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Tyndale University presents a series of recorded chapel services from Tyndale's very own faculty and guest speakers.
Wow, what a powerful worship. Thank you to our team for leading us in that time.
You know, this isn't like church where they get my sermon title a week ahead and they get to prepare the songs. This is all the Holy Spirit, really just integrating and bringing together a spirit of worship for us today. So thank you to God for coordinating everything through His Spirit.
My name is Sarah, I am so overjoyed to be here to share the Word of the Lord with you today. And I am just anticipating that God would come, that God would show up, and that God would do a work of healing and rejuvenating in the hearts of every single person that is here in this room. Amen. Amen. And so can I ask you to all rise with me and I'm going to read the Word of God together from us, for us today from Mark chapter two.
And when Jesus returned, to Caperneum, after some days, it was reported that he was at home, and many were gathered together so that there was no more room not even at the door, and he was preaching the word to them. And they came bringing to Him a paralytic, carried by four men. And when they could not get near him because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him. And when they had made an opening, they let down the bed on which the paralytic layed and when Jesus saw their faith, he said to the paralytic Son, your sins are forgiven. Now some of the scribes are sitting there questioning in their hearts. Why does this man speak like that? He's blaspheming, who can forgive sins, but God alone? And immediately Jesus, perceiving in his spirit that they thought question within themselves said to them, Why do you question these things in your hearts, which is easier to say to the paralytic, Your sins are forgiven, or to say, rise, take up your bed and walk. But that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins. He said to the paralytic, I say to you, rise, pick up your bed, and go home. And you rose and immediately picked up his bed, and you went out before them all so that they were all amazed and glorified God saying, we have never seen anything like this. Amen. For this is the word of the Lord thanks be.
As you're standing, can I ask you to just open your hands as a sign of your heart being open to the Lord and let me pray for us? Jesus, we thank you that you are alive and present in the sanctuary right now. We thank you that you have called each of your daughters and sons by name this morning. Jesus, it is not just mere words that heal and transform us. But it is your very Spirit at work, to cultivate, to heal, and to rejuvenate us from deep within. And so God as your children have their hands and their hearts open to you. God, would you be faithful? Would you minister to them? And would you fill us with your Holy Spirit at this time? We thank and pray these things in Jesus's name. Amen. Amen. Please be seated.
As mentioned, I teach here in our practical theology department, I teach in our practical theology department, but I also am director of a new center that we have created called the Tyndale center for pastoral imagination. I also am a bi-vocational church planter, meaning my husband and I and a team of pastors. We all have full time jobs, but just out of the passion of our hearts. We have a church that we operate and, we run every Sunday, and throughout the week. I also have three children that are 11, eight, and five. And so I have many different hats that I'm wearing. And a question that a lot of people ask me is this Hey, Sarah, how do you balance it all? I'll tell you no, I don't. My children go to school late about three days a week, you know, there's always a pile of laundry somewhere. If you send me an email, I probably won't write back and then in 10 minutes time, you know, I realize it's not about balancing my life, and being able to do every single area and every single hat that I wear perfectly, but it really is about integrating all that I do under the loving directing guidance of our Lord Jesus Christ. And so something I've started to do, you know, we're talking about cultivating our faith today. Something I've started to do to integrate my faith life is that I just ask God, God, you know, I can't be in 10 places at once. So would you just lead me in your spirit so that everything I do would be able to come together in a miraculous way that only you can do. And so, every day I live, I just ask God, God, how should I live my day today, and I opened my ear to him. And I realized brothers sisters, that being able to be a conqueror in every area of my life, it doesn't mean that I follow a meticulously planned out schedule, and that I sleep only five hours a day, and I'm able to get everything done perfectly. It simply means that I have my ear open to the spirit, to see where God is leading me and how God is giving me his word for that day. And so as I was preparing for this day, I was like, integrate, integrate. You know, I had a very busy week, last week, you know, my kids on field trips, we had events here, Tyndale I had speaking that I had to do, and I was like, Lord, give me a word for your people at Tyndale, give me a word that I can speak that will give a life that will revive the hearts of people that are just, you know, you're tired from winter, you're tired from the term, you're tired from all the emails in your inbox, give me a word that can bring healing to their hearts.
And this word actually came to me through the mouth of my five year old son, William, who goes to a Christian school. And day by day, you know, what we tried to do is we integrate the messages that we speak on Sunday at home with our children. So we do devotions, through the passage that we're going to preach on that Sunday, because we love to hear their insights. You know, in my 13 years of post secondary education, there are still things that my children see in the Bible that I'm unable to see. And so one day after school, he said, you know, eomma I learned eomma means mom in Korean, he said, I learned the coolest story, I'm going to tell you about the story of what Jesus did. And my son told me the story in Mark Two. And as he was telling me, the story something just lit up in my heart. And I was like, This is it. This is the word that God is bringing to our Tyndale community. And as he was retelling the story to me, the first thing he said, he said, eomma, did you know that these people were at Jesus's home? And I had to pause for a second honestly, I had to go back and look at the text because I was like, they were, they were at Jesus' home and all the times I've heard the story. I don't know why I never noticed this line where it says, You know what, that Jesus was home and many gathered there so that there was not even room not even at the door, I even have to look up the Greek like, does it actually say Jesus was home like boy calls home Greek and it said, Jesus was home. He was at home. And so when Jesus came home, this was after he had been healing, doing miracles in so many different places, you know, the multitudes have begin to learn what Jesus was able to do. And so they were just coming at him from every corner everywhere. And so he went home, I'm guessing, to have a little bit of respite. But the news spread, you know, Jesus is home, we need to go find him. And so now at his house, there are so many people in the house is so full, that there is not room for even one more person to come in. And you're in this scene, Jesus in his house JAM PACKED of people, we see four men who are walking over to the house with the paralytic man on a mat that is unable to walk. And so you can imagine they're carying him, and they're, they're excited, you know, this person is gonna get healing, we're gonna go see Jesus, and they get there. And the house is full. They're not able to get inside. At this point, my son said, eomma Do you think they gave up? No, no, no, no, no, they did not. Do you know what they did? They did a really naughty thing. My son said, they climbed up on the roof. And they started digging a hole in the roof. He said, I would never do such a thing. But this is what they did to try to get the paralytic man to Jesus. And what he said was, he said, these four guys, they must have really loved him. It's true. It was a love that drove these men to go on top of the roof, you know, it's very creative idea as well, and to begin to dig their way down into the home to get their paralytic man in front of Jesus. And in olden days, homes were kind of flat roofs like this. And there are wooden beams that would go across, and then they would lay dirt and leaves and different branches. And then they would put a thick layer of mud on top to keep all the elements out. And so you can imagine that they had to dig a very long time to get through that thick mud. And as my son was telling the story, it dawned on me I was like, this is Jesus's house. I was like, pumpkin, we call our some pumpkin, pumpkin. Do you know that Jesus his dad was a carpenter? He was like, Oh, I know. This home must have been fortified. There must have been beam after wooden beam in this. This home was built to code, right? There was no no betrayal there. They built this home right
And yet, these men are so devoted. They dug and they dug and they dug and they finally made a hole. And then they lowered the paralytic man through the hole. Again, my son had this whole strategy of how this supposedly happened, you know, he said they probably got their belts, and they probably lowered them down, they're probably stepping on each other's shoulders and their heads. And it was a whole strategy. But the point is, it was hard. It took a lot of effort. And finally, after all, this hard work of digging, climbing, lifting, lowering, the four people are now standing before Jesus with the paralytic man. When we see you in the passage, it doesn't say that Jesus heard their plea. And they made this great speech about why this man should be healed. But it says that Jesus saw their faith. And I want us to picture this scene for a moment, because these four men, they just made a huge mess, you know, there's probably dirt falling from the sky. And they probably took a long time to actually climb down the hole and bring the paralytic man on the bed with them. And now they're standing in front of Jesus. And now they don't even know what to say. They didn't think that far. They're like, we're just gonna get in there. And they're, they're finally infront of Jesus. And without any of them saying a word. Jesus looks at them. He doesn't just look at them, but he really looks at them. He looks deep into their eyes, he looks deep into their heart. He looks at the dirt on their hands, the sweat on their face. And what he sees in their eyes, is he sees his own eyes of love. He sees his own heart of love. And he is so moved by this love that he sees that has driven them in faith, to bring this paralytic man before them. It was a love that drove them to the badness of ripping off his wall, roof. It was a love that made them risk, you know, falling down from the second story climbing down. It was a love that fueled that hope and that faith that they just believe that Jesus would do something for their friend. It was a love that Jesus knew so well, that he himself described in John 13. He said Greater love has no one than this, to lay one's life down for one's friend. He was so moved not by what these four men said or what they did. But Jesus was moved by the heart behind why they did what they did. And the thing is, when we look at this passage, what we notice is that Jesus is looking at the hearts of all the people in his home. In that scene, you'll notice that there's very little script recorded about what people said, because really, nobody said anything except Jesus. You'll notice that Jesus sees the faith and the love in the hearts of the four men who dug through the roof. Jesus sees even the heart of the scribes they question and doubt him and judge and forth with blasphemous thoughts. Jesus sees the heart of the paralytic man and the son that the sin that he has in his heart that needs healing as much as his body. Jesus sees everyone's heart and out of love for every single person that is there. We see that Jesus not only forgives the man's sins, and heals his heart, he doesn't stop there. Jesus also heals the man's body and tells him rise, pick up your mat, and go home. He heals out of love for the four men that so faithfully labored for their friend, and he heals out of love. Also for the scribes, do you notice right before he heals, he said, I will do this, so that you may know he wanted the scribes to believe he wanted them to not doubt and see truly who he was. Jesus reveals his love that can heal on so many levels because he sees and knows the heart of those that are in his home.
Brothers and sisters, this is the kind of the Lord kind of Lord that I have come to know. That is worthy of my lifelong devotion. You know, Jesus didn't need the paralyzed man to plead for healing. Nor did he ask the four men to make a perfect speech or why the man should be healed. He also didn't discount the scribes for questioning in his heart. He had love for them all and he knew exactly what they needed and longed for them. to experience His healing love, brothers and sisters, Jesus sees each of your hearts today. Even if you don't utter a word, he knows you. He sees you. And when you have the healing love of Jesus, cultivate your heart. It is powerful, and it is transformative. Amen. When we have the healing love of Jesus cultivate our hearts. Sin will have no place in our lives, that the light of Jesus will come in and eradicate all the darkness chase away the sinful thoughts. When we have the healing love of Jesus cultivate our hearts. It eradicates and battles those negative voices that you have in your mind that may tell you, you're not good enough. You're worthless. Everyone is better than you, you're not able to do this. When we have the healing love of Jesus cultivating our hearts. It quenches and removes even the issues we have in our relationships, the unforgiveness, the bitterness, the anger. When we have the healing love of Jesus cultivating our hearts, even the physical ailments in our body. We don't need to fear them in the name of Jesus, but we have a Lord who has conquered even death itself. Brothers Sisters, Jesus longs to cultivate your heart with his healing love today. He desires for you to have your heart watered with his love until it is nourished and overflowing with vitality, and life. We are being called to soak in the love of Jesus today. You know, I mentioned after 13 years of studies, there's still things that I learned from my young children. And one thing I've learned from them is that when they have a hard day, immediately they come home and they don't look to go to the TV, they don't look to have a good snack when they've had a really bad day they come to me and they say, eomma I need a huggie time. And they'll come and they'll ask me for a hug and they'll just hug me soak in my love because something in their their hearts. They just know that when they are covered in love when they're being held that is going to heal and fix things on a deeper level that other things cannot heal.
Brothers and sisters, are you going to huggy time with God. You know, as an extrovert, it is so tempting for me to fill every pocket of my day with noise. You know, if I'm tired, it just you go on the phone or you go watch something you just binge and so hard for me to set a time where I can go to God and just say God, soak me in your love. So something that I've been practicing recently where I'll just go in a room, I'll shut the door. I'll sit down, and I'll physically just hug myself. And I'll say God, would you just come and pour out your love over me? God would you lighten my burdens, quiet and negative voices would you heal and empower my entire body would you fill me with love for other people? brothers and sisters, Jesus' healing love is so real. It is active. It has hands and feet and it has the power to save. It is the love of Jesus that led him to the cross and that brought him back to life. It is the love of Jesus that led him to heal so many even when they invaded into his home. It is the love of Jesus that led him to heal the paralyzed man when he saw his own love in the eyes of his four friends. Jesus's healing love has hands and feet. And we can ask the Holy Spirit, to fill us with Jesus' love every day so that as it's overflowing from within us, that we would be able to share the healing love of Jesus with all those that we encounter every day. So I'll tell you now, when we walk out those doors in this world, the message that people are given are that you only are given love when you earn it, or you deserve it. And yet the message of Jesus Christ is that his love is given freely as a gift through the sacrifice that he made on the cross. And so how can we become channels through which the healing of Love Love of Jesus can show up in the most unexpected places?
I want to close today by sharing a story. In this effort to integrate our lives I've been trying to keep my eyes open, you know for a where the healing love of Jesus is longing to come out from my life into the lives of others. And just two weeks ago, my husband and I went grocery shopping, we love to grocery shop, and my husband was determined to go to Sobeys. To buy one meat that was on sale, we usually don't stop shop at Sobeys, those of you that do groceries that's like the very expensive grocery store we're like no frills kind of people. And so we ended up at Sobeys to buy just this one cut of meat. And as we were checking out holding our two items, at Sobeys. You know, in front of me, I saw this young man with a whole cart full of groceries of fruits and bread and meat. And then I saw from far away a box of diapers. And this is not a good shining moment for me. But I'll tell you how I was judging this Man hard I was like I said to my husband very quietly, I was like, Who buys diapers as Sobeys? The most expensive place you could buy diapers, why is this person buying diapers at Sobeys. And yet, as we got closer in the checkout line to where he was standing in front of us, I looked closer, I noticed that the diaper box said newborn, and then I looked a little closer at the man's face. And he had these big bags under his eyes. And immediately I felt terrible for judging him because obviously he had just had a baby. And so I struck up conversation with him. And I said, Oh, did you just have a baby? My mind? I'm like, Is that why you're buying diapers at Sobeys? And then he said, Oh, I did. He said I have a one and a half year old daughter at home. And my wife just gave birth to twin boys last night. And we just got home 30 minutes ago. And it was an emergency C section. So we have no diapers. And immediately I was like, Oh, I'm so sorry for judging this man. And then he took out his phone, he starts showing me pictures like this is my wife and my babies and my daughter. And I'll tell you something in that moment when he pulled out his phone and he showed me those pictures. Something just clicked in my heart. And I suddenly felt such an overwhelming love for this family. This poor man with the big bags under his eyes. And so he paid for his groceries and he walked out. It was one of those moments where my husband and I, We looked at each other. We're like, we have to do something, we have to do something to show this man that Jesus loves them. But like so many other moments. It past he had walked away he was already gone. And we're like, ah, like we missed it. We missed the moment. But then as we're walking out to go into the parking lot from far away, I see him standing in front of the door of the grocery store. And so my husband's like, I'm going to get a gift card. I was like, oh go stop him. So I ran outside when my husband to get get the gift card and I see him on his phone. I was like hi. Like, are you are you waiting around? Can you just wait for a second? My husband, I just want to give you a gift because we just just really feel for you. You must be so tired. We just want to help out in some way. And he was like, Oh, thank you so much. I'm actually waiting for an Uber because my car just broke down three days ago. And so I don't have a way to get home. I just looked at him. I started filling with tears of like, cancel the Uber, Uber, sorry, Uber driver, like cancel the Uber driver, Uber, we’ll drive you home. He was like, really? And I said yeah, don't worry. It was Ben came, we loaded his stuff in our in our car. We drove him four minutes away. He was actually at Sobeys because it was the closest, closest grocery store to their home. And on the way he was just telling us the saddest story of how his wife's parents recently passed away. He's a stranger with his mom, his dad works full time they're away from any kind of family support. Their car just broke down. And he's a labor worker. So he needs to be home to help with his wife. So they have no source of income right now. And as he was sharing the story, he started tearing up, we started tearing up. And we just said to him, you know, we never go to Sobeys I think we were there. Because we have a God that really loves you. And we think he wants you to know that he really loves you. We dropped him off. He said come and see my wife. We were like No, we should just gave birth. He was like No Come in. We met his wife. We saw his twin sons. I held them one in each arm. They were like four pounds. And since that time, it's been a journey of just pouring out the healing love of Jesus in tangible ways into his family's life. You know, we told our Christian community and there was just an overwhelming response. We got like Costco sized diapers, gave them Costco sized diapers and wipes. Someone got up a breast pump for them. Someone got baby supplies and and initially they were so shocked. They were like, who are you? And then recently, just yesterday, my husband did a recent drop off of a whole other load of things that are coming for them. They said, You know, we just didn't know what to say. Or we just have to tell you, we felt so hopeless having these babies. We began to doubt maybe we weren't meant to have them. But something about meeting you and seeing the way that you're showing us this love is just renewed a hope in us that maybe there is a God and maybe this God wants to keep these babies alive. Maybe he does love us.
Brothers or sisters, when we allow the love of Jesus to cultivate our hearts, your life can be an adventure. We can experience miracles of healing, miracles of new hoping and fused miracles of provision, miracles of Jesus forgiving since miracles have even Lame people beginning to walk again. And at the end of this passage, when the paralytic man was forgiven, and his sins were healed, and he got up and walked, everyone around, suddenly they were able to speak again. They weren't talking until this time. And what they said was, they said, We never saw anything like this. It is my prayer. That wherever each and every one of you go, that the way you love against all odds, the way that you bring hope, the way that you rip off the roof when there's no room the way that you love on strangers when it seems like it's out of your schedule, or it's irrational. I pray that when we do all of these things, that people will look at us and say, We never saw anything like this. I need to know this love that you have. And so in this Lenten season, I encourage you, cultivate your heart by soaking in the love of Christ. feast on the love of God, go to him for huggy time, you're gonna remember that. Go to him for huggy time. And don't just focus on what you're going to fast from, but feast on the love of God. Invite people to feast on the love of God with you and then fast from things that distract you or keep you from doing those things. Brothers and sisters. Jesus sees you. And is powerful, transformative love, it can heal and transform your life to a degree that people will look at you and they will say, we have never seen anything like this. Amen. Amen. Let's pray together. Jesus, we thank You that You are the same Lord in this passage to us today. You are looking into our hearts. You see our needs, you see our sicknesses, you see our sins, you see our burdens.
And she says he will long to heal us, you long to restore us. You learn to pour out your healing love and abundant measure. So that not just our lives will be transformed, but that we would go out as agents of your Transformative love in every place that you have set us. And so Lord, would You fill us cultivate our hearts with your love today. And as we go on to the Lord's table, which allow your body and your blood to become your very presence onto us, that it would heal us from the inside out. We thank you and pray these things in Jesus's name. Amen. Today, we have the joy of partaking in the Lord's table. And when we have communion together, it is celebrating and remembering what Christ has done for us. We have a bit of a liturgy that I'd love for us to read together as our prayer and worship before God. So could you just rise with me? And the parts that are in green, I will read and please read the parts that are in brown together. Christ our Lord invites us to his table invites all who love Him who earnestly repent their sin, and seek to live in peace with one another. Therefore, brothers and sisters, let us confess our sins before God and one another. Let's read together. Merciful God, we confess that we have not loved you with our whole heart. We have failed to be an obedient church. We have not done your will. We have broken your law. We have rebelled against your love. We have not loved our neighbors and we have not heard the cry of the needy. Forgive us we pray for us for the joyful obedience through Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen. Hear the good news brothers and sisters, Christ died for us while we were yet sinners, that proves his love towards us.
In the name of Jesus, you are forgiven the Lord be with you. Lift up your hearts. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God it is right and a good and joyful thing, always and everywhere to give thanks to you, Almighty God, Creator of heaven and earth. And so with your people on earth and all the company of heaven, we praise your name and join there unending hymm. Holy, holy, holy, Lord God of power and might, heaven and earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord Hosanna in the highest, yes, holy Are you blessed is your Son, Jesus Christ, by the baptism of his suffering, death and resurrection, God, you gave birth to your church that is here, you delivered us from the slavery of death to sin and you healed us in your love. You have made us with a new covenant by water and the Spirit. Brothers and sisters, the Lord Jesus, on the night of his arrest, took bread. And after giving thanks to God, he broke it. And he gave it to the disciples saying, Take, eat. This is my body given to you do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, he took the cup saying, the cup is the new covenant sealed in my blood, shed for the forgiveness of sins. Whenever you drink, Do this in remembrance of me. And every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you proclaim the saving grace of the risen Lord until He comes. Amen. Let's pray shortly. Jesus, we thank you for the gift of your salvation. We thank you that it is a free gift that comes wrapped in the transformative and healing love of yours that is abounding and unending for us. We thank you and pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.