In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was God. He was with God
in the beginning. All things were created through
him, and apart from him, not one thing was created
that had been created. In him was life, and that
life was the light of men. That light shines
in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not
overcome it. There was a man sent from God whose
name was John. He came as a witness to testify
about the light so that all might believe through
him. He was not the light, but he came to testify
about the light. The true light that gives light
to everyone was coming into the world. He was
in the world, and the world was created through
him, and yet the world did not recognize him.
He came to his own, and his own people did not
receive him. But to all who did receive him,
he gave them the right to be children of God,
to those who believe in his name. who were born
not of natural descent or of the will of the
flesh or of the will of man, but of God. The
Word became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed
his glory, the glory as the one and only Son
from the Father, full of grace and truth. John
testified concerning him and exclaimed, This
was the one of whom I said, The one coming after
me ranks ahead of me, because he existed before
me. Indeed, we have all received grace upon grace
from his fullness. For the law was given through
Moses. Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
No one has ever seen God. The one and only Son,
who is himself God and is at the Father's side,
he has revealed him. You may be seated. All right.
Well, morning again. Get those little blue Bibles
out. If you don't have one, grab one. So a lot
of times you start a book of the Bible, it's
a huge challenge. And I'm kind of almost overwhelming
until you get into it. But this one I am super
excited about. And I think it's super timely
for us. Because my experience, I've been here
in Alaska my whole life. And this time of year.
is usually one of the hardest for us call it
march madness i call it march madness because
it seems like you get to this point and all of
our lives start to unravel not all of us at the
same time hopefully not but here's the reality
like we live in a broken world don't we and in
this time of year whether it's your marriage
or your job or You're just tired. You've been
sick. It's easy to just get in a funk. And I
think this book's really appropriate for us because
it's going to do something. It's going to take
our eyes off of our junk, our situation. It's
going to cast them on Jesus. So it's good timing
of it. And as we begin our journey through John.
I want to challenge and encourage you, maybe
in a way that I have never done. If I could force
you to soak in this book, to marinate in this
book like a fat steak, I would. Because I know
it will change you. Guarantee it. I was talking
to Brittany. I didn't bother to interview this
time, but we were talking. I threatened, but
Brittany got up here for the book of Ruth, and
she read every week. Remember that? Well, whenever
you're like, Zane was getting ready to read,
and I'm back to reading this passage over and
over and over and over and over again, because
you don't want to make a mistake when you're
standing up in front of everybody. But one of
the things that happened as I was talking to
Brittany about it is, I mean, Ruth is kind of
a hard book to read initially. It's kind of like,
really, that's a cool story, but what does that
mean? but how it came alive to you. And I thought
that was really profound. I guarantee if you
soak in John, if you read it regularly, if you
write all over it, everything that sticks out,
you circle it, highlight it, talk about it, make
your notes on the side, do whatever you got to
do to spend a lot of time. And I would even encourage
you, like, do it every day for a while. Don't
just wait for where I'm at. read ahead read it
again read it again and let it soak try to understand
what it is and if you don't understand it that's
okay we're going to tackle it verse by verse
word by word we're going to walk right through
this thing so um so on the front of your books
there's of this gospel of john notebook is these
three words read reflect and respond you see
that look at the front of your book not the front
open it the cover like All the way close. See
what it says right in the front? Read, reflect,
respond. That is what I want us to do in this
series. Read it, reflect on it, talk about it,
and then respond with your life. See, the Gospel
of John is one of four Gospels. You may know
a lot of this, but I'm just going to help you
read. I'm going to kind of put it in a place
that you, oh yeah, that's right. But it's one
of four Gospels. Each of them presents Christ
with a distinct emphasis. Okay? So it's important
to understand, like, Matthew, Mark, and Luke
are what they call the synoptic gospels, meaning
their stories are kind of like a timeline of
Jesus. John doesn't do that. Matthew focuses
on Jesus' kingship. Mark focuses on Jesus' servanthood.
Luke focuses on Jesus' manhood. And John focuses
on Jesus' godhood. Okay, so that's kind of the
focus of John. Let's pray. We need help with
this. I need help. You need help understanding
it. And we just need the Spirit of God to work
in us. So let's pray. Lord, we come before you
because we're just dark -hearted sinners in need
of your grace. And we've got this phenomenal
gospel of John in front of us. Lord, our prayer
is that these words don't just stay flat on the
page, that by your Spirit you'll make them come
alive to us and help us to understand and help
us to transform our very lives. We need you,
Jesus. We need you, Spirit, to do a work in us.
Lord, give me the words to say today. In your
name we pray. Amen. Okay, we call these books
gospels because gospel means good news. So in
a dark time of the year, guess what? We're going
to talk about good news. That's what we get to
talk about. So it's good news. So John, who is
one of Jesus' closest disciples, in fact, John
thinks that's such a good deal, he calls him
the one Jesus loved. It's kind of weird. But
John is one of the few disciples that has actually
not been martyred. He's actually old when he
writes this, and very old when he writes this
book, but he's writing because he has really
good news for us. And we're going to see this,
and I want you to turn up to page 116 in those
little books. Look at John chapter 20, verse
31. It's like at the end of the book. There's
one more spot, but 20 verse 31 gives us why he's
writing this. He says this in verse 31. But these
are written so that, underline that. I'm going
to tell you to underline a lot of stuff because
I want you to highlight that. These are written
so that you may believe, underline that right
there, that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of
God, and that by believing, you may have life
in his name. By believing. John is not just writing
to help us get to heaven. Probably the most read
book when it comes to people like, you need to
read the Gospel of John if you want to get to
heaven. No, John is not about just getting us
to heaven. John is writing this that we might
find real life, fullness of life in him. So,
if that's what he's writing about, let me just
say this to you. If you are in this room and
you're a skeptic, John is a book for you. You're
not sure what to think about Christianity. Maybe
you've done this. You've dipped your toe in it
a few times. John is a book for you. But maybe
you're new to the faith, like several of us in
this room. You're new to the faith. You don't
really know a whole lot. You're trying to learn.
John is a book for you. Maybe you've been a believer
for many years, a long time. John is a book for
you. And probably more importantly, if you are
a believer and you have... really fallen into
apathy with your faith, John is the book for
you. So I really want to challenge you. Like,
there's not a person in this room, myself, starting
with myself, that this book isn't going to be
important. And so let's jump in and let John's
gospel take us on a journey, all right? Ready?
We're just going to walk. Like I said, if you
guys are new around here, we're not going to
miss anything. We're going right through it,
one word at a time. Going to walk right through
it, and it'll be here forever in this book. So
here we go. Jump, by the way, if you do the math,
we might be here for a lot of months. But here
we go. Verses 1 through 18 is a prologue, or
what I like to call the foyer of the book. Right?
You ever play laser tag? And you're in, you go
in, you're all geared up, and you play laser
tag, and you're out in the foyer, right? And
you go, okay, we're going in. You've got your
teams established, and you don't even know what's
in there. You've never been into the laser tag.
And you go in, and all of a sudden, you go in,
the strobe lights are going, the music's going
like this, and you're trying to run around, act
like you're somebody bad, and you're going to
shoot somebody. And then you get done, you're
sweating, and you come out to the foyer. The
foyer kind of is the... prologue of what's going
to come, but it's also a great place to continue
to come back to. So these 18 verses that we're
going to look at are really helpful as you go
through John to come back and remember these
18 verses. It's kind of how it's set, and John's
going to start really high level for us. He's
going to get just way up in the air, and he's
going to say, this is what matters. This is really
important. Here's part of the prologue. The goal
of the prologue is to blow your mind about who
Jesus is. write that down the goal of the prologue
is to blow your mind about who jesus is and i
hope it does by the time we're done he wants
us to see the number one the greatness of christ
that's the first thing we're going to look at
the greatness of who he is okay john chapter
one verse one says this in the beginning was
the word and the word was with god and the word
was god okay Kind of a weird sentence structure,
the word. John doesn't just first tell it. He
just tells us first straight up who Jesus is.
Before there was a beginning, there was Jesus.
That's how he's saying it. Before there was the
beginning, before this world existed, there was
Jesus. There's never been a time when Jesus did
not exist because the word was. Word is Jesus.
That's what he's using it for. And so Jesus always
was. In another way of saying it, it's kind of
a weird way of saying it, you'd say Jesus always
was wuzzing. Jesus always was wuzzing. John wants
us to understand. It's all right, guys. Up here.
John wants us first to understand that God is
the center point. of everything he's the center
point of everything and guys this is our biggest
problem in life isn't it we don't we lose sight
of who's the center i think i'm the center my
problems are the center my family's the center
my agenda is the center and jonda says no i want
you to understand how big jesus is and he is
to be the center point everything so we begin
with god We don't talk about anything of Jesus.
A lot of the other gospels start with how Jesus
was born. This one just starts off saying, oh,
by the way, this Jesus we're going to talk about,
boom, he's God. He's the creator of all things.
He's the word. The word is logos in Greek, okay?
It means conscious or the force behind all things
that have ever been made. And it's a word that
we don't even understand totally, but it's driven
by an understanding of Greek philosophy and all
sorts of things, but it's this idea that everything
starts from the word. And by saying that Jesus
was with God and was God, John establishes the
idea right there of the Trinity, Father, Son,
Holy Spirit. We're not going to spend a lot of
time here right now. But it's this idea that
one God, three persons in a love relationship
with each other. Perfect relationship. So right
out of the chute, he says, Jesus is creator of
all things. He's God. And he was with God. Trinity.
Doesn't touch on the Holy Spirit yet. That's
coming. But this is in the first part. We begin
to even see that there's a three -in -one picture
of God. Again, the goal here is to blow your
mind. Before we ever get into details of who
Jesus is and what he did, blow your mind. Like,
who's at the center here? Not Caleb. Not you.
Jesus. John chapter 1, verse 2. He was with God
in the beginning, and all things were created
through him. And apart from him, not one thing
was created that has been created. Everything.
He says, has been created by Jesus. Sometimes
we separate Jesus and we just say God created
all things, right? In this situation, he says
Jesus was right there. This Jesus that walked
among you, which we're going to get to in a second,
was the creator of all things. He's the creator
of the universe. Colossians chapter 1 verse 16
and 17 says this, for everything was created
in him or by him, in heaven and on earth, the
visible and the invisible, whether thrones or
dominions or rulers or authorities, all things
have been created through him and for him, for
he is before all things, and by him all things
hold together. Okay, if you don't see Jesus yet,
Maybe you're a little skeptical. You don't see
Jesus as really the one who created all things.
You're missing all of what the Bible says. The
Bible is just loaded with Jesus is this kind
of guy. This is who Jesus is. Colossians just
points us there as one example. The little book
I've been reading, picked up this last week,
it's called The Gospel Way Catechism, poses this
question, what is the center point of everything?
poses that question. What is the center point
of everything? And the answer, he says, is God
is center and point of everything. In him, all
things come to be and are held together. He has
no rival. And that's what John is trying to do
right out of the shoes. He's saying, look, nothing
else in the universe is as important as Jesus.
He's the center point. God the Father, God the
Son, and the Holy Spirit. That is the center.
And I want to swear, he's church, he says, church,
I want you above everything else to see who is
most important. Now, as we move to verse 4, we
take, he takes it one step farther. We're going
to get to kind of the second point of his greatness.
The greatness of Christ's love. So we just see,
first of all, the greatness of who he is. creator
of all things, can't get much bigger. And then
he's going to hone in on the greatness of his
love. Look at verse 4. In him was life, and that
life was the light of man. That light shines
in the darkness, and yet the darkness did not
overcome it. See, in these verses, we are introduced
to two metaphors that are going to run through
the book of John. We need to remember as we come
back. Then two of these metaphors, and they describe
what Jesus brings as he steps into our broken
and jacked up dark world. I was just thinking
last night, and I was flipping through and watching
all the stuff that's going on in the war around
the world. We live in a pretty broken world right
now, don't we? The God of the universe stepped
into that world. He stepped into that world and
he says, I've got... I want to show you two different
things that I bring. It's not the only things,
but two. I'm going to do it through two metaphors.
He brings life and he brings light. In Jesus
is life. If you want real life with purpose and
with meaning, it is only found in Jesus because
Jesus is life. It won't be found anywhere else.
It won't be found in your achievements, how good
your marriage is, how well your children do.
It's only found in Jesus, real life. And then
he says Jesus is light. See, where light goes,
darkness is dispelled, revealing the true nature
of life. Like, he says when that light shines
in the darkness literally means It shines continually
in the darkness, meaning that Christ is continually
bombarding every corner of our hearts that are
of darkness through the work of his Holy Spirit.
If we're in Christ, if we embrace this light,
he's penetrating our darkness. That's what he
does. But sadly, the majority of mankind, according
to this, reject the light. Look at verse 6, starting
in verse 6 says, that there is a man sent from
God whose name was John. By the way, this is
not John the author, it's John the baptizer,
the different John. We're going to touch on that
as we go into the book. He came as a witness
to testify about the light, so that all might
believe, underline that. By the way, every time
you see the word believe in John, underline it,
okay, as we go through it. All might believe
through him. He was not the light, that's John,
but he came to testify about the light. The true
light that gives light to everyone has come into
the world. Straight up, John the baptizer came
as a witness to tell as many as he could about
Jesus, the light, and that Jesus was for all
people and is today for all people. That's his
point. Look at verse 9. See, the true light that
gives light to everyone was coming into the world.
I mean, the God who made all things has come
to us. And I could just stop right there. In
that whole thought, if it's true, if the God
that made all things really exists, and it's
true, and he chose to come to you, that ought
to blow your mind. Why would he do that? Because
everyone needs a, every one of us need a savior.
Look at verse 10. He was in the world, and the
world was created through him, and yet the world
did not recognize him. He came to his own, and
his own people did not receive him. Okay, so
let's just unpack this for a minute. See, the
Jewish Pharisees, which we kind of have a bad
taste in our mouth about the Pharisees, right?
Think about what the job of a Pharisee was. You
ever heard of the Pharisee? You may know what
I'm talking about. The Jewish leaders that Jesus
clashed with. If you've read any of the Gospels,
you see he can clash with these guys. They were
the religious elite. And the Pharisees, their
job, they were to be set apart to know God's
Word so well, to know this so well. A lot of
them had it memorized, most of it. That when
the Messiah would come, they would know it. That
was their job. Problem is, they fell in love
with the rules and they missed out on the relationship
that God was offering. Fell in love with the
rules. Religion took over. They became, in another
way of saying it, is that they became the center
and not God at the center. Which is what John
starts off by saying, is that God is at the center.
And so, they missed it. They missed it. See,
you and I can be in the church. We can be around
this. You can read your Bible every day and miss
Jesus. Don't miss Jesus. You belong to him. He
came after you. The Beatitudes Jesus talks about
in a couple of the other Gospels is a famous
Sermon on the Mount. Beatitudes start with kind
of this rising sunshine, sunrise. It kind of
talks about the process that we need to go through
as we begin to go, oh, I get God. And the very
beginning of it is what? Blessed are the poor
in spirit. Meaning you look at your life in the
darkness of your own life and you go, I know
I can't do this. I'm broken. I'll step aside
from being the center. In fact, you begin to
look at your life and go, man, I am so jacked.
See, the Pharisees couldn't do this. They're
looking at their life going, I'm pretty good.
One who's poor in spirit looks at their life
and goes, I'm really honest. I'm not doing that
good. So I need to be set aside. In fact, I'm
looking at my sin and my brokenness, and it grieves
me because I know what I'm doing to my Savior.
And so I mourn over that. So that's the start
point. Jesus came after you, though. Don't miss
him. Look at verse 12. But to all who did receive
him, he gave them the right to be children of
God. To those who believe in his name, who were
born not of natural descent, nor of the will
of the flesh, or of the will of man, but of God.
Going to come back later and talk about what
it means to be born again. It means newness in
Christ, starting over. To receive, when he says
to receive, to receive is to believe. In the
gospel, John, believe, when he says believe,
means to believe in. Okay? Not to believe that.
That's information. To believe that something
happened, that's information. But to believe
in the person of Jesus Christ. Now, I need a
chair. So, if I look at this chair, how many
of you believe? that this chair can hold you.
Yeah, duh. But to believe in this chair means
I actually rest in it and I release in it. And
that's what the difference is. Because I don't
just believe that. How many of us believe that
God is good? How many of us believe that, that
he came to save us, but do you believe in what
he's done? Is your life saying, that is what
I put everything into? That's what John's going
to call us to in this book. To believe in is
to put trust in it. I know that's hard. Some
people think it's weak to do that, and I would
say it's not. It's the other way around. To believe
in is to put your trust in. Those who received
the light became children of God. John also had
this to say in another John, 1 John. which is
a different book. 1 John 3, verse 1, the first
part of that verse, he says, see that what great
love the Father has given to us, that we should
be called children, or God's children. And we
are. I love that. And we are. Why? When you put
your faith in Jesus, he takes over. And you're
his child. Now, go back to verse 14. And starting
in verse 14, we begin to see the greatness of
Christ's grace. So we just have, it starts off,
we've got the greatness of Christ, and then we
see the greatness of his love demonstrated toward
us, and now we see the greatness of his grace.
And I need to drink. Here we go. In verse 14,
the word became flesh and dwelt among us. I love
this verse. This is the coolest verse. The Lord
became flesh and dwelt among us. We observed
his glory, the glory as the one and only Son
from the Father, full of grace and truth. Okay,
let's unpack this. This verse describes what
we call incarnation. It's the most remarkable
miracle. And it's... Really hard to put a metaphor
to it, but years ago when I did Young Life, we
always talked about the incarnation, meaning
God coming to us, putting flesh on, coming one
of us, hanging out with us, setting up his tent
with us. And so I used this illustration, and
I would have a bring in. Sometimes I think I
should do this all the time, these kind of illustrations,
because we think high school kids need it. They're
actually smarter than most of us some half the
time. But I put in this big bowl with a goldfish.
Get the big, fattest goldfish I could find. Stick
in this bowl. And I says, you know what? This
bowl is like you and me. Or this goldfish. We're
swimming around there. That's our little world.
And how crazy is it if I said, you know what?
I really love this goldfish. I want to dive in.
But I can yell at this goldfish. But I need to
actually become a goldfish so the goldfish understands.
How much I love him. And then I'm going to go
into that bowl. So it would be like me turning
into a goldfish and jumping into this bowl. And
you're going, that's ridiculous. And I'd say,
yeah, this is ridiculous too. That the God of
the universe would choose to come and live among
us. That's exactly what he does. And not only
does he come and live among us, he came in the
most poverty way. He became a tiny little goldfish.
The worst of the wimp is little goldfishes. And
then he would go into the bowl and he says, now
I'm going to believe I was a perfect goldfish.
And I'm going to take all of the sin of all the
other goldfish upon myself. I'm going to suffer
and die in their place, be crucified for them
because I love them that much. That's how ridiculous
this is. The God of the universe says, the word
became flesh. Wait a minute, he made flesh, right?
Yep. And what did he do? He dwelt among us. Meaning
he got in our bowl with us. Hebrews chapter 4
verse 15 says this. For we do not have a high
priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses.
But one who has been tempted in every way as
we are. Yet without sin. What does this mean?
Jesus knows how you feel. Gets it. He knows how
you feel. He knows your struggle, March Madness.
He knows what you're going through right now.
I get it. He says, I get it. I've walked in your
shoes. I felt your pain. I know what you're dealing
with. Oh, and by the way, I created all things.
I made you. I know you pretty well. He did not
stay distant, though. He came to us. You and
I couldn't get out of the bowl to save our lives,
could we? But he could come in, and he did. He
moved in, the word here is he moved into the
neighborhood or he pitched his tent among us.
Don explains that when Jesus came, became flesh
and dwelt, pitched his tent, literally what that
means, in the midst of humanity, man and woman
saw his glory. Here, characterized as full of
grace and truth. And what we'll see as we work
our way to the cross of Christ. is that becomes
bigger and bigger and bigger on display and it
will be seen most in the cross of Christ. Look
at verse 15. John testified according to him
and explained, this was the one I am whom I said,
the one coming after me ranks ahead of me because
he existed before me. John is just pleading the
case again, right? Indeed, we have all received
grace upon grace from his... Now, that's a verse.
I want you to circle that grace upon grace. John
is saying, from the fullness of his grace, what
is grace? Getting something you don't deserve.
That's grace, right? From the fullness of his
grace, we have received one blessing after another.
Here's how it works. You get grace. followed
by grace. It's grace upon grace upon grace upon
grace upon grace upon grace upon grace. It just
keeps going. That's what you get. Grace is not
just a one -time thing. You get it all from him.
This is what this is saying. It's grace upon
grace upon grace upon grace. John, now look at
verse 17. For the law was given through Moses.
Grace and truth came through Jesus Christ. This
reminds us what we looked at in Romans 5, verse
20. I'll just go there real quick. It says this,
the law came along to multiply the trespasses.
What did the law do? It took a magnifying glass
and said, look how much you cannot accomplish
perfection. You cannot earn your way to God.
It shows us that. But where sin multiplied, which
we see, happening all around us, grace multiplied
even more. Grace upon grace upon grace. See,
your sin is not too big for Jesus. Your sin is
not too big for Jesus. Whatever your sin is right
now or has been, it's not too big for Jesus.
There's more than enough grace to cover your
sin and to give you an overflowing free and victorious
life. Now, I said at the beginning that this
gospel is for all of us, right? From the skeptic
to the apathetic believer. Why? Because grace
upon grace has been given. And it's given for
you to experience an overflowing, free and victorious
life. If you know Jesus, Believe in Jesus. The
fullness of his grace is yours. But you can know
that Jesus' grace exists. But do you, have you
believed in his grace? Meaning, are you trusting
him for his grace? Because if you do, that grace
is yours. Grace upon grace. John concludes this
prologue in verse 18. Remember the foyer. We've
got to keep coming back to these truths as we
go through it. Verse 18, no one has ever seen
God. And the one and only Son, who is himself
God, and is at the Father's side, has revealed
him. Where do we see God, church? In Jesus. As
you look to Jesus, God the Father is revealed.
And the greatness of Jesus explains the greatness
of the Father. He didn't just leave us out there
to say, ooh, this force. He says, I'm coming
to you in a way that you can understand and you
can grasp. I'm going to come in human form. And
I'm going to walk among you, fully God and fully
man. The Gospel of John wants us to see Jesus
for, who he is, and to experience Jesus on the
ground level, to believe in Jesus as the one
true God. And one of the things John is going
to do is he's going to go really ground level
for us. He's going to go right down to the ground
level. He's going to show us the interactions,
but all of it is to help us so, yes, I believe.
And I need this, church. Because even as a pastor,
even as somebody who preaches, who spends time
in this, I struggle with my belief. My belief.
You all do. Help me. The Gospel of the Way Catechism
book I was telling you about, I just read. When
asked this question, who is God the Son? Jesus.
Who is God the Son? Answered it this way. God
the Son is the eternal word who took on humanity.
Jesus of Nazareth, Messiah of Israel, and King
of the world. He is not a life coach or a therapist
who affirms all your desires, but the great physician
whose blood heals our sin -sick hearts. That's
who Jesus is. My hope as we go through John is
that my eyes and that your eyes will be turned
to Jesus. that you will experience the fullness
of his grace, that you will believe in God, the
God who's come to us in a way that you've never
believed before, that your life will rest on
it, that he will be center of your life. To the
skeptic who might be here today, my hope is that
you would believe in Jesus as Lord and Savior
of your life. To the new believer that's here
today, that Jesus is and that you would begin
to believe who Jesus is and what he's done will
capture your whole life. Some of you have stepped
in, you put your toe in, you believe, but he
has not yet begun to capture your whole life.
I pray that as you go through this series that
the depth of it will just grow deeper. That you
will not view Jesus according to your ways, but
that you will surrender your life fully to Jesus.
For the believer, Whether you've just been doing
okay or you're apathetic or maybe a little bit
right now, you're falling asleep off the wheel,
that Jesus' fire would begin to roar inside of
you. I'm going to just say this before you. If
you're in any one of those categories, your prayer
ought to be, God, Jesus, roar inside of me. Meaning
a fire. Light the fire, the Jesus fire inside
of you. That's why I mentioned at the beginning
how important it is for you to soak. read, marinate
in John. Because one of the things it'll do is
the Spirit of God speaks to us through His Word.
And it'll drive it into your heart. And some
of you are probably good at memorization. Pick
verses to memorize. Let's just soak in that.
Let the richness of it change you. I want the
band to come up now. And I just want to, as we
prepare to respond, it really can be summed up
in these few words. My prayer is that we surrender
all to Jesus. That's it. We're going to go to
a time like we do every week where we have communion.
And as we look at the Lord's Supper, we're looking
at the central act of grace upon grace. What
Jesus did. It gives us grace upon grace upon
grace. Jesus offered his body and his blood as
the atoning sacrifice for our sins. In John chapter
6, verse 35, Jesus declared, I am the bread of
life. I am the one who sustains you and nourishes
your soul. If you are a follower of Jesus, you've
said yes to Jesus. When you take that communion,
you look at it and say, Jesus, you are the one
who sustains me, who nourishes my soul. That's
why we do it every week, that you come back to
that point every time. And then the cup. Matthew
chapter 26, verse 28 says this, for this is my
blood. What Jesus said to his disciples, this
is my blood of the covenant, which is poured
out for many for the forgiveness of sins. Church,
as we close today, my encouragement is no matter
what you're dealing with, get your eyes on Jesus.
Fix your eyes on Jesus. Run to Jesus. Let's pray.
Lord, as we come before you, I ask that if there's
anyone even in this room that has not surrendered,
put Jesus at the center, that that was where
we start today. Friends, if that's you in this
room and you've never surrendered your life fully
to Jesus, I pray right now where you sit, that
you would just say, God, I need you. I know I'm
a sinner. And I know you're the Savior. I don't
know much else, but I give my life to you. Lord,
as we become, step into this book, I pray that
you become so big in us, to us, that we will
see you, Jesus, for who you are. Change us, transform
us. We know that we get all of our purpose, sustenance,
And vision for this life comes from you, Jesus.
So we go all to you. We run to you today. In
your name we pray.