Welcome to the Party, Pal: God’s Plan for Your Mistakes

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- I'm just going to, you know,

00:00:04

break this guy's leg off.

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- I love that. - Eat his head.

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Guys! - Oh. Oh. We're rolling.

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[bars and tone]

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- Well, hey, welcome to Crossroads.

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We are here in our Christmas at the Movies series.

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I'm Debo. - And I'm Andy.

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We're so glad you're joining us for church online today.

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Hey, here's what's about to happen

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so you know what to expect from our time.

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In a moment, the band's going to lead us in worship.

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So take this opportunity to focus on the words

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of these beautiful Christmas songs

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and focus on what they have to say about Jesus.

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Turn up the volume and lean in.

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- That's right. And after worship,

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we'll be back for a few minutes to share with you

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what's going on around Crossroads

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and how you can stay connected

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in this busy holiday season.

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- Yeah, and last, you'll hear from

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our senior pastor Brian Tome as we look at

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a highly contested Christmas movie.

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We're so glad you're here. Enjoy this time with us.

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- Father God, that might be the most silence

00:17:49

any of us have experienced in our day

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or in our week, or maybe in this Christmas season.

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That silence is awe, A-W-E, awe in response to who You are.

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There's peace in this moment.

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There's peace in this place because that's You.

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Because that's who You are.

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You have our attention.

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God, we came in here, clicked on this,

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walked in a building to meet with You,

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something that nothing else can offer us:

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Peace, hope, joy, life, light like You.

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Thank you, Jesus.

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I pray and sing all of this because of You. Amen. Amen.

00:19:01

Yeah. I hope you're glad you came.

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And we've got some more fun for you.

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So if you're in the room, turn to somebody

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and say, "Hey, I'm glad to be here with you."

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If you're online and go make some popcorn

00:19:16

because we got a great movie up next for you.

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- Man, I feel like over the past few months

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I've seen our church step up in huge ways

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through generosity, like with the money

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committed through the 10X Push, with Thanksgiving Food Drive

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and Christmas Gift Drive, we are pressing the gas

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on making a real impact in seeing heaven come to earth.

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- That's right. If you haven't had the chance yet,

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head to crossroads.net/CGD.

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You can buy and help give Christmas gifts

00:19:45

to families in need, specifically

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to help incarcerated parents be the hero.

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- Yeah, I actually got to last year go into a prison

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and see these gifts get handed out first hand.

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It was beautiful.

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Like, the moments that this created for families

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to come together is just an incredible picture

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of what Christmas really is.

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It's light coming into the midst of darkness.

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And we, WE are bringing light into dark places

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through the generosity of everyday people.

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A couple of weeks ago, our church actually

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fully launched what we call the 10X Push,

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and many of us made financial commitments

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in hopes of being a part of this

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and bringing heaven to earth

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in really, really tangible ways.

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If you haven't yet, you can head to

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Crossroads.net/give to get started

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on giving towards your 10X commitment,

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or you can just simply learn more about

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what we believe and how we approach

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spending and giving money.

00:20:30

Okay, Debo, is it time for another Christmas movie?

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- You know what, Andy, I don't think

00:20:34

you can actually count this one as a Christmas movie.

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[cheerful music] - Christmas at the Movies

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[record scratches] [heavy metal music]

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Christmas at the Movies

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is perfect with some coffee.

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Don't need that ring-a-ling, ding-a-dong,

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ding-a-ding, talkin.

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So if we see the glow

00:21:02

of a cellular telephone

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we'll take 'em and we'll break 'em,

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and we won't say we were mistaken.

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You've been warned.

00:21:14

Merry Christmas. [glass breaks] [guitar solo]

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- Come to the coast, we'll get together,

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let's have a few laughs.

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Hey, let's be really clear about something,

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Die Hard is a Christmas movie. Okay?

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It's a Christmas movie.

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There's a Christmas tree in it, for starters.

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You got a guy fighting for his family.

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God fights for His family, this family of God.

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You got a guy who's willing

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to lay his life down for his family,

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that's John McClane or Jesus.

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And you also have a gritty guy

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who's had some real bumps and bruises in his life

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that can't quite put it together.

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That's the way a lot of us are.

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So we're going to look at that today.

00:22:28

Yippee ki yay -- [record scratching]

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Man, God bless America!

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Smoking in church. Oh, how good it is,

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only because John McClane did.

00:23:02

That's enough of that. Well, one more.

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Anyway. Yes, we are looking at

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the spiritual ramifications of Die Hard.

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Believe it or not, there's a lot in it

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and we're going to look at them today.

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But in case you just sort of aren't aware

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of what's happening, this will give you a little bit of recap

00:23:27

or pre-cap of what Die Hard the movie looks like.

00:23:32

[suspenseful music and gunfire]

00:23:51

- Welcome to the party, pal.

00:23:56

[explosion]

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- Oh, a machine gun.

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- Ho ho ho!

00:24:08

- Take this under advisement, Jerkweed.

00:24:15

Thanks for the advice.

00:24:19

[screaming]

00:24:23

[explosions]

00:24:37

- Happy trails, Hans.

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- So what do I call you?

00:24:41

- Call me Roy.

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- Man, well, note to self,

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next service, bring some mouthwash.

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I gotta remember that.

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Gotta remember that next time.

00:24:53

I don't know if you've seen Die Hard before

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or if you have maybe you forgot about it.

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I watched it and getting ready for my talk today

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and hadn't watched the whole thing for many years.

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Let me just give you the recap of what is happening.

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John McClane is a guy who's separated,

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and he's on his way to LA to meet his wife

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and hang out with her.

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When he goes there, there's a corporate function

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taking place at Christmas.

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And thieves are trying to overtake the building

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and actually do an act of espionage.

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And they actually do do that.

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And John McClane is left as a guy

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who's trying to thwart the whole thing.

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And you've got action, you've got family drama,

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you have tension.

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And all through it, all through it, believe it or not,

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when I watch it, I see the message of God.

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See, oftentimes -- for me, every time a movie moves me,

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it's because the story of God is in the movie.

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And even if the writers, the producer, the director

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don't know that they're telling a story about God,

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the most moving things are about

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the character qualities of God

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and the greatest story ever told, which is true.

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The story of Jesus.

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And the beginning of Him in His earthly existence

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is what we celebrate at Christmas.

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And so as I watched this, I was moved

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at all the connections I was making,

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whether or not the writers made it or not,

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I was able to see them.

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And I want to help you see them today as well.

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Let's pray before we go any further.

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God, I'm thankful for transcendent stories

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and also lightness.

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I pray you bring both things,

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levity and depth to us,

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not just to our time together,

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but to our lives, to our hearts today.

00:26:49

So I give You this time, God,

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and I ask you to use my words

00:26:52

and my words most importantly be

00:26:53

in alignment with Your heart as we try to get

00:26:56

all of us closer to You in the meaning of Christmas.

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I pray these things according to

00:27:01

the name and character and identity of Jesus. Amen.

00:27:08

So as John McClane comes to Nakatomi Plaza,

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there's a big Christmas tree that's in the lobby.

00:27:19

There is Christmas ornaments all over the place.

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You'll see them in some of the scenes

00:27:23

I'm going to show you in a little bit.

00:27:25

And the soundtrack for the movie,

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just about every single song is a Christmas song,

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but it's not the trappings of Christmas

00:27:32

that tell me that this is a Christmas movie.

00:27:35

It is the message of the movie

00:27:37

that ties in with the message of Jesus.

00:27:39

Do you want to -- You want to see how I do this?

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Would you like to see this with your own eyes?

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I think it's going to affect your heart.

00:27:45

Here we go, let's look at

00:27:46

a classic Christmas passage in the Bible

00:27:49

comes from the book of Matthew, chapter one.

00:27:51

The two main narratives of Christmas in the Bible

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come from Matthew and from Luke.

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And let me just read you a little short section

00:27:59

out of the book of Matthew 1:18.

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Excuse me, verse yes, verse 18.

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Here's it comes. Here it says:

00:28:31

This is massive tension in the first Christmas story.

00:28:36

The ancient culture is much more family centric

00:28:39

than is our culture.

00:28:41

In the ancient culture, you were expected,

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everyone was expected to get married.

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Everyone was expected to have kids.

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It's how you kept the family business going.

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It's how you worked the land.

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It was part of their religion.

00:28:54

It was part of their culture.

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And it's also part of just how you

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made your business work, because you had

00:28:58

free workers that were with you in your household

00:29:00

as you built your family business.

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And Mary and Joseph are going along the standard path.

00:29:05

They get betrothed, which is sort of like

00:29:08

engagement in our current culture on steroids.

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It's not quite engagement, it's beyond that,

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but it's not marriage.

00:29:15

So they're locked together.

00:29:17

Everyone knows this is what's going to happen.

00:29:20

And Mary has an encounter with God

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where an angel tells her that

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she is going to carry the child of God,

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and God is going to supernaturally impregnate her

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with her own seed -- with his own seed.

00:29:35

It's important to understand that

00:29:36

we look at people of the ancient world

00:29:39

as just unscientific, stupid people.

00:29:41

They didn't have the same understanding

00:29:43

of science that we have, but they weren't stupid.

00:29:45

They knew things.

00:29:46

They knew how you would get pregnant

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and they knew it would take nine months.

00:29:52

And so they knew when someone started showing

00:29:55

they had had sex before, it was only going to be

00:29:57

a matter of time.

00:29:58

Mary starting to show and being pregnant

00:30:03

without being married is a scandal of the highest regard,

00:30:09

and Joseph doesn't want any part of the scandal.

00:30:11

In fact, Joseph is not dumb.

00:30:14

He realizes, "Hey, if the person I'm betrothed to

00:30:17

is pregnant here, she's been unfaithful to me.

00:30:19

She's cheated on me."

00:30:21

And Joseph is trying to go about his way

00:30:24

to kind of honor Mary and put her away nice.

00:30:27

Because he's a just man.

00:30:28

He doesn't want to bring her undue shame.

00:30:31

He wants to just figure out how to end this thing appropriately.

00:30:35

Now, let's just talk about

00:30:36

the elephant in the room for a minute.

00:30:39

Of course, it's crazy that a person

00:30:41

who never had sex before is pregnant.

00:30:44

Of course, all the Bible writers know this,

00:30:46

and they all know that, including this

00:30:49

and referring to this, it is a reason

00:30:51

for educated people to disbelieve the Bible

00:30:54

and think it's all made up.

00:30:55

They know this and yet this is in there. Why?

00:30:59

Because it happened, that's why.

00:31:02

And I would submit to us that

00:31:05

if you want God in your life,

00:31:08

you have to believe this as actually historically true.

00:31:13

Why? Because if it's not true,

00:31:14

why would you want God in your life?

00:31:16

You want God in your life because you want

00:31:18

Him to do something that you can't do on your own.

00:31:21

You shouldn't want God in your life because

00:31:23

you want a new giver of rules to your life.

00:31:25

At least I don't want God for that.

00:31:27

By the way, He does give rules too.

00:31:28

You shouldn't want God in your life because

00:31:30

you want, you know, some moral compass.

00:31:32

He can be a moral compass, but you can get

00:31:35

a moral compass a bunch of different places.

00:31:37

You want God in your life because you want

00:31:40

some backstop that defies human explanation.

00:31:42

You want God in your life because

00:31:44

you want something to possibly be done

00:31:47

that you, your counselor, a doctor can't do.

00:31:50

And by starting off the Christmas story this way,

00:31:53

God sends a message, says,

00:31:55

"I do unusual things from time to time."

00:31:57

That's what a miracle is. It is.

00:32:02

Yeah. It's not normal.

00:32:04

And I don't want normal in my life.

00:32:06

I've got enough normal in my life.

00:32:08

I want something that's beyond.

00:32:10

I want a God of the impossible

00:32:13

who does the impossible, because He does things

00:32:16

that only He can do.

00:32:18

This is, this is an unideal family situation.

00:32:24

This is the first thing that Die Hard

00:32:28

has in common with Christmas.

00:32:30

It centers around an unideal family.

00:32:35

It's not ideal that Mary is pregnant

00:32:39

before she gets married.

00:32:41

It's not ideal that Joseph is going to marry

00:32:45

a woman that's carrying a child that he didn't father.

00:32:48

That's not ideal.

00:32:52

And as we'll see in a moment,

00:32:53

Jesus carries this stain on Him,

00:32:57

and people poke at Him for this unideal family,

00:33:00

for His entire life.

00:33:02

John McClain and and his wife, Holly,

00:33:05

they are in an unideal situation.

00:33:08

They are separated.

00:33:09

They're on their way to divorce.

00:33:12

It is not good.

00:33:13

And John notices something is wrong

00:33:16

when he comes into Nakatomi Plaza,

00:33:18

and he tries to find his wife on the employee board,

00:33:22

and he can't find the last name McClane.

00:33:24

And then he realizes, "Oh,

00:33:26

she's by her maiden name, Gennaro."

00:33:29

And it's like a dagger to him,

00:33:31

a reminder to him that his family is not ideal.

00:33:37

This is a little picture of this unideal family

00:33:41

and how they're wrestling and jousting with one another.

00:33:46

- Where are you staying?

00:33:48

Things happened so fast,

00:33:49

I didn't get a chance to ask you on the phone.

00:33:52

- Cappy Roberts retired out here.

00:33:55

- Oh, yeah?

00:33:56

- He told me I could bunk in with him.

00:33:58

- Cappy retired, huh? Where does he live?

00:34:01

- Ramona.

00:34:03

- Pomona. - Huh?

00:34:05

- Pomona. - Pomona.

00:34:07

- Yeah. Gosh, you'll be in the car half the time.

00:34:13

Why don't we make it easy?

00:34:14

I have a spare bedroom.

00:34:16

I mean, it's not huge or anything,

00:34:18

but kids would love to have you at the house.

00:34:24

- They would, huh?

00:34:28

- I would too.

00:34:31

[commotion, gasp] - Sorry.

00:34:43

- I missed you.

00:34:51

- I guess you didn't miss my name, though, huh?

00:34:54

Except maybe when you're signing checks.

00:34:58

Since when did you start using Miss Gennero?

00:35:03

- It's a Japanese company.

00:35:05

They figure a married woman's got --

00:35:06

- You are a married woman, Holly. You're married to me.

00:35:09

- We're not going to have this conversation.

00:35:10

We did this in July.

00:35:11

- We never finished this conversation.

00:35:13

- I had an opportunity, I had to take it.

00:35:15

- No matter what the consequences,

00:35:16

no matter what it did to our marriage,

00:35:17

you had to take this opportunity.

00:35:19

- It didn't do anything to our marriage,

00:35:20

except maybe change your idea of what our marriage should be.

00:35:23

- As if you have a clue as to what my idea of --

00:35:25

- I know exactly what your idea of our marriage should be.

00:35:27

- Ms. Gennero --

00:35:31

Excuse me.

00:35:33

Hi.

00:35:35

- Um, Mr. Takagi is looking for you.

00:35:38

He wants you to say something to the troops.

00:35:40

- Thank you.

00:35:46

Speech time.

00:35:47

I'll be back in a few minutes.

00:36:00

- This tension that exists is a key narrative

00:36:03

throughout the the movie.

00:36:05

And the tension of the ynideal family is

00:36:09

a key narrative throughout the entire Christmas story.

00:36:14

They are in the midst of getting a divorce,

00:36:17

it looks like it that way.

00:36:18

And in 1988 or so, when this movie came out,

00:36:22

divorce was a bigger deal than it is today.

00:36:24

I mean, we all know people have been divorced.

00:36:26

Many of us have been divorced.

00:36:28

Divorce, fortunately or unfortunately,

00:36:30

doesn't have the scarlet letter of shame anymore

00:36:34

because it's just so common.

00:36:36

And this is not the way it's been historically in America.

00:36:39

I remember when I was actually coming back

00:36:42

from a Christmas gathering.

00:36:45

All my family was there.

00:36:47

All the extended family from around Pittsburgh

00:36:49

would gather together at one of

00:36:50

the siblings houses, and I was a little kid,

00:36:52

and the first person ever divorced in the family

00:36:57

that was just found out at this Christmas party.

00:37:00

And I was in the back of the car going home late at night.

00:37:03

I heard my parents debriefing up front,

00:37:06

and they mentioned the divorce thing.

00:37:08

And I was like, "What the -- what? What? What's."

00:37:10

I never heard that word.

00:37:11

I didn't know what that word was.

00:37:12

And they were talking in hushed tones,

00:37:14

like someone had just killed somebody

00:37:15

or something like that.

00:37:17

Because in 1970 or something like that, you just --

00:37:20

It just it just wasn't a normal part of America.

00:37:22

1988, uh, getting a bit more normal,

00:37:26

but not as normal as today.

00:37:27

So they're dealing with the shame because

00:37:29

they're outside of the cultural norms.

00:37:33

Jesus and his family was outside

00:37:36

of their cultural norms as well.

00:37:39

And there was, I have to believe,

00:37:41

a level of tension in Jesus's family,

00:37:43

at least there is initially, when Joseph is told

00:37:47

by Mary that it's God's baby.

00:37:51

Not another person's baby, it's God's baby.

00:37:54

Tension in families that are unideal

00:37:57

is very, very common.

00:38:00

And one of the one of the more humorous parts

00:38:03

of the movie for me is when

00:38:05

John is fighting off these terrorists

00:38:08

who have taken over the building

00:38:10

and trying to get these bonds, basically,

00:38:13

and steal them and liquidate them and all that stuff.

00:38:15

He's like the ointment --

00:38:18

He's the fly in the ointment

00:38:19

that's keeping things from going well.

00:38:21

And we see after one of these encounters,

00:38:24

one of these guys just sort of is frustrated

00:38:27

and watch her reaction.

00:38:30

- Shoot the glass.

00:38:35

[gun fire, glass breaking]

00:39:06

- Jesus Christ!

00:39:23

- Get to work. - You got it.

00:39:35

[items breaking]

00:39:39

- God, that man looks really pissed.

00:39:44

- He's still alive. - What?

00:39:49

- Only John can drive somebody that crazy.

00:39:53

- [laughing]

00:39:55

Oh, I love that. I love that because

00:39:58

she's had her rounds and rounds with him,

00:39:59

and she's seeing he's having the same effect on us,

00:40:02

because they understand this is part of

00:40:04

what the tension is in the unideal family.

00:40:06

Jesus carried as a scourge his whole life

00:40:13

the notion that He was God's child.

00:40:17

He would be belittled because the story was

00:40:21

Mary wasn't unfaithful, oh yeah. Right, right, right.

00:40:25

It was God's child. Yeah.

00:40:27

How do I know this?

00:40:29

It's because later on in Jesus life,

00:40:30

we see the religious leaders use this

00:40:33

as one of the ways to throw darts at Him

00:40:35

and poking Him, they go back to a time tested thing

00:40:37

the people have been saying about Jesus

00:40:39

for a long, long time.

00:40:40

They say to Him, they say, "Well, at least

00:40:42

we know who our father is."

00:40:43

That's they said to Him, "We know who our father is,"

00:40:45

drawing on the narrative that this guy is a bastard.

00:40:48

Understandably, that's what people are calling Him.

00:40:50

And he's lived with this His whole life.

00:40:52

Why do I think He lived with his whole life?

00:40:54

Because they know exactly how to press His buttons,

00:40:57

and He reacts like He is one of the --

00:40:59

One of the few times we see,

00:41:01

one of the two times that I know of,

00:41:03

we see Jesus react reflexively and angrily.

00:41:07

And they said, "Well, at least we know

00:41:09

who our father is, Jesus. Hint, hint,

00:41:10

You don't know who Yours is."

00:41:12

Jesus says, "I know who your father is,

00:41:14

he's Satan. That's who your dad is."

00:41:17

It's like an immediate comeback,

00:41:19

like He's used it before because it's hurt Him before.

00:41:22

Because he comes from, earthly speaking,

00:41:25

an unideal family.

00:41:26

And this isn't just the family of Jesus,

00:41:29

it's family after family in the Christmas story.

00:41:31

We have His cousin John.

00:41:33

John, who's going to become John the Baptist.

00:41:37

John sees Him in the womb. He jumps for joy in the womb.

00:41:41

John knows that the Savior is there, it's his cousin.

00:41:45

And John goes on, and he, as far as we know,

00:41:48

he never gets married.

00:41:50

That's, like, really weird way back when.

00:41:52

It's still weird in many circles today.

00:41:54

I don't know why it is.

00:41:55

The apostle Paul says better to be single

00:41:59

than to be married.

00:42:00

In many, many ways, marriage is amazing.

00:42:03

I'm a high promoter of it, not --

00:42:05

Just not the point where you're half a person

00:42:07

if you're not married.

00:42:08

It's just not the point where we make someone feel

00:42:10

or someone starts to feel like,

00:42:12

"Unless I'm married, I can't fit into a church

00:42:14

that's all family centric."

00:42:16

No, look, the church should be Jesus centric,

00:42:18

not family centric, right?

00:42:20

And some of us who aren't married,

00:42:22

we feel like I have a non-ideal family.

00:42:25

You might actually feel like John the Baptist

00:42:27

because he would have been a really strange weirdo outcast.

00:42:31

He's in a non-ideal family.

00:42:33

We have his parents, Elizabeth,

00:42:37

Elizabeth and her husband, Zacharias.

00:42:40

They have an unideal family.

00:42:42

Is that in that it's past the time

00:42:45

of her having menopause until they actually get pregnant.

00:42:48

So for the first couple decades,

00:42:50

three decades of their marriage, they have no child.

00:42:52

That is downright scandalous

00:42:54

in first century religious Judaism.

00:42:57

Because what? You don't want children?

00:42:59

We're supposed to replicate and multiply. What?

00:43:01

You don't want children?

00:43:03

Are you trying not to have children?

00:43:04

Is the reason you don't have children because --

00:43:07

Because there's a curse of Satan on you?

00:43:09

Do you have hidden sin in your life

00:43:10

and that's why you don't have children?

00:43:12

They would believe these things.

00:43:13

And still sometimes some people, even today,

00:43:15

believe these things.

00:43:16

It was a non-ideal family structure.

00:43:18

And then they finally have John past menopause,

00:43:20

another miraculous, another miraculous conception,

00:43:24

basically because God opens up the womb

00:43:27

and enables the swimmers to work on two people

00:43:29

who are supposed to be past the age

00:43:30

of being able to have kids.

00:43:31

By the way, this is all in the Bible, friends.

00:43:33

I'm not making this stuff up.

00:43:34

Not trying, not trying to like, you know, be shock.

00:43:37

This is in the Bible, all of this stuff is in the Bible,

00:43:40

as is smoking cigarettes, by the way.

00:43:42

That's in there too. And --

00:43:44

No, that's not in there.

00:43:45

That's that's not in there at all. Relax.

00:43:47

I can't wait for the emails on that one.

00:43:49

I gotta tell you, can't wait.

00:43:52

Uh, let me tell you something.

00:43:54

God was just fine with it. He really was. Trust me.

00:43:58

He was just fine with that.

00:44:00

I'll get into that in just a moment.

00:44:02

But if you come from an unideal family structure,

00:44:05

if you're saying, "My family, it doesn't fit

00:44:08

what Christmas holiday tradition

00:44:09

is supposed to look like?

00:44:11

I'm not married, or my marriage is dissolved,

00:44:14

or I don't have kids, or I have kids,

00:44:16

but I don't want those kids."

00:44:18

You know, if you're in this place where you feel

00:44:22

like your family isn't ideal

00:44:26

and doesn't fit the Christmas hallmark norm,

00:44:28

welcome to Christmas, because that is the story of Christmas.

00:44:35

The Unideal family that we see

00:44:37

with John and Holly McClane is

00:44:39

the Unideal family structures

00:44:42

we see all throughout Christmas.

00:44:44

And here's the thing,

00:44:45

everybody does have some sort of family.

00:44:48

If you're part of Crossroads,

00:44:49

you have a Crossroads family.

00:44:51

Welcome to the family.

00:44:53

It's big and we're loud and we're boisterous,

00:44:56

and we don't even know everybody.

00:44:58

And we're annoying sometimes, but we are a family.

00:45:00

We are a family.

00:45:02

And you may have a group structure,

00:45:04

friends of yours that are around,

00:45:05

you're sitting in the auditorium,

00:45:07

wherever you are right now. That is a family.

00:45:09

It can be a family if you operate that way.

00:45:12

The family of God, all of us

00:45:14

who have received Jesus and have His Spirit,

00:45:16

we come into the same family.

00:45:18

We're of the family of God,

00:45:19

and we have all different sort

00:45:21

of physical family structures.

00:45:24

And probably about none of us

00:45:25

are really happy with our family. That's okay.

00:45:28

It's not about our family, it's about God.

00:45:31

And I came to the Thanksgiving Eve service,

00:45:33

which was really fantastic.

00:45:35

I love walking into a service that I don't know anything about

00:45:37

because I don't have any part of it.

00:45:39

I don't have any role on it.

00:45:40

And so Lib and I met with a couple, a friend,

00:45:43

a couple of friends and we then

00:45:46

came into Thanksgiving Eve service.

00:45:47

It was great. Didn't know we walked into. It was great.

00:45:49

We sang, sat up on a balcony,

00:45:51

and we just sort of took it in and had a--

00:45:54

Wasn't it great, those were at Thanksgiving Eve,

00:45:56

wasn't it awesome?

00:45:57

The creativity with the leaves

00:45:59

falling down from the catwalks.

00:46:01

If your site had catwalks and stuff,

00:46:03

it was just really, really, really, really cool.

00:46:05

And it was also kind of funny when I'm worshiping

00:46:08

just as normal Joe someplace, it takes a while,

00:46:11

but generally a few people around me go like,

00:46:13

"Hey, is that?"

00:46:14

They think there's some weird thing

00:46:16

that's going to happen where spotlight's

00:46:17

going to come on me.

00:46:18

No, just normal Brian guy, Brian and Lib here worshiping.

00:46:21

It was really, really good.

00:46:22

On our way out, saying hi to people

00:46:25

and there was there was one woman who came up

00:46:26

that I haven't seen much in the last couple of decades.

00:46:29

She's been part of Crossroads for decades,

00:46:31

I don't know, 25, maybe 28 years,

00:46:33

maybe since weekend one, I don't know.

00:46:35

We saw her. We're talking with her

00:46:37

and and she comes from an unideal family structure.

00:46:40

She's not married, has never been married.

00:46:44

And she told me as we were talking,

00:46:46

as we were walking out, she said,

00:46:47

"Yeah," she basically said, I have

00:46:49

an unideal family structure

00:46:51

and I've always struggled with it.

00:46:52

She said, "When I was younger, I got pregnant

00:46:55

and I gave the child up for adoption,"

00:46:58

and said, "The craziest thing happened.

00:47:00

I went on one of the websites

00:47:01

and I filled out my my name,

00:47:04

and a couple years later, my son, who's in his 30s,

00:47:08

contacted me and we've been in touch.

00:47:10

And now I have a grandchild

00:47:13

and I travel out and to this thing.

00:47:15

God just brought me this unusual."

00:47:18

Basically, she was saying a strange unideal family,

00:47:22

but yet for clear, a family structure

00:47:25

and she's just beaming.

00:47:26

I think God gives us blessings

00:47:29

and we don't notice He's giving us blessings

00:47:31

because we're still looking for

00:47:32

the cookie cutter blessing that we wanted.

00:47:34

We think, if God's going to bless me,

00:47:36

it's got to look this way.

00:47:38

No, a key thing is looking for the way

00:47:41

that God is going to bless me

00:47:43

that's beyond my expectations.

00:47:45

For sure, Joseph at some point said,

00:47:47

"Man, I always wanted my oldest son

00:47:50

that I was a father of, to be my son, my DNA."

00:47:53

At some point he went, "Dag! Pretty freaking cool

00:47:57

that my oldest son is not my DNA,

00:48:00

and I get to raise the Son of God."

00:48:01

At some point he made peace with that

00:48:04

and just a huge depth of meaning for it.

00:48:06

It's really, really cool.

00:48:08

Appreciate what you have

00:48:10

instead of grieving what you don't.

00:48:13

Family stories do fascinate me because

00:48:15

family stories, um, they're personal to all of us.

00:48:18

One of my favorite family stories was tied into

00:48:22

our recent Push that we completed.

00:48:25

By the way, I'll say it again.,

00:48:27

it's amazing what God has done with us

00:48:29

with the Push for 10X.

00:48:30

And what's even more amazing is when you do,

00:48:33

just get started on it, get started. Really critical.

00:48:36

One of the stories that came in was a guy who said,

00:48:40

"I'm giving my inheritance."

00:48:43

And his inheritance came from his father

00:48:46

who was an atheist.

00:48:49

So I just imagine with that, like, him and his dad

00:48:53

kind of doing battle over the role of God

00:48:56

and religion and this and that.

00:48:58

And then at the end, you know, his dad's money

00:49:01

is being used to bring people to Jesus.

00:49:03

I think that's -- I think that's cool.

00:49:05

And I also think there's some real beauty

00:49:07

in the midst of that whole thing.

00:49:09

I think that there's kind of an unideal nature

00:49:13

of that relationship that probably

00:49:14

also brought about a richness of it as well.

00:49:18

All of us have unideal things. I have unideal things.

00:49:20

I was asked by a friend just yesterday, said,

00:49:24

"Hey, how are things going with your birth father?"

00:49:26

I was born at a very early age,

00:49:30

and then I was adopted,

00:49:31

and I've given that whole story before.

00:49:33

I'm not going to give the whole story right now,

00:49:35

but I met my birth mother several years ago,

00:49:37

and I met my birth father a couple of years after that.

00:49:40

And we met once, and it was a pretty good meeting.

00:49:43

And and we interacted

00:49:44

and then it just kind of dropped off.

00:49:46

And I said, "I've texted him a few times

00:49:49

over the last year, year or two,

00:49:51

and he's never responded to me.

00:49:53

So I don't know if he's dead

00:49:54

or if he's just upset at me, because

00:49:57

maybe he had some image of what his son would be to him.

00:50:01

And I just I got a full family life,

00:50:03

maybe just was frustrated that I wasn't able

00:50:05

to just drop everything and be with him.

00:50:08

And I don't know."

00:50:09

But again, it's I have an unideal family structure

00:50:14

and I've made my peace with it

00:50:16

and God's good in the midst of it.

00:50:19

Let's keep going on our Christmas story, verse 20.

00:50:22

But as he considered, as Joseph considers, how to,

00:50:25

you know, be done with Mary as their betrothed.

00:50:42

The angel, verifies and justifies what Mary has said.

00:50:48

It is from the Holy Spirit.

00:51:04

The core of the Christmas story isn't about family.

00:51:09

Family is a backdrop to it.

00:51:11

The core of the Christmas story

00:51:13

is the theme of someone needing a savior.

00:51:19

She will bear a son.

00:51:22

You will name him Jesus,

00:51:23

for He will save His people from their sins.

00:51:27

The second thing that Die Hard has in common

00:51:29

with the Christmas story is the presence of sin.

00:51:33

The presence of sin.

00:51:35

This is a four letter word

00:51:38

that no one wants to talk about.

00:51:40

It's a four letter word that's more offensive

00:51:44

than the four letter word that starts with an F.

00:51:47

It's a four letter word that's only three letters,

00:51:49

and it's S-I-N, sin.

00:51:51

When's the last time you've said "I sin"?

00:51:55

I'm not talking about saying,

00:51:57

"Well, I have mistakes, I have problems,

00:52:00

I have outages, I've got my struggles."

00:52:02

All that may be true. All that may be fine.

00:52:05

But how often are we able to say "I have sinned"?

00:52:09

"I have a sin problem."

00:52:12

When you watch Die Hard, sin is very clear

00:52:15

all through it.

00:52:17

You got John and Holly who are at each other's throats.

00:52:20

You've got people stumbling in the office

00:52:22

who are having sex outside of marriage

00:52:24

or extra marriage or whatever is happening there.

00:52:26

You've got people who are greedy.

00:52:28

You've got people who are killing people.

00:52:29

You've got people who are going on ego trips,

00:52:32

who are outside the -- It's all over the place,

00:52:34

the presence of sin. And it's the same with us.

00:52:40

We have a sin problem.

00:52:44

I don't want to start giving examples of sins,

00:52:49

because if I give examples, I'm leading the witness.

00:52:51

I'm not going to give examples because

00:52:53

I want to see if your heart is good enough

00:52:57

to understand your own sin,

00:52:59

and to start dealing with it

00:53:00

and take responsibility for it.

00:53:01

I'll just give one example, just one example.

00:53:04

It's kind of a covering for so many of them.

00:53:06

It's the sin of of pride.

00:53:09

This is part of what's going on with Holly and John.

00:53:12

No one wants to say I'm sorry.

00:53:14

No one wants to say I'm wrong.

00:53:15

No one wants to budge.

00:53:16

She's moving out. I'm not moving there.

00:53:19

They're kind of stalemate because of their pride.

00:53:22

One of the reasons why we don't feel God more.

00:53:24

By the way, I know some of us, a lot of us here,

00:53:26

God feels so distant.

00:53:28

Can I tell you something?

00:53:29

You know why He feels so distant?

00:53:31

It could be because He is

00:53:36

because your sin disgusts Him.

00:53:40

Your sin repels Him.

00:53:44

You want to be around stinky underwear?

00:53:47

No. God doesn't either.

00:53:50

Now when you come to Him in a relationship with Jesus,

00:53:54

you never lose the love of God.

00:53:57

You never fully lose the presence of God.

00:54:00

When you come to Him and you receive Jesus

00:54:02

and you have forgiveness,

00:54:03

and I'll get into that in a moment.

00:54:05

It's not like you lose your salvation

00:54:06

when you have sin in your life

00:54:08

because Jesus handled that.

00:54:09

But, but when you do have sin in your life,

00:54:14

you can't have the fullness of God

00:54:16

because He just doesn't want to be around it

00:54:18

because you're choosing that I want this sin

00:54:20

more than I want You.

00:54:22

And so, yes, you don't feel Him as much

00:54:24

because there's a distance between us.

00:54:27

Pride as an example. Pride. Okay?

00:54:30

Pride will keep us from ever saying, "I have sinned,"

00:54:35

because our pride won't even allow us to say,

00:54:36

"No, I'm not a sinner.

00:54:38

I'm just a understandably flawed person

00:54:41

who just needs some helpful spiritual principles,

00:54:43

that's all I am." No, I'm a sinner.

00:54:47

Pride is a massive deal.

00:54:50

It's one of the outages for why we don't have more of God.

00:54:54

I counted up in the New Testament,

00:54:56

Jesus is recorded as doing 41 miracles, 41 healings.

00:55:02

As I count them up, 34 of them

00:55:04

are all initiated by the person who gets healed.

00:55:07

Of the remaining seven, about five of them

00:55:09

Jesus asked the person to go do something.

00:55:11

And so what I take from that is

00:55:13

if I'm going to pray for somebody to get healing,

00:55:16

I do that a lot, I very rarely ask somebody

00:55:19

if I can pray for you, because

00:55:22

that doesn't lead to an effect of yes.

00:55:24

The person has to initiate it.

00:55:28

In the book of James, it says,

00:55:29

if any of you are sick, let him call the elders

00:55:32

and have them anoint them with oil for healing.

00:55:36

Oil is not the key ingredient in healing.

00:55:38

Someone who holds a title and a church

00:55:40

is not a key ingredient to healing.

00:55:42

What's a key ingredient?

00:55:43

The humility of asking.

00:55:46

The humility of reaching out and asking.

00:55:50

But when we're prideful, we're unable to ask.

00:55:53

When's the last time you asked somebody to pray for you?

00:55:55

Have you ever done that?

00:55:57

Hey, would you would you pray for me?

00:55:58

Some of us are just too proud to even ask that.

00:56:00

We've got too much going on.

00:56:02

Yeah, we're too sinful and we don't want more of God

00:56:05

or we're afraid of what we're going to look like.

00:56:08

The moment you cross over from not being worried

00:56:10

about what you look like to other people,

00:56:12

and you want God to look on you with favor,

00:56:14

as soon as you cross over that,

00:56:16

that's in your spiritual realm just starts opening up.

00:56:18

Your spiritual world starts opening up before you.

00:56:21

It's the practice of humility, of saying,

00:56:25

"I've got a problem. Would you help me?

00:56:29

I have a sin."

00:56:30

Would you confess your sins to one another

00:56:32

and you will be healed, sys the New Testament.

00:56:34

Again, it's that humility.

00:56:35

But when you're prideful,

00:56:37

you never ask someone to pray for you,

00:56:38

you never admit you're a sinner.

00:56:40

You know you can't --

00:56:41

You just can't do some of the basic things.

00:56:43

And this is John's frustration.

00:56:46

His life just isn't working out because he has a problem.

00:56:49

And then things start to change for him

00:56:52

as he's interacting with his new buddy

00:56:55

on his walkie talkie.

00:56:56

John's a cop from New York,

00:56:57

and he's interacting with this cop from LA,

00:56:59

and he's -- they're basically having a men's group

00:57:01

on the walkie talkie a number of times

00:57:04

over the course of the meeting.

00:57:05

They're supporting each other, and both of them,

00:57:09

at one point or another, come to confess their sin

00:57:11

without calling it sin. Here it is.

00:57:14

[chuckling]

00:57:17

- Hey, pal, you got flat feet?

00:57:22

- What the hell are you talking about, man?

00:57:24

- Something had to get you off the street.

00:57:27

- What's the matter? You don't think

00:57:28

jockeying papers across a desk is a noble effort for a cop?

00:57:33

- No.

00:57:38

- I had an accident.

00:57:40

- The way you drive I can see why.

00:57:42

What'd you do, run over your captain's foot with a car?

00:57:49

- I shot a kid.

00:57:53

He was 13 years old.

00:57:56

Oh, it was dark. I couldn't see him.

00:57:58

He had a ray gun, looked real enough.

00:58:03

You know, when you're a rookie,

00:58:04

they can teach you everything about being a cop,

00:58:06

except how to live with a mistake.

00:58:15

- Listen, man, I'm starting to get a bad feeling up here.

00:58:18

I want you to do something for me.

00:58:21

Um, I want you to find my wife.

00:58:25

Don't ask me how, by then you'll know how.

00:58:28

Uh, I want you to tell her something.

00:58:32

I want you to tell her that, um.

00:58:41

Tell her it took me a while to figure out,

00:58:44

uh, what a jerk I'd been.

00:58:46

But, um, that --

00:58:54

That when things started to pan out for her,

00:58:57

I should have been more supportive and, uh.

00:59:04

And I just should have been behind her more.

00:59:09

Oh, shit. Tell her that, um,

00:59:17

that she is the best thing that ever happened

00:59:19

to a bum like me.

00:59:23

She's heard me saying I love you a thousand times.

00:59:28

She never heard me say I'm sorry.

00:59:30

And I want you to tell her that, Al.

00:59:33

I want you to tell her that, uh,

00:59:36

John said that he was sorry.

00:59:39

Okay? You got that, man?

00:59:44

- Yeah, I got it, John.

00:59:49

- Vulnerability and repentance,

00:59:51

this is another theme that's here

00:59:52

that's part of the Christmas story.

00:59:54

Vulnerability and repentance.

00:59:55

This is when John Mcclane's perspective shifts.

00:59:58

And there's a notable change in him

01:00:01

throughout the movie that comes to closure.

01:00:03

And for us spiritually, when you come to a place

01:00:06

of vulnerability and repentance,

01:00:08

repentance is when you call something what it is,

01:00:11

and then you turn, you turn from it.

01:00:14

Instead of going this way,

01:00:15

I'm going to be vulnerable and confess it,

01:00:18

and I'm going to turn from it.

01:00:20

I'm going to go the other way.

01:00:21

That's a powerful spiritual moment in everybody's life.

01:00:26

This last week had an unideal family moment.

01:00:29

We had one of the worst fights we've ever had.

01:00:32

I just -- I wasn't sensitive to her.

01:00:35

I said something, I said something that was insensitive.

01:00:38

She fired back with something that really

01:00:40

got under my skin really, really bad.

01:00:42

And then I overreacted. And I just, you know,

01:00:44

I found myself just screaming at my wife.

01:00:46

I'm not a screamer.

01:00:48

And I don't remember the last time I screamed

01:00:50

just like, oh, anger scream.

01:00:52

It was -- it was not good.

01:00:53

And then I came into work at a church, it was great.

01:00:55

And then I left and I slammed the door,

01:01:01

got in the truck, started driving.

01:01:02

And I knew as I was coming over, like,

01:01:04

I can't go to work like this.

01:01:06

I couldn't go to work at McDonald's

01:01:07

in this spiritual condition, let alone

01:01:10

the stuff I need to do on my normal day job.

01:01:12

And so I wrestled through it for, I don't know,

01:01:14

ten minutes on the way, the drive.

01:01:16

And I just because I could feel

01:01:18

I wasn't close to God already in that moment

01:01:20

I could feel like I've done something

01:01:23

and my sin is blocking my ability to encounter

01:01:26

and sense the presence of God.

01:01:28

Because again, it's stinky, stinky socks and underwear.

01:01:30

He just don't want to be around it.

01:01:32

He hasn't rejected me. He doesn't hate me.

01:01:34

He still loves me.

01:01:35

If I wreck my truck, I'm going to heaven.

01:01:37

I'm not doubting any of that stuff.

01:01:39

It's just the abiding, calming presence of God

01:01:43

was very clearly not there.

01:01:45

So I called her up about 15 minutes into the drive,

01:01:48

and she called me, and she talked me and we talked.

01:01:51

And we didn't get everything all right and well,

01:01:53

but said enough that we could focus on our days,

01:01:55

enough of vulnerability and repentance on both of us.

01:01:58

And then that night, we kind of put it together

01:02:00

and put it behind us and it was great and on we go.

01:02:03

Those are beautiful things,

01:02:06

because it's a sign of my sin,

01:02:08

and that I need something beyond

01:02:10

what I can do in and of myself.

01:02:12

And I know that this is an important thing to do

01:02:14

because I have a Savior.

01:02:17

John McClane is a sort of savior,

01:02:20

because saviors are there to overcome sin

01:02:23

and overcome problems.

01:02:25

And that's what the angel says to Joseph.

01:02:27

Like, keep him, I'll read to you again.

01:02:29

He says to him, he says, look, she will bear a son,

01:02:32

and you shall call His name Jesus,

01:02:33

for He will save his people from their sins.

01:02:36

If our key deficiency was knowledge,

01:02:40

God would have sent an educator.

01:02:43

If our key deficiency was resources,

01:02:46

God would have sent a banker.

01:02:48

If our key deficiency was strength,

01:02:51

God would have sent a personal trainer.

01:02:54

But our key deficiency is sin,

01:02:58

so therefore, God sent a Savior,

01:03:03

not someone to help us work out our sin

01:03:06

and to go counseling again and again

01:03:08

and navel gaze on it.

01:03:11

But to recognize for what it is vulnerably,

01:03:14

turn from it and have a Savior who saves us.

01:03:17

That's who Jesus is.

01:03:18

And many people don't receive Him

01:03:19

because he's a non-prototypical rescuer.

01:03:22

He's not that way.

01:03:24

This is the third thing, third or fourth,

01:03:26

that John McClane is a type of

01:03:28

non-prototypical rescuer, non-prototypical savior.

01:03:34

He doesn't look like a savior.

01:03:36

John McClane didn't look like

01:03:38

the action heroes of the time.

01:03:40

He wasn't a Jesse Ventura, a Sylvester Stallone,

01:03:44

a an Arnold Schwarzenegger musclebound thing.

01:03:48

He had a pretty normal build.

01:03:50

He didn't seem like that. He would bleed.

01:03:53

He would get hurt immediately in the first scene,

01:03:55

not seemingly seemingly bulletproof.

01:03:58

He felt pain, unlike Schwarzenegger,

01:04:02

who looks like he never felt pain in those action movies.

01:04:05

He felt actual pain.

01:04:07

He's relatable and this is the way Jesus is.

01:04:11

He is not the prototypical savior,

01:04:14

which is why many people have not received Him,

01:04:16

which is why the early Jews and many Jews today

01:04:19

just have not received Jesus at all,

01:04:21

won't give Him a second look for a Messiah

01:04:22

or a Savior because He's not what they want.

01:04:25

They want a Schwarzenegger type who comes down

01:04:29

and blasts all Muslim countries and people

01:04:32

who are oppressing them and trying to put them down.

01:04:35

They want somebody who just, you know,

01:04:36

just makes it right.

01:04:37

And here comes Jesus in first century,

01:04:40

He doesn't lead a revolt and crush Rome physically.

01:04:44

He leads a revolt of love by laying down

01:04:47

His own life on a cross.

01:04:49

And many people just couldn't fathom that,

01:04:51

didn't make sense with the Messiah they wanted.

01:04:53

And today doesn't make sense with the Messiah

01:04:57

that they want, but that is who Jesus is.

01:05:00

By the way, that form of Jesus is coming.

01:05:03

It's just the second time.

01:05:05

And that's coming, whenever it comes,

01:05:08

He's going to be in a different mode when He comes.

01:05:10

That's very, very clear in the Bible.

01:05:11

But people rejected Jesus because

01:05:13

He wasn't a prototypical savior.

01:05:15

Aand this was prophesied in the Bible

01:05:18

that this Savior would come and wouldn't be prototypical,

01:05:20

and people would reject Him.

01:05:22

In Isaiah 53:2, it says this:

01:05:33

Nothing about Him is attractive.

01:05:35

Whenever you see a Jesus that's, like,

01:05:38

that's all ripped, you are not seeing

01:05:40

what Jesus looked like.

01:05:42

Now, some of those cheesy Christian t-shirts

01:05:44

that show Jesus bench pressing a Cross

01:05:46

and He's all ripped and veiny. No he wasn't.

01:05:48

There was nothing interesting about His physique at all.

01:05:52

You never see Him like chiseled face,

01:05:54

amazing movie star looks.

01:05:56

No, He wasn't no, He wasn't.

01:05:57

Probably had pock marks from acne.

01:06:00

He had something that was, it says again,

01:06:02

just believe the Bible for a minute.

01:06:04

There was nothing about Jesus physically

01:06:07

that would attract us to Him physically,

01:06:09

unlike a classic Savior in Hollywood.

01:06:15

Because He wasn't coming with all His physical apparatus.

01:06:19

He was coming with all of His spiritual apparatus.

01:06:21

He was coming with His Holiness.

01:06:23

He was coming with His qualifications

01:06:25

as having been the Son of God who's never sinned.

01:06:29

He came not as someone who looked beautiful,

01:06:31

but was beautiful on the inside because

01:06:33

He wrestled His whole life

01:06:35

and never succumbed to sin Himself,

01:06:38

never did Himself.

01:06:40

And so when He goes to a Cross,

01:06:42

He doesn't die for His own sin.

01:06:45

He can die for our sin.

01:06:48

And so there's this transfer of He saves me

01:06:51

because He takes all of my sin and puts it on His back,

01:06:55

so He takes the punishment that I deserve,

01:06:58

because God is disgusted by my sin and

01:07:00

disgusted by somebody who's walking in sinfulness.

01:07:04

Instead of taking it out on me,

01:07:05

He transfers to Jesus.

01:07:07

By the way, this is called the Good News.

01:07:09

And people who find this weird and archaic,

01:07:11

I know it is.

01:07:12

And you find it that way, which is exactly why

01:07:15

you don't have peace right now,

01:07:16

which is exactly why you don't feel God,

01:07:18

which is why exactly there's no X factor

01:07:19

in the power of your prayers,

01:07:21

exactly why you don't have peace that passes understanding.

01:07:23

Because you're operating on a wavelength

01:07:25

that's totally of this world and doesn't work.

01:07:28

And you need rescued. You need saved from that.

01:07:31

Oh, He's good. He does that really well.

01:07:33

Oh my gosh.

01:07:34

There's no sinner who's too sinful for Him.

01:07:38

There's no person who's too unideal for His family.

01:07:41

He'll take His family with you any time.

01:07:44

He would love to have you in His family,

01:07:46

but you got to come the same way all of us do,

01:07:49

humble and vulnerable and broken and sinful,

01:07:53

and recognizing it for what it is

01:07:54

that God doesn't need me.

01:07:56

He's not impressed by me

01:07:57

and my works don't get me anywhere.

01:08:00

It's His works get me someplace. His works.

01:08:03

All those people in the Die Hard,

01:08:05

they're having whatever they're doing

01:08:07

while they're waiting, it's not about them.

01:08:09

It's about the rescuer coming to set them free.

01:08:11

It's not about -- they're not doing anything

01:08:13

that's getting them anywhere,

01:08:14

no matter how they could be brushing

01:08:16

and flossing their teeth every ten minutes.

01:08:18

Doesn't matter. Not getting themselves anywhere.

01:08:20

It's the rescuer.

01:08:21

It's the Savior who is coming for them.

01:08:30

And when the Savior comes, peace comes.

01:08:34

It's like there's a blanket of peace

01:08:36

that falls on that whole building.

01:08:40

Here it is.

01:08:42

- [indiscernible chatter]

01:08:45

- If this is their idea of Christmas,

01:08:46

I got to be there for New Year's.

01:08:51

- [music] Oh, the weather outside is frightful,

01:08:57

but the fire is so delightful

01:09:01

and since we've no place to go,

01:09:05

let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

01:09:09

- I love that, while there's cacophony

01:09:12

and carnage everywhere, they go out

01:09:15

in peacefulness while a Christmas song is playing.

01:09:18

Why a Christmas song?

01:09:20

Because Die Hard is a Christmas movie.

01:09:21

Do you not, do you not see this yet?

01:09:24

Do you not see it yet?

01:09:26

I don't care if you agree with me on that,

01:09:28

but maybe you'll see this.

01:09:30

Maybe you've sinned.

01:09:31

Maybe you've seen the reality of your sin

01:09:35

and how you're incapable of getting out of it.

01:09:38

And maybe you're seeing that there's a family

01:09:40

that you'd be welcome into.

01:09:41

It's an ideal family, has a heavenly Father

01:09:44

that will never let you go,

01:09:46

and will love you to death,

01:09:48

and will be with you to the very end.

01:09:50

And maybe you're noticing that you're helpless

01:09:53

with the stuff you're dealing with.

01:09:54

You've gone as far as you can go in your own power,

01:09:57

and good for you for doing your own power.

01:09:58

But there's a God who wants to save you,

01:10:02

not help you, save you.

01:10:05

And maybe right now, for the first time,

01:10:06

you want to give your life to Him.

01:10:09

If you do, let's bow our heads right now.

01:10:12

Let's bow our heads and you just say something like this.

01:10:14

Just say it out loud to Him right now.

01:10:16

He can hear you however soft you go.

01:10:19

Jesus, I want You.

01:10:22

I confess that I am a sinner.

01:10:28

I don't like the things I've done or the things I'm doing.

01:10:35

And Jesus, I ask You into my life.

01:10:39

I ask that You would forgive me.

01:10:42

I ask that You would save me.

01:10:45

And I ask that You would fill me with your Holy Spirit.

01:10:49

As best as I can, I'll follow You the rest of my life. Amen.

01:10:57

- Hey, we're so glad that you joined us for church today.

01:11:00

Whoever you are and whatever you believe about God,

01:11:02

there are amazing people all around the world

01:11:05

that call Crossroads home,

01:11:06

and they would love to connect with you.

01:11:08

- Yeah, actually, just this morning

01:11:10

I was reconnecting with some old friends

01:11:11

from all over the country over breakfast

01:11:13

and was reminded these are the same people

01:11:15

who've pushed me and challenged me

01:11:17

in some of the most difficult times of my life,

01:11:19

that I wouldn't have been able to get through without them.

01:11:21

You need that, too.

01:11:22

You need good people around you.

01:11:24

And you can get in community through a group online.

01:11:26

Just head to crossroads.net/Anywhere

01:11:28

and we'll help you find the right group for you.

01:11:31

- See you back here, same time, same place next week.

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