The Road To Easter | Week 2 | Full Service

Well, some of you are wondering who I am. If you've only been in this church for a month or less, you've never met me. And I am Bill. I am the lead and founding pastor of this church, by the way. And yes, I still work here. So

seems like every time I go somewhere, someone like makes fake news like, is Bill gone? Why is he gone? What happened? I was in Africa. And and I was there for two weeks, and it seemed like it took me two weeks to get there and two weeks to come back. So,

no. I we were in Africa, actually. It was a real blessing. We we have ministry there with a friend named Malanga, if you've been here very long, he comes here every year. And,

he's a church planting movement guy, and he's starting churches. And every two years, I get to go. Every year, we send a team to go do stuff, but I go every other year. And got to I speak at a conference that he does where I get to pour in about four, five hundred leaders, pastors on leadership.

And this time, we got to go and dedicate two different buildings. One was in Cobway. I sent a video that they played while I was gone. And that was awesome because

those of you that that that are part of Rock Point, you give here, you you serve here, this is your church. Well, guess what? God used you. You helped pay for it. We paid for half of that building. So so that isn't that awesome? And it's

there was a 100 and some odd people at their grand opening, their first service. I I got to share the gospel. About 40 of them came to Christ. It was really cool. That was awesome. And got to do that. We then got to go to Kenya, and we did the same thing in a building that we didn't pay for half of, but we paid a chunk of it. Helped support a church that we'd started there. Got to preach in that church, train their leaders,

and and it was just, and then the big thing we did this time was we got to be the tip of the spear. As I always like to say, I've always prayed that God lets us, the people of Rock Point, be the tip of the spear and just have a front row seat in the tip of the spear of what God's doing in the world. Well, at Melinga's church, we pulled off the first ever church planting assessment center. It's like boot camp for people that think they might be able to plant a church where they get assessed, they get grilled, they get trained.

And, Malanga had 10 couples there. I didn't think there would be that many, so he's ready to launch 10 more churches. We gotta we gotta catch up, man. And he is,

and it was tiring and exhausting, but all of them passed, they're all getting ready to go. So we got to be a part of that too. So, hey, I love you guys. I'm happy to be back. And thank you that we we get to trust the Lord together and we get to do stuff like this together. Amen? But

whenever I think about travel, you know me, I like being places. I don't like getting places because you have to do airports.

And and I don't know about you. I don't like airports. And airports are worse right now, man, with what's going on in the world and lines and security and and and the quality of service just seems to be dumping in on airlines and stuff. Every time I fly a foreign airline, it is so much better. And then but

but yeah. But I was reading in an article just yesterday. It's funny. It was about this guy was given the task of writing about the worst airport in The United States. And he goes, is that even possible to figure out what the worst airport in The United States is? He opened up saying, maybe it's whichever airport you're in at the time. But then he starts going through and listening. He goes, and he starts to pull out some evidence of that Newark

International Airport is the worst. It consistently gets pulled the worst. And a matter of fact, he pointed out that there are two prisons in New Jersey that have a higher Yelp reviews than the Newark Airport.

And and and I believe it because I've been there seven times, and I've been stuck and spent the night three times and barely got out of there the other times. And it reminded me this article about and then going and traveling that I have this last month about,

the worst time ever. When you're have you ever been you're just trying to get somewhere, and it's just not working? It turns into, like, planes, trains, and automobiles? The first time in 2018 now if you went to Israel with us in 2018 cover years, you're gonna get PTSD flashbacks.

But we were supposed to fly through Newark. We get there, and the flight to Tel Aviv, Israel is kinda the last flight of the night. It's late in the evening. So we get there early. We have a pretty long layover anyways. But we're watching as this storm hits, and all of sudden you see the board like, delay, delay, delay, delay, delay, delay,

delay, delay. And then as the night goes on, canceled, canceled, canceled, canceled, working up to us. We're the only one. And it gets to the point that it's late now. We're the only ones on the board left. And there's nobody left in the airport except us. And

and they were trying to get us a different plane, then they needed this, and then they thought they might be able to get us out of there. And so then they told us we need to go through the extra security because when you fly to Israel, they set up an extra security thing. But our American airports are not set up, so what they do is they partition off the section of chairs that's by the gate you're going to, and then they set up a little extra security screening, little mini,

you know, x-ray thing. And you have to, at some point, go through that. And once you go through that, you can't leave. So you don't go to the bathroom or anything else once you go there. So I'm like, I'm gonna wait as long as possible so that by the time I went back there thinking we were getting ready to leave, it it it there's no place they they don't have enough seats for everybody. So you're just standing.

And not even up against you're just standing in the middle of the the person sitting there for a you're just standing there. And and and we stood like that for a couple hours. And then I finally I go, oh, look. Our luggage is going onto the plane. And then, like, hey, look. They're loading food onto the plane.

And then a cabin crew went onto the plane. I'm like, yes. And then we thought it would be about another hour goes by, forty five minutes, like they're getting ready to go, and then we're all crammed. It's just so terrible. This has been so long.

And the cabin crew walks out with the captain and the pilots, and they just leave with their little bags. And I look at my wife and go, That's not good. She goes, What do you think it means? I go, I think it means we're not going to Israel.

And I go, I'm pretty sure. She goes, Why do you think it means that? Who's gonna fly the plane? And and so then once they got out of sight, they got on, we're so sorry. By FAA regulations, the crew timed out.

Because adding the flight to how long they've been there waiting with all the delays, they now pass their hours they're allowed to go. So we're like, nobody can fly the plane. I I was seeing this close to going, I'll fly the plane.

And so then they go, and they said, well, because of all the cancellations, there's no, hotel rooms nearby.

So they brought out stale cheese sandwiches and airplane pillows and blankets and locked us into the terminal for the night. And I mean, you know, you the and then they were airplane pillows, you know, the kind that would best fit on a Malibu Barbie house.

And and and so then we're trying to get comfortable. We're sleeping all night in an airport terminal. We wake up. We've had the same clothes on. Everyone's gross. We look like hobos. And and all the people start showing up in the morning to get their new flights all refreshed

and clean from their showers and their hotel rooms and the chocolates on their pillows and stuff like that. And we look like death we look like we're we're extras on the living dead and and trying to figure out where to go. It was terrible. Then we had to figure out how to fly out of there. And then there were 60 of us.

So they're like, well, okay. Then they lined us up. Finally, I I need eight of you. Come here. Alright. You guys are going through Belgium. You go that that way. You go, you're going this way. You're going that. One group, they go, you're going back to San Francisco. I'm like, what? They had to fly all the way back to San Francisco,

then got on a plane and fly all the way to Tel Aviv. By the time they hit the Atlantic Ocean, they had crossed the Continental United States three times already. It was awful. And then the worst thing is I have a picture here I wanna show you.

They reminded us that since your flight's canceled, all of your luggage is down where the the baggage claim is. You have to leave security, go back out, and go all the way back through. Well, our flight, a couple of us were sitting there. We got down there, and then they told us, oh, when's your flight leaving? Oh, you're not allowed to go into the airport for another two hours. You're you're too early.

So that's me and our executive pastor sitting on the floor. We thought the floor of the terminal was bad.

And then we sat there, and I barely made my flight by the time I got through security because they made us wait so long to even try. I should've known how bad security was, that we should've just started right then. It would've we would've by the time we got to the front, it would've been time we could go in.

All I remember is this. As we flew out of and I looked down at Newark, I said, that really is Seward Airport. And I am so glad I'm out of here. And and I don't know about you, but we you've had those days in travel, but what about if you're in some of those days in your life?

You're trying to get somewhere. You're even trying to go the right way, and it seems like it just gets darker and darker and darker and harder and harder and harder. What do we do in those times? What we're gonna learn from from what we're gonna look at today is is is what happened on Good Friday.

And how could that darkest day of all of human history be called Good Friday? The day when Jesus was tortured and beaten and tried and and and and carried his cross and he was hung on this cross the most gruesome way to be killed. And then, that's not even the worst part, all of our sin was placed upon him.

And yet we call it Good Friday. How can you ever call a day filled with darkness good? And we're going to see. We're going to see. And then we're going to learn from this good day, how can we apply what happened here in the example of Jesus

to bring that to our dark days? Because what we're gonna see today, the big idea is the darkest day did the deepest good. The darkest day did the deepest good. And that can happen in all of our days as well if we allow it.

So we're in Matthew 27. I'm just gonna read six verses. These are the last words that Jesus says, and it's when he dies on the cross, he's been hanging. And and I just wanna read this and unpackage three things from here that what we can do from what happens here

when when it feels like our days are dark. So it says here in verse 45, at noon darkness fell across the whole land until 03:00. At about 03:00, Jesus called out with a loud voice, Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani, which means, my God, my God, why have you abandoned me?

Some of the bystanders misunderstood and thought he was calling for the prophet Elijah.

One of them ran filled with a sponge with sour wine, holding it up to him to reed sticks so he could drink. But the rest said, wait. Let's see whether Elijah comes to save him. So that's just showing people are stupid now. People were stupid then.

Then Jesus shouted out again, and he released his spirit. So he gave up his life. He died. At that moment, the curtain in the sanctuary of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, and rocks split apart.

So there you have it, that last moment on the cross and what happens. And I think there's some powerful things in here when you take it apart and understand what's really what it's saying deeper than just the words we just read.

I think we can apply that to this dark day doing the deepest good, but we can apply this to our dark days. And the first point I wanna make is when life gets dark, remember his cross. When you go through darkness, and and even if it's darkness you caused yourself, your own disobedience, your own stupidity,

or if it's darkness caused by someone else, or it's just circumstances. Whenever it seems to be dark, remember the cross. Verse 45 says, at noon darkness fell across the whole land until 03:00. Three hours of darkness.

What was this darkness? Now it's interesting. That three hours, noon to three is the brightest time of the day. And at the brightest time of day, it got dark.

And we know this was not an eclipse. There's several reasons. One, they freaked out by it, but it's also they knew what an eclipse was because it would just say there was an eclipse.

Eclipse are shorter than this, and also they were living on the lunar calendar. Jesus died during Passover. Passover is the time of year where there would have been a full moon. You can't have an eclipse when that's happening. So it's not an eclipse. It's like God just turned a dimmer switch down.

It's like you could see the sun, but it wasn't making it bright out. It got dark. Now what's the big meaning of that? Is it just to be ominous? Was God just setting the scary mood? In scripture, whenever God brings darkness, it means he's bringing judgment. It's his judgment, the plagues in Egypt, prophetic messages,

the the use of darkness in descriptions. And so in this moment, literally darkness is falling upon the land. And then we need to remember that. Remember at the cross, this darkness of God's judgment came. And you're thinking,

how does God's judgment make me feel better in my dark times? If it's dark, does that mean He's judging me? No. That's the critical point. Who is that darkness falling upon in this moment? It's not the people. It's not us. That darkness of God's judgment was falling upon Jesus. That was the point of him going to the cross.

God is holy. God is righteous. God is just. He will judge sin. So the reason Jesus went to the cross was for the darkness to fall on him, not on us. It fell on him, not on us. So if you're in darkness,

you're like me. Whenever things just don't seem to work, I seem to think, is God out to get me? You ever think that? Like, when's the other shoe gonna fall? God just hates me. Or God's judging me. This is God's judgment upon me. No. Some of the dark things we do is the consequences of what we did.

But God is not purposely judging us because he already took the judgment. So what we can hold on to that is that in this moment, darkness in your life is not proof that God has abandoned you. It's also a proof of what it really is is the darkness over Jesus is proof of how serious our sin is,

but also how far he was willing to go to take care of it for us. In other words, when you remember the cross and you have darkness in your life, God's not judging you. But it is a reminder of what he went through to take the judgment shows how serious our sin really is.

But also shows us how incredibly deep God's love is. It's both of them at the same time. So when it gets dark, what we don't want to do is just stare at our circumstances. A lot of times, we just get stuck looking at the problem. But here's a but

and then you say, hey, you know what? Jesus loves you. Yeah, I know he loves me. But no, Jesus loves I know but when we say that, I know but. It doesn't help you when you're stuck in darkness to just stare at the problem.

It doesn't. And somehow we think if I worry and worry and worry and worry, somehow that's changing it. No, that's just draining us. God loves you. He loves me. He already took the judgment upon himself. So when it gets dark, remember that. Remember his cross. Remember that he took the darkness.

And I know why we struggle, but it's hard. You know why? It's really hard because when we're going through those tough times, those dark times, if you're anything like me, it's hard to not stare at it because you feel alone. I mean, if you're anything like me, when it gets really dark,

I end up feeling I can be surrounded by people. I just feel like I'm all alone in this. I don't know why. I just do. I remember that one of the worst times I ever got stuck in dark moments, and it really just hit me, was back right after we had started the church in 2001. Moved out here, and I was 31

years old, and we just launched the church. Came here with my two kids, a five year old and a two year old, and my wife. And then one year into this, we're coming up on the one year anniversary. My wife was really pregnant with my our third born, my daughter Sarai.

And and and what I'm thinking about is this around this time of year. My daughter just turned 23 this last week. And so we're getting close. February 12 was our one year anniversary of launching in 2000 and back in 2003. And

right at that same time, had all the pressure of one year into a church. We had launched and had no money. We were still barely making it. I had all that pressure of providing for my family and my young kids. There was constant stuff. When you started church, there's nobody around. I'm building a team. I mean, we put door hangers out to invite people to the church, and it was my cell phone number that was listed on it. So I was the lead pastor, the preacher, the the shepherd, the counselor, the and I was even the the the receptionist.

And and I was doing everything at that time,

and and it was a lot. And I would get called, and then and then you always feel that weight. It's like if you started a business, and you just feel that weight that that that's there's something more you should be doing, And it was really hard. I had to learn this because I my office was in the house, and even where I sat my big comfy chair, the way our house was laid out, the best place to put this nice comfy chair so I could just watch football

and and and and and and and be relaxed as long as it wasn't the Cardinals playing. And and baseball and whatever, when I'm relaxing, even trying to shut it off. The way the chair sat, all I had to do was turn my head this far to the left. I could see all the way down our high hallway in my office and the the desk sitting right there, and I'd see all the stuff piled on it. And I had to be I had to learn to shut that door. I had to go, it's time to be done for the day, and close the door. But it would just people calling you, you know, all this stuff, and it was like felt that pressure.

Add on top of that, my wife's really pregnant. We're we're planning out this big worst year bash. I'm really busy with that. And then on on on top of that, she's planning this big baby shower, and and I got family coming into town and all of that. On top of that, my dad had just died at the end of January. He had just died

right before.

And on top of that, my mom was dying. She ended up dying ten weeks after him. So in the middle of all this, dad dies, pressure, pressure, pressure, baby coming, pressure, and mom is dying.

It was a lot. And so I came home one day after just all these meetings all and as I came home, I was also coaching the baseball team at Higley High because, why not just add one more thing to the plate? Because I go, I need a little extra money. So I was working all those hours for $2,200 for a whole season. It wasn't

I've never been that bright when it comes to how you spend your time for money. And and and

I and and I just got in a fight with my sister at the baseball field because she was a teacher at the school, came out to confront me because she's like, hey. You've got to do something with mom. I know. She's fine. She's okay. Because I was just convinced. I I realize now my sister was not just about right at the time. I would not accept the fact that she was dying.

She died way I thought she'll be okay. She'll last longer. She'll she'll fight this out. And she came over and said, You're not taking this seriously. You need to come do something about it. I like, I'm so busy. What was I saying? And she walked away, turned around to me in front of the whole baseball. She's like, Billy,

you have got to pull your head out of no, he won't repeat that part. The baseball team kept repeating it. And realize mom's dying.

And then she turned around and walked off. So that was the last thing I had. And then I come home. And my wife was like, hey, we have got to get this and this cleaned up. You gotta get this before everyone gets here this weekend. And that was just was the match end of the gasoline for me. I lost it.

I took my keys. I'm like, fine. I got so much to do. Might as well. Threw them down, broke the key fob on our our our minivan, our one car. And and that thing was like $80 to replace. That was worth more than my minivan.

I would have been better off walking out and flipping my minivan over. That would have cost me less money. And and and and as I smashed it, and she's go, great. And then I go, yeah. Great. Fine. And I turned, and I started punching this closet door in our hallway,

and I just went Rocky Balboa. I started yelling stuff. I don't remember when I was yelling. Was like, you, Adrian. You know, was like, bam, bam, bam. I kept punching it till there was a hole this big in it. The entire top pain setting was gone.

I do not know how I didn't break and eat the bones in my hand, so don't get in a fight with me because apparently I'm Iron Fist. But I I did that and I stopped. I'm like, god, fun. And I was just so mad, like acting like Hulk. And then I turn and she goes, great. Now you gotta fix that before my parents get here too.

Now I don't know if it was all the pressure of everything else or the realization that my in laws were coming, but I broke at that moment. I'm just joking. My in laws, I love them. I love them. I love them. And and so And they watch the service all the time. So love you guys. It was all the other stuff.

But something weird happened. Instead of being in a fight, instead of me just destroying something, I just broke down. I literally I actually sat down on the ground. I just flopped down and just started rocking like this. And then I had man tears.

I don't know if you guys, we we we fight it. We fight. We hold tears back. We don't women don't, so they know how to regulate in those moments better than we do. You think, oh, look. She's getting emotional. Wait till you finally get emotional.

You think they're being ridiculous? When we finally lose it, it's like a damn broke. We don't know how to stop it. We don't know what's happening. We get snot bubbles. We, like, we start breathing,

It was I I I went all in. I was I was just losing it. And then as I was doing that, I just started saying, can't take this.

Dad's dead. Mom's dying. I finally realized I was rolling out. I go, I got all this pressure. I can't keep everybody happy. You're not happy. We got all this stuff happening, and I am all alone. I just remember I was crying. I'm like, I'm all alone. I'm all alone.

I was like that.

You know what my wife did? She walked over. She sat down next to me. She put her arms around me and put her head right on my shoulder and just rocked with me for twenty minutes.

And then she whispered in my ear, you're not alone. You never have been and you never will be.

And I don't know what it was about that, but I was able to get up easier than I am nowadays.

And something about what she just did

enabled me to deal with that day

because she was Jesus to me in that moment. When you remember the cross, that's what Jesus is doing.

He took our sin, our judgment on Himself And then He's willing to put His arms around us when we feel alone and say, You're not alone. Because when life gets dark, you remember His cross. But when you feel alone, you remember His cry. The reason He hugs us and holds us when we cry and we lose it and wonder, I feel alone.

And when you feel alone, isn't the common question? Is, God, where are you? We've all said it. Some of you are thinking it right now. I don't know why we always go back to that. I do it all the time.

Well, Jesus was the first one to ask it. Look at what he cried out on the cross in verse 46.

At 03:00, after three hours of darkness, the darkness was the judgment. So when all the sin was laid on him. So after having three hours of all the sin, think about what was laid on him. It we always worry about just how badly he got beat up and tortured. You realize that was the least

agonizing part of being on the cross? That three hours, when that darkness came, every sin was laid on him. And and and and God the Father basically was judging it, putting his judgment upon Jesus. The Bible says Jesus became sin for us. It means he took all the sin on himself. He became the sacrifice,

and God laid out his judgment upon it, allowing him to have all the sin. Can you imagine? Think of your worst, most guilt ridden day where you feel the most shame about something, that even if you've gotten past it and there's been forgiveness, if you think about it, it still makes you feel kinda bad?

Now imagine every one of those that's ever existed through all of time laid onto Christ. He was God who could take it, but he was also a man. Could you imagine feeling all of that all at once? That was made him was what made him cry out.

Because in that moment, him and God, he's God three in one. They're all God. They're connected, but they all have their own separate. They're they're three in one. But in this moment, they weren't one. This was the one time where God the Father has to kinda put his judgment on Jesus, and Jesus became something else for us in that moment. And he's sitting there disconnected,

so he cries out, my God, my God, why have you abandoned me? You ever feel like that? He's being honest. As a man, he feels alone. But in this case, he had to be. He chose it, but it was so much. But he's not losing his faith because even in that moment, he's doing his job.

Because that what he says there, he's directly quoting Psalms 22 verse one. Johnny read it earlier. That's called the shepherd, the suffering servant psalm. It's King David writing, and he's it's one of those weird things where a guy writes and he's writing about his own life. He's a king. He's also a a pre foreshadowing

of Jesus, the perfect king, and he's talking about how he's trying to do the right thing, but he's struggling and he's wondering where God is, and he's suffering. But if you read the whole Psalm, it goes beyond just David's life. He starts to talk about stuff. David has nothing to do. It's like, it goes deeper.

He's he's bringing this prophecy, and Jesus is calling out the prophecy. Is me. I am the messiah. I am the suffering servant. And in this moment, his soul felt, man, I feel all alone.

But it wasn't a lack of faith or disbelief by what he said. If you read the whole Psalm, but even in that first words, he says, my God, my God. It says he said it loudly on purpose. He wanted everyone to hear it because he's quoting the prophecy. But he also

feels alone. But when in that, he didn't say, God, where are you? He said, my God.

He did not lose his faith in that moment. This isn't disbelief.

This is one who is suffering and feels alone in the dark, but it is faith in the dark that he's showing. We need to remember that, That one, when we feel alone, we can cry out just like he did. And it won't God wants us to be honest with how we feel. But what Jesus knows is it's just a feeling

because He knows He's doing the right thing and He knows it'll be all right in the end. He's being honest, but He's having an honest faith as He's being honest with His feelings. And that's what we can do too. Remember his cry whenever we wanna cry. Because we do ask, Jesus, where are you?

In other words, my feelings, your feelings, that moment I had with my wife, our feelings scream, Alone. You're alone. But the cross says, You and me are loved. You're seen, and you're held despite how you feel.

So if you're in darkness, remember that cry. Remember that. Okay. So then what do I do with it from there? How do I get up? And that's the third thing, when God feels far. Because you might feel alone, but now you're like, I know I'm not alone. I know he's here, but why does it feel like he's way over there?

Why do I feel like I know I'm not alone, but I feel like he's off in the distance looking at me? Well, I don't know why. I feel the same way. And when you do that, remember his curtain.

The cross, the cry, the curtain. Verse 51 says this, at that moment the curtain in the sanctuary of the temple was torn in two from top to bottom. The earth shook, rocks split apart. So there's this earthquake and this temple curtain ripped from the top to the bottom.

You gotta understand there's power in what this happened here.

If you don't understand this, in the temple, they had their their their outer courtyards where they talked. They went in the inner. There was the holy section where they'd offer some stuff. They would do their their their their things, the bread offerings and stuff like that. They had the place where they offered the daily sacrifice the people brought. But then you went into the back, and right in the front, there was this huge curtain. And it wasn't a thin little. It was like an inch. It was huge, thick,

super thick. It doesn't just accidentally rip apart. And and and it was covering this front, and that was called the Holy of Holies. And and no one was allowed to go back there except for the high priest one time a year.

And it was very simple. God told him how to lay this out. And he's saying, hey, I love you. You're my people. You can come worship me. Can come into this holy area. But you know what? There's this section here that is representative.

It's it's it's an it's an illustration, you guys, that this is where I consider the holiness of my presence, my truest presence, my grand holiness, who I really is is behind there. And you're not allowed in there. Only the high priest one time a year, and what he had to do was he had to do all this preparation,

get cleansed, get these things, pray all these symbolic things, dress the right way, get his heart right, get his attitude right. And then before he went in there, they would tie a rope around him. And then he'd go in there and he'd offer the sacrifice once a year, and he would sprinkle blood on the ark of the covenant in there, and then he would get out of there. And that that represent that was symbolic of Jesus was that offering.

He's the one that came to give that ultimate offering. And it's symbolic. What he was saying was, you can't be in the room with my holiness. The Bible says it in the book of Romans, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. It means that all of us cannot meet up to God's glorious holiness.

And God does love us, but if he was just to let us in his presence and his holiness and just say forgiveness was, hey, don't worry about it, then he is not God. Because God will judge. God is just and holy and righteous. So for for we to stand in the in the room with God and his holiness, we can't live.

That's why they tied the rope. If he did anything wrong or hadn't prepared his heart right and and did it, he would die. And they're not allowed to go in. They would die. And so the rope you hear a thud or it's been way too long? They pulled the rope and dragged his body out.

And here's the thing, though. That seems scary. That's well, because here's the thing. What the cross teaches us, guys, is it shows the seriousness of our sin. God is holy. Our sin is a major, major offense to the holiness of God. But on the flip side, Jesus taking that judgment

shows the incredible depth of his love because what he was willing to do to make it right for us so we can go in. So when he gave up his spirit earlier in one of the other passages on his death, he had said, It is finished. He didn't say, I'm finished. He said, It. What's it? The curtain's finished

instead of, It's curtains for you. Yeah. See, some people are old enough. He said it's no curtains for you.

It's done. And it ripped from top to bottom. If a curtain was ripped, which one inch is not gonna rip by wear and tear, but if it did, it starts at the bottom, right? This was ripped like a piece of paper. God himself is saying that God himself,

through his power, that earthquake, presence of God, ripped this thing down. So you got rubble all around and this curtain rips, it falls open, and there's the holy of holies. He says, I've opened the room for you. Remember the curtain because He's invited us to walk between the curtain and come into the room with Him.

But if you sit in the rubble staring at the darkness, wondering where God is, not trusting him, maybe making it worse, going further into the rubble,

That's why God feels far away. If you feel like God's far away from you, this torn curtain guarantees this truth. If he feels far from you, that's not from his side. I'll say that again. If God feels far away from you, that isn't from his side. He's not running from you. He's not hiding from you. He's not rejecting you.

It's us choosing to stay in the rubble instead of entering the room. Because we're invited. We're invited. How do I get there? Confession? Prayer? Take your sin serious, step into the room, be with Him, trust Him.

See, it's important that we acknowledge the seriousness of our sin, but it's but we are called to live in the depth of His love. See, we may sit there in the rubble and go, Yeah, this is bad. This is bad. Well, then what we're called to do is go live in the room with Him. We get up, and we walk between the curtain.

In other words, in order to apply this to your dark days and my dark days so we can say that's a good day. And when you say that's a good day, you never have to admit that the pain and the struggle and the suffering that happened was good. But the deepest good could be done in that day if we let God do it.

In other words, ask yourself this. If the cross shows you the worst about your sin and the best about his love, which side are you refusing to look at? If it shows you the worst about your sin and the best about his love, which side are you refusing to look at? I've discovered in my own life, and I see it scripturally,

that every time we feel alone or we feel hurt or we're in a dark time or we're worried or we're a struggle or we're mad at God or we're wondering where he is or we're just sitting there in the rubble and and we don't get out of that, we just get stuck, it's because we're refusing to look at one of those sides.

So ask yourself, are you minimizing your sin? Is there things that God said, hey, this is how to live life, and you don't do it, And you have your reason. We're justifying it. We're minimizing it. We're making excuses for it.

We're saying, I love God in all these other ways, but not this. That's why God feels far from you. Because He didn't pull away. You're still in the rubble. You're not in the room.

Or you might be sitting out the rubble because of the other side of it. You're confused by what you're doing all the things God wants you to do, and life just seems to be hard, and it seems to be pain filled, and it seems to be hurting, and so now you're more of the other flip side. You're like, does God really love me?

So you're not in the room. It's always one of those two, and we are called to sit and reflect on that. And ask yourself, which which where am I stuck right now? Am I stuck by not taking my sin serious?

Or am I stuck because I won't trust how much God really loves me?

That's the way we have to decide, and that's how we we we move. That's when we deal with that, dark days become good days. Because then that process pulls us closer to God. And the cross and everything Jesus did becomes active in our life. And that's a good day.

Good things might not have happened that day that you think are good, but it's a good day.

It's a good day. You know how I learned this? Just in life in general, about even if tough days, bad days, even the days that I caused the bad stuff. My dad taught me. He he said how to have a good day. When I was little,

I would come home, bad day, whatever. He'd home from from work, you know, he's wearing his bell bottom dress pants and his short sleeve dress shirt and his clip on tie.

And and he would like, you know, and I'd say something's bad. And we we after dinner, we'd sit out in the backyard. Sun was usually setting, so we're looking at the sunset. And he would say, son, let's talk about this. Were you faithful? Meaning, hey, is my bad day caused by myself?

Like, is there something I did? And if it was, he goes, hey, I think you need to deal with that. You need to go say you're sorry to your sister, your mom, or go make that right with your teacher. Whatever you did, you should make that right.

Or if it was something that's happened to me and I didn't like, he goes, well, were you faithful? Did you make it worse, or did you do the right thing through the process? And if I did the right thing or said, I'll go make that right, the second question is he say, well, are you breathing still?

And he's like, like like, basically, did you die? Is what he's asking me as a five year old. And I go, yeah. And he goes, well, that means you're still in the fight. That means you were faithful and you're still here. You're still in the fight. And he goes, son, when you're faithful, no matter what,

if you did it, go make it right. If something happened to you, did you do the right thing? And you're still here, God still has more for you, you're still in the fight. If you're faithful and still in the fight, he goes, that is a good day. No matter what happened, no matter what the circumstances,

no matter what happened, if you can answer those two questions and deal with that, that's a good day. And I believed him until I got close to being a teenager, and then I'd have a bad day. You know, and I asked that girl to a dance. There's a fifth one that said no. And he goes, well, look in a mirror. And I'm like

I told that to the counselor. No. Just kidding.

No. I would tell him stuff and and and he would say the same thing as he always said. And I'm sitting out in his son's. I go, dad, no. This is you've said that since I was a kid. I don't understand it now. I was old enough to process. I go, that just sounds like a pep talk. And I go, how on earth is that good?

And he goes, can I tell you how I came to this moment? And I go, yeah. And he felt I think he felt I was old enough to hear the story now. And he described a scene. He goes, see that sunset? I was looking at one of those in January 1945.

I got a picture of the sunset. He's looking. I found it just this last year. I didn't even know it existed. There's a black and white version. This is a war photographer who took a picture. That sunset over Iwo Jima, the first day of the battle of Iwo Jima. So after the first day of fighting.

And then I got it colorized so we can see more what my dad would have saw. He was 17 years old. He goes, I lied. I walked away from professional baseball. He'd already signed a contract because this was the right war to fight. I was gonna do the right thing. And I did. Went to boot camp, got all excited.

But then it became real. You can be all excited about getting into the right fight, but then you gotta have to fight the fight.

And that first day, that's what he looked at at the end of the first day of battle where he was a machine gunner on the landing craft. So all day long, back and forth, where they're the targets of the cannons up on the tall part of the mountain, Mount Suribachi.

He watched one of his friends get blown up in the landing craft right next to him. He saw bodies, he killed people, fought all day long. And then as the day started to end, they were picking up their loading wounded, they were getting bodies.

And he was just looking at all this carnage of wrecked things, dead bodies, wounded people screaming, burning, and the men moving inland knowing there's still a lot of fighting left. He was bloody and sweaty and gross.

And he thought about how right when he went into that battle, he thought about two things, right? When he sat there with that machine gun going, wow, the loudness of combat and all these horrible things he was about to see, he thought, will I be a coward or will I have courage? And will I be killed? Well, at that sunset,

he said, Son, I was sitting there looking. I go, well, I had the courage. I did the right thing. I was faithful, and I'm still in this fight. And as he was looking all the most horrible things he'd ever seen, ever, Probably more horrible than most anybody has ever seen.

Iwo Jima was the bloodiest battle in the World War II in The Pacific.

He says, I turned around,

and I saw this sunset. And I go, wow, that is one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen. It's weird. I looked this way, that. I looked this way, that. And he goes, I decided to change my perspective. On that day, I redefined what a good day is supposed to be.

I said, God, I knew I'd never make it through this and I'd never make it through life if I thought good days are only when everything goes my way. When I get everything I want, when there's no stress and there's no conflict and there's no things, that's a good day and everything else is a bad day.

I realized I did have courage. I said I wanted to be in this honorable fight and I did it. And God spared me and I'm still in the fight. And he goes, son, as you go through life, that's what Jesus did for us on the cross.

It's what he did. He stayed faithful for us, and he came back to life. He stayed in the fight for you and me. And we call that Good Friday. He goes, that's the definition of a good day.

And he goes, so every day, no matter what circumstances you go through, no matter how bad it is, if you can stay faithful and trust the Lord and you stay in the fight, he goes, no matter what happens, son, that is a good day.

That's what we need to do. The darkness you're facing is not the problem.

It's which direction you're looking at it from.

And this is why I believe very strongly Jesus instituted this thing we call communion the night before he went through that good day. Because he knew that his disciples who believed in him, trusted and knew who he was, didn't understand the definition of a good day. They

thought God's gonna win the day, which he did, But the way they thought was make it go perfect our way, no struggle, get rid of our political problems, get rid of our financial problems, make everything work fine. And that's not how he did it.

And he told them what was gonna happen. I believe communion is God defining how to have a good day. When he took the bread and he broke it and said, this is my body broken for you. The bread represents the seriousness of our sin. I was broken for you. But then he took the cup

and he said this, this is my blood spilt for the forgiveness of sin and for a new covenant, a new life, a new relationship. This shows the seriousness of the sin. This shows the depth of his love. And he says, do this.

And then in the New Testament, it describes when we come to do this, we should go make our relationships right. We should confess our sins before this moment. We should sit before the cross and be real about where we're at. We should share about the darkness in our lives that's happening to us, but also the darkness in our hearts that we're bringing out of us.

Be serious with your sin, but embrace the depth of his love. In other words, I believe that communion moment, why he said to have this reflection time and to meet him at the cross, is meeting him at the cross is is is meeting him by walking back through the curtains.

When we remember the cross and we confess our sin and we profess our faith and we remember he loves us and all that doubt and all that fear and all that aloneness, we look at the cup and we say, I am not alone. I was never alone and I'll never be alone if I have Jesus.

And so this communion moment is like sitting in the backyard with my dad. We're sitting with our heavenly father, and he's saying, hey, I know it's tough, but is there something you need to confess?

And I know it feels hard and lonely, but embrace my love

and join me in the room. Because that is why I died for you and me. So we're gonna take communion, but here's what I wanna do. For those of you that already know the Lord, start talking to him right now. Just spend a few minutes and start reflecting on on on that have that moment with God. Where do you need to be faithful?

Where do you just need to remember his love and embrace it? But there's some of us that that that that this won't do anything if you haven't met Jesus in the first place. The first thing you do is put your faith in him.

The Bible says if if if you can fess with your mouth and believe with your heart, Jesus is Lord, you will be saved. So you need to have the very first good day, and that's put your faith in Jesus. And I wanna pray with some of you to do that. It's just all you do is pray.

The prayer will be make it your words. I'll pray with you. But so can we just close our eyes, bow our heads? And if you're someone that's never done that, that says, hey, you wanna have the greatest day of your entire existence and meet Jesus for the first time and put your faith in him and not yourself,

I'm gonna ask you to just raise your hand and hold it up while we pray. Because what you're doing when you raise your hand is you're saying, here's my sin. I'm confessing. And you're handing it to Jesus. And then he's taking your hand for life. So symbolically and literally,

think about that as you do that. So if you wanna pray, just hold those hands up. I see him going up. Just keep him up. I see him all over the room. And just pray just pray something like this. Dear Jesus, thank you. Thank you that the darkest day did the deepest good for me.

Right now, in the best way I know how, I confess that I am sinner and I'm taking it serious, but you died, came back to life, and you tore that curtain so I can join you. So please take my hand right now and walk me through the curtains and help me to understand what it means to live from and in your love

for the rest of my life. I thank you and I pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.

So Jesus took that bread, he broke it, said this is my body broken for you. Take and eat.

He then took the cup, said this is my blood spilled for the forgiveness of sin, for the new life, the new covenant, to make it a good day. Take and drink. Father God, I thank you, Lord. And my prayer is simple. It's for me, for everyone in this room, and anyone watching. I pray that we would always meet you at the cross

whenever it gets dark and especially when the darkness is brought on by our own running to the rubble. And Lord, I pray we will come and sit with you and and take the sin seriously, but remember the love more.

And when we have this moment with you, may we walk out of here and no matter what that day was like, may we be able to say that, that my God, my God was a good day. Amen. Hey, thanks for joining us online for service this weekend. Make sure you stay connected by following us on social media.