you they will.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_00: It removes all of the pressure.
• 32:38
  SPEAKER_00: All of the pressure.
• 32:39
  SPEAKER_00: I need to read three more verses.
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_00: This is from Romans 5, just a few verses earlier than the ones we read.
• 32:45
  SPEAKER_00: I love these verses because these are awana verses.
• 32:50
  SPEAKER_00: For while we were still helpless at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_00: When did he do it?
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_00: At the right time.
• 32:58
  SPEAKER_00: Wasn't too early and it wasn't too late.
• 33:01
  SPEAKER_00: One will hardly die for a righteous man, verse 7, though perhaps for a good man someone would dare even to die.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_00: Here we go.
• 33:09
  SPEAKER_00: This is why you came to church today and you just didn't know it.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_00: God demonstrates his own love toward us.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_00: In that, while we were yet sinners.
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Why?
• 33:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because there's never a point when we're not sinners.
• 33:27
  SPEAKER_00: That was the only state he could find us in, because it's the only state we exist in.
• 33:33
  SPEAKER_00: While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_00: Listen, before performance.
• 33:40
  SPEAKER_00: No performance.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_00: Just grace.
• 33:44
  SPEAKER_00: Not because your performance is worth it, but because you are worth it.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's three responses to this, three applications.
• 33:55
  SPEAKER_00: Number one, some of us have been putting too much emphasis on our own personal achievement.
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's great.
• 34:02
  SPEAKER_00: I think we should work hard, work long, try to do the best that we can.
• 34:07
  SPEAKER_00: God gives us, this is a whole nother sermon.
• 34:10
  SPEAKER_00: God gives us opportunity and we need to steward those opportunities well.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_00: I get that.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'm with you on that.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_00: I agree.
• 34:17
  SPEAKER_00: But some of us don't need to repent of our sins as much as we need to repent of our successes.
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_00: Because deep down we take just a little bit of credit for it.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_00: You don't get credit.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_00: Whatever credit you get is credit that should have gone to God.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_00: I don't care if it's 1% or 5%, it all goes to God.
• 34:40
  SPEAKER_00: Second response is on the total opposite end of the spectrum.
• 34:46
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us have been carrying around some stuff with us for a long time that we just need to lay down.
• 34:53
  SPEAKER_00: Some of us have never really gotten past our worst moment, or maybe several worst moments.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_00: Because we think God doesn't really love us.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_00: How could he love us?
• 35:02
  SPEAKER_00: Because of what we've done.
• 35:05
  SPEAKER_00: He does.
• 35:07
  SPEAKER_00: Where sin abounded.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_00: Grace superabounded.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: You haven't figured out a sin that you can commit yet that God's grace won't cover.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_00: If you repent and change your life and change your heart and come back to Him, you gotta get up and walk out of the pig style.
• 35:24
  SPEAKER_00: You gotta come home broken.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_00: And He's ready.
• 35:28
  SPEAKER_00: He's ready.
• 35:30
  SPEAKER_00: Third application.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: Some people have never accepted God's grace.
• 35:36
  SPEAKER_00: That's pretty obvious, isn't it?
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, that's the obvious application.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_00: There are some people who've never done this.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_00: You're investigating, you're curious.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not sure if I'm gonna walk away from this God thing or not.
• 35:47
  SPEAKER_00: Think about what you're walking away from.
• 35:49
  SPEAKER_00: This is the message that your heart was built to receive.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's not about your performance, it's about a loving, heavenly Father who thinks that you are worth it.
• 36:08
  SPEAKER_00: I want to close with a quote.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_00: This is from Desiring God.
• 36:12
  SPEAKER_00: It's from their website.
• 36:13
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know if you're familiar with Desiring God.
• 36:14
  SPEAKER_00: Uh it's John Piper, just a phenomenal pastor and Bible teacher.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_00: And uh it's a great website.
• 36:20
  SPEAKER_00: I'd highly recommend that you go there and check it out.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: You can Google it.
• 36:23
  SPEAKER_00: I think it's desiring God.org.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_00: I don't remember if it's.com or org, but it's just a phenomenal website.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_00: There's an article that was written back in April, and this has stuck with me ever since then.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_00: If you remember the context of what was going on in April, that was about the time that the big discussion around homosexual marriage was really starting to heat up.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_00: And Desiring God published an article on this website about homosexuality and how sexual sin is different from other sins.
• 36:50
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't have time to go into that, but they're right, and the Bible does teach that, that sexual sin is different.
• 36:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's not like it's just you can be forgiven, but the consequences are just so much more far-reaching.
• 37:02
  SPEAKER_00: And so, anyway, they wrote this article, phenomenal article, and there are two paragraphs that stuck out to me very, very poignantly.
• 37:09
  SPEAKER_00: And I want to share those with you because they fit the context of the discussion they were having.
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: But they also fit the context of our discussion this morning.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: This is what it says, where the gospel shines.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_00: It says, you're wrong and you're loved.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_00: That's the unique voice of the Christian.
• 37:32
  SPEAKER_00: That's what we say, speaking from our own experience.
• 37:38
  SPEAKER_00: We don't have to look far to see that.
• 37:41
  SPEAKER_00: As Tim Keller so well puts it, we're far worse than we ever imagined and far more loved than we could have ever dreamed.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_00: That's our message in this debate.
• 37:53
  SPEAKER_00: When society's elites despise us, when pop songs vilify us, when no one else has the resources to say anything outside of two extremes, we have this incomparable opportunity to let the gospel shine.
• 38:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm telling you, it shines.
• 38:16
  SPEAKER_00: To reach out in grace, you're wrong.
• 38:21
  SPEAKER_00: And you're loved.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_00: We get to say this.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: What an opportunity.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_00: To say something nobody else is saying because there's no other message like it.
• 38:35
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm telling you, no matter how long you've had your faith in Christ, no matter how long you've been a Christian, this is still the message that your soul needs to hear.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_00: You need to continually run back to it.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_00: You don't outgrow it.
• 38:50
  SPEAKER_00: This is the message.
• 38:52
  SPEAKER_00: We're wrong and we're loved.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_00: Let's pray.
• 38:59
  SPEAKER_00: God, thank you for the gospel message.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much that you sent Jesus.
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't say that lightly, and I know we say it all the time, but we mean it.
• 39:11
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much that you chose to send your son to die a sinless death on the cross to set us free from performance demands.
• 39:22
  SPEAKER_00: He performed so we don't have to.
• 39:24
  SPEAKER_00: And God, I pray that you would remind me and all of your children who are sitting here and all of your children who are listening by video or online.
• 39:32
  SPEAKER_00: Remind us this week that we don't have to perform to get your grace.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_00: That you love us in our best moments and our worst moments, and all of the ones in between.
• 39:45
  SPEAKER_00: That your gospel sets us free from performance, but it sets us free so that we can turn around and offer our lives and our performance as a sacrifice to you, not to please you, but in response to the love and the grace that you've poured out on us.
• 40:01
  SPEAKER_00: Set us free from performance demands.
• 40:05
  SPEAKER_00: Set us free to pursue you with pure hearts, with clean souls, because you've made us clean.
• 40:15
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for superabounding grace.
• 40:21
  SPEAKER_00: Be with us as we go from here.
• 40:23
  SPEAKER_00: It's in Jesus' name that we pray.
• 40:25
  SPEAKER_00: Amen.
• 40:27
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for coming.
• 40:28
  SPEAKER_00: Have a great week.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_00: You're dismissed.