The Road To Easter | Week 1 | Full Service

Just, I mean, we got married and we moved into this house. We we got to bring our daughter home. It was her first home. We we really built this life together. And there were a lot of fun things about this home. It's kind of like a standalone

condo style home. There's communal parking, and they have the kind of communal dumpsters around the community. And I always met some interesting people walking around the community. There's amazing people, but I remember years ago, I haven't seen them in a while, but when I would walk my dog around our community,

I kept running into this guy, and his name was Kevin. And he had this knee He'd always wear this neon green, like construction worker vest, and he always had a shovel with him. And I remember the first time I met him, he was over in our communal dumpster, and he was moving stuff around in there.

And I came up and I said, are you taking stuff out or are you putting stuff in?

And he was not very happy that I interrupted him kind of organizing the garbage. And he kind of told me he was trying to get things together so everything would fit. I said, okay, all right. And so I tried to befriend Kevin over the months that I'd see him, and so I'd say hi and ask how he's doing, and he'd usually grunt at me and didn't really say anything. Said, Okay.

And I remember this one time, I finally got to he finally had a conversation with me. And I said, so Kevin, you know, why are you doing this? Why are you like,

you know, organizing the garbage and everything? He said, well, I work for the government. All these homes are government owned, and they actually just passed a bill that they're gonna destroy all the homes in this community.

I said, Kevin, I own my home. Like, what are you talking about? He said, nope, nobody owns these homes. They're government owned and they're gonna tear them down. I said, Kevin, I don't know what to tell you. I own my house. That's just not true.

And he just kept arguing with me. So I decided from that day on, I'm gonna love Kevin more from a distance at that point. You know, still love him. A couple months later, it's the middle of summer, and it is hot. It's like 115,

and I've been working out in my yard all day. I'm pulling up weeds. I'm I'm I'm clipping, like, the little bushes and trees we have. I'm I'm picking up all this garbage from, like, a barbecue we had. I'm I'm getting everything together. And the last thing I have to do, I just wanna be done. I'm so exhausted. I'm so tired. I'm dehydrated. I just have to get all of this stuff in a garbage bag and take it over to the communal dumpster, and I'm done with it. I'm so ready to be done. And so I tie up the bag and I put it over my shoulder and I start to walk around the gate and to the communal dumpster around the house. And as I'm about 50 feet away, I start to feel the bag get lighter on my shoulder.

And I start to feel stuff hit the back of my ankles. And I look down and the bag is completely torn open and everything is falling out in the middle of the road. And I just think, could I leave this here?

I know I can't leave it here and I'm just so tired. I just pray, God, could you just send help? I'm so done. And I look up and walking towards me is a man in a neon green vest carrying a shovel and I pray, God, anyone else?

Kevin walks up to me, he says, well, you made a mess of things. Yeah, Kevin, yes I did. This is what he says, just go inside, I'll take care of it. I

could have kissed Kevin in that moment. I'm telling you like, he was my garbage angel from heaven. I was so thankful for Kevin. I was so thankful for Kevin. He I'm gonna be honest, he was not the help I wanted, but he ended up being the exact help I needed.

See, in Matthew chapter 21, Jesus is gonna present himself to the world, to Israel, as the promised king and Messiah that they wanted. But what he knows and what they're gonna soon realize is he is not the king they want, but he's exactly the king they need.

It is so easy for us in our lives to put expectations on who Jesus should be. It's so easy for us to to decide, hey, Jesus, you know, I want you to make my life feel like this and look like this, and I want you to I want you to say these things about me. When Jesus doesn't live up to what we want him to do,

we can get upset and we can get frustrated and we can end up throwing him away. My big idea today and what I want us to walk out of here understanding is Jesus may not be the king we want, but he's the king we need. Jesus may not be the king we want because but he is the king we need. The people of Israel wanted a savior,

a messiah who would come in and destroy their enemies. And Jesus wasn't the king they wanted, but he was the king they needed. So Matthew chapter 21. For ninety years, God's people have been oppressed by the Romans. The Romans have come in, they've taken over, and they've occupied Israel. And so for years and years,

these people, the Jewish people, God's people have been taxed. I mean, they're paying an imperial tax and a temple tax and a local government tax, and they can barely make ends meet. They're struggling to figure out where they're gonna How they're gonna pay for dinner and how they're gonna get shoes for their kids.

They're taxed so heavily because they're under Roman occupation and they're sick of being under the Romans for ninety years. Everywhere you go, there's a Roman soldier always looking over your shoulder, and they can do whatever they you see,

by law, if a Roman soldier told you that you were gonna carry their supplies, which were 50 or 60 pounds for a mile, you had to do it.

It was required by law that you would carry their supplies for one mile. That's why Jesus is teaching his followers, if somebody asks you to carry your carry their stuff for a mile, to walk with them a mile, walk with them two. Go the extra mile. Because Jesus is teaching His followers how to love people that they hate.

Jesus and His friends and His disciples growing up, they heard rumors about how Jewish people would try to revolt against Rome.

How the Jewish people were tired of being occupied and tired of not having the freedom that they felt they deserved from God, and so that they would try to revolt and take out Rome, and the power of Rome absolutely crushed them, destroyed them.

It was not uncommon to be walking along the roads in Israel and see crucified people on the side of the road as a warning that you do not revolt against Rome. And God's people were so tired of being oppressed. And they start to go to their scriptures and look and they see signs and promises of a hero,

of a king, of a Messiah that's going to come and save God's people, and what they believe and what they cry out and what they hope for is that this king, this Messiah will finally free them.

And yet they start to put their own expectations of what they want their Messiah to look like, and they start to expect a Messiah that's gonna come and destroy Rome, come and crush their enemies, a Messiah that's gonna come and put them back on top so that their life will be prosperous and good and enjoyable,

and their enemies will be destroyed. That's the Messiah they want. That's the King they want. Three years ago, leading up to this moment in Matthew chapter 21, they start to hear stories and rumors of a man who's doing things men shouldn't be able to do. Blind people are now able to see.

Deaf people, people who can't hear, have never heard, can now hear for the first time. People who have never walked before, this man is talking to them, and they are getting up and walking for the first time and dancing and running.

People with demons inside them, they're they're being exercised out by the power of God through the voice of this man. There's a man and they start to believe, could this be the promised king? Could this be the Messiah that's finally here to free and rescue us? Could this be him?

As we approach Matthew chapter 21, it is Passover week. It is like the Jewish version of fourth of July on steroids. Thousands and thousands and thousands of people are flocking to Jerusalem to celebrate Passover, which is a a holiday of freedom,

celebrating an event where God freed all of the people, all of God's people out of Egypt from slavery. And if there was ever a time for the Messiah to show up, if there was ever a time for the Messiah to present Himself, it's this week. And they're right. This is the week that Jesus is gonna show Himself

as the promised Messiah, the promised King. But what they're going to realize by Friday is He is not the King they want. But what they'll understand by Sunday is that He's the king they need.

Matthew 21, verse one. As Jesus and the disciples approached Jerusalem, they came to the town of Bethphage on the Mount Of Olives. Jesus sent two of them on ahead.

Go into the village over there, he said. As soon as you enter it, you will see a donkey tied there with his colt beside it. Untie them and bring them to me. If anyone asks you what you're doing, just say, the Lord needs them,' and he will immediately let you take them.

This took place to fulfill the prophecy that said, tell the people of Jerusalem, 'Look, your king is coming to you.' He is humble, riding on a donkey. Riding on a donkey's colt. The two disciples did as Jesus commanded. They brought the donkey and the colt to him, and they threw their garments over the colt and sat on it.

Most of the crowd spread their garments on the road ahead of him, and others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. Jesus was in the center of the procession, and the people all around him were shouting, praise God. It's this word from Psalm 118. They're saying, Hosanna. Praise God for the son of David.

Blessings on the one who comes in the name of the Lord. Praise God, Hosanna in the highest heaven. The entire city of Jerusalem was in an uproar as he entered. Who is this? They asked. And the crowds replied, It is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee. So Jesus is coming into Jerusalem and he's presenting himself

as the promised king. He's riding in on a donkey in humility, bringing peace. Coming in and he knows at the end of the road there's gonna be a cross. He's coming to bring salvation, but it's not salvation through the strength, it's salvation through his sacrifice.

You see, why is it so important for us to know the kind of King that Jesus is? I'm gonna give you two reasons why it's so vitally, unbelievably important that we understand the kind of King that Jesus is. The first thing is, if we put the wrong expectations on Jesus, and we believe he needs to live up to our expectations,

expectations that he was never meant to fulfill, when those expectations are not fulfilled, we are going to believe that God doesn't work for me. That this whole Christianity thing, I, you know, I don't even know if God's real because He didn't show up in my life. When the truth is we just put expectations on Him that

didn't belong on Him in the first place because we made a counterfeit Jesus, a counterfeit Christ that never should be there. He may not be the Jesus you want, but he's the Jesus we need. The second reason it is vitally important for us to know and understand the kind of king that Jesus is, is this.

Jesus is the model for our lives. If we're Christians, we're supposed to be representatives that follow Jesus. So Jesus is the Christ, it's not his last name, sorry to burst your bubble. It's a title, Messiah and Christ mean the same thing. It's a king. And we are Christians, he's the Christ, we're Christians.

Christian literally means little Christ or Christito, like a tuck key, it's like a Little Christ, that's what we are, we're representatives of Jesus. And if we don't have a clear understanding of exactly who Jesus is, then we're gonna do it wrong.

And we're not gonna get the life and the fulfillment that Jesus promises when we follow him for who he is. It's vitally important we understand the kind of King that Jesus is, because these people, they missed it.

They put on Jesus the kind of King that they wanted Him to be, and when He didn't show up, here's the tragic part of this story. They're saying praise God, Hosanna on Sunday, these same voices that are screaming out Hosanna are gonna be the same voices on Friday screaming out, crucify him. Because when Jesus

ended up not being the king they wanted, they threw him away. And if we're not careful, the same thing can happen in our life. So I wanna give us three things today that really come from this passage showing exactly the kind of king that Jesus is.

So three things. First thing, Jesus is a king who brings victory through humility. Jesus is a king who brings victory through humility. You see, when Jesus rode in the kind of Messiah, the kind of king that they would want, a king that's gonna come in power and crush their enemies, that king would ride in on a war horse.

But Jesus rode in on what? A donkey. Not just a donkey, a baby donkey, a colt. What a king rides into town on in this day, in this age, is vitally important because it communicates what they're bringing. When a king rides in on a war horse, he's bringing power. He's bringing conquest. He's bringing war.

But when a king rides in on a donkey, he's bringing peace. He's bringing humility. Most historians, when they look at this passage, they actually say, at the same time that Jesus is coming into town on a donkey, on the other side of Israel, on the western side, there's probably another royal procession coming in.

There's probably Pontius Pilate, the governor, the Roman governor that oversees Israel. He's probably coming in at the same time on the other side of town, and he'd be riding in on a war horse.

I mean, there'd be just battle drums going. There'd be Roman centurions that are walking him in because he's coming in in power. Why? Because the Romans are trying to communicate that we're gonna have victory over you through power. And yet Jesus, the king of the universe, if anyone can exploit their power,

if anyone can use their power to do whatever they want, it's Jesus, the king of the world. I mean, see it in what he writes. He rides in on an unbroken, never been ridden baby donkey. Anyone who knows anything about, you know, donkeys or riding donkeys is you don't do that. You can't do that. You have to break

a donkey. It sounds, you know, violent, but I promise it's not. You have to break in a donkey so for it to actually ride and obey you and it goes where you want, but Jesus, the king of the universe, you see, donkey's surrendering to his will. Surrendering,

all of creation is surrendering to its creator, and if anyone can abuse and use their power to their own leverage, it's Jesus. But he comes in on a donkey in humility. You see, we can get in this trap in our life where we try to use our power and our authority to get what we want. I remember,

you know, I'd always try to convince my siblings to play games with me growing up, And they never would because I'd always beat them. But it's kind of a them problem.

So I finally convinced my sister this one day to play Monopoly with me because there was nothing going on. We were bored, was middle of summer. So we were playing Monopoly. And so we're playing this game and we're an hour and a half in.

Mean, I am like one or two moves away from beating her and I know it and I know she knows it. And then right when I'm about to win the game, she says, I don't wanna play anymore. I said, Matty, you can't do that. You just know I'm gonna win, so you're

choosing to quit so you don't lose. She said, well, I don't wanna play anymore. I just don't wanna play. I said, well, you have to play. No, I don't. Well, then I'm just gonna play for you and I'm gonna show you you're gonna lose. And she takes the board and she throws it against the wall.

She said, well, now no one's gonna win, are they?

And we do the same thing in our life. You know when you get in the crazy cycle in your relationship or in your marriage, when it's like you just feel hurt? So it's like, Well, I'm not gonna tell you I love you because you hurt my feelings.

It's like, oh, you know, you're not gonna say I love you, then I'm not gonna leave you a note. Oh, I'm gonna grab myself a coffee. I'm not gonna grab you a coffee because you hurt my feelings. And it just starts to spiral and spiral and spiral until we just are so upset with each other that we have a big fight.

Is it just me? Happens all the time, why? Because we just try to one up, one up, one up, win, win, win, win, win until we're losing. All of us are losing, nobody's winning. Or you know, at work or when we're in these mom groups or PTA meetings, somebody starts to say something about us and we feel frustrated and hurt and

so we're like, they said that about me? Well, you're not gonna believe what they did or this about them or their family. And then we start something and that spirals and they start something and it just gets bigger and bigger and bigger until we end up on the secret lives of Mormon wives. It's just crazy.

It's just insane. All of us have had that experience where we just try to use our power and our influence to win, and the winning feels like losing. But the model Jesus brings in, and the model that Jesus shows in our life is not winning through power, but winning through peace, winning through humility.

Man, when you're in the crazy cycle in your marriage and you just feel hurt, you feel frustrated and it just feels like nobody's giving in, man, if you wanna find victory in your marriage, bring humility into that. What if you just, you went to God and said, God, I feel so hurt by my wife, by my husband, my parent. But I

trust and believe that this relationship isn't to make me happy, but it's to make me holy. And would you help me work on my selfishness in this relationship? And you bring humility into that, and even when you feel hurt, you love them unconditionally, I'm telling you, that's gonna bring victory to that relationship.

And if somebody's talking bad about you behind your back and you know they're gossiping about you, you wanna know how to nip that in the bud?

And if you go to them and just ask to have coffee with them or have lunch with them and you just say, Man, I'm just so impressed with your parenting. I'm so impressed with your marriage. I am so impressed with your life.

I mean, could you help me? And you humble yourself and you go to them and you ask for help. I'm telling you, when you bring humility into that relationship, there will be victory in there. And some of us, we're

struggling with the Lord and it feels like we're losing in our relationship with God and we're not connecting, but it's actually because we're not willing to humble ourselves before God and say, God, whatever you want in my life, I'm gonna do.

What relationship do you need to bring humility into? Whether it's with God, whether it's with a person, what relationship right now do you need to bring humility into? Because you know on the other side of that humility is victory.

Jesus is the king who brings victory through humility. Number two, he's the king that brings joy

through sorrow. Jesus is the King that brings joy through sorrow. You see these people as He's coming into town, they are so excited the Messiah is showing up because they know what they expect, what they want is a king who's gonna come in and crush their enemies and everything's gonna be good now.

I mean, they're gonna be financially secure. They're gonna be not taxed anymore. They're gonna have a nice house on the beach. It's gonna be amazing. They're so excited for Jesus to change their circumstances. But what they're gonna realize is Jesus is not the king they want, but he's the king they need. You see, I

got this palm branch from my backyard because I live on the beach, of course. Just kidding, I live in San Dan, if you missed my first story. It's kinda sad now, it's been drying up. But these people, they would cut off these branches and they would

They came to the road that Jesus was coming in on and they would wave them. And they were singing praise God, praise God, because these palm trees, they were a symbol of joy. They were a symbol of victory.

And what they believed and what they wanted Jesus to be is someone who would come in and change their circumstances. They're waving these, saying, praise God, everything's gonna be different now. Praise God, I'm gonna have a nice new horse. Praise God, I'm gonna get a new roof on my hut. I can't wait. Praise God.

And Jesus is not that king.

He's the kind of king that brings joy through sorrow, because he knows at the end of this road isn't destruction, isn't conquest, it's a cross. And he knows on the other side of the cross is unbelievable,

incredible joy, eternal joy, more joy than anyone could ever anticipate or expect. But he knows the only way to get through there is the cross. See, Jesus invites us into a life where we go through sorrow to joy, through pain to healing. One of our pastors on staff, his name is Ronnie,

and I remember about a year or so ago, he came into work and he had gotten this new tattoo on his forearm. It was like of a buffalo or a bison. I don't know the difference, I think it's probably not the same thing, but

And he was showing me, and it's a cool tattoo, it's intense, it's well done, it is like a work of art. And I was like, dude, this is awesome. Why is it a buffalo? And he said, you know, this buffalo, it's a symbol, it's a picture of the kind of person I believe Jesus calls me to be. I said, what?

And he tells me this story, and I don't know if it's true, but I thought it was really interesting. He said, so in a field when there are cows, whenever a storm comes over the horizon, the cows see the storm coming like a snowstorm, they don't wanna go through the pain of the storm.

And so the cows, what they do is they run-in the opposite direction of the storm, but the storm, it inevitably overtakes them. And because they're running in the same direction as the storm, they actually are in the storm way longer than they would be, and they're actually more miserable because they ran away.

But what buffalo do is completely different. What buffalo do is when they see a storm coming, they begin to run towards it. They begin to run through it. And they run and they run and they run until they reach the sun on the other side. And he said, I got this tattoo because it's a symbol

of I wanna be the kind of person that runs through pain, runs through hard things, runs through the sorrow because I believe joy is on the other side. And I think that's exactly right. I think that's a picture of the kind of king Jesus is. So often we can expect Jesus to fix our circumstances,

and when He doesn't, we're upset. But He's the kind of King that takes us through the storm, through the pain, through the sorrow, because He knows there's real joy on the other side. Even the most famous Psalm, most of us have heard it, most of us know it, Psalm 23. It starts with, The Lord is my shepherd,

I shall not want, I have all I need. In verse four it says, Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for you are with me. Notice it doesn't say, thank God we're not going over there.

Thank God we're going around the valley. Thank God there is no more valley. No, what does it say? Our good shepherd takes us through. He's with us, he protects us, he leads us, but we're going through. We're going through the sorrow

because on the other side there is joy. That's the kind of king we have. That's the kind of king we need. And it may not be the king we want sometimes, but it is the king we need. He is the king we need. Where in your life have you been avoiding the pain and the sorrow?

See, sometimes a lot of us, when we come in this room, we just get this from the Holy Spirit, this conviction of this sin that we've been struggling with, this addiction that we know we shouldn't be, this thing we're not doing that we know we should be doing. And instead of dealing with the conviction

and going through it, we just avoid it because it's uncomfortable and it's painful. Because we live in a culture that doesn't say go through the pain, they say numb the pain. If you're having a stressful day, if you're having a hard day, if things are going difficult, just pour a glass of wine at the end of the day.

Just take a couple pills, just get on Instagram, let your brain go numb, just binge Netflix, just eat and eat and eat and eat until you can't feel anything anymore. Just numb the pain. But Jesus is a king who knows that only makes things worse. He wants to take us through. That conviction

in your life, He wants to take you through that. He wants you to deal with it. He wants you to walk through it because there is healing on the other side.

Some of us, we've had really, really difficult things in our life happen and we know it affects the way we live and the way we see ourselves and see other people. And we know we need to probably go to some sort of Christ centered counseling, but we don't wanna deal with the pain because

it happened in the past, I don't want my past to define me, it's too hard, really we're just avoiding the pain, even though we know it affects us. And Jesus is the kind of king that wants to take us through the pain with Him, because He knows there's healing on the other side.

Some of us, we have a hurt or a habit or a hang up and we need people to walk alongside us through it. We need a community of people who are willing to walk through the pain of dealing with the addiction or the hurt or the relationship to get to the healing and the joy on the other side.

And if that's you, if that relates to you at all, I wanna invite you to a ministry we have at Rock Point Church every Monday night. It's called Care and Recovery Night. If you come back here on Mondays, the whole campus is overtaken with different ministries that deal with helping people

walk through the sorrow along with Jesus because there is joy on the other side.

What hard thing, what pain, what sorrow have you been avoiding that God actually wants to walk with you through?

Jesus is the King who brings victory through humility. He brings joy through sorrow, and the last thing is He brings salvation

through sacrifice. You see, He's coming in and presenting Himself to Israel, everyone is saying these words, Hosanna, which literally means save us now. They are crying out for salvation from heaven. They're crying out, and what they want is salvation through the strength of God. But what Jesus presents is salvation

through sacrifice. They want strength and Jesus offers sacrifice. Because Jesus knows the true thing we need to be saved from is not the Roman army, it's from sin and death. It's from our own brokenness. And He knows true, real salvation can only come from His sacrifice. What's fascinating is Passover celebrates when,

in the book of Exodus, when the people of God were enslaved. And God was freeing his people through the 10 plagues, the tenth plague, the angel of death was gonna come over and kill all the firstborn males in the home. Unless you took a perfect lamb,

no blemishes, no broken bones, nothing could be wrong with a perfect lamb, and you sacrificed it, and you took the blood and you put it over the doorpost of your house. When the angel of death came to that home, it would pass over and you would be saved, there would be salvation from the perfect lamb.

What Jesus is doing, he's coming into Israel at the very same time that all the Passover lambs would be coming in for Passover week, and he's on the same road, and he is presenting himself to his people as a perfect, sinless Passover lamb that will bring salvation. That's the kind of king Jesus is,

that brings salvation through sacrifice. You see, I think a lot of us, especially depending on our religious background, if we grew up in a very religious context, we can get this so twisted that we think our salvation needs to come through our strength. That I need to work really hard, and I need to do good,

so much good that God's pleased with me, and then I've earned God's love, now I'm saved. And that is not the gospel. That is not the good news of Jesus. The good news of Jesus is not that your strength saves you, it's that his sacrifice saved you once and for all.

When Jesus died on the cross, it was in our place for our sins, because He sacrificed so we could be saved. That's real salvation. That's the King that we need. When we're working and we're working, we're trying to work for God's love. When the gospel says, we live from God's love.

We're not here to earn God's love, but we actually start with the fact that Jesus wanted us while we were still sinners, while we were still broken. He paid the price for us, and when we make him our Lord and our savior, we get salvation, not determined on our strength, but determined on his sacrifice.

And our response to that is sacrifice. Romans chapter 12, it says, If you're a Christian, offer your life as a living sacrifice, pleasing to God. See, our lives, when we're followers of Jesus, because he sacrificed for us, we can't earn his love, but we live from it, and we sacrifice our lives for him.

We say, Jesus, you're my Lord now. That means the person that's in charge of me, here's my life. Take it, it's yours. We sacrifice our life for Him. That's the response. And so where in your life do we need to sacrifice? I'm gonna get really practical for you guys. And I love what Rita said before this of,

and Easter's coming, and here's a couple things that I know working in a church for a long time. There are going to be so many people who don't know Jesus that are gonna show up on Easter Sunday. They have a divine appointment to meet Jesus for the first time, and that will happen. I also know visitors,

they only come on Sunday. It's the truth. Would you be willing to sacrifice your Easter Sunday, your plans, and move to a Friday or a Saturday so that someone can have an unencumbered first time meeting Jesus on Easter Sunday? Would you be willing to make that sacrifice? Second thing is, and this is tough,

all these people who are gonna come and meet Jesus, be here on Easter Sunday, someone's gotta help them park. Somebody's gotta greet them at the door. Somebody's gotta make sure there's coffee out there. Somebody's gotta make sure they're greeted and welcomed. Somebody's gotta watch their kids.

And we need people who are willing to sacrifice their Easter Sunday so that people can meet Jesus and get pointed to Jesus. Would you be willing to sacrifice your Easter Sunday so that people can come and meet Jesus? Where is Jesus asking you to sacrifice?

For some of you, I think this is actually the first time that you've ever heard Jesus sacrificed for you and that you don't have to work for God's love. For some of you, this is the first time you realize that the correct response to that is actually to offer your life to Him as your Lord and Savior.

So what I wanna do is give everybody in the room an opportunity, if it's the first time for you to say yes to Jesus, I wanna give you that opportunity and accept Him as your Lord and Savior.

You see, because the gospel is Jesus chose to die on the cross in our place for our sin, and He paid for our sin and death through His sacrifice. And when He rose from the grave, He proved that He's God and He proved that sin and death was defeated once and for all. And if anyone wants to be a follower of Him,

if anyone wants to live with Him for the rest of their lives, for the rest of eternity,

all you have to do is you have to make Him the Lord of your life, means you're sacrificing your life for him, that he is the one in charge now, and the savior, the one you desperately need. And when you call on him as your Lord and savior, you will be saved. So we're gonna do that right now.

I'm gonna ask everybody in the room to bow your head and close your eyes.

If that's you for the first time, you wanna say yes to Jesus, I'm gonna have you say a prayer with me. But would you just raise your hands so I know, so I can pray with you, pray for you? Just raise your hands super high so I can see it. Yep, I see your hands all over the place. Yeah, just stick them up because I'm gonna pray for you. So we're gonna say this prayer. You can say this in your hearts. There's nothing magic about the words, but it's a heart of surrender to Jesus. And here's what I want you to pray.

Jesus, I believe you sacrificed for me on the cross. I believe you rose from the grave proving that you're God. I want to give my life to you as my Lord and my Savior, starting right now. In Jesus' name we pray. Everyone said, amen. Hey, can we give it up? There were hands all over this room, just people who sacrificing

their life. Because Jesus sacrificed it first. You see, it is so important for us to understand that Jesus may not be the king we want, but he's absolutely the king we need. Because when we make this counterfeit Christ, this this this king that we want, that king can't save you. Only the king we need can.

Where in your life do you need to come back to the king that Jesus presented himself to be? Where in your life do you need to humble yourself before the king? Where in your life do you need to choose to move through the pain, through the sorrow with Jesus? Where in your life do you need to sacrifice for your king?

See, when we come to the point where we realize that, man, we may have been having and holding these false ideas about Jesus, what do we do with that? How do we recenter ourself on the king that he presents himself to be? And the answer is actually pretty simple. It's worship. And so we're gonna sing a song today that

is commonly sung on a Palm Sunday, but it's taken the words right out of Matthew chapter 21, what these people are proclaiming, Hosanna. And what we're going to proclaim is praise God, Hosanna to the king that Jesus really is. You see, Hosanna has a rich history. Hosanna started, it literally means, God, save us now.

And God's people would they would cry out to God when they were in hard times, when they couldn't make ends meet, when they were struggling in their marriage, when they were being oppressed, God, hosanna, save us. And it became it was a cry for help. And over time, God did deliver, and God did show up, and God did move.

And this word hosanna that was a cry for help, it also became a cry of praise. Hosanna God, thank you for saving me. Thank you for showing up. Thank you for getting me through that hard time. God, remember that time I didn't think I was gonna make it? Hosanna, thank you that I made it. Hosanna is this beautiful word

that we can bring to our king. It's a word that says, God, save me in my hard times now. Would you save me? Hosanna, help me. At the very same time, Hosanna, praise you because I know you're gonna do it because you've done it before. Hosanna.

Would you approach the king? Not the king you think you want, not the king that, you know, might give you what you want, but would you approach the king who will save you? And would you glorify him as the only one who can? Let's stand, church, right now, and let's worship our king.

May not be the king we want, but man, he is the king we need. He's the king our nation needs. He's the king your family needs. He's the king your neighbor needs.

And if you've just decided to make him your king, I say this every time and I mean it, man. I believe you've just made the best decision of your life. Don't let the day end without telling somebody about it.

Head to the prayer room. There's people in there who would love to talk to you. And guys, I know you're probably wondering, I went back there and I figured out how to use my phone, and she responded.

I'm five for five, guys. Now imagine if every single one of you invited someone to Easter this year. I have five. You just need one. You guys can do it. You can do it. Don't let the weekend end without inviting someone. Thanks for joining us, and we'll see you back here next weekend. Thanks

for joining us online today. Be sure to follow us on social media to stay up to date with everything happening here at Rock Point.