Walk on Water - Neighbors to Nations - Matthew S8E3

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) Hey, welcome to the church of London to meet you. Thanks for sitting us. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) What's up church family welcome to the church of 1122. My name is Matt. This right here is Chris Bacon. Our campus pastor here at our college park Orlando campus. Man, wherever you're worshiping with us whether it is in Orlando, Fort Worth. Yeah. Around the world. You know, we are a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we are so excited to worship with you this weekend. Hey Chris, you know, or Orlando's taken off over the last several weeks. Tell us about the journey to get to this moment right now. Absolutely. We like to say it's not new. It's just our term. Yeah. And whenever it's your turn, God opens doors for you to be in the neighborhood. And that's exactly what he's done here at college park Orlando. Whether it's giving us a location to be a part of or sending 200 serve staff that want to be a part of what God's doing here in central Florida. Yeah. It's been incredible. Like God's really going before us. And that's how you know he's in it.

Amen. Praise God. You know, the reality is it's not about opening a campus or, you know, moving into a new location. It's about reaching one more. Yeah. And that's what we're doing is we launch campuses creating space for people to bring their one more so they can discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. So we've been open for a few weeks. Yeah. There's already been stories of life change. Could you share one of those with us? Yes. Incredible. So I love that we're launching as a campus in the middle of neighbors to nations. Yeah. Because the truth is the nations are in every neighborhood in Orlando. 150 countries represent it. But we think about the gospel work that he's already done. In fact, when I stepped into my role, we were able to follow up with somebody that actually found us on TikTok, gave our life to Christ. And then was baptized at one of our first gatherings. That's just one of the stories of how God has gone before us. Amen. To help us reach one more is all across central Florida. Amen. That's incredible. And you know, the past couple of weeks we've been talking about neighbors to nations. And you know, part of that is reaching your neighbor. Yeah. So what it is, is it's God's invitation into the Great Commission.

And so over the next two years, we're going to be in this disciples journey of neighbors nations. And I just can't wait to see what God's going to do all over the world, including here in Orlando. And so hey, maybe there's someone watching on their couch here in Orlando. How can they get involved here at the campus? We'd love to have you here. God is doing an incredible work. We've got amazing people. And if you're watching online, the truth is God has a next step for everybody. Whatever he's calling you to do, you should do it. Whether you're out of outpost, man, get involved there. Whether you're in a neighborhood and you've got a campus near you, man, get involved. Because man, God is doing an incredible work through this movement. Or maybe, man, it's simply you taking a step into serving. Never underestimate the reality of what God can do with your yes. And that includes you inviting your one more to church or to be a part of it. Because one invitation can change a life. We love it here because even when you bring your first and best, man, God multiplies that and does more than you could ever ask for. Imagine. Amen. So we're about to get ready for service. God is going to do incredible things as we worship and open up God's Word together. So grab a Bible, grab a pen. Church family welcome, it's so good to see you. We join us to worship our King together in the house. If you're not already standing, let's get up and worship. This is true. Jesus is mine.

He's been my fourth man in the fire time after time one of his spirit washed in his blood and what he did for me on Calvary is more than enough. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. He will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. He will never fail. Perfect salvation. All is irate. I know the other up to moral. He's born in my state. So this is my story, yeah. And this is my song. I'm praising my Lord in peace and favor. All that they have for me to say. I trust in God, my Savior. If you're the one who will never fail. He will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. He will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. He will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. He will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail.

I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail. (audience applauding) ♪ Christ is my reward ♪ ♪ Oh is all of my devotion ♪ (upbeat music) ♪ Now there's nothing in this world ♪ ♪ I could ever satisfy ♪ ♪ Through every trial ♪ ♪ My soul will sing ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ I'll dance every one, every voice in ♪ ♪ Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Oh Christ, you are enough for me ♪ ♪ All everything I need is in you ♪ ♪ For everything I need ♪ ♪ Oh Christ, I'm my all in all ♪ ♪ You're the joy of my salvation ♪ ♪ Is the one ♪ ♪ All this hope will never fail ♪ ♪ 'Cause heaven is our hope ♪ ♪ Through every cell ♪ ♪ Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Jesus is me ♪ ♪ To the God be the glory ♪ ♪ Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ All Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ All everything I need is in you ♪ ♪ You're everything I need ♪

♪ Oh Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Oh Christ, you are enough for me ♪ ♪ Oh everything I need is in you ♪ ♪ You're everything I need ♪ ♪ Everything, everything I need ♪ ♪ You're everything, everything I need ♪ ♪ Come on, promise them ♪ ♪ I have decided to follow Jesus ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ I have decided ♪ ♪ I'm gonna follow Jesus ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ I love you life ♪ ♪ I have decided ♪ ♪ To the follow Jesus ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ I have decided ♪ ♪ To the follow Jesus ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No cross is for me ♪ ♪ You're everything I need ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ You've lost me for all of me ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪ ♪ No turning back ♪

♪ I'll turn it back ♪ ♪ I'll say Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Oh everything I need ♪ ♪ Oh everything we need ♪ ♪ Oh everything we need ♪ ♪ Oh Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Christ is enough for me ♪ ♪ Oh everything we need ♪ ♪ Oh everything we need ♪ ♪ For everything I do ♪ ♪ Is to you ♪ ♪ For everything I do ♪ ♪ Oh, it's into cheese ♪ ♪ Mmm ♪ ♪ Mmm ♪ ♪ Mmm ♪ ♪ Mmm ♪ ♪ You gave a life for mine ♪ ♪ Nailed to the crops ♪ ♪ You crucified ♪ ♪ On my sin and chain ♪ ♪ It was washed by your mercy ♪ ♪ And you are the treasure I find ♪ ♪ My reason for living ♪ ♪ So live my life ♪ ♪ Becoming offering ♪ ♪ To the one who is worthy ♪ I'll make this your prayer. ♪ And all praise to the Lord most like ♪

♪ All praise to the one who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ Harking of heaven ♪ ♪ Harking forever ♪ ♪ You're my king, my king ♪ ♪ You're my king, my king ♪ ♪ You store the gates of my heart ♪ ♪ The failure between was torn apart ♪ ♪ You hold the keys to the grave ♪ ♪ Come on and testify ♪ ♪ 'Cause you believe he's the light ♪ ♪ You rose from the rain ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord most like ♪ ♪ All praise to the one who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ Harking of heaven ♪ ♪ Oh, you're my king forever ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord most like ♪ ♪ All praise to the one who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ Harking in heaven ♪ ♪ Harking forever ♪ Deuteronomy 6.4 says, "Here, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is one. ♪ You shall love the Lord your God with all of your heart, with all of your soul, with all your might. ♪ So Lord, we give you everything today. We surrender to you Lord. ♪ ♪ Oh, I lift my hands up, leave my whole life down ♪ ♪ My whole life down before you ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life down ♪ ♪ My whole life now is for you ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life ♪

♪ Oh, I'm for a needy Lord ♪ ♪ Oh, I need you, Jesus ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life ♪ ♪ Oh, my soul is tested to without your love, yeah ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life down ♪ ♪ My whole life down before you ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life down ♪ ♪ My whole life now is for you ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord knows ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord who saved my life ♪ ♪ All praise to Jesus Christ ♪ ♪ All praise to the Lord who saved my life ♪ ♪ Oh, I lift my hands up, leave my whole life ♪ ♪ You can have it all ♪ ♪ You can have it all ♪ ♪ I lift my hands up, leave my whole life down ♪ ♪ My whole life down before you ♪ # Oh, I'll be home before you # # I'll eat my hands and plead my whole life # # My whole life now is for you # # All praise to the Lord most light # # Oh, praise to the One who saved my life # # Oh, praise to Jesus Christ # # Our King of heaven # # My King forever # # My King, my King #

Lord, we worship you today in the splendor of your holiness and the assembly of the saints. Not by anything that we've deserved or earned, but by what you have done on our behalf, that you didn't just die for us, you died instead of us. And so, Lord, we come today just to say thank you. Thank you for redeeming our lives. All of us in this room, Lord, I pray that salvation would come upon every soul in this room today, that they know your forgiveness, they know your redeeming love, that they'd be filled with wonder in all of the God who gave everything so that we could live an eternity with the One who created it all and gave it all. So, Lord, we love you. You are the High King of heaven. And today, we all proclaim you are My King forever. We love you. It's in Jesus' name we all set. Amen. Amen. You're going to get seen. Amen. Church, how are we doing? You sound good out there worshiping. So good to worship with you. Welcome to the Church of 1122. We're moving for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we are in our final season of our Matthew series. This has all led to season eight neighbors to nations, which is not just a sermon series inside of Matthew, but a two-year discipleship journey that we are headed towards as a church, rooted in Matthew 28 in the Great Commission and the core of neighbors to nations over the next two years is us asking, Lord, what is my role in your Great Commission?

Am I giving, my growing, and my going? I hope you brought your neighbors to nations discipleship guide. Raise them in the air like you just don't care. Good job. You brought them back. Gold star for you. And if you don't have one, we'd love to give you one. Our team is around. So go ahead and raise your hand. If you need a discipleship guide, we got one right here on the front row in the middle. Raise your hand and we would love for you to have this. It's really important. It has all the information for the ministry that's going to be a part of neighbors to nations. And then there's room towards the back for each week of the sermon series. So take notes today, take it home, bring it back, use it as a prayer tool and a resource over the next two years. The past two nights, we got to have what we call advanced commitment night at both our St. John's and our San Pablo campus, where the leaders of our church went first in making their financial commitments to neighbors to nations. We worshiped our faces off. We ate good food to the glory of God and we turned in our commitment card. It was an incredible couple of nights. We are, I'm just more excited than ever about what God is going to do through neighbors to nations. And if you weren't able to make advanced commitment night, our whole church will have the opportunity to make our financial commitments in two weeks on November 19th to 20 seconds. So mark that down on that same weekend, our kids and our students will also be making their commitment. So a big weekend for the family. Be praying now, what is God calling you and your family to do so we can show up on that weekend, ready to respond to the good news of the gospel? For now, go ahead and turn to page 61 in your discipleship guide. And we're going to continue and worship by hearing a testimony of how bringing our first and our best

responding back to God with what is already his can change our whole life. Check this out. So in 2015, I was diagnosed with breast cancer and I went through surgery, radiation and chemo. This was also a really hard time for us in our marriage. That we were fighting cancer as well as fighting to save a marriage at the same time. Just to put it bluntly, our marriage was dead. We just weren't doing a good job of being married. We weren't being good spouses, friends. And then, you know, when the breast cancer popped up, it just kind of put everything on hold. I'm actually thankful for the cancer because that did save our marriage. It put me in a place where God gave me an opportunity to show Angie that this and she means something. many times I'd pray for him to be the leader of our home and lead us as a house with our Christian faith and finances and all it was just an area that we still needed to grow in go for more podcasts Denny Thompson pastor Jobe Martin Jacksonville Jaguar punter Logan cook what's up man during a bill for more podcast I asked you guys feel guilty at times over the success that you've had or the life that you get to live when you look out and you see the way other people have to do things that's a good posture to have because first and foremost you don't deserve your salvation what we deserve is to be judged by a just judge but we're don't we get graced by him and then you got to understand it's all his you don't really have anything you're just holding it for a minute are you trustworthy with what God has trusted you with and what we are where to be good stewards and not be just driven by feelings and so a part of it every single believer is called to participate in a system of generosity that's different than when I feel like and I'm gonna give a little change here and so that's why we bring our first and best to Jesus through the local church and you partner with church and all kinds of organizations to make sure systematically we're helping those kind of people in me I just was convicted that I can't reconcile now how I can be a follower of Christ but not understand that that includes my money I just said

let me just go back a year and just tithe on that I was elated you know and it was an answer to prayer that I had for him to step out and lead our family and our faith walk not only am I legitimately excited to give we look at money now as what I think it's intended to be as as there's an act of worship but also a way to leverage to expand God's kingdom everything that we're doing is coming from a place of how is this in service to God our finances and all the gods blessed us with are all his and he's just graciously giving to us these resources and giving back to him seems to be a no-brainer like it's his anyway we are making a commitment to neighbors to nations because we have so much evidence in our lives we've got redeeming our marriage God walking us through cancer and transitions in life and why not trust God with our finances because he's been so faithful in all areas amen amen how we doing church good I'm doing great man I'm doing great had a great weekend you have a great weekend I love it don't you love with the Jack's play on Thursday and win by a thousand oh Sundays feel so much better hey I love Denny and Angie they're sitting right over here and I love that testimony video and that other guys Logan Cook he is the best punter in all the NFL but he works part-time because we never punk because we're so good how about that he's also the best holder I don't know if you know that that's why we could call the field goes anyway hey but one good job coming back you came back I freaked about money for an hour last week and you came back look at you and even though that testimony video was about money I'm not primarily talking about money so everybody can just take a deep breath and part of reason I'm in a really good mood is I'm preaching out of one of my favorite passages in the Bible I know I have like a hundred but I read the Bible a lot Matthew chapter 14 is where we're gonna be this is one of my favorite events in all of the scripture and as you know we've been teaching through the gospel of Matthew all year and I saved five different episodes in the scripture for this last seasons neighbors the nations and the reason that I did is because they're all action oriented passages and so we're gonna talk about one of my favorites

this is where Jesus walks on water so even if you're brand new to Bible study you may have heard of this one and every single time I go to Matthew 14 it takes me back to the 1900s when I was working at Camp Pine Hill Baptist Retreat Center and I was the lifeguard I had about nine jobs but one of my jobs I was the lifeguard and I just got to tell you as a lifeguard it was an absolute nightmare because we didn't have a pool because we weren't bougie like you people we just swam in a pond and how many of you know some of you can testify this that redneck fun is more fun than rich people fun everybody know that you ever going to redneck vacation? do at your bougie five-star all-inclusive resort. All you do is complain, but it's not as good as your last one, yeah. But, bro, you get a couple of rednecks and a fishing pond, and you've never seen fun like this. Well, a part of the reason it's an absolute nightmare as a lifeguard is because all of the kids are just chicken fighting, and I don't know if that's culturally appropriate to say. I'm sure somebody will hate me online for that. I don't care. Get in line. So, everybody looks like they're drowning, and the water is just absolutely dark pond water. You can't see this far under it. So, I don't know if there's just dead kids all in the bottom or not, but whatever. And so, the kids are chicken fighting, and then we're about to go to the next thing. I blow the whistle. Everybody's heading in. And as everybody's heading in, I was also the camp pastor. That was one of my jobs. And I'd been teaching on Jesus walking on water about Peter getting out of the boat all week long.

And my brother, who was the grass-cutter there, he was, I think he was about 14 at the time. And everybody's going in and nobody's paying attention to him. Now my brother's a deacon, he attends our St. John's campus. He's a really big deal down in St. John's County. And my brother Russ is standing on the dock. Nobody's paying attention. Everybody's going in. I've been teaching Matthew 14 all week, and my brother Russ stands on the dock, praise, and then takes a step. And goes right to the bottom. But still, there's only one way to find out. And he gave it a shot. I want you to give it a shot. Matthew chapter 14, we're going to talk about again a very, very, very famous passage of Scripture. I need to give you just a little bit of context, because your life is like my life, and it's like the disciples' life, it's just a series of highs and lows, amen? Like, it's just a series of mountains and valleys. And so if you're in a mountaintop right now, you should praise God for the mountaintop. And if you're in the valley, you should praise God, though you walk through the valley of the shadow of death. He is with you, and you will not be there forever. A mountain's coming, man. Praise God for that. So, a valley for Jesus is in the very beginning of Matthew 14. Jesus finds out that his cousin, John the baptizer, gets killed, in prison, beheaded. You know why? He got political. So think about that for a little while. He preaches against the immorality of the political leaders, he loses his head for it.

And so then Jesus is obviously sad, and Jesus is going to try to find a place to go pray and be alone and spend some time with the Lord. But I don't know if you know this, but people aren't good with boundaries, and they won't leave him alone. And so 5,000 men, plus everybody means a wife on a date, there's like 15,000 people track Jesus down where he's just trying to go have a quiet time, and Jesus has compassion on these people, and he feeds the 5,000 people. The disciples come up to Jesus, and they're like, "Hey, boss, all these people are hungry. What are we going to do?" And Jesus says, "Why don't you feed them?" And they're like, "We don't have enough food. We got five loaves, two fishes, and a little crying kid over here." That's all we got. What are we going to do? Jesus blesses the food, hands it to the disciples, and in the hands of the disciples, the disciples actually feed all the people. This is a high-holy moment for the disciples, amen? They're thinking, boy, we have made a wise vocational decision. We walked away from our lucrative fishing business, but we had the fastest growing church in the Galilee. This is good. We just did a miracle with our own hands. They're back on the mountaintop, verse Matthew chapter 14, verse 22, it's page 61, "Anybody bring their journal back? Did you bring your journal back? Be proud, okay? Be proud. They're telling you. You can get to eat first in heaven. God told me, okay?

Good job. Matthew 14, 22, it says, "Immediately he, thus Jesus, made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side while he dismissed the crowds." A part of the reason that he's dismissing the crowds and getting the disciples out of there, John lets us know that this group of people, after Jesus does this miracle, they want to make Jesus the king. And Jesus is going to say, "Yeah, I am the king, but I'm the king of kings, and my kingdom is not of this world. And my throne does not come be a crown. It comes through the cross, so I'm not going to step into this position of power that you were offering me." And I think it's a little bit of speculation. I think he doesn't want the disciples to get this craziness in their mind, because Simon the Zealot will go crazy, because that's what they're looking for. They want him to take over. And so what does Jesus do, Jesus immediately made the disciples get into the boat? That's right. He made them. Now, if you're in the gifted class, you already know that this boat is heading directly into a storm. Does Jesus know that he's making them go into the storm? Yes. Yeah, Jesus will make you do stuff. You realize this? We love some 23rd Psalm, don't we? Everybody loves the 23rd Psalm. This goes with misread it. We think it's all about us. The Lord is my shepherd. I shall not be in want.

He makes me lie down in green pastures. Now listen, if you're real young, you don't like it when people make you to do stuff. Nobody can make me do anything. This shepherd makes you do some stuff. And if he hadn't made you do something you haven't wanted to do, it might be because you're your own shepherd. 'Cause he makes us do all kind of stuff we don't want to do. Like forgive people that don't deserve it. He makes us say no to stuff we want to say yes to and say yes to stuff that we want to say no to. He makes us repent. He makes us confess our sins. He makes us lie down. He makes these disciples row directly into the storm. Verse 23 and after Jesus had dismissed the crowds he went up on the mountainside by himself to pray. And when evening came he was there alone. So he's there for a long time. We're gonna find out in a little while that Jesus is gonna show up on the lake, on the Sea of Galilee between three and six AM. But he goes to pray as the sun's going down. He doesn't just say his prayers but he spends time in prayer, do you know the difference? There's a difference between now I'll lay me down to sleep and laboring in the presence of God for hours and hours and hours.

And here's what's crazy man. Jesus prayed all the time. In the good times and in the tough times he prayed all the time. He needed to be connected with his heavenly father all the time. Let me ask you, is prayer for you a first response or a last resort? This is a big, big deal. Listen, I pray for you every single week, man, hard. It dawned on me when we first started the church and thousands of people started showing up that I felt like my prayer life was not keeping up with the amount of responsibility that God was trusting me with. And that's why I go out into the woods every single Monday to write sermons. And every single Monday I do the same thing. I sit before the Lord, I'm in the dark so I can't see my Bible and I can't turn a light on because it might affect the other thing that I'm there for. It's kind of an armed quiet time. And so I pray the same thing every week. All right, Lord, if you're a sheep, they're not my sheep, what do you want to say to your people? And pray, pray, pray. A couple weeks ago there were 18 pastors, young pastors, most of them from all over the country. And we were at the retreat center,

we leveraged the retreat center to try to bless some pastors, to try to keep some other pastors in the game. And I am mentoring these young guys that are pastoring really fast growing churches. And one of these pastors asked me what's your primary responsibility at 1122? We're sitting around the fire pit and everybody leans in and I think every single person thought my answer would be the thing I do is preach. That's what everybody thought I was gonna say. And I said, my number one job for 1122 is not to preach. And they're like, what? Then what is it? Let me tell you what my number one job is. It's to hear from God. 'Cause if not, what am I gonna preach on? Just make some stuff up, people do it all the time. But my number one job is to hear from God. He's the chief shepherd, I'm the under shepherd. And he trusts me to set the direction to hear from him and say, hey church, I've heard from the Almighty God. This is what he is calling us to. It's happened several times, man. I mean, this is why we are taking the good news of the gospel from every neighborhood to every nation for the one name under heaven that deserves our one and only life. Because I was in a significant time of prayer. I was in the mountains.

We don't have mountains in Jacksonville. I think I was in Utah or somewhere. And I was praying like crazy about the future of our church. And I was just overwhelmed with this phrase, neighbors to nations. And that's why we're doing this thing that we're doing. Years ago, I wasn't in the mountains because I was in Jacksonville, I was sitting in my house and I was watching the news. And this was during COVID and all of that. Remember the glorious years of like 2020? And every time I would turn the news on, all I saw was hate and destruction. Then everybody was convincing us that we were all supposed to hate each other for about 12 different reasons. What you looked like, who you vote for, what you thought about mask and vaccines and whatever, man. It was just nothing but division and hate. And I had this overwhelming sense is that it looks like sheep without a shepherd. And that drove me to the 23rd Psalm into John chapter 10. These are the pre-minute texts on shepherds. And I read it and read it and read it. And that led to the 10, 10 life. and have it abundantly. And it was in this prayer time that I felt convinced that what we were called to do as a church is to fight for life, not just as a political statement, but from womb to tune. And we got into the fight, man, in all kind of areas.

But one of the primary areas we got into the fight was fighting for the right of life for the unborn, the most vulnerable human beings on the planet. And we got into the fight hard. And people loved it, other people hated it. No problem. I don't care. I have decided. I'm going to follow Jesus. No turning back. No turning back. And then you get to the end of it. You get to the end of it. We're wrapping up the 10-10 life and we're celebrating all the things that God has done. And one of the things that we did is we partnered with a whole bunch of crisis pregnancy centers that are rooted in Christ. But first-coast women's services reaches out to me, sends a thank you note to us, and it says, "Because of the money that we donated, the volunteers that we sent and the prayers that we prayed, over 1,500 babies that would have been aborted are alive." Okay? And here's what I thought. I thought, "Oh, my goodness, the God of the universe talked to me. I'm not special about me, but the God of the universe, the one who spoke everything into existence, who am I? Who is man that you would be mindful of me? And yet, when we would take that time to go on a mountain side by ourselves and pray, the King of kings and Lord of lords, the one who holds the very nature of existence in reality, he will speak to you too." This is what Jesus is doing. He's by himself, and he's praying. And when evening came, he was there alone, verse 24, "But the boat, by this time, was

a long way from the land, beaten by the waves, for the wind was against them." Again, we're going to find out in just a minute, if Jesus shows up between 3 a.m. and 6 a.m., this should not be a very long boat ride. These boys, these pro-fishermen, have done this every day of their life, and they have been rowing all night long, and they're not getting very far, and they row right into a storm. Why? Because I know what you think, because I think the same thing, even though the Bible doesn't say this at all. We tend to think, if you just do what Jesus says to do, then everything should go great, right? It should be Cadillac, cotton candies, the jags, when the Super Bowl, I mean, let's go. Has that been anybody's experience? Anybody even in trying to obey Jesus, find yourself in a storm? And I know what will happen, you'll ask the question, "Why God, why did this happen?" I can tell you the reason right now, here's why the storms happen in your life. These are theologically accurate, now if you're in a storm, it's not going to help your heart at all. If you're in a storm, but this is the reason, here's why bad stuff happens. Here's why there are storms in our life. One of the reasons is because we live in a broken world, and the whole thing is fractured. At the macro level, there's hurricanes and tsunamis, at the micro level, sometimes cells don't do what they're supposed to do, because we live in a broken world. Secondly, sometimes you're in a storm because somebody dropping the boat to an idiot, it's not your fault, but sometimes you were in a storm because somebody sins against you. And sometimes you're in a storm because you're an idiot. I hate to tell you, but oftentimes the attacks of the enemy are self-inflicted because you're your own enemy. I mean, my daddy'd say this all the time, "You play stupid games, you win stupid prizes."

Sometimes it is a direct demonic attack of the enemy. And again, sometimes people are like, "You mean to tell me you believe in demons?" "Yeah, I do." You don't, then you're too dumb to talk to, okay? And then here's what's the craziest one to try to get your head around. And no matter what it is, whether it's the broken world or somebody else who sinned against you or a result of your own sin or demonic attack, no matter what it is, it's all under the sovereign hand of a loving and merciful and just God. Every single time God is in control. And here's what's crazy about our God, He would love you so much that He does not mind putting you in the middle of a storm because He's going to use that storm. J.I. Packer says it this way in a great book called "No One God." He says, "And still He seeks the fellowship of His people, and He sends them both sorrow and joys in order to detach their love from other things and attach it to Himself." Oh man, here's something that we should learn from this. It's just because you're going through hard things does not mean that it's a sign that God is not in it. I don't know where we got this idea that if God asks us to do it, then everything should work out easy. Anybody ever heard of this phrase? The safest place you could be is in the will of God. Have you ever heard that? Can you imagine telling that to Moses? When he's staring down the pharaoh going, "Oh, let my people go." Can you imagine telling this to David as he walks out to fight the giant? Can you imagine telling this to all the disciples that were martyred for following after Jesus? Can you imagine telling Jesus this in the Garden of Gethsemane? Yeah man, life's hard. Get a helmet.

But God is good all the time. And I can't find one place in the Bible where God calls anybody to do something significant that's easy. You remember that passage in the Bible where the angel shows up in the middle of the night and is like, "Don't be afraid. It is I. God has for you comfort." No, not one. Every single time the heart is actually evidence that you might be in the very center of the will of God. You guys remember my coaching advice when I was coaching at Providence to know boys? Everybody wants to be strong. Nobody wants to be sore. And oftentimes we're asking God to remove us from the gym that is going to produce the pain that is going to produce the strength. And God put you in those very circumstances to grow you. The Bible says without faith it is impossible to please God. And so it's actually God Himself that may put you in the circumstances that grow your faith. This is what He is about to do not to the disciples but for the disciples. This is how Denny can say, "It's crazy but I actually thank God for the cancer." Because God is at work and all things for the good of those that love Him and are called according to His purpose. Verse 25 and in the fourth watch of the night this is between 3 and 6 AM. Jesus came to them walking on the sea. This means Jesus has been praying for hours and hours and hours. And now He's going to come walking across the sea a Galilee. Now if I had time to do it, if you guys could listen faster I could explain to you all the correlations about when the first-century Jewish people would hear this verses they would understand that this was a throwback to Moses.

That Jesus is the greater Moses. That Moses walked through the red sea on dry ground and Jesus walked on top of the sea. That this is a fulfillment of Psalm 77 that the Son of Man would come on top of the ocean. It's crazy. Sometimes people will be like, "Well how in the world could Jesus walk on water?" Newsflash. Because He's God. That's how. If He spoke the water into existence, if He wants to make Him make it hold Him up, He has no problem with this. Here's what I need you to know that our God commands the storms and comes the storms and even walks through the storms. So don't be afraid because He's got you. I've told you a million times, I'm going to tell you a million more because we need to hear it every day. Is the difference between faith and fear is when you look into the future, who do you think is in control? And when you look out at the storms of your life and the resurrected Christ comes cruising up on top of the storms, you can know that He's got you. Here's what's crazy is that the disciples are going to freak out because that's what they do. It doesn't even make sense, man. Here's why. Part of the reason it doesn't make sense is they've seen this before. If you just back up six chapters to Matthew 8, this is when there was a big storm there there on the sea because the Sea of Galilee is the second lowest place on the planet. The dead sea is the lowest. It's 700 feet below sea level next to two mountain ranges on the either side of the Galilee that are about 2,000 feet high. And because of the weather systems there, it can go from glassy to six foot waves in like a second. And these professional fishermen in Matthew 8, they're out there and they're in the boat and the storm kicks up. Meanwhile, Jesus isn't freaking out by the storm. He's actually asleep in the boat taking a nap and the disciples come and wake him up and he's angry. So listen to that kids, don't you wake up your daddy today when he's taking a nap. He's like Jesus. And here's the problem is that they're so focused on their circumstances that Fear is a liar. Fear will make you begin to believe things that you know are not true and fear will begin to make you doubt things that you know are true.

And they are like, hey Jesus, do you not even care? We are perishing. He's like, you ain't perishing, I'm napping. And I think he looks at the disciples and says peace be still and the waves go, yes sir, and they calm down. They've seen him calm storms before and now they're going to freak out because they're in another storm. You might want to jot this down. Forgetfulness is the enemy of our faithfulness. Forgetfulness is the enemy of faithfulness because what fear does is fear will cause us to forget that all my life he has been faithful. And you don't just have to look over your past to see the faithfulness of God. You need to look all the way back to the cross. If you wonder if Jesus loves you, don't look at your circumstances, look at the cross that God demonstrated his love for us in this while we are still sinners Christ died for us. The middle of the night Jesus comes walking up on the water, verse 26, but when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified. And they said, it's a ghost. It cried out in fear. Now here's what's actually happening here. Immediately, they forget everything that Jesus has taught him over the two and a half years they've been cruising around Galilee. And there was a cultural narrative in the first century that ghost walked around on the Sea of Galilee. And the reason this cultural narrative began to pop up is because many, many, many fishermen had died on the Sea of Galilee. And in the first century, water represented chaos and they thought that there would be ghosts just out there cruising. And here's what's crazy. Immediately, now I get it. It's the middle of the night. Everybody's tired. They've been on like the row machine all night going anywhere and they look up and there's somebody on the water and they forget everything that Jesus told them and they're like, they bought into the cultural narrative. So I get the ghost. I saw it on YouTube. Must be true. Yeah, because fear is a liar. Fear will make you believe things that are not true. And the number one lie the enemy tries to get you with is this, that God is not good and he won't take care of you. And all of a sudden, all of the history that they have to go with Jesus is gone in a second because fear can consume. But look at this, verse 27, "But immediately Jesus spoke to them saying, since three things, take heart, it is I, don't be afraid." Oh, take heart. Here's what this means. In the first century, the heart was believed to be the center, the control center of your emotion. So he's saying, "Hey boys, get your emotions under control and do not be controlled by your emotion." Another way this gets translated is,

be of good cheer or take courage that Jesus was trying to encourage them, take some courage and put it on the inside of them. Now listen, emotions are a gift from God and they're a good tool to help respond to this world. They make a good gaze, they make a terrible God or God. I hope you realize this. And so he says, "Take heart." And he says, "It is I." You see, the Prince of Peace just walked up on the scene and wherever Jesus walks in, peace walks in with him. And the Bible says, "Perfect love drives out fear." And then he says, "Do not be afraid, the most commanded thing in the entire Bible." And so if you look at your circumstances and you were afraid, I've told you this 10,000 times, Paul tells Timothy that God did not give you a spirit of fear. Fear is a spirit that does not come from God. And I would differentiate between scared and fear, scared is fine. If you get scared, cool, just do it scared. You know what happens when you do it scared? That's called courage. Encourage is a biblical value and we need some more courage in our churches and in our country right now. Just be courageous, man, be strong and courageous. Fear paralyzes and faith always produces action. So he says, "Take heart, it is I. Don't be afraid." And who's going to talk first and who's going to talk most? My God, Peter is like, all right, I'm going to take some courage. I ain't scared. And he raises his hand and Peter rents, "Lord, if it's you, command me to come to you on the water." What a bold claim here. All right, Jesus. Now why in the world would he say this? Here's why he would say this that Peter is actually holding Jesus to Jesus his own words Do you remember the first thing that Jesus ever says to Peter on the sea of Galilee? First thing he ever says to him is this follow me and So Peter's like alright you said to follow you can I follow you out there on the water and here's why? It was rooted and what it means to be a disciple in the first century I told you this before but in the first century every little boy and girl. They would all go to Hebrew school And it was called Betchafar and in Hebrew school what you would do you get a little tablet Not like to play Angry Birds and do tick-tock and make your brain be dumb But it was like they'd be Bible verses on it And so what these little kids would do is they memorize the first five books of the Bible I mean they didn't have Netflix. What are they gonna do? So they would just memorize the first five books of the Bible and if you were the best of the best if you were like in the gifted class

Then you went from Betchafar to what's called Betmin Rash. That was like the next You'd be like if you were in advanced placement, okay? And so if you got invited to that then you would memorize the rest of the whole Old Testament every word of it And then if you were the best of the best if you were like top of the class If you were elite if you were like Ivy League, you know, like you could go to Yale or Harvard or Georgia or whatever the best is I couldn't go to Georgia. I went to VCU so whatever all right so But if you were the best of the best of the best of that and memorize the whole Bible then you would be invited to follow After a rabbi and you would fill out an application to follow a rabbi And when you followed a rabbi in the first century when we hear discipleship in America, we think would you teach me what you know? But in the first century It would be I want to become who you are This is why Jesus does not say follow me and I'll teach you everything. I know he says follow me and I will make you fishers of men and so the phrase that you would be given in The first century when you began to follow a rabbi is this like on your graduation day When you began to follow the rabbi, they would say may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi? So you're gonna learn what he teaches you're gonna know what he knows you're gonna go where he goes and you're gonna do what he does Now this is what's interesting When Jesus Picks his disciples He does not go to Jerusalem to Gamaliel Who taught all the best of the religious leaders and you say hey, who's top of the class here? I won't all five-star recruits. That's not where he goes. Where does Jesus find his disciples? He goes to the Sea of Galilee and he finds some guys some blue-collar guys that are doing some other things because If you did not have what it takes to be a Talmudine, then here's what the rabbis would tell you congratulations You know the Torah very well. God is pleased But you don't have what it takes to be a rabbi so go and learn the trade of your father And what are Peter Andrew James and John doing when Jesus finds them? They're fishermen because their dad was a fisherman

You know what that means that God has always been in the habit of taking the rejects The walk on they got cut They're not good as the JV the person the people that everybody else says you don't have what it takes and Jesus says perfect You follow me And so what he's saying is Jesus you told me to follow you And so Can I still follow you out on this water? Look what happens verse 29 and Jesus said come And so Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus Now before we pick on Peter for not getting it right because in a minute He's gonna mess up because that's what he does But before we get to that I want you to see what Peter does That Peter gets out of the boat. I Mean he has the old ass that he'd say if you tell me to get out of this boat I'm gonna get out of this boat and Jesus is like come on big boy And he gets out of the boat Nobody else gets out with him But Peter has the courage in the faith to get out of the boat Let me ask you has Jesus ever asked you to do something that doesn't make sense to you Cuz they don't make sense to get out of the boat you ever go boating the point is to stay in the boat and Jesus is like come on And nobody else goes with him and here's the thing Here's the thing in this season of the life of our church neighbors the nations This is what we're doing right every single one of us Jesus is standing on the water And we're in the boat of our comfortable life and we are saying hey, Jesus. I Got a question you better be careful if you ask it though Am I giving? Am I growing? Am I going? And Jesus is going to hear it and he's going to be like, "Step out of the boat."

And here's what happens. The Bible doesn't say this so I'm making some stuff up so the Bible is way over here. I wonder if the disciples started chattering in Peter's ear. Jesus clearly says, "Peter, come out of the boat." And I got to imagine, Judas steps up and be like, "Yeah, you should try it." I think you're going to try it off. I bet Thomas, you know, doubting Thomas is like, "There's no way this is going to work." John was probably like, "Why does he always pick you? I cannot run you. He's jealous." My experience is this. The Bible is clear, my sheep hear my voice, but then he says, "The voice of a stranger, they will not follow." But he doesn't say the voice of a stranger you won't hear because I hear it all the time. I constantly have competing voices. The voice of the good shepherd that bids me by faith and courage that the Spirit of God has put in me to trust him, this whole thing boils down to this, "Do you trust me?" And then I get all these competing voices, "What will everybody think? What if it doesn't work? What if you're not enough?" And yet Peter decides to listen to the voice of Jesus instead of listening to the competing voices, "What about you? What is my role in the Great Commission? Am I giving? Am I growing? Am I going?" And then Peter does it, man. He steps out. Imagine what this is like. He puts his foot out and he goes, "Boom!" and it sticks on the water.

He's like, "Oh my gosh. I've done this a million times." But every other time my foot goes, "Whoo!" all the way to the ground. And now it's up here on the water and Peter walks on the water. He's the only other human who's ever done this in the history of humans. And the Bible doesn't say how far, but the Bible does say that just a minute ago Jesus is far enough away that they can't recognize who it is and in just a minute Peter's going to walk over there close enough to him where Jesus can touch him. He walks on the water and it goes great for a minute. And then it doesn't go great, verse 30, "But when Peter saw the wind, he was afraid and beginning to seek," he cried out, "Lord, save me." He takes his eyes off Jesus. He focuses on the circumstances and he begins to sink. But one second, man, but at least he walked on the water. I mean, I wonder how many miracles have not happened because people were afraid to get out of the boat. So what if you sank? How many of them walked on water? This is why Jesus wouldn't let me do something like this because if John was like, "You know how I'd run into you," I'd be like, "You know I walked on water." Oh, please don't let the fear of what may or may not happen keep you from what might. I mean, come on, man, that we live by faith. It reminds me of this incredible quote from Theodore Roosevelt, "It is not the critic who counts. It is not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled or whether doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who airs and comes short again and again because there is no effort without error or shortcoming. Who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions and spends himself in a worthy cause who at

best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement and who at worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat." And he wrote that before the internet, listen man, you see, he has the guts to get out of the boat and then what he does, and this happens to us all the time, is while he's focused on Jesus, he can do everything Jesus calls him to do, and then he takes his eyes off of the author and the perfecter of his faith, and he shifts his eyes to his circumstances, to the wind and the waves, and the Bible says, and he begins to fear, and fear is a liar, and fear is paralyzing, and then he begins to sink. He begins to sink. He begins to believe the lies, and listen, as we march towards commitment Sunday in neighbors the nations. If you're serious about this thing and you go before the Am I giving my grown my goal? The good chapters gonna speak to you. And you're gonna get some chatter. And if you'll let it, man, the enemy will take your eyes off of Jesus by paying attention to the chatter. Look, it would be real easy for us, for me, right now, to take my eyes off of Jesus and put your eyes on the wind and the waves. But you make no bones about it, man. We have decided to follow Jesus and do what he has called us to do. And listen, as you were preparing to join the folks that already made a commitment at Advanced Commitment Night, I want you to know, as you were making your preparation for commitment weekend, all the, we take our financial integrity very, very serious. And you can go on the website and all the answers about financial integrity

and scrutiny are on the website, as well as all the questions and answers about governance and how decisions are made around here and exactly what neighbors, the nations, is all about. It is all there. But don't be like the disciples that immediately are like, oh, it's a ghost and just buy into the cultural narrative. You see, as soon as Peter begins to sink, he cries out, "Lord, save me." What a prayer. That's a prayer he'll answer every single time. You want to see the grace of God in your life? Cry out, "Lord, save me." I mean, think about this. Jesus is the only one that when you find him, he'll never fail you. And when you fail him, he'll always forgive you. The next word is Jesus immediately reached out his hand and he took hold of him saying, "Oh, you have little faith. Why did you doubt?" Immediately he saved him. This is why I couldn't be the savior. I wouldn't immediately saved him. I'd be like, "I told you." I'd let him, I'd be like, "You know, under the water." And then I'd get him maybe. Or he could have let him die. See Lazarus, John 11. He could have just let him drown all the way,

put his dead bloated body in the boat and just, "What happened?" I'm like, "I told you, don't doubt." It's not what he does. Here's why this matters. Some of you feel like you're walking through the valley of the jet shadow of death and you were asking, "Does he see me?" Oh, he sees you. He hears you. And if you will just cry out immediately, he will reach out his hand and take hold of you. And he says, "Look at this question." He says, "All of you is little faith." Why did you doubt? Here's the question you gotta ask. What was Peter doubting? He wasn't doubting Jesus. Is Jesus thinking? No. Jesus is doing just fine. Peter was doubting that Peter could do what Jesus told him to do. You ever think about this? I mean, the Bible doesn't give us like the inner dialogue of the Apostle Peter. But I gotta think that Peter gets out and he's like, "Oh my gosh, I'm gonna water. "I'm not supposed to do this." Ah, man, wave.

And he starts going down. And Jesus is like, "Why did you doubt?" And Peter would go, "Cause I'm not supposed "to be able to walk on water. "I've lived here my whole life. "You can't walk on water." And Jesus would go, "Who told you you can't walk on water? "I said you could walk on water. "And if the whole world says you can't walk on water, "but I said you can't walk on water, "then you can walk on water." You can't take this too far because you become a heretic and make it about yourself. So don't take this too far. I know you believe in Jesus. Praise God, that's the whole point. Did you ever think about it? That Jesus believes in you? Not for salvation or something crazy like that, but if Jesus calls you to do a thing and he is deposited the Holy Spirit in you, then Jesus believes that through him, you can do everything that he has called you to do. The Apostle Peter later in his life is gonna write this book called First Peter. And he does the intro, first two verses, like, "Hey, what's up, I'm Peter." It says more than that, but it's cool. And then the third verse, when he starts preaching, he says this, "His divine power has given us

"everything we need for life and godliness." You know what that means? If God has called you to do it, he'll equip you to accomplish everything that he has called you to do. Mama, you feel like you're over your head? God called you to beat up, mama. Dad, husband, wife, leader, pastor, missionary, his divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness and so if he called you to it, And so with this kind of attitude, because we live in a world, this means billions of dollars a day. Every commercial that you see has this message, stay in the boat, stay in the boat, put some leather seats in the boat, get you an iPad in the boat, whatever you do, just stay comfortable and take care of you and the Savior comes walking up and says, "I dare you to get out of the boat." I dare you to pray, God, what is my role in your great commission in my giving, my going, and my growing? And so we're going to close our service and you are going to lead worship, okay? And we're going to sing and we're going to bring and we're going to pray and check it out. We're going to text to the glory of God. My teenage daughter would be so excited. A mentor of mine used to ask me this question all the time, his name is Doug Fields, a faithful man of God, a ministry forever. He used to ask me this question all the time. What would you do for the glory of God if you knew it wouldn't fail? If you could do anything for the glory of God and you knew it wouldn't fail, what would you do? Because too many times, man, the fear of failure paralyzes us and keeps us in the boat and

Jesus, our Savior, is like, "Listen, the adventure is out here with me on the water." I dare you to get out of the boat and for neighbors and nations, let's just reframe it a little bit. What would you do for the glory of God in your giving? And what would you do for the glory of God in your growing? And what would you do for the glory of God in your growing if you knew it wouldn't fail? And the moment you know the answer to that question, the next question is, so what's stopping you from getting out of the boat? Who do you doubt? Who do you doubt Jesus? I mean, he came out of the grave so he can accomplish whatever the thing is. Like, what's stopping you? So some of you, if you're honest, if you know that you would trust God in the area of your finances for the very first time, and some of you would go on that very first mission trip and you're like, "I know, but I've got kids. Let Nana keep them." She raised you and I know you're like, "Well, that's the problem. They'll be fine." Or maybe you'd forgive him and you're like, "He doesn't deserve it. I know, neither did you. That's the gospel." Or maybe you'd tear up the divorce papers, or you'd launch the ministry, or you'd start the disciple group, or you'd keep the baby. You'd share your faith and you would change your major and do what God's called you to do. Maybe you would pop the question, stand up, act like a man, get on your knee, or maybe surrender your life to the Lordship of Jesus Christ for the very first time. What are you afraid of? Listen, I'm going to give you permission here to do something kind of crazy. I want you to text the word "go" to 44/11/22, and this little thing is going to pop up

and you're going to answer the question, "What would I do for the glory of God if I knew it wouldn't fail?" Even if you know you're not going to do it because you're a wimp, or you've got all these pieces of wine, wine, wine, wine, wine, wine, wine. I dare you to just confess it out loud. If my faith meter was pegged, way over here, 100%, if I knew that I knew that I knew for the glory of God, if I knew if I did it, it wouldn't fail. I would, and I dare you to just confess it out loud. And then that's how we're going to close our service. In just a minute, we're going to sing and we're going to bring and we're going to pray and your text messages are going to be scrolling up on this screen. And you have no idea what your statement of bold, audacious kind of scares you a little bit of faithfulness popping up on this screen, how it might encourage somebody else that God is calling to do the very same thing. So you may ask me, "Pastor, what would you do for the glory of God if you knew it wouldn't Well? with Jesus Christ. And I know what you're saying, but you already did that, and it's not easy for you to say. Just trust me, back in 2011 and 2012, it didn't feel easy. So what would I do for the glory of God today? I'd continue to give my life, and as long as God puts breath in my lungs to continuously serve what He told me to do when we pushed all of our chips in on the table and said, "All right, we're going to start a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus." And let me... Please hear my testimony on this. I'm a nobody from nowhere, and ain't nothing special about me. I'm glad my family's not here right now to amen that, you know. You have no idea what hangs in the balance when you step out. You have no idea the kind of Kingdom impact God wants to make in you and through you

and to you. What would you do for the glory of God if you knew He wouldn't fail? So I'm going to invite you to stand up, and I'm going to pray for you. And I'm going to give you permission that you don't have to close your eyes during this prayer. You can text during this prayer. Everybody stand up, we're going to pray, and you're going to text, and then we're going to respond, and our good and our gracious Heavenly Father. Jesus, who are we that you would even be mindful of us? God for the man or the woman who's in the storm right now, maybe they would just cry out, "Lord, save me," and I pray that you would save Him. God, I thank you that you see us. God, I thank you that you love us just as we are, but you love us too much to leave us right where we are, and you call us to continuously take steps of faith and obedience in your direction. And so, Lord, I pray that we would fix our eyes on you, the author, and the perfecter of our faith. And God, this week, when the wind and the waves begin to get bigger, and the fear begins to rise, that we would know fear is a liar. And we don't have to live by fear, because we're children of God. And Lord, I thank you for all of the courage and all of the faith, of all of the men and the women and the students that today is the day that they finally step out of that boat, and they do what is impossible with man, but with you, all things are possible. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. So we're going to respond. We're going to sing. Oh, we're going to sing about the faithfulness of God, and we're going to bring our ties and our offerings as an act of worship. And I don't know about you, but on sermons like this, I need to pray so that I can hear clearly exactly what he is calling me to do, and we're going to text to the glory of God.

What would you do for the glory of God if you knew it wouldn't fail? Let us sing, let us bring, let us pray, let us text. Be encouraged as you read about what God is doing in the lives of the men and women around you. Let's respond. Let us sing, let us pray, let us sing, let us pray, let us pray. Let us sing, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray. Let us sing, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray. Let us sing, let us pray, let us pray, let us pray. This is not the end You conquer love So I live Resurrecting life Resurrecting Come on, we're sitting with faith this morning Right here Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrecting Now the witness to praise the Lord I see you breathe I believe in sin All of my friends I believe in the way That you may be alive The promise is never enough And I've got stories All you do is turn me to the ground All of my friends

I believe in sin All of my friends I believe in you all of my friends All of my friends All of my friends Resurrecting I believe in you all of my friends Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrecting Resurrect You're good And I've witnessed it Come on You're strong And I've witnessed it You're constant I've witnessed it And I'm confident I'll see it again And again You love it I've witnessed it Time and time again You heal it I've witnessed it You save it

I've witnessed it And I'm confident I'll see it again And again You're good And I've witnessed it You're strong And I've witnessed it You're constant I've witnessed it And I'm confident I'll see it again And again You love it I've witnessed it You heal it I've witnessed it You save it I've witnessed it And I'm confident I'll see it again And again I've witnessed it You're faithful I've seen it Be like women Time Pull up my brains It's getting away Don't you

Your promise is never fair I've got stories I'm addicted So I'll Pull up my brains It's getting away It's getting away To the broken I'll witness it To the hurting I'll witness it To the lost I'll witness it I'll touch your legs I'll touch your world I'll witness it To my family I'll witness it To my neighbors I'll witness it To the nations I'll witness it I'll tell you that I'll tell the world that I'll witness it Isn't it incredible? Aren't you so encouraged and challenged to see what God's doing in the lives of the people sitting right next to you? So what is it for you?

If you could do anything for the glory of God and knew it wouldn't fail what would it be? Text go to 44-11-22 There's nothing magical about texting it but there is something powerful about saying it out loud And then the follow-up question Why aren't you doing it? Church, we love you We are praying for you We'll see you next week Be free [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)

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