Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room

ReCAST Church of Mattawan

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You are listening to the podcast of recast Church, Matawan, Michigan Christmas program here recast kids

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Christmas And I'm gonna be preaching on making room for Jesus from the book of Matthew Matthew chapter 8 verses 18 to 22

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So I'm gonna go ahead this morning at the start. We're gonna have a little bit of an abbreviated introduction this morning I'm gonna go ahead and read the text that we're gonna be talking about a bit of a strange text

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It'll make sense once I'm preaching on it after the kids program, but a little bit of a strange text

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So open your Bibles, please if you have one with you to Matthew 8 Verses 18 through 22 if you don't have a

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Bible I'd ask that you please just do me a favor and raise your hand and a guys back here with Bibles He just wants to bring you one and so we're not trying to call anybody out

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But we want everybody to have a copy of the Word of God on their lap so they can see For themselves the things that I'm saying are coming from God's Word and so and then you can also feel free to just take that Bible home with you.

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We want everybody to have a copy of God's Word and we've got boxes of those in the back so feel free to take that home with you and Take advantage of that Recast this is

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God's Word to us and when we read it I want to make sure that you remember that what we're reading here this morning is what

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God desires for us to know This morning he is selected.

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This isn't by chance. He he desires for us to hear this So let's listen in to Matthew 8 verses 18 to 22

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Now when Jesus saw a crowd around him he gave orders to go over to the other side and The scribe came up and said to him teacher.

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I will follow you wherever you go and Jesus said to him Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests

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But the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head Another of the disciples said to him

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Lord. Let me first Go and bury my father and Jesus said to him follow me and leave the dead to bury their own dead

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Let's pray Father I rejoice in the opportunity that we have to gather together in your name

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We have an opportunity to hear from you We have an opportunity to hear what it means to be a follower to invite you in and to To take you on and and for you to take us on as a disciple and it's a radical calling.

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It's a significant calling It's a major calling. It's not something that we would enter into lightly It's something that we need to count the cost to consider what it means to become your follower and to live for you as our king

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Father we thank you for this Christmas time that we have to reflect and think about the coming King the one who arrived on our behalf and sacrificed himself for us and as we get a chance to see the cute little kids come and sing songs and do a presentation and a play for us we thank you for and rejoice in the youth in the vibrancy of youth and the

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Enthusiasm and excitement of it father. I pray that you would restore that notion of anticipation and enthusiasm in our hearts as well

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And father that as we have an opportunity even now to sing a couple of songs to you father You'd move in our hearts to recognize how glorious how worthy how majestic how awesome you are

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And that you love us so dearly that you sent your son to die for us Not just to remain a baby in a manger

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But to live a sinless life and to die as a sacrifice, but not just to remain dead But to come alive again three days later is the victor over sin and death

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Thank you for your victory Thank you for your love. Thank you for your grace in Jesus name

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Amen And I want to start off just by saying thank you to Dave and the band for leading us this morning worship

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And then just also for all of the children's workers that made this program possible. I just I'm overwhelmed by the number

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I looked at this past week and kind of looked up how many people it takes to run our children's ministry We have over 70 volunteers in our children's program

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So I'm just really grateful for the time and the energy And to be honest it serves us all even if you don't have children because you get an opportunity to kind of hear

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And listen in and have a little bit of that time. That's distraction free in here, too So they really are serving all of us and particularly those of us with kids in that program as well

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So I'm just really grateful for all the time and energy that goes into that Go ahead and get comfortable if you need to get more coffee or juice or Donuts while supplies last up at front you can you can you can get that at any time if the chair that you're sitting in Gets uncomfortable in the next half an hour

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So you can get up and stretch out in the back You're not going to distract me But I want your focus as much as possible to be on the

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Word of God as we walk through that over the next half an hour or so And then also just have your

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Bibles open to Matthew 8 18 through 22 So that you can see as we walk through what

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I think is a pretty stunning text and pretty shocking to us at the start So remember the last week we looked at the

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RSVP of the king from the book of Daniel He told us he was on his way back in the

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Old Testament He gave him many indications indication after indication that he was going to come and be among us

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Emmanuel God with us And then he was going to come as a king who was going to set things, right?

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And so we kind of looked at it kind of like hey, Jesus is RSVP and he's coming over and so now this morning

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We're gonna be looking at what do you do when you know that you're having guests arrive?

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So he told the Old Testament He told us all and through the prophets in the Old Testament that he was on the way

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And when someone tells you they're coming over, what do you do? Well, I can remember my sister and I as kids

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I'm sitting in the front window on Christmas Day waiting for my grandparents to arrive and we would be sitting there

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Anticipating and we'd be eager So there's a level of anticipation that you can kind of think of if somebody says they're coming over They're coming to visit as long as it's a good visit, right as long as it's somebody that you want to arrive

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Um, there's an anticipation and maybe it's a proper word to use it as anticipation If it's somebody you don't want to come over.

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It's more like maybe it's anxious. I don't know. But um, so there's there's that level But if all you do is get excited that they're coming over You're not gonna be ready when they arrive right if all you do is you just get excited about it but you don't prepare and So I mentioned last week that often as my sister and I were in the front window waiting for family to arrive

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Where was my mom? Anybody have any guesses? Yeah, you had more than a guess you knew where I was going.

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She was in the kitchen and what was she doing? She was preparing for the guests. We were excited

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We were enthusiastic and and both are our appropriate responses, right? Both are things that we ought to be considering is both anticipating with enthusiasm and excitement, but also having some level of preparation and So this week we're considering preparing room for Jesus And my title is a bit tricky to this this sermon because I'm talking about preparing him

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Room preparing room for Jesus and I think that's tricky because by the end I hope you recognize that Jesus is not just merely asking you and I To prepare a nice guest room for him to stay in for a week or two

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He's not asking to just come over and hey could could you just get ready and maybe maybe I could sleep on the couch

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Maybe you could just kind of carve out a little bit of area for me for just a little bit here over the holidays

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And then we can just kind of I'll take off and you can get back to business as usual How many of you are glad when guests come over to stay with you?

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You're excited about that. You enjoy entertaining How many of you are glad when they leave? Okay, you can't you know, you know how that feels, right?

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Like I mean, we all kind of we all kind of know that right? So there's a level of that That's kind of like yeah, it's both

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But we're talking about Jesus coming to stay in a different way than just preparing him a room to come and stay with us

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Over the holidays our text this morning is found right in the middle of miracles So just to put the context of Matthew chapter 8 prior to this

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Jesus has spent an entire day healing people physical infirmity disease

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Pain suffering and he is healing them and spending the entire day Healing the crowds and then after our text he goes back into healing people and performing miracles so The crowds have been pressing him all day.

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How many of you get a little bit exhausted in a crowd? Does it ever tire you out maybe been in a crowd like shopping recently or something like that It's just kind of like a wear it it's wearying

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Not only that but Jesus is the center of attention all day long and I would imagine that in his in his humanity

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He's tired. And so this crowd is gathered and he's ready to take a break evening is coming

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And he's ready to take a break from the crowd So in front of everyone a crowd is pressing in on him and he gave orders to his disciples and he says could you push?

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The boat out apparently this was on the shore Just could you push the boat out and get ready because we're going to the other side The only way he could escape the crowds at times

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You notice how he goes across the lake a lot It puts a little bit of distance between him and the people because he needs a break from time to time

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And so he's literally says push the boat out into the Sea of Galilee Verse 5 if you were to look back there gives us exactly where this is all taking place in Capernaum on the north shore of the

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Sea of Galilee, so we know that he was right there But because the crowd was gathered around to hear and they were able to hear his comments to pack up and roll out and to move out onto the lake a

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Couple of conversations developed as a result of him saying I'm taking off I'm leaving and the crowds heard him say that now how many of you think some of the crowds?

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Maybe wanted to stay closer to Jesus. They didn't want him to get away kind of they're pressing in and they they wanted their miracles

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They wanted a whole host of motivations for them being around and listening But we see these two conversations beginning in verse 19 the first one starts in verse 19 a scribe one of the learned people of Israel drew close to Jesus and Boldly declared if you're going

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I want to go with you. I Will follow you wherever you go Really?

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How many you think that's a pretty solid statement like to say that to Jesus? I will follow you wherever you go. I mean how many are excited like that's a that's a that's a cool thing to say

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Now you need to understand scribes just briefly It's not sick not not crazy significant for this text, but the scribes were often mentioned in opposition to Jesus They were not always the most favorable people in his life.

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Oftentimes. They were challenging him I'm little minutiae of the law. They had all kinds of detailed structures of laws upon laws and rules upon rules

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They were kind of the lawyers of their time They studied the law and often were the ones able to read and write and they were able to find loopholes and all of this kind of stuff, but but the

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Scott but this scholar this particular scribe Enthusiastically and boldly steps forward in the midst of a crowd to say

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I Will follow you Jesus Now if the story ends right there,

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I think we just get super excited right? We're like picturing angels in heaven You know shouting and excited someone a new follower of Jesus How many of you celebrate when there's a new follower of Jesus?

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Are you excited about that? That's a there were not enough hands on that. Do you get excited when there's a new follower of Jesus?

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Okay, I hope you get enthusiastic and you're excited when someone gives their life to Christ and says I will dedicate myself to you

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And so if the story ends there we'd be stoked Would you be excited if there's an unbelieving friend who hasn't come to understand

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Jesus Christ is their King and they give their life to Christ would would you be excited about that? Would you be enthusiastic about absolutely?

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So and it's not if they came to us and said well, I'll follow Jesus wherever he goes we'd go well, you're in right celebration begins and welcome them as a brother and a sister, but Look at verse 20.

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Well, Jesus says in verse 20 might come as a significant shock to us and Jesus said to him

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Something about foxes and birds Where's he going with this? Why would you you just had a guy say

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I'll follow you wherever you go I mean How many like that kind of allegiance in general in life like somebody comes to you like I have had one person in my life

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Tell me that they would fuck she's smiling at me I've had one person in my life say I will follow you wherever you go and I was pretty jazzed about that Okay, have any of you ever had that privilege of having somebody say that to you pretty big deal, right?

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Pretty exciting when somebody says oh, so what why this foxes and birds business was

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I? I'm tempted to think and certainly I don't believe this for a second But I'm tempted to kind of question

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Jesus. Are you being cranky here? Are you tired from a long day? Did you not just hear enough to celebrate this guy wants to follow you wherever you go?

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Jesus responds by saying dude Do you remember? I'm homeless

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I'm homeless. Are you are you tracking with me? If you're do you realize what you're signing up for here as my follower?

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Do you realize what it implies when you invite me into your life? Do you recognize what it means when you invite me over and you let me in I'm homeless

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I'm a homeless wanderer who doesn't know where I'm gonna sleep this night. Well, certainly in his deity

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He knew all the things unfolding in front of him, but he didn't own a house He's staying in Peters Mother's house or mother -in -law's house the night before and look at this.

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It's crazy You realize where he's gonna be spending this night here in just a moment Later in this very same chapter.

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Where is he sleeping in the bottom of a boat in a storm? That sound like a comfortable place to sleep

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Not at all How exhausted is this is our Lord in this context and in this situation?

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I don't know what the Fox says, but I have an idea where the Fox sleeps According to the text and it is in a hole in the ground apparently

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And then think about birds which are a dime a dozen when you saw a bird today Oh, you did even if you'd probably didn't even register in your mind.

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You saw some birds flying around or whatever They have nests to sleep in But the son of man slept wherever he could grab a few winks between significant times and bouts of ministry

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And he in our text was indeed flat -out exhausted and spent the night on a boat out in the water

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But I don't think he was being snippy. I don't think he was like at the end of himself I think he was still teaching about what it means to join his kingdom

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He is still educating even in his exhaustion even in this moment where this guy is saying I'll follow you

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And I think what he's kind of getting at is it's easy to drum up a frenzied enthusiasm about following the good

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King What do you know that it's easy to say I will follow you wherever you go.

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Is that easy? It's pretty easy to say it with your mouth. Are you saying what about living it?

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What about following through on it? How often do we? encourage others

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To count the cost of being a disciple of Jesus to consider what it's gonna cost us to follow him

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We're looking for the easy sell Right a lot of times as Christians We're looking for the man if we could just get you to say yes to Jesus Then it's gonna be great because if we could get your mouth to utter this prayer if we get your mouth to say

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I will Follow Jesus wherever then you're all good, but that's not it It's about a heart given over to Christ in a radical relationship of following him

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Significant difference between those two And the question is for all of us in the room Have we counted the cost of being a follower of Jesus?

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Have we considered that it might cost us something and if we were to consider what it might cost us.

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Are we still in? We still in are we still gonna follow him? This first man had an open enthusiasm and I might even say an

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Idealism that was quickly dampened by the reality of what I would call true discipleship true following of Jesus Discipleship is not a declaration that we will follow

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Jesus wherever and then return to our homes unchanged like I am convinced happens so often and I have to confess that that's happened many times in my life where I come to Church and I hear a message and I'm like, yeah

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I'm gonna do great things for God and by the afternoon. I mean, I'm it's all gone. It's like just where did that go?

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And it's not that it's a life lived out with these things for God The way of Jesus was a radical often uncomfortable

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Way, and it was full of sacrifice We don't know the impact that the sober statement had on This man the scribe but we do know this very sadly that he's never mentioned again in Scripture He comes with I will follow you wherever Jesus says

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I'm homeless And we never hear from this guy again There's an implication that Jesus understood something about this man's heart

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Where maybe he hoped to gain something by being close to the Messiah Maybe he had different ulterior motives for saying that but but it's it's it's pretty clear that he's not in here again

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But another disciple then comes up to Jesus with the desire to follow him and maybe this one's gonna go better This guy has a family issue just a small thing

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He needs to deal with and he wants to resolve it before he begins to follow Jesus He says I'm gonna follow you. I want to follow you, but I got some stuff

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I got to take care of first. It's just this one little thing He needs to go Bury his father first and then he says

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Jesus. I'll catch up with you Maybe I could maybe you could tell me where you're gonna be in a couple weeks and I'll take care of this or whatever

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But now this needs a little explanation because that's the way our mind thinks is that it's gonna be like Just a day or two and he's gonna get caught up as he's got to go to his dad's funeral

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How many think that's a big deal going to a dad's funeral? That's a that's a big that's that's heavy. That's weight But in ancient times we need to understand what's going on here

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Because we take in our mind what a funeral looks like in America and we go, okay I understand this guy's dad's passed away

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And so he needs to go to the burial but in ancient burial in ancient times burial preparation began immediately after death and the actual burial

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Generally speaking took hours. It was hours away after death

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It wasn't days away like we think of it now and usually within hours of death

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The body was interred in a cave in the ground So the notion that this guy this guy's dad is dead at home

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And he's here speaking with Jesus is just not a culturally sensible interpretation of this text

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It doesn't make sense from their cultural standpoint that this is the right interpretation

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So something else is going on here I'm in agreement with many scholars who believe that this man's dad was still alive

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Possibly even healthy at home What seems more likely is that this man's father was advancing in years and the disciple wanted to care for his father in his old age

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And then once he died then this guy would join up and follow Jesus, but he said let me let me take care of my family responsibilities first Now I'd suggest to you that that sounds like a noble thing

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Would you agree with me on that? That sounds pretty noble. It sounds like a good thing I think it's a great thing to be honoring to your father and to care for him in his old age mom, too

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But once again Jesus uses this opportunity to teach about the priority of his kingdom

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His response to this disciple would be disciple is to immediately turn to him and command him look at verse 22.

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It's a command Follow me Stop looking at the things around you follow me and leave the dead to bury their own dead.

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What? Is this am I reading it wrong? Is there something that how many you think that's a pretty shocking statement for him to say to this guy?

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Who it has every appearance this would -be disciple has every appearance of wanting to follow the law and honoring his father and mother and wants to Do good and Jesus says hey, follow me.

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Let all that other stuff ride is Jesus against families Is he against funerals?

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Is he against honoring our parents? No, no No But is he for you and I adopting a radical

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Crazy high view of his kingdom and him as the king over our lives

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Yes, he is for that He is for you recognizing who he is and what rightful claim he has over your life

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He doesn't come to visit us as merely a tender baby in a manger He comes as a king

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Demanding us to follow him while forsaking anything and everything that might get in the way of our allegiance to him

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Jesus spoke of his kingdom being like a treasure hidden in a field a man found that treasure hidden in a field went out sold everything that he had so that he could buy that field to obtain that treasure

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The immense worth of the kingdom is tied to the immense worth of the king. Hear me carefully It is not just that the church is worth it or the movement of God on the planet is worth it or you know

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Good deeds are worth it. But the king is worth it. It's about the king

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What is his worth in your and mine lives? What what what worth do we ascribe to him?

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It isn't that dads are not worth our honor It is that in comparison to Jesus our dads barely register in comparison

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It isn't that owning a house and having a place to lay your head is sinful I'm here grateful for that.

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You're grateful to have a place to lay your head tonight. It's God's grace to you but if owning a house in Some way is hindering you from following Jesus.

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You should sell it I believe Jesus would say that to you When Jesus called people in Scripture, they left something.

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Have you noticed that? Follow it look it up read it when when Jesus called somebody they left something

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Peter and John left their father They left their father counting the fish in the family business that they also left when you think old

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Zebedee might have been a little disappointed as his as all of the dreams that his sons would follow in his

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Fishermen footsteps and and work there in Galilee and help him in his old age

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And he watches them as they trail off in the distance as their their footprints in the sand with Christ as they walk off To follow him

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They left something Matthew They're outside the temple collecting taxes a pariah to his culture and at the same time an

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Extremely wealthy man because what did he do? He extorted money from others? Gets up leaves his table

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Presumably with all the money. They're ready to be counted And he gets up and he follows

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Jesus people left something Matthew left his lucrative tax collecting job

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Peter and John left the fishing business and their dad John the baptizer left his head

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Left his head So Jesus is on his way to your place this

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Christmas It's RSVP and I'm on the way That's what we're celebrating.

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That's what we celebrate in a cycle It's a little bit weird that it's this cycle a cyclical pattern that every year we celebrate the same coming the same

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Advent We certainly look forward to an Advent that is to come But there was this

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Advent that we keep celebrating time and time again And so I'm using that as a metaphor and he's coming to your place and I'm mixing my metaphors a bit here

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But I know you're bright enough to synthesize this to put it all together Let me make it explicit as we close our time together

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The line in the song joy to the world that is my sermon title is a bit underwhelming

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Let every heart Prepare him room Somehow that doesn't quite cut it in an understanding of the text.

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We've just looked at Jesus isn't coming over to your place for a room It's not sufficient to just carve out your little spot for him

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He isn't asking to come and just be the little baby on the nativity scene in your shell on your shelf

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His visit is never to leave us unmoved and unchanged He's coming to draw you out

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To lead you to walk down roads. You never considered Think of Zach and Lee Lloyd is an example of that who?

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Probably a year and a half ago had no idea that God was going to be leading them to Indonesia and yet God has put that on their heart and they are being called out to go to places that they did not think that they would

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Go Places they didn't even know existed That's where their ministry is going to be He he's coming over to draw us out to to give and sacrifice like you never thought possible

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To serve and to love people you thought were unlovable and maybe even enemies He isn't coming over to stay in the guest room he is coming to claim the deed

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He's coming to own the house He wants all of you

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That's just part furthermore. He's not coming to camp out He's coming to invite you on a journey

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He's coming to call you out to a life Movement we picture the arrival of Jesus as the king is a static arrival

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He comes to stay with us and we hang out and that's cool. But actually he's coming to lead us out He he comes like the

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Dwarves arrived to the hobbits house at the beginning of the Hobbit And if you've seen that movie or read that book, how did what did the hobbits arrive?

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Or did they come to set up shop and hang out there for the rest of their lives? They came with one purpose to come and get the hobbit to lead him away

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On a journey they show up with that purpose in mind and that's what

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Jesus is coming To do for us this holiday To make room for this king is to prepare our hearts for mobility for flexibility and for readiness to action

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Hear me carefully. Jesus is not anti family Jesus is not anti fun and Jesus is not anti homeownership.

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Okay But Jesus is the king over a glorious kingdom and that kingdom should take supremacy should be the highest thing

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The king should be the highest thing in your life and mine And that's what he's calling us to to a person in the room.

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He is calling you Say come follow me. Make sure you understand what you're signing up for first It's like you told these guys don't don't come don't come without thinking it through don't come on come to it thinking

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This is gonna be easy Following Christ.

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He's the one who said take up your Cross and follow me what a cross is for to come take up your cross

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So if there's anybody here if there's anybody here who recognizes in your heart, you're like, you know what?

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I've heard this said this way before but it sounds like you're asking me to give up a whole lot in Christ is

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He's asking you to give something up today, but man, he is offering you something glorious and beautiful Forgiveness of sins purpose in life and an eternity together with him as your

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Savior and Lord He loves you And so it's it's a call to give up some things but it's a call to something greater

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Join this cause with the King enter his kingdom through faith in what he has done for you.

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He's not coming to camp out He's coming to call us out. You hear me carefully Jesus loves you and I deeply

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Pay the price on the cross That anyone who would come to him by faith say forgive me

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Take you as my king. I Need salvation from you. I recognize my own sin, but I believe that you've paid for me.

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He will indeed set you free We come to communion today. We're gonna hear a different kind of Christmas song

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It's very different kind of Christmas song and I'm and I want to read these words and just think about what it meant when

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Jesus arrived Because we actually are talking about a kingdom, but it's a kingdom that's at war

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Do you realize that the kingdom is at war and the war hasn't been completed yet? And so we can sense all kinds of lines drawn up in our lives

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How many of you ever seen a line drawn in your life and it's like man That looks really clear like there is there is an issue in my life where I'm constantly crossing this line

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And there's a fight in my soul to do the things that I want to do and do them, right? And if you relate to what

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I just said you see within yourself a battle going on And that's just a microcosm of this bigger picture of a battle that is going on.

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So I'm gonna read these words This is by a guy named Dustin Kensaroo. The song is called. This is war great

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Christmas title, right? This is war This is war like you ain't seen the winters long.

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It's cold and mean with hangdog hearts We stood condemned but the tide turns now at Bethlehem This is war and born tonight

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The word as flesh the Lord of lights the Son of God the lowborn King Who demons fear of whom angels sing?

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This is war on sin and death The dark will take its final breath

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It shakes the earth confounds all plans the mystery of God as This is our king and he is worthy of our complete allegiance

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Are you just planning to have him over a bit for the holidays? Maybe clean out the guest room give him a little corner of the house to make sure

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That he's comfortable during his hopefully short stay with you Will you give him the deed?

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Will you let him move you out to places you never thought you could go Will you let him show you how to love deeper than you ever thought you could?

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He comes to us all this Advent not just as a baby in a manger But as the rightful

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King over us all So as we listen to this song feel free to get up from your seats and there are four different tables set up in the corners of the room for communion if Jesus is your king and you've asked him to save you from your sins then feel free to come to one of those tables and take the cup that we take to remember the juice that we take to Remember his blood that was shed for us and we take a cracker to remember his body that was broken for us

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We do this not just because we came up with this but we do it because Jesus told us to Say get together and do this as the church

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Remember, it's a it's a remembrance of what he has done for us but if you're here, you're kind of like I I Don't have

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Jesus as my king. I mean, I think you'd know that if you did, right? And so if you're sitting here and you're like Jesus isn't my king.

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I Kind of dance to the beat of my own drum. I do my own thing Encourage you to take in the song reflect on it and think about it just remain in your seat

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Don't don't take communion If you're you can't take it and remember something that's been done for you if you don't believe it's been done for you

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So that's kind of the point. So only only if it's Genuine in your heart do

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I want you to go and take communion and reflect on that but come and talk with me If you're here and you you don't have a relationship with Jesus and you're like it's time

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It's time and I and it's time for me to bow my knee before the Lord and say I want to get this right now

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He is your king I Mean that to be harsh. I don't mean that to be too direct, but it's the reality

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You have a king It's a matter of whether you bow before him Says in the end everyone will

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Do so as a willing participant in this game Father I thank you so much for this call to discipleship and a call to following you and and these two examples in Scripture of men who had a

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Zeal and a passion without counting the cost father. It's potential in your kingdom to count to cost us much is significant and father

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I pray that you would Work here even right now father whether there's somebody here who's wrestling and just thinking man

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I've been in the church for a while and I I've been attending church And I and I have never really bowed my knee before Jesus and asked him to be my king

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I pray that you would work in their hearts to bring that about maybe there's some here who haven't been around church much at all And they're they're they're sitting in there just kind of thinking

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I don't even know what any of this about but I'd like to know More father. I pray that you give boldness to those who need boldness father for those who are in your kingdom a

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Celebration and opportunity reflect on the on the cross and the sacrifice of Jesus for us. I thank you for our

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King Who has brought us into this glorious and beautiful kingdom that has no end.