The Myth of Human Permission: Why Peace Comes from Grace Alone

• Anxiety vs. Peace [00:34:26 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor contrasts unproductive anxiety (like a chirping smoke alarm with no fire) with the peace provided by the Holy Spirit.
• The Role of the Holy Spirit [00:34:45 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor outlines that the Spirit gives peace by convincing believers of Jesus' presence, power, and centrality.
• Resurrection Evidence [00:36:19 ▶️ 📄]
  > The marks on Jesus' hands and side serve as proof of his identity and power, convincing the disciples of his presence.
• Jesus' Centrality and Power [00:39:13 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor argues that Jesus is not just present but central ('the middler'), possessing power over death and cleansing power through his blood and water, which convinces believers of his ability to forgive sins.
• The Holy Spirit and Mission [00:44:20 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor explains that the Holy Spirit confirms believers in Jesus' mission, which involves being sent into the world just as the Father sent Jesus.
• Forgiveness and Withholding Forgiveness [00:46:24 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor details the dual nature of the church's mission: offering forgiveness to the burdened and withholding forgiveness (excommunication) from those who flagrantly sin without repentance to protect the holy community.
• Ministry of Forgiveness and Evangelism [00:51:11 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor uses the analogy of feeding stray dogs to describe offering forgiveness and Jesus to those who are spiritually lost, emphasizing the commitment required to 'leave out food and water' through relationships.
• Conviction of the Holy Spirit [00:52:37 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor explains that the Spirit gives peace not just by confirming mission, but by convicting believers of Jesus' commands, using the story of Thomas to illustrate the transition from doubt to belief.
• Confessing Jesus as Lord and God [00:54:55 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor argues that conviction leads to two confessions: Jesus as Lord (giving Him control to remove anxiety) and Jesus as God (acknowledging His ownership of all things, making us mere managers).
• Personal Testimony of Conversion [00:56:34 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor shares a personal story of being 18, hungover, and deciding to walk and pray, resulting in a moment of conviction where he accepted Jesus as Lord and God.

• Sermon Illustration [00:31:47 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor shares a personal anecdote about a high-pitched, intermittent chirping sound from a smoke alarm at 1:00 AM. He describes the frustration of searching through every room to find the source, eventually discovering it was a low nine-volt battery. He uses this as an analogy for unproductive anxiety that signals a problem (or lack thereof) without a real 'fire'.
• Sermon Illustration [00:40:06 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor shares a personal anecdote about a 'date night' at a Steve Miller Band concert where he got distracted talking to a stranger, leading his wife to joke that he was acting as a 'middler' (intermediary) rather than engaging with her, illustrating the difficulty of disengaging from distractions.
• Sermon Illustration [00:42:47 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor uses an analogy of a 'party in your mind' at 3 AM where uninvited guests like financial insecurity, health worries, and anxiety crash the party, illustrating how Jesus wants to come between believers and their anxieties to be the 'middler' of peace.
• Sermon Illustration [00:49:56 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor tells a story about finding an abandoned dog crate with food and water in a park, illustrating the intentional, sacrificial commitment required to care for 'stray dogs' (people in need) who may not even know they need help, paralleling the ministry of offering forgiveness.
• Sermon Illustration [00:50:35 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor tells a story about people who found a stray dog in the wilderness, bought it a crate and dishes, and committed to feeding it, but eventually lost energy for the task. He uses this to illustrate the initial commitment of offering forgiveness to 'stray dogs' (lost people) and the need to persist.
• Sermon Illustration [00:51:49 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor shares a personal anecdote about going to a gym where he encounters both believers and non-believers. He describes his internal struggle between wanting to just work out and feeling called to get to know the non-believers to 'leave out food and water' for them spiritually.
• Sermon Illustration [00:56:34 ▶️ 📄]
  > The pastor recounts a personal conversion experience at age 18. After a night of drinking and studying the Bible, he attended a conference, felt God speaking to him, went for a walk in the cold, prayed, and decided to make Jesus his Lord and God, resulting in the Holy Spirit descending and changing his life.

• Pastoral Charge [00:46:24 ▶️ 📄]
  > To feel excitement about the mission of forgiveness.
• Pastoral Charge [00:49:41 ▶️ 📄]
  > To exercise discernment in the church by withholding forgiveness from those who are unrepentant, as a disciplinary measure for restoration.
• Pastoral Charge [00:57:31 ▶️ 📄]
  > To make Jesus Lord and God, receive the Holy Spirit daily, and surrender anxieties for joy.

[00:01:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[00:01:03] Hey, good morning. Thanks for being here with us this morning for worship.
[00:01:07] At Corinth, our mission is to proclaim and worship Jesus as Lord, and we're going to do that together.
[00:01:12] If you're seated along one of the ends of the aisles, will you grab that black friendship pad and sign your name and give us your information?
[00:01:19] If you're new, there's a way to give us your contact information, and we'd love to help you get connected at Corinth.
[00:01:26] To a Sunday school class, a life group, to a friend, we'd love to do that.
[00:01:29] So give us your information. We'll follow up with you about that.
[00:01:33] you. None of us should have to do life by ourselves. So if you have a prayer need, we'd love to be praying for you. Also, congratulations on navigating the worship schedule change by showing up exactly
[00:01:46] like you always do at the time you always show up. Good job. But there will be, there are some things, like there's a longer break between now and Sunday school. As we kind of go through this
[00:01:56] process of changing to like 8, 15, 10, 45, and 11, if you notice something or you have a question or a suggestion. I will just assume when we do something new, we won't be great at it the first
[00:02:06] time we try. So if you notice something this morning or in the coming weeks that you think the staff ought to know, don't assume somebody else already told us. Reach out to the office or a pastor. We want to do this next few months really well. Right after this service in the
[00:02:20] courtyard, we have a baptism service. Three of our students are going to be baptized by immersion, and it is something worth celebrating, and it will encourage you for your whole week if you come.
[00:02:31] Wednesday morning at 9 30 here in this room is Refresh for Moms. It's our ministry to mothers of every age. So come for breakfast and some encouragement from Katie Elder and Lauren Everly.
[00:02:42] There's information about child care in your bulletin. Also Thursday is date night. Carl and Eugenia Welch, these are some of our people who've been married I think over 50 years, are just going to come and talk for a few minutes. Hey, here's some stuff we've learned about faith and love
[00:02:56] through the years, and then you can enjoy a date night out. Childcare sign-up is there. If Corinth adults over 50 this Friday at 5.30, this one's not in your bulletin and probably not on the screen.
[00:03:06] I got this this morning, but Corinth adults over 50 this Friday are going to Sims Barbecue at 5.30, so be on the lookout for that. And then our final announcement is a women's ministry event on Sunday,
[00:03:19] April 26th. It will be Make Them a Meal. Women are invited to come together and make meals for the foster care ministry that we might be able to love and support those families in our area. So
[00:03:30] be sure to check out your bulletin for more information. All right. Switching over to worship.
[00:03:37] As we begin worship, I want to invite you. Do you have your bulletin? Do you have a bulletin? Can you hold it up? Do you have one? Okay. Look at the front with the scripture on it and look at the top
[00:03:46] right corner. It's got the date and then it says second Sunday and Easter. You may never have paid attention to that in your whole life. It's there every week. But here's the thing, especially in
[00:03:58] this season of Easter. So historically, kind of a tradition of the church is that Easter is worth celebrating more than just one Sunday of the year. They actually split the whole year up into different seasons, and they gave 50 days to celebrate Easter. Just Easter and Jesus' resurrection.
[00:04:13] Jesus coming back to life. He was dead, and now he's alive. It was worth celebrating. We're going celebrate that again this morning. The Apostle Paul says this in 1 Corinthians 15 verse 14, if Christ has not been raised, our preaching is useless and so is your faith. If Jesus isn't
[00:04:32] alive, we are wasting our time, but he is alive. And this is of unimaginable importance when you lift your voice to Jesus and sing, when you give your attention to the scripture and the spoken
[00:04:43] word, that stuff has power to do in us what it could not, like regular words could not do because Jesus is alive, and there's something more powerful than whatever the forces in the world and social media and some of the things going on in the world. There's something more powerful
[00:04:56] than that, and that's the resurrected Jesus and his spirit. He's alive, and we're going to celebrate that together. So let's pray, and then we're going to sing together. Pray with me. Jesus, we're celebrating this morning that you're alive. Father, thank you that this was your plan and that
[00:05:09] you raised Jesus up. Holy Spirit, thank you for making that real to us. Would you make it real to us again, and we might experience the joy and delight of Easter again this Sunday. Give us what
[00:05:20] we need for the next hour to love and pay good attention with your help. Amen. Please stand and sing.

[00:06:13] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]
[00:06:13] Him who showed great love and bled for us. Freely you bled for us. Christ is risen from the dead, trampling over death by death. Come awake, come awake, come rise up from the risen from the dead.
[00:06:42] we are one with him again come awake rise up from the grave lamentations chapter 3 verses 22

[00:13:56] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_07]
[00:13:56] through 24 the steadfast love of the lord never ceases his mercies never come to an end they are new every morning great is your faithfulness the lord is my portion says my soul therefore i will
[00:14:12] hope in him father god you are so so good lord great is your faithfulness your mercy lord When we are still sinners, you died for us so that we can know you and walk with you, Lord.
[00:14:32] Please just be with us here and let your spirit move as we are in this time of worship and as we read your word. We love you, Lord. In Jesus' name, amen.

[00:14:43] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]
[00:14:43] I want to invite you to pray now and thank God for the goodness you have seen in the land of

[00:19:30] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[00:19:30] the living. You have seen God at work in your own life and in the world. And just for the next 60 seconds or so, best you can, name before God the things that you are thankful for, where you have
[00:19:38] seen his goodness here in your own life in Hickory. God, you have been good to us to give us another day here together with these people worshiping you in this place. This is a good gift from you,
[00:20:19] and help us not miss that. Thank you for the goodness of family and health and safety and your protection from who knows what that we never had to deal with because you took care of it.
[00:20:29] We pray your goodness will be experienced by people here locally, the people in our family, and then around the world in places like Moldova and Nicaragua that we love, where there are ministries going out and doing your kind of work.
[00:20:42] And would people see your goodness here on earth while we wait until goodness covers the earth?
[00:20:49] God, meet us in our normal everyday lives.
[00:20:52] Would you show up in our workplaces?
[00:20:54] Would we see your goodness in our relationships with our neighbors and with our parents and our kids and our spouse?
[00:20:59] Would you fix what is broken?
[00:21:02] God, would we give forgiveness and receive forgiveness, humble us enough to ask for it and then heal what's broken inside of us?
[00:21:09] God, heal the sick, those with cancer and disease that they cannot make go away, but you can.
[00:21:16] Would the doctors be great at their job this week and in coming weeks?
[00:21:19] And would you heal the people we love the most?
[00:21:23] God, as we continue in worship, would you receive this offering as a gift to you?
[00:21:28] And then as we read your word, would you open our minds again to what you have in your story for us today? Empower Pastor Nick and help us receive from you. We pray all this in Jesus' name. Amen. I invite you to bring forward
[00:21:45] your tithes and offering and also greet those around you. Say hello. Tell them you're glad they're here. Good morning. On the evening of that first day of the week when the disciples

[00:23:15] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_00]
[00:23:15] were together, with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood among them and said, Peace be with you. After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side.
[00:23:31] The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord. Again, Jesus said, Peace be with you.
[00:23:38] As the Father has sent me, I am sending you. And with that, he breathed on them and said, receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive anyone's sins, their sins are forgiven. If you do not
[00:23:51] forgive them, they are not forgiven. Now Thomas, known as Didymus, one of the 12, was not with the disciples when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, we have seen the Lord. But he said to
[00:24:07] them, unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were and put my hand into his side, I will not believe. A week later, his disciples were in the house again, and Thomas
[00:24:22] was with them. Though the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, peace be with you. Then he said to Thomas, put your finger here, see my hands, reach out your hand, and put it
[00:24:37] into my side. Stop doubting and believe. Thomas said to him, my Lord and my God. Then Jesus told him, because you have seen me, you have believed. Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have
[00:24:56] believed. Jesus performed many other signs in the presence of his disciples, which are not recorded in this book, but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God,
[00:25:09] and that by believing, you may have life in his name. The word of the Lord for the people of God.

[00:25:23] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_02]
[00:25:23] So I told you there would be some things that we're still learning. Nick is finishing up in traditional service, and so I'm actually going to invite the worship team. We're going to do what would have been our closing song now, and we're going to work on this again for next week. So
[00:25:36] We're learning stuff together.
[00:25:37] We'll do that together.
[00:25:38] So I'll invite you to stand, and we'll sing together.

[00:25:42] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_04]
[00:25:42] I see the star.
[00:26:57] I hear the thunder.

[00:27:03] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_05]
[00:27:03] Thy power throughout the earth.
[00:27:11] He sings my soul.
[00:27:21] God, he's my soul.
[00:27:41] you're God, then I shall bow. Morning church. One night while I was sleeping, I was awakened by

[00:31:47] [SPEAKER SPEAKER_01]
[00:31:47] a sound. It was the strange sound, and I said, well, maybe I was dreaming that sound. I went back to sleep, and then it happened again. It was this chirping, high-pitched noise that was really loud. And this time it will cammy up. And we're like, what was that? And then about 30,
[00:32:12] 45 seconds later, it happened again. Oh, it's a smoke alarm. Now, maybe you've encountered this before, but when your smoke alarm starts kind of intermittently chirping, it's hard to figure out where the source can be, especially if you've got a smoke alarm in every room. So one o'clock
[00:32:35] in the morning. We're going through every room, and we just wait. Is it this one? Chirp. I don't, and it just took us forever to find out where it's coming. Well, then we finally found it,
[00:32:46] and once I found it, I'm just so done with this. I just want to rip it out of the ceiling, wires and all, but I said, wait, you know what? Maybe just, it needs a new battery,
[00:32:55] and so we go back down to the kitchen. The battery drawer, we keep all the batteries, and they should all be there, and you know, you got your triple A, and you got your double A,
[00:33:04] near C, near D, and where's the nine volt? And the chirping's just going on. I mean, the dog is even getting tired of it. Well, we finally found the nine volt battery and put it in. The chirping went
[00:33:19] away. Problem averted. You know, when we look at this passage in the Gospel of John, a week after Easter, Jesus grants peace three separate times. And he grants this peace, why? Because the disciples are afraid. The disciples are anxious. And Jesus wants to say, look, when you're anxious,
[00:33:45] the key is peace. And the only way you get peace is by Jesus breathing on you, the breath of the Holy Spirit. You know, I don't think anxiety is all bad. Sometimes there's a healthy, productive anxiety. When I'm on my roof blown leaves out of my gutter, it's good to be a
[00:34:06] bit anxious. It's good to be a little, have a healthy fear of gravity, right? Sometimes anxiety can keep us focused and that's great. But this morning, what I want to talk about is unproductive anxiety. Anxiety is like that smoke alarm that keeps going off, but there's no smoke and there's
[00:34:26] no fire. And anxiety is something that this passage speaks about. And if John were to summarize what this passage about, I think he would say this, that Jesus gives us the spirit in order that we
[00:34:38] might experience his peace. The key here is the Holy Spirit. How does the Spirit give us peace?
[00:34:45] I want to talk about three ways this morning, exactly how the Spirit gives us peace. So let's get right into it. What's the first way the Spirit gives us peace? It's by convincing us of Jesus'
[00:34:57] presence. The Spirit convinces us that Jesus is in the room. If you want to be convinced of Jesus' presence, you're going to need the Holy Spirit. Verse 19. On the evening of that first day of the
[00:35:14] week, when the disciples were together with the doors locked for fear of the Jewish leaders, Jesus came and stood in the middle of them and said, peace be with you. After he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples were overjoyed when they saw the Lord.
[00:35:32] Now, this is the first day of the week. It's same day as the very first Easter. Mary Magdalene has seen the empty tomb. Peter and John have seen the empty tomb. But now the disciples are huddled
[00:35:44] together. The doors are bolted. Why? Because they're wondering, if that's what the Jews did to our master, what are they going to do to us? So they're hunkered down, the doors are locked, and Jesus just shows up out of nowhere. And he stands there and he says, peace be with you. He speaks
[00:36:03] peace because they're anxious. He speaks spirit where they are afraid. And after he said this, he showed them his hands and his side. And that's when they were convinced this really was Jesus.
[00:36:19] Because they recognized the marks on his wrists and on his hands. And they recognized the spear point in his side when the Roman centurion stuck a spear into his side. This is Jesus. He's really in the room with us. And they were overjoyed. And that's what the Holy Spirit
[00:36:40] did for the disciples that day. And that's what the Holy Spirit can do for you and me. He can, the Holy Spirit can convince us, when Jesus seems far away, the Holy Spirit can convince us that no,
[00:36:53] Jesus is actually present. Now, what does it look, what does this look like in practice?
[00:36:59] What are the marks of someone who's convinced of Jesus' presence in their own lives?
[00:37:04] Let me hit on three things.
[00:37:06] First, people like that, they're convinced of Jesus' power, that Jesus has this power.
[00:37:14] Now, if you go back to verse 20, it says this.
[00:37:18] Jesus appeared to them, and he showed them his hands.
[00:37:23] And they see those hands, and they think back to when Jesus talked about being the good shepherd, and the good shepherd has his sheep listen to him.
[00:37:33] And the good shepherd says this, that when the sheep are in my hands, no one and nothing can take them out of my hands.
[00:37:43] Jesus' powerful hands before the disciples that day convinced them that not even death could rob the good shepherd of his disciples.
[00:37:53] His hands are how powerful, so powerful that he held on to his disciples even through death.
[00:37:59] they are convinced of Jesus's power, but they didn't see his power. They also saw his cleansing.
[00:38:08] And I say this because they didn't just see his hands. They saw his side. And if you remember from last week, what was really remarkable about what happened when they sent the spear into his
[00:38:25] side was this. It wasn't just blood came out, but it was water. Blood and water. Water being a symbol of cleansing. God wanted everyone to know that Jesus' blood wasn't like anybody's blood. This blood had cleansing power and could cleanse us from our sins. And so when they saw his side,
[00:38:47] they were reminded this is the same side that showed us that he had this cleansing ability.
[00:38:56] So there's two marks right now of someone who's convinced of Jesus' presence.
[00:39:00] First, you're convinced that not only Jesus is in the room, but that he's powerful.
[00:39:04] And second, you're convinced that he has the ability to forgive you your sins.
[00:39:08] But there's a third thing that marks out people who are convinced of Jesus' presence.
[00:39:13] And that is they're convinced of Jesus' centrality.
[00:39:18] His centrality.
[00:39:19] Now, notice, when Jesus appears, he doesn't have to knock.
[00:39:26] When Jesus comes, no one has to let him in the door.
[00:39:31] When Jesus shows up, no one escorts him from the side of the room and says, hey guys, it's Jesus.
[00:39:37] He just shows up.
[00:39:39] And where does he show up?
[00:39:40] He shows up in the middle of them.
[00:39:44] Not just in their midst, but in the middle.
[00:39:48] God always wants to be in the middle, doesn't he?
[00:39:51] And that's because he deserves to be in the middle.
[00:39:55] It's the same thing with Jesus.
[00:39:58] God wants to be in the middle of this church.
[00:40:01] God wants to be in the middle of your hearts and minds too.
[00:40:06] God wants to be the middler.
[00:40:10] One evening came and I decided to go out on date night.
[00:40:13] And so we're going to see the Steve Miller Band, an outdoor concert.
[00:40:18] And, you know, it was because of the outdoor concert, we had our chairs and we got to the concert venue and like, oh, where's an empty space?
[00:40:25] Okay, over here.
[00:40:26] So we go over there, we put down our chairs.
[00:40:29] There's another couple there, you know, and we're just waiting. We have a 30, 40 minutes before the concert starts. So, you know, we could get some time catching up and before the, you know, music. And so this other couple, they go off
[00:40:41] to concessions. And so there's these two empty lawn chairs. And I look over and there's this crumpled $20 bill just sitting on the far lawn chair. And there's people moving back and forth.
[00:40:53] And I got kind of worried about that $20 because I said, someone might nip that. So I'm just going to take that and hold it for them. And so when they got back, I said, hey, just so you know,
[00:41:04] you dropped this $20, but I held on to it for you. And they said, that's not our $20. Oh, okay.
[00:41:13] But then he said, well, let's, how about we go buy some beer with it and split it?
[00:41:19] I said, okay, you know, that sounds great. We're not beer drinkers, but like brought some, sure, come on. So they went off and brought back some food and they're sitting down. And then we just
[00:41:28] kind of start talking. Not when I say we, it's just me and this guy sitting here. And so we're talking about bands we've seen and music we like. And then we're moving to favorite vacation spots
[00:41:39] and the Bears' chances of making the playoffs. And like, we're having a great time, me and this guy.
[00:41:46] And then the concert starts. And, you know, we find the car when it's all over. We're driving home. I go, gosh, honey, wasn't that a great concert? She says, yeah, sure. What? You didn't think it was a great concert he goes well you and that guy sure had a great date oh that oh well
[00:42:08] that's just part of being a middler you know it's like you're here he's there i'm trying to engage him i know he's really trying to engage me he's she said well you can always disengage a little
[00:42:18] bit and you can do it politely i go i i guess i could right and so i said okay i'm sorry right so So ever since that day, we've always decided when Kim and I sit down,
[00:42:31] she's going to be the middler because she's the one who is just better at just disengaging rather than getting sucked in to ultimately guess you don't want to be there with.
[00:42:45] That's not the reason you came.
[00:42:47] If you guys are like me, there's times where you wake up like 3 o'clock in the morning, and there's a party in your mind.
[00:42:55] and the problem is you never invited these friends over they just crashed your party and they they're they've got their opinions and it's like there's there's mr financial insecurity so like telling you like wow you sure you got enough money in the bank account i don't know
[00:43:14] and then then there's the you know miss physical health who is making wonder like why does the doctor want to see me again? And then there's somebody else who says, you know, I wish the
[00:43:30] kids could make more friends at school. Or what about that math test I have next week? Am I going to pass that test? And all these anxieties just start. It's like this party and you want the
[00:43:42] guests to go home. You don't want them to be there, but you can't, you can't get rid of them.
[00:43:46] Has that ever happened to anyone else? And it seems like the party just gets bigger with more people coming in the room. Here's what Jesus says. Here's what the scripture is teaching us.
[00:43:56] He says, let me be the middler. Let me come between you as your peace, come between you and all those concerns, and let me do the talking. You see, Jesus, he wants to be in the middle,
[00:44:11] not just in the middle of the room. He wants to show his power, his cleansing, and his centrality.
[00:44:16] It's not enough to be in the same room with Jesus. You have to make him central.
[00:44:20] Here's the second thing that Spirit does in the way he gives us peace, is by confirming us in Jesus' mission.
[00:44:28] If you want to be confirmed in Jesus' mission, if you want to be onboarded, if you want to be empowered, if you want to be a piece of it in an ongoing way, you will definitely need the Holy Spirit.
[00:44:40] This is what verse 21 suggests.
[00:44:42] Again, Jesus said, peace be with you.
[00:44:46] As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.
[00:44:48] And with that, he breathed on them and said, receive now the Holy Spirit.
[00:44:59] If you forgive anyone's sins, their sins are forgiven.
[00:45:02] And if you do not forgive them, they are not forgiven.
[00:45:09] As the Father has sent me, exactly in the same way the Father has sent me, now I'm sending you disciples.
[00:45:16] Sending you where?
[00:45:17] To the world.
[00:45:20] You see, they were a continuation of this redemptive plan that God had from day one.
[00:45:26] And now we at Corinth are a continuation of that.
[00:45:30] You know, when we engage this mission, this mission to bring Jesus to the world, we just didn't make this up.
[00:45:37] This all began with the Father who tasked the Son, who in turn tasked the disciples who were tasking us.
[00:45:44] And what's the scope of this mission?
[00:45:45] There's two pieces.
[00:45:46] First, to offer forgiveness in Jesus' name.
[00:45:51] God has reconciled the world through Jesus Christ.
[00:45:55] We got to go out and tell people about that.
[00:45:57] We got to tell people who are burdened with guilt, burdened with shame.
[00:46:01] They're weighed down.
[00:46:01] They're alienated from God.
[00:46:03] We have to be the ones to say, look, you can be forgiven.
[00:46:08] And you just need to come to him for that forgiveness.
[00:46:12] What a great message.
[00:46:13] What a life-giving message.
[00:46:15] What an exciting message.
[00:46:17] And God has allowed us to be the heralds of that message.
[00:46:21] I hope you're excited.
[00:46:24] And this is exactly what Jesus means in verse 23 when he says, if you forgive anyone's sins, their sins are forgiven.
[00:46:30] This does not mean to say I have the power to forgive people's sins.
[00:46:33] You don't have the power to forgive individual sins.
[00:46:35] But what we can do is broker Jesus to a world and Jesus can forgive their sins.
[00:46:42] But there's a second piece to this mission.
[00:46:46] And it might surprise you.
[00:46:49] And it's this, to withhold forgiveness in Jesus' name.
[00:46:53] That's right, to withhold forgiveness in Jesus' name.
[00:46:57] Now, why would anyone withhold forgiveness?
[00:47:04] Well, let me explain it this way.
[00:47:07] Imagine you're on an airplane and you're riding along and the person behind you is an adult and they kick your seat.
[00:47:17] Not once, not twice, but a couple of times.
[00:47:19] And you finally swing around and say, excuse me, do you mind just not kicking my seat?
[00:47:24] Oh, sorry.
[00:47:27] Well, then it happens again.
[00:47:29] And then it happens again.
[00:47:30] And then you turn around, hey, you know, you might not have noticed you're still kicking my seat. Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry. And they just don't stop. And you begin to wonder, do they know what sorry even means? Sorry means
[00:47:45] what your behavior is doing. Now, not only are they kicking your seat, but they're cursing out the flight crew. And what they just might do, you're hoping that they do, is that somebody takes this guy off the plane. What does Jesus mean when he says, if you withhold, if you do
[00:48:04] not forgive them, they are not forgiven. So there is an appropriate time to withhold forgiveness.
[00:48:09] And that is when people don't want to be forgiven. When people are headbent on disobeying God in a flagrant and no stops type of way, or they're violating other people or sinning against other people flagrantly within the Christian community, what Jesus is doing, he's authorizing the church
[00:48:29] to take steps. And the steps is to gently show this brother, the sister, their ways. And if they don't listen once or twice, the third time, remove them from the communion. The technical term for
[00:48:43] this is excommunication. That's in hope that they return or brought to their senses and come back and then restored with the right hand of fellowship. And that's the hope. But you see, there's boundaries. There's this community of reconciliation, but you have to protect the
[00:48:59] boundaries because we are a holy community where we're committed to love one another. Does that make sense? I believe that there's a great commission in every gospel. Matthew's great commission is the most famous. When Jesus said to the disciples, go and make disciples of all nations,
[00:49:15] this is one version of John's great commission. He says, church, you've got two exciting pieces.
[00:49:22] You've got an exciting piece of this mission. Forgive anyone's sins, and their sins are forgive him. But here's what you have to do too. Sometimes you need to withhold forgiveness until they're ready to receive it. Personally, I'm more excited about that first part of the mission
[00:49:41] and here's why. I'll illustrate it this way. When we first came to Hickory, I found the park off Cloninger Mill Road and you keep walking the park and then you go down the hill through the woods
[00:49:56] and it's really wooded down there. It's like a wilderness within Hickory. And they come to this creek, Fallen Creek. And then the path turns to the right and I was walking along the path and I noticed an old dog crate. But it wasn't just abandoned there because there was also a dog food
[00:50:17] dish and a dog water dish and some carpeting inside. Somebody put that dog crate there very intentionally. And I have to imagine that what had happened there was, let's say a family noticed a stray dog that was emaciated, that was cold, that needed help. And for whatever reason, they couldn't
[00:50:35] round him up or they didn't want to. But what they did is they went to the pet store, bought a crate, bought dishes, and would feed the dog. Now, think of how much work that is. To come all the way down
[00:50:48] the hill, find the path after parking the car, bring food and water. How often? Maybe every couple days. That's a commitment. But judging by how old this stuff looks, apparently they lost energy for it. You know, with this ministry of forgiveness that God has given us, God is essentially saying,
[00:51:11] look, there's people out there, maybe there's people in this room, and they're like stray dogs in the wilderness. They're emaciated, they're diseased, they're hungry, and they don't even need to, they don't even know that they need to come home. But when we offer forgiveness, when we offer
[00:51:28] Jesus, what it starts with is putting food and water in front of people and knowing them and providing them through the kindness that only Christ can offer. So I have my extroverted moments, but I have my introverted moments too, came and I go to the gym. There's believers there,
[00:51:49] there's Corinth people at this gym, but there's also not yet believers at this gym.
[00:51:54] And part of me says, you know, I just kind of want to go and work out. It's not enough energy just to lift a weight, I'll tell you, just to have more energy to kind of extrovert with people. I
[00:52:05] don't know, but God has called me to it. And so what I make it my point of being at this gym is to get to know as many names as possible, and if possible, just to get to know them.
[00:52:16] Because you never know.
[00:52:17] You never know when through relationships with people who are not yet believers, when in a sense, you're leaving out food and water for them, and they want to know more.
[00:52:27] And they want to know what makes you different.
[00:52:30] That's what it means to offer forgiveness in Jesus' name.
[00:52:34] Here's the third piece.
[00:52:35] How does the Spirit give us peace?
[00:52:37] Not just by convincing us of Jesus' presence or by confirming us in Jesus' mission, but by convicting us of Jesus' commands.
[00:52:45] Verse 24, now Thomas, one of the 12, was not with the disciples when Jesus came.
[00:52:52] So the other disciples told him, we have seen the Lord.
[00:52:57] But he said to them, unless I see the nail marks in his hands and put my finger where the nails were and put my hand into his side, I will not believe.
[00:53:08] A week later, his disciples, with his disciples, Jesus came and stood among them and said, peace be with you. Then he said to Thomas, put your finger here. See my hands.
[00:53:21] Reach out your hand and put it in my side. Stop doubting and believe. Thomas said to him, my Lord and my God, we need the Holy Spirit to work conviction in our life. Conviction of our
[00:53:39] day-to-day sin. But there was a first time too for everybody when we're convicted. Thomas is convicted.
[00:53:47] He wants evidence and he gets evidence, but there's something else that's very interesting that Jesus says.
[00:53:53] He says, stop doubting and believe.
[00:53:58] Have you ever had someone tell you, you know, I know you're Christian all, and boy, I wish I could believe, but I've studied it.
[00:54:07] I've had someone say this to me last week, someone in the neighborhood.
[00:54:10] I was talking to the gospel about them and I said, yeah, I've studied it, but I just, I can't believe.
[00:54:15] And the way he was saying it, it was almost like he was saying, you know, it's a neutral thing and you've got your evidence, I don't have mine.
[00:54:24] Jesus says, you know what? When we doubt, we're acting unfaithfully to God. We need to turn to him, stop doubting, and believe. But we can't do that without the conviction of the Holy Spirit.
[00:54:43] We desperately need the Holy Spirit to show us, convict us, persuade us that we need him.
[00:54:51] And what happens when we're convicted?
[00:54:53] Two things.
[00:54:55] Exactly the same things that happens to Thomas.
[00:54:57] First, we confess Jesus as Lord.
[00:55:00] Isn't that what Thomas says in verse 28?
[00:55:02] Thomas said to him, my Lord.
[00:55:06] For the first time, Thomas made Jesus the Lord.
[00:55:11] He gave him control.
[00:55:13] And why is that so important?
[00:55:15] Because sometimes the reason we're anxious is because we're trying to run things that we have no business running.
[00:55:22] We're trying to control areas of our life that God has no intention of us controlling.
[00:55:27] And God is sending us a signal to say, if you make me Lord of this area of your life, it will bring peace in that area. Think about that. But it's not just enough that Jesus is Lord.
[00:55:42] Thomas also confesses Jesus as God. And that's my second point. We confess Jesus as God.
[00:55:51] That's what Thomas did.
[00:55:53] And that's what we need to do too, if you haven't done that.
[00:55:56] Why is that important?
[00:55:59] Because if he's God, it means he's the creator God.
[00:56:02] And if he's the creator God, it means he made you and me and the world and everything in it.
[00:56:07] Everything you have was made by God.
[00:56:10] Therefore, he owns it.
[00:56:13] It's all his.
[00:56:15] You're just a manager.
[00:56:18] Why are you so anxious?
[00:56:21] God's got this.
[00:56:22] He is the Lord. He's the God. He has rights to it. There was a time in my life when I confessed Jesus both as Lord, as God. I was 18 years old. I stayed up the whole night, the night before,
[00:56:34] just drinking and talking to a friend and said, you know, I've been studying the Bible for like a year and a half now and trying to live a good life, and I don't know if I can keep going.
[00:56:44] But I got this Christian conference I need to go to, and I went there, and I was slightly hung over, and the preacher was preaching, and I felt like God was speaking my name. And I felt like
[00:57:00] God was saying, stop doubting and believe. And I said, okay, God, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to go for a walk, and I'm not going to turn around until I decide either for or against you.
[00:57:11] Either I'm going to just get rid of my Bible and drop this Christianity thing, or I'm all in.
[00:57:15] And it was a cold November day, and I got about three or four blocks, and I prayed, and I talked to him. I said, you really are my Lord and God, aren't you? And that's when it all came together.
[00:57:31] And that's when I was convicted of my sin. And that's when the Holy Spirit descended on me and changed my life. If you're here today, you don't know Jesus. Jesus and the Holy Spirit, between those two, they can change your life. But you have to let him. You have to make him
[00:57:49] your Lord and your God. The Holy Spirit wants to come, take away your anxieties, and exchange your fears for joy. Will you do it? Then receive the Holy Spirit daily in your life, starting today.
[00:58:07] Let's pray. Jesus, we talk a lot about you, as we should, and we talk a lot about the Father, as we should. Sometimes we don't pay enough attention to you, Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, we invite you all now to come descend on us fill our hearts so that we can see jesus right in the
[00:58:34] room with us so that we can be empowered for this mission that you give us and then for those who need to be convicted in regards to sin and and and jesus righteous demands may they see that
[00:58:46] holy spirit take over in this room we pray for your sake and for the sake of the world who so desperately needs you. Amen. All right. Please receive the Lord's benediction. I want you to
[00:59:01] rise. May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God the Father and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be on you all. Amen. Go in peace.