Sympathetic Priest

Last week we had some special announcements that we are changing the name of our church to every day so if that's if that's new news to you because you weren't here last week yeah we're changing the name of our church so go listen to the message and that's coming but and then we're also pursuing a building on Red Fox Road so that's exciting there's no updates yet so we'll keep you on the loop on that okay and the week before we were at Easter and the week before that we were continuing our series on called priest which is all about us being priests of the Lord that every single person that gives their life to Jesus is actually called as a priest to God and and Jesus comes in in Revelation and it says in the book of Revelation that this kingdom of heaven is made up of a kingdom of priests in other words not the priest like a Catholic priest you know even though I love that I mean I just picture many of you guys just sitting I just see a room full of everyday people and I see you guys with collars I don't know if you saw that in the video last week as we were rolling out the rebrand but there is one moment where one of our I think it was Gus he had he had just a normal shirt and then there was a collar I don't know if you saw that like a reverend collar and I just picture all of us going to work on Monday and Tuesday going to school just wearing collars in the spirit you're destined to be a reverend in the spirit God's called you as a priest to the Lord and so we've been talking about that and most of the series has been all about worship and the knowledge of God and knowing God and the last message that we talked about was the depths of God and and one of the things that we talked about was that Jesus and John 17 he's praying and he's talking to the Lord and he's praying and he kind of gives us a little bit of an opening to the longings of his heart and he opens up his heart and he reveals something that he wants something that he desires even though he's fully satisfied with in himself with God the Father Holy Spirit and him they're eternally happy they don't need anything but they want something and they want to be known they want to be known they want to be sought after they want to be known like a man and a woman know each other intimately that's how deeply they want to be known they want to have an intimacy with us and they want to be intimately known and have us be intimately known by them okay and so we talked about how how me in my boring awkward you know insecurity that even me I can give something to the Lord that he doesn't already have that is wild that God would humble himself enough to go I'm going to desire something that I don't have as the Creator and it's to be known by that individual and then I can minister to God by going I want to know you and I minister to him by being curious about him and getting to know him more and it actually hits his heart personally and he goes oh my goodness he gets a ravage he he gets giddy when I just take a pause and I go oh I love you I want to know you and I lean in a little bit see we think that he's so detached but he's really engaged and so we've been talking about that and what I want to do is we're switching our pre-series and we're going to move more into prayer and intercession and we're going to start talking about that and so I want to just briefly address the fact that most of us when we think about prayer and intercession we think about boredom we think about boring lame prayer meetings we think about little groups of people oh Lord bless them and bless me and bless grandma and bless bless Somalia and then the president and everybody around the circle is like all right oh and then your distant cousin needs healing okay and we start going around circles and everybody's just bored is that I'm just saying it like it is and then we think of and then we think of intercession and we think of okay hey yeah I'll pray for you and then we never pray right and we think of this cultural thing that you do called prayer for people and when we think of prayer we mostly think of just asking God for things and we think of prayer we mostly think of falling asleep in front of our Bible just trying and and that's okay I just see the Lord and he's just like oh I love even if there's a Bible in front of him I just love it you know it's like oh they're trying they woke up they woke up 10 minutes early and it just like hits my heart you know turning your Bibles to Hebrews 7 what I want to talk about tonight is that Jesus is the eternal intercessor Jesus is the eternal intercessor we're gonna we're gonna look at Hebrews 7 here and we're gonna start in verse 23 23 it says this 7 23 the former priests were many a number because they were prevented by death from continuing in office so what what's being said by the writer of Hebrews is he's basically saying in verse 23 all of the Old Testament priests they're not priests anymore because they died okay so that's what he was saying in verse 23 the spirit of wisdom and revelation is on your pastor and that's why that hit different you know like when I said it you're like wow okay verse 24 but he holds this is talking about Jesus he holds his priesthood permanently because he continues forever in other words he's never going to die isn't that great just like the phrase he continues forever that's like a great way to say like you're gonna live forever he continues I don't know I just thought it's funny okay verse 25 consequently he is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through Jesus since Jesus always lives to make intercession for them do you know what that that verse is saying is that because Jesus lives forever and he forever will be an intercessor we can draw near to him we can get close to God we can get close to the perfect Almighty awesome never-ending God that is completely dreadfully powerful and we can draw near to him because Jesus is an intercessor forever intercession is the idea it's the what intercession is is someone coming on behalf of someone else before God so I come on behalf of you before the Lord that's called intercession and so a lot of times when we think of that's it seems like a spiritual it's like a spiritual word like I don't know it intercession means it's a praying I think right it's basically praying for somebody you're talking to God or meeting God on behalf of someone else and that's what the priest did in the Old Testament all the time they would take they would take like a sacrifice from someone but they were the only ones that could offer sacrifices before God the priest of the Old Testament and because there's a sacrificial system you know Candie she's got her turtle dove sister candy brings her turtle dove over to me let's say I'm a priest a Levitical priest candy thank you for the turtle dove and then I on behalf of Candie make a sacrifice before the Lord right so it's like a mediation it's I'm an intercessor as a priest and what this passage is talking about is Jesus is the intercessor he's the priest let's continue for it was indeed fitting that we should have such a high priest he's holy innocent unstained separated from sinners in other words set apart he's holy and exalted above the heavens he has no need like those high priests to offer sacrifices daily first for his own sins and then for those of the people since he did this once and for all when he offered up himself in other words Jesus didn't need to make a sacrifice for himself because what happened in the Old Testament is the priest would offer offer a sacrifice for themselves and a sacrifice for the people and what this passage is saying is Jesus didn't have to do that Jesus was perfect innocent unblemished and he comes in and this is what we talked about on Easter he comes in and he becomes sin he becomes pain he becomes everything that's wrong in the world he becomes and he embodies it and he takes on the wrath of God fully when he dies on the cross the cross is the greatest act of intercession in human history the cross is the greatest act of intercession someone coming before God on behalf of others in all of history because what Jesus does is he comes in and he is he is fully man representing the dwelling place of man earth and he's fully God which means heaven right so he represents the dwelling place of heaven or a dwelling place of God and the dwelling place of man heaven and earth and as fully God and fully man he comes in right into the middle as the overlap of heaven and earth Emmanuel God with us and though he is perfect he became one with sin and God poured out wrath on him and this is what we talked about a little bit I know this is review but so important God it delighted God to crush Jesus on the cross it it the Father was waiting for a long time to absolutely crush the Son on the cross you're like wow that is violent and what kind of Father would want to crush his own son like yeah that's really intense why because Jesus became sin and sin destroys that which Jesus loves which is us he loves us sin destroys us and so what he does is he comes in and destroys the very thing that destroys the ones that he loves it's just like we all hate cancer right I talked about this we all hate cancer because it destroys the ones that we love sin does the same thing and God said I have in my heart to destroy it and destroy its power of slavery and so Jesus did that on the cross it's the greatest act of intercession and then from there he says hey come up here with me he says I want you to be seated with me in heavenly places so what that means is there's a spiritual throne room in heaven okay this is where God dwells where he sits and just picture God on the throne there's mariots which means thousands and thousands of angels there's cherubim which are really weird creatures they're worshipping and and there's there's just beauty everywhere emerald green rainbow there's just like wild stuff and God there is sitting on the throne and Jesus ascends into heaven after the resurrection and he comes and sits at the right hand of the throne of God so it's the Father and the Son and then the Bible it says that we yeah you we are all seated with Jesus in that place we are seated spiritually speaking in the throne room of heaven now when you think of a throne room what do you think of you think of decisions being made you think of policies going forth you think a king makes a decision and then things change and happen is that right a king makes a decision on the throne and then the kingdom changes right and so what happens is he says I want you in the decision-making center of the universe and I want you to sit there with me I want you to sit there with me and you're gonna get caught up into there's two things that happen in the throne room connection and love right the Father and the Son are connecting we get caught up into this love exchange with them oh they love us we love them back it's really powerful it's awesome first thing that happens in the throne room which is kind of not normal right normally throne rooms are a little stoic a little disconnected very serious faces right and God is the God of joy and he's going oh come on sit on my lap come here I'm a dad and I love you and he's he's got warmth the throne room is warm with love and and so there we are and and you start getting caught up into who he is and the love of God and then he says okay I want you to turn and look with me at the earth and I want you to see the brokenness that I see how many of you know that we don't need to pray for anything if everything is going perfect and great there's no need for intercession if everything is great is that true if there are no problems then you don't need to be an intercession praying for something and so God takes us and he goes get caught up into love exchanges but now I want us to look together at things and I want you to see things from my perspective and I want to carry I want you to carry my heart and I want you see what I see turn a page back to Hebrews 4 Hebrews the book of Hebrews is wild you guys it's all about Jesus is the high priest okay it's like just sit down and read it for an hour and you'll be able to read all the book of Hebrews and it's all about this high priest thing the priestly call of Jesus it's wild so you'll see that as a theme but Hebrews 4 here we go verse 14 since then we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens Jesus the Son of God let us hold fast our confession for we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are yet without sin let us then with confidence drawn near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and help in time of need in Hebrews 9 he talks about a very similar thing we get to approach God and he actually gives us grace and strength and we get to approach him with confidence right remember he says I want you to sit with me and when he says I want you to sit with me what he means is don't be bashful about it I want you to be confident I want you to confidently take your place confidently take your place be confident in what I did for you as a priest that's what we need to start with is you need to actually receive the intercession that Jesus has has done for you the act of intercession on the cross you actually need to receive that first before you follow in his footsteps and you be an intercessor but I want to tell you this everybody listen to me this is really important you are destined to be an intercessor now some of you guys are like no I'm not a prayer warrior I don't know where people got the whole idea prayer warrior is that in the Bible I don't does anybody know passage like prayer warrior no it's not in the Bible but it's like a it's a Christian thing it's like yeah I'm a prayer warrior okay listen you don't have to be the prayer warrior lady okay that's okay even though some of you are the weird prayer warrior lady and we're thankful for you we're thankful that you've accepted responsibility for your identity as an intercessor okay oh man but listen you are all called as priests you are all called as intercessors it's just what priests do and you're all priests and so what Jesus is doing is he's going I want to reveal something about myself though as a priest I want to look us to look at this one of the important things that we get to see in this passage is that Jesus is a sympathetic priest he's a sympathetic priest how many of you know that our city doesn't need more judges from the church how many of you know that our city doesn't need more people that think that they know it from the church how many of you know that our city actually needs sympathetic priest of God that are caught up into the love of God seen from his point of view and then realizing that we're sitting with one that is a sympathizer you know how many how many of us get caught into the swirl of accusation well should have done this should have done that couldn't have that how do they do that why and the Lord is going where where am I in your city do you see where I am and I'll tell you where he is he's near to the broken hearted in our city he's not caught up into the air ways of accusation and judgment he's actually feet on the ground crawling with the broken hearted in our city he's the sympathizer how many of you know Jesus was of a group of an oppressed people how many of you know that Jesus came from a town that was looked down upon he was from the wrong side of the tracks how many of you know that he came from a single parent home how many of you know that Jesus actually buried his father how many of you know that Jesus was abandoned and betrayed by his family and by his closest friends Jesus can actually sympathize with being hunted Jesus can actually sympathize with being misunderstood and some of us are going yeah but he can't sympathize with this yeah he can he fully became all of the pain in your life he embodied it and fully experienced it within his body when he hung on the cross is this supernatural miracle that he fully experienced all of the pain and sin of your entire life all the sin done against you and all the sin that you did to someone else and the sin that you did against the Lord he took all of that and he experienced it fully it says that it messed him up so much he didn't even look like a man Isaiah 52 says that he was marred be on human likeness in other words he didn't even look like a human that's how bad sin marred his body and how badly he was beaten Jesus is the sympathizer he's the sympathetic high priest there was there's a moment yesterday we were at home and one of my kids came in and they were whining and you know crying about they fell over the handlebars on their scooter something like that and and you know as parents sometimes some of your kids they're not you kind of want to toughen your kids up right and so they're whining and complaining and you're kind of like come on you know like you guys are like oh no like I thought you were a good dad you know and you just want your kid to just be like yeah I bounced back you know like I'm I'm fine you know I've got like blood everywhere and I'm tough and and then they're not and and that's okay but but how many of you know that when there's pain that that pain is it serious pain it doesn't just go away and however in can be a lot of times what happens as a parent there's this temptation and I I uh vulnerable share that I've given into this temptation that there's the temptation to just minimize the pain because it's actually inconvenient to me it just feels like man that it's draining to hear you it's draining to hear about your pain because I'm doing things because I've I've got some projects to do because I've got my life and I'm doing some things and now you're being an inconvenience to me and so what happens is when pain surfaces and we just kind of stuff the pain it gets pushed and then over time it starts coming out in a lot of different other ways and what I want to acknowledge is that George Floyd passing away last year and being murdered on the streets of our city is not the new issue in our day when Rodney King got beat senseless on the streets I think it's 30 or 40 years ago that was not a new thing there's been pain generation after generation and what's convenient is to just kind of go about our business and ignore it because it can get inconvenient if you have the privilege of not having to think about it then it's convenient to just not but as the people of God God's actually the one that we're seated with and guess where he is he's drawing close to the pain he draws closer and he gets near and he starts listening to the pain because how many of you know pain just doesn't go away the first step to healing is actually acknowledging that it's there and if we haven't acknowledged it by now it's a problem and I want to confront if you are consistently minimizing the pain of our black and brown brothers and sisters I want to I want to give a pastoral excitation to you that you must with the heart of God stop minimizing pain just because you don't know what to do with it because we are a family of God and family doesn't just stuff it and ignore it and act like it doesn't exist no family listens and leans into the pain and then they raise their children to not just minimize pain but actually be present to it and look at it and look at the brokenness so that then the next generation goes oh my goodness that's wrong and I am actually a priest that sympathizes and makes things right with my influence and maybe it's an influence of two maybe it's an influence of three and praise God praise God that it's an influence of two or three but listen pastors aren't gonna fix it do you think your government officials are gonna fix the problems of our day no it's little people like you and me and like our children it's all of the everyday people that have decisions to make in their workplaces it's all of us we all take responsibility for the pain in our city you know I look at David and I know I just want to look at Jesus again Jesus accepts responsibility for problems that aren't as an intercessor not my problem I wasn't the cop it's not me I'm not racist man we got it we actually have to get low God resist the proud he gives grace to the humble and we start going low we start listening and we develop a resource as a church so that we can just learn and get educated because there's so many opinions going back and forth on social media so we're trying to go like okay what are some healthy resources that we can actually listen and learn as a community and look at the issue of our day listen it will go in the history books for the rest of this age what happens this year and last year in Minneapolis you are actually part of history that you're living right now in our city there's a black brother that's a leader in Texas his name is Will Ford and I was talking to Will on the phone this week and we're probably gonna have him come and preach some time at Grove but we're talking and he was saying that that 20 years ago he was part of the church community where the pastor was doing like spiritual manipulation and it was really intense and then it ended up going to federal prison because of what was happening but Will in that in that season he came out of that and the only church that he could find that he felt safe in to experience emotional healing was actually in Minnesota and so he would fly from Texas to Minnesota to experience healing in Minnesota and as he was on the phone with me he said I believe that my story is actually a prophetic picture of what God is calling Minnesota into in the season and he said that I believe that God is going to take what the enemy meant for evil and he's gonna turn it to good and he's drawing the attention of the nation and bringing the nation to Minnesota to be healed and I believe I believe that word I just want to believe it in faith yes Lord bring the nations here have them get healed and and that same day Will Ford he was he was talking on the phone and then later we came to the prayer room and Anna before the prayer set she said that she was praying and the Lord gave for a picture and vision and Anna I'm sorry if I get it wrong I'm trying my best do you want to come up and just could you just come up and share the vision that you got I felt like at the 330 is that okay I just totally put you on the spot I'm sorry okay all right yeah cuz I was at the 330 and I was telling it but I don't know if I got it right so yeah I was just praying over our city and I was meditating on Psalm 45 and Isaiah 52 and Psalm 45 in the beginning talks about the beauty of the Lord and how he's like the fairest among all men and Isaiah 52 towards the end of the chapter it talks about how he was pierced for our transgressions and like marred beyond human recognition and as I was preparing for the prayer room set it was like I was imagining Jesus with his pierced hands and his pierced feet and his pure side and the scars on his back walking through Brooklyn Center and I was looking at him and I was saying this this version of you on the cross pierced for me and bleeding for me is beautiful and just thanking him for yeah like what he did for us and the wounds that he took in the scars and talking about him and singing to him like you are the wounded healer that was pierced for our city and you're walking through our city as the wounded one so that we might be healed so thank you Anna I believe that God is calling us as a community to follow the wounded healer and when we look at Jesus he's the wounded healer in the words he took on the wounds he's a sympathetic priest and him taking on the wounds is actually this beautiful picture of he's gonna bring healing to our city to our nation a lot of times what we think about when we think of the second chronicles seven passage we think about if you humble yourselves and pray and you seek my face then I'm gonna heal your land and forgive your sins and so on and Jesus has already forgiven our sins so that doesn't apply like that passage doesn't make any sense in the new covenant when we're talking about healing or the forgiveness of sins but I think it's so significant that it starts with humbling yourself and then it talks about seeking him humble yourselves and then I just I'm gonna even turn there I'm I think it's so it's one of those passages that we've heard a million times but I want to read it again it says if my people were called by my name humbled themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their ways there's repentance there then I will hear from heaven forgive their sin and heal their land that forgiveness of sin thing doesn't work doesn't make sense in the new covenant through Jesus but man I believe that there's healing that gets to come as we humble ourselves and we take the place of prayer seated with him seeing what he sees full of sympathy as we hear the pain let's not minimize the pain the start of healing is actually to listen to it the start of healing is actually to lean into it and God is actually taking it he's going it's all of our responsibility I'm the God of compassion we get to be the people the church of compassion maybe you haven't tasted the pain yet maybe you have had the privilege of not having to think about pain on this issue maybe you haven't had to think about your relationship with law enforcement that is a privilege we have to acknowledge that some of us are saying I don't have white privilege you haven't thought about your relationship with cops and you don't think you have white privilege what where what planet are you on that you think that you don't even have to think about the issues of our city that speaks of your white privilege right there I do it humble yourself stop living in the politics of this age get low and be a sympathizer and get low and humble yourself before the Lord and actually be acquainted with the brokenness of our society and realize that we are all a part of the story let's all stand I just want to respond to the Lord God is calling us as a people God is calling us and I want to acknowledge something Katie said in the last last service is what I'm not saying is that you have to be an activist what I'm not saying is this has to be your calling you know I'm not saying that you have to be this crazy like I don't know I don't know what that looks like but I'm not saying that that has to be your call we all have different callings in the body of Christ but we are living in a day and we have to actually be present to culture what's happened is God God has never intended for the church to just be safe in the church buildings and not engage with culture and just go about our Christian lives in the Christian bubble and just be ourselves and be happy and blessed no what you're supposed to be in the fields and in the fields there's pain in the fields there's dirt in the fields it's messy it's not clean in the fields Jesus wasn't Jesus had dirty feet we were all meant to have beautiful feet not clean feet beautiful feet because we walk around with peace in our hearts peace that we have because we're positionally here and go it God is calling us not to be peace keepers but to make peace and peace is made through listening first peace is made through sympathy first and empathy first you might not have the calling of an activist and that's fine you have a different call but we're all called to follow in the footsteps of the wounded healer I just want to encourage you maybe you don't feel like you have capacity I'm telling you you have capacity to drive Brooklyn Center you have capacity to go into South Minneapolis maybe drive past the memorial and you can you have capacity to pray and get his heart and actually lean into his heart and do it as a family do it as a couple do it as a single do it as a group of friends hey I'm driving Brooklyn Center you want to come we're just gonna pray you want to get out yeah let's just let's just walk and pray this is your city there's 299 million people in our country that don't live in our city but you're part of the one million that does you're part of the the couple hundred in this community that is actually hearing this message with an invitation to go will you will you adopt my heart as a sympathetic high priest you can if you want to Lord we just receive your invitation as your people as your sons and daughters that you've welcomed into the throne room you've welcomed us into the place of power authority and love in the throne room of heaven to release power from this room Lord we thank you that the power of healing comes from this place from the throne room as we're seated with you thank you Lord Lord we thank you that you are calling us as a people to step closer to move closer to lean in to listen thank you Lord Jesus I just thank you God that Jesus said that I said other peacemakers the peacemakers they will be called sons of God and I just thank you Lord that we are all peacemakers in this room and that we are sons and daughters Lord Lord I just thank you that we walk in the awareness of the power of your blood I thank you Jesus that as we drive through our city and we declare your blood over our city and we see you as the wounded healer in our city God that things are about to change in our city God that we walk in awareness of what you did for our city and we see the people walking down the street we see the people we see the protesters we see the police God through your blood Jesus God I thank you Lord that your blood was enough Jesus I thank you God that your blood is stronger than all the blood that has been shed in our city and I thank you Jesus that the wounds of our city are not deeper than the wounds that you took for us Jesus God so we declare your healing over our city God we stand together as a family of sons and daughters as peacemakers not peace keepers God aligned with your heart Jesus having the mind of Christ being seated with you in the heavenly places being intercessors next to you Jesus having your heart thank you Lord for giving us your hearts for doing what we could never do Lord for pouring out your blood on our city Jesus that your blood is enough God if we can't remember anything else let us remember that it was your blood that's in this room God that each of us have a testimony in this room Lord and I believe God and I declare that the testimonies in this room are the freedom the deliverance the reconciliation that we've experienced in this body God it's just beginning Lord that it'll be multiplied in our city Jesus God that us as peacemakers and sons and daughters Lord will see Lord a multiplication of what you've started in this city in this in this body God so I thank you Jesus for what you're doing and we stand together for you Jesus Lord I just declare that Minnesota will bring healing Lord we just speak that over our state and we just declare would they be brought to Minnesota so that they could get healed Lord just encounters on the street encounters in homes Lord we just thank you would you as the peacemaker of the ages the wounded healer of the ages walk through our cities at the sound of our voice just move into homes move into streets this week Lord Lord whatever happens this week even with a showman trial whatever is happening in our city streets Lord we thank you that you're gonna take it all and you're gonna turn it for good Lord we thank you that the good is healing thank you Lord we declare emotional healing in the church in Minnesota in Jesus name thank you Lord