He Calls Sinners, Not the Righteous - Matthew S4E1

Welcome to Deep In with Pastor Joby Martin. The Church of 1122 is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. And we're praying this message helps you deepen your relationship with Him. Now let's dive in. Welcome back Pastor Dr. Reverend Matt Carter today. Yeah man, good to be here once again with the Godfather of Evangelical Christianity. You're doing this favor and I have to... We're going to be at Matthew 9 today and I know you're going to talk on this. But what's interesting is Matthew writes this book, obviously it's a Gospel Accord to Matthew. And then tells the story about himself being called a bit in the third person. But he's very spare on autobiographical details. He doesn't take this opportunity to say, let me tell you a little bit about me and my story and what it felt like when Jesus was calling me and all that. So we're going to get way into it. But what was it like for you gentlemen? Like if I say what was the moment when Jesus walked by and said, follow me. What comes to mind? Thursday night, Camp Pine Hill Baptist Retreat Center, sitting on a railroad tie on the other side of this little pond. Coach Lee standing up front. We call them counselors. I think that's illegal to call them that now. But whatever they were, we call them counselors. They reenacted the crucifixion of Christ starting at Pontius Pilate. So one of the, these are all college kids with like togas and real torches. And Pilate says, what should I do with this man named Jesus? Everybody else crucify him. He says, I'll wash my hands of this. They lead Jesus down the bank of the pond because that's where we were. They threw him down. They whipped him and somebody's in the woods clapping flip flops together to make whip noises. And then they get over to the other side of the pond and you know how voices carry over water super good. So nobody's mic or anything. You hear the nails and then they erect this cross with Jesus on it. Thieves on either side. He goes through his seven sayings. Says it is finished and the torches go out. Coach Lee stands up and says, for God's so loved you pointed right at me. God's so loved you that he sent his only begotten son and he points it back to the crosses that whosoever and that means you believe. Then you will not perish and have everlasting life. We sing just as I am without one plea. Just I was so embarrassed. Like I told everybody as a Christian that this Christian camp and I was cutting grass and stuff. And so at this point I had moved over to a little stool and I wrapped my legs around it and I was like, I am not getting up. I am not going down there. But that's when I knew it counted for me. And then Coach Lee got up and said, I think there's one more. And I was like, crap, that's me. And then I walked up there and just cried. The language we use is I asked Jesus into my heart. And I know theologically people couldn't bang that around if they won't, but I did and he did. And he knew what you meant. And then we all sat down. And then Coach Lee said, that's not the end of the story. Three years later he was resurrected from the grave and they hit a big spotlight on the cross. Because we didn't, in all the just as I am and the invitation, everybody's off the cross. And he said he's not on that cross now. He wants to live in your life. And so that was it, man. It's amazing how it can come alive. I'm sure it wasn't a Broadway level production. It was terrible. I'm sure the guy was on the cross was from Furman. It's finished. You know what I mean? And Grandma Shaw wrapped around it. I was not in any sort of metaphysical spiritual sense, but in my mind, I was in Galilee 33 AD. And that's when, and I'd heard all that before, man. I grew up in Dillon, bro. Everybody knows that there's a God and you send the Son of Jesus down on the cross and all that stuff. But it was just like a thing out there that you could believe that it happened. And that's when, you know, I have a lot more terminology for it now, but God's off in my heart. And I realized that that was for me. It counted for me if I would just receive it. And yeah, that's where I guess. A little bit of a tangent. Something just happened that I've been talking about for a long time, but it just happened and it's on film. And so I want to document it for posterity. Is that the word? Yes. When I, back in the days when I was a senior pastor, when we were looking for senior level leadership guys, I can be working with every day. Pastor Job, he always asked him one question, let all the smart guys ask the rest of the questions. I'd look at them and these are guys I was going to go to war with. And I'd say, I'd ask, when's the last time that the gospel made you weep? And if they couldn't answer that, I didn't want to have them on my team. This man's 52 years old. Been doing this for 30 years. One of the most successful pastors in history. He starts talking about Jesus and it messes him up. And that's why we've been friends forever. And I just love that about you, brother. For me, I asked Jesus in my heart when I was eight and I'm in it. I knew what I knew what sin was. I knew I was a sinner and I knew I needed a savior. Man, I actually got saved at a thing called Camp Sunshine in Athens, Texas, which is the same demographic as where you grew up. Just a little bit distance in between. Bro, they had this liquid in a jar and he's like, this is your heart before sin and it was clear. And then here's what happened after you sin and it turned black. You ever seen that? And then like the blood of Jesus covers you and it turned red. And I was like, you got to be kidding me. And then after he covers you with a sin, it turned clear again. And I thought maybe I dreamed it a couple of years ago. I looked it up on chat, GPT. No, it's like a thing you can do with chemicals. We need to do it sometimes. It's pretty cool. But anyway, I knew I needed it. And I gave my life to Christ and trusted in him as my Lord and savior. But man, I did what a lot of kids that grew up in church did and ran from the Lord for a long time. And it was my freshman year at A&M. When I got to A&M, I did not darken the doors of church first semester. I was doing everything I thought I was missing out on in high school by trying to be a good kid and just was miserable. And it's a funny story. I don't have time to tell today, but man, the Lord just brought a young man in my life that invited me to a Bible study. And I said, I'd go. And, uh, and Joe, I walked in the door of the, it was an all faith chapel at Texas A&M University, about 50, 60 seats. There's a guy on a keyboard. I think it might have been Sam Perry. You remember? Yeah, I think it might have been him. It was just a keyboard. And, um, and maybe I grew up in a church where we never sang to Jesus. We always sang about Jesus. A mighty fortress is our God and he is. But I had never, it was a very traditional church. I'd never sung to him and I'll never forget this. As long as I live, uh, he was leading in Lord, you are more precious than silver. Lord, you are more costly than gold. Lord, you are more beautiful than diamonds and nothing I desire compares to you. And for the first time in my entire life, I sang that to the Lord. And, um, man, I felt in my heart a satisfaction in the deepest parts of who I am and was. And, and man, I literally spoke this out loud. Job, I said, I've been looking for this my whole life. And, uh, I started walking with Jesus right then. I never turned back. And so in many ways, um, and I'm going to tell you something, man, I wasn't looking for him. He found me. And that's ultimately the story of Matthew. Um, Matthew was in the tax booth. I mean, it's a, it's a metaphorical picture of, of his sin. And we were talking about it earlier, you know, this guy has, this guy was, um, you know, he was an insider. He was a Jew, but he was so hated because of the tax booth that he's now an outsider for everybody. Everybody hated his guts. And as we're going to see in this story, Jesus walks up and finds him. It's a great, it's a great picture of his calling on our lives. So to preview that or make a connection, what, based on what we know about Matthew, what similarities are there for your store, for our story of Jesus coming and saying, follow me. You know what I mean? Like we're going to unpack it, but in what ways were you the outsider and what ways were you trapped and what ways had you turned away? Well, man, I'll say this. First of all, he's my namesake. You know, my mom, my mama named me Matthew and everybody calls me Matt now, but my old women used to call me Matthew and they're all gone and I miss it. But it means gift of God. And you're one of the things I talked about in the sermon that for me, you know, Pastor Joby, one of the, one of the reasons I believe in God. And there's a lot of reasons, but one of them is this book right here. And I've been reading this for a long time. I've been studying it for a long time. I got a doctorate in it and I'm telling you every stinking time I sit down and get quiet enough. The Lord speaks to me. I hear his voice number one, but I see things that I've never seen and I've read that verse a hundred times. And one of them that I talked about in the sermon, I just think is so powerful is when, first of all, is what you said earlier. And I think we ought to talk about this in a minute, but man, he's in this is chapter nine. We're talking about here. This is the guy that wrote the book. And the first time he mentions his calling is in chapter nine. I don't know about y'all, but if I'm writing the gospel, I'm starting off with this story. Hey, I have credibility to write this because Jesus called me. He doesn't. It's a one Senate statement in chapter nine. So I thought that was powerful. The point is he's making it all about Jesus. But man, he's literally in the phone book or the tax booth, rather, of his sin when Jesus finds him. And that is what I just shared. That's my story, man. I wasn't looking for Jesus. I wasn't sitting around thinking, man, I need my life changed. I definitely wouldn't sit around thinking that I was going to be a pastor. It was the farthest thing from my mind. But when I was in the tax booth of my sin, Jesus came and found me and I'll be forever grateful. If you watch the chosen, the first season when it sets everything up, they do such a great job of making you feel how he's out ostracized. You know, like people give him dirty looks and you've got the sweet house and everything. The art is right next to him. We've underplayed what it means to be a tax collector. I mean, you guys know this, so it'll be a review for those of us around this table. But it doesn't just mean he worked for a pretty decent government and he took a little off the top. That's not what it is. The Roman Empire has overtaken Israel. And then you could buy into the tax system and essentially sell out your own people. Take money from your family and extended family. Give it to the Roman government and then the Roman government tyrannized your family. I mean, Jesus is not the first person to get crucified, dude. Oh, yeah. I mean, they're crucifying people. It was the primary deterrent. Because how do you rule from England to India? Yeah. Fear. If you get out of line, we will kill you. And so, I mean, it would be like setting up a lemonade stand, giving the proceeds to Osama bin Laden on September the 12th in downtown New York City. It ain't gonna go good for you, man. It'd be even worse than that. It would be like if the Taliban took over the United States and then one of our friends, one of the people we grew up with now works for the Taliban taking money from our family. Correct. And then they use that money to like, they'd killed your uncle. Your cousin was missing and you're pretty sure that the Roman soldiers took him out. It's that, I mean, dude. So when you, you know, all throughout Matthew will talk about the tax collectors and sinners that doesn't just and even the word center is it's almost always. It's like, it's like the, the ultimate sociological outcast. Oftentimes it's people that were sending in sexual immorality that were prostitutes or things like this. And the religious people were like, what are you doing? Yeah. So another story about my sanctification, not my salvation, about three years. So I got saved that night, came on, on fire for Jesus, threw away half my clothes with my like rock bands on them and I had four T shirts, a Lord's gym, you know, those kind of like FCA T shirts. Jam for the lamb. I wore them every day. I was the guy like my last couple of years of high school that were, you know, then I go to college and lose my ever-loving mind. And just did Daniel Freedomwell and, you know, and it was trying and I completely lived the duplicitous life and it was miserable. Yep. Then coach Lee asked me to come and be the camp pastor. Oh man, I didn't know that. Bro. And I was like, ooh, thank God there was no social media or because I was dunk. I was disqualified. I should have said no, but I was like, I'd love to. So I get to camp, start preaching. First of all, you're so insulated. Like you're just, I live out in the woods in this little cabin with like 12 kids at a time. I just had a bunk with a little bit of stuff under it, whatever. Well, so I had coach Lee's job. I would be the guy that stand up at the campfire and be like, for God's sake, love to you, you know, and I would do the invitation and all that stuff. Well, the guy that played one of the soldiers got sick. And so for two weeks, he couldn't do the campfire reenactment of the crucifixion. One week I played Jesus and I remember like when I always say he didn't just die for you. He died instead of you. I can remember going through that thing and they're doing the nails and they're doing all the stuff. And I have to say the seven sayings of Jesus. And I remember thinking this should have been me. What am I doing? I am not living like this actually mattered in my life. The next week, another guy played Jesus. I probably didn't do it good enough. And so I was the Roman soldier doing the nails. And what we would do is we'd lay the guy down and we had like an anvil and a hammer and we would hit that thing. I remember my buddy's hand is right there and I'm hitting next to it. And every time I hit it, I could just see the things I was doing in college. Gosh. You know? And I was like, holy, what am I doing? You know? And so I mean, I shift the significant gear when I came home. That was my sophomore year of college. So I get home and we had these dumb business meetings. I don't know if I've turned, they ain't got no business, but you haven't had these business meetings. And so I opened it with a confession and repentance of just me. Just like guys, I have claimed to be a Christian, but I have not been following Jesus in the way I've treated myself and others in you. And I'm sorry. And it was that. So it was that moment. It was that like, you know, just being like a little bit player in this play. And I said, when I got saved, I felt like I was an actual Roman soldier and it was my sin that was nailing Christ to the cross. And I was still gladly participating in it. And then there was regret and remorse, but there had to be a repentance and some significant areas of my life. I want to ask about what you just said, but I think it is true. If you look up the testimony of like Jim Caviesal or actors who have portrayed Jesus. And the weight and crazy stuff that they go through, they feel when they're taking that on. I mean, it is, it is wild. I mean, just a set of the passion of the Christ alone, the amount of things that happen is, well, you know, who nailed the nail and passion of the Christ. Mel Gibson. Nobody would do it. And he's like, I'll do it. And you can kind of recognize the big beefy hands. You know, if you've seen, seen, pray for her, you know, that's it though. That's it. Like, because here's what happens all the time. All right. So when we get in this next section, like versus 10 and following the tax, the Pharisees are like, why are you hitting with those people? Right. And that matters a ton. It matters a ton because I came for the sick and I said, well, and you think you're well. That's how I know your heart is sick. And when pastors like us, as we should scream grace from the top of the roof and from the mountaintop as we should, that what you can't do though is diminish sin. Yeah. Like sin is such a big deal. Jesus, the son of God had to die for it. That's what a big deal it is. And if you think you're just a little bit of a sinner, then you think you need a little bit of a savior. But if you know that you deserve hell because you have willfully committed treason against the eternal King, then you realize the death sentence is just for you. I also think I keep going back to at the beginning of Jesus teaching ministry is blessed are the poor in spirit. That's what that means. When you look at that cross and you think that should have been me, you know, you're not diminishing your sin. It's literally what I just wrote down. Blessed are the poor in spirit. You just talked on it. You just preached on it a while back. You know, for those folks that are watching that didn't miss that, that Greek word that Jesus uses, patakas. It means completely and utterly impoverished. There's a couple of words in the Greek language that Jesus could have used. One is a word. I can't remember the Greek translation of it, but it basically means college poor. You know how when you were in you were poor in college, but you could you could scrounge in the in the cushions of your couch and find 50 cents and go to Taco Bell and buy 10 tacos or whatever. That's not the word Jesus uses. It's patakas. It's utterly completely impoverished. Baby on the side of a road can't walk, can't talk, can't provide for himself. Jesus said, blessed are the those who realize their spiritual condition is that for you will turn and reach to the Savior who will save you. But you remember what second one is. Bless those who mourn. You know, and the word used there specifically is talking about sin. Blessed are those who mourn over their sinful nature for then you will turn to the Savior to make you righteous. And so that's what you're just describing. You go one more. Meek, I mean weak, it means a bit borrowed with horse. So blessed are you when you turn the reins of your life over to the Savior. There's got to be a mourning over your sin or there's not a salvation. Correct. Yeah. What you need for salvation is need. And the difference between the sinners and the tax collectors and as a group and the Pharisees is they didn't think they needed the Savior because they were doing it good. And if you declare yourself righteous by definition, you're self righteous. And if you declare yourself depraved, then you know that you need to be made righteous. Yeah. The thing that happens right afterwards is criticism because Jesus is hanging around with Matthew's friends. What did your fraternity folks say when you did that? I mean, was there a response of like repentance or they're like, that's as weird or? Yeah, it was like, you know, I was like, no, that's cool. I've all for whatever reason, I've always had influence. So I started a Bible study in my room. Some guys started showing up. But honestly, when that really took off. So, you know, one of the things in my own for my own sanctification and wisdom purposes, I decided I'm not going to parties anymore. But I was like head of security for my fraternity, whatever that means. And and I, and I didn't drink. And so I was the only sober one at these party, me and my roommate. And I lost it on a guy in my fraternity. And I didn't like beat him to a pulp, but I embarrassed him in front of everybody. And like, you know, he kind of got my face. I put him down and it wasn't like hospital or anything like that. But it was, you know, and then the following week I was like, and I was the president of the fraternity too. So I just got up there and said, Hey, I need to repent. I'm man, I'm a work in progress and I am so sorry. But I had about two or three guys in that Bible study that were already Christians for the, for like almost the whole semester when I started that. And then after that, it jumped to 19 guys and 11 of those guys got saved. Because because at first I was kind of coming with this like, I know better than y'all. And if you would just listen to me, you wouldn't be such idiots and you could be like me. It was when they saw what I did when I screwed up, not that I didn't screw up. And for that shouted the gospel louder than, Hey, I'm back and I don't drink anymore and I don't go to parties and I don't, I'm not going to do the things I used to do. That didn't really impact me by that much at all. It was actually showing people what the gospel, the gospel doesn't save you. It doesn't save you, the only save you, but it continuously saves you and sanctifies you and refined you. And you got to take up your cross daily in the life of the Christians that have daily repentance. So it began to get way more traction then than when I, you know, when I, because I kind of came back more like a Pharisee. Were you discipled in that first year? Was anybody discipling you? So a part of my tragedy of my story is the only Bible studies I've ever been around. I've been in charge of every one of them. So every, I mean like similar stories. So, you know, by the time I got to camp, I didn't even live as a teenager. I didn't live in that. I had moved from Dillon. So I would get there, I get saved and every summer I'd go back. I would like roll in a super Christian, you know, and then in college, I mean, when I came on staff, I came on as like I was in charge of the Bible studies and I was always in charge of everything. And coach Lee did not have a discipleship process. His discipleship process was boy, getting the truck. So he would just, he would just make me do stuff with him, you know, but never did I sit down. I think this is before we started recording, you're talking about sitting down with your daughter and y'all are working through effusions together, doing the soap process, right? Read the scripture, make your observation, application and prayer. Never, ever, ever. So, in college, the church that I volunteered at, so I started volunteering and in about three weeks, I'm teaching Wednesday nights. And the lady that was in charge of the youth group, she was incredible. Her name is Lynn Turner. She was incredible. But she had administrative gifts and she also knew if we're going to reach high school boys, we need like somebody like me to be the guy on stage doing the Bible studies. But our church was heavy on like education, you know, that's what we called it then. And so they would have all these classes like the lead pastor, senior pastor would do like a 10 week class on the Lord's Prayer. And I would sign up and go, average age in the room is 69 and I'm 18 and I would just be in there and 19 years old. And so it wasn't until then that anybody ever taught like. Hmm. Started walking through it. Our stories are super similar. I get saved out of the blue. Nobody's discipling me. Right. The first time I even got even remotely discipled was I dated a Christian girl for the first time and she took me to church and the guy was preaching the Bible, you know, from the stage. But, you know, it's interesting. I didn't have and the reason I asked you that question is because I was in the core cadets at a M. I wasn't in a fraternity. So I get radically saved, called back to Jesus. I go back to my court dorm and people are like, what happened to you, man? Like you're not drinking. You're not chasing girls. Like what's going on? I didn't know how to articulate to them, right, that I had been changed. All I know is that I'd been changed. And matter of fact, I didn't lead any of them to Christ. And but what's fascinating, man, is that we've kind of all stuck together. We're on a text thread. We talk every day. That's cool. Every day. And now that we're all in our fifties, they're starting to come to the Lord by by looking at my life. They're seeing a difference in my marriage. They're seeing a difference in the way of my kids and they're starting to reach out to me and go, OK, talk to me about this. And one day I was one morning I was preaching at 1122 on marriage and I thought, man, if I'm ever going to do this, do it now. So I put up the live stream and they all watched it and they couldn't get their brains around that that I was talking like that. But then they found this guy named Pastor Joby Martin. Like that dude's jacked. Anyway, man, all that to say God's good. He's faithful. But looking back, it's very similar to Matthew to answer your question. Right. And there is there was no credibility, benefit whatsoever that Matthew brought to the kingdom of God that would merit Jesus calling him, which is fascinating. If you were making this whole thing up, you would never call the tax collector to be one of the guys to write the Bible. Right. You know, we have a very divided political party system in our country. And so if you're a liberal, you know, conservatives don't like it. You can serve as liberal, don't like it, but at least half the country likes you. If you want to the other, your tax collector, nobody likes you. And yet Jesus walks straight up to this guy and says, follow me. Only explanation for that is it happened. And Jesus didn't put him in charge of the money. This is a guy that's an expert in money. And that's not even what he's used for. He puts Judas in charge of the treasury. He's the worst. It's crazy, right? Yeah. That it's back to what you said, like a huge part of the evidence of the reality of Jesus is this word we have in Jesus. Right. Because this is not the story you would make up. Yeah. And you and I are lives are great examples of that. There's no business. We get to do what we do. No, no. Far from the Lord. Well, if you're familiar with Jesus's methods, this phrase, follow me comes up quite, I mean, he used it when he called the first disciples, follow me, I'll make you fishers of men. I think of the restoration of Peter when he's restoring him. He says, follow me, you know, so Pastor Matt, I want to ask you what's the significance of that phrase. And maybe even before that, he sees him there. You know, you talked about that too. What does it mean that Jesus sees him where he is? He can see through all his defenses. And he still says, come on. Remind us of the different Greek words. Yeah. And so I'm going to let Pastor Joe be deal with follow because he does it better than anybody I've ever personally heard of. And so I let him deal with that. But let's talk about what happened right before that. And to me, this is when I was preparing for this, I had never preached on the calling of Matthew before. And this stopped me in my tracks. It's in, man, it's in Matthew 9.9. And it says, as Jesus passed from there, he saw a man called Matthew. And I was looking, looking at that and I thought, I wonder if there's any significance to, to he saw. Didn't say walk past, didn't say spoke to, it says he saw everywhere in the Bible is there for a reason. Holy Spirit, you know, led Matthew and he was writing that to write that. And this is his guide, what happened. And so I look it up and there's at least three Greek words for, for the word see that I, that I'm aware of. And one is, it means to notice or glance at. That's not the word that, that Matthew writes down. It's not like Jesus was walking by and noticed Matthew. The other one is a little bit more engaged. It's a word that means to observe. You know, I could, I can observe you wearing a white hat, wearing a green jacket that you have a beard, because I'm studying you to some extent. That's not the word that, that Matthew uses. The word that he uses there in that sentence is a word that means to recognize and fully know. And so literally what Matthew writes is, as Jesus passed by from there, Jesus saw me. And what he says, but what he means by that is Jesus saw and knew everything about me. That's fascinating. Pastor Joby, I wrote a book back in the day on, on the prodigal son and I did some research on why millennials were leaving the church. And they're not leaving the church anymore, but they were, they were seven, eight years ago. And Barna came up with some statistics that stated that one of the, one of the primary reasons that millennial men, especially were leaving the church is they felt like they were unworthy of being at the church, going to church, because of the way that they'd sinned. They looked at their own life, they looked at their failures and they're like, Jesus, they had not stopped believing in Jesus. They thought Jesus had stopped believing in them. And that statement right there, as Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man named Matthew just dismantles that whole concept. Man, when he, when he called you to himself, he didn't, he not only saw all the sin that you'd already committed, he saw all the sin you would ever commit. He knew all the ways you were going to mess up and fail and fall short of the glory God. And he called you anyway. And we can get into it later, man, but there's some significance there about the term Matthew. A lot of theologians believe that as he's sitting there in the tax booth, his name is Levi, which means connected to the old covenant really is what it means. But Jesus walks by and he sees, he doesn't see Levi, he sees Matthew. He sees what he would become. And so, man, talk about that, Pastor Job, this idea that the Lord, before he calls us, knows everything about us, calls us anyway. Yeah, there's a couple of things. I think a lot of people are kind of asking that question, like, do you see me? Like, I think that's a part of the growth of social media. You know what I mean? Like, I just want somebody to notice me, see me. And God really does. And honestly, it's like a fire, dude. Fire is unbelievably dangerous and incredibly inviting at the same time. We all have spent a lot of time around campfires, right? Nobody looks at each other. Everybody's just staring into the fire. That's right. That's the presence of God. On the one hand, it's terrifying. You mean like he sees everything? We had one of our elders one time at an elderly prayer and he said something that changed him is he had some sin in his life and he was hoping God would not see that. Meanwhile, he's begging God for blessing like in his business and his marriage and it just dawned on him like, you dummy, what do you, he sees it all. So on the one hand, it's terrifying, but the only reason it's not is because he chooses us anyway. It's exactly what you're saying. The example I use is if you're everybody use car, you run a car fax and God has run a car fax on you and it comes back not good. Busted leaks oil, you know, out of alignment, needs a new transmission, needs everything new. And God says, I'll pay full price and then I'm going to start the restoration project from the inside out. And that's it is the beautiful thing when he sees Matthew not Levi, he doesn't see who you are in the moment he calls you. He sees who he's going to transform you in into becoming. I talked about this a little bit. I think on the second week when he calls the fishermen, the beauty of an everlasting all knowing God is he doesn't merely see you where you are. He completely doesn't meet you there, but he sees who he had in mind when he created you. So the fishermen for sure were failed out Hebrew students. They could not make it to the Talmudin level because I think it's is it best to far first or Batman Rash thinks that Shaffar Batman Rash. And if the end of Batman Rash, they would say if you didn't have what it takes to become a Talmudin, to become a follower of a rabbi. Most often what what rabbis would say is congratulations. You love Yahweh. You know the scriptures now go and learn the trade of your father and these fishermen are fishing with their dad, which means they're the JV. They're the B team. They're the you got cut. You don't have what it takes. And when Jesus sees them fishing, he's like, I haven't wasted one moment of your life. Follow me and I'm going to make you fishers of men. And actually Jesus does some very unique. He goes and recruits. He doesn't receive applications, which also says a lot about the nature of our salvation. You said it before I was not looking for him. He was looking for me. So Jesus is not the Ivy League school where you put your resume together and say, will you please accept me? Jesus is a recruiter that goes out and finds his team and puts it together. And like the Bible says, man sees the outside, but God sees the heart. And so I see the story that using the sermon and talk about my son. You met my son, Sammy, my youngest son. When he was little, we called him Big Chungus. And because my oldest son was the was the rock star, the golden child, valedictorian, all state quarterback, beautiful. And Sammy was 11 going through his awkward phase when JD was going through the golden child phase. And I'll never forget, man. I walked into his room one day and Big Chungus was sitting on a bed just crying, man. And I was like, what's wrong, man? And he said, he said, dad, I'm ugly and fat. I'll never be as good looking as JD. You know, girls are never going to like me. And I had this conversation with him. I shared this sermon, but, you know, he was he was he was dark, complexed. He, you know, I'm like, complexed, but he got that from his mama, but he got all the other good aspects of his mom and I. And I could see who he was going to become. And I had a conversation with him. I said, listen, little man, I said, I'm going to make a promise to you. I was like, one day you're going to be better looking than JD. And he's like, no, I'm not. I'm fat or whatever. And bro, I'm going to tell you something that kids like a Greek guy right now takes saying in. So look, folks listening to this, it when Jesus looks at you, he does not see your sin. He sees what he's going to transform you into in the story is proof of that. Yeah, I've used the example 10,000 times, but imputed righteousness. The two primary examples are the breastplate of righteousness and the robe of the father with the prodigal son. So if you are in Christ, what he sees is his righteousness. My favorite example of that is the breastplate of righteousness because you've never seen a chubby breastplate. That's right. They're all chiseled. Even if you're chubby under it, you put that breastplate on, you look like you could start. Glad to, man. I'm like, look at you, right? It doesn't match. And then what's crazy is over time, the more you walk with Jesus, he conforms what is actually under that breastplate into the image and likeness of his son. So spiritually speaking, you get that six back and big pegs. That's such a good, I remember you preaching that. I remember thinking, I wish I'd have thought of that. That was good. But anyway, you know, man, it's so comforting because there's a lot of folks out there that maybe wrestle their Christians and their fighting sin. And they think, man, there's a line to which I could cross that the Lord's going to be done with me. And again, it says nothing to do with like grace over sin, whatever. You got to fight sin with everything you are. You got to put to death. But what this is saying is that he knew all of it anyway, and he still chose you. You know, I was thinking about this, that, you know, there was a fight one time that my wife, Jennifer and I were in about 15 years ago. And we both separately had the same thought and we confessed it later to each other. But it just in the moment of our greatest weakness and in the flesh, we kind of had this thought like, man, if I would have known this, I don't know if I would have married this woman. Now I was being an idiot and she was thinking the same thing. Man, if I don't know that about that idiot, I don't think I'd have married him. Jesus doesn't have that. That's right. But he knows all those things and chooses you in spite of it, which is so comforting. Well, from a feeling standpoint, this is why you have to understand the difference between conviction and condemnation. Conviction is a tool of God to draw you closer to him, see Romans 1, that it's the kindness of God that leads us to repentance. But the kindness is him convicting us of our sin. It's a warm invitation to receive the warm blood of Jesus to wash away our sin again and again every day. It once and for all happens and we need to pick up our cross every day. Condemnation is one of the primary tools in the hand of the enemy that doesn't say run to God, but run from him. That you are unfit for use is literally, it's a building term. I know this first thing because I was in college at this fraternity house, our fraternity house got condemned and they slapped a big sticker on the front door and it said condemn on a city of Richmond and it just said unfit for use on it and then had all these details. And for the longest time, when I talk about the whispers, that's what I'm talking about. It's the lies of the enemy. I think I heard Louis Gigler say this the first time that the devil wants you to be defined by your scars. But Jesus says, no, no, no, you're defined by mine. That's the difference between conviction and condemnation. It's funny you say that because as we're talking about being seen by God, we have this great need to be seen by him. It's so deep. And also our friend Charles Martin will say that the strongest wound you can have is rejection. And so think about the Garden of Eden when they sin against God, they go hide. And so they're like, don't see me. So we have this fear. My son was playing basketball. He's 10. And it's one of these basketball leagues where they're not really playing. It's just kind of like, and I hated it because, you know, I'm like, just teach him to play the game. They're just out there, you know, there's just one. Right. There's one kid and this kid's the worst and his parents are the worst. And I'm like, I've never wanted to hit a kid or a parent more, but you know, I was one of those guys. But even this kid, I'm watching him. He shoots the ball and then immediately does this. He looks over to his parents. Every time, like if it was a good shot or a bad shot, did you see me? Did you see that? What did you think? And I think it's such an innate desire to be seen and to feel the approval. Like you're saying Jesus saw and approved and said, I see, I see all the things in even in the future and I still accept you. You know, you just said something that, that unlocked something for me. I hadn't thought about, you know, in the Garden of Eden, they sin and they hide in their shame. But here, if you notice in the one sentence that Matthew talks about himself, he said, Jesus passed by from there. He saw a man called Matthew and then he calls out his old self sitting in the tax booth. He didn't have to say that. I'd have hid that. I don't think I would have mentioned that. And I don't, there's something there that I'm smart, not smart enough to figure out is that when you realize that Jesus called me in the worst moment of my life. You don't have to hide anymore. That's right. Talk, you're smarter than me. Does that unpack anything like, see what I'm saying? He, he, he admits. He calls out to Adam and Eve, right? Well, they're hiding from him. The essence, if you begin to, if you have this feeling, oh no, I've screwed up, don't tell dad. You don't understand the gospel. If you think, oh, somebody called dad, I need help. I've screwed up. That's the gospel. And the gospel compels us to run to him and not from him. A hundred percent. Cause he already sees, he's already placed his approval on you. So if we can, the more we can lean into that, then the more likely we are to confess and repent instead of running and hide. Listen, the Protestants, man, and I'm super pro-pros, you know, probably have the reformation. We got back to the shout out to my boy, Martin Luther. You did some stuff, man. But in the reformation, in order to not be Catholic, some things we lost in the Protestant experience and confession is a big part of it. Now, confession and penance is a mistake because Jesus is the full and final payment. So you don't have to go pray yourself back up and give more money and all that stuff. That's dumb. Cause there's no way you can add to the bill that is already paid in full or to tell a side. But James, the brother of Jesus, when he's like, Hey, anybody sick? Here's what you do. You get the elders pray for you. Anybody cheerful? Cool. You sing. Let us confess our sins to one another so that we could walk in the healing that Christ has already purchased for us. And I mean, I say this all the time around here, too. Bruce Frank taught us and we all check the sanctification boxes in the wrong. I mean, in different orders, you know. And so when we see somebody repenting, if you ever think, how could they bro? Check yourself. Right. You're at the party. Jesus is at the table and you're like, what you doing hanging out with these people? We're these people. And he chose us. And as Paul struggles with the people, he's like, Hey, I'm going to get you. We're these people. And he chose us. And as Paul struggles with sin, see Romans chapter seven. I mean, it is a deep struggle between his renewed spirit, his brand new life in Christ and his flesh. They are at war against one another. And he's saying, and sometimes my flesh is winning and he doesn't say, what, what am I going to do? It's not do better. Try harder. He says, who will save a wretch like me? Yes. Thank you, Jesus. And then you get to Romans eight one. Therefore, because Jesus knew everything about me, he ran the car facts on me, knew I was a lemon. I bring no merit to the equation. Therefore, now there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. Let's take it one step further. If condemned condemnation is a building term and the enemy says, because of what you've done, you are no longer fit to be used by the king. That's the lie of the enemy. In 1 Corinthians six, Jesus comes along and says, no, what you talking about? Your body is a temple. By the way, what? I thought I was unfit for you. So like, man, that's what the devil said. But actually you're not your own. You're bought with a price. I'm going to move and the temple is wherever the presence of God resides. So the believer today is where God sits on his throne on this planet. You are simultaneously a wretched, blackhearted sinner that needs a savior. Once you get saved, you're imputed with his righteousness and the spirit of God dwells inside of you. The holiest thing you've ever encountered in your entire life is being in the presence of another believer. We warn when we do trips to Israel, which we're doing again next year. And I'm going to, anyway, footsteps of Paul, that stuff. One of the warnings I give people is do not be mesmerized by these old rocks. It's really cool for you to try to get your head around. We don't believe in a story. This is an actual event. We're going to take you to an empty tomb. Like this is really, really happened. But these are just rocks and dirt. And we get to walk by the sea of Galilee. That is neat and nothing holy about to see a galley. The holiest thing you will encounter is your brother and sister in Christ on that bus because the spirit of God dwells inside of him. So God does it just say, now you're not unfit for use. You're okay. He actually takes it a step further because you're not primarily just fit for use. You are a son in his family and the spirit of God dwells inside of you. The more we get our mind towards that fixed on that, the whispers of the enemy and the temptations of the devil get weaker and weaker and weaker. I mean, where's Lest of the flesh, Lest the eyes and pride of life go when you're like, I'm a son of God. The spirit of God dwells in me. I just, I can't get over, as we're talking, I can't get over this idea of a pursuing Christ. He's relentlessly pursuing. Pastor Jebe, we talk about the painting that we're going to spend some time with neighbors to nations. It captures his idea of Jesus chasing a lamb. I mean, he's not passive. You're not just like, oh, I just happened to see that guy over there and like, okay, fine, come over here. No, he's focused and directed towards us. Yeah, this fall, we'll give you a quick little preview. Gretchen and I were in Franklin, Tennessee, and I was not thinking about Jesus. We were, I was thinking about cowboy boots and cowboy hats because I was trying to get me some stuff. And we go in this little store, this like a Christian women's clothing store, which by the way, for all our lady listeners, bro, when you take your husband in those places, we feel like creeps. What are we going to do? You just leave us. And then we're just standing there like, we don't know where to go. We don't want to look at. I just walk. I do too. So anyway, so we go in the store. They sell my books. So I was like, hey, what's up? Yeah. So I'm talking to the people and they had this painting and I don't know what's going on with me. I'm putting the men and men of Paul's in my old way. Dude, I get off. Dude, the whole church will see it. It's a picture in the woods of Jesus. And he's kind of blurred out a little bit and he's running with great intensity at this little lost lamb. I saw it in your office and started falling like a 13 year old girl to Justin Bieber concert. And I'll tell you what got me is the lambs covered in mud. Mud, yeah. And Jesus is coming after him, man. And that's us. And there may not be, well, that's not true. I was about to say there may not be a better story in the Bible than Matthew. But the fact of the matter is it's the story that's all through the Bible. Yeah. Peter, James, John, Paul, Paul was just doing his, I was killing Christians, riding on a donkey down the road to Damascus. Jesus pursued him. Every single story is a story of people being stupid and Jesus intervenes in our life. And that's why it's called the gospel, Job. And I think that is why Matthew puts himself in his story, chapter nine, verse nine. It's because he's like, look, this had nothing to do with me. Right. It had everything to do with Jesus. One of the things that I did not go into in the sermon, but if we have time, we have a couple of minutes here. I'd love, I'd love for us to unpack is, is this needs to, this needs to impact pastors. I know a lot of pastors watch this podcast. It ought to impact the way you preach. It ought to impact the way you live when you realize that you had nothing to do with it. It was Jesus coming after you, saving you. I don't know. We see it in, we see the Matthew here. He is like, I don't even want to talk about me. Let's put the spotlight on Jesus on things. I love about 1122. I've always loved about you. Is that your heart? Talk about that. Well, the net, this, I guess this is inferred. There's not even a transition. It just says, and as Jesus recline at the table in the house, we hold many tax colliders and sinners came and we're reclining with Jesus and his disciples. Apparently the moment that Matthew gets rescued, he becomes part of the rescue team. The moment. And when you, by the grace of God, never forget what you've been saved from, you just want everybody to experience what you've been able to experience. Not because you did anything to deserve it or earn it, but he just chased you down. So when I get up there and just plead for people to surrender to Jesus and plead for people to love him and know him, it's because I know. You've experienced it. And then back to that picture, theologically speaking, you're not the lost sheep anymore. You were, but when he saved you and you redeemed you, theologically in the picture, you're actually the one pursuing because we, with the spirit of God in us, we are the body of Christ. And what we are supposed to do is not just sit around all the fluffy sheep and be like, look how clean we are. Our whole mission is to now go and be a part of the rescue mission. And what's crazy about this, that, you know, we say it here at Nauseam, the best way to deepen your relationship with Jesus is help people discover theirs. So the closest you can be to Jesus is when your own mission for him. You'll need him more. You'll realize that he's the one that saves to the pastors. It's not your great sermon's ever saved a soul, dude. It's not your slick presentation. It's not some incredible singer. It's not your lights. It's none of that. And so like Paul says in Corinthians, he has made us ambassadors for reconciliation, not just people to people, but primarily from a tradeous race to a perfect and holy king. And that we implore people to put their hope in Christ because we know we've tasted and seen how good it is. And we want to share that good news. Verse 12 and 13 are like, you know, double punch to the face. I mean, and doesn't it feel like a summer as a, when have you ever, when can you remember reading in the gospel, Jesus saying, go figure this out. There's only a couple of times he says, why don't you go learn what this means? I desire mercy and not sacrifice. People who don't need a doctor don't need a doctor if they're well, but I, the doctors are for sick people. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners. Didn't you say Pastor Joby that somebody has seen a common threat amongst thriving churches? And it's one of the, one of the qualities that the pastor is like, I remember that I was a center. Somebody else said that. I can't remember who maybe it was on a somebody. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Go learn what this means. Quoting Hosea, I desire mercy and not sacrifice. So if you come to 1122 and you stick around here a little bit and you get thoroughly disappointed with the messiness of it, please review this. It's always going to be a mess. There's going to be lost people acting like lost people. There's going to be safe people acting like lost people. You know, it's a mess. Chandler, our dear friend, he talks about like in any good family and the churches of family, there's generations of folks, man. There's some grandparents and they got their own struggles, but you know, anybody ever seen their grandma like just overtly sent, I mean, you know, they're kind of locked down right there. And then you go all the way down and there's some babies. And you know what, you know what you get with you get babies, you get crap everywhere. There's messy diapers and whining and complaining and crying everywhere. There's a baby. You cannot have a perfectly spotless clean house and have a generation of babies. I hope this place has got crap all over it all the time. Because we got brand new baby Christians all over the place and we got lost people. I don't like lost people. And the parable of the one sheep, Jesus, this is crazy. Church people get the feelings hurt. He prioritizes the one over the 99. He leaves the 99 for a time to go get the one. And so when your heart gets wrapped around the mission of Jesus, you'll never, he won't ever have to leave you. How about this? Matthew 28 will talk about this a lot in the fall. Jesus gives great commission, right? Go and make disciples everywhere. And lo, I will be with you always. What if you're not going to make disciples? Is he with you? In the sense that God is everywhere, his presence is with you, with you, like he's with you when you were on mission to do what he is about. Yeah. Kind of the experiencing God thing, like watch what God's doing and join him. And he always wants to be on mission. And he's doing the great commission. He's doing it. And so you want to experience him? Do that too. Correct. You know, I want to talk about the, he desires mercy, not sacrifice. What comes to my mind is that, you know, I think about that most churches that lose sight of the gospel will drift heavily towards. Self-righteousness, work space, religion, phariseical attitude. I think about a church that I was a part of for a while. And I did not see this with my own eyes, but I heard about it firsthand. And one of the staff daughters of this church was dating a non-believer. You know, we can talk about all that all day long, but she was dating a non-believer and she invited him to church. And he decided he would go to church for the very, very first time in his entire life. 17 year old young man. And he walked in, he walked into church and he was wearing a hat and 71 year old Deacon. Walked up to him, took the hat off his head, threw it on the ground. And said, young man, we don't wear a house or a hat in the house of the Lord. Kid grabbed his hat, walked out the door and never came back. And so that's a great picture of someone that's trying to sacrifice for the Lord, do what's right in the sight of the Lord and completely miss the heart of God, which is that God is going after that lost sheep right there. And that's the most important thing. Here's what I bet you, if that 71 year old Deacon and it was his lost grandson, he would see it differently. Because now he sees a lost sheep, because that's his grandson. You know, and he would just think, I'm just glad you're here. I hope it gets on you. But you cannot simultaneously look down your nose at anybody and fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfect of our faith. You can't. You have to take your eyes off the cross to look down your nose at somebody. I want to ask, we're almost out of time Pastor Job, but this, these two verses remind me of a movement for all people to discover and deepen our relationship with Jesus. Talk about how that inspired that mission. Yeah, I was at this really famous church conference in 1995 and the guy who's exponentially smarter than me, better communicator than me, all those things. And he said, you got to make a fundamental decision. Are you going to keep people or reach people? And he is a primary leader in the seizure sensitive movement. We just do whatever it takes to get them in the door of the God will change them. But he would even say, we do this at the expense of church people or the expense of discipleship. And it did not sit well with me. I'm like, just, that's not what I get when I read the scriptures, you know. And then, so I'm kind of wrestling around with it. I didn't have the verbiage or whatever. And I'm watching Shrek too with JP when he's a little. And I laugh at one part and JP laughs at another part. And I thought, oh, is Shrek a kid movie or an adult movie? And I remember just being, I was like, all right, well, if Pixar can pull it off, surely the spirit of God can reach people and keep people and the kept people, the one that are saved by grace and nothing can pluck us from his hand. The more focus we are on reaching people and get them on the, the, the, the rescued side with a focus on being on the rescue team. Jesus has built into discipleship when you're about the great commission, like come follow me and I will make you fishers of men. Not come follow me and we're going to do a Bible study together. We're going to sing songs. We're not going to get this world on us. But we are going to be about this Matthew, follow me next thing. Somehow there must have been a conversation here is like, Hey, let's do a dinner, bring all your friends. Because all of a sudden it will prevent you of being the crotchety old deacon that looks down their nose at the 17 year old kid with a hat. And instead of that, you see human beings that Jesus died for. And you remember you were him. That's right. That's right. That's. And, and then what really got me is I've told the story 10,000 times here. I'll tell it 10,000 more and I'll have time to get all the way into it. But I was when I was in college after, after my camp days, I had three jobs because nobody paid me just, you know, whatever. So anyway, I, I waited tables. This was a North Murdoch Beach. I waited tables. I opened, I worked at the morning shift of the gym and I was a youth pastor at a church, a very, very, very Southern Baptist church. And I was just like the summer youth guy, you know, and I would write my sermons at the desk where you make the protein shake across the street from this place was a strip club called the crazy horse. Well, the guy that owned the gym, he's smart. He told all the dancers, you get a free membership at the gym. Well, they would all come over at about 11am and every dude in North Murdoch Beach would work out at 11 and pay $20 a pop because they knew all the shippers were there. And, and these are very, very high end. I mean, these, and they had invested heavily into their career. Well, what begins to happen real quick, dude, is they would sit around, they'd all get their little protein shakes and I'd make them. And I'm a, I'm like 21 years old or something, seminary student. And I got my Bible open and I'm writing my Wednesday night talk. And they're like, what are you doing? I was like, well, hey, I'm writing this sermon. Let me, can I run it by you? And I just thought, take this for what it was. I thought if the shippers get it, surely my high school. You know what I mean? So whatever, learned all kinds of things very quickly because at first I was like, dude, what is somebody see me up here talking to these girls? You know, they're all in sports bras and everything. You know, I mean, it's whatever. They're not modest at all. I found out some things. Okay. They all had two names. You talk about seeing Matthew. Like their name was not their stage name. They had a name and they had parents. Almost all of them had kids, almost all of them. None of their kids knew what they did because they were so ashamed of it. None of this was not their plan, man. They went down this road and they made so, they made thousands of dollars a night. And then they began to live a lifestyle that they thought, I can't, I can't undo this, you know. Some of them had husbands. That was the, you know, that's kind of a whole thing. And then I invited them to church because I thought they'll never come. And then one of them, her name was Sunshine, her stage name was Sunshine. And she's like, I'll go to church with you. And I thought, oh crap. I mean, bro, like my first Sunday there, I wore a blue blazer and khakis and they were like, we dress up around here. That was not enough. That was business casual. I didn't have any money and they made me go buy a suit. And so I had to go buy a suit. So anyway, and all they let me do is the announcements because I was the youth guy. So Sunshine comes and picks me up in her, a white convertible Corvette with her daughter. And we, the three of us, the daughter sat in the lap of Sunshine, her license plate said topless fun for like the double entendre meaning, you know. So we take her is about a 30 minute ride to this church inside of like, you know, in the inner parts of South Carolina. And she had on a little tiny slender dress and big old, big old high heels. And she was, I mean, she was a modestly dressed. But probably she just put on the best thing she had went to church with me at the end of the service. And dude, you could feel the eyes looking. You could, you know, it was like, oh man, I remember that I'm going to get in trouble. Dude, I'm 21. I'm like a seminary student. We drop her kid off at Sunday school. We go through the service. I have no idea what the guy talked about. A deacon comes up to me afterwards and say, hey, we need to talk to you. I was like, hey, you go get your kid. I'll be right back. And it was a group of deacons that said, what are you doing bringing a girl like that here? And they said, we, our job is to protect our people from people like that. And you're bringing them in here. And I wish I could tell you that I had the boldness I have now. Yeah. Fear took over and I just capitulated. You were 21. I was just like, yeah, I'm sorry. So I go out, sunshine is leaning up against the car. She's got this cool Ray Benzon. Just freaking ball. And I was like, she's like, that was about me. I lied. I was like, no, no, no, we got, you know, I made up something. I lied to her face. We're getting in the car, right back. It's just quiet. It's like death leopard on the radio. Meanwhile, by the way, her kid is finishing a color and a picture of Jesus. And I'm just, it was so awkward. I felt so insecure. I was like, so what'd you think? And she just says, I've never been more humiliated in my life. Think about that, dude. In the house of God. Mmm. Two nights before she's naked dancing for strangers for a dollar at a time. And somehow she felt more honored there than in church. So I just decided if I ever have anything to do with it, I repented. She moved the next week. I don't know her real name. I have no idea how to track her down. I have no idea what that experience did, but I know we failed and I failed. And so I just decided if I ever get to run one of these things is for all people, all people. Now we have multiple ministries to the strip clubs and to help women get out of human trafficking and prostitution. And now my wife is like a fill in for one of those and goes into the strip clubs and takes dinner to the girls because they matter to God. And so I learned it through utter failure. The phrase mercy instead of sacrifice. I was reading a Psalm and there's a similar line in there where David says you desire something in the heart. Yeah. And the thought came to me offering a sacrifice to a God was not unique in ancient times. But the difference was this is a transaction in a pagan religion. It's a transaction to try to earn some kind of favor. It's also very public. Right. And Yahweh's way was different was that it's supposed to come from the overflow of the heart. Correct. Not the externals. And man, I just I'm so grateful for the culture that you set Pastor Joby that comes out of that experience. The fundamental here's what Jesus is saying, man, the moment you sit in the seat of the Pharisee and you're like, do you know what I have given up? Do you know what I have done? Mm hmm. What you're saying is that Jesus, I'm not paying any attention to what you've given up what you've done. I've got this whole thing focused on me. And I think what Jesus is saying is what I desire is for you to have my eyes towards the lost sheep, towards the tax collector, towards the sinner. And it's not what are you doing? It's what can I sacrifice for you? That's the fundamental difference to keep you out of the seat of the Pharisee. Right. Yeah, I was thinking this last Sunday I preached on Romans two. He got Romans one. He's speaking to the center. Romans two. He's speaking to the person in the church. Yeah. And he he says therefore, and he's talking about all the crazy sins of chapter one. He says when you judge and he drops a theological nuclear bomb on us, he says you are doing the same thing. Yeah. The point is whether you're a self-righteous deacon or a stripper, you're all equal at the foot of the cross and desperate native of Savior. Amen. Amen. Well, thank you gentlemen for a rich conversation. I don't know who should pray, but God loves you. I would love to pray. God, we. God, we thank you that you came after us. Mm hmm. Well, you didn't see who I was. You saw who you would transform me to be. Mm hmm. Thank you. I thank you for Colin Pastor, Joby Martin out of nowhere and lifting him up and using him and all the staff of this church to be a place that anyone can come and encounter the gospel of Jesus Christ. I pray for anyone that's listening that thinks that they have sinned so heinously that the blood of Christ does not apply to them. May they hear clearly today that there is no sin greater than the grace of Jesus Christ and they would come to you. Lord, we love you. We thank you for who you are and what you've done in our lives. And we pray all these things in Jesus' name. Thank you for listening to the podcast at the end. The reality is everything already belongs to God. And when we give financially, we're acknowledging that we trust Him. If you just watch this and feel led to make a donation, text the word donate to 441122 or visit coe22.com slash donate. Your generosity is not only an act of worship, but an investment so all people can discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. Thank you.