 Resurrection of Jesus Christ is a big deal for Christians. The reason why it's a big deal for Christians is because our faith is not based on the Bible. Our faith is based on Jesus rising from the dead. The Bible documents this. The Bible is the word of God. But our faith is built on Jesus dying and Jesus rising from the dead. That's why if some agnostic or atheist or a professor with more degrees than a thermometer will challenge my faith and come and say, well, your Bible has mistakes. Let's say even if it's true, I don't believe Bible has mistakes, but let's say that it is true. Then it's gonna be like you coming in and saying that your birth certificate has a typo. It doesn't change the fact I'm alive. Birth certificate, if it has a typo, it doesn't change the fact that I am alive. The faith of a Christian is based on the fact that Jesus Christ has died for our sin and that he is alive today. And the Bible documents that but our faith is not in a dogma or a doctrine. Our faith is in the person. His name is Jesus. We don't subscribe to just goodness and to different things. We're subscribed to the person and his name is Jesus Christ. Resurrection of Jesus Christ is such a big deal because if he would have not been risen from the dead he would have been like every other guy who said good things and who probably somewhat had an impact on the world. Jesus Christ rose from the dead and it wasn't just God coming in and saying, hey, this is my son and I'm gonna raise him from the dead to prove a point. It's that death couldn't hold him. Death holds every person who is a sinner, which you and I, Alexander the Great, every Pharaoh, every Nebuchadnezzar, everybody who wanna be God, that holds them. The reason it couldn't hold Jesus Christ is because 2,000 years ago Jesus took our sin upon himself and that's why he died. But once he was buried in the tomb, you have to understand once they placed him in the tomb, death wrapped its chains around Jesus Christ but because he was sinless. The only guy who was ever sinless is Jesus. And the proof of that is death couldn't hold him. You were like, ah, I'm not sure, was he really sinless or not? Judas could betray him, thought he was sinless. He threw money back and said, I betrayed innocent blood. Washed his hands and said, ah, yeah, like this whole thing, are you guys killing? Yes, that's your doing, I'm not doing it. And Pilate was not a moral guy. Herod, who was a crook. He sent Jesus back to Pilate and wrote this, he says, I find no fault in him. The guy Jesus was crucified next to said, ah, we are, he's talking to another dude on the cross and he says, we deserve this but this man did nothing wrong. Roman soldiers looking at Jesus when Jesus died and he says, this is a righteous man. Now if that's not enough, death itself that holds every sinner, you and I included could not hold Jesus Christ. Death couldn't hold him. He would say, why did he die then? He died for my and your sake. But he rose again because he was pure, he was righteous and he was sinless. Death was like a spider trying to put a web on the lion and Jesus Christ ripped the whole thing apart and left the grave. Angels came in and removed the stone not to help Jesus get out but to help us see he was not there anymore and he rose from the dead. It was such a big deal for Christians at the time that Jesus rose from the dead that they actually started to worship Jesus. Now during his time when he did miracles he forgave sins. A lot of them still struggled with Jesus being the son of God even though they claim he is the Messiah, he is the son of God but after the resurrection you see the shift taking place with believers they started to worship him. Now for some of us like, yeah, I mean Jesus, of course you worship him but you have to keep in mind for a Jewish people to worship a man would mean he's either God or they're breaking first to commandments of a Jewish law. His own family worshiped him. My family has a hard time to recognize that I'm their pastor. Come on, we all know how family is. It's like some of you have a hard time bringing them to church they're like, you know what, don't talk to me about your religion. Don't shove it down my throat. Because it's how family is. So I have a brother and I have two brothers and two sisters and they're incredible, I love them, they're part of our church but I have one brother who is very specific on our family meetings and my sister to let everybody know, Vlad in here you're not a pastor, you're a brother. I was like, what, my pastoral jurisdiction ended at Hungry Jen? I was like, you're my leader, I'm your pastor. But you know how that's how family are. Imagine Jesus family wasn't even like that, they were crazier because one time Jesus was preaching they came to take Jesus from the pulpit and they said he's out of his mind. So I'd rather have a brother who doesn't think I should be a pastor in the house than to have a brother who will say you're out of his mind. His mom and the brothers and the sisters thought Jesus was out of his mind. After resurrection, they worshiped him. Man, he must be God if his own family worshiped him. It was such a big deal that not only his family worshiped him, not only his followers worshiped him but they actually changed the day that Jewish people celebrated to honor God the day of Saturday to Sunday. Now for us Saturday Sunday, both days we get off and most of you are lucky to have two days off. We're like, no big deal. For Jewish people Saturday Sabbath was such a big deal. In fact, some of them believed that God created Shabbat had nobody to keep it. So he went and made humans to keep the Saturday. This was such a big deal. For Jewish people Shabbat Saturday was a big deal. For Christians to be able to worship and gather on Sunday morning to remember Jesus' resurrection was honestly dealing a death blow to the fourth commandment of Jewish people. Why would they do that? Because Jesus declared he's the Lord of the Sabbath and because he rose again on Sunday morning. This was such a big deal. Resurrection was such a big deal that we as Christians have two main ordinances. Now if you're a Catholic, you got seven. We got two. Join the Protestant church, less ordinances. But the two ordinances that we as Christians have, what is that? The one is the Holy Communion and the other one is the water baptism. The Holy Communion speaks of Jesus' death and then the water baptism speaks of his death, burial and resurrection. Because if you notice everyone we baptize we bring them out of the water. Now there are people we don't want to bring out of the water. We want to keep them there. But we are obligated by the ordinance of Jesus Christ to bring them out. If Jesus did not rise from the dead, imagine our water baptism. We're like keeping you there until you meet Jesus. So the reason why you're getting up from the water is because Jesus rose from the dead. Hey man, another reason I'm thankful for resurrection. I get a chance to come out of the water. I'm not stuck in there. Resurrection of Jesus Christ was a big deal and we celebrate that as a big deal. The story that came to my mind that really just I feel like the Holy Spirit reminded this week is about the rod of Aaron. Now we all know the rod of Moses and if you've never even been to church you watch the movies. The guy with the stick, the magic, you know, split the sea. Moses did some pretty cool stuff with his rod. Now at that time everybody had a rod. It's like everybody has a car today. It's like social security. Everybody would have a rod. If you're a shepherd you would have a rod. It was the cool thing to have. It was also a symbol of authority. And Moses had a rod, but Aaron also had a rod. Aaron was the brother of Moses. And Aaron's rod actually was the one that Aaron threw on the floor and it turned into a snake. Now I'm not going to do that because there's too many children sitting just in case it becomes a snake. But God could do it again. So I'm going to hold this, okay? So you guys are okay, all right? I'm going to be a snake. No, it won't be a snake. It will be okay. I won't be throwing it down. So Aaron throws it down and then it becomes a snake. And of course other guys also had rods in Egypt so they all thrown. It was like a battle of the rods. And then Aaron's rod eats the rest of the snakes. Pretty much a rod that became a snake. And so Aaron begins to use this rod and he touches water and it turns into blood. And there's a lot of miracles that were done through it. And then one day Israel, you know, kind of develops rebellion against Moses and Aaron. You have to keep in mind their brothers, okay? So people feel like Moses and Aaron are like these two boss slash dictator leaders telling us what to do and like we don't have any space. Like they keep making all the decisions like a family mafia that runs Israel. And so they were opposed to that. Korah was one of those guys and he had two other dudes that joined him in revolt. The earth was not very kind to these guys. It actually swallowed them. You would think the rest of the people would learn the lesson like don't smack, don't talk smack about Aaron or his rod. But they continued to rebel against Moses and against Aaron and God had it enough. And then God made this test and God says I want every leader of Israel to bring their rod meaning like they all had rods, okay? It was like a rod generation. They all had rods. God says bring your rod. Place it before me in my presence and God says this. The guy whose rod will supernaturally come alive is the guy that I have ordained to be my high priest. Like that's the guy you should listen to and you should stop bickering about is he enough? Like should you also hear from God like Aaron? And so what happens is in Numbers chapter 17 verse 8 it says the next morning they came and Aaron's rod it blossomed. Now for those of you who don't do much farm work or have trees or care about that stuff and you just eat your fruit like if you cut this off from its source it's dead, dead. A rod is a branch that used to be alive and now it's dead, okay? I won't spell dead like Bryson did a few times and misspelled it. So I'm just gonna... So those of you who don't know what that is just an inside joke. Bryson one time tried to spell dead out loud and then he misspelled it but I said it so boldly and confidently that we didn't catch it. So the rod was dead and then the rod is placed before the presence of God and the rod comes alive. It starts to bloom. It starts to blossom. It even produces fruit on it. And God's like, okay now this is the proof that Aaron whose rod supernaturally got brought back to life is my man, is my high priest. In fact it was such a big deal that God said to put this rod in the God box that we call the Ark of the Covenant. It's such a big deal. Now how is that symbolic for us? What does that mean for us? You have to understand every religious leader has left some kind of a mark on the world. They left some kind of a writing some kind of maybe a good thing. They've said good things and everything but what makes Jesus different and what makes Jesus our high priest is the fact that his rod bloomed. He blossomed. He rose again. He came back to life. And what makes Christianity different my friend this is not to brag and to point fingers at other religions that's not what this is about. It's just that our guy came back to life. It's a big deal. Very big deal. That's why we sing. That's why this guy is screaming. A spit is coming out. Why? Because it's a big deal. It's a great news. It's amazing. That's why we're alive because the guy we worship is. That's why he still changes lives today. If he would be dead he can't help you. And that savior is no good for nobody. Only a living savior can help us. Amen. All the pharaohs, all the Nebuchadnezzar, all the dictators, all the wannabe God, wannabe saviors, all the people who try to rule the hearts of men with the sword and with violence. Their rods are still dead. Jesus was cut off from the sword when he died. He rose again. And because he lives today my friend not only he is validated by heaven as our Messiah but it confirms our faith. Our faith is not foolish. A lot of people think well Christians just bunch of stupid people who use God as their crutch. My friend, our faith is not true because we believe it. We believe it because it's true. I just had recently a guy, an acquaintance who was saying really bad things about a very close friend of mine. He believed those things and when I heard from him what he said I said are you out of your mind? I said where did you came up with that? How could you even think that? Like that is complete fabrication but he believed in it so powerfully and it dawned on me. You can believe in something so powerful and be totally dead wrong. And just because something is true it doesn't mean you will automatically believe it. And why wouldn't you believe that Jesus rose from the dead if he did? Because it challenges your lifestyle. You gotta change your life now. Because as long as he is dead you can do whatever you want but the moment the truth faces you you have to now change something. That's why when Pharisees encountered the truth instead of saying oh my God Jesus is God they said soldiers how much would you take if you would conjure up a lie that disciples stole the body when you slept? Which by the way there's really clever lies and there's dumb lies. I'm thinking if I would be Pharisees I would at least wait for 24 hours to come up with something decent to say. How stupid is that is to spread around by soldiers and I don't know why these soldiers agreed. Disciples stole the body when we slept. How did you know they stole the body if you were sleeping? Don't ask any more questions. In the Roman Empire if you slept on a duty you get executed. So my question number one is how did you see the disciples stole the body if you slept? Number two why are you still alive? Why they didn't kill you? That's a dumb idea. Come up with something better but that's exactly what happens when you try to cover the truth and put it under the carpet is you do dumb things. Our faith is not dumb. Our faith is grounded in a historical fact. Now our faith is supernatural which is weird for some people like man but it's hard to swallow it is hard to swallow but it's not dumb it's not something just spooky it is supernatural but it's undeniable that are facts that are our faith rests on. Let me put this down so that I don't scare the children anymore. Amen? The Bible says in Book of Acts chapter 1 and verse 3 it says to whom he also presented himself alive after his suffering by many infallible proofs being seen by them during 40 days and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God so arguments against the resurrection of Jesus is number one he didn't die. Jesus didn't really die he simply was nursed back to health and honestly he just got beaten pretty bad lost a lot of blood he was unconscious they brought him down Mary and other people give him some medicine and so when he was in a tomb he kind of recovered and then he pushed the rock aside got through the 16 soldiers and convinced in his weak fragile body his disciples he's the lord of the universe I mean I've heard a lot of dumb stuff in my life but that really puts it on the top like that's just not possible disciples were so scared that they ran from him they were such a coward and seeing Jesus broken beaten they would have departed and left them and say Jesus you need as much help as we do see you later the second argument against the resurrection is like as we mentioned disciples stole the body and how do we know that because the soldiers that were sleeping saw that okay that doesn't fly and the third one is that disciples just came up with a whole story because it will give them a really good standing in the future as the founders of a religion now typically people come up with a lie or deception for three reasons money power and sex okay I have a person right now that's impersonating me on Instagram and is saying that he's a lot and he's sending messages so you probably got him to to orphanage in Nigeria and gives you a whatsapp number with Nigerian whatsapp number and so the reason why this person is lying and impersonating me is because of money that's the reason people don't typically lie or come up with something unless they have these three reasons or unless they have a really big problem with their brain disciples would have come up with the story if they would have one of these three reasons now track with me did they get any political power no most of them lost their jobs did they get any money not really when they faced the crippled men they said golden silver we don't have did they get a lot of sex well the history doesn't say anything of that because they live very chaste lives so why would they come up with it and if they would come up with it they would never put women as the first witnesses of the resurrection of Jesus because women's witness was not credible even up to now culture when until me too movement started even women's testimonies in our culture culture that is pushing feminism inequality did not value the credibility of the story imagine 2000 years ago so if disciples came up with the story where you definitely don't want to put women as the first witnesses because their testimony wouldn't stand any kind of credibility it had to be this stuff just you just you can't make stuff up like that you can't then we're faced with a problem if this is real then it confronts us if this is real then these facts demand a response from us scholars say that there is more evidence that Jesus walked out of the tomb than there is evidence that Julius Caesar was ever alive a German philosopher said the following concerning the resurrection of Jesus he said the evidence for Jesus' resurrection is so strong that nobody would question it except for two things first it is very unusual event and second if you believe it believe it happened you would have to change the way you live again I just want to encourage those of you who are believers please don't let anybody talk you out that your faith is built on a myth or feelings fantasy or something was just conjured up your faith has a concrete evidence your faith even if you got healed in your body that's not where your faith rests in it rests in the evidence of historic proportion it's a historical fact that Jesus rose from the dead and that's where your faith rests in and based on this now I'm going to go to the second layer and the second layer is not only there is evidence that Jesus rose from the dead but there is also scripture and there is prophecies that were given concerning his resurrection as I mentioned the Aaron's rod it was just a picture of that there was prophecies in the Old Testament there was also predictions by Jesus that he would rise from the dead someone calculated that there is 2,500 prophecies in the Bible and 2,000 of them already came true the Bible has a lot of predictions the Bible is not just stories of like crazy things that have happened or even miracles the Bible has some things to say about the future that have come true the book of Revelation and you're thinking you're reading like newspaper today a lot of stuff that is happening right now we're very close to that 2,000 years ago we didn't have chips that you can put under your skin 2,000 years ago we didn't have those opportunities where we can shut down the whole earth and tell everybody to be scared of a flu I mean COVID, I'm sorry of a pandemic and really buy people into compliance with anything like this doesn't exist we need this that we pretty much can release any kind of weapon and we don't have to do it in Wuhan we can do that in Washington just here Bill Gates House sorry I just had to throw away that Bill Gates part didn't go so well in the second service as I said in the first but we live in the day today where a bio weapon can be released and within 3 days everybody shut down and the only way you can get out and do what you can do today freely you would have a vaccine if you would have a passport if you would have this thing that makes you safe to the community read the book of Revelation you will see that I'm not saying in any way the vaccine is the mark of the beast or this is what I'm just saying is today we see that these words are coming true right in front of our eyes to us this is a confirmation Jesus rose from the dead because Jesus when he rose from the dead he went to the disciples to the scripture and said this is the proof this is what these guys prophet said about thousands of years my supernatural birth my supernatural resurrection is crazy but guys this is not the only thing that's crazy there's a lot of things in the bible that you just can't explain how could they have known that Jesus as well, God impossible undeniable you gotta receive that so that's the second thing the third thing is that Jesus he gives us proof not only Jesus gives us these prophecies that predict his resurrection but the third one is that Jesus gives us personal encounters with people by which we can be assured he is alive now I on purpose did not talk about the personal encounters first because I don't want our faith to be founded on our experience it has to be founded on the evidence of God's word and it has to be founded on the evidence of the history but as Christians our faith is not just dogmatic our faith is not just theories and ideas that are verified by history our faith leads us to a person my house got robbed a few years ago when I still lived here in Pasco and somebody was window was open and broke into my house and went over like turned stuff over but thankfully didn't take anything except the car that was not mine so that's why I said thankfully and so the guy gave me my cousin gave me a car he wanted to get rid of it and so the car was stolen and now it was obvious to me that there's somebody was in my house I didn't have video cameras but looking at the evidence looking at the fingerprints that he left on the window as he was using the gloves and looking at the fact somebody turned stuff over it was evident to me somebody was in the house police was very kind when they came in they didn't say no we don't believe in that like all this evidence like ehh man it's just circumstantial no police was very kind to look at that and say yeah you're right somebody did stole your house stole your car somebody did go through the stuff and so we knew the fact that somebody was there but see we did not know who see the empty tomb tells you Jesus is alive but it doesn't tell you who Jesus is it's the scripture that tells you who Jesus is that's why Jesus takes us from the empty tomb to the scripture he says this tells you I'm alive and this tells you I'm the king and where does it lead to now it leads you to the person that you can actually meet you know it's one thing to study lions and to watch movies about lions it's another one to look them in the eye when I was in Tanzania and we were you know like and you're watching you know Lion King and you know Simba and all other stuff like man you know I can pet them like it's just big glorified African cats I can just pet them yeah until one passes by like an abacones or your knees are shaking you're stuttering and you're like close the door and we're inside of a vehicle and you know the skinny little lion just walks by and you're like you're scared because it's a royal beast and see the same thing you know you can talk about Jesus and study Jesus but it's totally another when you have an encounter with him it's totally another when you have an encounter with him now the guy that stole my house I stole my car I'm sorry broke into my house broke into my into my house and stole the car I never met him sadly I posted a Facebook post and I said if you ever read this please show yourself I will gift you this car and lead you to Christ and I'm thinking this would be such a cool testimony stole the car from a pastor got forgiven got the car back and got saved I'm thinking like testimony time so I saw a blurry picture of him in one of the bakery places what's the bakery place in Pasco Vierras yes and so the cashier lady the cashier lady was there she messaged me on Facebook and she's a listen she's like I think the guy who stole your car came to Vierras bakery I was like you got to be kidding me so I go in there I wanted to see but it's just a very very blurry picture that this is interesting he comes in barefoot asked for a piece of paper and she remembers what he was writing on the piece of paper because she looked at it and it says I am sorry for stealing your car he leaves the note inside of the car in downtown Pasco now police find it by three or two o'clock in the morning so I recovered the car but see I never met him I wanted to meet him and if you maybe are here and you stole the car I want to meet you I love you I don't have that car anymore but I have some other cars maybe I can help you see resurrection the action of Jesus Christ is not just God leaving evidences so you will know he's alive all of this evidence goes and takes us to the scripture where we learn who Jesus is and then we take the evidence and the scripture to actually meet this person he's not hiding he's not running away he says now I want you to encounter me like Pastor John the way he encountered Jesus it changed his life the way I encountered the Lord it changed my life and in conclusion the four people that encountered Jesus that it changed their life the first one is Peter now you would say well Peter knew Jesus before that see that was the issue when Peter walked with Jesus for three and a half years Peter became so confident you know and let's not blame Peter I would get a little bit cocky too if Jesus would call me an apostle I would walk with a little I'm not a fisherman anymore the man of God where's my man of God parking lot come on let's face it and then when Jesus said Peter Peter you know I'm going to build a church and you're going to be a part of that come on give me a little self a steam boost so when Jesus says I'm going to die and all of y'all going to betray and walk away from me this would be a good moment for Peter to shine once again and that's where Peter says Jesus never ever would I deny I will Jesus brose for life die for you and Jesus says Peter why did you have to say that because now you're going to deny me three times it's like you could have just went down into history as this person who just fell during a hard time and now you're really going to go down and of course everybody else said but nobody else was as bold as Peter Peter was very bold and Jesus in his worst in his most difficult time Peter wasn't somebody who helped Jesus in fact he was on the side and you would think he would be on the side texting in his Facebook group soliciting prayers for Jesus guys Jesus is going through a very difficult time let's raise an intercession let's just begin to pray for Jesus right now he's going through a difficult time and snapping take a picture yeah he's right now being arrested he's being beaten right now prayer point number two is this we're praying for protection he wasn't there he's sitting by the fire and he's pretending he never knew Jesus slave girl not some kind of powerful girl or powerful man he's like hey your accent betrays you sound Russian or like you sound Galilean they didn't say Russian Galilean you your accent like you've been with Jesus and Peter goes full blown f-bombs like to prove that I have nothing to do with Jesus once twice three times the Bible says he was cursing and Jesus is not very far in one gospel it says and Jesus looked at Peter man Peter felt so bad what do you do if you've been involved in church you know the ropes you even learn the Christian ease and you joined the church maybe you even got elevated to the position of a leader apostle maybe your dad or grandpa was a pastor and you walked for three and a half years with this faith and in fact you change your status on facebook believer born again you didn't even know what that fully meant like everybody says it I have to put it in and then you told all your friends y'all gotta get saved bunch of heathens you became like a little fire brimstone evangelist you did a testimony at hungry jet praise God God delivered me depression is gone anxiety is gone no longer sleeping with my boyfriend I'm just a completely different person and so everybody now knows you as the person if after that you flunk you fail I'm talking about embarrassingly fail like scandalous kind of a fail where everybody knows about it where you almost feel like I need to run from this city I need to switch churches I need to switch I need to completely delete all of my social media I don't want nobody to talk about my failure I don't I don't deserve the forgiveness why because while other bad people they did not know I knew it better I made promises to God people saw my change I was the one that bowed before Jesus when he filled my boat with fish he called me Peter he called me the rock or a rock he just he elevated me now I blew up I love this because when Jesus came back the angel of God said to the women he says go tell all of his disciples let me drop you the pin of the location that Jesus is going to be in in Galilee and by the way also tell Peter tell the disciples why do you want to isolate Peter because the way he fell was big the way he's going to be restored is also going to be big it's not that what Peter did was worse than others it's the fact that Jesus saw how much weight Peter was under because his history was not sin his history now was walking with Christ and so many Christians we are so easy and eager to give the good news of Jesus to a prostitute drug dealer even a murderer but the moment you and I we fail the moment we screw up the moment we make promises and we break them and we make a mess and my friend you are capable of that Peter is capable of that and I am capable of that and guess what we do then we're like man I don't deserve this and we allow the cancelled culture in our own mind to go in and say cancelled cancelled cancelled that's it you're not good you're not worthy you just deserve to be completely cancelled and to be finished and to be done with now some of us are a little bit better than that we forgive ourselves we're like no girl all you gotta need all you need to do is just learn to forgive yourself well the problem is you're the one that committed the sin you can't forgive yourself you can't forgive yourself if you can't forgive yourself Jesus did not die why did Jesus die then you can't forgive yourself ask Judas Judas made a mess out of his decision to betray Jesus he felt so guilty and instead of running to Jesus for forgiveness Judas believed if I could just return the money I would be okay he returned the money hanged himself why because you can't fix you only Jesus can fix you whether you're Peter today and you used to be a believer and man you just made a mess look man I don't know where to start I want to tell you today a disresurrection Sunday Jesus is calling for you and he says get all the disciples and you he has you specifically in mind but you don't understand I'm divorced but you don't understand I dumbled in the same sex relationships but you don't understand I am transgender but you don't understand I dumbled into other religions you don't understand I cursed Christians I want to tell you something that Jesus Christ wants to meet you and you might not need today you don't need to go to Israel to see the empty tomb today you need to come to the altar you need to present your empty life and he will fill it with his forgiveness he shed his blood to remove the weight you cannot remove on your own he died to lift that stain of that guilt and the shame you're like I can't forgive myself my friend wait until you meet Jesus once he forgives you will be lost from that guilt you will be lost from that pain how is that possible he's the only one who took my sin and he's the only one that has the authority to wipe my record completely clean man I can't tell you how many times I felt like Peter and no I didn't get online and cursed Christianity and denied Jesus Christ but I did some things that I was not proud of I did some things that I was like man I don't deserve Jesus's forgiveness anymore and it's so easy for me to tell somebody who doesn't know Jesus man believe in Jesus he will forgive you but it's another thing when you've been in Christianity for very long and you feel like man the grace doesn't apply to me anymore sometimes we can be like a chef dying out of hunger in our own kitchen I don't want you to just preach the gospel and believe the gospel and never receive the gospel as a Christian just because you're a Christian and you've been in the faith for 20 years it doesn't mean you outgrow your need for the grace of God it doesn't mean you stop being completely a person who is capable of doing a lot of stupid and those of you who will tell you that if you come to the altar and you become a little angel and you grow wings I'm gonna tell you one thing you might become an angel not with the wings though and you will still capable of falling and tripping and making mistakes and the Lord will allow that why so that you can be reminded once again you need a savior and your savior is not you your savior is Jesus that's Peter, Peter encountered Jesus Jesus encountered Peter his life was not the same but I love how Jesus encountered Peter he didn't come to Peter with the fire brimstone message like I'm doing right now here he came to Peter and he saw that Peter was struggling and he said Pete throw the line, throw the nets into the other side and Peter threw the nets into the other side and caught a lot of fish it's like Jesus led Peter to himself through goodness could it be that you're sitting here today and you're noticing God is exceptionally good to you and you're exceptionally terrible what do you do run to him and you know that it's God you know it's his goodness that is circling your life you just can't explain it like man you must be God but you're like I can't reconcile it how could he be good to me if I'm a screw up it's because he's calling you and sometimes he calls you through a preacher like me and sometimes he calls you through a blessing that he gives you in your life you know you absolutely don't deserve it and it's not God trying to remind you he just says hey I want you to come to me I want to forgive you I want to restore you I want to love on you the second person that Jesus encountered is Cleopas Cleopas he's the guy that walked from Israel from Jerusalem to Emmaus because he was disappointed that Jesus did not redeem Israel as he thought Jesus should Jesus comes alongside Cleopas and he was with another disciple some scholars believe it was actually his wife and so Jesus comes alongside but he pretends to be somebody else and he just asks Cleopas how you doing you know just a chit chat conversation and Cleopas begins to pour out his heart and very soon you can see you can dive into Cleopas disappointment Cleopas doesn't necessarily have a problem with denying Jesus as much as he had a problem with being disappointed in Jesus because Cleopas is just like a lot of us here today we get the promise of God and we know that God's promise is yes and amen but sometimes it doesn't come true the way we think it should come true sometimes things don't work out like they should work out and then we kind of blame God we're like why did God allow this to happen why did God not stop this where was God when I was going through that and we developed this little disappointment it's not that we don't believe in God it's just we lack the trust in him and we don't want to raise our hopes anymore because man we did it and it proved to be wrong and so we want to play it safe with God we want to come to church and just sit there our heart is no longer burning for the Lord because we've been so disappointed we're afraid to fall in love because we've been hurt before we're afraid to have children because we've had miscarriage before we're afraid to believe for the healing because we've asked for it and we're still sick we're afraid to start a new business and your job because we've tried it and it just backfired and so right now we play it safe we walk away from the Jerusalem of burning for God because we're disappointed we hoped he will be the one and now we're confused because the women are saying he rose from the dead other people are saying they saw him and it's just it's confusing and Jesus is seeing all of that he doesn't rebuke them he starts slowly ground him back into the Scripture back into the Scripture he says didn't you know Christ was supposed to suffer before he entered his glory yes he will reign and redeem Israel he will establish his kingdom in Jerusalem but you got your timeline wrong it's not about that it's about his salvation and he begins to bring them back to the Scripture back to the Scripture and then he sits down breaks the bread and I think one of the disciples caught wait that's his score God he was gone and as he was gone they looked at one another and said wasn't our heart burning as he talked to us and guess what they did they dropped everything that they were doing and ran back to Jerusalem maybe you've been disappointed that God didn't heal somebody God didn't do something that he was supposed to I want to tell you something your faith and what God did not do it should rest in what he did what did he do he died on a cross for you but Vlad you don't understand my sister died if your sister went to heaven she's gonna slap you and say what are you whining about I'm in a better place and you better stop worrying why are you mad at God all of us will die one day but his death it changed the relationship with God and Jesus wants to anchor us back in the scriptures and back into himself and say listen this is about me not about what I can do because I will do things for you but sometimes the timeline you got is kind of wrong have you ever called somebody in the other continent and you thought it was 8 a.m. there and it's one o'clock in the morning and they're like where are you why are you calling me what's wrong exactly with us God lives in heaven we live in here our time zones are different and sometimes we see the promise of God and we're like it has to happen right now it has to happen this way sometimes it's lack of our faith and other things but I want to let you know don't place your hope in healing place your hope in the healer don't place your hope in your deliverance place your hope in your deliverer anchor yourself in Jesus Christ he rose again according to the scripture he's coming again and he wants to point you to himself the third person Jesus encountered it was Thomas if Peter was devastated by his sin felt unworthy of Jesus' love Cleopas was discouraged and disappointed by his expectations and Jesus drew him back he drew Peter back but Thomas Thomas was the one who doubted that Jesus was risen he didn't believe that and when Jesus came he let Thomas touch Jesus I love this because Jesus didn't send Thomas a book on resurrection Jesus sent himself this is what I love about Jesus is that if you doubt him you can meet him and you can meet him and you're like how do you know it's him oh you would know it's him and when Jesus came to Thomas but it's interesting he didn't say just touch my face he said touch my scars I find it interesting that the resurrected glorious body had defects now there are defects in my mind your mind because when you get scars you want to get rid of them you want to cover them people who had C-section you're trying to cover that people who maybe had some cuts somewhere I had some you know I have certain things that you know when I die I hope I'm not going to have those eyes better ones we all want to you know be perfect and you would think Jesus resurrected body would be perfect and it is but somehow he allowed the scars to remain there for two reasons to prove his love and encourage your faith because like Thomas sometimes I doubt God loves me I have so much evidence around me that seems to point that he doesn't love me why was I born like this I didn't ask for that I didn't deserve that I struggled with headaches for a very long time as a young kid I battled with inferiority I really did not believe that God loved me I believe that he loved everybody else who was born with perfect bodies who had perfect talents and God didn't go and do a plastic surgery on my eyes I did too I did two surges not plastic surges but two surges they still didn't fix the problem God didn't do that on me what he did was what he did with Thomas what he did with you if you're ever doubting God's love there is a place where you can touch his scars why is that significant because it will remind you he does love you the proof of that is not your car not how much money is in your bank account the proof that God loves you it's not an easy life it's not that your husband will always treat you good your kids will always treat you good your society will treat you good or people in church will treat you good the proof that God loves you is that he died for you that is the proof a little boy lived with his grandma and the apartment caught on fire the grandma was in one room trying to climb through to rescue the boy and then doing so she died in fire there was a man on the outside who climbed through the drain pipe and got into the fire burned his skin trying to get in took the boy in one hand and climbed down through that drain pipe down and saved the kid few days later the town gathered together and who is going to become the guardian and the adoptive parent for this little kid and the kid stood in shame and broken because he lost his parents looking at the floor and the mayor was there says I can adopt the kid some wealthy lady saying I can adopt the kid there was somebody else and the man who climbed through that drainage he comes and he took the kid's hand and the kid felt that his hand was different because his hand was marred his hand was scorched with flame and when he looked up at the guy he realized it's the same man and saved me he hugged him tears begin to flow and he says this is going to be my dad because he saved me and I know that he saved me because there is scars that I can feel my friend I want to tell you something your savior is not just coming on the white horse he has scars to prove he truly loves you don't use what you went through as an excuse to feed your doubt look to the hill where your help comes from look to your savior you can put your hands into his scars today and believe I love you but if he loved me why was I abused the proof that he loves you is not that you will never be going through difficult time it's that he went through the worst time to save you to be with you to fill you with the Holy Spirit and he says to you today that I love you I love you with love that's unconditional I love you with love that's unfailing I love you with love that's never ending I love you with love that doesn't have strings attached it's not just the love that's physical it's spiritual love and that is the love he has for me and for you the last person that Jesus encountered is Paul now the way he encountered Peter was one way the way he encountered Cleopas was another way the way he encountered Thomas was another way Paul was encountered differently now Paul was not devastated by his sin, Paul didn't think he was a sinner in the first place Paul wasn't disappointed in God Paul wasn't doubting you know what Paul's problem was he was dead wrong Paul was a terrorist he was killing Christians like crazy he was just bad he was killing God you know how Jesus encountered Paul he knocked them out of his horse this wasn't come over here Paul do you know you're a sinner I came to die on the cross for you this one was like pow he falls and Jesus says because Paul was stubborn and there are people in this room you're stubborn and God will encounter you but you're not gonna like it this is not gonna be gentle like oh just such a breeze of God's love he does that to people that are hurting but the people who are mean and stubborn and knuckleheads a lot of times what he does is he encounters you in the way where I'm not gonna give details of that encounter but if you have somebody praying for you and you're stubborn I can encourage you there is easier way to enter the Lord that's all I'm gonna say the easiest way could be just coming to the altar now if you want to knock down off the horse kind of a presentation like good for you I would love to hear your story on the stage later I don't want to be a part of this story and I don't want this to happen to me I just want Jesus' love, gentleness and goodness lead me to repentance but there are people they're so stuck up and because God loves them so much the people, the grandma of yours that is praying for you that God will knock you out of your horse and can blind you for three days that's not the God of the Bible I don't know which Bible you've been reading bro but that's not the Bible why does he do that because a stubborn person has to have their pride broken you will never receive the gift of God until you're humbled and some of us we need to be humbled but we can choose to humble ourselves today yes, yes so I want to invite you today to humble yourself before God if you're already humbled by your sin here's already rolling down your eyes you're like glad do the call I'm ready to get saved if you're here doubting God's love I know that you're already broken if you're here you're disappointed your heart is melting like ice cube in the fire but if you're here and you're like you're not gonna get me I know this looks like manipulation just manipulating screaming and all of this stuff it's just the atmosphere manipulation in this room it's just I've studied this I know how this works Jesus loves you no matter how much you've studied how much you know Jesus loves you genuinely does if he can break through that cold callus hard heart of yours it will make such a big difference you'll be vulnerable but you'll be alive but if you refuse that he can also be gracious and he can break things yeah I know some people who did this happen to until they brought down to zero only then they were able to be humbled and I pray this will not be our case but I love the fact that my God is so good that even if I'm blind and stupid and stubborn I just pray that he gets me one way or the other help more people to discover this video it cost you nothing but it can go a long way to help with the algorithm as well as if you're not subscribed to our channel hit subscribe click on the bell so that you can be reminded each time that we upload videos thank you so much for being a part of this community if you're interested in learning more about Hungry Gen, our internship our conferences, deliverance and so many other things go to HungryGen.com for more information and as always remember, better is not good enough the best is yet to come