The Church of Eleven22 - Saturated 2023 - Friday: J.D. Greear

Episode Date: September 9, 2023

Saturated is our annual five-day event in which we anticipate the movement of God to bring revival in our lives individually and as a church body. - The Church of Eleven22™ is a movement for all people to discover and deepen a relationship with Jesus Christ. Eleven22 is led by Pastor Joby Martin and based in Jacksonville, Florida, with multiple campuses throughout Jacksonville and the surrounding areas. To support The Church of Eleven22 and help us continue to reach people around the world, visit https://www.coe22.com/donate

Thank you, Church of 1122 for the best and worst introduction I have ever had in my entire life. Y'all, I always get a little nervous up here preaching for Pastor Joby because he really is one of our country's greatest preachers. And this is one of the greatest churches that God has his hand on in our country. And what an honor to be here. I think I told you last time I was here that I always feel like if C.S. Lewis, Charles Spurgeon, and Jeff Foxworthy could have a child together, the offspring would be Joby Martin. And so I'll be honest. I'm going to do this for a living, but it's still kind of intimidating to stand here. My wife noticed this week as I was trying to get ready for tonight. I think she

just noticed that I was a little bit more anxious than normal. And she said, well, what are you, what are you worried about? You do this all the time? And I'm like, but what if I'm not, you know, engaging enough or entertaining enough? Or what if I'm not funny enough? Because, you know, Pastor Joby is really, really funny. And she said, would you relax? She said, just don't worry about it. Get up there, do what you always do. She said, don't try to be smart or witty or funny or profound or cool.

Just be yourself, okay? So whatever that means, whatever that means. And let me just say here, right before we begin, to those of you that are here right in front of me and also at the, I believe, eight other campuses or seven other campuses that are all together tonight. Tonight at every campus, we are going to end with an opportunity for you to be baptized if you never have. And we are excited about that for you. For you, baptism, if you don't know, is the public declaration of deciding to follow Jesus.

It is the ceremony. It's, we often say, like the wedding ring that you put on, that demonstrates to everyone else that you are married. It's what you do when you go public with your faith in Jesus. Scripture teaches us that it is to be our first act of obedience after we choose to become Jesus's follower. But I know, I know that there are probably a number of you in here or listening to me right now that have never made that decision to be baptized. And for some of you, it's because you're not a Christian yet. And Lord willing, by God's grace tonight, you're going to make that decision to become a follower of Jesus and your first. first act of obedience. You're going to do it right. You're going to do it the New Testament way.

You're going to get saved in one breath and you're going to get baptized in the next. That's some of you. For others of you, you were saved a while ago. You became a Christian. It may have been a few weeks ago. May have been a couple nights ago. May have been 10, 15, 20, 40 years ago. But for whatever reason, you have yet to take the step to declare that through believers baptism. And I'm not here to judge you for that, but I am here to give you an opportunity for you, to actually make it right. And I know that tonight you may not have come here planning to do that, but that's okay. God was planning on it.

That's why he brought you here. And we are also ready for you here at the Church of 1122. We have changes of clothes for you. We have products. We have thought of, tried to think of everything that you would need. And so, how are you like, well, we got people here to take your picture. I even think we got hair products here. I know Pastor Jobi doesn't care about his hair.

but I know some of you do, so we've even thought of that. Seriously, everything you'll need. I am not an expert at many things, on many things, y'all, but I am an expert on baptism, I think, and that's in part because of the number of times that I was baptized when I was a teenager or college student, which was the overflow of how many times I had prayed the sinner's prayer. I often joke, it's actually not a joke, I'm serious,

I think if there were a Guinness Book of World's Records for how many times a single, human being has prayed the sinner's prayer. I would hold that record, no questions about it. This is not a joke. By the time I left for college, I had prayed the center's prayer no less than 5,000 times. I wish I were joking. Every single time when I was in middle school or high school, almost every single time that our pastor gave an invitation, I raised my hand, I walked forward, I got saved. It was almost a little embarrassing. I got saved every single year at youth camp. I've been saved at youth camps all over the nation.

I think I've been saved in every denomination. And then I followed up with baptism. My church, this part I'm not serious about, but I think they actually considered getting me a locker in the baptismal. That's how often. I think one year I fulfilled our baptism goals all by myself. It got to the point that my dad, my dad, who's a godly man, was like, son, you've got to cut this out.

I'm not sure how to explain this to our friends when you keep going forward and getting baptized. But see, I didn't want to be wrong about it. That was what was driving me. I kept being afraid that, you know, something didn't take and I hadn't done it right. And so that's what I want to talk with you about tonight, is how can you know, how can you know that you are saved? And how can you know that it's time to be baptized? Interestingly, I was preaching at a Christian school chapel not long ago, just actually a few weeks ago.

And I passed out little three by five cards to the whole audience. and I asked them to write down an answer to a question. And that question, again, at a Christian school, I just said, would you answer this question? In your view, how can a person know for sure that they will go to heaven when they die? And then I took up their responses. About a third of the responses when I went through them later and there were several hundred of them. About a third of them were, let's just say, a fairly decent explanation of the gospel. I wouldn't call them the most articulate, you know, expressions of the gospel I'd ever heard,

but they were at least pointing the right direction. About another third of them were, it's not, they didn't really say anything wrong per se, but it was a pretty far cry from what you would say as like a very clear expression of the gospel. I mean, things like if you trust God and try to follow Jesus, things like that. I'm like, yeah, okay, maybe we could go with that. About a third of the answers that came in were just, I mean, outright heresy. No ambiguity at all. That is well articulated heresy when I read the,

things. And that was at a Christian school, probably the best Christian school that we have in our area. And so I figured if some of them were unclear, then maybe some of you are, too, even though you have the opportunity to be under some of the best preaching in the country. And so tonight, I want to do my very best just to make it as painfully and as simply clear as I possibly can. Paul wrote Romans chapter 3 versus 23 through 25 to answer the question of how you can know that you know that you know that you know that you will go to heaven when you die. So if you have a Bible and you haven't done so already, why don't you take it out and open it up or turn it on if you're super cool and go down to Romans chapter 3. How many of you have an actual paper Bible? Why don't you hold that up?

I love that. Thank you for that. My pastor growing up used to say the sweetest sound he heard was the sound of the ruffling of the pages as people opened their Bible to God's word. As a pastor of a church full of millennials and Gen Ziers and whatever comes after them, I never get to hear that sound. I get to see the warm glow of God's word on their faces. And I'll take it, whatever you got.

But Romans chapter 3, many theologians say that Romans chapter 3 versus 23 through 25 constitute the most important sentence in the Bible, maybe the most important sentence in human history. Martin Luther said that the sentence that makes up these three verses mark the center point of the entire Bible, and that this is the sentence on which the entire Christian life rises and falls. It begins like this. Romans 3, verse 23, for all have sin and falls short of the glory of God.

Let's start with the bad news. Nobody, Paul says, is good enough to qualify for acceptance by God. All have sinned. A lot of us tend to think of sin as heinous acts, adultery, murder, violence. And it certainly includes those things, of course, but sin in its essence is simply rebellion against God. It's thinking that we know better, thinking that our plan is better, thinking that our plan is better, thinking that that whatever it is that we want is more important than what God wants. I always tell my kids that the best way to understand sin is simply by looking at the middle letter. S-I-N. It's when I think that what I want is better than what God wants and when I do what I want to do rather than what God wants me to do. And that is a rebellion from those of you that have grown up, and this is your first time in church, to those of you that have grown up in church.

Like me, you say the only drug problem I ever had growing up was getting, drug to church. I don't care what side of that, just you're on. That is a rebellion that every single one of us has participated in. And that means that all of us fall short of God's glory. Most of us like to measure ourselves by how well we compare to others. But Paul makes clear in Romans 323 that our true measure is what is what God is worthy of compared to our obedience. What his glory would bring him glory, what he deserves. Think about your life. Has it been a of devotion to God. Has it been one characterized by surrender and humility and an outright unqualified devotion to giving God glory? And Paul says, if not, that you fall short of what God deserves,

you fall short of his glory. Imagine if we went out here to Jacksonville Beach and I'll try to swim to England. I can swim, but I promise you I'm not making it farther than a mile, mile and a half maybe. I'll get farther than Joby. I'm quite confident of that, but I'm not going to make it much farther than that. I'd be toast. Maybe you're a great swimmer. Maybe you're like an epic swimmer and you make 10, 15, maybe 20 miles. In the end, one mile, 10 miles, 20 miles, that makes that much difference because all of us fall short of England by about 4,300 miles. And for all of us, Paul says, our sin puts us miles away from the glory that God deserves and what it would take for us to earn acceptance before God. So Paul continues, but we are justified by his grace as a gift

of the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood to be received by faith. Now, there's a bunch of really, really important words in there, big words like propitiation and redemption and justification words you probably don't use much in normal conversation but these words contain within them the secrets of eternal life and you are capable of learning them i mean i figure if you can memorize your what 14 ingredients 16 dollar drinks at Starbucks, you can memorize these words and know what they mean. The first one's very easy. Grace.

Grace. Verse 24, we are justified by His grace as a gift. Grace simply means gift. It means something that you do not deserve. A lot of times people will say to me that, you know, all religions are basically the same. They all teach people to love God and be nice and do good and tell the truth and that sort of thing. but that's not true.

Every other religious message in the world works off of the premise. I obey, therefore I will be accepted. I obey, and if I obey well enough and often enough and sincerely enough, then God will accept me. You may put different variables into what it means to obey God. It might be the eightfold path of Buddha. It might be the five pillars of Islam. It might be going to church and going through the sacraments. It might be coming here and being a part of a small group and diving and

and volunteering on the weekend. But whatever it is, the premise is, I obeyed, therefore I will be accepted. The gospel reverses that premise and says, no, you are accepted. And in response to that, you obey. I'm accepted, therefore I obey. It reverses it. It makes it fundamentally different. Or here's another way to say it. Most religions are spelled D-O. It's what I do that earns me a place before God. The gospel is spelled D-O-N-E. It's not what I do, but what's been done. for me. And so if I were to ask you something I frequently ask people, if you were to stand before God tonight, today, and he were to say, why should I let you into heaven? And you say one thing about how hard you tried, how good you were, what you believed, how much you went to church,

how sincere you were. If you say one thing that has the word I driving the sentence, then you do not understand grace. Because grace is not about what you do. It's about what Jesus has done that you receive as a gift. Grace. It's how Paul starts his explanation of the gospel, a group of professors at Cambridge University had met one afternoon to discuss world religions. They were writing a paper together, how all world religions were basically the same. And so them all together in the room, they'd started to write on a chalkboard different characteristics of world religions. and they put some 70, 80 different words that they thought all these religions had in common when down the hall walked a English professor, professor of English literature by the name of C.S. Lewis.

And they saw him and they said, hey, Jack, that was his nickname. I'm not sure how you go from C.S. to Jack, but whatever. But they called Jack. Why don't you come in here for a minute? And Jack walked in and they knew that he was a Christian. They said, you're a Christian. Why don't you look up on this board and tell us, is there anything about Christianity that's not a Christian? That's not. already listed on this board. C.S. Lewis looked at it for about five seconds. He goes, oh, easy. You missed the most defining characteristic of Christianity. He took the piece of chalk and he wrote the word grace and he put it down and he walked out. Two lessons you learn from that. One never get in a battle of wits with C.S. Lewis. Right? These things are self-evident. But number two, number two, what defines the gospel? What separates it from every other religious message in history is that God

gives salvation as a gift by grace and not according to works. Paul says grace. Here's your second word. Propitiation. Propitiation. This is the big one. Verse 25, who got forward as a propitiation by his blood. Propitiation is the Greek word hylisterion. And it means literally that God's wrath has been satisfied. The reason for his anger has been taken away. The concept of God's wrath is really difficult for people today, usually for a couple of reasons. A lot of people in our culture have a hard time seeing God as angry at sin. You may say, wouldn't God a God of love? I don't understand why you would talk about wrath or hell, but see, that's actually a very shallow view of love,

because when you love something, then you must hate whatever destroys that thing. If you love the cancer patient, you hate the cancer that is ravaging their body. I love my kids. So I hate seeing things in their heart that I know are going to cause them harm. Dishonesty, cruelty, bigotry, laziness. I get angry when I see those things. Wrath is a necessary component of love, which is why God hates sin. All the destruction in the world, all the disease, all the sickness, all the pain, all the divorce, all the abuse,

all the broken relationships ultimately go back to sin. And because of that, God hates sin. Many of you in this room right now are listening to me, you have been the victim of sin. Somebody has wronged you or used you or abused you. And it is because God loves you that he hates that sin. And he is angry at that person who did it to you. Habakkuk 113 says of God, you are of such pure eyes that you cannot even behold evil. In other words, you are so good and so full of love that you can't even stand to look at sin.

Imagine if you were forced to watch some violent assault on a child. Imagine if you were forced to watch some bigoted racial assault on an elderly person. that feeling you might get in the pit of your stomach that's what god feels when he sees sin but multiplied times a billion we're to change the metaphor here imagine you were drinking milk you know a sudden your mom comes down the stairs and tells you oh this is a special thing of milk it's very good milk it's only 2% human urine you're not going to say oh i love 2% milk i mean 98% that's like an a plus in my school no even the slightest bit makes the whole bit loathsome. That feeling you would have of knowing that you were

drinking that, again, you multiply that times a billion, that gives you a fraction of a taste of how God feels when he sees sin. Trying to stand in God's presence with jealousy or hatred or idolatry or rebelliousness or pride or wandering out of control lust would be like a tissue paper touching the surface of the sun. The second problem, people have with God's wrath, specifically the concept of propitiation is, they said, wouldn't God forgiving? Why didn't God just look at the human race and say, okay, okay, it's clearly a mess. I think we all learned our lesson now. Everybody back in the pool, okay, everybody, you know, all skate, same direction or whatever. Let's just try this thing again. So why didn't God just overlook it? The answer is

because God is just. Psalm 89.14 says that justice is the foundation of God's throne. and for God to simply overlook sin would be unjust. I mean, imagine it like this. Say, I've got a brand new Audi, and you steal it, and you wreck it, and you don't want to pay for it. So we go to court. And the judge looks at you and just full of compassion, likes you. He says to you, yes, you were guilty of stealing the car, but I forgive you. You're free to go, no consequences.

Now, that might be awesome and moving, might make for a great movie. But who is left wrong in that situation? Me! I'm still out and outy. The same thing is true with us and God. We owe a debt to God's justice that has to be paid. Now, change the scenario a little bit. Say in that courtroom, I say to you, after the judge pronounces you guilty, I say, I forgive you.

You are free. if I say that, who has agreed now to absorb the cost of the destroyed Audi? And the answer is, it didn't just go away. I absorbed it. I said, I'm going to pay it in your place. I'm going to take care of that, which is what Paul explains that God did on the cross. He absorbed the price incurred by our sin into himself. Look at verse 26.

Paul said at the cross, God demonstrated his righteousness so that he would be both righteous and he could declare righteous, the one who has faith in Jesus. At the cross, God accomplished two things that up until that point seemed like they were hopelessly at odds. He satisfied the full demands of his justice, and he saved us. Again, I'm trying to make this simple. I'll tell you how I explained it to my kids for years. That's a story I heard in high school when I was growing up. It's a story that was told to me is true.

I don't know if it's true. You can find it on the Internet, which means it has to be true. right? The story took place in about 1,100 AD in a little Viking kingdom. Kingdom had had early missionaries of Christianity that had put the gospel there, and perhaps that's where the origins of this story kind of came from, but the king was a beloved king. The people loved this king. It was a small little country, but he had the reputation of surely being the fairest king that ever lived, and also the most loving king that ever lived. People absolutely adored him. One day, the king came out to address his small island country and he said, I have grievous

and terrible news. Somebody is stealing money from the treasury. We know. We know somebody is stealing money from the treasury. You know that as your king, I've committed to do whatever I can to take care of you. If you have a need, just come to me, but you cannot steal because that would undermine the entire kingdom. Nobody had any idea where it was being stolen. So it went on, but a couple weeks went by and money continually being stolen day by day from the king's treasury. So the king came out and brokenhearted said, somebody continues to deliberately steal from the kingdom from the treasury. I'm going to issue a penalty, and that is 10 lashes with a whip.

Ten lashes with a whip for whoever gets caught stealing the money from the treasury. And again, nobody came forward. Nobody knew who would do this. King came out a week later and said, somebody continues to steal, I'm going to double it to 20 lashes. Now it was kind of the talk of the whole country. Who's stealing from our king? The king came out a fourth time and said, somebody continues to steal.

It's like they're trying to sabotage the kingdom. I'm going to do something that I don't want to do, but I don't know what else to do. I'm doubling this penalty now to 40 lashes, which because of the kind of whips that they used was essentially the death penalty. According to this story, which, again, I heard is true. Two days after the king gave that proclamation,

they caught the thief red-handed. It was the king's mother. So now the king faced a dilemma because he's the fairest king that ever lived. And the people said, well, if it had been anybody else, he would give them the punishment. It's not fair for him to just turn the other way because it's related to him because it's his mom. But then other people responded and said, but, I mean, this is our king who has more love in his heart than anybody we've ever known. How could that man kill his own mother? The king asked for 48 hours to think about it.

He goes into his chambers. He comes back out, he says, you have to give her the penalty. The law is the law. Justice is justice. So they marched the king's mother out like they would anybody else, and they tied her up to the stake and ripped off the back of her shirt, and that guard took that whip, and he pulled it back so that he could bring that first lash across the back of the king's mother. And right before he did, the king said, stop.

And the king walked over to his mother, and he looked her in the eye. and he said, what have you done? And then he grabbed his mother and he hugged her as tight as he possibly could. And he took off his robe and he laid it aside and he hugged her again. He looked back at the guard and he said, now hit her. And the guard said, I can't hit her because I'll hit you. And he said, I am giving you a command and that is, I want you to give all 40 lashes to my mom. But the king stood there and took them in the place so that not a single inch of that strap ever touched his mother.

thereby the most fair and the most loving king that ever lived. And that's what God did for you when Jesus stepped into your place and died on the cross. Friend, you understand that God's wrath burns against your sin. There's only really two ways to pay for sin, really only one way in it's death. And for you, death means eternity apart from God in hell. the only other way to pay for sin is that somebody who is without sin who is themselves eternal can pay it in your place which is what Jesus did when he died on a cross the prophet jeremiah says that god's wrath is stored up for us like poisoned wine in a cup that one day we will all of us

all of us who have sinned and rebelled against him all of us will have to drink it but at the cross as that cup was being handed to us jesus stepped in the way and he snatched that cup out of our hands and he drank it to the dragged, and he turned it over and slammed it down on the table and said, it is finished, so that there is therefore no condemnation. Paul says that so that there is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ, Jesus. It's like Charles Spurgeon said, God could not hold me guilty for my sin, because that would be unjust. Because God would be, if God ever punished me for any of my sin, if he punished me one I owe to one ounce for anything, it would be unjust.

just because God has already given the full measure of his wrath and he has poured it out on Jesus. He would have to apologize to Jesus if he punished me. Jonathan Edwards described propitiation, like standing before an incredible dam. I mean, imagine the Hoover Dam. I know it wasn't around when Jonathan Edwards was around, but imagine that. Imagine you're standing in front of this dam and maybe you're half a mile away. And all of a sudden, Jonathan Edwards says it begins to crack and it just in a moment splits open in this wall of water, half a mile, you know, high it seems.

A couple hundred feet high is coming down this to you, and it's just going to sweep you away, and there's nowhere you can run, there's no way you can resist it. He said, when suddenly the ground opens in front of you, and all of that water is swallowed up in the ground so that not a drop touches you. He said what Jesus did when he died on the cross as he stood there in the way of the wrath of God, and he absorbed every single bit of it for our sin in our place. Jesus paid it all. All to him, I hope. Here's your third word, justified. Justified. Verse 24, we are justified by his grace as a gift. Justified means literally declared righteous.

It's a legal term. It refers to a legal status. You are declared to be something, or maybe like your Sunday school teacher, if you were up in church, explained it the way mine did. said justified means God looks at you, looks at me just as if I'd never sin. Justified does not mean, listen, that you slowly become a better person. That in theological terms is called sanctification. It is also important. But justification means that God declares you righteous even while you still struggle with sin. While your life is not righteous, when no one would look at you and say, that is a holy

person, that is when God declares you righteous. Martin Luther had a famous phrase to describe this, simul Eustas et peccator. In Latin, that is simultaneously righteous and a sinner. The Christian is simultaneously justified even while he or she still struggles with sin. It's not that I become righteous enough after accepting Jesus that God accepts me, but while I am still sinful, God declares me fully righteous because of what Jesus did for me. This was all pictured in the Old Testament process of sacrifice. Once a year, in ancient Israel, each believing family, according to Leviticus, would bring a lamb. A perfect, spotless, unblemished lamb.

And once a year, the father of that family, whoever was the head of that family would bring it to the temple and they would come up to the altar. And they would lay that lamb down on the altar and they would bind its hands and its feet. And the father of the family would reach out with his hand and he would put it on the head of that lamb and he would begin to confess the sins of the family. And as he was doing that, the priest would slit the throat of that lamb so that it began to bleed out and die. In that moment, the family was justified because the lamb was taking their sin and dying there in the altar. And they were going home free. This was a foreshadowing of what Jesus would do and how, how would. we would receive him.

On the cross, Jesus literally became my sin. He became the rebellious attitude of a 15-year-old that didn't want to, listen to anybody. He became the proud self-sufficiency that says, I know what's better for my life than you do. He became the liar, the thief, the adulterer. He became the murderer. He became the abuser. He became the husband who had neglected his family or cheated on his. wife. He became the immoral woman who wrecks somebody else's marriage. He became the drug addict.

He became the teenage girl lying to her parents. He became the hypocrite living a double life. He became, he became the proud. He became the selfish. He became the apathetic. He became those things and died for them so that when I lay my hand of faith upon his head. And when I claim him as my own, my sin becomes his and his righteous. becomes mine. It's pictured, Paul says in Ephesians, it's pictured in that incredible moment of marriage. July 28th, 2000, I walked down an aisle in Richmond, Virginia, and I stood at an altar. And on that day, I said, I do to Veronica, Marie McPeters, and she said, I do to me. And in that moment, everything that was mine became hers and everything that was hers became mine.

Now, if you've ever seen her, you know her, you know, I call. clearly got the better end of that deal. But, but I've been out of college for about four years, and I had a job. She had a lot of debt. I had a car, nice car. She had a broken, wrecked, totaled, rebuilt, beat up Honda, CRX with no air conditioning. And in that moment, my incredible, brand-new, beautiful Nissan Maxima became hers. My savings account became hers, wiped out her debt. Her debt became mine. That C-HR-X became mine. All that was mine became hers and all that was hers became mine. And Paul says God gave that as a picture of what happens when you say I do to Jesus Christ. 2,000 years ago, Jesus stretched out his arms and said, I do to you. All that was yours became

his. What was that? It was sin. It was condemnation. It was brokenness. It was loneliness. It was depravity. It was death. And all that was his became yours. What is that? It was forgiveness. It was divine sonship. It was an eternal inheritance that cannot be taken away.

And in that moment, in that great exchange, you became him and he became you. That is what justification means. Here's the last word. Verse 25. Faith. To be received by faith. faith is how you receive this gift. And don't get confused by this. I don't mean faith like, oh, I just have a lot of hope in God and I'm a person of faith. Faith is probably the most

misunderstood word, at least in this context, in the Christian English language. Faith is the hand on the head of the sacrifice that says, that's mine. The Greek word translated faith is the word pistis. And what it means is literally to lean your weight on something. The moment of salvation is when you lean the whole hope of your salvation on him. Sometimes I describe it. Again, to my kids, it's like sitting down in a chair. If I had a chair up here on stage, you can really only be in one of two relationships to the chair. If I sit down in the chair, that means I'm transferring the weight of my body off of my legs and my feet.

I'm transferring it on to the chair. If that chair doesn't hold me up, then it's going to be embarrassing for me and entertaining for you. Or I can be standing beside the chair. Nothing wrong in the chair. I might believe in the chair. I might believe it could hold me up. But I'm standing there, holding myself erect on my own legs and feet. When it comes to Jesus Christ, you can really only be in one of two relationships to him.

Either you believe that he has done everything necessary to save you, and you've transferred all the hope that you have of getting to heaven onto what he has done, or you are standing in the hope that you're going to be good enough, and if God grades on the curve, maybe you'll make it that way. You can either be seated in submission to the Lord's judgment. Jesus Christ or you can be standing in control of your own life. Salvation means assuming a posture of faith and surrender. It's two sides of the same coin.

That's what faith is. I am transferring my hope and I'm transferring authority to him. Right now, in this room or at any of these campuses, you are in one of two relationships to Jesus Christ. I don't care what you had beliefs. I don't care how many verses you know. Right now, if I ask you, why do you think you'll go to heaven? and if your answer is because of what Jesus did,

all my hope is him. If you've transferred your hope onto him, the Bible says that faith is counted for righteousness. Right now, you're in one of two positions when it comes to the Lordship of Christ. You're either fully in surrender or you are not. Surrender is one of those things like,

it's kind of like marriage. It's either all or it's nothing. If I go home to my wife, like, hey, you know what, we've been married for 23 years now? I want you to know in those 23 years, I've been 97% faithful to you. She's not going to be like, oh, that's amazing. Are you kidding?

That's like, isn't that summa cum laude? No. Because 97% faithful means, what, out of 100 girls that I know, I said no to 97 of them, but I've got a relationship with three of them, that is not faithful. That is wholly unfaithful to put faith in Christ to surrender. It is dependence. It takes both. There's a really strange corruption out right now.

I run into it all the time. I'm into it at our church where people think I accepted Jesus's Savior at this age when I was eight, when I'm not really living for him as Lord. You can't bifurcate Jesus. You can't separate him out. He's either Lord of all or he's not Lord at all in your life. Think Turtolian, the ancient church father said it may be best. I love this. If you attempt to have Jesus without repentance, you will end up with church without heaven. Grace, propitiation, justice. faith. These four words are the gate of paradise. So let me ask you some questions. Do you understand these words? Maybe for the first time of the night, you understand what they mean.

You've heard them? Maybe you grasp them. More importantly, have you received them for yourself? What these verses declare to you is that Jesus has done everything necessary to save you, but it's a gift that you've got to choose to receive for yourself. Recently, I read about one of the most bizarre Supreme Court cases of all time has to be. 1833, United States versus George Wilson. George Wilson was, some dude lived out in, I think it was Georgia, had committed a series of crimes, was sentenced to die by hanging. But President Andrew Jackson, for reasons unknown to us,

issued George Wilson a full pardon, but then George Wilson, for reasons also unknown to us, refused to receive the pardon. Said, I reject it. I don't want it. I demand to pay for my crimes. The warden of the prison where Wilson was being held said, I can't execute you because there's a pardon on my desk. George Wilson took the warden to court.

This strange case, I kid you not. look it up later, made it all the way to the Supreme Court of the United States. And in 1833, the Supreme Court sided with George Wilson, and this was their verdict. A pardon is a contract and is therefore not complete without acceptance. A pardon is an act of grace that may be rejected, and if it be rejected, this court has discovered no power to force it on him. George Wilson was executed in 1833 with a presidential pardon sitting on the warden's desk. I'm not sure if Chief Justice John Marshall who wrote that opinion,

I'm not sure if he was thinking about the gospel when he issued that ruling, but that is exactly what the Bible teaches about justification, propitiation, and redemption. A pardon is only valid if it is received. You can reject it. But friend, why would you? Why would you? If you believe this is true, have you given yourself to sharing it with others? Have you shared it with your friends?

If not, I hope you won't think me rude when I say, do you actually believe it? Paul, right before writing the Senate said in chapter 1, I'm eager, I'm eager to come to you that are in Rome. Rome's a pretty cool place. You might have been there. If you haven't been there, you probably want to go. I got a chance to go last year. It's awesome. Want to go to the Coliseum?

told my wife I want to go there because gladiator Russell Crow always reminds me of myself in that movie I told her for Paul won the vacation Paul knew when he goes there that coliseum wouldn't be somewhere he would visit it probably somewhere where he would be a sporting event I stood in the little hole where they kept Paul right before they executed Paul knew all that and Paul says I'm eager to come because I'm not ashamed of the gospel because it and it alone is the power of Jesus unto salvation to everyone that believes. There is no such thing as somebody who believes the gospel, who was not also an evangelist.

I just submit you cannot believe the gospel and stay silent about it. I'm not trying to turn this into works righteousness. I'm just saying, would you actually believe it? Years ago, I was sharing Christ with a young lady named Rhonda. She was from the Northeast. She grew up, you know, in America. She'd never heard the gospel.

I explained it to her. We were in a group of friends. We played games together and stuff. and she said to me, one night we were going through this, she was asking questions, she was arguing, she graduated from Yale, she was real smart, and she was like, she's like, you actually believe this. And I said, well, of course I believe it. She said, you don't act like you believe it. She said, what do you mean? I'm talking to you about it. She said, no, no, no, you act like you're trying to win a debate right now. She goes, if I believed what you say you believe,

I'm not sure how I make it through the day. She said, said, I do know that I go to every single person that I loved and on hands and knees, I would plead with them that you have to pay attention to Jesus. And I just don't see any emotion in your heart or your eyes. This is like verbal sparring to you. And y'all, I knew she was exactly right. Do you believe the gospel? If you do, who is there in your life that doesn't know about it yet?

Do you actually believe it? Here's my fourth question. Last one. Have you been baptized? The symbol of all of this receiving Jesus, a symbol of Romans 3, 23 through 25 is baptism. Earlier, I compared it to the wedding ring, or wedding tattoo in my case. My wife has this illusion that girls hit on me at the gym, women hit on me at the gym, and I'm like, that literally has never happened, not one time.

So her name is Veronica, so I got a little V right here. And I, uh, and I nice? I told her if she ever leaves me, I can fly them. little over to A for available, right? But this little, this little tattoo right here, or your wedding ring, doesn't make you married. Taking off that ring doesn't mean you're not married. Somebody else putting on that ring doesn't mean that they're not married to your spouse. It's just a symbol, but it's an important symbol because it says, I'm not ashamed to be married, and I'm no longer looking for dates. Paul says, when you follow Jesus, you go public with it.

Because you declare, you put on that wedding ring, and you say Romans 6, 3, and 4, I am buried with him by baptism into death. His death is mine. Just like Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. Even so, I also am walking in newness of life. It's a picture of repentance. In just a minute, you're going to see people at every campus come up here. They're going to stand in there, and they're going to go down, and they're going to be buried with Jesus. They are reenacting Jesus' burial.

We're not going to hold them under for three days, thank God, right? But then they're going to come up out of the water, y'all. and it's the most amazing moment because what you're seeing is somebody resurrected with Christ. It's the picture of the gospel. I'd go over here and do this, but they told me I cannot leave this carpet. So I want you to pretend I'm touching this water. There's nothing magical about that water. That is Jacksonville City tap water, okay?

You're going to be dirtier when you came out than when you went in. There's nothing magical about it, all right? But as you declaring, I identify with Jesus. I choose Jesus. so let me return to the two groups that talk about at the beginning of this message. Some of you have yet to fully surrender your lives to Jesus. And in just a minute, I'm going to give you a chance to sit down in that chair to transfer your hope of heaven to Jesus Christ and to surrender to Him as Lord.

You're going to do that with me in just a minute in one of these campuses, and then immediately, immediately you're going to get baptized just like they did in the Bible. Hey, just so you know, you're in good company. Every single baptism, everyone without exception in the next. New Testament happened immediately after somebody accepted Jesus. Others of you are already Christians. Like I said, you accepted Jesus at some time in the past, but you've not taken this step, and I want you to do it now. Now, let me go ahead and just, let's go ahead and say it. At this moment, a lot of excuses are jumping into your head. You say, well, I ain't got no clothes. It's wet.

Jacksonville's cold. And you know you're lying to yourself. Like I said, listen, We got all you need. We really do. T-shirt, shorts, they're modest. Others of you, if you're honest, right now what you're saying to yourself is, yeah, I mean, come on, man, I just don't think it's that important. I mean, I don't need to be baptized to love Jesus and follow him. At which point when somebody says that to me, and people do say that to me, and sometimes

they don't say it, they just think it. I know they're thinking it. I always want to say, really, like, that's how you want to start out your relationship with Jesus? Who are you to decide which of his commands are important to which ones aren't? I don't think that's the way you want to start off following him. You want to start out your walk with God telling him which of his commands you're going to obey and which ones you're not? I don't think so.

Some of you, if you're honest, you'd say, well, it just seems weird. I mean, getting wet in front of a bunch of strangers. I'm like, do you have any concept of what Jesus did on the cross? Strip naked, spit on, beaten to a pulp, crucified for six hours on a Friday. you don't want to get wet? A lot of you say, well, I was baptized as a child. I was an infant. My mom and dad did that. And listen, I just want to say this really clearly. That's awesome. Let me just ask you a sincere question. Whose faith was being demonstrated when you got baptized when you were an infant? Whose faith was it? It wasn't yours. It was theirs. And thank God for their

faith. They were hoping that one day you grew up and followed Jesus. it's time for you to ratify what they did 30 some years ago. You're not rejecting what they did. People say, well, I don't want to reject what my mom? You're not rejecting it. You're fulfilling it. You get to call your mom and dad tonight. You get to call your mom and dad tonight and say what you hoped for me,

35, 45, 75 years ago. You may have to telegram them in heaven if that's the case. But what you did all those years ago, mom and dad tonight, I ratified it. And I chose to do it on my own. Listen, there are 27 baptisms in the book of Acts. And all 27 times, all 27, they received, they believed first. Because baptism is a profession of your faith.

You say, well, no, my friends and family aren't here to see me. And this is a special moment. I really want them to see me. Y'all, listen, we can take pictures. Literally, you hand us your camera when you get in there, and we will take that picture for you. And if you drove down here from Georgia and you don't have a phone with a camera in it yet, we'll take one for you, okay? And we will send it to you, all right, I promise.

Every time we do this at our church, somebody, somebody out there is like, well, I rode with people. They don't want to wait. They'll wait, I promise. In fact, raise your hand if you brought somebody tonight at any campus, and you are not willing to wait for them to get baptized. Just put your hand up. Be honest, because, by the way, this will be your admission that you need to be baptized. You just come down here and we'll have that conversation. In fact, by the way, here's a little secret.

The reason that person invited you tonight was for this moment. Plus, Jobie's told me about this church, y'all got a lot of lift and Uber drivers here. I'll personally pay for somebody to drive you home if they won't stay. You say, I'm not sure I'm ready. I still got questions. That's great. I want you to consider this an invitation to come and start a conversation. You're walking forward doesn't mean that you're definitely going to do it.

That you need to have some conversation. We need to kind of do it. and if you decide not to do it, we'll even let you keep the t-shirt. You can just have it. You say, I'm nervous to go down there by myself. I get that. That's fine. Ask your friend to go with you.

Right now, just kind of top them on the leg. That means I'm going to go. I need you to go with me. Should, take the whole row if you want. I'm really. Let's do this. Everybody, at all campuses right now, I want you turn right now and say to your neighbor,

I want you say this. I'll go with you if you want me to. Just say it right now. I'll go with you if you want me to. I'll go with you if you want me to. You mean that? All right. Then in a minute we're going to do it. You say, well, J.D., I don't want to become a Baptist.

Or whatever it is, they are here at 1122, right? That's, hey, hey, hey, that's legitimate. Right? But this is not about, we are not baptizing you in the name of Baptist. We are baptizing you in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Okay? So I mean it. Y'all, no excuses.

This is too important decision for you to put off any longer. Why don't you bow your heads at all campuses, if you will. Buy your heads right now. Do you need to receive Jesus Christ right now? Are you not sure if you've ever received him? Maybe you know you've never received him. Or maybe you're just, you've been unclear and you're like, I don't know if I understood it before, but I see it clear now.

If that's you, then right now I want you to say, right? You can even use these words. They're not magic words, but if they come from your heart, God will hear him. Lord Jesus, I know I'm a sinner. I know I'm a sinner. I know I need to be saved. Say it to him. I turn from my sin right now and I receive you as my Savior. Right now I'm putting my hand on your head, Jesus, and saying, my Savior. Thank you, Jesus for saving me. Thank you, Jesus for saving me. If you prayed that prayer right now at any of our campuses, would you just lift your hand up real fast? And to say,

tonight I'm praying that prayer for the first time or for the first time that I understand. Just hold it up real high. Just hold it up. Every head's bowed, every eye click. Nobody's looking. Just hold it up. You can put it down. Father, I pray for the hands I could see and those that I could not.

I pray that you give them that courage to do what I'm going to ask them to do. Keep your heads bowed. Keep your heads bowed, everybody. Here's what's going to happen. Baptism counselors and prayer counselors, they've filled. build the rooms here. In just a minute, I'm going to stand you up. I'm going to make it super easy. I'm going to count the three. So you know exactly when to do it. And if you need to be baptized in one motion as you stand, you're just going to move your way to the aisles. You're going

to take that person that said that they would go with you, that you were going to go together. Nobody should come alone. And when we do that, when we stand and you begin to come, church of 11, 22 members are going to go crazy. They're going to put their hands together and clap like they just won the lottery. Because they're more excited about this than they would if they actually did win the lottery. Because they're excited about you passing from death to life. And so they're going to go crazy. And you're going to come. So what I'm going to do is I'm going to count the three. When I get the three, we're all going to stand. Everybody's going to stand together. You're going to be clapping your hands like a crazy person or you're going to be coming forward

because you need to be baptized. You got questions. You come. You ready? And when I get the three, you just stand up and you come. Don't wait. Wait, don't hesitate. By the way, let me just say, this is a very, very poor time to choose to go to the bathroom. Okay? I'm just telling you, it's happened at our church, a series of mishaps and you end up down here, okay? So, hold off on that. All right, here we go. On three, you're ready? Father, give them courage to obey immediately. I pray in Jesus' name. One, two, three. Everybody stand to your feet. Put your hands together and go. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Come on. Step out. right now go that's right come on come on come on come come come come come come