 So good morning. Thank you so much for joining me for Thursday morning prayer in the room and online I'm really excited and coming with anticipation to be able to pray together and set aside this hour to really Speak into the rest of our day today and as we've been praying and preparing we've been really feeling the idea of Beholding Jesus thanking the Lord worshiping the Lord for the miracle of of Easter week the miracle of his death his resurrection and As we we move into that there's an element of preparing our own hearts to experience What Easter is to be ready to make space for the King who's entering in even as we celebrate Palm Sunday this coming Sunday So as we open up, I just want to read some sections from Psalm 22 No, it starts with Jesus Really famous words on the cross. He says my God my God. Why have you forsaken me? No, I want to be careful that we don't read this just to ourselves to say my God my God Why haven't know if you feel forsaken this morning? That's okay. We're gonna get there But but first I just want to read this with just a lens of reverence for Jesus because he's the one who? appropriated these verses on the cross as he bled and suffered and died for us And so let's just read some of this together not necessarily saying oh wow this feels like me this morning But saying Jesus this is what this is just a glimpse of what you were feeling and we're gonna magnify You before turning inwards God, we're gonna look upwards to you So let's just read this together Says my God my God. Why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me from the words of my groaning? Oh my God, I cry by day, but you do not answer by night, but I find no rest Yet verse 3 you are holy In throne on the praises of Israel in you our fathers trusted they trusted and you delivered them To you they cry and were rescued In you they trusted and were not put to shame But I am a worm and not a man scorned by mankind despised by the people all who see me mock me They make mouths at me they wag their heads He trusts in the Lord let him deliver him let him rescue him from for he delights in him Yet you are he who took me from the womb You made me trust in you at my mother's breast and on you was I cast from my birth From my mother's womb you have been my God be not far from me And I just want to jump to verse 27 and so We see how this back and forth of saying I feel forsaken God, but you are worthy God I feel alone, but you are holy you are steadfast and at the end It's beautiful. He says all the ends of the earth shall remember and turn to the Lord and All the families of the nation shall worship before you For kingship belongs to the Lord and he rules over the nations All the prosperous of the earth eat and worship before him shall bow down all who go down to the dust Even the ones who could not keep himself alive Posterity shall serve him it shall be told of the Lord to the coming generation They shall come and proclaim his righteousness to a people yet unborn that he has Done it all the way from my God my God. Why have you forsaken me to they shall proclaim that he has Done it so Jesus we posture our hearts as we enter into this time of worship and prayer We say that you have done it We want to see you rightly God give us a new and fresh Revelation of what it means that you God became flesh and died on the cross for us Lord we want to behold you We want to see you rightly and we just say before Addressing our own needs and concerns God we turn our eyes to you We worship you Jesus and we thank you for the cross We just set our hearts in that posture right now And we choose to engage We choose to behold you. We love you Jesus In your precious name. Amen. All right, let's worship together But I think there is a grace to understand the cross in a new light this morning And it's not to focus on it. So we feel bad or we feel you know guilty or whatever, but it's this idea of worshiping the Lord for Everything that he's done for us thanking God for his sacrifice And some talk about the scripture and what's in the scripture like it like a many-sided diamond that you turn it and each Turn you see a new angle and perspective And so I just want to invite you if you're here online if you're in the room and you feel like The crosses may be lost its Appeal or or even the miracle nature of it I just want to encourage you and challenge you to open up your heart for even just a few minutes to Reflect on on the cross and say Jesus give me a new perspective on the cross. I want to be Totally floored by the cross God. I want my heart to be broken by your sacrifice So I want to see a new side of the diamond Of your death of your sacrifice So just open yourself up ask for that say Jesus Renew me in the knowing of you Renew to me the joy of my salvation just put ourselves in that posture and we wait on you We listen to you now. We say we make space for you what we reprioritize our Schedules we are rearranged the space in our heart Say God we want to put you on the throne magnify you God we we don't ever want to get tired of saying thank you for the cross God we want to be formed With a lens of the cross God with with your death and your resurrection We want to see the world Through what you've done. We ask for more. We know that you have done Exceedently abundantly all that we could ask her imagine even more God But we ask for more we ask for even your help to rearrange our priorities rearrange our inner Dialogue in a range rearrange how we see you even just think about Isaiah 53 just Hearing this prophetic word about Jesus and What you've done Just want to read verse 4. It says surely he has borne our griefs and carried our sorrows Yet we esteemed him stricken and spitten by God and afflicted But he was pierced for our transgressions He was crushed for our iniquities Upon him was the chastisement that brought us peace and with his wounds We are healed All we like sheep have gone astray. We have turned Everyone to his own way and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all God we hear those words and we just stop in wonder How The chastisement on your body brought us peace God how your sacrifice Brought us into right relationship with you God. We don't know how it works. We can't explain it But we thank you for it. We enter into it We look to you God we get our gaze from ourselves on to you, but we sit at your feet We ask that you would teach us how to see you God how to see Your death on the cross and how to worship you God and we thank you for your precious blood even just tell him in your own words right now. Just tell him thank you Jesus, thank you Thank you for your sacrifice Thank you for the cross I thank you for saving me sit her like me God you see me like a saint Thank you for your work. God. Thank you from seeing beginning to the end Lord, thank you for not leaving us alone Thank you for bringing us into relationship with you. Thank you for your saving work. I thank you for your kindness Grace your mercy God. We know you never get tired of hearing these things We just take a second and minister to your heart We gaze upon you we worship you and we say thank you God let us be abounding with gratitude towards you. Let us prepare our own hearts Let go of our agendas and skays at you and sit at your feet Once again, we look upon the cross where you die exalt you Lord. We magnify you Tation Jesus we praise you. I just want to begin to turn Here maybe you're praying with us and you feel like hey, we haven't prayed for anything yet. Are we really praying? Yes, we're praying we are it's not just intercession, but it's ministering to the heart of God We are praying we're magnifying him. We're making space for him but I do want to turn for a few minutes to some intercession together and really Just feeling a burden for those who are going to be coming to Easter services Good Friday services Sunday morning services who may not know the Lord You know those people who might come to Christmas and Easter, but maybe have not experienced a life changing and encounter with the risen Lord Jesus Christ and So I just think you know many of us here together might have friends or family members who are not saved right now Maybe we can invite them to church, but I just want to be able to contend for them together and I even think About the cross and there's something about the cross that Peels the scales from the eyes of people who don't believe in the Lord I think of the centurion in Luke at the foot of the cross where Jesus breathes his last and Centurion has a revelation of Jesus and he said surely what this was an innocent man Or he says surely this was the son of God There was something about the cross that allowed him to see who Jesus was and so I'm believing and praying and expecting that We're gonna have many many people maybe in churches here at radiant Maybe in Kalamazoo no matter where you're tuning in that there will be a harvest of people who are gonna see The sacrifice of Jesus see the miracle of his death and resurrection and say ah Surely this was the son of God. So let's pray together Jesus and I want you to join me. This is a group participatory sport I want you to join me think of somebody who might be in your sphere of influence If we say Jesus Draw these people to yourself Draw our friends our families to yourself On the cross as you're lifted up You said that you would draw all people to yourself and so We come with eager Expectation to see what you're gonna do God that you're gonna be able to draw people They're going to even be able to melt the hardest heart Maybe someone who is just being dragged along to church on Easter Sunday Because it's the cultural thing to do It's the thing that we always do no matter what God We pray that even as people walk into the door that they would be hit by your spirit and by your presence And that they would know there is something real and living and active here God let them experience your grace. We pray that you would break down barriers of hostility of a hurt of Pain God you even promise on Isaiah that you take our pain God that you take our grief that it's on you the cross is effective To even transform our pain in our grief into something miraculous God, so we pray for these people we contend for these close friends Family members people who do not know you God we ask that you would bring them into the saving knowledge and love of you Jesus Our hearts ache for them God let them see the miracle of the cross and the resurrection bring them into your fold Bring them in to the your pastor God your your sheep. Let them hear and know your voice Let them taste and see that you are good We stud stud stand in the gap and pray for them Lord do your work. We agree with you or bring them in like sheep have gone astray That Isaiah 53 picture who have turned and gone their own way bring them back God you say that your sheep know your voice And so we just pray that you would break through into the lives of people who have put up walls and barriers Who have run who have gone their own way? And at the same time we pray that you would give us eyes to see what you're doing God. Let us make space. I Was even just thinking about maybe there's gonna be people who watched the Jesus Revolution movie and there's something stirring in them And they think okay, maybe I haven't been to church in a couple years I'm just gonna go I'm gonna check it out and maybe those people are going to look like the hippies of the 1970s and people were offended by them But God is asking us and inviting us to see the lost with new eyes To be able to make space for them to say they might be smelling. They might not look the part They might not have their Sunday best on their Easter best They might not be all cleaned up and tidy, but God you care for them so much So we even ask that you would do a work in our hearts to prepare a space not just for you God always for you, but God but for those who might be coming for the first time in a long time Give us your eyes to see what you're doing God Give us your ears to see and to hear what you are saying and give us our hearts To love you always gotten a heart for the lost who might be coming in Literally this week for the first time in years God We asked for miracles and testimonies during this holy week this Easter week that we are right on the edge of entering into activate them Lord with your grace Jesus Revolution This Easter 2023 I just want to close with reading Acts 2 Verse 22 this is just Peter preaching to people who have come God It did something he poured out his spirit and people came and were attracted to what was going on And what did Peter say about Jesus now? This is the truth This is the reality that we can leave in the posture that we can actually to rest in and leave in this week He says men of Israel hear these words Jesus of Nazareth a man attested to you by God with mighty works and wonders and Signs that God did through him in your midst as you yourselves know this Jesus Delivered up according to the definite plan and for knowledge of God To you and you crucified and killed him by the hands of lawless men God raised him up Loosing the pains of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it God raised him up Loosing the pains of death because it was not possible for him to be held by it So I just want to encourage us to be able to to go in that posture and that position of authority and victory of Jesus even over death And I want to encourage you be praying for those friends those family members who might come to church this weekend and Meet the risen Lord who is alive and active for us. So with that I want to close for this morning We're gonna be back here in person at noon and at 6 30 and then live tomorrow morning again at 8 a.m We're gonna be transitioning into a devotional set here. So if you're in the room I just asked that you would step out to keep conversations out there We're gonna just keep this an atmosphere of posture of worship. Otherwise have a great Thursday. We'll see you soon