Immanuel Sermon Audio
Luke 9:1-17
Take your Bible out, find the Gospel of Luke. This morning we're in chapter nine, Luke chapter nine. Theme verse for our study in Luke is Luke 19, 10. The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. We're gonna see that in action this morning in the verses that we look at and the application of this passage is going to tie in nicely with the big idea of what Luke is telling us in this gospel, that Jesus came to seek us and to save us. Let's start with the big idea of our passage this morning. The passage is Luke 19, 1 to 17. And here's the big idea. Jesus expects those who have been found to serve as his representatives to those who are lost. Luke 19, 10, the Son of Man came to seek and save the lost. Once you have been found, you are now sent out to those who are still lost. That permeates everything we see in these verses this morning. And our approach is gonna be really, really simple. It's a simple passage, three short stories. We're gonna read the verses. We're gonna talk about each story individually, and then we'll try to sum it all up with one last thought of application. So in your Bible, follow along Luke chapter nine, beginning in verse one. And he called the 12 together and he gave them power and authority over all demons and to cure diseases. And he sent them out to proclaim the kingdom of God and to heal. And he said to them, take nothing for your journey, no staff, nor bag, nor bread, nor money, and do not have to tunics, whatever house you enter, stay there and from there to part. And wherever they do not receive you, when you leave that town, shake off the dust from your feet as a testimony against them. And they departed and they went through the villages, preaching the gospel and healing everywhere. Now Herod, the Tetraark heard about all that was happening and he was perplexed because it was said by some that John had been raised from the dead, by some that Elijah had appeared. And by others that one of the prophets of old had risen. Herod said, John I beheaded, but who is this about whom I hear such things? And he sought to see him. On their return, the apostles told him all that they had done. And he took them and withdrew apart to a town called Besseta. When the crowds learned it, they followed him and he welcomed them. And he spoke to them of the kingdom of God and cured those who had need of healing. Now the day began to wear away and the 12 came and they said to him, send the crowd away to go into the surrounding villages in countryside to find lodging and get provisions for we are here in a desolate place. But he said to them, you give them something to eat. They said, we have no more than five loaves and two fish unless we're to go and buy food for all these people for they were about 5,000 men. And he said to his disciples, have them sit down in groups of about 50 each and they did so and had them all sit down. Taking the five loaves and the two fish, he looked up to heaven and he said a blessing over them. Then he broke the loaves and gave them to the disciples to sit before the crowd. And they all ate and they were satisfied. Whatever was left over was picked up, 12 baskets of broken pieces. Let's pray. Lord, we're grateful for the privilege of worship and we are grateful for the privilege of looking at your word this morning and hearing what you have to say to us through the scriptures. We believe that this is your word, that they are living, that they are active. And Father, we pray that you would this morning divide our hearts, cut us to the heart. Father, that the thoughts and the intentions of our hearts and our minds would be laid bare before your word. That we would submit humbly to your word. That we would understand what you're saying to us in these stories about Jesus. That we would have wisdom to receive it and also to apply it to our lives. And we pray in Jesus' name, amen. We're gonna start with the first six verses in Luke chapter nine. And this is the part of the story where Jesus sends the 12 on a short-term mission trip. In fact, this is the first mission trip ever. In the Old Testament, there were no mission trips. There were people who were not part of Israel who met the Lord, but there were no mission trips. There were no Israelites, no Jewish people, no Hebrews, leaving Israel to take the gospel, the good news about who Yahweh was to the nations. Those people who met the Lord did so because they left home and came to Israel. And so we can just go through a few examples and we can think of Rahab who lived in Jericho. She had heard rumors about Yahweh, but she ultimately left Jericho and went with the people of Israel, entrusting the Lord. You can think about Ruth who left her home, who left her family, who left her culture to identify with God and to follow God. You can think about the queen of Sheba later on who traveled from her kingdom to meet Solomon to hear about his wisdom, to hear him talk about the Lord. You can think about Naaman, the general of Syria who left Syria to go to Israel to be healed, right? All of these people are leaving home, going to Israel to hear the good news. You say, well, what about Jonah? Wouldn't Jonah be a story of a missionary? Jonah wasn't a missionary, he was a prophet. And you can go back and read Jonah this afternoon and you can look at the words that Jonah actually spoke when he went to Nineveh. He didn't tell anybody, at least that we know of, he didn't tell anybody anything about Yahweh, the Lord, that they needed to believe in him, they needed to trust in him, they needed to do this or that. All Jonah did is he walked into town and he said 40 days and the town's gonna get blown up. 40 days and you're all dead. That's why he was so mad when it didn't happen. He had put his reputation on the line in a sense and he was angry that God didn't destroy the city. So Jonah was not a missionary, he was a prophet. All of these Old Testament people, non-Jewish people who meet the Lord leave home and they come to Israel to find the truth. And now Jesus flips the whole thing on its head. Old plan, Israel is to be a light for the nations. The nations come to Israel and they hear the truth. New plan, you, the new Israel, go out to the nations. And it starts right here with the 12. Look what we see in verse one. Jesus gave them power and authority over demons and disease. Verse two, he sent them to preach the kingdom and to heal the sick. Verse three, four and five. A bunch of instructions about how they're to go on this particular trip. He gives different instructions for different trips later. So if you're going to Kenya this summer and you look at this and you say Chris, all I can take is no bag, no staff, no bread, no money. And I can't take two tunics, I only get one set of clothes. Chris is going to say, no, no, no, no, no. We want you to pack more than one set of clothes. Bring an extra set of underwear, you're going to need it. We're going to work hard. These instructions are for this trip. This is how you go on this trip. And verse six says they went. They left, they're sent out through the villages preaching the gospel and healing everywhere. At this point, the 12 disciples officially become apostles. That word disciple literally means a learner. And up to this point, that's all they were. 12, set aside from the masses of people following Jesus, set aside to learn specifically to spend time with Jesus. Remember, we saw a few weeks ago. They're the ones who hear the explanation of the parables. The crowd here, here's the parables. The 12 hear the explanation. They're learning. And now Jesus says you're not just disciples, now you're apostles, literally ones that are sent out. And you're going out with this message. Here's something you don't need to miss. You need to get this. Jesus calls His people to spread the good news about His kingdom. It begins here, but it flows out through the rest of the New Testament. He expects His people to spread the good news about His kingdom. What a mistake to think that that's the job of pastors and missionaries. That's part of the job of pastors in missionaries. But it's not only theirs to do. What you see in the book of Luke and what you see in the book of Acts and the rest of the New Testament is that you're gonna, if you're gonna sign up with Jesus, you now have responsibility to go out and to spread the good news of Jesus. Now, take a breath. That doesn't mean everybody has to be a missionary. Cross-culturally, leaving home, going to Kenya. That doesn't mean that everybody has to stand up and preach sermons or teach Sunday school lessons. That doesn't even mean that everyone in this room has the spiritual gift of evangelism. What it does mean is that if you follow Jesus, you in some way are responsible for spreading the good news of the kingdom. It is not just my job. It is not just the job of our missionaries. If you follow Jesus, this responsibility falls to you. Maybe that means you pack up everything you own. You sell everything you own, you move around the world. Maybe. Maybe it means you go on a short-term trip, like the apostles did right here, and some of our people did this last week, and some of our folks will do a Kenya this summer. Maybe that means you're going home, not out, but going home. You remember the demoniac killed a few weeks ago. Jesus, please let me go with you, and Jesus said what? No, you're not going. You go home and you tell everybody at home how much God has done for you. But it doesn't matter who you are. One of the 12, a pastor, a missionary, a regular follower of Jesus Christ. It is your responsibility in some way, shape, or form to spread the good news about Jesus and about his kingdom. Here's a caveat to that, or here's an explanation to that. This means meeting spiritual needs and physical needs. Spiritual needs and physical needs. So Jesus sends the 12 out here, and he says, "I want you to go preach, but I also want you to heal. "I want you to speak about my kingdom, "but I also want you to cast out demons." And what he's saying to these guys is, "Look, I want to bring wholeness to people. "I want them spiritually to be realigned with the truth "and to have a relationship with God through me. "But I also care about them where they're at right now. "If they're sick, I'm giving you the 12, "the apostles, the authority to heal them. "If they have demons, cast the demons out. "But you are to go out preaching about my kingdom, "and you meet spiritual needs, and you also meet physical needs." Now we can have a debate about the miracles and the exorcisms and the healings and the apostles and whether we have that gift or not. Regardless of where you come down on that issue, the principle behind this is very simple. Jesus is concerned about souls, but he's also concerned about bodies. And sometimes we make the mistake of thinking, Jesus only wants to save people's souls. And what Jesus is saying to the 12 here, and later in the passage is, "I care about people when they're suffering physically. "I care about them, and I want you to care about them." And so yes, you're going out to meet spiritual needs that are very real and eternal. But that doesn't mean you just forget about the guy that's hungry. That doesn't mean you just overlook the person who's sick. That doesn't mean you just ignore physical suffering and say, "Well, you know, that's not really our thing. "We're just here to preach the good news about Jesus." He says, "I care about those things, "and I want you to care about those things." Does that mean you give 20 bucks to every guy standing on the street corner? Does that mean you try to feed and clothe every orphan on planet earth? Does that mean you can fix every social injustice and alleviate all of this physical suffering? No. And you don't need to have a guilt complex about not doing those things. But Jesus cares about the physical suffering of these people, and he's saying to his followers, "You need to care, too." If it matters to me, it needs to matter to you. So I'm sending you out to spread the good news, the good word, the exciting message of my kingdom. And as you go, you meet spiritual needs, and you also meet physical needs. Let's move on to the next story. Little interesting story, just three verses, Luke, throws right in the middle of two stories that really go together. It's a story about Herod. And the Herod here is Herod Antipas. And I'm gonna put a family tree up on the screen because here's the thing. There's a lot of guys named Herod running around in the New Testament, okay? There's four of them. And one of them is Herod the Great. And another one is Herod Antipas. He's the guy we're talking about here. Herod the Great was the father of Herod Antipas. So I circled those two names for you. Over here on the sort of the bottom left, there's a guy named Herod Agrippa. You meet him in the book of Acts. And then down in the very bottom left, there's Herod Agrippa, too. He's just called Agrippa. Makes it a little bit more clear. But all these guys are Herod. And they're all in the same family. And I'll put this up here for this reason. These guys are kinda like the Kardashians of Jesus' day, okay? I don't know if that's exactly fair to say, but they're just sort of like everybody knows them. There's a whole bunch of them. And they're always doing stupid stuff. And you wonder, how did you get where you're at today? How is this possible that you have money and influence and people like you? This is crazy, this is insanity. And, like the Kardashians, there was always drama in this family. Like if Jerry Springer had been around, the Herod's would have been on. They would have been the perfect people to have on Jerry Springer. Just one example of this. You see, Herod the Great had a son named Aristobulus. And Aristobulus had a daughter named Herodias. And Herodias initially married Philip over there on the top right. But then that didn't work out because Herod Antipas basically wooed her away from her first love. So Herodias was then married to Herod Antipas. This is a crazy family, okay? And this is what got John the Baptist in trouble because when Herodias left Philip to marry Herod, John the Baptist would follow around town and say, hey, you know that's not right. You know that you're not supposed to be married to that man. You are married to Philip. And this is not right what you're doing. And he was a thorn in the side of Herod Antipas. So when we talk about Herod, verse seven, Herod the Tetrarch, we're talking about Herod Antipas. And you see, Herod the Great had four sons. His kingdom divided into four parts. The Tetrarch, he's a ruler of a fourth, okay? So we're talking about Herod Antipas. Eventually, this is the guy who's gonna be involved in putting Jesus to death. You back up to the top level, Herod the Great. Herod the Great was the guy who tried to kill Jesus with the babies in Bethlehem, right? Was not God's plan, did not happen, Jesus escapes. Herod Antipas now takes a throne in this territory. And he is the one who eventually we will see involved in putting Jesus to death. Look at verse seven, Herod is confused, okay? He's confused. He's trying to figure out who Jesus is. Some people say he's John the Baptist, raised from the dead. Now this is ridiculous. This is a ludicrous suggestion because Herod Antipas was the one who had John the Baptist's head removed from his body and served on a plate. He saw that happen. He knows that John the Baptist was dead, really dead, not kind of dead, dead dead. But when you do something stupid like Herod Antipas dead and you let lust and drunkenness get the best of you and you chop somebody's head off, you have a guilt complex and you're paranoid. And so in the back of his mind, he's saying there is no way that's John the Baptist. I hope that's not John the Baptist. He doesn't know. Some people say it's John the Baptist, back from the dead. Maybe those people were just trying to mess with Herod. Who knows? But some people said that. John the Baptist, back from the dead. Verse eight, some people say no, it's Elijah. The Jews had this belief that Elijah was gonna come back before the servant of the Lord came, before the Messiah came in. So some people say no, he's Elijah come back from the dead. Some people say no, no, he's not Elijah, he's not John. He's just one of the other prophets. He's a prophet. All these people, interesting saying he's somebody come back from the dead. He's not a normal person. He's somebody who is spiritually powerful and they're all giving all these explanations. Herod has no idea what's going on. But look at verse nine, this is fascinating. Herod said he's trying to remind himself. John, I beheaded, I know I did that. But who is this about whom I hear such things? Who is this guy? I don't know. And look at this, he sought to see him. He sought to see Jesus. He has no clue who he really is. He's extremely curious about who he is. And he is seeking to see Jesus. He sought to see him. A couple of thoughts for you to take away here. Number one, the world is often confused about Jesus, his followers and their mission. The world is often confused about who Jesus is, about what his followers are doing and who they are and about what the mission is. The world doesn't get this. The world doesn't understand it. The world tries to describe Jesus or tries to describe his followers or tries to describe their mission and the world mischaracterizes who Jesus is. And they mischaracterize who we are and what we're really about. And sometimes we are really bad about whining when that happens. Oh, did you hear what they said about Jesus on CNN? They had this special on CNN, discovering the real Jesus. Did you hear what, oh, what do you expect? Why would we be surprised? When you flip through the news or you read something on Facebook or the internet and it's mischaracterizing, slandering Christians or slandering our mission or making fun of us. What do you expect? They were confused about who Jesus was. Herod lived on a piece of real estate right there with Jesus for 30 years. A little bitty spot, he had no clue what was going on. Look at this map, I know that you're all familiar with the borders of the territories that the Romans lined up in Galilee in the time of Jesus. So this is review for all of you, I know. But just to remind you, in that little circle is called Galilee, right? Sea of Galilee is that body of water right there in the middle, the Dead Sea down below Galilee. Okay, Mediterranean Sea on the left. Little blue blob right there. That's where Jesus spent about 30 years of his life. That's where Herod was the Tetraark. Now you look at that and you don't really have a sense of size or scope or scale and you say, what is that? Was that like Texas? Is that like Oklahoma? How big is that? It's about the size of a county in Texas, roughly. This is not a big place. Little bitty patch of land, Herod is the ruler, the Tetraark of this spot. And he is seeking to see Jesus. He's heard the rumors, he's heard the stories, he's heard the explanations, he's read the tabloids, but he is still confused. He lived on the earth with Jesus in a tiny space of land and he is still confused. What do you think you should expect today, 2,000 years later on the other side of the world? Should we expect people to understand the truth about Jesus? Should we expect people to be clear about who we are as his followers or what we're about in the mission that he's given us? People are confused. This has always been the case. Here's the second lesson I don't want you to miss. Curiosity and commitment are very different responses to Jesus. Very different responses. Herod is curious. He ends up murdering Jesus. Curiosity is not the same as commitment. Some of you say, well, what does that mean? Because maybe you're here and you feel like you're curious about Jesus. Maybe you think you have questions about Jesus. Listen, it's okay to have questions about Jesus, right? Did you catch what Herod asked? Look at Luke eight, excuse me, look at Luke nine nine. Herod said, who is this? Who is this guy? If you go back and you look at Luke 825, guess who asked the exact same question? The disciples, the exact same question. Herod who eventually murders him, the disciples who follow them to their death, both asking the same question, who is this guy? Who is he? It's okay to have questions about Jesus, but the posture that Herod asked this question from and the posture of the disciples is completely different. The disciples have said, look, we can't really wrap our arms around who this guy is. We don't have it all figured out, but we are with him to the end. Herod on the other hand is merely simply curious. Here's the reality. In our culture, where we live today, most people are curious about spiritual things. There are very few people who will just completely stonewall you, tell you that they're atheists, they have zero interest in spiritual things. There's a few of them, and maybe you know some of them, I know a few of them, but there is not many. Most people where we live have somewhat of an interest in spiritual things, and most people where we live are not hostile towards Jesus, at least as they understanding. And maybe they're curious, and maybe they have questions, and maybe they want to learn more, maybe they don't understand what they want to. That's great, you just need to understand this. Curiosity and commitment are worlds apart. And Jesus can handle your questions. He handled the disciples, no problem. But he's looking in your life for commitment. Will you be committed to me? I'm not asking you to have everything figured out. We'll figure it out along the way. You're gonna learn more next year than you learn now. That's the nature of it. That's the nature of being a disciple, a learner. But what I'm looking for Jesus is saying is commitment, and that's very, very different than curiosity. One last thought, and I didn't put this on your outline, I'm just sort of thinking out loud. The detail that Herod wanted to meet Jesus. He is seeking to meet Jesus. Herod was not Caesar in Rome, and he wasn't even as powerful as Pontius Pilate, the governor of this whole area, all the colors I put up there just a minute ago. So he had people above him, but in Galilee, he was a pretty big deal. He's pretty important. He had some sway, he got his way. If he wanted something, it happened. And it says he was seeking to meet Jesus. He wanted to have a face-to-face with Jesus. And so I'm thinking this week, and I'm thinking, how would we respond as Christians if somebody very, very important and influential wanted to have an audience with us to learn more about Jesus? They're curious, and they wanna ask questions. I think our first impulse would be to say, hey, this is great. You won't believe who wants to talk to me about Jesus. Do you know how important that person is? Do you know the kind of authority they have? Do you know how many people they have influence over? And they lead, and man, if we could get that guy on our side, (whistling) how great would it be? It would be, can you imagine the influence that they could have on other people in their position? What was Jesus' response to that same situation? He could not, I'm gonna say this correctly 'cause a lot of times we say it wrong. He could not have cared less. He's not interested. The tetrarch wants to meet with me? Not interested. I'll hang out with the fishermen and the former tax collector and the zealot and the nobodies. Listen, Jesus can use important people. No doubt about that, but he's not dependent on your level of importance to use you. He's perfectly fine using nobodies. People who are on the outside looking in, and he's saying, in essence, Herod wants to meet me? I'll stick with the guys I've got. I don't need it. I'll take ordinary people who are committed to me any day over important people who are curious about me. If you think, I don't know how Jesus could use me. You know, I don't have the influence. I don't have the title. I don't have this. I don't have that. Drop it. He's not asking you to have those things. He's asking you to be committed, and when you're committed, he will use you. And we see that here in this passage, not interested in meeting with Herod. Now for the last story, very quickly, because you know it, Luke 9, 10 to 17. You have read this, you've heard it in church. Jesus feeds thousands of people. We can speculate on the number, thousands of people with a tiny lunch. Other than the resurrection of Jesus, this is the only miracle recorded in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, the only one. You can look it up in Matthew 14, Mark six, here in Luke nine, John chapter six. The only miracle in all four gospels. Verse 10, this is interesting. Jesus is trying to enjoy privacy with his friends. He's trying to get away. They just came back from the short-term mission trip. He wants to get alone with these guys, so they sort of try to sneak off and get off by themselves. Verse 11, the crowd, like a bunch of paparazzi, follow Jesus. If I'm Jesus, I'm annoyed. It's a good thing I'm not Jesus. He's not annoyed. In fact, Luke says he welcomes them. He welcomes them. He just tried to get away to be with his friends. The crowds track him down, and instead of sighing, or you're kidding me, here we go again. He welcomes them, and he doesn't just welcome them, but he speaks about the kingdom of God to them. He teaches them about the kingdom. And it goes on, Luke says that he cured all of those who had need of healing. Verse 12, the day wore on, the 12 are antsy, the 12 are like me, not Jesus. And the 12 are saying, look, we're sick of the people. We're sick of the crowds. Can we just have five minutes to tell you what happened on the trip? We just want to talk about what happened. We have some questions. We're excited about some things. Jesus, look, we can't feed these people anyway. Send them away. Tell them to go, spend the night at Motel 6, eat some McDonald's, whatever. Get rid of these folks so that we can spend time with you. And Jesus says one of the strangest things in all the Bible. He just looks at him and he says, you give him something to eat. Really? We don't have that much money. If we did have that much money, where are we gonna buy it? Jesus, what in the world? And I read this week in studying, all sorts of explanations about what's going on in this back and forth when Jesus says, you give them something to eat. Here's what I think Jesus is saying to these guys. I think what he's saying to them is, I care about these people and you need to care about them too. We just went over that before I sent you out on the trip. And now all you care about is telling me about the trip and not the people. I care about the people. You need to care about the people. Here's what he's saying to them. Number one, he's calling people to serve others in the name of his kingdom. Yes, he sends us to spread the message, but he also sends us to serve others in the name of his kingdom. And I think he's gently rebuking these guys right now, saying, listen, you give them something to eat. You are your brother's keeper. You can't just not care about the needs of real people. You can't just go and preach and be out of there. You gotta be involved. You gotta care. You gotta serve them. And as we saw earlier, this means meeting spiritual needs and physical needs. Yes, Jesus preaches the kingdom to them, but he also heals all who need to be healed. And yes, the disciples are there for the preaching part, but Jesus also says to them, now you, we need to feed these people. And it's amazing. Jesus takes this small lunch that they have and he blesses it, which means in a Jewish culture, he gives thanks for it, not some sort of magical formula. He just thanks God for what they have. And he begins to distribute it. And there's enough for everybody there to eat. But Jesus doesn't say, line up here and come by and I'm gonna break you off a piece. He says, you guys get into groups and he blesses the food and he gives it to who, the disciples. And what do they do? They give it to the people to eat, right? There's an intermediary here. And Jesus is making a teaching point to his buddies. He's saying, look, I don't care if you can't multiply the bread. That's not the point. You have to care about other people. You're gonna serve these people. You're gonna be the waiter. You're gonna humble yourself and serve this multitude of people what I'm gonna provide for them. I'm calling you to serve. That means meeting spiritual needs as well as physical needs. Now, I mentioned to you, this is the only story. The only gospel story, the only miracle story in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John other than the resurrection. I think God is trying to say to us, this one is really important. They're in there anywhere, even once they're important, but you better pay attention. It's in all four gospels. And if you just back up from a big perspective, the lesson here is very, very simple. It's something we would teach our kids down the hall in Sunday school. The lesson is God will provide for his people. It doesn't matter what you have or what you don't have. God will provide for his people. And you see that when you read in Matthew and Mark and Luke and John and you read them all together, you see it when you think about what this miracle reminds the people of. They see Jesus do this and they think back to the Old Testament. They think back to the Exodus when they get out in the wilderness and they have nothing to eat and what does God do for his people? He provides water, bread, quail. They don't have anything. They're really scared. They're really anxious about it and God provides any meets their needs. Jesus does the exact same thing here. They don't have nearly enough to feed these thousands of people and he says, "It's okay, I'll provide. I'll meet your needs." And ultimately both of those miracles point to the cross, the greatest miracle where God said, "I'm gonna provide what you really need." I know, as Corey prayed earlier, that you don't have any righteousness to bring before me. That's okay, I'm gonna provide it. I know that you can't bear the punishment that's gonna fall on your shoulders. That's okay, I'm gonna provide a substitute. I will provide for you. Here's how we sum it up, not only in summary, but also application. Jesus entered this world to bring good news, to make it a reality. Now Jesus expects us to do for others what he has done for us, right? This is the big point of Luke, Luke 19, 10. The Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost. He didn't just send a message about good news. He entered our world, he got dirty, shoulder to shoulder with us. He entered our reality to bring this good news to us and to make it real. And now he says, "I want you to do the same thing "to those on the outside looking in." Right, no more of this Old Testament, Israel's a lie, the nations come, you guys are going out. And you're not just going out to teach Bible lessons. You get this, you're not just going out to read verses to people and then move to the next town. You go and you enter their world and you rub shoulders with them and you spend the night at their house and you let them cook dinner for you and you live life with them together and you care about spiritual needs and physical needs. I want you to do for other people what I've done for you. So I'm thinking about a manual and I'm thinking, why do we make such a big deal? Why do we encourage in our new member class and on Sunday mornings? Why do we want you to be involved in a small group in a Sunday school class? It's because in this room, there's not a lot of sharing of life. There's a lot of sharing of content, a lot of sharing of truth, but you get into a small group of people and you enter their world. And you do for them what Jesus has done for you and you allow them to do for you what Jesus has done for them. It matters. Why do we, when we have men who are involved in the Kairos prison ministry, why do they go spend a whole weekend at the prison? They could send the money for extra food, they could send the notebooks with the Bible study, the guards could read through it with them. Why do they go? Take a whole weekend to stay with those people because they're doing for others what Jesus has done for them. Why do we get excited and try to support ministries like Team Flow that the Sherman's lead and first priority that the Kenny's lead? It's because these people are saying, look, there's folks out there that are not coming in here. And Jesus didn't just tell us to sit here and wait for them to come. He sent us to go out to them. He came to seek us and to save us while we were lost. Now he wants us to do the same thing. We're gonna go out and we're gonna seek them and we're gonna do what we can to bring the message of salvation to them by entering their world. We go on and on. Why do we go to Kenya? Those of you who have gone to Kenya, no, this is kind of how the trip goes. We pack up, we take a lot of stuff with us, we go over there and we distribute some of that stuff to the folks and we work with some guys called Fundis, builders, experts and we build homes out of sticks and mud. Can I just tell you something? The Fundis are good builders. They don't need me at all. Chris is a better nail hammer than I am but they don't need Chris. Christian's better than both of us. They don't need Christian. We could just write a check. We could just send the money over there and say, "Hey, we love you over here in America. "Enjoy the new house. "It's on us." We picked up the tab. We don't do that. Why? We go to enter their world for a brief period of time and to say, "Look, the son of man, "Jesus Christ left his throne in heaven, "humbling himself to come and to seek us "and to save us and to serve us." He entered our world to bring us good news and for a brief few days, we wanna do this for you. We're leaving our home. We're entering your world. We want to serve you and we wanna tell you about our King. Listen, as a church, I hope that we're about this, about number one, celebrating that despite our failure, the son of man came to seek us and to save us. Not because we're good, but because he's gracious and that he entered our world to bring us good news. I hope that we celebrate that, but I also hope that we live that, that we don't just gather together in this room and sing songs about it, but that when we leave this room, we realize now we're supposed to do for others what Jesus has done for us. We're supposed to enter their life on a personal level. We're supposed to rub shoulders with them. We're supposed to serve them. We're supposed to share the good news of the kingdom with them and when we can, as we can, we meet needs, physical needs, practical needs, everyday needs. Jesus cares, so we ought to care. You look at this passage, I think you see great reason for worship. And I think you also see great reason for going, whether that's going around the world, whether that's going across the street or whether that's going home. We want to do for others what Jesus has done for us. Just pray. Father, we are undeserving, we are sinners, we have fallen short. And all of our hope is built on Jesus Christ, on the Son of Man, coming to seek us and to save us. Father, in you are worthy in deserving of our worship as we think about what Jesus has done to bring us into a relationship with you. And so we do want to be people who worship. We want to be a church that is passionate about celebrating who you are and what you've done for us. But Lord, we also want to take seriously the call that you've placed on our lives, not just to worship, but to go to those who are not worshiping. Father, we've been found by your grace and we want to go out and seek those who are lost. And we know that looks different in our lives. We won't all be involved in the same ministries, we won't all have the same calling. But Father, wherever you send us, we want to go. And we want to be faithful to do for others what Jesus Christ has done for us. Lord, before we leave with that mentality, we do want to worship. And we want to celebrate Jesus, who He is, and what He has done. And so Father, as we lift our voices together in celebration and in worship, we pray that Jesus Christ would be honored and we pray in Jesus' name, amen.