 I'm so glad you're joining us and all of you, what a fantastic weekend it is, spring rains are out there. And that means summer is on the way, come on somebody. That's exciting, we're looking forward to that. And last weekend we celebrated the resurrection of Jesus and we had 91 people make Jesus Christ the Lord of their lives here at Radiant Church. So we celebrate that powerful, powerful weekend and next weekend we are going to celebrate water baptism. And so as a part of the setup for that, I wanna share a message with you this week called What Happens in the Water? Talking about water baptism. And I came up with the title for this because years ago when I was a youth pastor in Kansas City, I remember this weekend where we did water baptisms. And one of the families in our church, they had a little boy who was probably four or five years old, maybe five, six, but he's one of those little boys that has no filter on what he says. Anybody know what I'm talking about? Okay, and so when we had baptisms, he was sitting next to his mom and his dad and he was just asking questions. He was like, mom, why are we doing this? Mom, why are people getting wet? Mom, what happens when they get baptized? And the mom turned to him and said, well, when people get baptized, they're changed. I mean, they're not different. It's like, it's a whole transformation. He's like, really, really? And then he like leans over to his dad and he says, dad, did you know that when people get baptized, it's like they change. They're never the same. And he goes, yeah. He said, it's a burial. It's like they're burying their old stuff. And he's like, really, this is a burial. And so we did the baptismal and it was in the stage. It was kind of like this. You could pull the lid off and baptize people. And one of the particular people that the family knew was an older gentleman got baptized. And when he got out, everybody clapped and the little boy who was in the third row, he goes, he's not changed. He looks exactly the same. We need to bury him. And so imagine how that changed the whole dynamics of the service. And so oftentimes there is a misunderstanding about things. We use language that if you've been in the church, you understand that language. But if you're new or if you're just kind of learning or maybe come from a different faith tradition, we don't always understand the things that are taking place in church or as the church. Things that we walk out as followers of Jesus Christ. And it's important that we not just know what happens externally, but we need to know what happens spiritually because that's where the supernatural, that's where the grace of God, that's where the power of God really happens. There's a lot of things that we do externally. Why do we sing the songs that we sing? Why do we raise our hands in church? Why do we pray for other nations? Why do we take bread and juice or bread and wine? What's the significance of that? Well, the things in the natural, lifting your hand, singing a song, eating bread and juice, those things are not the significant part of what we do. It's what happens behind what we're doing that has the significance. And the same is true with water baptism. And so if you have your Bibles, I wanna invite you to turn with me to Acts chapter eight, Acts chapter eight, and I wanna set this teaching up out of the text. Acts chapter eight, it's Philip who's one of the early church deacons encounter with an Ethiopian eunuch who's traveling from Jerusalem back to Ethiopia. And he has an encounter with him that leads to a water baptism. Let's look here, verse 26. It says, now an angel, the Lord said to Philip, rise and go towards the south to the road that goes down from Jerusalem to Gaza. This is a desert place. And he rose and he went, and there was an Ethiopian, a eunuch, a court official of Candice, Queen of the Ethiopians who was in charge of all of her treasure. He had come to Jerusalem to worship and he was returning seated in his chariot and he was reading the prophet Isaiah. And the spirit said to Philip, go over and join this chariot. And so Philip ran to him and heard him reading Isaiah the prophet and asked, do you understand what you are reading? And he said, how can I unless someone guides me? And he invited Philip to come up and sit with him. And now the passage of scripture that he was reading was this, quote, like a sheep, he was led to the slaughter and like a lamb before it shearer is silent, so he opens not his mouth. In humiliation, injustice was denied him. Who can describe his generation for his life has taken away from the earth? And the eunuch said to Philip, about whom I ask you, does the prophet say this about himself or about someone else? And then Philip opened his mouth and beginning with this scripture, he told him the good news about Jesus. And as they were going along the road, they came and they saw some water. And the eunuch said, see, here is water. What prevents me from being baptized? And he commanded the chariot to stop and they both went down into the water, Philip and the eunuch and he baptized him. And when they came up out of the water, the spirit of the Lord carried Philip away and the eunuch saw him no more and he went on his way rejoicing. This is a supernatural water baptismal service that takes place. So the reason why this eunuch from Ethiopia is in Israel to begin with is because he's there to worship and he's probably there during a high holiday. It's probably either Passover or the celebration of unleavened bread that kind of encapsulates the Passover holiday. Or he's there during the celebration of Sukkot, which is where they live outside of their homes and they build external, basically tense tabernacles to remember how God led them into the wilderness. And he's a eunuch, which means he's an official of Candus, the Ethiopian queen. And you might wonder why with an Ethiopian queen or a eunuch from Ethiopia be worshiping in Jerusalem during a time of a high feast. Well, you might remember in your Old Testament when Solomon was the king of Israel that a woman who was called the queen of Sheba came to visit Solomon. Well, Sheba is the area that is Ethiopia. And so Solomon so impacted the queen of Sheba that she took the worship of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob back with her and established a Jewish community in Ethiopia. So some 1500 years later, there are still worshipers of the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who are coming to Jerusalem to worship. And this is one of them. He's in his chariot. He's on his way home after worshiping and he's reading a scroll of Isaiah. He's actually reading a passage of scripture out of Isaiah chapter 53 that describes prophetically the Messiah, which ultimately would be Jesus. And that's what Philip does. Philip wakes up one day, he's a deacon in the church, but the Lord speaks to him to go onto a certain road, this highway that is leading from Jerusalem to Gaza, then along the coast down back towards Egypt and then Ethiopia. So he goes down there and he intersects this chariot. And as you just saw, he pulls up alongside the chariot. How many know the chariot's not moving really fast? If Philip's able to catch up to it and overtake it and run it down, and he begins a conversation with him, invites him up into the chariot and Philip begins to break down Isaiah 53 that the land that it's talking about or the suffering servants talking about Yeshua, the Messiah, Jesus. And he begins to share with them the good news of Jesus. Good news is the gospel. And so Philip is witnessing to this eunuch who has a biblical understanding but not yet completely fulfilled. He doesn't understand. And so in the process of time, faith arises in this eunuch's heart that Jesus is indeed the Messiah, the one that it's speaking of. And he says, so here's some water. What prevents me from being baptized? Now some translations, King James and New King James said, if you believe with your heart on the Lord Jesus Christ, you may, and the eunuch's response was, I believe that Jesus is the Son of God. And so they both go down into the water and Philip baptizes him. And then they come back out of the water and it says the Spirit took him. How many want to ride like that? That's Holy Ghost Uber. When you're responding in obedience to what Jesus calls you to do and then when you're done, he just whoop, I mean, transports you to another place. And the Ethiopian eunuch has got to be standing there going, whoa, what just happened? It's supernatural. But it's interesting that in this whole process as Philip witnesses, shares within the good news, he believes his first response is there's some water. What prevents me from being baptized? In other words, water baptism was a part of the gospel. That Philip was preaching to the Ethiopian eunuch. Baptism was nothing new to Jewish believers. In fact, when John the Baptist came, he came baptizing. And it was part of ceremonial purifications before you could go into the temple. All around Jerusalem, there were these baptismal tanks that you had to have a ceremonial washing called a mikvah that you would go down, you would be cleansed before you would go into the temple to worship. It was a symbol of purification, a symbol of repentance and a symbol of preparing yourself to worship God. So when Jesus commissions his disciples to go into all the world and to preach the gospel, make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. This was not like Jesus comes out of left field with this idea about, I want you to go and preach. And then what I want you to do is I want you to take people into water, put them under the water, pull them back up and say, now you're a disciple. They completely understood what was taking place. The external was speaking about something that was happening internal. And so that tradition carried into the followers of Jesus that we were called to believe and then be baptized. But when somebody gets baptized, a whole lot more is happening than meets the eye. And one of the things I want to say about baptism right off the bat is here at Radiant Church, we have things that we consider to be closed-handed issues that are significant and important that we will not let go of because they're important to us. Things like the deity of Christ, the inspiration of scripture, salvation by grace through faith. Those are closed-handed issues, the Trinity. Those are things that we're either in fellowship or we're not about. But then there are what we call open-handed issues and that's things like the timing of the return of the Lord. That's things like the presence of Jesus during communion and water baptism. We know that there are a lot of people who are like, well, we believe in sprinkling instead of immersion. Is that a deal-breaker? No, you can be a part of Radiant Church if you believe that. But you need to understand that our posture, what I'm gonna walk you through here in a moment is what we believe it's our biblical conviction of what Jesus calls every disciple to do and to believe and to be. Now, there are a lot of great Christians that believe other things. They believe, no, when you're baptized as a baby, that's it. No, sprinkling or immersion. And so those are non-salvation issues. They're believers in Jesus. They have a difference of opinion. This is our deeply held conviction, but yet salvation is not predicated on you getting baptized. Salvation is by your belief in Jesus Christ as the Savior who died for your sins on the cross and you by faith receiving him as Lord, okay? So you're not saved by baptism, but with that being said, let me say this, baptism is incredibly important. It's incredibly important. And I wanna show you why today it's important through talking about what happens in the water. When we're baptized, like this Ethiopian eunuch was, in response to faith in who Jesus is, what happens to us when we are baptized? What happens in the water? Number one, I'm gonna share with you three things that happen when you are in the water. Number one, water baptism is our first act of obedience as disciples of Jesus Christ. It's our first act of obedience. And this is important because it begins to set a new trajectory of our lives. When we go down into the water, we are responding in obedience to what Jesus called us to do. Mark chapter 16, verse 15 and 16, Jesus's words to his disciples were this. He said, go into all the world and to proclaim the gospel to the whole creation. Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned. So you notice here in Matthew chapter 28, verse 18, Jesus tells his disciples to go into all the world, preach the gospel. That's the good news. And then baptize. He says, and then those who believe and are baptized will be saved. So you might think to yourself, well, that means if I don't believe and I'm not baptized, then I'm not saved. No, notice the counterpart of that was Jesus said, and those who do not believe will be condemned. He doesn't say those who aren't baptized will be condemned. Why does Jesus say it so strongly though, when he says those who believe and are baptized, they will be saved? It's because Jesus wants us as his disciples to actually begin walking out a life of radical obedience to Jesus. And water baptism becomes the very first thing that we do as a disciple in obedience to the Lord Jesus because of what takes place there. And so if we have a hard time just taking that first step by saying, okay, I'm gonna go public with my faith by being baptized, I'll promise you we're gonna have a difficult time following Jesus in other areas of our life. Because listen, far too often, especially in our culture, we talk about Jesus being our personal Lord and Savior. He is indeed our personal Lord and Savior, but being your personal Lord and Savior is not the same as him being your private Lord and Savior. You need to go public with it. Jesus said, if you confess me before men, I will confess you before the Father. Water baptism historically for the church has been our public statement or our public profession of our faith. It's us going public saying, I prayed, I invited, I recognize Jesus Christ is the Son of the living God who died upon the cross for my sins. I've repented and I have made Jesus the Lord of my life. Now in front of the devil, hell, heaven, the congregation, family and friends, I am stating by being in the water that I am a Christian. And so historically, that was our profession of faith. If we're afraid to do that, then Jesus literally says that we're gonna, he won't confess us to the Father and we're gonna have a very difficult time stating that Jesus is Lord and standing up for that or even sharing the hope that's within us outside of the walls of the church. If we can't stand up in the middle of the church and confess him, we're gonna have a difficult time. This is why Jesus gives us this radical act of going into the water and being baptized. Back when I was in high school, I was a part of a youth ministry. It was a great youth ministry, but I had a friend in the youth ministry who was incredibly scared of crowds. And he wanted to be baptized. His name was Tim. He'd given his life to the Lord, but he didn't like being in front of crowds. And the church we grew up in had a 2,500 seat auditorium with a balcony. I mean, it was a big, big church, always full. And he's like, I wanna be baptized, but I don't wanna do it on Sunday night when everybody's there and you would come up behind the stage and they had it up high with cameras on you and you're on the screen. He's like, I don't wanna do that. And so we got baptized, but he didn't sign up for it. And I'm like, Tim, are you gonna get baptized? This is like a couple of weeks later. And he's like, I did it. I'm like, what do you mean you got baptized? You did what? And he goes, I baptized. I mean, what do you mean you baptized? And he says, here's what I did. I went into my bathroom and I filled our bathtub and I baptized myself. I'm like, Tim, I'm no theologian, but I don't think that counts. I don't think that counts. And he goes, well, why wouldn't it count? I'm like, because there's a going public act of obedience that's connected to it. There needs to be somebody there that is a witness to what you are doing because it is our first radical act of obedience to Jesus. And it sets a pattern in our life. So what happens in baptism is we're making a statement before everybody, Jesus is Lord, and I'm going to follow him. Now, here's the unfortunate thing in our culture. In American culture, we've replaced baptism with altercalls. Now, you all know this if you've been here at Radiant Church for a long time. I believe in altercalls. I give altercalls, lead people in a sinner's prayer where you invite Jesus Christ into your life. And we then celebrate that you're saved. And that's absolutely right. But the problem with that is if we end it there, we've turned salvation into an event instead of a journey of obedience to Jesus. And yes, faith is what saves us, but historically for the church, it's water baptism that is our public profession to the whole world, to heaven, and to hell that we belong to Jesus. And the reason why I think it's more significant that way than just stopping and saying, well, I prayed a prayer one time, I invited Jesus into my life. Have you been baptized? No, because I just prayed a prayer is there isn't a next step of radical obedience. If you are a follower of Jesus, you've prayed a prayer and invited him into your heart and into your life, but you've not yet been water baptized. If you wonder what's next in your journey with Jesus, it's taking that step of being baptized because there's other things that take place in the water, which leads to number two. Baptism is our burial of all old identities and allegiances. It's the burial of the old man with all of its identities and all of its allegiances. Colossians chapter two, verse 11 through 12 says this, in him talking about Jesus, you were circumcised with a circumcision made without hands by putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism in which you were also raised with him through faith in the powerful working of God. Notice what Paul writes in Colossians that baptism is number one, it's a burial where we take the old us our sin ridden self and we literally bury, we identify with Jesus in his burial by putting our old flesh under the water like Jesus was buried in the tomb. But something more than that happens, he calls it a circumcision of the heart. Now, if you know what circumcision is, if you came into the Commonwealth of Israel in the covenant of God, all the way from Abraham, all the way up even including Jesus, on the eighth day they were baptized or they were circumcised, the males were circumcised as a symbol of the covenant. And the parents did that by faith. Paul is saying that there's a circumcision that's made without hands that happens when in faith we bury our old identities, our old sinful flesh in the waters of baptism. The Holy Spirit literally comes and does something to our heart. He doesn't circumcise us physically, he circumcises us spiritually. What does circumcision do? It cuts away flesh. There's a cutting away of the endemic sin nature that happens to us when faith is walked out in radical obedience by burying all old identities and allegiances. Think about that. All identities, all old identities and allegiances. We live in a world where we make covenants, vows, and allegiances with all kinds of things. And our identities are shaped by a lot of different things. Especially in our world today, so much of what we deem as our identity is shaped by me-centered living and even our own sin. But yet in the kingdom of God, Jesus says, I don't want to be an add on accessory to your current identity. And I don't want to be one of your many allegiances. I want to be everything and all things and the only thing in your life. I want you to bury your old self, whatever sin you used to identify with. If you used to be a gang member and you're just like, you know, I've got the colors and I've got some tattoo, it's like bury that old identity. If the strongest identity that you had was politics, bury the politics. If it happens to be your sexual identity or your proclivity, Jesus says, bury it. If it's your sin, bury it. If it's your pride, bury it. Whatever your allegiance was and has been up until now, whatever identity, maybe your identity has been defined by the trauma that you've experienced or by what other people have said about you. Jesus will not be one among many. He wants to be total. And so what happens is we bring our old and we say, Jesus, you are Lord of all. You are my savior. I'm a sinner. You're the son of the living God. And so I repent and I'm burying my old self. All of the things I used to depend on to give me definition, to give me identity, all the old things that used to give me affirmation, all the old ways I used to find pride in who I was and in my life, I take it all and I consider it to be dead. Just like Romans six says, I reckon myself to be dead and I bury that thing. And when that happens, Jesus sends the Holy Spirit who then to our old heart, our calloused heart that has layers of sin and pride and the flesh as Paul calls it, which has the sin nature in it. There's a circumcision where that is removed from us. It's the work of the Holy Spirit. There was a Chinese or a missionary in China who told the story years ago about going into the Western provinces of China and ministering in some of the rural farm communities way out where nobody else had gone. And when they went there, the gospel had not yet penetrated these villages in these towns. But when they went there, do you guys hear the applause of heaven, look at that now, I love it. I love it when the angels clap for me, it's awesome. He talked about preaching in these villages where the gospel had never penetrated and in one particular village when he preached the gospel, the leader of the village came out and listened and because he came out, everybody else did. And he was a traditionalist like a Confucianist and that's how the village had always been. But he came out like three nights in a row, heard the gospel and on the third night, he said, I must stay up all night to consider what you've said. And the missionary, the evangelist was so glad that they were taking it so seriously. But the next morning, the man came to him and he said, all right, I believe what you say. And I'm ready to confess that Jesus is Lord of all and to be baptized, I am ready. I'm ready to give it all for Jesus. And he said, awesome. So he invited everybody, the chief invited his family, he invited the whole village that came out. And so they all came down by the river and the missionary took the man down into the river. But before he went down, he gave his wife a kiss, he's crying, he kissed his children, he kissed his extended family, hugged them, gave instructions to his son, went down into the water and the missionary is like, man, this guy is taking this really, really seriously. And so he took them down into the water and the man took a deep breath and he said, okay, I'm ready. And the missionary plugged his nose, held him and he said, I baptized you in the name of the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit, put him down into the water and then brought him back up. And when he brought him back up, the man shook his head and he looked at him and he looked shocked and he looked surprised. And he said, what, what just happened to you? And he said, why did you bring me back up? He said, I thought, remember translation, I thought I had to die and be buried in order to receive eternal life. He had gone into the waters of baptism thinking that he was about to be held under and drowned so that he could gain eternal life. And then when the man figured out, no, you don't have to because Jesus already has, the man's smile on his face was from ear to ear and he said, it's like I have a whole brand new life all over again. That's as real as it gets church because that's exactly what happens. When we're baptized, we bury the old and then we come up in the new. So baptism is our burial. And there we don't just go through the motions. We're really burying our old identity and all other allegiances. Romans chapter six, verse three and four says, do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death in order that just as Christ was raised or raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in the newness of life. See, there's a death to ourselves in following Jesus. Matthew 16, Jesus said, if any one would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross and follow me. Jesus said, if any man chooses or desires to hold on to his life, he'll actually lose his life. But he who gives up his life will gain his life. There's a burial of the old. It's an identification with Jesus and saying, when he died, I died. And because I died, all of my natural sin desires, all of my allegiances, all of the things that have shaped and for me, I am now a new creation. So it's water baptism becomes a burial of the old. But number three, here's what happens in the water as well. Baptism is also our uprising. It's our uprising against sin, against death and against the devil. We come up in the newness of life. It's exactly what Romans six says, that we too might walk in the newness of life. So just like Jesus was raised from the dead on the third day, we just celebrated that last weekend. When we go down into the waters of baptism, we're acting out what Jesus did, his death burial, but also his resurrection. And we come up in the newness of life, changed, transformed, filled with life. In Acts chapter two, where it records the very genesis, the beginnings of the first church in Jerusalem. It says in verse number 40, and with many other words, this is Simon Peter as he's preaching on the day of Pentecost, with many other words, he bore witness and continued to exhort them, saying, save yourselves from this crooked generation. So those who received his word, so they believed, were baptized and they were added to the church that day, 3000 souls. Now you might be wondering where they baptized all these people. Remember, they had baptismal tanks all over Jerusalem for mikvahs, purification rights. So they took these 3000 people who heard the gospel, who believed in Jesus and responded and said, what do we have to do? He says, be saved from this perverted and this crooked generation. And then they were baptized and added to the church and then look at what it says. And they devoted themselves to what? To the apostles teaching and the fellowship and the breaking of the bread and the prayers. What is that? It's a new way of living. They now become students or disciples of Jesus. Notice what they didn't do. I got baptized, now I go back to living the way I used to. Where I got baptized once upon a time but it really didn't change me. You see, the biblical order of things is that we hear the gospel, we believe the gospel and we respond to the gospel. This is why we dedicate children and we baptize believers. We dedicate children because we want them to experience the grace and the covenant of our families. So we dedicate them to the Lord. But the biblical pattern is that we hear the gospel. We believe the gospel just like they did here. And then we respond to the gospel. How do we respond to the gospel? We respond to the gospel and the demands of the gospel and the explicitly of the gospel by dying to ourself, burying our old identities and allegiances and allowing the Holy Spirit to bring us up out of the waters in the newness of life. And then devoting ourselves to following Jesus in a new and living way. Far too often what happens is we just, well, I believe in Jesus, but I believe in Jesus, but I want to kind of experience life or I don't want to get too crazy. I don't want to be a fanatic for Jesus. I just want to kind of have a nice form of religion that makes me feel good about myself and kind of spiritual therapy for my soul and I need to, but yet I'm gonna kind of live my life. No, that's not what they did. They heard the gospel and it so shook them church that Jesus came from heaven to earth as a man, died for our sins on the cross and then really was raised again from the dead and calls us to follow him, to radically forsake the pattern of the world and to begin to become students of Jesus by devoting ourselves to the apostles teaching, to the prayers, to fellowship with one another and to breaking the bread. As we do these things, what begins to happen is we're beginning to learn how to walk in the newness of life, a new life. We don't go back to walking in the old life. If you've ever seen a child learn how to walk, it's fun. It's fun to watch him. You know, some really pick up on it quick and others, what do they do? They take a couple steps and then poof. But give them six months, man, and they are booking. They're running. Why? It's because every time they fall, they get back up. Mom and dad are there to help them learn how to walk. Come on, you can do it. Take your first steps. And you make sure that they got good shoes on so that they're stabilized. You make sure that all the sharp objects, you know, like chainsaws are out of the living room because you don't want them to hurt themselves. You don't put them on ice skates. You don't make them tight rope. You don't stick them on mountain tops. You know, he's like, come on, you can do it. They're taking those first steps and they're learning how to walk because they're new to life. Part of being a disciple is learning how to walk and follow Jesus. And can I just tell you, you're gonna have times where you fall down, you're gonna have times where you get back up, you're gonna have times where you knock your head, but you get back up and you begin to take more steps until the new life becomes the supernatural life. What's your first step? The first step though is always the hardest, but it's the most significant. And as disciples of Jesus, our first step is saying yes to Jesus and then stepping into the waters of baptism. It's not like, like there's gold package Christianity where it's like, I'm gonna read my Bible every day, go to church and be baptized. But I'm happy with just silver level, which is I pray to prayer and I got fire insurance. When I die, I'll go to heaven. Listen, there's only one way. Jesus didn't say, I've got multiple levels. So I've got one way. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them. Baptism is important. Baptism is significant. The eunuch said to Philip, here's water, what prevents me from being baptized? So here's my challenge. There are some of us that are watching online, joining us from places where you're not yet free to, or you don't have the ability to get to radiant or you don't have the ability to get to a community and be baptized in a church service. Here's what I want to challenge you to do. Find another believer to baptize you, videotape it and send it to us. But those of you who can, those of you who are here, those of you who are joining us online, I want to challenge you, be water baptized. You don't need me to baptize you, but you do need a believer to baptize you and you need to do it in front of at least two or three people as a witness. So invite family and friends and get baptized. Next weekend at radiant, both of our campuses, we're going to be performing water baptism. If you've believed in the gospel and you have not yet been water baptized or you feel a conviction because when you were baptized, it really didn't have any meaning to you because you were just doing it as a formality or maybe you were an infant or maybe you did it because mom and dad wanted you to do it when you were a child but it's not really been for you. This is why it's significant. I want to encourage you. I want to encourage you. Sign up, call a church office, get on the app, whatever you need to do and let's take that first step of radical obedience and following Jesus and then devote ourselves to following him in the newness of life. Amen, stand up with me if you would. If you would wherever you're at just buy your heads with me right now. As I said, the first step is hearing the gospel and then responding to it. And maybe you are hearing the gospel for the first time and you've never responded to it in faith. You know that you are a sinner, dead in your sins and you need new life. You want to make Jesus Christ the Lord of your life. Turn from your sin, turn towards Jesus and receive forgiveness and grace. You want to make Jesus Lord of your life. Simon Peter said it like this, be safe from this crooked generation. And while you're praying, I think one thing that we can all agree on is our world is crooked. It's broken. We can't look to the world to save us. We can't look to our best intentions to save us. We can't look to any man to save us. Only Jesus can save. And if you know that you need Jesus to save you, to forgive you, to give you eternal life and you're willing to walk away from all old identities and allegiances and say, Jesus save me. I want to follow you. I will be a disciple of yours. You want that, I want to pray with you. Again, this is our first step. But for many of us, we may need to take this step. If that's you, right now, I want you to just raise your hand and say, pray for me today. I want to be saved. I want Jesus to save me. Thank you. Looking around the room, just if that's you, say, I need to get my life right with God, Jesus saved me. Thank you, I see that hand over there. Who else? Scanning the room. If you've not raised your hand and you know you need to make Jesus, Lord of your life, raise your hand. Thank you to these two. You can put your hands down for a moment. We're gonna pray in just a moment. Before we do though, as many of us that are here and even online that you say, well, you know what? I'm a believer, Jesus is Lord of my life, but I've never maybe understood baptism and I've never really taken it seriously. Or I know I need to take that radical step of faith. You say, you know, I know I need, I've not done that, but I know that I need to. And I'm saying before God that I'm committing myself. I'm going to obey him by going into the waters of baptism. If that's you, I just want you to raise your hand. Whatever way you're making that commitment before the Lord. I just want you to right now raise it up so that heaven sees that commitment. Yes, hands all over. Come on, you're a Christian. You've never done it and you know you need to. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. You can put your hands down, thank you. Those of you who raised your hand to receive Christ, right now I'm gonna lead you in a prayer. It's a faith confession. It's how we receive the gift of God's grace. I want everyone in the room and online to pray it out loud with me. Say, Heavenly Father, I believe in Jesus, that he is the Son of God, that he died for me and bore my sin in shame and then was raised from the dead. Today I repent of my sin, my offense towards you God, living for myself. Today I ask you to forgive me. Jesus, come into my life, be my Lord and Savior. I turn my back on the world. I turn my back on all old identities. I turn my back on all old allegiances. And today I believe I am a new creation. I am now a child of God. I have the spirit of God living in me. My heart is clean and I have an inheritance. In the kingdom of God. Thank you for loving me and saving me and leading me from this point forward in Jesus' name. Amen. Come on, can we just celebrate new life in Jesus?