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Well, good morning, everyone.
Yeah, well, today is Father's Day.
Like many of you, my father growing up was a very hard worker, long hours at his job, long
hours fixing up the house, keeping up with the chores, and of course, raising us kids.
And I'm very thankful for the father that I have, and I hope to be the father that he was
to us, to my kids, the way he showed me how to be.
And I don't know what anyone's relationship is with their father here this morning, but
I am thankful we have a great father, that I have a great father, and that I have a great
father-in-law.
But that's not the case for all of us.
And while we are thankful for good dads today, we are here this morning to talk about the gifts
of our heavenly father.
It should not be lost on us that he is called our heavenly father.
It was Jesus, when teaching us how to pray, who first said this, saying, our father, who
are in heaven.
So we have permission to call God our father, and I believe we should be thankful that we
can.
Because God the father is the greatest father of them all.
He will never leave us.
He will always do what is best for us.
He will love us unconditionally forever.
Fatherly love, that is what we see from God the father.
But we also see that from his son, Jesus.
We see the same compassion from God the father coming from Jesus.
And that's what we're going to learn about today in Matthew chapter 9.
It's the compassion of Jesus for us.
Let's pray.
Heavenly father, I just thank you for this opportunity to come to read your scripture.
Lord, that we are in a country where we can openly read your scripture.
Lord, that we not take that for granted.
Lord, we do thank you so much for good fathers today, but we thank you so much more for our
great father in heaven.
Lord, I pray that he will be honored by the words that we have this morning.
Pray these things in your name.
Amen.
All right.
This morning, we'll be reading from Matthew chapter 9, and we're going to be reading verses
1 through 13.
I'm going to be reading from the NIV this morning, so it might look a little bit different
from your scripture that you're reading, but it's the same.
So let's open the word this morning and read from chapter 9, verses 1 through 13.
It says this,
Jesus stepped onto a boat, crossed over, and came to his town.
Some men brought to him a paralyzed man laying on a mat.
And Jesus saw their faith, and he said to the man,
Take heart, son.
Your sins are forgiven.
At this, some of the teachers of the law said to themselves,
This fellow is blaspheming.
Knowing their thoughts, Jesus said,
Why do you entertain evil thoughts in your heart?
Which is easier to say?
Your sins are forgiven?
Or say, get up and walk?
But I want you to know that the son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins.
So he said to the paralyzed man,
Get up, take your mat, and go home.
Then the man got up and went home.
When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe,
and they praised God, who had given such authority to man.
And Jesus went on from there.
He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector's booth.
Follow me, he told him.
And Matthew got up and followed him.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew's house,
many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples.
And when the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples,
Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?
On hearing this, Jesus said,
It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.
But go and learn what it means.
I desire mercy, not sacrifice.
For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.
So we're going to break this down into two sections.
And as we look at verse 1 through 7,
we see Jesus healing a man because of his faith.
This story many of us have heard before.
A paralyzed man brought to Jesus.
And as we look closer to the story,
I want to make sure that we don't miss something that is here.
And it's scripture tells us that Jesus heals the man
because he saw their faith.
Now the man who was paralyzed may very well have had faith.
There's no reason to believe that he didn't.
But we know that he was not alone.
Because what Jesus says is he saw their faith.
Their.
That's plural.
It could be that the paralyzed man had faith,
but we know he was not alone.
These men who were with him also shared that faith.
It is helpful often that we have four gospels.
So we can see this story from different points of view.
We see the same story in Mark chapter 2 verses 1 through 4.
And some additional information is given.
It says this.
Starting in verse 2.
They gathered in such large numbers that there was no room left,
not even outside the door.
And he preached the word to them.
Some men came bringing to him a paralyzed man carried by four of them.
Since they could not get to him or get him to Jesus because of the crowd,
they made an opening in the roof above Jesus by digging through it and lowering the mat the man was lying on.
So here's some additional information.
We know there were crowds.
There were four men.
And that they lowered this man through the roof.
And I think this creates a very interesting picture.
One that shows their faith.
And that's our first point this morning.
It's that Jesus delights when we have faith in him.
Now I have a good imagination.
And it's a helpful tool when I'm thinking about these different scriptures
and how they might actually play out.
All that I'm about to say is not in scripture.
But I imagine it would have been an encounter that could have gone something like this.
We know that there had been crowds following Jesus.
And we know many of them turned to follow Christ.
But we also know that many of them followed him because he was healing people.
And many people wanted to be healed.
Now we have these crowds.
And they have surrounded the house.
And these men, before they got there, had made a plan.
We just want to get our friend as close to Jesus as possible.
Because we know that if we do that, Jesus will heal him.
I'm sure they thought, easy peasy.
But when they got to Jesus, the crowd was so great that they could not get in.
So they had to come up with a new plan to get their friend before Christ.
And it's hard to know exactly how it went.
But something probably happened before their final solution of going through the roof.
I think they probably would have started by asking the crowd, excuse me, we have a friend who just needs to be before Jesus.
But to no avail.
So maybe they thought, well, what we'll do is we'll hoist him up on our head and we'll push through.
But the crowd might have been too dense.
So maybe the smallest of the four guys said, all right, you three create a wedge.
I'm going to throw this guy on our shoulder.
We're going to power through this.
They may have had tons of ideas before they came up with the final solution.
This solution where they would come through the roof.
I wondered on this.
While I can totally see myself coming up with a plan like this,
I thought, is this something that commonly happened in that time,
lowering people through the roof or using the roof in that way?
And a little research tells us that ancient Middle Eastern architecture,
this is the way that the homes were.
They were flat roofed.
And there were ladders that went up the side.
Often people would get up there and they would talk to one another
or they would lay their fruit or vegetables out to dry or they would take a nap up there.
But coming through a roof would have damaged the whole house and damaged the roof completely.
So these men, again, who had faith, so sure in the result, dug through somebody else's roof
to get their friend closer to Jesus.
Because they had one idea, that if we can get him closer to Jesus, he will be healed.
One author that I read called this a roof ripping faith.
And I like that.
Now I said earlier that we don't know if the paralyzed man had faith,
but I believe that he probably did.
He and all his friends.
Because the final plan that they came up with would have required me to have a lot of faith.
Okay, buddy, here's what we're going to do.
I'm going to throw you on my shoulder.
I'm going to climb up a ladder.
Then once we're up there, we're going to dig through the roof.
And once we dig through the roof, we're going to lower you down to see Jesus.
I can't imagine that they would have had that plan ahead of time,
where they would have bring pulleys and ropes and things like that.
So getting him down probably would have been pretty scary.
And that's where I feel like faith comes in.
They had faith, all these men did,
that all they would need to do is get their friend close to Jesus
and that Jesus would have compassion on him and that he would be healed.
It was their faith that pushed them to tear open the roof,
to carry that man up there, to create some makeshift way to lower the man down
because they knew there was no doubt in their minds
that Jesus' response to this would be healing.
And then Jesus follows that up by accrediting their faith as to why he was healed.
This faith was powerful.
This faith we see again later in Matthew 9, verses 20 through 22,
as a woman suffering from bleeding
knew that if she could just touch the garment of Jesus,
that she would be healed.
And when she did, verse 22 says,
Jesus said, take heart, daughter.
Your faith has made you well.
And then we move on in Matthew 9 to 27 through 30,
as two blind men cried out to Jesus,
asking for healing.
And Jesus did heal them.
And he said again, according to your faith, let it be done.
So a paralyzed man, a woman inflicted, two blind men,
all healed as Jesus responds to their faith.
So how does this apply today to our faith?
Well, faith isn't something like a magical formula or a tool that we can use to force God's hand.
That's for sure.
We don't get to say, I have faith, Jesus, heal my physical ailments.
Instead, faith is trusting in God and that he is sovereign.
That he loves you.
That he is using both afflictions and triumphs to perform his will on our lives.
So that we will have a deeper understanding of who he is.
Before we move on, we need to see that it was Jesus at the beginning
who stated, I need to heal something beyond the physical.
All the way back at the beginning of the story,
Jesus goes to the root of the pain of this world, sin.
Jesus again in 9.2 said,
Take heart, my son.
Your sins are forgiven.
You see, Jesus started with,
because the issue was sin,
it was not physical pain.
Jesus knew the real problem with our world.
After all, isn't that why Jesus came?
He came and he died on the cross for sin,
not to heal the physical pain of the world.
And when we accept Jesus,
there's no assurance that our physical pain will go away.
And while I'm spending this time
and I'm highlighting the different ways that Jesus had power then
and he has that same power now to heal us physically,
he didn't come to heal us physically on this side of heaven.
He came to heal our sins.
As I look around the room this morning,
I love that this is our whole body.
And when I knew that today was going to be one where we all got to share,
I was pretty excited.
We have little kids in here with us this morning.
We have the youth.
We have young adults.
We have older adults.
We have slightly older adults.
But we're all here together.
And this is our body.
This is our family.
This is the Willow Ridge Church family.
And it's easy to know that this is our body
because it looks a lot like the family that I have at home.
We are loud.
That's exciting.
We spill stuff.
And that's okay.
In the middle of a conversation,
we're going to get up and use the bathroom
or more.
We're going to get some water.
But I wouldn't have it any other way.
Here's something else that I can see as I look around this room
is that our bodies are going to respond differently to pain.
What do I mean by that?
There's a 10-year-old in here, I'm sure,
that running full speed could hit that back wall,
bounce off that back wall,
hit the floor,
jump up and keep running.
Now, I know that if I graze that same wall,
I'm going to have a bruise on my shoulder for a week.
Tomorrow, when I wake up for some reason,
my hip's also going to be hurt.
And when I go to the doctor,
of course, my cholesterol has raised.
Not sure why, but I can tell you this.
My body reacts differently than a 10-year-old's body.
I'm going to wake up feeling broken.
They're going to wake up feeling fantastic.
Kids, if you're in here,
just understand that you're stronger than us.
But if we are both believers in Jesus,
both that 10-year-old and I,
and we're both saved,
and we both love God,
then we are both free from the pain of sin.
But there's no assurance
that I will be healed physically
this side of heaven.
But I can absolutely know
that my sins are forgiven
because I have faith
in what Jesus did on the cross.
That faith is what heals my soul from sin.
And if you are a believer here with us today,
your faith in the cross
heals you from that sin.
This is what Isaiah the prophet said
in Isaiah chapter 53, verse 5.
It says,
But he was pierced for our transgression.
He was crushed for our iniquities.
Upon him the chastisement
that brought us peace,
and with his wounds we are healed.
This is what Jesus came to do for us,
to heal us from the pain of sin.
Now, if you're in here this morning
and you have not accepted Jesus,
then you are currently living in the pain of sin.
And Jesus wants you to be healed.
You only have to accept him into your heart
in order for that healing to begin.
And later we're going to have a time of response,
and we're going to bring the prayer encouragers up here,
and they're going to be ready and willing
to walk you through the plan of salvation
that Christ has for you.
That you too can be healed from that sin.
As John 3.16 tells us,
For God so loved the world
that he gave his only son
that whoever believes in him
should not perish,
but have everlasting life.
And although that's a very familiar passage to us,
but we've got to know what it means.
His desire is that the pain of sin
does not inflict us anymore in this life.
And it can go away by accepting Christ.
The next point what we're going to explore
is that Jesus demonstrates compassion to sinners.
So as I was processing this sermon,
I asked myself,
and I'm asking us today,
how do we treat those
who we perceive as sinners?
Those we might seem as messy,
difficult, hard to deal with
because of their sinful actions.
Because I think that how we treat sinners
is important,
and how we see sinners is important.
I think it shows a great deal
about who we are.
So what is a sinner?
This word in the context of Matthew
is used five other times in scriptures.
The Greek word is hamartalos,
and it stems from the word hamarte,
and it literally means this,
missing the mark.
These people,
these sinners,
they're missing the mark.
They're choosing to continually live in sin.
They are choosing sin.
And this sinful world that we just discussed,
that Jesus came to save,
he came to heal them.
This is why how we think,
and even how we talk to,
and interact with,
sinners may reveal a lot about
how we perceive ourselves,
and how we perceive Jesus,
and what he's done.
We read earlier,
and we'll read again,
Matthew 9, 10 through 13.
It says this,
While Jesus was having dinner
at Matthew's house,
many tax collectors and sinners came,
and ate with him and his disciples.
When the Pharisees saw this,
they asked his disciples,
Why does your teacher
eat with tax collectors and sinners?
On hearing this,
Jesus said,
It is not the healthy
who need a doctor,
but the sick.
But go and learn what this means.
I desire mercy,
not sacrifice,
for I have not come
to call the righteous,
but the sinners.
So first,
we must know this about Jesus,
that this was not a one-time thing
that Jesus offered compassion
towards sinners.
It's all through Scripture.
He has compassion for the woman
who's unfaithful in her marriage
in John chapter 7.
He has compassion on the woman
who is anointing his feet
in Luke chapter 7.
And he tells a famous parable
about a prodigal son
in Luke 15,
pointing to how the father
forgave the sin,
and he welcomed him
back into the household.
And there's many more
throughout the New Testament.
Jesus shows us,
he tells us,
he demonstrates to us,
he encourages us,
and then he commands us
to love the sinner.
Now we just talked about
seeing Jesus heal blindness,
paralyzed limbs,
physical sickness,
and for some reason
that's easy for us now,
and it's easy for the people
of the New Testament
to swallow.
Good.
Jesus is healing
a physical problem.
But when Jesus wants
to heal the heart
to forgive the sin,
people make that
more complicated.
As if we have the ability
or the right
to determine
whether or not it's okay
for Jesus
to heal sinners.
even where he would go
to heal them.
And so where does Jesus
go to heal the heart?
He goes to the house
of the wicked.
He goes to the place
where healing
is needed most.
Now I'm sure
that everybody has heard
about tax collectors
during the Roman Empire,
but I want to take a second
just to make sure
that we're all
on the same page
as to why
Jewish people
disliked tax collectors
so much during that time.
I think today
taxes in general
are a sore subject
for a lot of us.
We know we have
to pay them.
We don't love it.
But we feel like
we can pay the IRS
one time a year
and then we can forget
that they exist.
That wasn't the same
as the case
for the people
who were in the Jewish
communities
under Roman occupation.
They had to see
that frustration
every day.
Though it would be
the instruction
from Rome
to collect the taxes
from the Jewish people,
it would be somebody
in their community
that would be doing it.
It would be a neighbor.
And here's where
it got tricky.
See,
Rome was collecting
for the empire,
but the ruling body,
or the ruling body,
but the Jewish people
believed
that their only ruler
was God.
So why should they
have to pay taxes
to somebody
who wasn't God,
somebody who wasn't
their leader?
So anytime a Jewish person
was a tax collector,
they would be seen
as a traitor
to the faith,
a traitor
to the Jewish people.
Why would anyone
want to be friends
with the one
who works for the enemy?
But that's not
the only reason
that the Jewish people
had contempt
for the tax collectors.
There was another reason.
There were lots of opportunities
for extortion.
They clearly took it
as we read
through Scripture.
You owe Rome
120 pieces of silver,
or 100 pieces of silver,
excuse me,
I'm going to take 120
and I'm going to pocket
that 20 for myself.
I think anybody
would be frustrated
knowing that
that was happening.
The Jewish people
saw tax collectors
as evil.
Scripture even
categorizes them
as sinners
in Matthew, Mark,
and Luke.
So when Jesus
ate with the known
tax collectors
and other sinners,
the Jewish people
were surprised.
While not all Jewish people
were following
the teachings of Jesus,
he was a rabbi
and they expected him
to keep better company.
They were angry with him
that he did this.
And then this is where
we get to see
Jesus' incredible response
to that
in 9-2
where he says this,
excuse me, 9-12
where he says this,
on hearing this,
Jesus said,
it is not the healthy
who need a doctor
but the sick.
He's explaining
to the people
that a
spiritual need
needs a spiritual
doctor,
that he has come
to heal them
spiritually.
And then Jesus speaks
in verse 13,
but go and learn
what this means.
I desire mercy,
not sacrifice,
for I have not come
to call the righteous
but sinners.
The Jewish leader
would have taken note
of this statement
because it's something
that they had heard
before.
Now to understand
what's going on here,
we have to understand
the word mercy.
Mercy in the Greek word
is eleos
and it's translated
often mercy
but it's got other
translations as well.
It's translated
tender mercy.
It's translated
compassion
and in several instances
it's translated
love.
So when we hear
the word mercy,
we know that it is
an act of withholding
punishment from somebody.
Mercy is withholding
punishment that is
deserved.
So when we read this,
we may think
Jesus is saying
I am withholding
the punishment
you deserve
but Jesus is saying
much more than that.
He is saying
I desire compassion
and I'm going
to show compassion
but to who
is he showing
this compassion?
Well, Jesus desires
to show compassion
to others.
He desires us
to show compassion
to others
and we have already
established in this chapter
who those others are.
They're sinners.
Jesus desires
we have compassion
towards sinners.
Known sinners.
So I ask myself
are we sure
that this is what he means?
That we have this compassion
towards known sinners?
And the answer is yes
because he says it
but he also does it.
He says mercy,
love,
compassion
towards sinners.
then he eats
with sinners,
with traitors,
with thieves,
with liars.
In other scripture
he shows compassion
to those caught
in all sorts
of sinful acts.
You see,
Jesus is forever
the teacher,
he's forever
the leader,
he's forever
the pastor
and he's forever
the example setter
of what he wants
us to do,
how he wants
us to live.
His desire
is that we show
compassion
towards sinners
so much so
that he did it
as the example
for us.
So as I took
stock in myself
and I'm going to ask
you to do the same,
how do you view
others?
How do we view
others?
How do I view
others?
More importantly,
how do I view
sinners?
Now we all know
that sin is sin
but do we
divide
different sins
and different
sinners?
Do we categorize
the sinner?
Well this sinner
is speeding
in a car,
that's a little sin
so that's okay,
I'll still hang out
with them.
They steal
or they lie,
well that's a little
bit of a bigger sin
maybe,
so we're not going
to hang out
with them as much
but we'll still
like them.
But what about
a traitor?
This is the word
that the Jewish
people use
to describe
tax collector.
Well I would argue
this is a big sin.
How do we view
them now?
Do we view
a traitor
with all the
anger that wells
up within our
souls?
You betrayed me,
you betrayed
our country,
you betrayed
our God
but then how
does Jesus
view them?
The great thing
is we don't
have to wonder,
we just have to
open scripture
and we find out.
He showed
mercy,
he showed
mercy.
So is this
us?
How are we
approaching
sinners in our
own lives?
Do we seek
out to share
the gospel
with them?
Is there
anyone in
our life
that we're
refusing
to show
that mercy
towards?
We don't
want to,
maybe it's
a parent,
maybe it's
a child,
maybe it's
a close
friend.
We are
not called
of course
to accept
their sin
but we
are called
to show
Christ's
love to
them
because that's
what he
would want.
He would
want them
to see
the sin
in their
life but
more importantly
he'd want
them to
come to
him.
Then he
will help
show them
that sin
and walk
them through
that.
So do we
have that?
Think about
the sinners
in your life.
Do you
avoid them?
Do you
yell at
them?
Do you
write them
off?
Or do
we show
compassion?
Do we
show love?
The truth
is preparing
to preach
a sermon
is a lot
of fun.
Delivering
is a little
bit more
difficult.
But reading
how this
story plays
out is
amazing.
And when
we see
what Jesus
said and
why the
Pharisees
would have
taken note
is because
he's quoting
Hosea the
Old Testament
prophet as
he says
I desire
mercy and
not sacrifice.
That's in
Hosea 6.
And understanding
the context
of what's
going on
in Hosea
and what's
going on
in Matthew
they share
a common
thread.
In Hosea
they didn't
want sinners
to be around
people.
And the
Jewish leaders
at that time
were showing
like they
were great
people but
they weren't
following God.
And then the
same thing is
happening again
in Matthew.
In Matthew
these Pharisees
these Sadducees
they were not
following God.
they were
instead putting
on a
religious
front.
And in
that they
were questioning
what Jesus
was doing.
That's why
Hosea said
this prayer.
He said
that he
trusts the
love of
God and
he sees
loving hand
of God
in correcting
people.
Though they
are in sin
he wants
to bring
them out
of this.
While God
does desire
a loyal
loving
relationship
with us
it
doesn't
come
from
spiritual
rituals.
That was
in Hosea
and now
we jump
back to
Matthew
and the
same
thing
is
happening.
Jesus
is
addressing
the
Jewish
leaders
of the
time
and
they're
questioning
him
why
on earth
would
you
do
this
thing?
Why
would
you
sit
with
sinners?
Why
would
you
eat
with
known
tax
collectors?
See
these
leaders
of the
Old
Testament
and
these
leaders
of
the
New
Testament
they
had
the
same
issue
they
had
the
same
mindset.
Sinners
should
be
avoided.
Sinners
should
be
cast
out.
We
need
to
stay
away
from
them
and
specifically
the
Jewish
leaders
would
have
said
we'll
have
nothing
to
do
with
them.
So
Jesus
comes
in
with
a
desire
to
change
that
view.
So
it
got
me
thinking
how
would
we
view
Jesus
today
in
that
same
scenario?
How
would
we
look
at
Jesus
today
if
he
was
sitting
with
a
known
sinner?
So
I ask
you to
think
in your
mind
of a
sin
that
really
bothers
you.
Something
when you
hear
about
it
gets
to
the
middle
of
the
core
of
your
body
and
you
just
makes
you
so
angry.
Now
let's
say
that
sinner
is
your
next
door
neighbor
and
the
love
compassion
and
forgiveness.
He
wants
to
and
he
has
the
power
to
forgive
them.
If
you
saw
that
today
if
I
saw
that
today
would
that
make
us
angry
at
Jesus
for
what
he's
doing?
We
would
think
how
dare
you
do
this?
Don't
you
know
what
that
person
has
done
many
times
or
just
once?
That
person
in
our
life
that
sinner
in
our
life
who
has
done
that
thing?
We
may
even
try
to
rationalize
it.
Well
Jesus
may
not
know
what
that
person
has
done
because
obviously
if
he
knew
he
wouldn't
go
in
there.
He
wouldn't
sit
with
them.
And
this
was
deeply
convicting
es
to
me
as
I
prepared
this
week.
When
I
look
around
the
world
I
see
sin
everywhere.
I
see
sinners
everywhere
in
workplaces
in
schools
in
towns
in
our
city
in
our
country
in
the
world.
And
a lot
of
times
I
just
get
angry.
I
get
angry
because
I
think
what
these
men
and
women
have
done
these
hideous
sins
that
they
have
done
makes
me
so
angry
that
I
want
to
turn
off
the
news.
I
don't
want
to
know
about
what's
going
on
I
don't
want
to
see
it
I
want
to
avoid
what
is
happening
in
the
world
if I
can
I'd
like
to
ignore
it
I'd
like
to
pretend
that
it's
not
happening
I'd
like
to
build
a
wall
around
my
kids
around
my
family
around
this
church
around
my
town
and
I'd
like
to
escape
and
live
safely
not
having
to
face
or
engage
in
the
world
around
me
not
to
engage
with
sinners
but
that's
not
the
example
that
Jesus
set
as
Christians
Matthew
28
calls
us
to be
evangelists
to
go
out
into
the
world
we
must
be
flexible
in
the
way
that
we
do
that
as
Christians
we
must
meet
people
where
they
are
not
where
we'd
like
them
to
be
Jesus
didn't
wait
in
the
synagogue
for
people
to
come
in
so
that
he
could
share
the
good
news
we
can't
wait
in
the
church
for
people
to
come
in
so
that
we
can
share
the
good
news
we
must
go
out
that's
what
Jesus
did
we
don't
need
them
to
conform
to
what
we
expect
we
need
to
meet
them
where
they're
at
I'm
going
to
ask
the
prayer
team
and
the
band
to
come
up
and
I
want
to
spend
a
moment
here
and
just
recap
what
chapter
nine
teaches
us
Jesus
has
a
desire
that
we
have
faith
in
him
his
healing
power
in
our
sinful
lives
that
Jesus
desires
us
to
have
compassion
towards
sinners
meaning
we
must
meet
them
where
they
are
in
their
brokenness
with
compassion
and
Jesus
desires
more
than
that
he
desires
that
we
share
his
love
with
this
entire
world
what
we
can't
do
is
we
can't
say
Jesus
saved
me
but
now
I
don't
have
to
do
anything
with
that
we
can't
say
that
Jesus
saved
me
but
I
really
did
it
all
on
my
own
we
cannot
say
that
God
has
saved
me
but
I
don't
need
to
help
others
find
this
same
salvation
we
cannot
say
God
has
saved
me
so
now
I
will
cut
off
the
world
because
it's
sinful
and
I'll
protect
myself
to
live
safely
scripture
calls us
to be
transformed
that
we are
a new
creation
in
Christ
and
he
calls
us
to
follow
his
example
to
show
Christ's
love
to
this
world
that
love
that
he
demonstrates
that
same
love
that
his
father
demonstrated
to
us
by
sending
his
own
son
into
this
broken
world
to
save
sinners
so
church
this
is
our
challenge
do
you
have
the
faith
that
Jesus
points
out
that
no
matter
what
is
going
on
in
our
lives
in
our
world
that
our
desire
is
to
be
close
to
him
like
the
men
that
we
read
about
the
story
who
were
willing
to
carry
a
man
up
onto
a
roof
and
lower
him
down
simply
so
that
he
can
be
in
the
presence
of
the
Lord
is
that
where
we
are
do
we
desire
that
badly
to
be
in
the
presence
of
the
Lord
also
do
we
have
the
willingness
to
see
sinners
the
same
way
that
God
sees
sinners
the
same
way
that
Jesus
interacted
with
sinners
as
someone
who
needs
God
not
a
sinner
that
should
be
cast
out
and
then
the
follow
up
question
of
that
is
are
you
willing
to
share
the
gospel
with
those
sinners
to
change
somebody's
life
we
can't
hide
behind
fear
we
have
to
live
in
the
freedom
that
God
has
provided
we
have
to
live
in
the
place
where
God
has
showed
the
example
be
willing
to
go
in
where
it's
going
to
be
difficult
let's
pray
Heavenly
Father
I just
thank you
for an
opportunity
to
open
your
word
Lord
I
thank you
for an
opportunity
to
see
what
you
have
for
us
Lord
let
the
words
that
are
true
sink
in
our
hearts
challenge
us
this
week
Lord
to
live
in
the
faith
but
also
to
not
be
afraid
to
go
out
and
share
that
faith
God
you
have
called
it
on
our
hearts
to
share
the
gospel
with
the
broken
world
let
us
not
be
afraid
to
do
that
God
I
pray
that
you
be
with
us
today
as
we
go
from
here
Lord
be
with
the
fathers
amongst
us
be
with
the
fathers
who
are
preparing
to
be
fathers
Lord
and
we
are
so
thankful
for
the
fathers
that
have
come
before
us
Lord
but
we
are
most
thankful
for
you
God
being
the
ultimate
father
who
will
never
leave
us
who
will
always
love
us
Lord
we
pray
all
these
things
in
your
name
amen
that's
it
for
this
week's
message
be
sure
to
check
back
next
week
for
a
new
episode
and
in
the
meantime
you
can
visit
us
online
at
willowridgechurch.org
or by
searching
for
Willow Ridge
Church
on
Facebook
Instagram
and
YouTube
thanks
again
for
listening