Where Is God When Nothing Is Changing? (Watch This)

And this is week 31. And the title of this message is Jesus is still here. Now, let me take a moment to do this. I've been gone a while, I've been watching services. And I think we have a great preaching team. These guys, and they're not just, they just don't preach, they work very hard for you. And I just wanna thank them, you know, from my son to Michael who's over there. He's had some surgery. And Pastor Daniel, I think he's around. And who else? Pastor, well, Pastor Joe's crazy. We don't thank him very much. (congregation laughing) Yeah, we don't thank him 'cause it goes to his head and then he thinks he's all that, you know, but. No, Pastor Joe's funny, he makes me laugh. He's the, he's more the crazy one. Comes up with different examples that I'm like, "What the heck?" Well, you know, my mind doesn't even go there, but anyway, I just wanted to publicly thank them. They've done such a wonderful job. I've enjoyed all their messages and. (congregation applauding) So let me ask some, how many people actually still carry around a Bible when you come to church? Oh, wow, okay, more than I thought. So for you that have a Bible,

I haven't said this in so many years. If you grab your Bible and turn with me to Acts chapter nine. And the rest of you, we do it on phone, right? We got it on phone and yeah, everybody. So, and I know that. You know, years ago, when phones first started getting popular and everybody started having them, we used to do big announcements before the server started. It says, "Please turn off your phone," or silence them. I don't remember, but it was just, "Turn them off." And now we're like, "Pull out your phone." You know, text this and give that and do this. And so you can get on your phone. And what's funny is, since we, you know, people are more on their phones more, we get less interruptions from Jesus calling people during the service than we did before, which is funny. And so we're more conscious of them. But anyway, if it's on your phone, it's on your phone, or you get to follow along on the screen. So today we're going to talk and look at a woman who was dead, and then she wasn't. And you know, you think about it, what a great way to start off a Sunday service. We're going to talk about a dead woman. But then she wasn't. So Acts, chapter nine, verses 36 through 43. There was a believer in Japa named Tabitha, which in Greek is Dorkus. She was always doing kind things for others

and helping the poor about this time she became ill and died. Her body was washed for burial and laid in an upstairs room. But the believers had heard that Peter was nearby Lydia, or Litta, and so they sent two men to beg him, please come as soon as possible. So Peter returned with them. And as soon as he arrived, they took him to the upstairs room. The room was filled with widows who were weeping and showing him the coats and other clothes Dorkus had made for them. But Peter asked them all to leave the room. Then he knelt and prayed, turning to the body and said, "Get up, Tabitha." And she opened her eyes. When she saw Peter, she set up and he gave her his hand and helped her up. Then he called in the widows and all the believers and he presented her them to them alive. The news spread throughout through the whole town and many believed in the Lord. I want you to highlight that. If you're in your Bible highlighted, if you're taking notes highlighted, I'm gonna tell you something, because we're gonna come back to that. Many believed in the Lord. And Peter stayed a long time in Japa, living with Simon, a Tanner of heights. So let me just be honest with you, not that I'm gonna lie,

but I always laugh when I put those statements down like, let me just be honest with you. I won't lie this time. When most of us read a story like this, we do something sometimes without even thinking about it. We turn it into a lesson about us. We read about somebody doing something good and right away we think, man, okay, I need to do that too, or I need to do better. So it would be real easy to walk out of here today and say, be like Tabitha. Serve people, make a difference. And we all should. We all should make a difference. We all should be more like Tabitha in some ways. We should serve, we should help people. You know, I say this a lot, that this world needs more kindness. 'Cause people aren't kind. People just aren't kind at all sometimes. I mean, the rudest people, it's like we turn into different beings. It's like all manners go out the door. I don't know what it is about airports, that people get that way. One day I was standing there, I'm going to confess on myself. This is not confession, but I'm going to confess. I'm standing and, you know, my back was still heard at the time, so I was standing. I was all by myself and waiting to get on the plane, but there was no lineup, you know, they hadn't called for the plane yet.

And there's all this, there's no one around me. Well, then I'm standing and this guy comes up and stands almost behind me, but right by me and I'm looking like, "Dude, what's wrong with you? It's like when you park your car and there's 20 spaces and someone parks right next to you, it's like, why?" Anybody know what I'm talking about? I was like, "Why?" They're just parked one away. But anyway, he was standing there and, you know, it was probably 20 minutes before they called us. We were going to get on the plane first. And I'm just standing there and he's standing kind of behind me to the side. And when the flight attendant calls us up to get on the plane, he just jumps in front of me. Like, cuts me off, steps in front of me. Well, I didn't take it that way. I wasn't kind at all. I said, "What are you doing?" I said, "Well, go ahead, then. Go ahead and be rude. Go, go ahead." And he looked at me and goes, "I was just trying to get on the plane a minute. I got mad." I said, "I don't care what you were trying to do." I said, "I ought to whoop you right now." I mean, I was mad. And I thought to myself, he was a little bigger, and I thought, "Ah, man, what am I doing? That's dumb. I'm an old guy now. But inside, I don't feel that old, right?" And I wasn't tough, but I just made me mad. And he looked down and then I thought, "Oh, I got him now, man. He looked away. He wouldn't look at me." I'm like, "Oh, yeah. You know, I got you.

I may not be able to whip many, but I whip you." So I was so mad, I get on the plane, and I'm mad-dogging him. And it just so happened, we were in row four. I was on the end, and he was on the next, on row four, on the next group of seats. So you know what I did? I put my leg over the chair, and I just stared at him. I'm like, "What's wrong with you?" And then I thought, "Ah, I better be more like a Christian. I am a pastor, so I should act a little better." But it just amazed me. People just cut you off. We're getting on a plane. These two older folks were getting in. The lady was moving real slow, and you know, people just start cutting in. So I don't know what got him. I just said, "Stop!" Everybody looked at me like, "What?" I said, "Let these people go." And then we're walking down the, you know, the thing to get on the, I don't know what's called the tarmac, not the tarmac, but the, I don't know, the long thing you walk to get on. What is it? A ramp. Oh, yeah, a ramp bridge. Okay. A ramp bridge. That. And we're walking down, and the guide looks, turns around and says, "Thank you so much." My wife broke both of her ankles. She just got out of her cast, and she can barely walk. And I'm like, "How do people not see that?" Let me tell you something, guys. When we become a believer, we should change. Things should change in us. I mean, I know we're always in a hurry. We always want to be first. Sometimes a little kindness can go a long way, even though I wasn't kind to that guy. I was kind when I quit staring at him. And I was kind when I repented. I said, "God, forgive me. I don't know. I just got mad." You know, I don't know why I got that mad. I just, it just, it shouldn't have bothered me. But you know what? Here's what it is. No matter how spiritual we become, we're still human, right? But we have to recognize when we blow it.

I blew that. I've never told that story publicly. And I don't know why I did now. I think I'm confessing. I'm trying to get, I'm back. I'm trying to get cleansed and, you know, get it all out of me. But anyway, I know some guys looking at his wife, "See, I'm not that bad." But Tabitha is a beautiful picture of what a life changed by Jesus looks like. But I don't think that's why Luke, who wrote the book of Acts, Dr. Luke, who also wrote the book of Luke. I don't believe that's what he meant for us to get out of this. Because the center of this passage is not about what Tabitha does. Really, the center of this passage is what God does. Tabitha serves. Tabitha gets sick. And Tabitha dies. And then God does something nobody in that room could ever do. He raised her from the dead. So today I want to change the question. Instead of asking, "What should I do because of this passage?" I want us to start asking this question, "What is God showing me about himself?" What is he showing me? Because sometimes we are so busy finding ourselves in the Bible that we miss who the Bible is revealing to us. Now picture the scene. They were so grateful that she gets sick and she dies. The church is devastated. They send for Peter with one simple message, please come as soon as possible. And when Peter walks into the upstairs room, the widows are crying and they are holding up coats. They are saying, look, this is what she did. This is how much she meant to us. And they are literally standing there holding the evidence of how much this woman mattered to them. You can almost hear it, can't you? She made this for me. She helped me when I had nothing. She was there when I just needed somebody. And so, folks, I've been a pastor a long time now, and I've stood in a lot of rooms

like that, hospital rooms, living rooms, funeral homes. And when I know the people real well, it breaks me. It just works me. I've been in a lot of those rooms, and some of you have been in that room, and some of you are in that room right now. And those widows weren't being unspiritual because they were crying. And I want to say this again. When I came back and did one midweek, and then I just wasn't just too much pain at the time, I want you to hear this. Grief is not a lack of faith. Grief is what love does when somebody is gone or leaves the earth. It's just a part of who we are. You know, love is that emotion that is so good sometimes. You know, like, you're fixing to get married. I just love her. I just love him. You know, I remember counseling couples when they were first getting married. And I said, well, tell me what you don't like about her. I love everything about her. And I'm like, oh, dude, you have a rude awakening. And then you look at her, what don't you like about him? And she would say, he's the greatest, he just does everything great. I'm like, oh, yeah, keep that for 10 years. Go ahead. Because when you start living with somebody, it's different, right? And so we get in those places when we walk into rooms, when grief happens because we loved somebody. If we didn't have grief, we wouldn't, we wouldn't care. We wouldn't have any compassion. And so that reminds us that we do love when we have the ability to love, when someone we

love dearly dies and goes home to be at the Lord or leaves this earth. Just think if we didn't have any of that. Just think if we were callous, like, oh, so what, who cares? Dang, what a world we live in. See, we need to see in the scripture the power isn't Peters. Now here's where the story takes a turn. Peter asks everybody to leave the room. Then he gets on his knees and Peter prays. Think about who this is. Peter walked with Jesus for three years. Peter saw all the miracles up close. Peter preached on the dead Pentecost and 3,000 people got saved. People were laying the sick in the street hoping that his shadow would fall on them so they could be healed. But when Peter walks into a room with a dead woman lying in front of him, what does he do? Peter gets on his knees because Peter knows something. The power isn't his. Peter can't raise Tabitha. Peter can't produce a miracle. Peter can't manufacture the power of God. So Peter kneels before the one who can. You know, I drove a brown truck for UPS for over ten years before I became a pastor. I delivered thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of packages. And at Christmas time, a lot of thousands. But nobody ever opened the box and said this, wow, look what the UPS guy made me. I didn't make anything. I just delivered it. Peter is the delivery guy. When you pray for the sick, you're the delivery guy or woman.

You are the one that is being the delivery person. That's all we are because only God can save. Only God can heal and only God can raise someone from the dead. Peter's the delivery guy, Jesus is the source. If God uses you and he wants to, don't you ever start thinking you're the source? Don't read your own press clippings. You're the instrument. We're the instrument. And the minute we forget that, we stop kneeling. And the minute we stop kneeling, we stop caring anything worth delivering. see, you know, miraculous miracles, God's always doing miracles. He's always healing people. But we have a hard time giving him the credit. You know, someone comes in and says, "I want the doctor, I got this diagnosis." And so the church prays or people pray for him, the prayer team prays, the elders pray. Then they go back to the doctor several weeks later or whatever, and the doc says, "Man, I don't know what happened here, but you don't have that problem anymore." And here's where people go to, "Well, it must have been a misdiagnosis." Instead of, "Thank God you healed me. Thank God." So what happens in our culture, because we have Hollywood preachers, that's what I call them, we were never meant to be Hollywood preachers. We were never meant to be famous, only Jesus should be famous. And, you know, and if God lifts you up, you should stay humble. Well a lot of the guys, people watch on YouTube or whatever, you know, I know some of Adam, sometimes I know them, and it's like, they just want God to do something so they can become more popular or show off. Like if I prayed for the sick today or prayed, like someone walked somebody in and said, "They're dead, pray for them," and God raised them up, here's what we would do. We would go on social media and say, "Look how God used me.

Look what I did. Look, I just want to be famous, I want to be popular, I want to be known." And that is not the reason God does things. The reason God does things is so he can be more known. And we've got to get that mindset. We're servants, we're not the source. We're not the source at all. God is the source. God can raise the dead. I hear a preacher say all the time, "I went to this meeting and I saved 10,000 people." I'm like, "You saved nobody." God used you and you preached and prayed and 10,000 people came to the Lord because it's the Lord who saved, the Lord who heals, the Lord who delivers, and we have to come back if we're not already there and be careful that we're always giving God all the praise, the glory and the honor forever, ever and ever. Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty who was and who is and who is to come. He gets the credit. He's the source. I'm standing up here but by the grace of God. I made it through surgery and the first thing I wanted to do, because I moved my toes, because when they do back surgery, spinal surgery, no one little cut and I could have been paralyzed. So that's the first thing and when they woke me up in recovery, I'm like, "Oh, I can feel my toes." I was so happy. And I didn't realize the recovery would be so painful and so rugged, so funny. They told me when I left the hospital after two days, they said, "Hey, you need to get a walker and use a walker for the next month." And I said, "What?" They said, "Yeah, you need to use a walker. You know what?

I'm so vain." I thought, "I'm still a man. I'm not using a stinkin' walker. I'm old but I'm not that old." So I just stumbled around my house praying I didn't fall. But I'd rather fall than have a walker. I'd rather still feel like a man than not feel like a man. Thank you. And it's so funny, I think, "Why am I like that?" It's so dumb. Just use a stinkin' walker. I just couldn't make myself do it. But God's grace and mercy, guys. I'm glad to be here today. I really am because it's been so wild, but I can tell you this. God gets all the praise and glory and honor. Whatever he does in your life today, he gets all the credit. He may use people because he does. He wants to use us in a good way. But a lot of us aren't even willing to be used. And I keep thinking about this thought with this message. If you were put on trial and accused of being a Christian, would there be enough evidence to convict you of being a Christian? I mean, when they went all through the trial, would there be enough where they say, "Yeah, he's a Christian. She's a Christian." They're convicted. Because a lot of us don't. When I talked about kindness, the fruit of the spirit is huge. Love, joy, peace, kindness, long-suffering, faithfulness.

We need to cultivate that. When you get born again, they're put in you. But a lot of people don't want to cultivate them because they would say, "I don't want to change. This is just the way I am." But when you're the instrument, we have to be willing to change. We have to. And here's something I really love. Peter had been in a room like this before. I want you to check this out. Years earlier, J.I. and said, would you come to my house? And he said, well, he said, you don't have to come to my house. Just pray, I'm under authority, you're under authority. And just praying Jesus went to the house. Peter was with him. So he had been in a room like this before. Jares' daughter had died. People were crying then too. Jesus sent the crowd out and Peter was one of the few he let's stay. Mark 541, holding her hand, he said to her, Talata Coom, which means little girl or young girl. Get up. Now Peter is standing in another room, another dead woman, another group of breathing people. And Peter spoke Aramaic just like Jesus. So what he most likely said was, tabata coom. Talata Coom and tabata coom, one letter different. And you don't think Peter was remembering that other day? He does almost exactly what he watched Jesus do.

He sends the people out. He speaks to the body. He takes her by the hand, but there's one enormous difference here. Peter prays first. Jesus commanded her to get up on his own authority. Peter depends on Jesus' authority. Peter isn't becoming Jesus. Peter is showing everybody that Jesus is still working. And after he prays, he turns toward the body and says, get up, tabata. And she opens her eyes. She sees Peter. She sits up. Peter gives her his hand and helps her to her feet. Then he calls the widows back in the room. And the same people who were crying a few minutes ago are now looking at tabata alive. The tears are still wet on their faces. Some of them are still holding the coat. And out of nowhere, everything changed in a moment of time. You see, this was a sign, not a formula. So here's the question we have to wrestle with. Why? Why did God raise tabata? Because God does not raise every believer who dies. Just a couple chapters earlier, Stephen was murdered for his faith. Jesus, Stephen wasn't raised. A few chapters later, James was killed by air. James isn't raised.

John the Baptist wasn't raised. We could go on and on. Eventually, Peter himself will die. And tabata, eventually, she died again. See, how do you know she died? Because she's not here. [LAUGHTER] There's thousands of years ago. She died again. She's probably one of the few that says, I died twice. I really died. And just so you know this in the Jewish culture, when someone died, they would get him cleaned up for burial. And then they would bury him usually that day. But for some reason, they took tabata to a room and then sent for Peter and said, please come as soon as possible. I don't know if Peter knew what he was getting into. Can you imagine Peter walking in and like, dang, who are all these people? And they're crying, and they're moaning, and they're just boo-hoo, and then they're showing, this is what she did, she was so great. And then Peter does what he knew to do, what he saw Jesus do. Get out. Years ago, we had a guy work with us named Pastor Bruno. Some of you may still know and remember him. But he worked here. I became great friends with him. But he told me, he goes, eight people

have awakened from comas when I prayed for them. God woke up, eight different people that were in comas. They woke up instantly. And I'm like, well, I never had that happen. But then one day I went to the hospital with him, we were just in the family. And it was so funny to me, because he was in his late 80s bright end, and he walks into the room and he's Italian. And so he had that kind of, you know, Italian kind of mindset, just aggressive in some ways. And we walk in the room and he walks in. I walk him with him and I'm the pastor and he looks around and he said, if you're not safe, get out. And I went, oh, dang. I'm like, I'm like dying a thousand days like, what? I'm looking at him like, I think I may need to go. What? I mean, he said it's so stern and firm, and it was funny as people left. They were family, they left. And he says, now, is everybody else in here safe? And then he shook their head. And he was tough. And then he goes, OK, now I'll pray. I thought, wow, I thought, where did he get that? He may have got it from Jesus and Peter. All these widows are crying and, you know, they're grieving. And he says, get out. Get out of the room. And so we do not walk.

I don't want us to walk out of here thinking that if somebody has enough faith or serves enough or serves enough people, God will keep them from dying or hand them a miracle. That's not how it works. People always talk about their faith. Well, if you had better faith, if you had more faith, We have to have faith in God, but He's the one that does the stuff. And Jesus even said this, you don't have to have a lot of faith. Just have a faith as a mustard seed, which is a smaller seed ever to grow tree. Just have the faith of a mustard seed. But people always want to talk about their faith. You know, people get hurt or, you know, someone dies and people are grieving and sure enough, one person will come up and say, well, if you had more faith, you'd be okay. Like, what? It's so hard, harsh. I've always hated that. It always greeted me like, why would you say that? Those people just ignorant of God, they see themselves in the scriptures, but they don't see the God in the scriptures that He's constantly throughout the Bible, revealing Himself to His people. And so we think if we do these things, but this is not what this passage teaches, teaches, Jesus is not a vending machine. You don't put in enough service and pull out a miracle. Tabitha wasn't raised because she earned it by sewing enough

coats. And some of us need to hear this today. Some of us have prayed and your person didn't get up. You believed fasted. You called everybody you knew to pray and they still went home to be with the Lord. So hear me. That does not mean we didn't have enough faith. It does not mean Jesus wasn't in your room. He was just as present in your room as he was in Tabitha's. What happened in Japa was not a formula. It was a sign. And Luke tells us exactly where it was headed in verse 42. Many believed in the Lord. Not everyone believed in Peter. Not everyone started talking about how wonderful Tabitha was. Many believed in the Lord. The miracle pointed to Jesus. The miracle pointed past itself. See, his ascension did not mean his absence. And that's what people think today. Where is he? God was showing that the early church, he was showing them something they desperately needed to know. Jesus had ascended. They couldn't watch him walk to the villages anymore. They couldn't watch him touch the leopards. They couldn't follow him from town to town the way Peter had. But Jesus, going back to the Father, did not mean Jesus stopped working. Look at what Luke starts in the book of Acts.

If you didn't know, Dr. Luke wrote the book of Luke and the book of Acts. Acts chapter one, verses one and two, the very beginning. In my first book, I told you, Theopolis, about everything Jesus began to do and teach until the day he was taken up to heaven after giving his chosen apostles further instructions through the Holy Spirit. Did you see that began? I want you to look at that thing about began. The gospel of Luke tells you what Jesus began to do. The book of Acts shows you that Jesus wasn't finished. He had ascended, but he's not absent. His ascension did not mean his absence. Jesus is still working. He was still working. Jesus was still saving. He is still saving. Jesus was still building the church. Jesus is still building his church. But only now he was doing it through his spirit, working through his people. That's why we got to be more Christ-like. That's why we got to figure this out. That's why we have to let God reveal himself. You know, when you get married, you know, some people say, I trust him with all my heart. I tell him everything. I don't know about that. But then when you've been married five years, 10 years, 20 years, you learn to trust them more with who you really are and what stuff you tell them more. I think it was 15 years before I told my wife certain things. And the one that I didn't trust her then, I just trusted her more now and I felt more comfortable doing that.

You know, folks, we've got to as we get to know the Lord and I got to know her. I realized I could trust her with my stuff. And as we get to know the Lord and when we were the Bible, instead of just making it about ourselves, which it is about us, we need to change. But we need to say, God, what are you showing me about yourself? Because as you get to know more, you'll trust it more even when you can't see him. When you're wondering, he's still working. He's not absent. And when Tabitha set up, it was one more loud declaration that Jesus is alive. Now, that's something we still have to learn because we don't physically see Jesus either. And if we're honest, sometimes we can't see God working. We start to wonder if he is. You're praying about your kid and they're still running. You're praying about your health and the report is still the same. And that quiet voice starts telling you where is he? That's not God's voice. But the story of Acts is a story of the risen Jesus, continuing his work in the world. And he is still working. That doesn't mean he'll do exactly what he did for Tabitha every time. The story isn't a formula, it's a revelation. It reveals who Jesus is. Jesus is still Lord, even when you can't see him. See, death doesn't get to keep us. And that's a big thing we need to look at. And maybe the greatest thing God was showing them that day was this. Death does not have the final word.

It does not have the final say. Tabitha's resurrection was incredible, but it was temporary. She died again. So what happened in Acts 9 wasn't the ultimate resurrection. It was a preview. You know, when you go to movies, how may I watch the previews when you go to movies? No, some of us. I don't like the previews. In fact, sometimes we're going to movie. They say, well, it starts at this time. I said, no, we got 20 minutes. So we're calm, we're relaxed. We don't run in, we're just like chilling. But we know that the previews are before the main feature. And some of you like the previews better than the movie. And that's between you and the Lord, I would do that. But we know the preview is not the main event. It's a taste of what's coming. Tabitha got up that day because Jesus had already gotten up. And because Jesus got up, death's authority has been broken. John 11, 25, Jesus told her I'm the resurrection and the life. Anyone who believes in me will live even after dying. Christian hope is not that we will somehow dodge death. Christian hope is that death doesn't get to keep us. Because one day Jesus isn't going to just raise one woman in Japa. First, that's only in four, 14 through 18.

For since we believed that Jesus died and was raised to life again, we also believe that when Jesus returns, God will bring back with him the believers who have died. We tell you this directly from the Lord. We who are still living. When the Lord returns will not meet him ahead of those who have died. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven with a commanding shout with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet call of God. First, the believers who have died will rise from their graves. Then together with them, we who are still alive and remain on the earth will be caught up in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. Then we will be with our Lord forever. So encourage each other with these words that those that you love that have gone, you will see them again. They'll be raised first. I think we'll be looking up like, oh, dang, there they are. (congregation applauding) I don't think God says dang, but I say it a lot. Dang it, man, you know. But think about it. That is our hope. Our hope isn't that God will always keep terrible things from happening because that's misplaced hope.

Our hope isn't that every sickness will be healed in this life. Our hope isn't even that we will never die. Our hope should be in the Lord Jesus who conquered death, hell, and the grave. And because Jesus is alive, death does not get the last word. Every believer you have laid in the ground is getting up. Jesus is going to say, get up one more time. And this time, nobody's ever lying back down. In closing, in Acts 942, the news spread throughout the whole town and many believed in the Lord. That's where this whole thing was going. God did something extraordinary and people saw Jesus. That's what miracles are supposed to do. That's what the church is supposed to. That's what your life is supposed to. Not so I can get popular. You know, they consider me a public figure. And I hate that term, but they consider me a public figure. So that means people can take any shot at me they want. And so to be popular is not always fun. And yet most people want to be popular. That's why these preachers always grieve at sometimes, like it's not about us, it's about Jesus working through us. That's why we got to stay humble. That's why we can't read our own press. I don't read it, I don't read my own press, I don't know. All I know is God always gets the praise, When I started pastoring, I never started pastoring to be popular.

I did it because I believe I was serving God. And how will you serve God? Make sure you give Him all the praise and glory and honor. Make sure you recognize who the source really is. And that's what we need in America. We need people to be humble and just say, "Man, God did this. God did this." And our life is supposed to be that way. We're supposed to point people to Jesus. Tabithus service pointed to Jesus. Peter's ministry pointed to Jesus. Tabithus resurrection pointed to Jesus. And sometimes out of nowhere, God does something nobody could ever manufacture, plan, or pull off. But when God moves, don't get so fascinated with what He did that you miss who He's revealing Himself to be. Tabitha was dead. Peter was powerless. The church was grieving. The whole thing looked finished. Then God moved. But the greatest sins in this story isn't Tabith open to our eyes. It's this. Many believed in the Lord. So here's what God is showing us today. Jesus is still here. Death doesn't get the final say. So look to Him. He's the Savior of the world.

Folks, without Him, we have no hope. The risen Jesus wasn't working through His church in Japa. And the risen Jesus is still working through His church right now through legacy, through your hands, through the meal you drop off at somebody's house and the prayer you pray in somebody's hospital room. Now before we pray and in this service, some of you walked in here feeling like you're in that upstairs room. Something died, a marriage, a dream, your hope. And it feels finished. But Jesus is still here. He still walks in the upstairs rooms. He still takes people by the hand. And He is still saying to everyone, get up. Get up. And maybe you've never actually put your faith in Him. Maybe you walk with Him and walk the way. Maybe you've never put your faith in Him at all. Folks, I'm out here trying to get people to join Legacy Church. I'm here to help people become part of the family of God so that when you die, you don't go to hell. You can go to heaven. [APPLAUSE] I say this a lot. Nice people don't go to heaven. Kind people don't go to heaven. Generous people don't go to heaven. Only saved people go to heaven.

It starts by believing in your heart, confess with your mouth. I'm going to leave everybody in here in a prayer. I do this a little different than I normally do. So with every head bowed, I want to ask everybody in this room just to pray this with me. Jesus, I believe you died for my sins. And you rose from the dead. I believe you're alive right now. And I give you my life. Forgive me, Lord. Change me. Be my Lord in Jesus' name, amen, and amen, and amen.