His Ways Are Better Than Our Ways

John chapter 12, beginning in verse 17 and going through verse 26.

! So the Pharisees said to one another, You see that you are gaining nothing. Look, the world has gone after him.

Now among those who went out to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, Sir, we wish to see Jesus. Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus, and Jesus answered them, The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.

Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone. But if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loses his life, whoever loves his life, loses it.

And whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me. And where I am, there my servant will be also.

If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. May God add a blessing to the reading of his word. Would you please be seated? Since the beginning, Satan has tempted mankind to disobey God.

He has tempted mankind to doubt his provision. He has tempted mankind to doubt God's will. If you recall, in his original temptation to Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, it came in the form of a question.

And the question that he asked them was, Did God actually say? Or did God really say that? Or did God truly say that?

And ever since that time, Satan's tactics to challenge God's word haven't really changed all that much. As a matter of fact, when Jesus, the Son of God, began his public ministry, he was visited by Satan, if you recall, in the wilderness.

Jesus had been fasting for 40 days and for 40 nights. Now, Jesus is fully God, but he's also fully man. And so he was hungry and he was physically weak.

And so you'd think, what a perfect opportunity to lay a deceptive trap if you were Satan. And that's exactly what he does.

If you recall, he begins tempting Jesus by questioning his true identity. Satan said to him, If you are the Son of God.

And basically he said, Then prove it. Turn these stones into bread and eat. But when that fails, Satan doesn't give up.

He presses on by challenging, once again, Jesus' identity, saying, If you are the Son of God. But then he actually quotes from the Bible.

He quotes Scripture. And Satan takes Jesus to the pinnacle of the temple. And he says to him again, If you are the Son of God, throw yourself down, for it is written, and he's quoting Scripture, He will command his angels concerning you, and on their hands they will bear you up, lest you strike your foot against a stone.

But yet again, that temptation fails. And Satan then takes Jesus to a very high mountain. And he shows him all of the kingdoms of the world.

And he says to Jesus, All of these things, I can make yours. You can be the king over all of these nations, over all of these people, if you'll just bow down and worship me.

And if you know that passage of Scripture, you know that each time Satan tempts Jesus, Jesus uses Scripture to defend against that temptation or to reveal the lie behind what Satan is saying.

Jesus would not be deterred from his mission, which he summarized in many places, particularly in Matthew chapter 20, verse 28.

Jesus says, Even as the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve, and to give his life a ransom for many.

Satan's attempts to derail Jesus from his mission were unsuccessful. Our Lord would not avoid the cross and the suffering that he would endure as he atoned for our sins.

Our Lord allowed nothing to get in the way of his doing and accomplishing his Father's will, the purpose for which he had come.

Even when Peter, one of Jesus' closest disciples, protested Jesus' plans to go to Jerusalem, Jerusalem, where Jesus had said that he would suffer many things there from the elders and the chief priests and the scribes and that he would be killed, but on the third day he would be raised.

Even Peter took Jesus aside to rebuke him. Listen to their exchange in Matthew 16, verses 22 through 23. Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, Far be it from you, Lord, this shall never happen to you.

But Jesus turned to Peter and said, Get behind me, Satan, for you are a hindrance to me, for you are setting your mind not on the things of God, but on the things of man.

You see, Peter thought he knew better than Jesus at this point. But in getting in the way of Jesus' mission, really, what he's doing, Jesus says, is serving as the mouthpiece of Satan, trying to distract him from the purpose for which he had come.

Jesus could not be deterred from his mission. And listen, as followers of his, as his church, hasn't he given us a mission too?

Matthew chapter 28, verses 18 through 20, after Jesus has died, after Jesus has risen again, and right before he ascends back into heaven, it says, Jesus came to them and he said, All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you, and behold, I am with you always to the end of the age.

Jesus had a mission and he was undeterred in fulfilling it. We have a mission, but how well are we doing right now at not being derailed from our mission like our Savior was?

How often are we seen as Christ's followers standing for the truth that our culture has exchanged for a lie? How well are we really following the Lord's example, not just in church, but at home and in our workplace and in our neighborhood?

Have we allowed ourselves to become lax in our God-given mission and our devotion to following our Lord who has saved us?

Are we more closely following our will or God's will for our lives and for His church? Are we serving truthfully Christ's agenda or our own?

Are we actively engaged in the good fight for the faith that Jesus commanded us to be a part of? You see, Satan is active.

The Bible says that Satan prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. I read a quote recently from John MacArthur that talks about how active Satan is in our world.

He said, Satan continues his efforts to make sin less offensive, heaven less appealing, hell less horrific, and the gospel less urgent. And so, brother and sister in Christ, what we need to be as followers of Christ is to be active to in the mission, in the purpose for which our Lord has given us and equipped us to carry out.

So, the main idea for this morning's sermon is this. It is better to obey God's will and serve Jesus. It is better in all cases, in every situation, to obey God's will and serve Jesus.

So, if you recall from last week, we were in verses 12 through 16. Jesus has entered triumphantly into Jerusalem and through those verses we saw how Jesus is our true king, how Jesus has fulfilled prophecy, how Jesus, though he works mysteriously, reveals through his ability and his fulfilling of prophecy and even though we don't understand what's going on in the moment, eventually we do and that reveals that Jesus is sovereign and is in control of our lives.

And those realities should encourage us to obey and follow him. And so, now that theme continues in verses 17 through 26.

In these verses, Jesus sets the example for us of how to be undeterred from following God's will and why it is better for us to obey and to serve him with our lives.

And so, in this text, we see that Jesus faces three kinds of opposition to his carrying out his mission. And, they are three kinds of opposition that we face today as followers of Christ, that we face in our Christian lives and what God wants is for you to trust in him despite the opposition, to not be deterred from your mission and your purpose and to know that in all things it is better to obey his will and serve Jesus.

And so, the first opposition we see that Jesus faces to his obeying the Father's will is the crowds. The crowds flattery, but we see that it did not keep Jesus from obeying his Father's will.

The crowds flattery. Look at verses 17 and 18 again. The crowd that had been with him when he called Lazarus out of the tomb and raised him from the dead continued to bear witness.

But the reason why the crowd went to meet him was that they had heard that he had done this sign. So, really, there are two groups within this one crowd.

The first group was with Jesus when he had brought Lazarus back to life. And so, they were bearing witness to this amazing miracle which then stimulated a response from those who had come to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover to check out this Jesus guy who had done this amazing thing and other things that they had heard.

And we've seen from last week's study that their hope was that someone like Jesus who had such power would use that power to lead them in an insurrection against the Romans who occupied their land.

And so, in that moment, we have to understand that Jesus' popularity had hit its apex. These people wanted him to be their king.

When it became clear to them over the course of the days that would follow this week, that his agenda was not to do their will but his father's will, we saw and we'll see as we continue through this book that they quickly turned on him just a handful of days later going from shouting, Hosanna, save us, hail the king, to crucify him, crucify him, crucify him.

Jesus didn't give in to peer pressure and he wasn't interested in winning popularity contests. But, unlike Jesus, let's be real and let's be honest, we very often give in to peer pressure because we want to be popular and we want to be liked, don't we?

Isn't that the whole premise of social media a lot of times? Facebook? To have friends who like our lives by the posts that we make or the comments that we share, we like being liked.

And not only that, we enjoy being complimented. As a matter of fact, compliments can become addicting for us because oftentimes we will search for compliments from others to give us a sense that we have self-worth and they can become very addicting.

In my previous church, I served as the associate pastor for one year before becoming the senior pastor and soon after I began as associate pastor, our senior pastor went out of town and he gave me the opportunity to preach.

And so, I preached my first sermon that I'd ever preached in church before and people were complimentary and people said some really nice things, but there was this one guy in particular that seemed really moved by the sermon and came to me later that week and he told me, you know, we just think you're the next Billy Graham.

You're the next Billy Graham. And that's high praise, you know, that's, Billy Graham is pretty well known and, you know, that comment certainly inflated my ego as a young man almost out of seminary.

Flash forward a year later and I'm the senior pastor and I'm out of town on vacation and our youth pastor at the time preaches in my place and that week, I'm not making this up, the same man came to my office, knocked on my door and said, you know, hey, I want you to know a youth pastor did a great job and let me tell you, we think that he is the next Billy Graham.

So, so either that church was blessed to have two Billy Grahams on staff or more likely and truthfully that man was just very generous with his compliments.

You've got to be careful because we can let the praise of men get to us. and inflate our ego and then desire it. But Jesus never let the praise of men or the sides of the crowds that followed him to distract him from his mission, to seek and to save the lost by dying and rising again that they would be saved through faith in who he is and what he has done for them.

I was reminded of this again this week as I was going through my Bible study. I'm in the Gospel of Mark and I love Jesus' response to his disciples in Mark chapter 1.

Jesus is, again, at the very early stages of his earthly ministry. He's been in Capernaum and he's been preaching and healing people and casting out demons.

Verse 33 says that the whole city was gathered at the door where Jesus was staying. And then in verse 35, Mark records the next day.

And rising early in the morning while it was still dark, Jesus departed and went out to a desolate place and there he prayed. And Simon and those who were with him searched for him and they found him and said to him, everyone is looking for you.

And he said to them, let us go on to the next towns that I may preach there also for this is why I came out. The disciples had experienced an awesome day of successful ministry.

Jesus was popular in Capernaum. And so I think that they probably woke up the next day with the thought that it would see more of the same.

But Jesus is gone when they wake up. And everyone is looking for him. The disciples search for him and then when they find him, Jesus says to them, basically, yeah, it's time for us to go.

And so wouldn't you, if you were one of those 12 disciples, be surprised by that response? I know I would be. You know, I know, I believe that I would be of the mind to think, you know, you know, Jesus, do you understand that people really like you here?

The whole city is coming after you. Let's stay here. This is good. This is safe. This is fruitful. Let's build a church.

You know, hey, we could go multi-site from this church right here. But Jesus wasn't interested in just popularity because he had a mission.

And that's what he says, I came and I must go out to preach. What was he preaching? The gospel. Repentance for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.

Flattery and popularity might keep us in a place because we need it. But Jesus didn't need it. He had to go. The cross was on the horizon and he had much to do before the time of his death.

And you know, as Christians, we're seeing that it's becoming increasingly unpopular in our culture to truly follow Christ.

As we affirm what the Bible says, that Jesus is the only way, not one of many, but the only way of salvation, as we affirm what Jesus said, that hell is the eternal destination of everyone who rejects him, as we testify to the truth of Scripture that marriage is between one man and one woman, as we testify again that the Bible says that there are only two genders, male and female, and that abortion is murder, and that there is not your truth and my truth, but Jesus is the only truth, what we will hear and what we're seeing is people say, well, what you believe is irrelevant, you're out of touch, and even now, more so, being accused, we're being accused of believing and spreading hate speech because of what God's Word says.

And so, the question that we need to consider when it comes to our desire to be popular or to follow Christ is, are you going to give in to gain the world's acceptance?

or are you going to follow Christ? Are you going to pursue God's will in your life and follow God's ways in your life despite whatever the personal earthly cost might be?

Are you going to be silent? Are you going to guard your words and hide your faith in order to please men or are you going to be like Jesus who didn't do any of those things?

Again, Jesus did not let the flattery of men their promise to give Him a crown without a cross to deter Him from God's will.

And it was so much better for us, wasn't it? That He didn't because through His death, through His resurrection, we have been saved by faith in Him.

In salvation, He gives us His Spirit and His Word to continually remind us of what is true, to keep us from being derailed from our mission and to prevent us from wasting our lives because it is better to obey God's will and serve Jesus than please men.

we should not be distracted by that as we seek to pursue the Lord's mission and calling in our life. The second opposition we see Jesus face here is from the Pharisees.

The Pharisees scheming did not keep Jesus from following His Father's will. The Pharisees scheming did not keep Jesus from following His Father's will.

Look at verse 19. So the Pharisees said to one another, you see that you are gaining nothing. Look, the whole world has gone after Him.

So at the moment, we know that the people are ready to make Jesus their King. And that thought troubled the Pharisees. Jesus could have begun an armed revolt right then and there.

The people were so passionate about Him and for Him to be the kind of King that they wanted. And while the Pharisees didn't like the Romans being in control, you've got to understand that they liked Jesus even less.

And we know that the Sanhedrin, the Jewish Supreme Court, they had already been plotting and scheming. They've already hatched their plan to put Jesus to death. But at this point, these Pharisees saw all their efforts to confront Jesus, to seize Him, and to arrest Him and to warn people not to have anything to do with Him as having failed.

And so from their perspective at this moment, it appeared as if the entire world was going after Jesus. His words and His actions infuriated the Jewish authorities.

And all along, we know that Jesus was aware of what their plan was, but their schemes never struck fear in the heart of our Lord. He did not allow their influence or their power to deter Him from His mission, nor silence Him from speaking the truth.

And we know from His Word that He repeatedly encourages His followers to do the same thing. Matthew 10, 26 through 28, Jesus says, have no fear of them for nothing is covered that will not be revealed or hidden that will not be made known.

What I tell you in the dark say in the light. What you hear whispered proclaim on the housetops and do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul.

Rather fear Him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. schemes of the Jewish authorities would be successfully carried out according to the design of God's sovereign plan.

But listen, even when their plan had been successfully carried out and even when people scheme against God's church or God's people, we can't forget how Jesus responded to those who had beat Him, who had spit on Him, who had torn out pieces of His beard, who had mocked Him, who had ridiculed Him.

Jesus did not call for the Father to smite them with His wrath. Instead, as He was on the cross, as their scheme had been achieved, we see Jesus praying for those who had put the scheme together.

We see Jesus praying for the Roman soldiers who were gambling over His clothes at the foot of His cross, as the criminals on each side of Him were reviling Him, as the religious leaders were mocking Him, as the crowds were walking by and blaspheming Him, even in His agony and in His humiliation.

Jesus' concern was that this unworthy lot be forgiven by His Father. Luke 23, 34, Jesus says from the cross, Father, forgive them for they know not what they do.

As His final hour approached and as the cross loomed, Jesus was undeterred by the schemes of the Pharisees to seek His death because He knew all along that it would accomplish His Father's will.

Followers of Christ have no reason, therefore, because of who Christ is, to fear those who scheme against them, because in Christ we have eternal life.

In Christ we have peace with God through His death and His resurrection. In Christ we have been giving His Spirit who serves as our helper and who emboldens our testimony should that time come when we must make a defense for the gospel that has saved us to those who have plotted and schemed for our demise.

Jesus promises in Luke 12, 11-12, and when they bring you before the synagogues and the rulers and the authorities, do not be anxious about how you should defend yourself or what you should say, for the Holy Spirit will teach you in that very hour what you ought to say.

We should not fear doing God's will because it's often through persecution for our faith that the gospel spreads far and wide.

Don't fear people. Don't let the fear of men discourage you from following God's will because it is better to obey God's will and serve Jesus.

He has saved us from the worst and he has given us his best. The third opposition that Jesus faces here is in verses 20-24.

The trepidation of the final hour did not keep Jesus from obeying his father's will. The trepidation of the final hour did not keep Jesus from following his father's will.

Look at verses 20 and 21 again. Now among those who went out to worship at the feast were some Greeks. So these came to Philip who was from Bethsaida in Galilee and asked him, sir, we wish to see Jesus.

And so here there's a couple of different thoughts among biblical scholars as to who these Greeks were. But I think that the evidence best suggests that these were God fearing Gentiles who came to Jerusalem to worship God and to celebrate the Passover.

And I also think that their desire to meet Jesus was fueled by what they had recently witnessed him do. You see, in Mark's account of Jesus' triumphal entry, he reveals that Jesus cleansed the temple for a second time.

And we know that when Jesus cleansed the temple, he came in and what he saw disheartened him. In the outer court reserved for the Gentiles to worship God, there was buying and there was selling and there was cheating going on in that place.

And Jesus declares that they had turned his father's house from a house of prayer into a den of thieves and he drove all of them out. What a distraction for these Gentiles to try to worship when all these animals that were there to be bought for sacrifice were, you know, their noises and their smells were filling that place and it drove Jesus to a point where he was so enraged that he kicked it all out.

And so perhaps these Greeks witnessed Jesus do that, cleansing the temple and saw in him someone who did not look down on them, someone who cared about their space and cared about their place in worship.

Philip. Or again, maybe they were just curious to meet this Jesus who so many people had been talking about. Then they go and they approach Philip. Why Philip of all the disciples?

Maybe he was the closest one. It could be that Philip had a Greek name and so maybe for that reason they felt like he was the right one to approach. We don't know and it really doesn't matter because the most important thing to see here is that their desire to see Jesus sent a message to our Savior that his hour had come.

Look in verses 22 through 23. Philip went and told Andrew. Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus. And Jesus answered them, the hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified.

as we've gone through the gospel of John we've heard Jesus refer to this hour as future. In chapter 2 verse 4 and chapter 4 verse 21 and in verse 23 and chapter 7 verse 30 and chapter 8 verse 20 this hour was always future.

But now all of a sudden Jesus says that his hour has come. This hour referring to the appointed time established by his father from eternity past for the son to die and rise again for the forgiveness of sins.

You know what's interesting here and we can't lose sight of is that the mission of the Jewish people was to be a light to the Gentile nations.

But we've seen that instead of doing that repeatedly over and over again and to this point in their history they hated the Gentiles. They despised the Gentiles and in that they failed to achieve the mission that God had given them but where the Jewish people had failed Jesus has succeeded.

Through his death and his resurrection we see the love of God for not just a certain group of people but for all kinds of people.

In John 3.16 Jesus declares that this is what he has come to do for God so loved the world that he gave his only son that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

You see in Jesus there is no division amongst believers. The temple had walls erected to keep certain people out because of their ethnicity but Jesus demolishes all barriers.

Our sinful nature causes us to erect the barriers that the gospel has demolished. Ephesians 2.13 through 16 Paul the apostle speaks of this very thing addressing a Gentile crowd he says but now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ for he himself is our peace who has made us both one speaking of Gentile and Jew both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility if you're a Gentile you couldn't go further into the temple you were stuck on the outside Jesus has divided these walls of hostility by abolishing the law of the commands expressed in ordinances that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two so making peace and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross thereby killing the hostility so you see as painful as that hour would be when he who knew no sin would become sin so that we might become the righteousness of

God Jesus in obeying his father's will that it would mean that he would suffer and it would mean that he would die in place of sinners but he understood that in doing so it would not be pointless it would not be meaningless it wouldn't be a death for possibilities it would be a death that ensured people would be saved and it would accomplish far greater things than anyone at that time understood and so Jesus says in verse 24 truly truly and when he says that he means come on focus in here what I have to say is very important I say to you unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies it remains alone but if it dies it bears much fruit so here's a science experiment you can try at home take a seed and put it on a shelf and see nothing's going to happen it has to go into the ground it has to germinate and as it germinates this seed that dies comes and brings forth life and it brings forth fruit the dying of the son of

God has produced life in abundant measure the Bible says that all have fallen short of the glory of God and are by nature children of wrath the Bible says that God's standard is perfection we fail miserably to meet that perfect standard and the Bible says that when we sin ultimately we are sinning against our creator when we sin what we're saying to our creator who's given us life you know I don't really believe that your ways are better I reject your authority over my life I choose to pursue my own will I choose to place my opinions and my feelings and my thoughts over and above your revealed word we see when

Jesus was in the garden of Gethsemane that hour is there he is about to be arrested he is about to go and be tried and crucified and he's in the garden of Gethsemane and he's praying about these things and he knows that the time will soon come imminently where he will be crushed by the father's wrath for the iniquities of our sin that God the father would unleash upon him his wrath for the sins that we have committed Jesus sweat drops of blood never knew fear never expressed fear at any time in his life and here he is our savior so distressed by what was about to happen that he sweat drops of blood now

I've been distressed and I've been stressed I've never sweat drops of blood and so what that should tell us is how horrific what Jesus endured on the cross how horrific it truly was for him and yet you remember he prays and he asked for that cup of wrath to pass but in the end he says yet father not my will but your will be done and he goes to the cross and he drinks every last drop from that cup until he says from the cross it is finished and he died and his death as he said has produced an abundance of fruit he took our sin he took our shame he bore!

our guilt he shed his blood for us to atone for our sins and he died in our place he endured hell for us on the third day he came back to life and he said that by faith in him in who he is and what he has done not on who we are what we've done that we who believe in him who have put our faith in him that just as he lives we live to now and forever and so we have a mission don't we this is good news we need to share this good news and carry out his commands and that's what Jesus is encouragement here look at verses 25 and 26 and he's saying this to you follower of

Christ whoever loves his life loses it and he's saying it to you also unbeliever and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life if anyone serves me he must follow me and where I am there my servant will be also if anyone serves!

me the father will honor him! Jesus is saying the person who loves his life will forfeit eternal life in heaven because the reality is that they truly love themselves more than God they truly love themselves more than anybody else they truly would rather obey their will than God's will they would rather serve their own agenda for their own selfish gains than to serve God's agenda and accomplish his will for their lives!

And in that they reject and deny God's sovereignty and God's goodness To reject him is to make yourself your own king or your own queen of your own little kingdom where you are your own sovereign And let me ask you if that is you how has that worked out for you?

I know how it's worked out for me when I ran from the Lord and I'll tell you I'm a miserable king I'm a really bad God I give myself terrible advice and I've done horrible things I cannot serve in that role God has not given it to me and I fell miserably at it because I'm a sinful man but thank God I've been saved by his grace and I know a king who is the king of kings and who is greater than anyone else and whose secure who loves me and who is willing to die on the cross and take my place for me Jesus Christ is worthy he's worthy of your obedience and your faith and he tells us and he commands us to understand that the one who dies to himself is the one who truly has life and that means as he said in other places take up your cross and follow him those who do are the ones who choose not to pander to their own self interests or seek to gain popularity but who trust in

Jesus Christ and they know that his ways are better that God's ways free from sin protect from sin and ultimately end in exaltation as Jesus says the one who does this will be honored and so I want us to look at Hebrews 12 1 through 2 quickly here this is my closing bit of encouragement for us before we move on to the application questions what should we do with this we have scripture that testifies to those who by God's working put their faith in him and were rewarded and blessed others because of the lives that they live therefore since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses!

Let us lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely let us run with endurance the faith that is set before us looking to Jesus the founder and perfecter of our faith who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross despising the shame and has been seated at the right hand of the throne of God and so what our Lord wants you to know today is that the Christian life is the unwasted life the life that is spent obeying God's will in serving Jesus Christ ends with honor glory exaltation and peace as you see your Savior face to face praise Jesus that the things that so easily keep us off course did not do the same to him and thank God that even as followers of his when we go off course he is gracious and loving and forgiving to remind us to pick us up and to set us back on the course that we got distracted from and may we be the same way to one another by our

Savior's example we should see and we should know that it is far better to obey God's will and serve Jesus you will not be disappointed three questions of application that we'll talk about tonight encourage you to come to that study at 630 we meet right here in the sanctuary if not I encourage you to come back to these questions and even if you come back to these questions and really think about them in this passage and ask that the Spirit would be at work in you to make you more like Jesus question number one how can seeking the flattery of people derail a Christian in a church from obeying God's will and serving Jesus a follow-up question to that are you currently seeking man's praise or God's glory in your life and one way that it helps me to understand whether I'm seeking my glory or

God's is to ask myself why am I doing this who stands to look good from this decision question number two Jesus was not afraid of those who schemed against him what promises do we have from Jesus in his word that can help us overcome those fears what promises do we have and then finally what does it say about Jesus that though he knew the trepidation of that final hour he was still willing he still willingly endured the cross for you think about Jesus in that final hour and the trepidation he faced yet he was still willing to endure it to save you what does it say about how good our savior is if you're hearing these if you've heard these words you've heard the gospel preached!

today and you realize that you know what I don't know Jesus as my Lord and savior I'll be down here and that's uncomfortable I encourage you to reach out to me today call me text me I would love to share more about the good news of Jesus Christ and how better it is to obey the father's will and serve Jesus let's pray heavenly father we thank you so much for your word we thank you so much for this day God we have already seen that when we go when we participate in the great commission that there is fruit and we have seen that through the baptisms that we have witnessed this morning God may we live our lives knowing and being convicted and convinced that it is better to follow your ways than our own that it is better to serve Jesus than to serve ourselves Lord I pray that this message would be one that your spirit!

continually brings a fresh to our minds so that wherever we're at wherever we go we have us go that we would trust in you follow you and live our lives for you knowing that in the end it will all be worth it God be glorified in our lives be glorified in your church in Jesus name we pray!