Man, I'm really excited to actually preach a message called the Lamb of God. So the worship team kind of beat us to it a little bit. And so I'm going to build off of what they were singing about. But before we do, I want to read a letter.
A letter. Get ready for a letter. I want to read a letter from Pastor Katie and I to this community. We have been in a series of messages over the last month about how do we carry God's heart in this cultural moment that's happening in our city.
And how do we respond? How are we supposed to think, biblically? What are we supposed to have as our posture, as followers of Jesus? And over the last four weeks, we've been talking about that here on Sundays and I've been sharing messages.
And I'm wanting to read this letter. But if you haven't been around for the last four weeks, you could be hearing this letter and hearing it in a vacuum and not realize that it's got context of four previous weeks. So this is your first time and you're hearing this letter and you're like, oh my goodness, I'm going to take all of these things. And OK, the context is just me reading the letter for your first time.
I want you to know that there's four weeks of context that is leading to us reading this and writing this to you as our church community. And so I want to communicate that. This last week has been a great week because I've had conversations that has actually spurred me on and spurred us on to make sure that we can have greater unity as a church community. And so that's why we're reading this.
We want to be really intentional to articulate what's important for us to say. OK, so are you guys ready? Yes. All right.
Ready for a lady? All right. OK, so perfect. Yeah.
Church family, over the last several weeks, I've tried to offer biblical clarity on how followers of Jesus are to think and act in this cultural moment. Well, I've not done this perfectly by any means. There has been an overwhelming response of positive feedback. However, we have learned that many of you have also carried real questions about where we stand, what we believe, and why we speak into certain issues the way that we do.
First, I want to say thank you. The maturity in this house has been evident. The restraint, the prayerfulness, the meekness, the thoughtful conversations happening with humility, and honor to the Lord. I have real brothers in this room who have disagreed with me with utmost integrity and love.
We are better together, even with, or especially, with different perspectives. I sat down with trusted friends and leaders this week in our community to spend extended time discussing areas where what I've said or not said has led to confusion. This moment is too important to allow confusion to cloud what I believe the Lord has been trying to say to the church. I stand by what I've said over the last few weeks, and sincerely believe there is an invitation to the evangelical conservatives, of which I am one, to humble themselves, address logs in our own eyes, and move forward in a posture of repentance.
However, I do want to offer a handful of clarifications in hopes of painting a more complete picture of where we stand. We've been asked, are you against the American church? Absolutely not. We're laying down our lives for the American church, and our zeal is to see her shine.
I apologize if anything that I've said has caused anyone to question that. As a shepherd, I have, and will continue to address what I perceive to be the greatest active threat to our journey of following Jesus. Over the last few weeks, I have been speaking as a person with conservative Christian values, and I've been speaking as a conservative Christian with those values, to those with conservative Christian values. I assumed that our community was approaching these topics with certain political propensities and biases, as well as certain foundational positions.
If it feels that we have been one-sided in our communication, it is because we have conviction that this is one of the primary threats to the church right now, and is also underrepresented in the church. We are extremely cautious when any leader who does not bear the consistent fruit of salvation, the consistent fruit of salvation right or left begins to function as a figurehead for the body of Christ. When a political figure begins to culturally represent Christians, it is imperative that we draw clear distinctions in order to uphold our biblical Christian witness to the world. Over the last month or so, I've spoken about immigration, the abuses of power and government, tweets from the president, and the injustices done against people of color.
These are all important topics. That said, I've been asked why I didn't speak up in other cultural moments or highlight specific injustices that have greatly impacted our people. It has been almost a decade since we did a sermon series on biblical sexuality. We didn't highlight the political sphere when Roe v.
Wade was overturned, and we haven't highlighted the policy changes that have positively represented the heart of Jesus for the flourishing of our society. When I listed the traumatic things that our city has been through in a recent message, I forgot to mention the murder of public servants like police officers Jamal Mitchell and Paul Elmstrand and Matthew Rouge, and a first responder named Adam Finseth, all of whom died in the line of service in 2024 in our city because of targeted ambushes. Even in this list, I'm sure that there are critically important issues that I'm forgetting and not addressing. I am so sorry.
By not highlighting any of those things, there is a perceived implication that we don't care or that we're soft on these issues. This has created room for people to wonder if we are a church that only calls out the political right and doesn't correct the political left. For the sake of clarity, we hold to a biblical definition of marriage and sexuality, and we grieve the 67 plus million babies that have died because of abortion. We stand with our local police and are so grateful for those who have given their lives to see the laws of our land upheld.
We do not hate our president. We should pray for him. We encourage every Christian to engage in the political sphere as you are able to do so and your obedience to Jesus. As we move forward together, let us remember that agreement on every issue is not a prerequisite for unity.
Quite the opposite. Unity is not unity unless there has been disagreement and then a conscious decision to stay in fellowship together despite the disagreement. When you find yourself in community with a brother or sister in the Lord who sees things differently than you, this is the moment where true kingdom unity is discovered. This is your invitation for connection and curious conversation that seeks to understand the lived experience of those who walk in different shoes than you but still love the same Lord that you do.
Let's reject the polarized current of our day. Assume the best intent, be quick to listen, slow to speak and very slow to become angry. Let's choose to engage in the public and political sphere without idolizing it. Let's honor law enforcement without dehumanizing anyone in the process.
Let us pray for leaders without excusing damaging behavior in the name of Christianity. Above all, remember, the kingdom of God does not rise or fall on an election cycle. It advances through the surrendered hearts of the beloved body of Christ and the God that is the only hope for our nation. We will continue to do our best to faithfully interpret the scriptures, apply them to our everyday lives, and we will continue to boldly call sin, sin, injustice, injustice, and truth truth.
We will continue to seek the Lord in how to best lead this body in the midst of a city that is reeling and intermoyled. We love you deeply, and we're committed to leading you with all humility, integrity, honor, and love. Pastor Josh and Katie, would you stand on us to pray together, on us to pray for unity in our community in this church community? Lord, we know that unity was on your mind, the night that you were betrayed, and that it's a priority to you.
And Lord, we think that you're worthy of great unity, and we ask that you would make us one. Lord, we ask that the oneness and the knitting of our hearts would be something that is a marker of this community, that it would be so profound, the unity that we have in this community, it would be so profound that it would actually fulfill what you prayed, where people would connect the dots, that the Father loves them so much that He sent His Son because of the way that we love each other. Would you help us, help us to become one as a community in this time? As our city is divided, Lord, would you tear down walls of division in our community?
In Jesus' name, everybody said amen. Amen, all right, you can have a seat. Thank you, Lord. Thank you, Lord.
In Zechariah 12, it says that there was this, it's like this prophetic statement, that the Spirit of Grace was poured out on God's people to look and behold the one that they pierced. And that's my prayer for this message, that the Spirit of Grace would get poured out on us to behold the one that we've pierced, that the Lamb of God would take center stage and that our hearts would burn within us like the road to Emmaus. Yeah? We're going after the Lamb of God today because on Wednesday night at prayer room, how many of you guys have been to the eight o'clock prayer meeting on Wednesday?
Raise your hand high. Man, look at all the people that haven't been missing out on the APM service, on the APM intercession set. But this Wednesday, one of our worship leaders, Sydney, she was singing and she started singing this phrase, Jesus, thank you that you're the Lamb. Think I tried to get the words wrong.
But basically, in essence, thank you, Jesus. Thank you, one of our worship leaders, Samantha's up front, she's helping me out. Thank you, Jesus, you're a Lamb. Thank you, Jesus, you're a Lamb.
And we started singing it over and over and over again. You know how we do sometimes start meditating on something. And we just decided we are going to yield to what the Holy Spirit was doing because the Holy Spirit wanted to reveal Jesus as the Lamb. And so we just leaned in as a community of intercessors and it was just a profound moment that we had.
And I just felt like, wow, there is something, as we started praying for the church to have the revelation of the Lamb of God, I was going, man, I want to come up underneath. What God is just, you know, as He was authoring something, I felt like it started stirring my faith. He was authoring faith for that to happen in our community. As we're praying, God reveal yourself as the Lamb of God as the city-wide church, I want you to be revealed as the Lamb of God to us.
Start with us, Lord. Fascinate our hearts with you as the Lamb of God. And so what I want to do is just honor the Lamb today. Are you guys ready?
All right, do you remember the city that Jesus was born in? How many of you know, can you just shout it out to me? What town was Jesus? Bethlehem, let's go.
You know what Bethlehem was known for? It was known for its lambs, right? Because what would happen is the priest in Jerusalem around Passover, they would actually make a trek out to Bethlehem to find a pure and spotless Lamb. And they would take that selected Lamb.
And they would actually enter through the Eastern Gate, the same gate that Jesus rode through on a donkey from the Mount of Olives. And they would present, they would have a procession, bringing a spotless Lamb that they had examined, and they would bring that Lamb into the temple. And all week during Passover, that Lamb would be examined by the Jewish people and by the priest. And they would examine and make sure that it really was spotless and perfect.
And so they would have that Lamb just in the temple. And I just think it's so profound, Jesus. Born in Bethlehem, right? Enors through the same Eastern Gate as the Lamb of God.
Rides in, there's a procession, right? He goes right into the temple, and then there's clashing happening as the Pharisees and the Sadducees bring accusation. They test him during the week of Passion Week. They go, how could you do this?
And they challenge him. And then Jesus gives them the seven woes, woo. Right? But Jesus was born in Bethlehem.
And I think it is so profound that we have Bethlehem known for the shepherds and the sheep. Yeah? And who does he decide to reveal that the birth of the King of Kings has happened? Who does he reveal that to?
A bunch of shepherds in the field, right? And where does he get born? He gets born in a cave. That is a cave that oftentimes shepherds.
So you guys think it's more like a wooden hut, because of your inattivities that you grew up with. But it was actually like a cave that he was born in. I don't know if it's a hut. Major, yeah.
But really what that was is he was actually born in a cave. And what was common practice is that shepherds would lay across the opening of the cave at night as the sheep were inside the cave. That's why in John 10, what does it say? He says, I am the door, right?
Because shepherds would lay across the opening of the cave to protect their sheep. And so that their sheep wouldn't leave the cave. He says, I'm the door. I lay down my life for my sheep.
Yeah? And so the shepherds are there in the fields. And it's to point us as the angels show up and they communicate to the humble shepherds. What God is doing is he's going, I want you to say it to the shepherds because I want everybody to remember that the lamb has arrived.
That's why he's showing up to shepherds. It's to point to the lamb has come. We see in Genesis, even as I just think about the beginnings, Jesus' life, the beginning, he's revealed as the lamb from Bethlehem. Then we see the beginning of Genesis, Adam and Eve.
What happens? They sin and then they have shame in their nakedness. What does God do? He makes a sacrifice.
You're going, I don't remember a sacrifice in Genesis. Yeah, he makes a sacrifice because it says that, that they were in shame and nakedness. And then God was the first clothing designer in human history. Is that right?
God clothed them with animal skins. How do you get an animal skin? An animal is killed. It's the first sacrifice pointing.
There is going to be a sacrifice that is actually going to cover shame. That's going to cover the shame of humanity, right? It's in Genesis. Then it's at the start of Jesus' ministry.
You guys remember the start of Jesus' ministry? What does John the Baptist say? He says, behold, look. He takes his big winner finger and he goes, I, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to draw your attention to the lamb.
It seems like God wants us to know him in all of his glory as a lamb. We even see it in Abraham, the father of our faith. What happens? I just had to fact check because what happens is there's a ram that's caught in a thicket.
And I don't know. You guys are probably way ahead of me. But I'm going, is a ram a lamb or a ram a sheep? Or is it just a completely different animal altogether?
Let me clear this up for you if you were confused. Some of you are like, no, I'm not confused. But for all of the other ones, like me, you're confused. A lamb is a year or younger sheep.
Sheep is just a sheep. But a ram is a male older sheep. Yeah? All right, we're good.
Sometimes it's good to talk about it. What happens in Abraham and Isaac? God says, hey, sacrifice your son. There's the son.
Just listen to the foreshadow. And the son is laid on a piece of wood. He's tied onto the wood. Abraham is ready to sacrifice his son.
And then the Jehovah Jaira, God the provider, suddenly breaks in and says, you're not going to do human sacrifice. You're not going to do child sacrifice, like all of the pagan peoples. I'm going to be the one that's going to provide the sacrifice. I'm a different God than all the pagan gods.
I'm a God of love. I'm a God that provides for you. I'm Jaira. And there's a ram stuck in a thorn bush, revealing Jesus, the coming lamb that would wear a crown of thorns.
Come on. Only God can come up with this stuff. There he is. Jesus, he's wading into the water in the Jordan River.
And John the Baptist looks at him and says, behold, the lamb of God who takes away sin. Some of you need to know the lamb of God that takes away your sins. See, Jews, when they're listening to behold the lamb of God, immediately what they're thinking about when they hear the lamb of God, they're thinking about the Passover. Now you need to know in the book of Exodus, the nation of Israel, they were in 400 years of slavery, and then God begins to sin plagues.
He sends 10 plagues, dismantling the 10 primary Egyptian gods with 10 plagues. And he basically shows himself as a stronger God than all of the gods of Egypt. And the final nail in the coffin is he says, hey, I'm going to pass over in judgment. And I'm going to pass over all of my people's homes if they put the blood of the lamb on their lentils, which is the top of the door post and then the door post.
And so they apply the blood of the lamb on their door posts. And what happens? God, in an evening, after 400 years of slavery, sets his people free through the lambs. There they are.
They experience deliverance. You want to know the lamb of God? You got to know that he brings deliverance from slavery. He brings freedom from enslavement.
That's what the lamb of God does. Somebody got to know the lamb of God that sets us free from slavery and sin. Some of us need to know the lamb of God today. That doesn't just forgive sin, but a lamb of God that takes it away and cleanses our conscience of sin.
In the Old Testament, the blood of lambs, it was known to cover sin atone for sin. But as John the Baptist, he says, the lamb, which represents forgiveness of sins in the sacrificial system. But then he says, takes away sins, but all of the Jews know. Lambs don't take away sin.
That's a scapegoat. How many of you have ever been a scapegoat in a relationship? Have you ever been a scapegoat in your workplace? It's like blame that guy.
Yeah? Horrible, horrible. But they know when he says the lamb of God that takes away sin, that's wrong because lambs don't take away sin. That's the goats where the priest would lay their hands on a goat and apply the sins of the nation of Israel on a goat.
And that goat would embody the sins of the whole country. And then they would push out the goat into the wilderness, outside of the city limits. Jesus is crucified outside of the city limits of Jerusalem. He's not just the lamb that forgives.
He's the lamb that takes away our sins, removes our sins from us as the east is from the west. Some of us are still dealing with sin consciousness. And Jesus is the lamb of God that takes sin consciousness away from us. Some of us are still wondering, does he love me?
Does he love me not? Am I in good standing with him? Am I not? I'm in a dance.
Am I OK? Are we OK? Jesus is the lamb of God. You've got to have the revelation.
He's the lamb of God. It's once and for all. He finished the work, right? Thank you, Lord.
You're the lamb. So there Jesus is. He's in the Jordan River. John the Baptist says, behold, the lamb of God.
And I just, I don't know if you're like me, but I just picture Jesus as kind of more of like a, he's working with his hands. He's in the trades. He's got some strong forearms. He's like, he's not that he had anything to draw a stool.
He wasn't very handsome. Says in Isaiah 53, there is no handsomeness to draw men to him. But I don't think I won't get in the details on that. I don't know what he looks like.
But what I will say is I don't think he's a chomp. Like I think he took care of himself. I think his body was a temple. Yeah?
Can I get an amen for that? Can you imagine? We won't just keep on moving. Listen, Jesus walks into the waters of the Jordan River.
And his first advertisement of his ministry, his first endorsement is from a guy that eats locusts, is dressed all weird, has been hanging out in the wilderness for a very long time eating honey. He's a beekeeper. He's condemning all of the spiritual leaders in it. But that's not even the worst part.
Then he looks at Jesus and he says, behold the one year old little sheep. That's what he says, behold the lamb. I was hoping that he would say, if I was Jesus, I'd be like, hey, let's do that later. That's fine.
I love that revelation about me. Let's say like the King of Kings, the mighty ancient of days. You know? The lion of the tribe of Judah.
Yeah? No, instead it's the lamb of God. That's how he's going to start his ministry. And then the Lord responds, Father in heaven responds, and rips open the heavens and says, this is my son who I'm well pleased with.
He's the lamb. He was the lamb, and he is the lamb. Isaiah 53, says in verse seven. If you want to turn there, you can look at Isaiah 53.
Says that in Isaiah 53 verse seven, that he was like a lamb that has led to the slaughter. And like a sheep, that before its shearers is silent. He opened not his mouth. Says in the same passage that there was no majesty, like I said, no attractiveness to stoked desire.
Verse three, it says that he was a leader that was rejected, acquainted with grief, with sorrows. He was despised as a leader. He's taken grief and carries sorrow. Verse five, it says that he was pierced for our rebellion, that the lamb was crushed for our moral crookedness, that the lamb was chastised to bring wholeness.
The lamb was scourged to heal us. We need the lamb. We all are in need of the lamb, and we are the ones that participated in piercing him. We were enemies of God and Ephesians two, it says.
He's the lamb. And he was silent. And I just think it's interesting that lambs aren't usually silent unless there's great sensitivity used by a shearer. They're usually still vocal.
But it speaks not of how he was cared for as a sheep or a lamb in his crucifixion, but it speaks of his great restraint. He's the lamb of meekness. We all just pause and just reflect that God designed lambs. You know how God created the whole, like all the animals?
He dreamed every single animal up, right? He designed them. It wasn't some evolutionary thing that happened. Evolution didn't just all of a sudden single cell organism just create all that we see.
No, God designed. And I want you to know he designed lambs. And that must, it creates wonder in my heart. When I go, you designed lambs to be humble, to be pure.
You designed lambs to be innocent because you knew that before the foundations of the world, the lamb would be slant. In other words, even before God said, let there be light, he knew that his son was going to be the lamb. That blows my mind. Even before Adam, even before he's in the garden, he forms Adam and then breathes the breath of God into Adam.
And Adam becomes a living. Even before that moment, he knew that his son was going to be the lamb that was going to be sacrificed. And you go, why didn't he do something about it? And it's to create wonder in our hearts.
It's to create wonder in my heart that God would design a system to actually put him in the position where he would be related with a humble animal like a lamb. Who is this God? Who is this creator that would do such a thing? The meekness of God on full display.
No human can design a system that would design God just pause that God would be signified as a lamb, is otherworldly. It proves that God relates himself to being a lamb, is one of those things that proves the divinity and the greatness of God as the author and creator of all things. It is a testament to this is not a manmade religion that we've all of a son created. Do you know how man would create God in his own image to get more honor and more glory?
And there would be a Revelation 5. I just got to pause in Revelation 5. OK. Oh my God.
Revelation 5. We have all of these creatures in heaven. They're the weirdest creatures. This is all continuous, I promise.
I'm getting to somewhere. Revelation 5. You can turn there if you want to and graze there. Revelation 5.
There's these creatures. They're around the throne. And maybe there's somewhere else in Revelation that talks about these four living creatures, but just give me grace on it. You guys know these creatures, right?
These creatures, they have animal faces. And they're the worship leaders in heaven. And one of them has the face of an eagle. One of them actually, some people interpret that they have four faces on each of the creatures.
And it just depends which angle you're looking at them. But beside the point, let's just make it simple and say that each has one face. Because that breaks my brain when I just think about four faces on a creature that's covered in eyes and has wings everywhere. So anyways, and they have one has the face of an eagle, one has the face of an ox, one has the face of a lion, and one has the face of a man, representing all of creation's strength, right?
The eagle, the most powerful bird, the ox, the strongest beast of burden, the lion, everybody knows. And then man, face of a man, right? The one that's been given dominion and authority to steward all creation. And then there's myriads of angels.
And they are all surrounding this moment. And they are crying out. And they're going, who is worthy to unlock the wax seals on the plan of God for the end of the story of human history and the unraveling of what's going to follow with heaven coming down to earth? And they're going, who can unlock this scroll and this plan?
Nobody has the authority and worthy is worthy of this in heaven or on the earth. And they're starting to cry about it. John the Baptist or John the Beloved is getting upset. He's going, who is going to do this?
And then all of a sudden, among the elders, among the humans, on their 24th thrones, there appears in their midst. Not on the throne, but among the people. There appears a lamb. To me, I go, why a lamb?
Didn't you get resurrected? Didn't you conquer sin and death? Didn't you take the keys of Hades? Aren't you the conquering lion?
Don't you got eyes like a flame of fire? Why don't you just show off how powerful your eyesight is like an eagle? Why don't you show off your muscles like an ox? Why didn't you show up as an ox?
Or just show up in the resurrected body, the glorified body of a human. And instead, the one, the only one that's worthy and all of heaven and earth is Jesus depicted as a lamb. There is none meek like the Lord. Having all power, having all strength.
Ha ha ha. Who created all things with taking phrases and speaking them. It took us thousands of years to create the light bulb. To be able to plug something into a wall took us thousands of years.
God says a word in light breaks forth. Says a word and all of the universe explodes and yet it's a big bang because he speaks. And every all of heaven and earth is fleeing from his mouth. He's the word of God.
Everything was created through the sun. And yet he chooses to restrain endless strength and associate himself with being like a lamb that was silent when those that he created not accusation against him, false accusation against him. There, listen, man doesn't create storylines like that. It burns in my heart because I know it's otherworldly.
I know it's of, it's of an author that is totally other than. There is a knowing inside of all of our hearts. We know we wouldn't write it that way. Nope, he's the lamb.
Revelation five and him being just the lamb is plenty, but he's not just the lamb. He's the slain lamb. My gosh, I would have loved for you to be the cute white little lamb. I would have loved that.
I thought that'd be beautiful just that fluffy white fur, but you had to be slain. You gotta have blood on you. You know what that speaks of? His blood that always cries out mercy.
He's the eternal intercessor, always making intercession for us. His blood is always speaking something from the mercy seat. Do you know what his blood speaks from the mercy seat? Mercy.
His blood, the lamb's blood, doesn't just speak of mercy and forgiveness. Do you know that the lamb's blood actually speaks, it speaks of how he is the wounded one and he's the sympathetic high priest and he gets your suffering. Do you want, remember Jesus resurrects and Thomas is doubting? Thomas is like, I don't know.
If I don't put my fingers in his wrists, then I'm not gonna believe. What does Jesus do? Maybe this is just for Thomas, but I think it's more than that. Like I would love him if he just had scars on his hands in his resurrected body just for the sake of Thomas.
I would love him for it. I would love him for it. If it was just father, I want my resurrected body just to have holes in my wrist, just so Thomas and I can have that moment. I would love him for that if that was the case.
But I want you to know he's thinking about you. He was thinking about your suffering. He was going forever. You will know that everything that you've suffered, every trauma that you've experienced or been responsible for, I took it in my body.
I'm the Lamb of God that took all of the sins done against you and by you. On me, I embodied them all. You go, nobody understands. I want you to know someone understands.
And it's one. There's only one that gets it. Only one that understands your suffering that you've gone through. And it is the Lamb of God.
Jesus, the one who took on sin and all suffering and embodied it and then took on the wrath of God and the vengeance of God. It says in Romans 12, what does it say? It says, don't get revenge. Vengeance is the Lord's.
Yeah? And then we see in Revelation 17, Revelation 17, the Lamb shows up again. It's not just one time at the end of the story, right? Now all of a sudden in Revelation 17, we see that the Lamb is conquering.
I just don't even know. When I look at verse, when I look at verse 14, in Revelation 17, they're gonna make war on the Lamb. The Lamb is gonna conquer them. For he is the Lord of Lords and the King of Kings.
And those with him are called chosen and faithful. So now we've got a Lamb and he's a conqueror. Ah, what a way to win a battle as a Lamb. You gotta just pause and reflect.
Even, I think it's in Revelation 19, or maybe it's Revelation 20. Yeah, there it is. Revelation 20, it says, in the presence of the Lamb, Satan and his demons, sin and death, are gonna be thrown into the lake of fire, in the presence of the Lamb. So what we're talking about is the Lamb is the one that is actually standing witness to and conquering his enemies.
That is very humbling for his enemies to get conquered by a Lamb. Can you imagine getting all of your strength together? All of the trillions of dollars of American military strength. China's military strength, Russia's military strength, and all of the strength of humanity's militaries coming against the Lamb.
And there's just no shot. All of the stealth bombers, all of the nuclear warheads. And the Lamb just, sorry guys, you're no match. Who is like the Lord?
When I think about the wrath of God at the end of the story in the lake of fire, there's tension there, right? And as I reflect on that, I think it's so profound that in that scene of eternal judgment, that the King Jesus is not positioning himself as the judge. But what he does is he reveals himself as the Lamb. And it's to point to the reality that there is no excuse.
And that all of the, I just imagine us that we were in the Lamb's book of life. Just listen, it's the Lamb's book of life. In other words, you didn't get in by your own works, right? The Lamb made a way, that's how your name got in there.
You surrendered to the Lamb, that's how your name got written in, and authored in, right? But I just pictured there being this tension for us. And at that point, we're just gonna know him in all his glory. There's probably not gonna be questioning around his decisions.
But there's that pain as we see judgment and vengeance on sin and its full strength. And yet then you look over at the Lamb, and you realize the greatest injustice in human history is that humanity looked at God, laying down his life becoming a Lamb and being sacrificed in slain for all of us. And then humanity spit in his face and said, I'm good. It is the greatest injustice in human history to look at what God has done through the cross, death and resurrection of Jesus, and go, I'm good.
And forever he will be the slain Lamb. And we will see him in all of his beauty and the pain that he experienced and him going, I pay the price for him. I love them to the end. I will that none should perish.
I want you to remember I'm the Lamb. Cause great pain. He's the sympathetic high priest. He's the God who bled.
And he's the Lamb that makes us a kingdom of priests. And then we finish up in Revelation 19 and Revelation 20. Says that there's gonna be a marriage supper of the Lamb. So the end of the story is not, I see I prefer, I prefer to be honest.
I prefer as the bride of Christ, right? So you're not a bride, but we are the bride. Okay? Ladies don't get that confused.
You're not the bride. We are the bride of Christ, right? We are the bride collectively. He's the groom.
He's the bride groom, right? But I wish that would have been what was communicated about the marriage supper, the marriage reception. You know, don't you wish? It's like that would make more sense.
But now we have to associate as the bride with you our covenantal partner and you're a Lamb. You gotta get there as the people of God to go, I'm actually covenanting myself and I have to the Lamb. The bridegroom, he's actually a Lamb. This is the marriage to the Lamb.
And then we want to, once you have the revelation of him being the Lamb, then you're going, oh, I can't wait for that wedding day, right? I can't wait for that marriage supper. I can't wait to be presented to him. I can't wait to see him face to face.
I want history in my eyes when I see him, when we see him. I wanna know him and I want him to know me deeply on that day. Not because of works I did because I knew him. Yeah?
Have you ever been to a wedding and you kind of looked at the bride's dress and you're like, oh man, not kind of not a good dress? Have you ever, I see some nods. You wouldn't ever say it, but I'm giving you permission. You can say it right now.
No, I would never, ever think such a thing. So personally, I've only thought that their beautiful dress is. I've never had that thought, but I'm sure some of you have. But it says in the end of the story that the bride, at us, we are gonna be presented to the lamb.
We are gonna be presented to Jesus. And we are going to be dressed in this beautiful dress. And it says our dress is going to be our love and good works, our deeds, our righteous deeds. We need the lamb right now as the bride to inspire us, to go, oh my goodness, what if the twin cities?
In this time, in this hour, I think about all of the righteous deeds of the church for the last 2000 years, beautifying what we're dressed in when we see him. And that we collectively, all together, present ourselves to the lamb in a moment. But what if there was just one little jewel that the twin cities in 2026 was able to add to the dress as we are presented to the lamb? I know that's probably not very inspiring.
Just a jewel, yeah, I'm really trying to be honest. It might not be much, but it means something to him. It means something to the lamb, and he's humble. And he appreciates the righteous deeds of his bride.
I'm so grateful that we have a lamb that we can serve, that we can know. And I think it's what we need as the church is to know the lamb. And I would hate for me and for you to just get some information about him being the lamb, but not actually to know him ourselves as the lamb. I've, listen, you're not going to remember 95% of what I said today.
It's just the reality, and I've come to terms with it. And sometimes I'm just grateful that you forget 95% of what I say, okay? I realize that. And what I want, but if the worship team sings it, then you'll remember like 50, 60% of it.
But I want you to know that there's an opportunity for us to step in as individuals and corporately. To go, Lord, I want to know you as the lamb. I want to know you as the Passover lamb. I want to know you as the Spotless lamb.
I want to know you as the lamb that John the Baptist beheld. I want to know you as the lamb that was sacrificed in the garden. I want to know you as the prophesied lamb from Isaiah 53. I want to know you from Revelation 19 and 21.
I want to know you as from Revelation 5. I want to know you as the Hebrews lamb that has actually set us free and cleansed us. I want to know you as the lamb personally. I don't want to just know facts about you.
I want to experiential knowledge and revelation. I want to follow the lamb. He's the perfect leader for this moment. And I'm not just talking about this moment in our city.
I'm not just talking about what's happened in our city in the last month or two. I'm talking about in your marriage. This is that I want to yield to the leadership of the Holy Spirit. His job.
I just got a real talk. His job is to reveal the sun. He has put his finger on revealing Jesus as the lamb. And what that means is we all have a choice as a people going, am I going to come up under what the Holy Spirit is highlighting and pointing to?
Because I want to do that. And I want to encourage us as a people to go, yeah, I want to know you that way. I want personal revelation on the inside of me. And it's just I want us to start with just whispering with God, saying things like, Lord, I want to know you as the lamb.
It doesn't have to be complicated. Just like reveal yourself as the lamb of God. What I'm hoping to do to close out our service is actually do a time of communion. Jesus is the Passover lamb that gave his body and his blood.
He said, this is the new covenant, take and eat. And what I want to do is celebrate communion together as groups of people. So like, if you came with somebody, if you're sitting next to somebody and you don't know them and they don't have anybody that they're with, you just like get a group of people together to take communion. If you're a parent and you want to go get your children out of everyday kids and come back into the prayer room and celebrate communion, I want to encourage you to take communion with some people around you.
OK? If you're if you came by yourself, I want you to just kind of go, hey, can I join you? That takes a lot of courage sometimes, but just do it. And I think we can all as a people, we're going to sign up.
Whether you came by yourself, came in a group, came in a family, we're all just going to go, we're the people of God. Yeah, hop in. We're going to take communion together. OK?
And I want to suggest it's going to be super simple. You're just going to have one person in the group say, you know, Lord, we remember that you are the Lamb. It doesn't have to be, it's just in your own words. And you hold up the bread and say, thank you for your body.
And then you eat. And then you're going to take, well, I guess you're going to dip it. It's all going to happen at the same time. Thank you for your body and your blood.
Thank you for being the Lamb of God. And then I want you to pray with each other just for a couple minutes and just ask the Lord that he would reveal himself in a profound way to you in this community as the Lamb of God. OK? Can we do that?
Let's all stand. Yeah. Great. Awesome.
OK. So there's going to be two setups here. Oh, you guys can do that. So we're going to have the matza and the juice on both sides.
If you're gluten-free, it's all gluten-free. And so there's going to be two lines. So you can come down this aisle and then you can go out the sides. OK?
So we're going to come down these aisles, form a line, then go out the sides. And then there are the elements in the back as well in these corner sections at the table. And so I'm going to pray. And you're just going to leave when you're able.
There's going to be people after a while. They're going to be upfront. They would love to pray with you if you want to receive pray after the service. And you want to pray with anybody at the altar.
But what we're going to do is I'm going to commission you out. And you're going to do communion in your own time. And then you're going to you're excused after you're done with communion. OK?
Yeah? Give me a thumbs up if we're good. OK. If you're willing, you can put out your hands.
Lord, we thank you that you're the Lamb of God that is ransom men to yourself from every tribe, tongue, nation, and people. You're the one that is going to unify us. You're the leader that we want. We're so grateful that you are the meek God that has revealed yourself as the Lamb.
From beginning to end, it says who we want to know you as. Would you give us your spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of you? In Jesus' name. Amen.
Amen.