FBCPS
Sermons, teachings, and podcasts from First Baptist Church in Powder Springs, Georgia.
FBCPS
The Best Christmas Presence | John 1:1
🎄 Picture this: a church brimming with warmth and the laughter of children as they eagerly await the PJs and Pancakes event. Our community is more than just a gathering; it’s a vibrant tapestry woven with shared stories and cherished memories. I vividly recall the excitement of Christmas 1988 when a Nintendo NES found its way under our tree, a moment that encapsulates the magic of giving and community during the holidays. Join us as we unfold the joy of upcoming festivities, from Community Christmas Sunday to young adult gatherings filled with free lunches and gift exchanges. It’s about embracing the spirit of togetherness.
📖 What if the essence of eternity was closer than we think? We journey through the profound teachings of John 1:1, unraveling the significance of Jesus’ eternal presence and divine nature. By comparing these insights with the foundational messages in Genesis, we address common misconceptions and affirm Jesus as the embodiment of the Word. This exploration isn’t just theological; it’s a call to align our lives with a presence that transcends time. We dissect the Greek term "ein" to understand Jesus’ continuous presence, demonstrating why understanding His true nature is vital.
🌟 Heaven, often imagined as an ultimate vacation, offers a promise far surpassing any earthly experience. Through a touching story about my daughter Brooklyn and her connection to her wheelchair, we grasp the limits of our comprehension of eternal life’s wonders. Reflecting on why God created humanity, we find a purpose steeped in offering fulfillment and relationship through Jesus Christ. Whether it’s through personal anecdotes about my son Cruz or the heart-touching decisions of those embracing faith, we celebrate the transformative power of accepting Jesus. This episode invites you to embrace His love and contribute to a community grounded in unwavering faith and worship.
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Amen. Aren't you glad you came to church this morning. God is so good. I just want to give a special welcome to all of our first-time guests and for everyone who is here. I even want to give a shout out to everybody who has been serving today. Maybe you're one of our hospitality greeters that we love to welcome people into our church from the streets to the seats. Maybe you've served already in kids ministry or student ministry. Maybe you've been inviting people this week. Maybe you're a part of our worship team, production team. And again, we're just so thankful for everybody that is here. Let's put our hands together one more time for all that God is doing here in our church and among us and in our midst.
Speaker 1:I wanna say a special welcome to everyone who is here on our Community Christmas Sunday. It is our honor to have you here. If you're a part of our Community Christmas Sunday, it is our honor to have you here if you're a part of our Community Christmas lunch. And we just wanna say that we don't wanna just be a church in the community, we wanna be a church that's known, who is for our community. And so I would just say, if you don't already have a church family that you belong to and that you worship with on a weekly basis. It would be our honor and we would love to be that church family in your life. So thank you so much for choosing to be with us today, and I can't wait to be with you in our lunch together here in just a few minutes. I want you to know that next Sunday everybody say next Sunday Next Sunday is PJs and pancakes. Before you get too excited, it's just for our kids and students, and so don't you come up in your PJs. But all of our kids, our preschool and elementary and our middle school and our high school students, they're all going to come in their comfy, cozy, modest PJs. You won't be coming to my PJs and I don't want you coming in yours, but that's for our kids and our students. It's gonna be awesome. We're gonna be feeding them pancakes, lots of syrup. Send them home happy and tired. It's gonna be great. And so that is next Sunday morning. So all of our kids and students, do not miss that.
Speaker 1:Today is our young adult Christmas party For those who are from 18 into their 30s. We'd love for you to come. It's gonna be a free lunch in our student room right up in those two doors up there right after this service. So even if you didn't even plan on coming today, and here you are and you wanna meet some more people your age, I would encourage you to be there. Free lunch, and they're gonna be exchanging just some $10 like white elephant gifts or whatever. You didn't bring a gift. We just some $10 like a white elephant gifts or whatever. You didn't bring a gift. We even have a gift for you. So we're inviting you to stay. If you're single, there's a mistletoe booth up there. I'm kidding, that's a joke, but it's gonna be an awesome party and, man, we're so excited about all that God is doing in our young adult ministry.
Speaker 1:I want you to think back with me. Do you remember the most memorable Christmas present that you've ever received in your life? I had to think back over my last 46 Christmases now that I've gotten to experience and I think the most memorable the one that I feel like that I remember the clearest was back in 1988. How many of y'all were back in 1988? Raise your hand if you were alive back then in 88. It was a good year, good year, and that was the year that the Nintendo NES came out with the Power Pad and the Duck Hunt Gun.
Speaker 1:Up until that point in my life I was a very, very deprived child. I had only played the Atari. How many of y'all know what an Atari is? Raise your hand right. You know what the Atari is. The Atari was life changing until the Nintendo came out right. And so we think back to the Nintendo and this is what it looked like. You can't even tell what that is, but back then it was 8-bit. It was unbelievable. We could not wait to play it. These are two people running on a track. I wait to play it. These are two people running on a track. I know you can't tell, just because it's so terrible to our eyes today. And I remember this new Nintendo again. It came with the duck hunt gun, it came with the power pad and it was the one thing that I asked for that year.
Speaker 1:So it was Christmas Eve. We had just gone to my granny's house. That's where all of my mom's side of the family always went Every Christmas Eve. We would all hang out and eat meats and cheese and crackers and open up presents, and then we'd go home and we would always just wait for our Christmas presents as an immediate family on Christmas morning. Well, my parents were so excited to give me this gift that when we came home, I was 10 years old when we came home and they had the Nintendo I'll just go and put it back up there they had it on the TV on the TV, and so I was supposed to come in the house and notice and freak out and get excited.
Speaker 1:But I came in I didn't even notice. I walked straight by and went back to my room. So they're like what is wrong with our son? So they called me back in and they turned up the volume right to the Nintendo. I'd never had a Nintendo before and they turned up the volume. They called me back in. I talked to them for a minute. I didn't notice. I went back to my room and now they're starting to pray for me and so they're like well, let's lay out the controllers. They laid out the controllers on the floor. Same thing. And I came in. They talked to me and you might be shocked and horrified and surprised this morning, but the one person that's not is my wife. She's not surprised at all that I didn't even notice. And so, finally, they laid out everything and I came in and I saw the Nintendo and I freaked out and cause they had got me the one gift that I desperately wanted.
Speaker 1:And I'm here to tell you this morning that we're all kind of like that in some way, that when it comes to Christmas, we can miss out on what is most important during the Christmas season, when we get caught up in everything about the Christmas tradition, and so there are even times in our life that you know we get focused and fixated on just all the things that have to do with Christmas and we lose sight on what that is of most importance. And so we think about I'll just go ahead and skip this next one here but we think about. I wanna encourage you this morning to maybe change or to shift your thinking this morning from to understanding that presence supersedes presence, that presence is more important than presence. In other words, what you offer people that is most valuable is not just what you give to them, but it's the time that you spend with them. See, what's most important in our families is the time that we spend together. We don't just need to give each other presents and then all go to our different directions and all go to our different rooms. We need to be families who are tight and dads. I want to encourage you in the room, dads. I want to encourage you to lead your family in this way, because I believe that it is your time and your focus and your attention with your family that is gonna make the difference in your home.
Speaker 1:Or maybe you're in here and you are a single mom, and I just wanna give a shout out to every single single mom here in this room. I don't know how my wife does it. All the single mothers in this room. I don't know how you do it, and it is amazing what you moms and you single dads are able to do. I'm so thankful that you're here today, but I want to remind you that it's your presence that matters most, and it's our time together over Christmas with people that matters most, but there's something that's even more important than that, and it is our time, or the presence of Jesus. In fact, I would just here's what I wanna talk to you about this morning.
Speaker 1:My sermon title is the Best Christmas Presence, and the Best Christmas Presence I wanna show you this morning is just simply the presence of Jesus in your life, and so I just want you to think right now about Christmas past and I want you to think to yourself how much did you focus and how much did you give your attention to Jesus's presence in your life over Christmas? Because right now we are in this series through December that I wanna talk about we're calling it Before All Things and I wanna talk about in this series Before All Things, that first of all, jesus comes before all things in your life, but also Jesus came before everything else in the universe, time-wise. I want us to see over this month we talked about last week how Jesus is before all things. This morning I wanna talk to you about Jesus, how he existed in eternity past. Next week I want to talk to you about how Jesus is. He showed up in the Old Testament even before he was born, fascinating. The Sunday after that, december the 22nd. I want to talk to you about how Jesus he was, all of these fulfillment of these Old Testament prophecies throughout the Bible On Christmas Eve. I want us just to get into the Christmas story and to understand how Jesus's birth changes our lives and changes our life direction, and then to be honest with you in January.
Speaker 1:I believe that God is calling us to continue to talk about Jesus. We're gonna talk about the life of Jesus in January. We're gonna talk about the message, the teachings of Jesus about Jesus. We're gonna talk about the life of Jesus in January. We're gonna talk about the message, the teachings of Jesus in February. We're gonna talk about the miracles of Jesus. In March, we're gonna talk about the passion of Jesus, his life, his death, his resurrection in April. That's gonna be leading up to Easter and we're gonna get to experience all of these different things about Jesus.
Speaker 1:But for now but for now I want us to see this morning, I wanna talk to you for the next few minutes about the importance of Jesus's presence in eternity past, and I just wanna say I've never preached a message on Jesus's eternity past. I've never heard a message on Jesus's his presence in eternity past. So I'm gonna ask you to pray for me and I want us to pray right now. Can I do that? Let me just pray for us. Heavenly Father, we love you and God, as we talk about your son right now and we talk about one of the most powerful parts of Jesus's existence, god, I pray that you would speak into our hearts. I can only speak to ears, but, god, it is only your voice that can speak to hearts. God Jesus is only your voice that can speak to hearts. God Jesus is your son, the Bible is your word, we are your people and this is your church. And so, god, we pray that we would hear your voice. We love you and we pray these things in Jesus' name. And all God's people said here we go.
Speaker 1:Open up to the book of John. John, chapter one, verse one. As we look at the importance of Jesus' presence in eternity. Past John, chapter one, verse one. As we look at the importance of Jesus's presence in eternity. Past John, chapter one, verse one. To be honest with you, I was studying for this sermon today to preach on John one, one through five, through verse five, and I studied for hours and hours and hours and I only made it through the first verse. So we're just talking about one verse in John one today. So hang on with me and here we go.
Speaker 1:John 1 1 says this in the beginning was the word, in the beginning was the word. Now, I think this is so incredibly important because, first of all, we see, in the beginning, everyone say beginning, beginning. Last week we talked about Colossians 1. And in Colossians 1, it looked like the apostle Paul was looking back at Genesis 1 when he was talking about Jesus being the image of the invisible God. This morning we're studying John, written by the apostle John, and he too is looking back at the book of Genesis, the very first book in all, the Bible Genesis, chapter one, verse one which says in the beginning, god created the heavens and the earth. Now, this is so important because we see here, in the beginning was the word, and the word is Jesus. Everyone say Jesus. Now, here's the reason why this is so important, because there are many people who do not understand this. There are many people today that are not being taught the word of God, and when you're not being taught the truthfulness of the word of God, then you're being left into your own thought, your own imagination and even making up things to what you think is real and what you think is true about Jesus.
Speaker 1:In fact, when it comes to Jesus, there's a lot of different thoughts, there's a lot of different beliefs and there's a lot of different heresies. One heresy is Arianism. I talked to you about it just briefly last week. Arianism is the heresy that God created Jesus at some point. So Arianism we see here, this is what Jehovah's Witnesses believe, that Jesus was the first creation of God, the Father. Mormons believe that Jesus was created by God as a spirit being. I want you to know that we love Jehovah's Witnesses, we love Mormons, we love all people because God loves all people.
Speaker 1:But at the same time, when it comes to differences of truths, we've got to go with the word of God. Can I get an amen? We believe what God's word says, what scripture says is true, and we see here also another heresy is adoptionism. Did you know that adoptionism? That there are people that believe that Jesus was just naturally born of Mary and she was a normal woman, he was a normal man and it was no miracle, miraculous event by God whatsoever. And in fact, god chose in that view, in that heresy, to adopt Jesus when Jesus was baptized, and that God adopted him as a son and Jesus just simply became a prophet. In other words, if I can just say this, the Bible teaches very clearly that Jesus Christ is God and there are many people today that think that Jesus was just a man, he was just a prophet or he was just a creation of God, like everything, like everybody else.
Speaker 1:But I want to show you this morning. In fact, I want you to know. I want to give you a little spoiler alert real quick. The spoiler alert is this the first half of the sermon is going to be a little deep theologically. The second half of the sermon is going to be little deep theologically. The second half of the sermon is gonna be about your life application and how to apply it to your life.
Speaker 1:Too often we just live our lives and we seek to fit a little Jesus into our life, but that's not what the Christian life looks like. The Christian life is we believe in Jesus and we fit our lives into him. If you believe that, put your hands together this morning that we should fit our lives around Jesus. So I want you to see. Here is what we see. This says John 1,. This is actually different. This is 1 John.
Speaker 1:This is 1 John 1, verse one which says this it says that which was from. It says that which was from the beginning, that which was from the beginning, and that word was there, that which was from the beginning. The word was is actually really interesting. If you just stick with me for a second. That word was is very powerful in the original language, in the Greek. This is talking about Jesus, jesus who was, jesus which was from the beginning. John went on to say it was Jesus who we saw with our own eyes, it was Jesus that we heard with our own ears, it was Jesus that we touched with our own hands. And he says it was Jesus who was from the beginning. Did you know that that word was? In the Greek is the word ein? Everyone say ein. This is how you say this Greek word ein, and the word ein means to have a continual presence from the past. In other words that John wasn't just saying that Jesus was there in the beginning. In the very original language, in the Greek, john was saying that Jesus had even existed, not only in the beginning, but that Jesus existed even there, for before the beginning.
Speaker 1:So y'all aren't listening fast enough. Here we go. I gotta move on here. I gotta show you this and what is happening. So you might be wondering then, why did John even say? Why did John say in the beginning, was the word? If it was Jesus, if Jesus was the word, then why didn't he just say in the beginning was Jesus? You know, it's interesting because John went on to later say that. So we know that the word means Jesus. John 1.14 says and the word became flesh and dwelt among us and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only son from the father, and he is full of grace and truth. We know that when John says in the beginning was the word, he was talking about Jesus.
Speaker 1:So then the question I'm asking if I were you, then why would John use the word word for Jesus? Did you know that the word word in the Greek is the word logos? And back in that day, jews would believe that the logos was the word of God. You know how God created everything in Genesis 1.1, and he says and God said let there be, and God said let there be. And God said let there be, and God said let there be. And that's how everything came into existence.
Speaker 1:So the Jews would believe that Jesus is not the Messiah, that Jesus is not God, that Jesus is not the creator, and so they would just believe in the logos, in the word of God, as having created everything. But then you have the Greeks. The Jews were the religious people, the Greeks were the atheists, they were the philosophers of the day and they also believed in the logos, but they believed that the logos was just this higher logic, or this supreme reasoning, or this highest wisdom that somehow personified, created everything, that everything comes back to that. In other words, here's what John is doing. Here's why God called John to use the word logos. Here's why. Because John is saying what the Jews believe and what the Greeks believe. They're both right, but they're both wrong. What John is doing is John is saying you're right in the sense that there is a higher power, you're right in the sense that there is a creator, but that logos has a name and that logos is Jesus.
Speaker 1:Jesus, as the eternal word, is the one who fulfills Jewish prophecy. He's the one that fulfills all Greek philosophy by becoming flesh, by becoming fully God, fully man. But he's also saying why else does he call Jesus the word of God? I didn't say this in the first service. He also calls Jesus the word of God because it's through Jesus that God speaks to you. That's why we call the scriptures, that's why we call the Bible the Word of God, because it comes to you from Jesus, and the Word of God is ultimately all about Jesus.
Speaker 1:So John says in the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God. In the beginning was the word and the word was with God. And some people read this and they say, aha, I gotcha See, jesus isn't God. Jesus is just there in the beginning with God. But that's not right. Did you know that the very first verse in the Bible again Genesis, chapter 1, verse 1 says this in the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Did you know that that word, god, in Hebrew, the original language that it was written in, is plural, which means even in the first verse of the entire Bible?
Speaker 1:We see here that God himself is a trinity, that he is Father, that he is Son and that he is Holy Spirit. In other words, here we are seeing that Jesus is God, but he has a distinction from God the Father, that there is one God who is three persons Father, son and Spirit. They are all unified as one God, but they are all distinct as persons within the Godhead. In other words, this is how powerful God is and this is how much God wants you to know him, that we see the Trinity of God in the creation. We see the Trinity of God in eternity past. And we even see the Trinity of God in Christmas. We're not just celebrating a baby in a manger. We're celebrating God coming in to the world to reveal himself so that we can know him and so that we can be saved by him.
Speaker 1:John 1, verse 35 says the angel told Mary the Holy Spirit, that's the Spirit of God, will come upon you and the power of the Most High, that's God, the Father, will overshadow you and therefore the child to be born will be called Holy, the Son of God, that's Jesus. We see the Trinity himself. God in Christmas. He says in the beginning was God, the word was with God and the word was God. We see here that John is saying that Jesus. Hear me, even since the beginning, even since before the beginning, and to be honest with you, our mind, your mind, my mind, we cannot even comprehend eternity, but somehow God in his Trinitarian Godhead Father, son and Holy Spirit existed all into eternity past, so that there is never a time that God did not exist. There was never a time that Jesus did not exist.
Speaker 1:Why does all of this matter? Let's get into you. Why does all of this matter? Because, to be honest, in your life there are times that Satan tempts you like Satan tempts me. That Jesus is not the point of your life. There are times that Satan wants to lie to us, about false truths, about heresies. There are times that we have people in our life that are our very family members, that are our closest friends, that do not believe the truth about Jesus. And we must believe the truth about Jesus to have a relationship with Jesus, to be saved by Jesus. We've got to get the right Jesus and we love those people, we live with those people and we serve those people and we pray for those people. We live with those people and we serve those people and we pray for those people. And God uses days like today to teach us some deeper truths about him so that we can be that messenger into their life and we can share the truth with them about Jesus Christ and about who he is.
Speaker 1:And it's not just John 1.1. It's throughout the entire Bible. We know Genesis 1.1, we already talked about it in the beginning. God Isaiah, chapter 9.6, says that Jesus is the everlasting one. That's eternal language. Micah 5, 2 is that Jesus is from the ancient of days. That's eternal language. John 8, 58, jesus is talking like God because he is God and he says that he is the I am. That's eternal language. John 17, 5, jesus said that he had glory before the world even existed. That's eternal language. Colossians chapter 117 says that Jesus is before all things. He's talking about eternity. Revelation 1.8,. Jesus is the alpha and the omega, meaning he came before all things. He's from eternity past. He'll be in eternity future. Revelation 21.6,. He is the beginning from the beginning, from before the beginning, and he goes into the end. Revelation chapter 22, verse 13, that Jesus is the first and the last. The Bible, from cover to cover, from Genesis to Revelation, proclaims that Jesus is the eternal God from eternity past to eternity future.
Speaker 1:Put your hands together this morning if you believe that we believe the truth of Jesus Christ. In other words, this Christmas we are not just celebrating Jesus's birthday. It's okay. If you want to sing happy birthday to Jesus and eat Jesus's birthday cake with your kids, it's okay. But can I just remind you that Jesus is not getting a year older because he's always been there and Jesus will always be there. He is eternity.
Speaker 1:You are worshiping at Christmas the eternal son of God, who is miraculously born of the Virgin Mary to remain fully God and become fully man for the purpose of him living perfect obedience in your place. That Jesus suffered and he died for your sins and he rose from the dead to become our Lord and our salvation, so that we could spend eternity with him. Do you realize that God loves you so much that he created you and that Jesus died for you and Jesus rose from the dead for you? Because God just wants to spend forever with you. That's how much God loves you. And you might be like, nah, he wants to spend forever with me. Well, how long is forever really? It's forever, like it's never ending. Probably the best analogy that I've ever heard about eternity is you take a sparrow and if a sparrow takes one grain of sand and flies it to the moon and back and another grain of sand flies it to the moon and back, and another grain of sand that it would take that sparrow, all of the grains of the sand of the entire earth, taking them to the moon and back, and once the sparrow is done with every single grain of sand of planet earth, then we will have spent one minute in eternity. In other words, it's everlasting, it's never ending, it's forever.
Speaker 1:And some people might think that just sounds a little boring, and you're right, unless it's awesome, you ever been on a vacation before and you didn't want that vacation to end. Raise your hand, you know what I'm talking about. You don't wanna go back home. You don't wanna go back to your house. You don't wanna go back to your job. You don't wanna go back to your house. You don't want to go back to your job. You don't want to go back to your life. Man, that's heaven. It's the greatest vacation that you could ever imagine. Do you know? The Bible says, when he talks about eternity, 1 Corinthians 2, 9, what no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, nor the heart of man could ever even imagine? You can't even imagine what God has prepared for you if you love him, because if you love him and if you believe in him, if you've been saved by him, then you get to spend eternity with him, forever. That we can't even imagine how good it is. And the best part about it is the good never stops, the good never ends. But we don't get it.
Speaker 1:For those of you that don't know, I've got a little. My five-year-old girl, our oldest child. Her name is Brooklyn, five years old. She's spunky, she's sassy, just like your kid. She's awesome. Brooklyn was born with cerebral palsy. We got to adopt her during her birth. Man, we're super honored to be able to be her parents. And she can't walk independently on her feet and so she's in her wheelchair most of the time. And she's just crazy and she loves, she's gonna be a lawyer one day. I mean, she just loves to try to disprove everything I say.
Speaker 1:And so I was talking to her one day and I said hey, Brooklyn, I was trying to encourage her and I said, hey, did you know that when you go to heaven, because she's been saved, she believes in Jesus, she believes the gospel? I said, brooklyn, did you know, when you go to heaven, that you're not gonna be in your wheelchair anymore? I said did you know that, baby girl, you're gonna be able to walk, you're gonna be able to run, you're gonna be able to jump, you're gonna be able to dance, you're gonna be able to spread to Jesus into his arms. She looked at me and I thought I impressed her and she said but dad, what about my wheelchair? And I said that's what I'm saying. Baby Girl, you don't even need a wheelchair, you're gonna be healed.
Speaker 1:And she said but I love my wheelchair, that's all she knows. That's how she gets around, right, and she did not want to leave her wheelchair. In other words, she couldn't even imagine it, and neither can I and neither can you, because sometimes we think, god, can I just have one more day? God, I just wanna experience this before I go. God, can I see this before I die? And I want you to know that's a good thing. You should love the life that God has given you on earth, but we should look forward most to the eternal life that is awaiting us in heaven. If you believe that, say amen.
Speaker 1:You know, as we're talking about Jesus' eternity past, maybe the question then we need to answer is what was Jesus doing during all that time in eternity past? Did you know that in eternity past, it was God, the Father, god the Son and God, the Holy Spirit, and all of them were in perfect community with one another, fully satisfied and fulfilled in each other, which means that they did not even need us. They weren't lonely. They didn't create us because they were missing something, because they were incomplete. They were perfectly complete in one another as the Godhead. Do you know why God created everything? Do you know why God made you? He didn't make you because he needed you. He made you so that you would have the opportunity to be fulfilled and to be satisfied in him. He made you for the opportunity to know him. Did you know that your life does not make total sense if you don't know God and if you aren't in a growing relationship with God through the gospel of Jesus Christ? That's why God made you. That's why Jesus died for you. That's why Jesus rose from the dead. We even see that God thought about you. He was thinking about you in eternity past. Revelation 13, eight says the lamb that's Jesus, who was slaughtered before the world. He was slaughtered before the world was made. In other words, this was God's plan all along that Jesus would come and Jesus would die for you. He knew that he was gonna create you. He knew that you and I, that we were going to fall into sin. He knew that he was gonna send Jesus to die on the cross to forgive our sins. He knew that Jesus was going to raise from the dead and he was thinking about you and he was planning it all out.
Speaker 1:Just this past week, my little boy, cruz, two years old. He got the croup again. Like maybe time, maybe it's 10th time now. We're not sure. Does Cruz love the croup or does the croup love Cruz? We don't know yet, but man, they sure like to get together.
Speaker 1:And I'm holding my two-year-old boy in the middle of the night, the past three nights, as he is gasping for breath and he's got this barking cough and he is striding and wheezing and trying to breathe. And I'm just holding him, I'm taking him to the bathroom with a steam shower, trying to clear out all of his, his, his lungs, his passageway, so he could breathe. And, and I'm just looking at him, I'm just like God, can you just give it to me? Can you just take it from him? Can you just give it to me? I can't stand to see him in this condition and I want you to know. That's exactly what Jesus asked God for you. Jesus said God, can you just give me his sin? God, can you just give me her sin? God, could you just lay upon me what he did, what she did, what Chip did? And, father, I wanna take it from them, I wanna die for them. God thought about us, so let me land this plane here.
Speaker 1:So what difference does it make about Jesus's presence in eternity past? Number one it means that Jesus is eternal God. And if Jesus is eternal God. That means that you can trust Jesus. Why? Because he's always been there. He knows it all, he's seen it all, he's witnessed it all. He's witnessed it all. You can trust Jesus because he is God and he has always been present. And if that's true, then that means that you can live with Jesus in eternity future. Why? Because only the one from eternity past can give you eternity future. So here's the deal Because Jesus was present through all eternity past, you can trust him with your present. In other words, what are you going through? What area does it look like that Jesus is not concerned? What area does it look like that Jesus is not involved? What area does it look like that Jesus doesn't care? Here's the deal. Jesus is so present in your life. He does care, he is involved, he is there and he is working everything out. The Bible says that he promises that he is with you. The Bible says that Jesus promises that he is working all things out for his glory. The Bible says that he promises he is working everything out for his good. Because Jesus was present through all eternity past, you can trust him with your presence in eternity future. Only the one from eternity past can give you an eternity future. So I wanna encourage you to use your past in someone's present to change their eternity forever.
Speaker 1:I went to lunch with a couple of men from our church just a couple of weeks ago. I just wanted to get to know them, took them to lunch and just said hey, tell me your story. And they started telling me their story, their background, their past. It was crazy, it was drugs. It was crazy. It was drugs, it was jail, it was all kind of stuff. And then they tell me about how they met Jesus and Jesus got a hold of their life and Jesus saved them and they gave their life to him and now they're new, now they're redeemed and now God is in their life and God is using them Brand new people.
Speaker 1:And I said what do you think that God wants to do with you now? They hadn't thought about it. They started talking to one another and they said what do you think that God wants to do with you now? They hadn't thought about it. They started talking to one another and they said we want to go back to the people who is struggling with all of the stuff that we were struggling with all the drugs, all the stuff, all the jail. They said we want to go back to the rehabs. We want to go back to the people who are struggling so that they can see if God can do it in us, god can do it in them.
Speaker 1:And in the same way, whatever it is, god wants to use your past to minister to someone in their present so that God can change their eternity forever. I'm gonna ask us all to bow our heads and close our eyes, nobody looking around. But maybe right now you just need to have an honest conversation with God and you just need to tell Jesus Jesus, I trust you, jesus, I trust you, jesus, I worship you. Maybe you just need to tell him Jesus, I'm struggling, I'm hurting, I'm going through so much difficulty, so much hardship in my life. But, jesus, I know you're there, I know you're with me. I know you're with me, I know you're leading me, I know you're working everything out for your glory and my good.
Speaker 1:You might need to pray to Jesus right now. Jesus, help me to use my past in this person's present so that you can change their eternity like you've changed mine, and you can pray for that person right now. Or maybe you are that person and God has brought you here today to change your life forever, and the only way is to invite him into your life as your Lord and Savior. And I can't pray this prayer for you. I can't save you, but I can lead you through this prayer. You pray it to God, you believe it and God promises that he'll save you, he'll forgive you and you will spend eternity with him.
Speaker 1:You can tell him something like this from your own words, from your own heart. You can say dear Jesus, I believe in you and I need you. You can tell him, jesus, I believe that you died on the cross for my sin and so, jesus, I ask that you would forgive me of all of my sin. And, jesus, you can tell him I believe that you rose from the dead, you're alive, you're real. So I call on you to be the Lord of my life, my God, my savior. And the Bible says that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe with your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. Jesus, we believe that. We thank you for that opportunity and we pray these things in your name, jesus Christ. Amen. And all God's people said amen.
Speaker 1:Put your hands together right now for anyone that prayed that prayer that gave their life to Jesus. We just want to say welcome to the family of God. We are here for you. In fact, we've got a next step card in the seat back in front of everybody that you can just indicate on that card whatever decision that you are making for him today. We've got one more song that we're gonna sing together. I'm gonna ask us all to stand and I'm gonna pray one more time. Everybody stand. We're gonna sing Heavenly Father, we love you and God, we just wanna proclaim Jesus is the eternal one, jesus is God. So we give Jesus all of our praise. We give Jesus all of our worship and, god, we pray that we would always give Jesus all of us, because Jesus gave us all of him. And, god, we pray that we would minister to others as others have ministered to us. We love you. We pray these things in Jesus' name, amen. Let's sing to him together one more time.