We’ll be in Matthew chapter 10 again. Matthew chapter 10, really just verse 2, the second half of verse 2 this week.

Matthew chapter 10, verse 2, the second half.

And all I really want us to see there is where it says, it says, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother.

That’s really it. I’ve been reading a book lately. And it’s about what really is the nature of pastoral ministry. Because I think that gets convoluted today about what a pastor is and what a pastor is supposed to do. So in this book, he’s making a lot of references and parallels with farming. He grew up on a farm. But more than that, his father and his father’s father grew up on a farm. So he’s talking about his dad and really he’s saying, my dad as growing up and seeing him deal with all the problems of farming and all the setbacks that come with that. He said, really my dad was doing work on the farm then, but my dad was a farmer before he farmed. He became a farmer watching his dad farm. He learned what it meant to stay up all night with a heifer that was getting ready to birth. A calf for the first time. What it meant to work in the fields. What it meant to know what a good seed looked like when it was germinated properly. So he was a farmer. He didn’t just do farm work. And the word he uses, and it’s an old word, it’s called habitus. Maybe you’ve heard the word habitus. It can be used in sociology. But essentially habitus is the disposition of a person’s soul, their life, that leads them to live the life that they lead. So it’s one thing, to do farming. It’s another thing to be a farmer. It’s just part of who you are. You just understand it, and you love it, and all that you’re doing, it flows from that. And so I think there’s a lot of great parallels there, surely for ministry, but I think there are wonderful parallels there for just Christian discipleship on the whole. It’s one thing to outwardly do the exercises of religion. It’s quite another thing to have the disposition, inside of a disciple. And I think it’s critical to understand Christ is not just calling us to outwardly exercise obedience. He is. But is it possible to do the right things for the wrong reasons? I think is the concern for every disciple. What you and I need is a God-given habitus. It’s not one you could just get. Maybe in your profession you would say, oh, I have the habitus of a teacher, of a doctor, whatever that would be. The habitus, if you will, of the disciple is God-given. So do we have that inward disposition that matches the outward obedience? That’s what I want us to think about this morning is our discipleship as it relates to the heart of the matter. Okay? And we’re going to consider this week as we did Andrew and Peter last week, we’re going to consider James and John, alright, the brothers there, the sons of Zebedee. So turn with me, if you would, to Mark chapter 1. Mark chapter 1, verses 19, 19 and 20.

And earlier there in Mark’s account, he says, and going a little further, he, meaning Jesus, Jesus saw James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. And immediately, he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him. So they left their dad and they left everything. They left everything. And as is always the case, that is a commendable first step of discipleship. It’s going when you’re called to go. Jesus said, come follow me, and they went. They left behind perhaps the life they preferred to have. A life comfortable. It was sacrificial for them to do that. Very possibly, their father Zebedee was a wealthy man. He had hired servants. So maybe he had a big business, it’s likely to assume. So they’re leaving behind likely maybe a cushion, a sheet of life that they’ve always had. So it’s commendable to go when Jesus says go. And it’s necessary to go when Jesus says go. Just go when Jesus says follow me. But again, is that outward obedience, is it correlating with something else Jesus domains in our discipleship? And that’s an interchange. As much as it’s worth noting their outward obedience, we’re pressed to consider their inside, the guts of their discipleship. And I said last week, there’s nothing in any of these men worth noting or praising, right? What’s worth noting in them is the grace of God at work. And our first clue when we think about making a word portrait of James and John, it’s their nickname. So Peter got his cool nickname, The Rock, right? And James and John, they get this cool nickname, The Sons of Thunder. That’s a pretty good one when you walk in the room. Here come the sons of thunder. Now Jesus never said, hey, this is explicitly why I called them the sons of thunder. But it’s pretty easy to deduce if we consider the gospel accounts of what James and John do and say. James and John have a certain nerve. They have a certain audacity about them. All right? And in seeing these narratives, plainly, we will see their imperfect insides. The error in the heart, the heart of their discipleship despite the requirements of it. So the first thing I want us to see this morning is this. The call of discipleship requires

great suffering and servitude. All right? The call to discipleship, the heart of discipleship, it requires great serving, great suffering and servitude. So I’m going to go to Mark 10 here. We’re going to read one or two of these accounts. In Mark 10.35,

here’s what Mark records.

It says, And James and John, the sons of Zebedee, came up to Him, Jesus, and said to Him, Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of You. And He said to them, What do you want Me to do for you? And they said to Him, Grant us to sit one at Your right hand and one at Your left in Your glory. Jesus said to them, You do not know what you’re asking. Are you able to drink the cup that I drink or be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized? And they said, And they said to Him, We are able. And Jesus said to them, The cup that I drink, you will drink. And with the baptism with which I am baptized, you will be baptized. But to sit at My right hand or at My left hand is not Mine to grant, but it’s for those whom it has been prepared. And when the ten heard it, they began to be indignant at James and John. And Jesus called them to Him and He said to them, You know that those who are considered rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. But it shall, not be so among you. But whoever would be great among you must be your servant. And whoever would be first among you must be slave of all. For even the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and to give His life as a ransom for many. So, what great nerve is that? Matthew’s Gospel Academy actually has James and John sending their mother to do the dirty work for them and asks the question, and what they ask of Jesus is, hey, Jesus, you know, in Your glory, when Your kingdom comes, Matthew says in his account, we want to be prominent. We want to be really important. So can You assure us now, tell us now, we’re going to count. We’re going to be really important in Your kingdom. And now here’s the truth. The truth is, they weren’t actually asking for a wrong thing. They weren’t. They weren’t asking for a bad thing. What they were doing, though, was wanting to get it the wrong way and for the wrong reasons.

Matthew Poole says, how carnal are our conceptions of spiritual and heavenly things till we be taught of God a right notion of them. So Galatians does say we will be heirs through God. Corinthians says we will judge fallen angels when eternity comes. Timothy says we will reign with Christ. Ephesians says we will be seated with Him in the heavenly places. Romans says we will be co-heirs with Him. So all those verses are plain evidences to this. Disciples, true disciples, in God’s eternal kingdom, we will have a share in Christ’s victory. We will have a share in Christ’s reign. We will be in a royal family taking part with Christ in ruling and reigning in a new creation. R.C. Sproul says we will sit on thrones alongside our Savior and enjoy by grace what is His by right. So that’s not something that’s wrong to think about as a disciple. But let me say this to you. As good as that mysterious truth is and all that it means, and again it’s a mystery, what will that mean to reign with Christ? The glory of the coming kingdom, desiring it, wanting that alone, apart from the demands of discipleship now, friends, that is a gross, inaccurate view of the full scope of Christian discipleship. You understand? Jesus responds to that faulty question really with the two holes He needs to address in their discipleship. The who, who they are, and the what they do. And for Jesus, the who produces the what and the what comes from the who. Jesus says, you don’t know what you’re asking for. And they obnoxiously say, oh yeah we do. Right? Jesus says, you can drink the cup I drink. You can be baptized with my baptism. And that’s Jesus’ veiled way of saying, my cup in life is to suffer. My baptism is a baptism of painful suffering and death. It’s the trial of the cross. Jesus says, that’s what my cup is. And secondly, He says, you have to be a servant of all. He says, you know, Gentiles, the world, they love to lord their position, their power over their subordinates. But Jesus says, that’s not how my kingdom works. He says, in my kingdom, you know what greatness looks like? Greatness looks like humility. Not a false illusion. Greatness is servitude and not in pretense. Jesus gets to the heart of the matter with James and John and really all the disciples because they’re indignant. They’re just mad they didn’t ask the question first. Really. Greatness in the kingdom of God, hear me say it, is suffering the loss of this world, all its treasures, its praises, its comforts, and it is aborting the process of self-exaltation. That’s what’s great in God’s kingdom. To really and truly in the heart be a servant of God. To really and truly be a suffering servant after in the manner of Christ who uniquely, perfectly manifested suffering and servitude in His life. Which it stands to reason then, doesn’t it? If you and I want to share in Christ’s glorious kingdom, we have to have a share in His suffering and in His servitude. So I gave you half the picture with those verses I read. Let me give you the whole picture. Romans chapter 8, verse 17. Then heirs, here we go, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, comma,

provided we suffer

with Him in order that we may also be glorified with Him. You want to reign with Christ? You must suffer with Christ. 2 Timothy 2.11 The saying is trustworthy, for if we have died with Him, we will live with Him. If we endure, we will also reign with Him. Suffering like Christ, serving for Christ, hear me say it, it’s the only pathway to glory. And Jesus is not calling you and I to do this, like, alright, I have to serve people in heaven, so I’m going to grit my teeth and do it. I’d rather be dominating people. You know, I guess I’ll suffer even though I despise every season of suffering that God brings. That’s not the case at all. You can’t dupe God with false discipleship. In the heart, truly and really, He wants you and I to have a changed, changed disposition where we actually value humility, value servitude. Why? Because it’s God-like. It’s just simply what looks like God. So when God looks on the heart of your discipleship, does He see the anthem of humility? You know what Paul says in chapter 2, consider Christ, what, though He was God, in the form of God, He didn’t consider a thing to be grasped, and though He was the Son of God, He lowered Himself to the point of death. You and I have that infection, called pride. We deal day in and day out with the pride of life, and you know what pride constantly does? It bedazzles us into thinking life would be better lived making much of me rather than making much of God and making much of God in other people’s lives through manifesting Christ in service and help. That’s what we’re constantly believing, that lie. But it’s a lie. That’s what it is. A perfect world, what do people do? How are people satisfied? I’m satisfied in knowing a God who loves me, a God who is a help to me, a God who desires to be a provision for me and to me, though He’s not obligated to me, and that I can bear that very same character in my life and manifest the likeness of God so other people can say, wow, why are you that way? What is this? Oh, let me point you to Jesus. Let me point you to God. What does sinful self do? It demands for it. It demands for itself, where Christ’s likeness denies itself. Sinful self passes over as to avoid inconvenience. Christ’s likeness passes by to serve and help. So it’s a question really at the end of the day, do you want to spend your life making much of you or making much of God? Man’s kingdom, oh, it has a flash of glory, but it’s really a shadow of something that doesn’t exist. That’s all it is. It’s the mirage of your flesh. But to know life in the kingdom, friends, is to have a life of joy and satisfaction and serving others and serving the great king. That’s satisfaction. That’s life when you and I can love one another and be submitted to and committed to one another as God intended for us to be. And as we will in the new kingdom to come, as we will be. What about suffering? I’m supposed to like serving. Am I supposed to like suffering? Is God like watching me suffer? Am I supposed to like enjoy the pain? No. No. But, you know, Paul gives us a pretty square reason why God does allow us to suffer in Romans chapter 5.

Paul says, 5.3, not only that, but we rejoice in our suffering. Why would I rejoice in my suffering? Because he says, knowing that suffering, what’s it do? It produces endurance. And endurance produces character. And character produces hope. And that hope doesn’t put me to shame because God’s love is important in my heart through the Holy Spirit has been given to me. So God leads me to suffer to burn away the old man. He’s getting rid of me. God allows me to suffer to expose in me where I still love the fallen man, where I still love this world, where I’ve yet to love his kingdom truly. What is suffering doing? It’s preparing me to reign with Christ.

Suffering is preparing me for that weight of glory Paul talks about beyond comprehension. What is Christ reigning? When we talk about reigning in terms of what Christ did, in his manhood. What’s reigning, isn’t it? Through the cross over sin. It’s reigning over death. It’s reigning over the effects of the fall of man. So when I, with Christ, suffer the loss of the world, suffer the loss of myself, I will be raised to new life over sin, over death, over the effects of the fall, both spiritually now and in the new heaven and earth to come.

More pointedly, when I take up my cross, just like Jesus did, and I follow him, I’m following him out of this kingdom that will pass away and into his kingdom that will last forever. So no, God doesn’t want to hurt you. God wants to save you. But the only way to save you is through the painful bloody death of Jesus, that through that, you would be brought to eternal life. God wants to save you from yourself. He wants to empty you of you and fill you up with Christ and that be your glory. And that glory is a far greater glory you could ever attain for yourself.

Acts chapter 12 it says, About that time, Herod the king laid violent hands on some who belonged to the church, and he killed James, the brother of John with the sword. Don’t marvel at James. Marvel at the Christ who led James to see the end of himself in real life in Jesus.

D.L. Moody was once asked the question, Have you the grace to be a martyr?

Moody replied, No, I have not. But if God wanted me to be one, he would give me a martyr’s grace.

You know, will God call you to martyrdom in life? I have no idea. I have no idea. I believe he’d give you the grace to suffer it. But, you know, way before martyrdom, which largely most of us won’t experience, God is giving you the grace every day to die to yourself. If you’re not dying to you, it’s not because God isn’t equipping you with Christ. It’s because you’re choosing to live in the old man. You have the equipping in Christ to live for the kingdom to come.

And when we talk about service, I know you think, well, service, that’s such a wide, big word, you know, that could apply to my life. And yes, absolutely. It’s a really big word that should apply to a lot of your life. I think in this order. Home, church, world. Now, in my home, I have the choice to consciously care about my wife. I have the choice to care about big and small things. Problems she’s dealing with. Struggles she’s having. Right? I can find those out. I can pray for her. I can be a spiritual. I can be a spiritual leader in my home. Small things. Honeydew list. Now, you’re thinking, that’s surely of no interest to Jesus. Wrong. And here’s why. In the smallest things of life, you discover the nature of your heart. So I can say, yes, she wants that fixed. And yes, it is a huge inconvenience to her today, but I don’t have time. And she’ll understand if I say, I’ll do it next weekend. And then I’ll say again, I’ll do it next weekend. What am I doing? I’m prioritizing Chad over Jessica. I’m not looking like Jesus in the big and small things. In servitude. It either is in the habitus or it’s not. Right? Same thing with children. Same thing in the church. In the church, I can come and be a consumer and take. Or I can serve and say, the church is a family. It’s not a country club. Where are the needs in this church? Someone hand me a broom. Where is there a hole in the ministry? Maybe no God didn’t put me on the face of the earth to, you know, run around and chase snotty-nosed kids. But I know that when I do it, it’s going to bring Him glory because I’m looking like Jesus and He’s working through that. So in church, on the biscuit, but in personal lives. Hey, if something’s going on, somebody’s alive. Hey, let’s help you. Let’s serve you financially. Let’s meet that burden. What does it look like to die to self and be for other people and they be more significant? The church, if anywhere, is where that should be mostly manifested. And then I would say thirdly, the Bible would say, those things are taken care of. The church should be in the world. And where do I see brokenness in my community? Where can I love well? Where can I serve well? Where can I help people struggling? Not just to do it, but what was helping people to Jesus? It was always a means to say, yes, let me help your physical needs, but let me do that so I can point you to the one who’s helped your soul, right? That’s always what it’s about. So we should always want as Christians to maintain that posture of, of serving. And serving often is suffering because you have to die. No one wants to die. But friends, if we’re going to follow Christ, what did He say? Take up your cross sometimes. Take up your cross when it’s convenient. No, He said daily. That means all the time. That means if you’re not asleep, you’ve got a cross, you’re caring, you’re dying to you so the life of Christ would be, will be manifested in you. Pray for the heart of a suffering servant.

Well, in verse 2 there of chapter 10 in Matthew, we saw a little bit there of James and John, and I just wanted us to look at another thing, and I’m going to go to Luke chapter 9.

Luke chapter 9, the call to discipleship requires great suffering and servitude, and secondly, I want to say it requires great love.

Luke chapter 9, verse 51. It says, When the days drew near for Him, Jesus, to be taken up, He set His face to go to Jerusalem. And He sent messengers ahead of Him who went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make preparations for Him. But the people did not receive Him because His face was set toward Jerusalem. And when His disciples, James and John, saw it, they said, Lord, do you want us to tell fire to come down from heaven and consume them? But He turned and rebuked them. And they went to another village. So they’re not being super spiritual. You almost wish you could see Jesus’ face. Like, what did you just say? Call fire down from heaven? Now, remember, Jews hated Samaritans, and Samaritans hated Jews. That’s how it went. The Jews and Samaritans avoided one another at all costs. Jews accused Samaritans, and they did, of polluting Judaism. So, just flash back to the Old Testament for a second. The Assyrians, they conquered the northern tribe of the northern kingdom of Israel, and they repopulated the northern kingdom, Samaria being the capital of the northern kingdom, with a slew of nationalities. So now those slew of nationalities, along with the remnant of Jews who were left behind, they formed this syncretistic, kind of pagan slash Judaistic worship. So when Jews finally came back to the land, they found these Samaritans in northern Israel with this weird, perverted version of Judaism. Alright? You fast forward to Jesus’ time, what’s going on? Well, the Samaritans, they’re saying, hey, no, y’all were wrong for worshiping in Jerusalem, your temple’s wrong, your priesthood system is invalid, you should be worshiping where we worship here in Samaria. Alright? They didn’t validate the whole of the Old Testament, so Genesis all the way to Malachi, they didn’t care about it. It’s one of the first five books. And then lastly, they said Moses is more godlike. Moses has kind of pre-existed. So they really almost put a divinity, on Moses. So for all these reasons, there’s always been this animosity of some good reasons, some not good reasons between Jews and Samaritans. You remember when Jesus goes into Samaria and talks to the woman, she’s astounded. She says, what are you doing, a Jewish man talking to me? And when the disciples walk up on it, they marveled, John says.

So, James and John wanting to call fire down from heaven, it makes a little more sense that they’d want to do it, I guess. Daryl Bach says James and John are asking for the ancient equivalent of nuking your enemy, right? But just because it makes more sense that they want to do it, does it make it any more right, is the question.

And I think they would probably say, yeah, well, they perverted Judaism. And you know, they’re hostile to us. And you know, they got bad theology. And you know this, and you know that. And I think you could say to all that stuff, yeah, yeah, all that stuff is true. But how quickly, have James and John forgotten what Jesus said in the Sermon on the Mount?

Jesus said, you’ve heard that it was said, you shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy, but I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven. And it’s not even true that the God of the Old Testament and the New Testament, Jesus, back in the Old Testament was saying, hey, it’s fine to hate your enemy, but now I’m here in the flesh, so we’re going to start loving them. We’re kind of switching tackles. That was never true. In Exodus 23, it says, if you meet your enemy’s ox or his donkey going astray, take it back to him. And in Proverbs, it says, if your enemy’s hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he’s thirsty, give him water to drink. So you see what’s going on here. Jesus is showing James and John, you’re just as much the enemies of God as the Samaritans, because you can’t keep the law. You don’t really love all that God has taught. It’s not inside your heart.

I want to say that enemy,

that’s a really dangerous word for us to use as Christians. It’s a really dangerous word.

Because if we’re following Jesus truly and really down in the heart, you necessarily have first seen yourself as an enemy of God. In your heart, mind, and soul. You have seen that the law says you are against God. You cannot please God. You are not on God’s team. Not John, not James, not the Samaritans, not us. God is on God’s side. And by our very nature and the limitations of our human heart, we cannot please God. We are labeled enemy. That is true of all of us. But here’s the incredible thing. When we encounter God’s Christ, we encounter love, friends, we did not deserve. When we encounter Christ, our status as enemy, it’s been changed to friend. And I imagine, I wonder if the Apostle John, when he was writing his epistle, thought back to that time that he and James said that. What was I thinking? He says this. He says in 1 John 4, in this is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us. That God’s sent His only Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love. Not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation. The once and total satisfaction for all our sins, all our wrongs, our status as enemy. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God, but if we love one another, God abides in us and His love is perfected in us. You have been made a friend of God because God befriended you. You were an enemy. You were against God, but the blood of Christ has made you child. The blood of Christ has made you friend. And if that’s true, you know what it does? It changes the definition of enemy for you as a Christian. Enemy now is not someone against me. Enemy means opportunity. Enemy means opportunity to show the love, the forgiveness that Christ showed me, though I didn’t deserve it. That’s so much the work of a disciple. It’s really painful, isn’t it? And it does start, first I want to say, in the church. The church is a painful training ground where we learn to love. And that’s really, really hard. You know why it’s hard? Because you have a lot of faults, and so do I. You have a lot of vices, and so do I. I don’t have enough patience for you, and you don’t have enough patience for me. The whole thing, this thing we do called church, it absolutely falls apart if it isn’t based on Jesus Christ, who through His blood washed away our sin so that we could know and experience the love of God, but also know what it means to love and forgive and have true fellowship with one another because of Jesus who died on the cross to love us well. We’re made one in Christ. And so I do think you’ve got to elevate love to a whole other level and take it out of its generic form you hear in the world. Because Jesus said, hey, this is how the world’s going to know about me. Here it is. It’s how you love one another. So friends, loving well has got to be a cornerstone of our church if we’re going to look like Jesus and see the cross. The cross displayed.

There’s going to come a time, maybe today, you’re going to want fire to rain down from heaven on somebody. It’s not an if, it’s a when. Okay? It’s not an if, it’s a when. You cut me off. You took advantage of me the last time. I heard you bad mouth behind my back. You’ve run my patience up. You’ve stolen from me. You’ve hurt someone I love. All that will happen to you. And in that moment, the heart of your discipleship will be exposed. You’ll find out the weight and worth of what’s in the heart of your following Jesus. And I want to ask you, what’s going to be there? Is it going to be you? Is it going to be your response to your version of justice?

Or is it going to be the substance of Christ who, though He was perfect, though He was in the form of God, became a man and He died for sinners.

Augustine once said, You have enemies for who on earth can live without them? Take heed to yourselves. Love them. In no way can your enemy so hurt you by his violence as you hurt yourself if you love him not.

Friends, I think that there truly is power in the cross to not allow hate and not allow vengeance and bitterness. And again, what I want justice to be, to override just the freedom of forgiveness and love and entrusting justice to God. That’s what He’s calling us to do. Love doesn’t mean hey, you know, I’m a Christian so I’m a doormat. I’m just going to let people walk all over me and if people hurt me, whatever, and if they’re doing wrong, I’m just going to love them. That’s not love. Alright? That’s enablement. I think there’s such a thing and it’s often the kind of love that’s needed to when you do experience the hard blow, I’m going to forgive you. Whatever that was, it’s going to be really hard for me because I’m not Christ, but because I have Christ, I’m going to forgive you but I’m also going to love you so much to issue correction. I’m going to speak the truth, what does Paul say, in love. So I can’t think about love and it means just backing off from you and your wrongs. Often when you do your wrongs against me, it requires me loving you so much rather to beat you down to actually build you up. So I think love is seen how you edify the people that hurt you as Christ edified and built us up through His cross. Are you as a disciple in the business of improving your enemies? And that sounds totally upside down, doesn’t it, in our world? But isn’t the kingdom of God totally upside down? Isn’t that the kingdom we say we want and desire to be a part of?

So friends, what we need is Christ at the heart of the matter. James and John, they were misguided, weren’t they, in their ambitions of glory. They were awfully confused about who qualified for the kingdom. But by grace, they could see at the last what they couldn’t see at the first. At the first, they only saw themselves in a big mirror. They saw their names in light. They saw being served. They saw greatness for themselves. They didn’t see suffering. They didn’t see helping. They saw conquering. But by the grace of God at the end, they saw in faith Jesus. And Jesus didn’t help them out. You know what Jesus did? Jesus gave them a new heart. Jesus said, let me take that old dirty, nasty thing out of your chest. Let me put myself right there so that you love people well. That you love through the cross. That’s what happened for James and John. Christ got to the heart of the matter. Christ gave them a new disposition.

And it’s something, that the prophets look forward to. In Ezekiel 36, 26, it says, I will give you a new heart and a new spirit. I will put within you. And I will remove the heart of stone from you, from your flesh, and give you a heart of flesh.

Ezekiel looked forward to the day where we wouldn’t be dead zombies, enslaved by our sinful desire, but in Christ we were truly brought to life and be new creatures with new dispositions to love God and to love one another. And so be satisfied and bring God glory. That’s the work of the disciple. Do you have Jesus at the heart of the matter? Don’t fool yourself with the outward work of religion. You can go to church your whole life. You can do service projects your whole life. You can share the gospel your whole life. You can do a lot of things and not truly have Christ in at the heart of the matter. It’s Christ, Lord. It’s Christ, Savior. It’s Christ, living. It’s Christ, living in you. Paul says, I have been crucified with Christ. It’s no longer I who live. Paul’s not alive. He says, it’s Christ in me. I live by faith in Jesus now who loved me, who gave himself for me. I can’t follow Christ. I don’t have what it takes. I need Jesus. I need the Spirit to connect me to Christ. I need the Spirit to make me one with Christ. I don’t want my old life. I want a new life in Jesus. Jesus rose up victorious over sin and death and grave and selfishness and impatience and hate and anger and everything that’s broken in this world. So I need just the Spirit then to give me the eyes to see by faith Christ that I would be joined to Him. Made one with Christ for an eternity. Because it’s only in Christ I’m going to have the fellowship of the Trinity and know God. And it’s only in Christ I’m really going to know the fellowship of the church. Friends, you need not some of Christ. You need all of Christ to replace all of you to come into His kingdom. To let go of you and grab hold of Jesus by faith. Amen? It’s Jesus in the heart of the matter. Just one Jesus.

Let’s pray.

Lord, we just come before You and we just want You to have Your way with us. We want You to break down every barrier. Lord, soften every callous.

Lord, knock down our strongholds.

Lord, see through us until You get to our soul. And there where it’s dark. There where sin hides.

There where we think life is found in pursuing ourselves. We pray that Your Spirit alone withdraws to repentance. That Your kindness withdraws to repentance. And how kind You are. For You have sent Christ, Your beloved, precious Son, to bleed and die for sinners. So let that kindness draw us in and be made new creations, new creatures.

Oh, give us power to let go of this world. Let go of ourselves.

Oh, that we would just come to new life in Jesus. Just knowing Him and being known by Him. Oh, make that our food. Make that our drink. Make that our prized possession alone, we pray.

And we pray that as we’re satisfied in Jesus, Father, You would be brought all glory.

And we just pray that in Christ’s name. Amen.