Galatians | Week 4 | Bill Bush | Full Service

There you go. There you go. Hey, if you've been in the search for very long, you've probably seen me use a shoe illustration. Three shoes before. How many of heard me talk about this in regards to relationships?

If if you didn't, I'm I'm it's gonna I'm gonna take a little bit different direction today in in relationship with God, but what I usually do with these three shoes when I talk about a relationship, you get married, and and and when I got married, I I discovered that, you know, two people don't always see eye to eye, and I who knew? Who knew?

And so as I was trying to figure out my own marriage and help other people understand how do you communicate, how do you work through things, and when you have conflict or differences,

I discovered there's that there's a couple different approaches that people have. We're like wired a certain way. And there there there's first the first type is this combat boot. That when you have conflict, you lace up, you go to war.

And and your attitude is I will address this. I'm gonna go at it. Sometimes you misapply the the bible scripture of we can't let the sun go down on our anger. That's basically stand out here and fight me you coward, you know, kind of a deal. And and and and it's a lot about force. Right? I'm gonna force this. I'm gonna make it happen. Then there's the other person

that puts on the running shoes, and they flee the fight. They don't want any conflict, so they just kinda avoid it and and run away. And there is like this natural law of the universe that this person always marries this person.

Now I think there's a reason why. I think two people like this never get married. They don't live to see the marriage. The relationship doesn't make it, and these two people can never really talk about anything. I get you can occasionally have you might be both like this, and so you you think your marriage is working out fine because you've never fought.

The the problem is you've never resolved anything either, and and and the real answer is is is instead of a combat boot or a running shoe, it's it's to have a hiking boot

in our relationship. See, a hiking boot is very similar to a combat boot. It's designed to go over rough terrain. It's designed to have those tough moments, but it's got a different purpose in mind. Whereas a a a combat boot is the terrain is just something to get through in order to find the enemy to win and fight.

A hiking boot is about a journey, a trip somewhere, and it's meant to be done together. A marriage is supposed to be a hike, and yes, sometimes there's uphill, sometimes there's downhill, sometimes it's rocky, sometimes it's not, but we are both committed to wear the shoe of good communication

to get there. Alright? That's great. I gave you a mini marriage sermon. Go figure that one out. But how do I wanna apply this today

to Galatians chapter five and really sum up what Paul's been talking about as he's been talking about these these the the what the real gospel is. What does it really mean to know Christ? What did Jesus really do when he died on the cross for us? What does it mean to be a Christian?

And and and how do we view the good news, the gospel? And and he's been talking about these opposite the the the wrong shoes when it comes to how we walk out our faith. The wrong shoes in walking out our faith. Now what we've already hit on because he's really been wailing on this is is the combat boot approach.

This is I'm gonna walk out my faith with force. It's what's we've talked about law, legalism, it's about ritual makes me right. The combat boot is a person who's trying to follow God, but you are gonna force your own righteousness. You're gonna force the righteousness by you living by the rules,

and and and and that's that's the one way to to try to do it. The the running shoe then is the opposite end that actually shows up in the passage today a little bit, and that that's I'm gonna find my own happiness. So this is saying, well, if the gospel if knowing God isn't about rules,

then I guess I can just trust that Jesus loves me and run into my life, run around however I want, and live my life however I want because the rules are there ain't no rules. That's what some people think. It's the grease thing again. That's twice I've referenced grease in this series. That's weird. But anyways,

force my righteousness, run and find my own happiness. Those are the two extremely false teachings about what the gospel really is, And and and and the real one is what we're gonna see today is we need to put on the hiking boot which is follow the holy spirit. It's not force. It's not find. It's follow.

We have to learn to follow the holy spirit and trust him because these don't work. This won't work. And that's what we're going to see. In Galatians chapter five, the big idea I want to talk about is true freedom is about trusting, not trying. Both of these are about trying.

I'm trying to be right before God in my own power. I'm trying to be happy and find my happiness. Know that God loves me, but live the way I want. I'm still trying. I'm trying to find a life that works independent of God and his spirit and what he's called us to. But what happens when we trust?

Cause that's the difference. We need to trust the holy spirit, trust the power, trust the real gospel. That's what we have to do, and and and we miss it. And so before I'm gonna jump in, I'm gonna read all of Galatians five,

But the key thing before I jump in to think about as we read this. As I read it, think about what I just described and see if you see that in this passage as it goes back and forth between these things and then this. But what the problem with these two is, like I said, they are rooted in control. I'm in control.

I make myself right. I make myself happy. And and and really, they're rooted in control, and that control comes from fear. I'm afraid that God can't really save me or doesn't truly love me unless I do these things. The problem with the combat boot when you're rooted in that kind of control and you use the force,

you also get very angry at people around you that aren't doing it. You get very judgmental because when you're judging yourself and you're living this way, you also start judging everyone around you, and that's really out of that fear.

The fear that I might not make it. The other problem with this approach is it ends up not letting the church ever be the church because when I try to force my righteousness, it's all about the rules. It's all about I do this for God's love instead of I follow from his love. When you make it all about that, you know you can't do that. You know you fail, and that's where the fear comes in. And so what you do is you have to hide that, especially at church because you need to look like you've got it together. So where the place where we should be honest and and and say, hey, man down, come help me medic. I need help. You're like, nope, I got this.

So you hide yourself and we judge other people. It's like a distraction. Well, what about the world? What about that? What about that? Look over there. Don't look at me.

This one is about control too. Yeah, I know God loves me, I come to church, but

there's some ways I'd rather live. I think I'd be happier if I could do this. I think I'd be happier if I could do that. So we just say, you know, we don't really listen to God's word in our life. This is really rooted in that that verse that all through Proverbs. There's a way that seems right to man, but in the end it leads to death.

This is control. You're trying to control what's really going to work in your life, and it's rooted in fear. I'm afraid that if I really trust the word of God, I'm never gonna truly be happy. I'm never gonna have contentment. I want to control.

This is about surrender. But how does that work? What does it look like? I want to read I'm just going read a little chapter and then I'll make three comments of how we can walk in true freedom. What does it mean to be free in Christ, to be free indeed?

And so here's what it starts off with where we ended last week. Verse one, so Christ has truly set us free. Now make sure that you stay free and don't get tied up into slavery to the law again. Don't go back. He's like, you're free, now live like it. Start living like free because those two shoes are enslaving.

They don't free you. And so he goes, listen, I Paul tell you this, if you're counting on circumcision to make your right with God, he's gonna talk about circumcision a lot right now. So it's it's a ritual, it's it's actually a very painful ritual

that that that is supposed to signify on the outside that you're righteous and holy on the inside. He goes, it doesn't work from the outside in. That's what he's trying to say.

And and he he goes, you try to make you right with God, then Christ will be of no benefit to you. I'll say it again. If you're trying to find favor with God by being circumcised,

you must obey every regulation in the whole law of Moses. What he's trying to say is if you're gonna try to force your own righteousness by obeying rules and rituals, it only works if you do all of it all of the time. You have to be perfect or you lose. And it makes Christ dying meaningless.

For if you're trying to make yourselves right with God by keeping the law, you've been cut off from Christ, you've fallen away from God's grace, you're missing the grace and the power and everything that comes with it. You're just you're just you're just gonna miss it.

But we who live by the spirit eagerly wait to receive by faith the righteousness God has promised us. For when we place our faith in Christ Jesus, there is no benefit in being circumcised or being uncircumcised. What is important is faith expressing itself in love.

You are running the race so well. Who has held you back from following the truth? It certainly isn't God for he is the one who called you to freedom. This false teaching is like a little yeast that spreads through the whole batch of dough. I'm trusting the Lord to keep you from believing false teachings. God will judge that person, whoever he is, who has been confusing you. He's trying to say there's someone that's been misleading you, there's a lie you're believing, and I'm telling you,

most of us struggle with either the combat boot or the running shoe, and we'll see some of us go we go back and forth, and at the heart of anything that makes us not trust God's love is a lie. You're you're believing a lie is what he's saying.

And then you're building a whole your whole plan of life, your whole view, your whole world view is built on a lie. And she's saying, don't believe the lies.

Dear brothers and sisters, if I were still preaching that you must be circumcised as some say I do, why am I still being persecuted? If I'm saying the things the false teachers were saying, then why am I being persecuted? If I were no longer preaching salvation through the cross of Christ, no one would be offended. You get that? He goes, if I stop preaching that the gospel is simply Jesus died for us and we have to put our full faith in him,

that's offending people. Couple thousand years later, it's still offensive to people because we don't want to have to surrender. We wanna force or find our own way.

He goes, I just wish that those troublemakers who want to mutilate you by circumcision would mutilate themselves. Ow. You know what he just told them? You cut it off. It's what it says, okay?

For you have been called to live in freedom, my brothers and sisters, but don't use your freedom to satisfy your sinful nature. Instead, your freedom to serve one another in love for the whole law can be summed up in one command, love your neighbor as yourself. But if you're always biting and devouring one another, watch out, beware of destroying one another.

See, when we try to run after legalism and all that, we get we just chew on each other.

He goes, so I say, let the holy spirit guide your lives. Then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the spirit wants, and the spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires. These two forces are constantly fighting each other, so you're not free to carry out your good intentions.

But when you are directed by the spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses. When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear. Sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, being a Seahawks fan, outbursts of anger. What?

Sorry. Right in the middle of this, that was bad. Selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, get serious, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the kingdom of God. What did he just say there? He goes,

the running shoe, if you say I can believe in Jesus and run my life however I want, If that's really how you choose to live, he says, you're probably not a Christian.

But this isn't the answer either, because he already opened up with that. But he says this, but the holy spirit produces,

see it's the holy spirit that does this, produces this kind of fruit in our lives, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control. There's no law against these things.

Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we're living by the spirit, let us follow the spirit's leading in every part of our lives. Let us not become conceited or provoke one another or be jealous of one another.

So there you have it. He's describing the three shoes of how do we walk in faith.

And I think in there, in all of that I just read, there's three points I want to pull out of how do we do that? How do we walk in true freedom? What does it look like? And it kind of lays it out in there, I just want to point out three things in there. And the first one is this, true freedom decommissions false control and underlying fear. Remember I said the false ways of trying to live your faith is actually about control and fear.

Walking the right way will decommission that. It takes it off the board. It helps you battle. Yes, it says it's a battle. You're always going to fight, but it will decommission it. How you say. How you say. Look at verse six again.

For when we place our faith in Christ Jesus, there is no benefit in being circumcised or being uncircumcised. The last part. What is important is what? Faith expressing itself in love. Faith and love. The key is love. We have to put our trust in love.

And when he says faith expressing itself in love, it's love for others, but it's really he says our faith is expressing itself in a love for God and it's really expressed because of the love of Christ. When he says, what does the spirit do? The spirit does this, what did God do? He died for us. What did Jesus do?

And and so the key is always love. It's always love. See, this is about force. This is this is legalism.

This isn't love. This is about wanting this false sense of freedom. This is what the bible calls license. I have license to do whatever I want. Well, if you say you're in a loving relationship some with someone and then say, I'm glad that you love me, but I'm gonna do whatever I want, you don't love. But real liberty

comes from love. It's all about that. We have to understand that freedom comes when trusting love replaces trying control. When we replace trying and control with a trusting in love. And that first step is we have to put our faith in God's love. You have to really understand and I think both of these wrong shoes

shows that we don't understand the depth of God's love because we don't understand the depth of our sin. See, both of these treat sin kind of cheaply. They don't take it serious. You think legalism would because they're all about the rules, but it's not because if I can do it myself, if I can be better than you

by being more spiritual than you, then you know what? I don't really think of my sin as any more than mistakes. We're not mistakers.

And when you make a mistake, my bad, I'm sorry, and you get past it. That's not what sin is. Sin is a battle within us. Says there's this even when you're a Christian, it says there's this echo inside of us of our old nature that's still whispering lies. That's the number one lie we believe, is that old nature

whispering. And so if you believe that you could do it on your own, then why did Jesus have to die? Because sin's not that big of a deal. You could handle it.

So it belittles. You don't understand the depth of God's love because you don't understand the depth of your sin and separation from God and how holy and righteous he is. And it's the same with this, running.

Running after pleasure, running after your own happiness. You're cheap like, God says this isn't the way to go. That's wrong. That's not. I died so you didn't have to do that anymore. You're like, no, it's okay. I can still do it. Fire is not that dangerous. This is your kid that wants to play with fire.

You're like, what does it matter? You're here. You love me. You'll put the fire out. It's not love. Neither one understand we're not mistakers, we're sinners. And when you understand the depth of your sin, you start to comprehend how wide and deep and extravagant and unbelievable the love of Christ is for you.

And that's what you have to embrace. See, those both of those other shoes I've I'm either trying to find happiness or holiness from the outside in. It doesn't work that way. It works from the inside out. It works from the inside out. How does that work? Well, when I embrace the love of Christ, the next thing happens,

true freedom is driven by, that's what we just said, is driven by and drives us to love. So not only is it driven by love, it drives us to love. So first, when I can see how much God loves me and know that I'm a sinner, not a mistaker, and quit trying to find my force my holiness or find my own happiness,

I now understand that God is the one who loves me and creates me and died for me to this level of he loved me so much. It says in first John that because he loved us first, we can now love. That's key. That meant we can't truly love God back without knowing his love.

We can't know his love till we own the depth of which we are sinners. Neither one of those shoes ever own the depth of which you're a sinner. So if if once I can own that and see that, I can embrace the love of God by faith,

and as I embrace his love, it now frees me by the power of the holy spirit. I'm now free to learn to love God back, and as I love God back, it unlocks my ability to love others. When it says that he loved us so we can now love, it means we can love God back, but we can also truly learn how to love each other.

That's why this passage, how many times you go in and out and talk about us relationship with God, and then then it keeps skipping over, don't be mean to it, don't devour each other. You know what? Now you can love one another. He keeps mixing in. Our relationship with God totally affects our relationship with each other.

And so what he's saying is is we we need to understand that true freedom is driven by and drives us to love. It's all back to love again. Love is what actually changes us.

It it it is. Oh, man. Where did I put that at?

There it is. Wanted to get this guy's words right. There's an author, George Gilder. He wrote a book for men and marriage, and he was just talking about the men's side of it. He was studying really studied men and like how many so many single men and and even some married men, they they just seem to be directionless.

They seem to just wander and struggle in and out of issues and and and the problem, and he and he did a bunch of research on it, he ended up writing about it. But what he noticed is he says he notes the the massive single men, they struggle with this. And here's what he said, and they often just pass through, in his words, right, the same sloths, the same ruts, the same things,

incurred the same boozy dreams, marijuana highs, cocaine crashes, sex diseases, job vapors, thinking the job's gonna solve it, legal scrapes, wanderings, I could add a few to that list too. Like they just kinda wander from one thing that things can be happening to the next, and they struggle with changing.

In other words, they it's it's we often they struggle with growing up in many ways, and he tried to look at what's consistently ever changed a guy,

and he goes he goes, normally they do not escape. They go they follow the entire syndrome and then break out of it, but then they end up back in it. So you snap out for a little while, then you back. You're out, you're back. I clean up my act, I'm back. He says normally they never escape through, he said, counselors, psychiatrists,

doctors, sex education courses, he said, peace corps programs, reformatories, guidance counseling, spirit, I think legalistic sermons that just scream at everybody that are just like do this or God's know, God's out to get you, he is, he's out to get you to come home and accept his love. That's what he's out to get.

He says what happens most of the time, the only effective thing that happens, the only process that reaches the sources of motivation and character is falling in love.

He said when a man falls in love, he changes. Love is effective because it works at a deeper, more instinctual level than all other modes of education and change. Love does not teach or persuade, it possesses and transforms. Love infuses reason and experience

with the power to change a man caught in a morbid present into a man passionately engaged with the future. So he said the most consistent thing that you saw a man change the way he lives was falling in love, and he was talking about that on the practical level, like in marriage,

and and you've seen that. You can see a guy could just be like all over the place messed up and really loves a woman, and he changes. Little side note for free for those of you in relationships, if a guy says the words I love you and then continues to wander around and treat you disrespectful and not do anything,

little clue here, he doesn't love you. He doesn't because it's proof positive when a man actually does love, he changes. He changes. So just think about that in your relationships right now and

look at it, but that's really key because the way God wired us is love truly changes us, when you know you're loved, it will change you. And so if you can embrace God's love for you, what the cross really means, what Jesus did by seeing your sin clearly, not to be hellfire and brimstone,

oh, you suck, you're terrible, guess what, we're all terrible, we all suck. We are all, you know, some of you are now legalistic mad that I said suck, and now I've said it three times, sorry.

But we are because we're not perfect like God is perfect, and we can't make ourselves perfect. And we have rebelled against God and you're never gonna understand his love till you understand that. And a God we rebelled against died for us to answer to himself. He's just.

He can't just forgive us like, oh, don't worry about it, because if he does, that's unjust. When everyone says, why is sin not judged, every sin is judged. God is 100% just.

So when you're yelling about everybody else's sin, think about yours. We need grace,

not justice right now. But we like grace for us, justice for you. That's the problem. We need to understand that love frees us. And I think women are the same. I think love changes us.

I know this for a fact because I've watched my wife who, you know, when you get into a really weird, like, we keep teaching, we keep having these

drills with our safety and security team because our team here is awesome. We're always doing these trainings and they're trying to teach us something because when you're in a weird scenario, which we had one a few weeks ago here, and people really respond one of three ways, fight, flee, or freeze.

Two of those are acceptable things to do. Guess which one you should never do.

Don't go possum on this scenario. You can't sit so still that they can't see you, okay? And and and you either need to fight, you need to flee. Well, my wife gets mad because her personality style, every time we take the test and we put us they put us in these stressful scenarios, guess what she always does?

And she doesn't like that about herself. And she's always worried, but what happens if something's happening and then I go, you know what, you'll do that, but I've watched you when our kids, like my son right here, I've seen him do a lot of knuckleheaded things when he was little,

and I've watched my wife react faster than me. I didn't even notice what was going on, and she's already in the pool. You know, she's already done that. She's like she didn't freeze. She's boom. Right then and there. Because you know what? A mom has a love for her kids that will change her.

I mean, they they they they they they'll pick up a car off their kid if they had to, and woe is the person who gets between the mama bear and her cub. And you could be the most docile, freeze oriented person in the world, and if something's about to happen to your kid, it changes you. Why? What did that? Love.

So guys, if you're in a weird situation, you're about to get hurt and your wife just sits there.

That's how you know she don't love you.

If she jumps into action and saves your best friend, you have a long conversation with her.

That's so stupid. It's probably true, though.

See, the choice is one of control, but what are you going to be controlled by? Your sin? Your desire to make yourself righteous? Or will you be controlled by love? Because when we're not, we're going to be wearing one of these shoes. I don't know about you, this is me, maybe you can relate,

I often fall into this trap if I'm not really walking with the holy spirit, I fall in a trap of I don't just wear one of these, I wear one of each. If you're like this is your life, you know what, I gotta get righteous, I gotta get my act together, you know, I'm gonna I'm gonna I'm gonna march

up this hill, I'm gonna get to the righteous spot, I'm gonna get where God want, and then it's so hard, you're dragging yourself up. You can't really do it. You start to feel defeated. The problem is when you try to do it on your own, and you are a good boy or girl, the second God doesn't give you what you want and more badness comes, you're mad at him. So you're like, I'm this is exhausting. You're like, I'm I'm getting up to I'm finally, that's it. I can't take this anymore. I just gotta be about me. I need me. And so then you like,

put on the other shoe and you hop this way, then you trip and fall, and you're like, okay, then you get so far away from running that you're like, where is God? What's going on anymore? And you're like, this is bad. I need to get back in the game. I gotta get back to church. Some of this is like, you're in church or out of church. It's either I'm running after all this stuff that I think is gonna make me happy, then something happens that's bad. You know what? God's probably punishing me. I should go back to church and and that could that be you?

You're like, I'm marching up the hill or I'm running away. I'm fighting it out myself or I'm fleeing as far away. That pendulum, that tension, that's exhausting. It's frustrating and this is why I think so many people say I used to be a Christian. But the question is, if you've only had

these on or these on or like me sometimes, if you only wear one of each, were you ever a Christian? That's the question. Because that's not how it's meant to work. That's what Paul is trying to say. So how do we do that? If true freedom, deep missions, false control, and fear and it's about love,

and when I embrace God's love, it's driven by and drives us to love not only God but others. How does that even work? And that's my last point. True freedom is developed by the Holy Spirit. It's the Holy Spirit that does it. Remember, said Jesus, we're waiting for the righteousness he'll bring us.

And then in in in I love in in verse 16.

I just wanna read that one verse again. It says, so I say, let the holy spirit guide your lives, then you won't be doing what your sinful nature craves. Let the holy spirit guide your lives.

In other words, put on a hiking boot and understand I'm not in this alone. I don't fight it up by myself. I don't run myself to find my happiness. I'm going on a hike. Take a hike with the holy spirit. Simply trust him. The nice thing about a hike is it has a beautiful destination that Jesus already died for us to reach.

We're gonna get there. The Holy Spirit is the guide. The Holy Spirit is the one that takes us there. The Holy Spirit empowers us. The Holy Spirit coaches us. The Holy Spirit when we wanna give up and sit down, he sits with us and goes, come on. And you gotta spend time. You gotta trust him. You just gotta step out. That's all. Faith by love. I believe in his love, so by faith I'll take this step.

And that's what we got to do. That's how it works. And then when we do that, the holy spirit then gives us all those all these the fruit of the spirit it describes. Love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self control, I mean aren't those what you really want in your life?

Isn't that the type of people you want around you in your life? That comes by the holy spirit. He produces it. All we have to do is let him lead us. That's where real freedom is found. That's the weird thing about Christianity. The only way you win is by surrendering. It's opposite. The only way you find true contentment

and joy and stuff is when you serve others, not just getting served yourself. So where are you on that? You know where a lot of us are? Our struggle is? We're trying to live the Christian life without the holy spirit. You know who was trying to follow Jesus that didn't have the holy spirit? The disciples

before Jesus went to the cross. You ever think about that? Like, what a bunch of knuckleheads, know. And you're like, wow, I'm just like them. You know why? They were vastly different. Didn't mean they didn't never sin again, but look at how different Peter was after the cross than before. Loping off ears,

boastfully saying I'll never betray you, then he betrays him. And and and and these guys were right there walking with Jesus, but before Jesus died on the cross, they they couldn't understand why you need to leave, and he says I need to leave because I'm gonna send you the helper.

I'm gonna send you my spirit, the holy spirit's gonna come, and now you're gonna have God in your bod. They had God in a bod, We'll have God in our bod.

The holy spirit will indwell us and he can empower us, and he's the one that helps us not listen. That's why he says there's this tension. He says when you become a Christian, you have the holy spirit, he says you are a new creation now. So that part of you, the biggest lie, here's why we have a hard time with the love and we keep running after your other shoes, there's two of us in there, and there's really only one of us. If you know Jesus, you're a new creation. The problem is there's still an echo, a shadow of our old self

that whispers to us. That's what he's saying. It whispers the lies. You can't really be happy if I no. No. No. No. I I don't care if the bible says that's not the way to go. I really feel that. I was born this way. I I have this desire, and that's that whisper of that shadow in there, and the problem is you either listen to it and run away, or you think I gotta fight it. I gotta fight it in the way of I gotta reform that because here's the lie. Here's the catch.

You think that's who you really are. You think that's the voice of you, and so the legalistic way says, I have to reform that part of me. No, you don't. It says you nail that part of you to the cross. It's that echo will be there, but that's not who you are. You know who you are once you put your faith in Christ?

That voice that listens to the spirit. That voice that wants to do the right thing. So you think that that's just an idea that God's calling you and you're really that other voice that you have to change. No. Just don't listen to that voice. That's not who you are. When Jesus comes back, know, he says he'll perfect us,

all it's gonna do is the part of us that is the new creation leaves, goes with him. That voice is no longer.

Stop listening to the lie that you have to change and reform that or that you have to listen to that and get defeated like and enslaved to the idea, well, that's just who I am. That's not who you are if you have Jesus.

And if you listen to the spirit by faith, lace up your hiking shoes and go, I'm going to go where you want me to go because you loved me so much. I'm going to go where you've asked me to go. That's really the whole point of this. In other words, freedom is found when I trust God's love and I follow his lead.

Before we close down, we're going to take communion here in a minute. Before we do that, I want to read a parable that Jesus taught to a crowd of people that struggled with combat boots, and he was talking about people that had running shoes on that ran back to Jesus.

You probably have never heard of this parable, the parable of the prodigal son.

How many of have heard that before? How many of have heard me teach on it poorly before? Here's what's interesting. I'm gonna just read it and I want you to think about the three main characters because it's really the parable of the prodigal sons. Both sons had a problem.

There's the father who represents God and there are these two sons. Just think about these three options.

Overlay that over the lens of what Jesus was saying and I think you might go, woah. You're gonna see something you never saw in this parable, what Jesus is trying to say. Here it goes. It says this, to illustrate the point further, Jesus told them this story. A man had two sons. The younger son told his father,

I want my share of your estate now before you die. So his father agreed to divide his wealth between him. He's a younger son. He doesn't even get the biggest he basically goes to his dad in this culture and says, I want my my my inheritance now. You know what he's saying is, I wanna live as if you're dead. I want your wealth, but I don't want your wisdom.

I I I want the inheritance, but I don't want the home. I I wanna have your money, but I don't wanna walk with you. I wanna go I wanna take what you have and go live any way I want to. Think about that. That's what he's saying.

And the father said, alright, go. A few days later, this younger son packed all of his belongings and moved to a distant land, and there he wasted all of his money in wild living. About the time his money ran out, a great famine swept over the land and he began to starve. He persuaded a local farmer to hire him and the man sent him into this fields to feed the pigs. The young man became so hungry that even the pods he was feeding the pigs looked good to him, but no one gave him anything.

It's funny how we run after the love of the world, the world will never love you back. Okay?

He says when he finally came to his senses, he said to himself, at home even the hired servants have food enough to spare, and there I am dying of and here I am dying of hunger. I'll go home to my father and say, father, I've sinned against both heaven and you, that's good, and I'm no longer worthy of being called your son.

Good. Please take me on as a hired servant. Wait. So now his plan is I'm gonna go back, I'm gonna apologize, and I'm gonna say, just let me be your slave.

In other words, let me be your servant, let me work for you, and the plan is he'll probably earn the father's trust back, earn his love back, now what's what is he what's his plan?

He had the running shoes, now he's like, I guess I gotta get back. He put on the combat boots.

But look what happened, he returns home to his father in verse 20, and while he was still a long way off, his father saw him coming. He'd been looking for him. Filled with love and compassion, he ran to his son, embraced him, kissed him. And then his son said to him, he starts his speech, father, I have sinned against both heaven and you. I am no longer worthy being called your son.

Which line did he not even get to finish?

All he said was the repentance part. I have totally sinned. This was horrible. I mean, I've walked away from real life. I've walked away from the freedom. I've walked away from this relationship, and he was about to say, because his plan was to say, take me on as a hired servant, but the father never let him say that part.

He stopped him at, I'm sorry, I came home, and I know I'm not worthy, but I came home, and he stopped him there before he said that. And he says, so he returned home with his father, and while he was still oh, well, that's that's already we already read that part. But his father said to the servants, quick,

set him up in the guest house. No. He said, quick, bring the finest robe in the house and put it on him. Get a ring for his finger and sandals for his feet. He said, no. No. No. No. No. No. You're not gonna come back and wear these shoes. You're gonna come back and wear the shoes of my son.

You are a son and you still are. You came home, put the sun clothes back on. Put the shoes back on. Let's hike together again.

He then says, and kill the calf we've been fattening. We must celebrate with a feast. For a son of mine was dead and now has returned to life. He was lost, but now he's found. So the party began.

Meanwhile, the older son was in the fields working. When he returned home, he heard music and dancing in the house, and he asked one of the servants, what's going on? Your brother's back, he was told, and your father's killed the fattened calf. We're celebrating because of his safe return. The older brother was angry and wouldn't go in. His father came and begged him, but he replied, all these years,

I have slaved for you and never once refused to do a single thing you told me to do. And in all that time, you never even gave me one young goat for a feast with my friends. How many of you are mad at God right now because you've been slaving away trying to be a good boy or girl, and he won't even give you a little goat?

He goes, yet, when the son of yours comes back after squandering your money on prostitutes, you celebrate by killing the fattened calf. His father said to him, look, dear son, you have always stayed by me and everything I have is yours.

We had to celebrate this happy day For your brother was dead and has come back to life, he was lost but now he's found. Jesus just taught that.

And what's funny is it's the other son at the end of this that's still lost. The son came back and from what we understand,

came back to a relationship with his father. The older son never left the home. You know what's interesting? One left, one stayed. But neither one truly had a loving relationship with their father. Neither one. How about you? Where are you at on that? There's only one solution for this.

The cross.

We've got to come back to the cross. Some of you have never met Jesus. A lot of us in this room know Jesus, and you've been struggling in one of these two shoes. Or maybe you're like me. You've put both of them on.

That pendulum, you keep going back and forth, back and forth, back and forth, and you are exhausted. You're tired. You feel shame. You feel like you can never get it right. Then you go to the other extreme, like, I don't have to get it right. Maybe the Bible's not right. Maybe God's this is too restrictive.

The answer is put on the hiking boot. Walk in a relationship with God, in love, by faith, being led by the Holy Spirit. That's what it's about. And I think communion, the night before Jesus died, when he knew his disciples would be confused,

he took that bread and he broke it. Says, is my body broken for you? He then took the cup and said, this is my blood, spilled for you for the forgiveness of sins.

And then he says, do this in remembrance of me. He said he wanted us to continue to do that. You know why? I think every time we take communion, it's an opportunity for us to return home.

It's an opportunity for us prodigals to come back. It's also an opportunity for us who are the older brother who's just getting mad at everything all the time and angry, and you're frustrated. And you're like, what about God? What about me? You're sitting in a church and you see what why do you keep telling me to go to Saturday night? I because new people. What about me? I've been in this church for a long time. I serve. Why can't I come on Sunday morning? What about me? What about me, God? What about me?

And maybe it's a chance to sit there and go, wait, am I sitting in the father's house and still wearing combat boots? It's on me, and now I'm angry because I think I'm doing the right thing and I'm not getting what I think I deserve.

When he said do this in remembrance me, it's a chance to hit that reset button. It's a chance to see God run to you again. It's a chance to see Jesus on the cross and see your sin and be able to go, father, you are right. I have sinned against you. I'm sitting in heaven, and I am not worthy to be your son. I am not worthy to be your daughter, but you made me worthy

when you died for me.

So I'm gonna live in that worthiness. That's freedom, and it's found at the cross.

So I'm gonna pray here in a sec, then we're gonna take communion, sing a song. That song's gonna be our closing prayer. But what I wanna pray about is, first of all, if you already know Jesus, just start talking to him now about which shoes you've been wearing and just hear him say, I love you and I'm glad you're home.

Let's walk together now. Just confess and bask in his grace and his love and his forgiveness. And then watch him extend a hand and pick you up, put the hiking shoes on and invite you to go walk with him now. But what I wanna pray is there's some of you that you've never met Jesus.

You might have been coming to church and trying these different ideas, but you've never actually met Jesus. This means nothing if you don't know Jesus. There's no supernatural powers in this.

It's just remembering what Jesus did in the Holy Spirit. So I want to pray with somebody. Somebody online, somebody in this room, you need to come. You need to put your faith in the love of Christ. That's how you start this process. And

I just want to pray with you now before we take and give you a chance so then you can take communion for real for the time. So let's pray. If you're in this room, you're online, and you've never put your faith in Jesus, it's simple. You just gotta

confess and profess. Confess that we aren't worthy, that we're far from God, that we're not mistakers, we're we're sinners, and profess our faith in what Jesus did for us. So if that's you and you wanna pray, just pray with me, but make it your own words in your heart. Just pray something like this, God, thank you.

Thank you that Jesus came and died for me and resurrected, bringing life to me, because I am a sinner. I've tried to fight to be right in my own power. I've ran to try to find my own happiness,

but I need you. And I'm sorry,

but thank you for dying for me and forgiving me. And right now, in this moment, the best way I know how I turn from me, and I turn to you and put my faith in you and your grace. So Lord, help that love just permeate my soul. Help the Holy Spirit's power to come in there and help me to love you back.

And then help me to lace up the hiking shoes of love and walk through life with you from now on. I thank you. I pray this in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen. You took the bread, broke it, said this is my body broken for you.

He then took the cup and said, Take. It's my blood spilled for the forgiveness of sins. Drink.

That's the gospel, and this is what truly sets us free. Amen.

Once we believe that this morning, we are free in Jesus because of what he has done on the cross, and we can go into this week not being a slave to what we've had in our past, but looking to him as our foundation. Amen? Hey,

would you guys celebrate with us? If you made a decision to join the family of Jesus, welcome to the family. Come on. Let's celebrate with them this morning. That's incredible. If you made that decision today, go to rockpoint.io.

We have a said yes to Jesus tab. We would love to take those next steps with you and help you in your walk of faith. Thanks for joining us online this weekend. Let us know if we can help you in any way. Make sure to follow us on social media and connect with us on rockpointe.io

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