Identity Crisis | Week 2 | Jeff Moors

I've placed so much of my identity, so much of my worth, my value into being the husband and the dad. That's not necessarily a bad thing, but it is a bad thing when it begins to usurp my identity in Christ. And I love that we're actually in this collection of talks titled Identity Crisis because

it's from our identity that our lives are formed. It's like who we think we are is is like who we become and it's so important for us to, yeah, acknowledge that these are parts of our life but even more so to acknowledge who we are in Jesus.

In the book of second Corinthians chapter five, if you have your bible, it's going to open up there. Second Corinthians chapter five, we're gonna read verses 14 through 21. Paul is writing to the Corinthian church. And the Corinthian church, if you don't know, was a wild church.

The city of Corinth was much like you would say is maybe kind of like our modern day Las Vegas except maybe about 10 times worse. Corinth was just absolutely crazy and the church was filled not with like

people that were knowledgeable Jews that had converted to Christianity, but it was filled with a ton of non believers that had become believers, tons of Gentiles who had worshiped different gods and goddesses in the city of Corinth that had just wild, wild testimonies.

And now Paul continues to write back to the Corinthian church in order to help them understand and really live out of who God has created them to be. And so he says here in second Corinthians chapter five, he says this, he goes, either way

Christ's love controls us. Another way to say it would be that Christ's love compels us. Since we believe that Christ died for all, we also believe that we have died to our old life. He died for everyone so that those who receive

his new life will no longer live for themselves, instead they will live for Christ who died and was raised for them. So we have stopped evaluating others from a human point of view. Or another way to say is, is we no longer view people from a worldly perspective.

So at one time we thought of Christ merely from a human point of view, how differently we know him now. This means that anyone who belongs to Christ has become a new person. The old life is gone, a new life has begun. I absolutely love that verse.

And all of this is a gift from God who brought us back to himself through Christ and God has given us the task or you could say the ministry of reconciling people to him.

For God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, no longer counting people's sins against them. And he gave us this wonderful message of reconciliation. So we, we are Christ's ambassadors. God is making his appeal through us. We speak for Christ when we plead, come, come back to God. For God made Christ

who never sinned to be the offering for our sin so that we could be made right with God through Christ. What Paul is declaring right here is that of course we've been given this new identity or maybe this we could say like a rediscovered identity,

an understanding of who we are. But with this, Jesus didn't just come to die for our sins, we raised to life so we could have eternity with him. He actually came to show us there was a new way to be human. That there was a new way to live and so I want to propose to us this idea, this big idea today that a rediscovered identity brings

a new humanity. Would you guys pray with me? Father, we thank you so much for your word.

God, we just ask now that as we open your word, you would open up our hearts, open up our minds, encourage us, convict us, Lord, inspire us, but father ultimately just continue to shape us more and more into who you've created us to be so that we can represent you to a lost, hurt, and dying world.

Father, we love you, we thank you, and we trust you. And it's in your name we pray. I know God's people said, amen. I'm actually going through a very interesting season of life, kind of a transition if you will. I'm beginning to understand that I'm getting older.

I'm getting older. I know that I look incredibly young. Part of it's the physique, part of it's the I'm just kidding. I know that like I and in my mind, feel young, but I'm starting to do things now that would I guess you could say our telltale signs that I'm no longer as young as I thought I was.

Like like I'm noticing that for some reason, like, labels are now printed very blurry.

It's like, come on, like pick a different printer. This shouldn't look like I should be able to read this. You know what I'm saying? Like, I'm having conversations I never thought I would have. Like, I'm having conversations about sleep. I talk about sleep all the time now.

And and and it's like when I was younger, never talked about sleep, but it's actually it's one of the first things that my wife and I will ask each other about in the morning. Every morning she gets up and about a half hour later, get up, I go downstairs, I get my cup of coffee, sit down on the couch and one of the first things I ask her is, so how'd you sleep?

She'll do the same thing. How'd you sleep? We both know we slept terribly. It doesn't matter. We still ask these these these questions.

My body isn't working quite like it used to. I will randomly break out into stretching. You know that you're getting older when you just will randomly in the middle of a conversation totally fully engaged like, oh, yeah. Yeah, exactly. For sure. Yep. I get that. Totally.

The other the other I kid you not. The other day, was like in the middle of our staff meeting for our church and I just like got up from the table, went and laid on the floor and did whatever I could to like crack my back. I have tendonitis in my left elbow. I'm right handed and I don't know how that works.

Think, honestly, think it's because I started golfing which is another indication that you're getting older as well too.

It's something I wasn't prepared for. My kids are in a new season of life. My kids are in a season. Like I used to love it, would come home and my kids would rush the door. Dad, daddy, daddy. Now I come home and one of them will give me a nod and the other one isn't even at home. Know, like my oldest daughter. No one came

for parents of teens, empty nesters, get this and I'm beginning to understand this. But no one ever told me that when I held my firstborn, India James, in my arms and I was like, girl, I will love you forever.

I will be dad for always and me and you were gonna have this bond. No one ever told me that she would leave the house and only text when she needs something.

I wish I was kidding on that one like, oh gosh. But what's hard is that I've placed so much of my value, my worth into this. I place so much of who I am into my skills and my abilities, you know, into being a dad, into being a husband

and all of those things, like if your worth and your value and your identity is in those, are changing, those are fleeting, they come and they go. And ultimately like my identity needs to be in who God has created me to be. My identity needs to be into being this new creation

Because all of this stuff with the flesh, it goes away.

And even Paul, the one who wrote second Corinthians chapter five, he gets this and he actually writes about it in Philippians chapter three verses four through seven. And he says this, if anyone thinks that they have reason to put confidence in the flesh, I have more

circumcised on the eighth day of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews in regard to the law of Pharisee. As for zeal, persecuting the church. As for righteousness based on the law, faultless. But whatever were gains to me, now consider loss for the sake of Christ.

Because these things for his community, they was were bragging rights. Those were something to put yourself into like law, faultless, I'm a Pharisee. Like he was able to like flex on all of this stuff like eighth day, done. You know, like he was the man. And everyone would have been like, based on all of that stuff.

But he was like, no, but whatever whatever that is, I I don't even think about it anymore. I just think about who I am in Jesus.

But our issue, the thing that we wrestle with is that we still like to put so much confidence in those things of the flesh. We still like to put so much confidence in the titles that we hold, in our positions at work, in the things that we have. And ultimately like that, like that's what we wrestle with.

Because here we are knowing that we're believers, knowing that our identity needs to be in Jesus, needs to be based in our relationship with Christ. But often that's not what we talk about, right?

Like when people ask you about you, you talk about that you're the manager of this. So you the you know, like you're the husband of so and so. You're the we never just go like, you know, well, hey. Tell me about yourself. Well,

I'm the son of the most high king. That's what I am. You know? I'm a daughter of, you know, daddy God. We don't we don't like daddy God.

That was the first one I said that. Okay. So but we we we don't really like we don't really lean into that. And I think a lot of times, I mean, it might be weird if we did that, but I think a lot of times it's because we still see who we are as okay and good.

We still have this idea of who we are in the flesh is like, it's like we're all right. That my titles are actually, they're good. That me as a human, we're good. They actually did a study, check this out. There was a poll done in 2021

where they asked thousands of people about what they thought about humanity and what they thought about their goodness. They found that 8181% say that they believe that humankind is inherently good. 81% believe that humankind is inherently good.

That we have a good nature about us, that we think good thoughts about others, that our intentions are good. That 81% of humans out there in the world are ultimately we're good. We're good people. And then it goes a little bit further and they believe that 75% think themselves a good person.

They're like, yeah, like so three out of every four of us in this room would say, I'm a good person. I'm a good guy. Like I tip well. I open the door for people. I let other people go first. I say hi. I smile. Like I'm a good person. Right? And the funny thing is is that 86%

of men would think themselves a good person while 67% of women would think themselves a good person, which either shows this, that men really are the the superior species or that women are way more self aware than us guys are.

They were saying amen in here. Come on. This church is getting Pentecostal. Come on, somebody. Amen. Right? So but but watch. Watch. It goes it goes even further than this. 40 six went a step further, admitting that in their eyes, they were better than everyone else they know. Can

everyone do this for me? Everyone everyone look to your left. Everyone look to your left. Everyone look to your left. Can everyone look to your right? Everyone look to your right. One of those people thought that they were better than you. Or or better yet, you thought you were better than both those people.

You're like looking over there like, yep, better than you. Oh, for sure better than you. Oh, yeah. Definitely. Right? So this is our problem. This is our problem, people. We're delusional. We are. We're delusional.

I love this. It's like pastors just call me delusional. That's weird. Well, I'm a guest pastor so I don't have to come back. I'll call you whatever I want. But like so, you're delusional. We we are delusional people. Like we don't have really a right view of ourselves or our issues. We

don't have really a right view of our sins. We treat our sins almost like when you think about like the way we treat our driving, right? Like if I'm in the car and I cut you off, it's because I'm important and I gotta get somewhere. But if you cut me off,

you don't know how to drive and you got issues, you got something wrong with you, right? It's the same thing with our sin. Like if no. If I lie, it's because I I had to lie.

Because if I didn't tell if I didn't it was a little lie. And if I didn't tell that little lie, then things could have gotten way out of hand. So ultimately, I had to lie to make things better and to make things okay. But you you better not lie to me. Don't you dare lie to me. That's that's sin. Gossip and slander.

Well, look, I like I know what's going on in their life and I just have to get it off of my chest. So I'm talking to you about what's going on with them and and it's not a good thing and and they really got some stuff that they're working through, but I'm glad that I'm able to talk. I just had to get it off my chest. And if we're Christians, we go that step further and so so ultimately, please be praying for them because they're messed up.

But don't you dare talk about me. Don't you dare gossip and slander about me. Or the reason why we have these issues in our lives, they're not even our fault. My addictions, my anger,

my frustrations rage, my lust, all of that is because of how I was raised and I didn't have the right family growing up and so ultimately it's their fault for my things that I go through today. And ultimately, what takes place for a lot of people as we come to the realization, better yet the revelation

that we are in need of a savior, that we are in need of forgiveness, that we are in need of purpose and that we are in need of an identity

that far outweighs the expectations and the weights that the world has placed on us because the weight the world has placed on us, the expectations that the world has placed on us is far too much for us to bear. And when we come to this revelation,

it doesn't make us weak, it makes us honest, it makes us humble and it sets us up for a new life. And all of these things, forgiveness, purpose, identity, they're all found in the person of Jesus.

And that was his answer. When he saw us in our delusion, when he saw us in our sin, he said, I'll go and I'll die for them. I'll go and I'll make it possible for them to rediscover their identity so that they can live a new humanity. And so within this new humanity, we get this, we become a new person.

A new person. We are a as as Corinthians puts it in other translations that we become a new creation. We are a new creation that the old is gone, the new has come.

That we get to live as it says in in John chapter one, if we have placed our trust and our belief in God, we get to live as children of God. We've been given the right to become children of God.

And it's so important that we begin to identify and think about this because our thoughts are powerful. I've heard it said that thoughts become words, words become actions, actions become behavior, behavior becomes character. Who you think you are is who you become. So we have to get this into our mindset.

I, I, that's just who I am. I am a prince in the kingdom of heaven or you are a princess in the kingdom of heaven. I'm a son or you are a daughter of the most high God.

Because that's where I'm gonna live from. That's where I'm gonna make my decisions from. That's what I'm gonna this is how I'm gonna form my future, this is what I'm gonna do. As a matter of fact, that's why when Jesus, like when people get saved, the first thing Jesus says to do is get baptized.

Therefore go make disciples of all nations baptizing in the name of the father, son, holy spirit. You guys had almost 150 baptisms last week, people. Come on. That's amazing. 150 baptisms and a baptismal that looks like a beautiful pool from a hotel.

I'm a church planner, people. We baptize like maybe 10 people in a horse trough. You guys are out there like, who wants to come to the luxurious pool and get dunked?

I'm not jealous or anything. It's really cool that you guys have this awesome building auditorium, the beautiful baptismal. It's a holy jealousy. It's a holy jealousy.

But he tells us this, he tells us this because he like for for the the first century Christians, it was it was very still connected and correlated to to Jewish tradition.

And for Jews, this gonna sound a little bit familiar, for Jews, baptism was it was a few things. One, it was a way to cleanse themselves before they would read scripture and all that stuff. But ultimately,

for a lot of the Gentiles that wanted to become Jews, it was the last ritual that they had to do in order to become a Jew. So a non Jew, a Gentile, if they were like, man, I love this Yahweh God that you guys like teach about, that you talk about. We wanna get rid of our Gentile ways. We wanna become Jews. And so the Jews were like, here, there's about six or seven rituals that you got to go through. You have to learn the Torah, which is the first five books of the Bible. You'd have to do some other stuff, go through these jump through other hoops and went up. The last thing that she went through was baptism.

Was baptism. And so what they would do is that they would take them, they would get them to this point and then the community would surround them and that they would be baptized. They would go under and when they went under, it's gonna again sound familiar, but what it was signifying is that they were completely

dead to their old Gentile ways. Meaning everything was erased. Their Gentile debts, erased. Their connections to the Gentile family, erased. Their connections to Gentile community, erased. And when they came up out of that water, they were now considered a Jew. So in the Hebrew community,

they no longer looked at him as a Gentile pig as they would say. They now looked at him as a part of the community, as a part of the family. And from that moment on, they do, they would would go to synagogue.

They would they could marry a Jew. Like it all became about now this was your new identity and they had that marked moment not only for them but the community around them which said, I am now Jewish, no longer Gentile. And what it then became for Christians

and what it is for us today is that when we do go under, then everything is forgotten. My past sins forgotten, my past debts erased, my past sinful ways, my sinful community, all of it was considered gone. And now as I come up out of that water, I truly am this new creation, which means now I am as a married man, I treat my wife as Jesus would treat my wife. I parent my kids as Jesus would parent my kids. I work at a job as Jesus would work at a job that everything is completely different and I have a marked moment for me. It was back in 1999

when I came up out of that water that I can remember now from that moment, everything is different. Everything is different.

And now I live from this identity. The only thing is, is that I think sometimes I forget that we do serve a God of the new. That he is continually making all things new. It says in Isaiah chapter 43 verse 18, it says that forget the former things, do not dwell on the past.

See I'm doing a new thing. Now it springs up, do you not perceive it? Basically, don't you get it? I'm making a way in the wilderness and streams in the wasteland. And that verse is just as important for us today. Do not dwell on the past, see I am doing a new thing. A good friend of mine, Joseph Barkley,

says this, he says that a lot of us, we live in three time zones at once. We live in the present, but we also are living in the past while living in the future. Meaning that when we're living in the present, sometimes we're thinking about the past, it's past regrets, it's past experiences, mistakes, so on and so forth.

In the present, we're interacting, we're connecting, we're around each other, we're kind of getting into each other's lives. And then in the future, we're thinking about the future, the future hopes, the future dreams, even the future fears, whether it be a day, two days, a week, a month, so on and so forth.

But what's important about this is that it's our past that has formed our future I mean, formed our present, which then our present informs our future.

So we are where we are in our present because of stuff that has happened in the past, but where we are in the present, we need to think rightly so that it begins to form our futures. But what we do is if we dwell on the past too much, that past is so alive in our present that it begins to inform our future.

The other day, was was surfing and and in the ocean, surfing in the ocean by the way. I live in Oceanside. It's in the name. The ocean's right. We're on the side of the ocean. Whoever came up with it was brilliant. But I was in I was in the water

and I was just slaying it. I was killing it. I was ripping, shredding. It was the gnar was crazy. And I'm just sorry. Just making a stereotypical California joke. It was rad. Actually, I really wasn't surfing that well and there was big lulls in between. I'm just kinda sitting there in the water, you know, bobbing. And

all of a sudden, the enemy began to remind me of my past. I don't know if you guys have ever experienced this, but the enemy began to remind me of my past. See, the thing is Satan is the father of lies. It says in scripture that when he speaks lies, he's actually speaking his native tongue. But what I found,

the only thing the enemy doesn't need to lie to me about is my past. He can tell me the truth all day long about it. So there I am in the water and I began to think about who I was in my younger years about what had taken place, about how I treated people, about different circumstances and situations and

I just started to just get so down. I'm like, I've been in the faith now for twenty five years. I've been pastoring for a long time too. And I just was like, man, what's maybe

shouldn't be a pastor. Who like who was I? What did I do? How did I treat that person? Where is that person now? What did I do to their lives? All of that began to just kind of work itself. And here I am

like living ultimately in the middle of God's calling on my life to pastor a church that's literally three blocks by the beach away from the beach by the way, if you guys ever want to come visit. And I'm like,

I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't like, what's wrong with me? And I just had to click out of him and I'd remind myself, no, no, no, no. That's not who I am. My past does not define me.

I'm God's chosen instrument. I'm God's beloved. Like this is who I am. Like this is where I get to live from so that I don't allow this past any longer to shape the future that God has for me. No. I get to live right now

as a son or a daughter of the most high king. And here's the fact about all of this stuff by the way, is even if you messed up yesterday, it says in Lamentations, the book of Lamentations in the Bible that his mercies are new every morning. So every day is a brand new start for us people.

So again, even if last night was one of those crazy nights, even even if on the way to church today, you did the typical church family thing where you're yelling at the kids in the back seat, and you're arguing with your wife, and you walk through those doors and you're like, praise God. Hallelujah. Good to see you guys today.

That's right. Hey. How are you doing? I'm just blessed and highly favored, bro. You know what I'm saying? Praise God. Let's worship. Come on. You know? We'll deal with this later. You know, like so. Like even if that his mercies are still new for you,

that that doesn't have to form who it is that we become because we are new people and ultimately we have a new power.

We have a new power folks. This new power comes from the Holy Spirit. It says in Ephesians chapter one that when you give your life to Jesus, are now sealed with his Holy Spirit. It is marked on your life. His Holy Spirit

lives and dwells within you and it's the same Holy Spirit as it says in Romans chapter number eight. It's the same spirit. The spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you and just as God raised Jesus Christ from the dead, he will give life to your mortal bodies by the same spirit living within you.

Meaning this, the same so we just celebrated Easter, the resurrection, we go nuts for it. It's so exciting, it's awesome. Everybody comes to church for Easter to celebrate this resurrection. But that same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives in us on a daily basis.

Do you realize the power that you have within you? And I don't mean like that sometimes we can over spiritualize and be like, yes, we have this resurrection power, but what does this mean? What it means is that every circumstance and every situation that you face, you have the power of God to overcome that.

Anytime that you are insulted or anytime anybody hurts you or anytime come anybody comes against you, you have the power to forgive them.

It means that you can resurrect dead things in your life. Let me just speak to marriages for a moment. If you feel like your marriage is dead, like it's almost gone, that you can by the power of the holy spirit humble yourself, get the counseling that you need and begin to work on creating something beautiful that God had joined together and no man should separate.

Yeah, we can clap for that. That was good. I mean, come on people. This is what we get to live in. We get to live with this power. I think sometimes like like, you know, we we even quote the verse, greater is he that is in me than he that is in the world. But we don't live that way.

We talk about, man, the world is just getting so dark. So dark. So I mean, have you read the headlines? Jesus, come back soon. Right? What happened what's happening in culture and what's happening in society and I mean, do you know what's going on within our school system?

I do because I'm from California. Like it's pretty wild people. And what we do then what we do then is we go, you know what? Wait. What? We better just retreat from all of this stuff because if the world's getting dark, it's too much for us now.

Let's just we let's, you know, get it. We'll make our own little holy compound here. You know? We'll just get in and it used to be you could watch Disney. You can't watch Disney anymore in that compound, but anyway, so like,

you know, no more Disney. So, you know, now what? You know, no it's just no more TV in general. You know, like, no media. Shut it all off. It'll just be us four, no more, and some peanut butter and jelly and then we'll call it good. I don't know why I said peanut butter and jelly, but

you can't go wrong with PB and J though. Ultimately, it's so good.

But instead we need to realize, no, no, we carry this resurrection power everywhere we go. In every situation we walk into, we have this. No, no Jeff, you don't get it. My workplace is dark.

You should hear the conversations that people are having on on Monday about what they did in the weekend, man. It's just it's have you don't get it, Jeff. You you work in in the church like, yeah, I work in the church. I work with people and people are messy.

Which by the way, if church isn't messy, you're not doing it right because people are messy. So you don't get it. It's heavy. I mean, you felt like the darkness in our cities?

Yeah. And if you're really spiritual it's like, there's just a real demonic presence here. Not to make fun of it because it's really true. There's demonic presence here but like sometimes we're like, there's just so demonic in this area. Just need to pray, gather the intercessors.

I think we forget, yeah, it is dark. But it's like this, like man, did you feel that darkness? Well, how about this? Did that darkness feel you?

If you got the power of God in you, when you walk into that workplace, it may be dark, but man, you have the power to begin to transform it. It's like this, this might be a little bit corny, play with me here. If you've never, if you've heard this, cool. If you've never heard this, awesome.

But if you have heard this, just act like this is the first time you're hearing this. But a lot of times as Christians, we act like thermometers. Meaning we we're taking the temperature of the room.

We take the temperature of the area. Oh, this is this is dark or, you know, this is real heavy or or, you know, this is real evil. We were never called to be thermometers. We are called to be thermostats, the ones that change the climate. Yeah.

So let's change the climate. Let's change the climate people. Let's be the ones that get to walk into our neighborhoods and change the climate. Walk into our families and change the climate. Walk into our schools and change the climate. Then ultimately, we have a new

passion. It's what wakes us up, it's what gets us going, it's what drives us. It's what it's as

Paul talks about in second Corinthians five, it's what compels us. What gets me up in the morning shouldn't just be work for the paycheck, for the this and for the that. So eventually I can retire, you know, like I'm not like all about getting this four zero one ks filled so that I can retire, although I should start a four zero one ks so that eventually I can retire. But like, but it's not about that, it's about

Christ's love and the love that I've experienced through him. And I want others to experience this, but so much of our life is not trying to experience Christ's love and getting others to. It's about the stuff, the house, the mortgage, the retirement,

the getting the kids off to college, all all the stuff that we need. I love what it says in Matthew chapter six verse thirty one and thirty three. It says, So don't worry about these things saying, will we drink? What will we wear? Which again for us today, we don't necessarily worry what we're going to drink, what we're going to eat, what we're going to wear. We worry about how we're to retire. We worry about how we're to cover the mortgage. We worry about if we're going get rent done. We worry about like, where's our next job? Can I get a promotion? All of those different things. Watch this. These things dominate the thoughts of unbelievers.

But if we're quite honest, they dominate our thoughts as well, don't they? But your heavenly father already knows all of your needs. So seek the kingdom of God above all else and live righteously and he gives you everything that you need.

Meaning that this is the passion in which we get to live from and we get to do so with a new perspective that we see the world differently. We do not see the world any longer from a worldly perspective. We don't see humans the same way as we used to. We now see them the way Jesus sees them with the value that they hold, that each soul has a value and that soul's value is the life of the son of God.

That I've given up the right now. And I know like right now, especially for you guys, you guys are living in one of the fastest growing communities in the nation. And that's partly because of my governor, but

but

but like I know that we can we can view that and go like, man, everything's changing in my area. Who are all these new people? Why are they driving housing prices up? What's going on? Like I remember how it used to be. We can see these people as an inconvenience or we can see them

the way Jesus sees them. Man, these people need hope. These people need salvation, that they're not an inconvenience, they're a mission field. Like, they're not a bother. They're a future brother or sister in Christ. Like this

is who they are and this is the way that we get to view them. But this is honestly, this is hard for us because it takes faith. Oswald Chambers said this, he said many people, this is in his the book, Outmost for His Highest. He says many people have turned back because they are afraid to look at things from God's perspective.

The greatest spiritual crisis comes when a person has to move a little farther on in his faith than the beliefs they've already accepted.

Yeah, start playing so we sound spiritual as we close. Because my my favorite is gonna get real, like, anointed in here, you know? It just means that we're about to go another half hour longer. I'm just kidding. But, man, it it takes faith to view people like this, like to like,

again, we wanna look at people because again, the 81% of people aren't good. They're not good. People are mean. Their motives are skewed. And it takes faith. It makes it a lot of times we just want to kind of go back and be like, well, you know what, like my past experiences have told me

this is the person and this is what's going to happen. I know how to read a person. I know who they really are. You know who they are from the world, but do you know who they are from Jesus that they can to rediscover their identity and live a new humanity?

A new purpose. We've got a new purpose. I love it at the at the end of this passage that we read in second Corinthians five. It says that we have the ministry of reconciliation

that God makes his plea through us. And that plea is be reconciled to God. And whether we know it or not, our life speaks a message. What message is your life speaking?

Is it speaking me, mine, take care of what I can take care or is it speaking, Oh, you got to be reconciled to God.

Oh, there's a God who loves you that like, yeah, life doesn't necessarily get easier. But now you have somebody that carries you through it. You have a savior who will never leave you nor forsake you. You have an eternity that is secure.

You've got a God who loves you. And even if everybody else abandons you, he's right there with you. Does your life speak that? Is your life's message or should we say your testimony from death to life? Is it screaming at your job? You reconciled to God. Is it screaming when we all go out to lunch, be reconciled to God.

Your neighbors, be reconciled to God. He loves you. You reconciled to God. Because when we truly begin to live in this identity, this rediscovered, recovered identity and live this new humanity, it comes

with a new person, a new power, a new perspective,

a new purpose.

That's what our new humanity is. And we only live from that place when we understand who we truly are in Jesus. So father, we come. God, we ask that this wouldn't just be another message that we heard that we walk out and forget about, but father, let this truly be a life defining moment for so many of us in this room

where we begin to live out this purpose. God, may we see our culture, our community, our cities, our states, our nation, the world transformed by your incredible love and grace that we have experienced. Lord, let us live out of not who the world calls us, but father out of who you've called us to be in Jesus mighty name. Amen.

Thanks for joining us 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 for prayer and everything happening here at Rock Point.