Where it All Was Made Right | Adam Weber

If you've ever felt like you're not good enough for God, if you've ever felt like you're just too broken, you're too messy, if I need to go to God, if I need to go to church, I first need to clean up all the crap, which is my life, before I come. If that's you, just know the stone is rolled away and the door to God is now open. And hear this, the door isn't just opened. Even better, Jesus, he's out of the grave and he is looking for you. The door to God is open, the tomb is empty, and Jesus is coming for you. What is up, Embrace? Huge happy Easter to you. It is so good to see you. My name is Adam. I'm one of the pastors here. We are honored, truly overjoyed that you've decided to come and worship with us here today. And really quick, we need to celebrate. Last weekend alone, we had 71 people raise their hand and make a first-time decision to follow Jesus. Can we celebrate that? Every time I hear that, I'm just so, so thankful and in awe. And this means that so far this year, 345 people, before this weekend began, have made the same decision. That's 345 people who have moved from death to life, who have been made new. And it just never gets old.

This past year, every single week, we're continuing to see more and more new faces. Last weekend, it again, was our largest non-holiday weekend ever in the history of Embrace. And we rejoice over this only because our heartbeat is to relentlessly reach the next person for Jesus. We just wanna tell one more person about the love and the wholeness and the joy and the truth found in Him. And so we celebrate that, and we're just so grateful for that. So today is Easter, where we celebrate Jesus coming out of the grave, right? Well, the other day, this shows you a lot how my brain works. The other day, I was randomly reminded of something else. You see, years ago, my wife, Becky, and I, we used to have backyard chickens. And so we'd have these chickens in our backyard. And well, they almost became like pets to my kids, which is awesome, except for when the chickens die. That is not so awesome. So the first time one of our chickens passed away, their kids were crushed. I mean, their dog, I mean, their chicken died. And so I had them say their goodbyes to the chicken, and then I had them go inside the house so that I could properly bury this chicken. And death is a holy thing, and so I really wanted to be able to properly do this for their beloved pet. Well, sporadically over the years,

the kids have genuinely asked me. It's been over a decade, but they've genuinely asked me, Dad, where did you end up burying our chicken at? And we'd be in our backyard, and they'd even ask, did you bury it over here, Dad, or over here? Well, one time they worried that they accidentally dug the chicken up by accident, you know? Well, over the years, I never really gave them a straight answer until last month. I'm like, well, how is this still coming up? Last month, when it came up again, Dad, where did you bury our chicken? And I said, well, guys, about that, you know? About 10 or so years ago, I didn't have the heart to tell you, I never buried the chicken. I just threw him in the trash. I kid you not, when I told my kids about this, you would've thought I deeply betrayed every ounce of trust they've ever had in me. All I could think is, just wait until our dog Daisy dies. I'm just kidding. Daisy, if you can hear me, I love you so much. Daisy, I'd never throw you in the trash, possibly. But truly though, I'm like Jesus when something dies in the Weber household, it typically doesn't come back to life, but once again, a huge, huge happy Easter to every single one of you. And speaking of Easter, in Scripture, we are told about two different gardens, two different gardens.

And the first garden is in Genesis where we're told this. The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden, put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. And the Lord God commanded the man, you are free to eat from any tree in the garden, but you must not eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat from it, you will certainly die. So God, he puts this first man into the middle of this beautiful garden to care for it, to bring life to it. This first man, he is in fact a gardener. And God said to him, you can go and eat from any tree in this garden, except this one tree. God's like, this is my will, go explore my garden, go. explore this beautiful garden, do anything you want, just follow this one rule. And yet this first man, instead of listening to God's will, he basically told God, I want my will to be done. I want my will. And so Adam and Eve, they don't listen to God. They eat the fruit from this one tree, and immediately we're told that they're afraid, and they're covered in shame, and they hide from God, and then God comes to them and says that as a result of you doing things your way instead of mine, and as a result of your sin in this life, you will experience death. Yes, a physical death, but even worse so, a spiritual death.

And now switching to us, even still today, for all of us in life, there is now this gap between the way things are and the way that things should be. In our world, in our city, in our families, in your life and in mine, there's this gap. Have you ever felt this gap before? You see, there's this gap, which is death. You see, death is what happens when the world is no longer the way that God says it should be. And more than anything else, this gap of death, it separates us from God. It separates us from him and all that he is, which means that we're separated from his love and his grace and his joy and his mercy and his goodness. You see, unfortunately, this first gardener, he failed us, but hear this, thankfully, this isn't the end of the story because friends, there is in fact another garden. There's another garden, which is what we're gonna look at for today. As you might know, on a Friday, Jesus is nailed to a cross and he is killed, he is crucified on this cross. A little later on in the book of John chapter 19, we are told this, so they took the body of Jesus and bound it in linen cloth with spices as is the burial custom of the Jews. Now in the place where he was crucified, there was a garden and in the garden, a new tomb in which no one had yet been laid. Friends, of all places that this could have taken place,

Jesus' body is buried in a garden, clearly connecting us and reminding us to what took place, reminding us and connecting us to that first garden in Genesis. And I don't know about you, but when I read this, I'm just in awe of God, I'm like, this is so awesome. Continuing on, we're told, early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene went to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the entrance. Again, on Easter morning, Mary Magdalene, she gets to the tomb only to see that the stone that had been sealing the grave, it had been rolled away. I love this quote by the great Timothy Keller. He says, the reason the stone was rolled away on Jesus' tomb was not so that Jesus could get out, but so that we could get in. To help us understand this, we just mentioned the gap of death, which is a result of our sin, which separates us from God and all that he is. Well, you see this death of Jesus, it bridges, it bridges this gap. I don't know about you, but thank you, Jesus. Thank you, God, you've come and you've bridged the gap. Seriously though, now through the grave, through Jesus, the door to God is now open. Friends, the stone is rolled away and the way to God is now open. Stone is rolled away, the way to God is now open

on Easter through Jesus and his death. And now through this empty tomb, God is opening the door for us. He's opening the door for you and for me. Last week, I drove up north with one of my best friends, Tyler. He was speaking to a business class up at SDSU and I had a speaking thing there afterwards myself. But when we got to Brookings, I had Tyler drop me off at the Starbucks. It's a couple of blocks away. And so I got my Starbucks drink and then I walked to Harding Hall where Tyler was speaking. But when I got there, I pulled on the door handles and the door was locked. Just a quick side note to SDSU, when you host an event, maybe unlock the doors, okay, SDSU? Also, maybe just stick to ice cream, okay? Just stick to ice cream. Unfortunately though, for me, Tyler had already started speaking. I'm out there, he didn't have his phone on him and so I'm just standing there. Well, at first, I'm like, this is no big deal. I mean, someone's gonna walk by and I'll ask them for help and they'll let me in or someone will walk out of Harding Hall and I'll be good and able to enter. And yet, 15 minutes later and I'm still standing there, at this point, I randomly start thinking to myself, I kind of feel a little bit like a creeper right now.

Just being this old shady guy leaning against the hall, bald bearded man putting out the vibe at Harding Hall. You know, it's just like, I'm like, how do I get myself in these weird situations? Almost called campus security. Sometimes you just can't ever be too safe. You know, it's just like, there's this shady individual. He's just leaning against the building. So I'm feeling awkward and then 10 minutes later, I'm starting to feel sad. I'm like, I'm gonna totally miss Tyler speaking. Like, nobody, where is everybody? And so I'm leaning against the building, bummed, feeling awkward. And I randomly look underneath my arm and there is a random handicap door button that I didn't notice. And I love buttons and so I like, you see a button and you just have to push it. I didn't even think it's gonna do anything. I randomly pushed the button. I still don't understand. There's a lot about SDSU that I don't understand, by the way. I randomly pushed the button and the door, it just starts opening. I'm like, what is happening right here? This is insane. I felt like I had accidentally broken into a bank or something.

Speaking of being an old man, I kid you not, I was so excited, I started racing the roof as I walked into Harding Hall. Truly though, all joking aside, unlike me hitting the button on the side of this building, on Easter, Jesus is the one who opens the door, okay? The stone is rolled away and the door to God is now open. And I just wanna highlight this. If you've ever felt like you're not good enough for God, if you've ever felt like you're just too broken, you're too messy, you're too jacked up, if you've ever just felt like you've made too many mistakes and maybe you've told yourself, well, if I need to go to God, if I need to go to church, I first need to clean up all the crap, which is my life before I come. If that's you, just know the stone is rolled away and the door to God is now open. And hear this, the door isn't just opened. Even better, Jesus, he's out of the grave and he is looking for you. He is searching for you and you can't come to him. You don't have to and you can't. Instead, Jesus, he comes and finds you. He comes and finds you. To be so clear, not because of anything you've done and not because you've now figured out your life and you've got it all together. No, no, no, no, no. Hear this, even on your worst day,

I'm talking about your lowest moment. When you're broken, when you're covered in sin, when you're crazy insecure, when you're restless and you can't shut your brain off at night, when everyone in your life is trying to distance themselves from you. All your business acquaintances are no longer reaching out because of your mess that you are. When you no longer wanna hang out with yourself, the stone is rolled away, the door to God is open, the tomb is empty and Jesus is coming for you. What's the big deal about Easter? It reminds us that Jesus is on a rescue mission to find you. Even death can't stop him. He's coming to find you. Again, not on your best day, I'm talking your worst day. When your life hits the fan. And it's like, when did I become this? On that day, in that moment, he's on a rescue mission to find you. When you don't wanna even be alive anymore. Surely people in church aren't thinking about that. You kidding? He's on a mission to find you. Going back to the story. So Peter and the other disciple, John, started for the tomb, both were running, but the other disciple outran Peter. I love how John brags about himself

and reached the tomb first. He bent over and looked in at the strips of linen lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter came along behind him. and went straight into the tomb, he saw the strips of linen lying there as well as the cloth that had been wrapped around Jesus' head. The cloth was still lying in its place separate from the linen. Again, Peter and John, they run to the garden, they come into it, and when they get to the grave, they look in there and they see strips of linen lying there. Just to explain this, at this time when a person died, they would wrap the body in long strips of linen cloth along with burial spices, and they would wrap the body with these claws to cover the body, but also they would do so to cover the smell of death that would have come from it. And so when Peter and John saw the strips of linen lying there, they were literally looking in and seeing the grave clothes that Jesus' body had been wrapped in. But you see, Jesus didn't need them anymore, because in this moment, it becomes clear, he's alive. He is risen indeed, the tomb is empty, and I'm just saying when you're alive, you no longer need to wear grave clothes, right? Grave clothes is what a dead person wears, and Jesus is, in fact, alive.

Okay, so that's great, pastor, but what does that mean for us? Friends, for all of us, we're all technically alive, right? Across campuses, if you're with us online, we're all technically alive, we've got a heartbeat, we've got breath in our lungs, and yet I'd argue that so many of us are walking around most days like we're dead. We're walking around wearing grave clothes. Some of us, we're walking around believing lies about ourselves. I'm such a loser, I'm an addict, I'm just like my dad, I can't stop drinking, that's what we do in our family, we drink. I'm unlovable. Some of us, we're walking around carrying guilt and shame for what we've done, crap from 20 years ago or what we did last week. For some of us, every single day, we're walking around in insecurities and worries and fears. I'm not good enough, I'm so stupid. I don't know why I talk, because every time I talk, I sound like an absolute moron. What's gonna go wrong in my life today? Because every day, something goes wrong in my life. Some of us, we're walking around and we're convinced that we can't change. We're always gonna be this way, we're always gonna have this life, we're always gonna be this person,

and so we just need to deal with it. Some of us are walking around being defined by our money, by our last success, by our relationship status, by what others think about us, and so we're on this constant, unending rollercoaster that looks awesome from the outside, and yet inside, we're miserable. Regardless of what it looks like, we just keep living the same life, hanging out with the same people, going to the same places, and yet we're miserable from the inside. We're miserable from the outside, and yet we're miserable from the inside. We're just people going to the same places, still wearing the same old grave clothes. I'm just curious to ask, what grave clothes are you wearing? What do they look like for you? And friends, I'm not immune from it. Yesterday morning, I sat at a coffee shop and I just began listing off, what does this look like for me? I've shared it before, I struggled daily with carrying around insecurities. Most days, I am fully convinced I don't have what it takes. As a dad, as a husband, as a leader, as a pastor, convinced of it. Almost every weekend, yesterday, literally on the way to church, I was struggling terribly with questioning

if God could use me, if somehow He could speak through me. I know it's a lie, it's my grave clothes. Friends, when we need Jesus, He makes us come alive. He makes us come alive. When we need Jesus, He forgives us completely. He loves us unconditionally. He frees us from the lies, all the crap we believe about ourselves. He gives us a new identity. He gives us a plan and a purpose for our life. Jesus makes us come alive. And when we're alive, we can throw away, or better yet, we can burn our grave clothes. Just ask once again, what grave clothes are you wearing? Going back to the story, listen to this. Now Mary stood outside the tomb, crying. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb and saw two angels in white seated where Jesus' body had been. One at the head and the other at the foot. They asked her, woman, why are you crying? They have taken my Lord away, she said, and I don't know where they have put him. At this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not realize that it was Jesus. He asked her, woman, why are you crying? Who is it that you're looking for? Thinking he was the gardener. I just love that.

She said, sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you've put him and I will get him. Jesus said to her, Mary. Now, just to remind us in Genesis, the first man was a gardener, right? And God told him to take care of this garden, to bring life to this gardener, but this first gardener, he didn't listen to God and he went his own way. He lived according to his own will and because of this first man's sin, death and brokenness, it entered our world and this gap, it showed up between the way things are and the way that things should be, this gap in our world, in our cities, in our families, in your life and in mine more than anything else, this gap of death, it separated us from God and all that he is, but now in our story for today, Mary, she doesn't recognize Jesus. And who does she think he is? None other than the gardener. Now, this might seem like a small detail or just happenstance, yet friends, this is a huge, huge deal, huge deal. You see, where the first gardener failed us, this second gardener, he came and he makes everything right. He makes everything new. Where this first gardener brought death into the world, this second gardener, he defeated death

and he rose from the grave. This first gardener, where he broke our relationship with God and he created this gap between us and God, this second gardener, he bridges the gap. He brings us back in relationship with God. He bridges the gap and only he and he alone is able to do so, friends. This is so cool. Mary, she doesn't recognize Jesus. And Jesus asked her, who are you looking for? Who are you looking for? And then Jesus says her name. He says, Mary. Jesus calls her by name. He basically says, Mary, I know you. I know everything about you. I know your story. I know your name and I love you and I want and I long for a relationship with you. Again, Jesus calls her by name and today you've maybe never, ever been told this, but Jesus, he says the same to us. He says, Adam, I know you, Adam. I know your brokenness. I know your insecurities that you fight daily. I know the areas that you struggle to trust me. I know you and Sarah, I know you. I know you. I know your story. I know your past.

I know your secrets. I know you. And Tyler, I know you, Tyler. I know every part of you. I know you. Jesus tells us because of the cross and because of the empty tomb, you can stop carrying around your grave clothes. The stone has been rolled away and the way to God is now open. And friends, today, Jesus is telling us and this is the gardener. I'm just telling you, he is here and he is alive. He is risen indeed. And to all of us, he says, to each of us individually, he says, I know you. I know you on your best day, but also on your worst day. I know you and I love you. And I long to have a relationship with you and even death won't keep me from you. Even death. And so today, if you're hearing my voice right now and you've never invited Jesus into your life, you've never started a relationship with him and today I want you to be a part of that. You're just like, today, I want to be made new. Today, I want to leave my grave clothes behind. Today, I no longer want to be the same person that I was when I came in. Instead, I want to be put on a new path, not just for me, but for my entire family, for my marriage. I want to start new today. Maybe you've gone to church. You were baptized as an infant. You've tried to be a good person, whatever that means. I'm still never sure who defines what that means,

but if you're here and you've never asked Jesus to come into your life, I truly cannot think of a better time than Easter 2026 to take this step. It is time, friends. It is time. And so, right now, at all campuses, I'm going to invite you to close your eyes. And if this is you, if you're here today, and for the first time, you want to invite Jesus into your life, right now, at all campuses, I just want to challenge you just to raise your hand. Just raise one of your hands, if that's it. Just boldly go for it. If you're like, I need this. I want to start over. I want to set aside my grave clothes. I'm just going to challenge you. Just raise your hand. Just raise it. If that's you, if you raise your hand right now, just in the quietness of your soul, I want to invite you to pray with me. When we invite Jesus into our lives, it comes down to four words. The first word is sin. Just tell God, Lord, I have sinned. I have fallen short. I haven't followed your will, and I'm sorry. And then the second word is love. Just tell God, but God, you love me so much. You conquered the grave just to be with me. Even at my worst, you love me more than I'll ever comprehend. The third word is grace. By the way, if you're like, I wish I would have raised my hand, it's not too late to shoot it up right now. Third word's grace. Just tell God, Lord, you sent me Jesus to forgive me, and I need to be forgiven. You sent me Jesus to save me, to rescue me, and I don't deserve it, which is why it's called grace. But you make me brand new. And then the last word is faith. Just tell God, today, I'm putting my faith in Jesus. I'm putting my trust in Jesus. I'm leaving my grave clothes behind. I'm choosing your will, not mine. I'm trusting you with my life from this day forward. Lord, for all of us, we just love you so much that you're a God who so loves this messy world, including all of us, that you sent us your son. And there is no name higher than the name of Jesus. And there is no name more worthy than the name of Jesus. And there is no name that can save us from our sin and can make us brand new other than the name of Jesus. And so I pray for everyone raising their hand right now, just that you, even in this moment, would just overwhelm them with your love. That you just overwhelm them with your grace. You just overwhelm them with all that you are, God. And I pray that today and in this week ahead and in their lives ahead, as they start this brand new journey, that they would sense you leading them and guiding them. And that every day, they'd just wake up and say, your will, not mine. My will doesn't work, Lord. And so I choose your will. Lord, we love you. We thank you. We pray all these things. And the risen name of Jesus and all God's people said, amen, amen.

Can we put it up across campuses and celebrate? Amen. Awesome. To those of you who just raised your hand, you just began the wildest, craziest, most awesome, bizarre adventure ever following Christ. And we just celebrate with you. If that's you, a couple of things. At all campuses, we have free Bibles out in the entryway. They're the Bible that I give to my own friends. They're a great Bible. You can't pay us for one. You don't have to give us your email address. Just grab one and go. We just want to get that into your hands. But also, we would love to come alongside you in the journey that you're beginning. The day I gave my life to Christ, a while back, years ago, the next best decision I made was I told some friends. I said, hey, I don't even know what I really did, but I think I just began following Jesus. And so I just want to encourage you, just tell somebody, text a friend, hey, I began to follow Jesus today. We would love to come alongside you as well. So text this word EMBRACE to 97000. We're just going to reach out to you and say, hey, we'd love to grab coffee. We'd love to share what it looks like to follow Jesus, ask any questions, pray for you, whatever it might be. So text that number. For all of us, one other thing I want to mention, one of the main steps that we're told to take as Jesus followers is getting baptized. And so maybe you're one of the 345 people who, this year so far, have raised your hand and started a relationship with God. Or maybe over the last few months, or even the last few years, God has been moving in your life. Maybe like me, you were baptized as an infant, but you wanna reaffirm it as an adult. If that's you, I can't encourage you enough to consider getting baptized. We have our next Baptism Sunday coming up in two weeks, and to do so, to get signed up, you simply go to imembrace.com slash baptism. Well, speaking of baptism, before we end today, I wanna share a part of Renee and her family's baptism story, and this is one of the most beautiful stories you'll hear. Check this out. That whole adoption foster had always kind of been

something that I yearned for, and we had talked about it. Our plan was probably to have a couple of kids and then adopt. Three miscarriages. And that plan didn't go. There's another family that we've been in contact with that we've been in contact with for a long time, and we've been in contact with for a long time. And that plan didn't go. There's another family that we knew of had gone through the adoption process. We got their contacts. We had our initial contact with the agency, and it just sort of kept proceeding. We got a phone call, and Malachi's born. When we got to the hospital, we stood outside of Malachi's birth mom's room, and we both looked at each other like, no, you go. Who's going first? We had no idea what was behind that door. We walked in there, and she was like, here's your baby. So we adopted, and we had one more miscarriage. And then we got pregnant with Micah. Our family felt complete. There was this little boy around school, and his name was Dexton. He came from a home and lifestyle, not a lot of structure. Renee told the principal, if I could give that boy a home, I would love to give him a home.

Dexton was not at school for a few days. Principal called in his grandma, and grandma's like, yeah, I have Dexton. Mom's in prison. Principal's like, he needs to be at school. Our principal goes, Renee, what about if Dexton comes to your guys' house tonight? So he stayed with us for- A couple weeks. A couple weeks. Mom got out of prison. And so Dexton did go back with her. In August, we got the news that mom had passed away. We get a phone call from grandma. She goes, I don't wanna be mom. I wanna be grandma to this child. Will you guys be mom and dad to him? There was a yes there. This past summer, Dexton went to NTS camp. I've always believed in God, but especially after NTS camp, I was at a good spot with God. I just wanted to take the next step. Baptism was being talked about. We said, this is something we feel like you're ready for. He was all in. And then Malachi's a quiet child. We were like, hey, Malachi, are you interested in baptism? I just started feeling like I really want to start pursuing that more.

And then Dexton wanted to do it. And I was like, this would be the perfect time. We just said to Micah, like, are you interested in baptism? He was just like, no, it's good. Dexton went first. It was really nice to have my parents there. They'd been there with me through a lot of things. Just knowing how much Dexton has overcome me, that's just that much more special. Malachi has the quiet faith. Just seeing that baptism Sunday was like, that's real. It was just emotional. And I felt like close to my mom. And my dad was there too to hug me after. I just felt like I got closer with them. When they started to get baptized, I just broke down crying. He was sobbing. My dad was walking back and I went straight to him and told him I wanted to get baptized. Dexton and I got to baptize Micah, but all of us standing right there. It was really cool just to be there and show that I'm there for him. It just felt like a big brother moment. There was this like, oh, we got there. Like, this is theirs.

It might be the best day as a parent when you have all three of your kids baptized and walk in with the Lord. I don't know if it does get better than this. I don't know if it does get better than this.