Ordinary People: The Middle Men

Speaker:
Aaron Couch
Series
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Ordinary People
2.7.21

Hi family. How are you? Thanks for joining us today in the room or online. We're glad that you're with us and we have a mountain of stuff to get through today. We're in talking about the middle men today. So last week we talked about the first four, Peter James, John, and Andrew. And technically we really only talked about Peter and John, because there's so much about them. But if you think about the apostle is kind of like a bell curve in the number of people that they actually represent in the world. Like this middle section of guys really represents all of us and we're all going to connect to them, I hope, in ways that we maybe haven't previously. Before we get started, I just want to celebrate like you guys don't get to see it. This service, we have nine baptisms today. Nine that's awesome. Yeah, that's really awesome. So we're, we're going to, I mean, you may want to stick around the, the party's going to happen next service. So we have seven baptisms next service. I'm so excited about that.

But we're going to jump into this and we're going to talk specifically about Philip Bartholomew. Who's Nisei annual Thomas. Who's also called Didymus, which means twin and Matthew, who is also called Levi, which means Levi. And I don't, you know, they all have different names and multiple names. Like there's, that's not uncommon in that world. And so these are ways that they're identified. I really want to kind of pull each one of them apart a little bit individually, but we got to hustle. We got so much text to go through you guys ready to go to work? All right. So what we're going to talk about first is Phillip and Bartholomew. We're kinda going to talk about them together, but I really want to look at these guys in the sense of -- these are the apostles of friends reaching friends. What we have to understand is that Christianity, following Jesus, is viral. It's passed person to person, not unlike COVID only when it's done right, highly more contagious. And so, I really want to wrestle with this, like, as we look at this guy Philip, and how he handles his life, this guy is a networker. He is always kind of getting other people connected to people. And this is kind of who he is. What I love about him is he's also like, he's like a youngest child, which I can connect to because I was the youngest child in my family. He learns from the other's mistakes. So my, you know, my brother and sister were quite a bit older than me and I got really good, by watching them, at not getting caught. Like when you told them the truth, that was a huge mistake. You know what I mean? Like that's never do that. That was a joke for all your children in the room that it was don't treat your parents like that just don't ever do the wrong thing ever. So this is Phillip, like he learns, he learns from mistakes from guys like Peter and, and you know, Peter speaking on behalf of Jesus, Philip won't do that. He won't do that. And so we're going to take a look at several scriptures that are connected to Phillip. What's interesting is Philip is almost exclusively talked about in the gospel of John, which raises a question. Why? Why is he talked about in the gospel of John when the other three gospels don't seem to be that concerned with him? Well, the reason is because John is a pastor in Asia Minor, and Philip goes to Asia Minor as well to a place called Hierapolis. And that's where he's ultimately murdered. It's a powerful story. Come with me to Turkey and we'll go right square into where it happened and tell the story. It's really powerful. It's one of the most moving days of the entire Turkey trip for me. But it's really, really powerful. Phillip is this guy. And so John, when he's writing his gospel is writing this kind of almost as a, an epitaph of remembrance, a eulogy of Phillip as this tremendous guy. So John 1, we see the first exposure to Phillip and starting in verse 35 it says ”The next day John (this is John the Baptist) was there again with two of his disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by, he said “look, the lamb of God!” When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus.” Now here's the deal. This is like, you don't ever, ever, ever do this. You don't ever, as a disciple, just leave your rabbi and jump in and start following another one. Because number one, there's no guarantee that this new one is going to pick you anyway. So, you don't just get to tag along, but what's happening here is like a big, like shame moment for their family. If this doesn't work out well, this is really, really bad for them and for their family. Like they could get shunned from their family for this, right? And so it's almost like Jesus is walking by, but Bubba buck is, Jesus has got swag and John's like, look the lamb of God. And then they start following him, jumping from bush to bush, sneaking, trying to look at him. And here's what it says, “Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, ‘what do you want?’” Funny? “What do you want? They said, rabbi (which means teacher), where are you staying? Come, he replied and you will see. So they went and saw where he was staying, and they spent that day with him. It was about four in the afternoon. Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus.” So, the first one of the pair is Andrew. What we're going to find is Andrew and Phillip are tight. Andrew and Phillip are really close friends and they show up together a lot. “The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, ‘we have found the Messiah’ (that is, the Christ). And he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, ‘you are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas’ (which when translated, is Peter). The next day, Jesus decided to leave for Galilee. Finding Philip, he said to him, ‘follow me.’  Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida.” So, Philip is the other one of the pair. Andrew and Philip are the ones that are leaving John the Baptist. “Philip, like Andrew and Peter, was from the town of Bethsaida. Philip found Nathanael (or Bartholomew) and told him, we have found the one Moses wrote about in the law.”

Okay. What in the world does he even mean there? And I wish I had time to pull this apart, but God comes to Moses and says I'm going to raise up from among your people, a prophet. One who was like you. Okay. And so, they're looking for the prophet. In fact, if you remember when Jesus raises the widow woman's son at Nane they asked him, are you THE prophet? That doesn't mean, are you A prophet? That's a very different question. THE prophet, the new Moses. And Jesus is like, as a matter of fact, I am. So, this is a huge deal. “We have found the one Moses wrote about in the Law, and about whom the prophets also wrote -- Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.’ Nazareth! Can anything good come from there?” Now, Nathaniel is not without a case here because the people who lived in Nazareth in the first century were snooty. I don't want to get all technical on you. They were snooty. These were people who, there was a prophecy in the Old Testament about Messiah coming from Nazareth. And now it’s not a very big village, but they kind of walked around with a sense of like, looking down their noses at people. Like, looking down their noses. They're really important people because they live in the town that the Messiah is going to come from. Now, we don't know when or who or whatever, but just know that we live in Nazareth. It's just fun to say it that way. So, “Nazareth, can anything good come from there? Nathaniel asked. Come and see, said Philip. When Jesus saw Nathaniel approaching, he said of him, ‘Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.’” And I would love to pull this apart for you, because what Jesus is doing here is so cool. Come with me to Israel and we'll talk about it. It is like John in his gospel -- so brilliant. So brilliant. I may preach a sermon about it someday, but probably you're going to have to come to Israel with me. No big deal. “Here truly is an Israelite in whom there is no deceit.” How do you know me, Nathaniel asked. Jesus answered, ‘I saw you while you were still under the fig tree before Phillip called you.” Then Nathaniel declared, Rabbi, you are the son of God.” Does that feel like a lot? I saw you sitting under a fig tree. You're the son of God. Yeah.

Here's the theory. It's educated speculation. We don't know for sure. It could mean that Jesus saw him under a fig tree. There's lots of them around Israel, but what we also know to be true, and we've talked about this before, is that the trees in Israel are metaphors for other things. The fig tree, being the largest of the cultivated trees, becomes a representation and a metaphor for leadership and for the teachers of the law in Israel. And so, when we're talking about this in a few weeks -- when we talk about Jesus cursing the fig tree, and why did he do that when it wasn't even supposed to have fruit on it? Why did he do that? And so, the fig tree becomes a metaphor for like the Sanhedrin, for the Sadducees and for the rabbinic system. And so, what's more likely -- not guaranteed, but what's more likely-- is that Jesus is saying to Nathaniel, I saw you sitting under your rabbi. Which means, that when he says, this is a true Israelite in whom there's no deceit, probably he's connected that to the morning teaching. Now there's no way to know that, but that seems to be appropriate, based on the response we get from Nathaniel. Does that make sense? Like, you're the son of God, what the, like, this just seems like it's really, if it isn't something big like that, then what in the world is he so excited about? Yeah, I was taking a nap under a fig tree. The sun was out, it provided shade. “You're the son of God; you are the King of Israel. Jesus said, ‘you believe because I told you I saw you under the fig tree. You'll see greater things than that.’” What he says, he goes on to say, you're going to see angels ascending and descending on the son of man. Is there anywhere else in the scripture that we see someone with angels ascending and descending on them? The answer to that is yes. And you ought to pay attention to that because when Jesus says that, he's making a connection that's also tied to an Israelite in whom there is no deceit, which is ironic. And it's connected to the next story and the next story and the next story. Like it's, it's crazy. It's crazy. Jesus is the new Israel, taking the place of Jacob, Israel. Jesus is the new Israel and choosing his brides. And the next story is at a wedding feast. And then the story after that is the woman at the well. What? Which one does Jesus want? And which one does he not want? Right. He doesn't want to do anything at the wedding feast for his own people. What he wants is to pursue the woman at the well, one bride he loves, one bride he doesn't love. Are you following me? Go back and read the story of Jacob. You'd be like, no.

John 6 is the next place that we see Philip. And, this is an interesting story. So we want to jump in and it shows us a little bit about the personality of Philip as this networker of people. “After this, Jesus went away on the other side of the sea of Galilee, which is the sea of Tiberias. And a large crowd was following him, because they saw the signs that he was doing on the sick. Jesus went up on the mountain, and there he sat down with his disciples. Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand. Lifting up his eyes, then, and seeing that a large crowd was coming toward him, Jesus said to Philip, ‘where are we to buy bread, so that these people may eat?’ He said this to test him, for he himself knew what he would do. Philip answered him, ‘200 denarii worth of bread would not be enough for each one of them to get a little.’” I love that. Phillip knows the amount like this is eight months wages to what? That wouldn't be enough to even give them a little bit. God of the sack lunch, right? He's the God of the little mate being much. He's the God of the third option. He's the God of parting the sea. He's -- this is the God that says to the mountain, move. And it moves. He's that God and Phillip forgets it. What we have is all there is, and we don't have that kind of money. Okay. “One of his disciples, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, said to him, ‘there's a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish.’” Now, we see Phillip and Andrew connected again. “But what are they for so many?” Well, the answer is, more than enough, because little is much when God is in it, right? And Phillip needs to learn this lesson.

One more passage with Phillip. And there's some others that we're not going to take time to read, but John 12, this is what it says: “Now, among those who went up to worship at the feast for some Greeks. So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, ‘sir, we wish to see Jesus.’” Which I think is kind of funny. Cause that's not a question. This, that should they asked him, sir, we wish to see him. It's not a question. All right. I won't do that joke next service. I think that's funny. I think that's funny. It raises a question for me. Why did the Greeks come to Philip? Like why don't they come to Peter or, you know, James or John, some of the clear leaders in the group. Why don't they come to them? Why does, why did the Greeks go to Phillip? Well, first of all, I would make this observation, the name Philip is not a Hebrew name. It's a Greek name. And so it's quite possible that the Greeks choose Philip because they feel like they have some kind of a connection with him. Okay. But the other thing is based on what we've already seen about Philip, who would be better? He's the networker. He's Captain Glad Hander. He's the one who's taking these people and connecting them to these people and back and forth. That's who Phillip is. He's the one that shares Jesus with his friends or brings his friends to Jesus. So, of course, they pick him. But Philip learned his lesson from Peter. You don't ever speak on behalf of your rabbi. And so, what he does is, he went and told Andrew. Why? Because Andrew's in that upper, in that inner circle, right? He's in the inner circle with Jesus. “Andrew and Philip went and told Jesus.” I love that about him. He knows, he knows. He's a networker. He's inviting all his friends to Jesus. He loves that. But he also knows his role in the midst of this has never to stand between people and Jesus, but to bring them to Jesus and show them who he really is. And that's actually really, really awesome.

Now our next apostle that we're going to talk about is Thomas. And if you've been around for a while, you might be vaguely remember the phrase – “you're just a doubting Thomas.” That was something that's not so used anymore, but it was used a lot back when I was a kid, it was used a lot. In my parents' generation, “you're just a doubting Thomas”. What that means is, as a reference to this guy, the apostle Thomas, if you ever listen to Nickel Creek, they have a -- not Nickelback don't ever listen to them -- but Nickel Creek which is maybe the greatest band in the history of bands. But they have a song called Doubting Thomas. And if you haven't listened to that, then immediately after service, like before you pull out of the parking lot, you need to download every song that they've ever written because they're amazing. I think Thomas gets misidentified. And what I mean by that is, I think it's an unfair picture that we color about who Thomas is. And so, I want to introduce him, not so much as the doubter, but as somebody that we can really connect with. Thomas, to me, is the apostle of unmet expectations. And how many of us have had an expectation of God that he didn't meet? Like, this is something that if you haven't wrestled with it yet in your faith, you will, because we all wrestle with our expectations of God. There's this tension when we talk to the Lord, because we know that God can do anything, but we're not really sure if he will or not. He can do anything. I just don't know if he will. I don't know. And there's these really interesting things, these, these expectations that we put on God that he has -- just be clear, God has no obligation to uphold my expectations of him. He has no obligation to do that. So how do we wrestle with this reality of unmet expectations? I want to begin in John 11, and we're going to look through a piece of the story of Lazarus who got sick and died. And then Jesus raises him ultimately from the dead, right? But they're up North. And they find out that Lazarus is sick and he waits and he doesn't go back because Lazarus lives in Bethany, which is two miles from Jerusalem. And the problem with that is, when you go back down in that neck of the woods, there's a whole lot of hostility towards who Jesus is. And they're concerned that if they go back down there, they're going to get in trouble. So I want you to ead along with that in the background. “Now a certain man was ill, Lazarus of Bethany, the village of Mary and her sister, Martha. It was Mary who anointed the Lord with ointment and wiped his feet with her hair, whose brother Lazarus was ill. So the sisters sent to him, saying, ‘Lord, he whom you love is ill.’ But when Jesus heard it he said, ‘this illness does not lead to death. It is for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified through it.’ Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when he heard that Lazarus was ill, he stayed two days longer in the place where he was.” He loved him. So when he heard that he was ill, he stayed away. I think that's funny, funny, and a really distorted kind of way, because we've all experienced. God's love that way, right? Like those times where we're like, Lord, I need you close now. I'm unsure about this situation. Whatever the situation is, I don't know how this is going to play out. And yet it feels like God is distant. And why, why, why? “Then after this he said this to his disciples, ‘let us go to Judea again.’ The disciples said to him, ‘Rabbi, the Jews were just now seeking to stone you, are you going to go there again?’ Jesus answered, ‘Are there not 12 hours in the day? If anyone walks in the day, he does not stumble, because he sees the light of this world. But if anyone walks in the night, he stumbles, because the light is not in him.’” Let me tell you what Jesus is saying, because this is one of those weird, like, I don't know what to make out of that. I guess I'll just read on and not really think about it. Here's what Jesus is saying. Same thing we talked about last week, spend time with Jesus and go. What he's saying is, when we spend time with God, when we spend time in his Word, there's a light to our path that shows up. His word is a light unto our feet and a lamp to our path. That's what the Bible says. So when we spend time in his word, it lights things up for us so that we know. So we spend time with Jesus and go. Spend time with Jesus and go. But if we try to go without spending time with Jesus, it's like, you're stumbling around in the dark because you can't experience where God's at in any of it ‘cause we're not dialed in. You think about your spiritual life, like a radio station, the more things that you do to orient your world around spiritual things the clearer that signal is. The less that we do to orient our life around spiritual things, the more fuzzy, the more static is in that signal. That it's harder for us to hear clearly. So, we spend time with the Lord because when we do, it brings the light for the path. So Jesus, having spent time with his father knows when it's time to stay. And he knows when it's time to go, then they're like, you love him and waited two days. And now that, now that he's dead, you want to go now? Like what? Because I'm living in the light, which is another way to say, don't question me. I'm God. And because I spend time with the father and he says, it's time to go. “After saying these things, he said to them, ‘our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I go to awaken him.’ The disciples said to him, ‘Lord, if he's fallen asleep, he'll recover.’” Like, don't, don't wake him up. “ Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that he meant taking rest in sleep. Then Jesus told them plainly, ‘Lazarus has died, and for your sake, I'm glad that I was not there, so that you may believe.’” Believe what? Well, here's the thing. If Jesus had gone while Lazarus was still alive, he could have healed him. He could have. And here's the thing. They already know him as the God who has the power to heal the sick. They don't know him as the God who has the power to raise the dead, yet. And what I often think is that when we get into these places where we expect God to show up in a certain kind of way, because he showed up that way before, sometimes God doesn't do that. Not because he doesn't care about you or doesn't hear your prayers, but because he's about to reveal a piece of himself to you that you did not know existed. So, what we have to believe is that even in God's absences, his nature is only good all the time. Then, when things are going on that we don't understand, then we don't get mad. We don't question. We don't step back in our faith. Then, we dance because we're about to see a part of God that we didn't know was there. “So Thomas, called the twin, said to his fellow disciples, ‘Let us also go, that we may die with him.’” Now be clear. That is not the statement of a doubter. That's not the statement of somebody who doesn't know what they believe. That's somebody who's ready to go and die. Now, the problem is that Thomas has an expectation about how the kingdom is going to play out and Jesus is not going to meet that expectation. Because, even after the resurrection, they're standing on the Mount of Olives in Acts 1, and the disciples are like, Hey, now, is now when you establish your kingdom? Now? And Jesus is like, bye, thank you still don't you still don't get it. This isn't about an earthly kingdom. Thomas is ready to go die in the name of establishing a kingdom that overthrows Rome, because that's what we want Messiah to do. We want Messiah to restore our nation to its former glory here on earth. And Jesus is like, I am going to overthrow them. It just won't look anything like you thought. So he dies. He's lays his life down and Thomas doesn't know what to do with that. That's not how this was supposed to go. That's not what I signed on for. John chapter 20, Jesus has risen from the dead and Peter and John went to the tomb and saw it empty. They come back and tell the disciples. And then later on -- Thomas wasn't there with them. Which raises a myriad of questions about where he was. Why did he run off? John 20 it says this: “Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, ‘we have seen the Lord, but he said to them, unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand in his side, I will never believe.’”  You ever been in that place? Fool me once. Shame on you. Fool me twice. Shame on me. Like, I bought into this nonsense once. Don't expect me to do it again. “Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, ‘Peace be with you.’ Then he said to Thomas, ‘put your finger here, see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.’” In this moment, because Jesus is so tender with Thomas and his disbelief and his doubt and his disappointment, Jesus, isn't shaming him. He's like, if that's what you need to believe, I'll give it to you. Jesus is in his glorified body. Don't think for a second, he still needs nail holes and the wound in his side. He did that just for Thomas. And I love that. “Thomas answered him, ‘my Lord and my God!’” And by the way, he never doubted again. Like, Thomas -- history will tell us that Thomas is preaching on a street corner that Jesus was God and had risen from the dead and two people snuck up behind him and ran him through with a spear and stuck it to the wall. That's how he died. He died preaching the gospel of Jesus's resurrection. Like, he figured out how to deal with disappointment. And we've all spent time in that space of unmet expectations. God, why -- this is not how it was supposed to go. And I'm learning something in my own personal spiritual journey that I don't know what to do with this. Yet you apply it as you see fit. But one of the things that I used to pray is, Lord, fix that problem. Only you can fix that problem, God, and I would give God his due. God fix that problem. God, I have this issue, Lord. I know it's getting in the way of your kingdom, whatever God, fix this problem, fix this problem. Fix this problem. My prayers have changed recently to this: Lord, show me how to love you in this context. Rather than expecting God to change or fix my circumstances, what I've begun to do is try to focus on my relationship with God and trust that whatever circumstances God has for me is good because his nature is only good all the time. If I really believe that, then all I have to pray is Lord, help me to know how to love you here. By the way, for those of you struggling in your marriage, that'll change everything. Stop praying for God to fix your spouse and say, Lord, help me to know how to love you and how I treat him or her.

Matthew is the last one we're going to look at today or Levi, the son of Alpheus. Which, by the way, there's another apostle called James, the son of Alpheus or James, the less, which is interesting because apparently Matthew and James are brothers, which is kind of fun. Matthew is the apostle of, “I am not enough”. And if we've ever struggled with unmet expectations with God, we also struggle with I am not enough. And so, in the book of Luke chapter 5, here's what it says: “After this, he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi (this is Matthew), sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, ‘Follow me.’ And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.” By the way, this is one of those scenes. If you've seen the series, The Chosen, I could not have been more thrilled with the way that they cast Matthew in that mini series. And if you haven't seen it, download the app and watch it , watch it. It's tremendous. But the moment that Jesus calls Matthew is perfect. It's perfect. “He said to him, ‘follow me.’ And leaving everything, he rose and followed him. And Levi made him a great feast in his house..” So, not only is Jesus hanging out with a tax collector, he's hanging out with a whole passel of them. …”there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them.” By the way, the others that hang out with tax collectors, probably not models of society. If they were, they would never have hung out with tax collectors. “And the Pharisees in their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, ‘why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?’” Which, they shouldn't have done. They shouldn't have come and talked to the disciples. They keep trying to leverage what the disciples are going to say to get at Jesus, which, by the way, is just straight up disrespect.” And Jesus answered them, ‘those who were well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.’” Jesus is like, Oh, you're not enough. Well, you're just perfect for me. And I know that for many of us, we carry the scars, the pain, the mess ups, the false beliefs, the things that were done to us as a kid or by our parents or by whatever, whatever, whatever. We, we carry these things that are just these weights of inadequacy that are reinforced all around us, that we are not enough. And I want to scream from the mountains that Jesus thinks you're just fine. I have a tremendous quote. Jonathan Martin wrote a book years ago called Prototype -- great book. Here's what he says: “Our scars reveal who we are. The fact that we've experienced profound suffering in life -- the fact that we carry what may seem to be unsightly scars -- does not disqualify us from following Jesus. It may precisely be what qualifies us.” The fact that we have scars that should be insurmountable is exactly the kind of people that Jesus is looking for. We shouldn't hide that. We, Paul says: “I boast all the more in my weaknesses.” Why? Because the more that you understand that I am incapable, the more that God gets the glory. I have people talk to me all the time about like, I can't believe you talk about the fact that you go to counseling. And I was like, why? It's true? And they're like, well, cause people are gonna think you don't have what it takes to lead the church. I don't have what it takes to lead the church! But the Holy spirit working through me has been doing some pretty cool stuff. So I'm going to hang out in that space. Like I like, I can't believe you -- listen, I wouldn't have survived 2020 without counseling. Plus, my wife's way happier with me. So I don't care if you think it's okay or not-- happy wife, you feel me? You feel me on that? That's right. That's right.  It isn't our scars that gets in the way of our relationship with Jesus. That's what qualifies us to need him. So if you've ever felt like you weren't enough, Matthew is your guy.

Let's work through some implications. Implication number one, God isn't looking for special people, just committed people. You don't have to be special. You don't have to have some supernatural talent. You don't have to have any of that stuff. You just got to be committed.

Implication number two, God's love transcends our prejudices, our preconceived ideas, and misconceptions. And he's gentle in loving us through those. Like, Nathaniel is prejudiced, right? Like, can anything good come out of Nazareth? Jesus loves him. Yeah. He calls him to a better reality. “Here's a true Israelite in whom there is no deceit.” Our preconceived ideas? Thomas believed that it was going to be a war and they were going to be rewarded for their commitment. And Jesus loves him through it. I
And gives them exactly what he needs to trust them. And our misconceptions. Everybody told Matthew that he wasn't enough. And yet Jesus comes to him and says, you're exactly who I'm looking for.

Implication number three, following Jesus is viral; its spread person to person. For those of you that are like, Hey, I have a friend that needs to know Jesus, let me call pastor Aaron. When you call me, I'm going to go, that is so exciting. Let me know how it goes. I am not the spiritual center for your friends who don't know Jesus, yet you are. It's one of the reasons why life groups are so important because our church is so big. Like, I can't be the pastor for everybody. Russ can. But he's like supernatural, superhuman. I can't be the pastor for everybody, but everybody needs to be pastored. So, if you aren't in a life group, you should get in one

Implication number four, God is kind when we doubt. I have one more quick quote from same book Prototype. Here's what it says: “I follow Jesus not because I don't have any doubts. I follow Jesus because in my doubt, He's always been tender with me.” I love that.

And as we move into our communion time, I would just invite us to consider like, where are the spaces that we try to deny what's really going on inside of us? God is bigger than your questions. It's okay. God is bigger than feeling inadequate. God is bigger than our unmet expectations. God's bigger than all of it. And in those spaces, when we stop trying to feel, act like we have it all together and push through and we just go, God, I'm a mess. I don't know what to do with this. God is tender with us in those spaces. And so, where are the places, as we think about communion time, that you haven't been honest with God -- because maybe disappointment, maybe unmet expectations, maybe questions you were afraid to ask? It's okay. It's okay to ask those questions. Where's that space? And as we think about this ultimate sacrifice that Jesus makes, what would he want you to do in light of this communion time and what it represents with those questions in places that you have in your own heart, let's spend some time with him.

On the night Jesus was betrayed, he took bread and he broke it. And he said, this is my body, which is given for you. So whenever you eat this bread do it in remembrance of me. Let’s remember him. And then after the dinner, he took a cup, and he said, this cup is the new covenant of my blood, which is shed for you. So whenever you drink this cup, do it in remembrance of me.

Let's pray, Lord, thank you that you meet us right where we are and you give us exactly what we need to be able to move forward in our relationship with you. Lord, for these questions in dark places, in hard spots in our life, may you remind us to ask ourselves not why you haven't fixed it, but how we can love you in it. Thank you God, for your faithfulness in Jesus' name, amen.

Let's stand and sing one more song. So I hope that in the midst of our unmet expectations, with God in our discouragement, feeling inadequate, that we don't use that as a way to run away from God, but that we use it as a way to press into him. And if you're struggling with that this morning I get it. That's not abnormal for us to struggle with that. And so there's some folks up here in the front that would love to pray with you about that or anything else for that matter. If you would like to ,they're here, or if you want to, right after the service, you can go out here to the prayer room and pray there by yourself or with somebody else there as well. But may we be people who spend time with Jesus and go without regard for expectation of results or I don't think I can do that. God's like, I know you can't, you can't, but I have plans for you. May we be people who stand in the faith that God, God uses rocks. If he chooses to, right? If he can do that, he can use you and me. Thanks for coming. Have a great week.