Easter at Echoes | Daniel Goulding | Echoes Church

And it's crazy, a couple weeks ago, was like starting to submit my notes for this to our team and I had this amazing introduction I was gonna use about the comeback story of Tiger Woods and it was gonna be awesome. And then he ruined all of that and I was like, bro, way to ruin my Easter opening story. Right? So and I'll use it again in a couple years. It'll be like the comeback of a comeback and

But there again, there's so many amazing stories that we could look at. One of those I was thinking about was a guy named Robert Downey Junior. Right? A couple decades ago, he was an up and coming actor, a guy that had lots of potential, but he just couldn't get out of his own way. He kept, you know, getting DUIs and waking up in the wrong people's houses and just he kept train wrecking himself. Eventually, he ended up going to jail and Hollywood said that they they just couldn't use a guy like him. He ended up becoming uninsurable

which for a studio is just the death kneel and so people said his career was over. But he eventually got sober and he started a relationship with God and he started to rebuild his life and slowly started to get some small acting roles and eventually,

a studio took a risk on him and they presented him with the idea of becoming who we know him as today, Iron Man. Come on somebody. And he's now he's now the face of the most successful franchise in history but his story is one of redemption and reconciliation.

Another one that's funny to think about is is Martha Stewart. Does anybody remember Martha Stewart in the early two thousands? This lady was a baller. She had every American woman folding napkins the way that she told them to fold them. Right? People don't realize like this is her actual mugshot photo which like of course her mugshot looks like that. Right? She was the original influencer

before social media, like Kim Kardashian who? It was Martha Stewart before. Right? This lady's business at some point was worth 2 to $3,000,000,000,

but in 2004, she got caught up in an insider trading scandal and she ended up going to prison. Same thing. Questions were being asked about the future of her her business because her business was so tied to her her brand and her name, she eventually gets out of jail and she reconnects to a younger audience. She signs the most bizarre partnership of all time with Snoop Dogg. You know, mean, come on. Who had Martha Stewart and Snoop Dogg on their bingo card? Right? Like, nobody could have predicted that, but her her business has rebounded. Her her brand is as strong as ever. Hers is again a story

of comeback. It's a story of restoration. Another one I was thinking about in the early two thousands, the the most popular artist of time, she she actually kind of created what is the pop music as we know it today, Britney Spears. I mean, come on somebody, baby one more time, sold a 100,000,000 records

and then she took a hard left hand turn, started shaving her head to avoid drug tests and I know you're sitting here thinking like, well, wait, when is Britney Spears'? What was her comeback story? It hasn't actually happened yet but we're believing

that if Jesus can come back from death that even Britney Spears can have a comeback in 2026. Come on somebody.

All stories that are amazing. So many amazing stories of reconciliation and redemption but I'm telling you, they all pale in comparison to the greatest comeback story of all time and his name is Jesus. And what I wanna do with the last few minutes that I I have with us this morning is I wanna talk to you about why I believe the resurrection

changes everything

because if it's true and if it's real, I'm telling you it is the most important event in human history and if it's not, then we've wasted our lives is what the scriptures says And I know for a lot of us sitting here, we're like, man, it's just it's too hard of a jump for me to get to that a dead person came back to life and I know a lot of you, you're just here because somebody promised you like a good dinner or something after this and I I hope you make them fulfill those promises to you but I also want to just kind of gently nudge you a little bit closer to what I believe is the realization that Jesus isn't a crazy person. And if you find yourself struggling to believe that a dead person can come back to life, let me just tell you, you find yourself in good company. See, this is the problem with the resurrection being an event that took place two thousand years ago. We're so far removed from when it happened. We we forget the tension that existed in the hearts of Jesus' closest friends and even his family members. His own mom

had a had a mixed reaction when she watched her son die on that cross. See, we think because we know the story of the resurrection that what was happening in the hearts of the disciples was the moment Jesus died on the cross, they just were telling everybody, we'll start the countdown clock because Jesus is about to be dunking on all these fools in three days because he's coming back to life.

That that's not what happened. They were they were struggling. They were running. They were hiding. They were fleeing

because they believed the same thing to be true, that dead people don't come back to life. Let me prove to you that if you struggle to believe that a dead person came back to life, that you are in good company. Join me, Mark chapter 16.

Here's the Easter story that starts in verse one. It says, Saturday evening

when the Sabbath had ended, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James, Jesus' mom as well, and Salome went out and they purchased burial spices so they could anoint Jesus' body. You gotta remember Jesus dies on a Friday. Okay? He's buried on Saturday.

Saturday is a Sabbath which means all the stores are closed so the first time that they can go to the store to get the burial spices that they need to go through a traditional Jewish burial is Sunday morning. Here's why that's significant.

You only go to buy burial spices if you're going to go through the process of treating a dead body. They are assuming that Jesus is dead. It says, very early on Sunday morning just at sunrise when they went to the tomb, on the way there they were asking each other a very logical question.

Who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance to the tomb? Again, Jesus dies on Friday. Saturday he's put into a tomb and they all watch five or six men roll a 2,500 pound stone in front of Jesus's tomb, sealing the tomb for good. So on their way there with the burial spices to treat Jesus' body,

they ask a very logical question, how are we gonna move that big stone to get to the body? Here's the point. They showed up that first Easter morning not expecting a resurrection. They showed up expecting a dead body. They expected to see a dead Jesus, but the scripture says, but

but as they arrived, they looked up and they saw that the stone, was very large, had already been rolled aside. Now again, we're two thousand years removed. You've heard the story before. So all of us go, yeah, well the stone was moved because Jesus came back to life. That was not their conclusion. That was not their

assumption. They see the stone rolled away and they draw logical connections that somebody has taken the body. John chapter 20 verse two records

what they say to the other disciples when they go running back to tell them what they've just experienced. It says, they have taken the Lord's body out of the tomb and we don't know where they have put him. See, here's their conclusion. They took him. Well, who's they?

We don't know. Somebody. Maybe the Jewish leaders, maybe the Roman guards, but somebody has moved the body to which the disciples respond but the story sounded like nonsense to the men so they didn't believe it. If you needed proof that the bible was written by single men, there's your proof because they told a bunch of women that the story sounded like nonsense. Nonsense. Okay? That's something that married men think but we don't say out loud because we're smart.

But the story is nonsense.

They tell them that the stone has been rolled away and somebody has taken the body and it makes zero sense and so what do they do? If you keep reading, you'll see they start to talk about the possibilities of what could have happened to the body of Jesus because the idea of him coming back to life, though Jesus tried to tell them, guys, I'm going to die and come back to life, they thought it was crazy because dead people are supposed to stay dead. As they're talking about this, if you skip down in Luke 24 to verse 36, you'll see something crazy happens. Says, just as they were telling about it, as they're talking about what happened to his body,

Jesus himself was suddenly standing there among them. Peace

be with you. Why would the first words out of Jesus' mouth need to be peace be with you? Because you better believe if a dude who was dead three days ago is now standing in my living room, he better bring a change of pants and some peace with him. You know what I mean? Like, I'm terrified, bro. What are we talking about? Right? So Jesus shows up and he's now standing there as they're talking about what happened to the body. He's there and I know the logical thing is like, oh, it's it's a ghost, it's some type of vision. No. No. Look at the story he says, but the whole group was startled and frightened thinking that they were seeing a ghost and Jesus asked a very Jesus question, why are you frightened? You're like, because you were dead three days ago bro. Now you're sitting in our living room. Right? He says, why are your hearts filled with doubt? Look at my hands. Look at my feet. You can see that it's really me. Touch me and make sure that I'm not a ghost because ghosts don't have bodies as you see that I do. Again, if you keep reading what Jesus reminds all of the disciples of

is, guys, we talked about this. I told you all of this was going to happen. I tried to tell you explicitly

though you didn't understand it, so he he re reminds them that this was something that he tried to tell them about ahead of time. He says, yes, it was written long ago that the messiah would suffer and die and eventually rise from the dead on the third day. It was also written that this message would be proclaimed in the authority of his name to all the nations beginning on that first Easter morning in Jerusalem,

but eventually that message would spread like wildfire and get to a point where in 2026 in Mesa, Arizona, we would be talking about Jesus proclaiming the message of Christ risen at Desert Ridge High School in the performing arts center still believing

that he is not dead, he is alive and here is the hope of heaven this morning. Here's the message that Jesus came back from the grave to tell every single one of us, there is forgiveness of sins for all who repents. There's forgiveness available for humanity. There's hope that is available.

All is not lost because Jesus who was once dead, he's now alive and he charges all the disciples in that room and he says, you are now witnesses of these things. What things?

You are now witnesses to the greatest event in human history that Jesus is the only person who went to the grave, who conquered death, hell, and the grave and today he's alive and active and he's ruling and reigning at the right hand of the father. It is now your job to tell the world. And I know sitting here reading that is not enough is not enough evidence to get you completely across the line of faith to go, okay. I I think that Jesus is who he claimed to be, but but I just want to submit to you today that the reason that the resurrection changes everything, it proves that if if Jesus was able to conquer death, if he if he was able to come back from the most overwhelming odds, it means that it's possible for you to come back as well. It's possible for you to start again as well. It doesn't matter how broken you feel. It doesn't matter how how far gone the relationship is. It doesn't matter how bad the addiction in secret is.

You are not too far gone. This is the hope of the resurrection is this morning there's a way back for you because when it looked impossible, Jesus made a way and we still serve a God that is in the business of making the impossible possible but it requires you to really begin to realize that the resurrection,

it's real. It's true. Jesus came back to life and again, I wish I could prove to you historically and scientifically and that that would be enough for you but this is the tension

of surrendering your life to Jesus is I can't get you completely there, but I can get you pretty close to the edge so that you can then take the leap of faith, but you will at some point have to take a leap of faith, but you don't have to shut your brain off. See, so often we think that to be a follower of Jesus and believe that a dead person came back to life that you have to disconnect that from your from logic and reasoning, but I would actually submit to you today that there's more evidence that Jesus actually is who he claimed to be than there is evidence for him not being who he claimed to be. I wanna talk to you about four proofs of the resurrection if you will. Four things that I think you have to you have to analyze and begin to go, okay, well, why do we have these? What are these pieces of evidence and obviously because I'm a good preacher and it's Easter, all four of them are gonna start with e. Okay? Alliteration to the glory of God. The first proof of the resurrection

is the execution of Jesus. See, we know for sure everybody's in agreement that Jesus actually died on the cross. Now, some skeptics will try to say that Jesus wasn't actually dead. He was put in the tomb and he was like he was like half asleep. He was almost dead. They thought he was dead, but they put him in the tomb. He woke up and then he supernaturally moves a 2,500 pound stone by himself. Now again, what you would have to discount is the fact that we have tons and tons, like hundreds and hundreds of accounts of Roman crucifixions,

but you know what we don't have one of? There's not a single story in antiquity that you can find where a single person ever survived a Roman crucifixion. They were unbelievably good at killing people. It was barbaric and it was brutal, but it was effective.

The other part you would have to discount is that before Jesus was nailed to a cross for three to four hours, before he hung on a cross, he was also beaten so badly that the bible says that he was beyond recognition. He didn't even look like he was human any longer. Most people believe as they assess the the flogging that he went through that his ribs would have been literally exposed. He lost at minimum a third of all of his blood if not a half of all of the blood in his body was gone.

That guy

barely gets to a cross, is crucified in a barbaric way, hangs on a cross for four hours, somehow falls asleep, takes a nap in a tomb, and then moves a stone that's 2,500 pounds away by himself. It just doesn't pass the sniff test and if that wasn't enough for you, we now have conclusive data. They've taken all the medical and scientific data that we have in a non christian group, compiled all of the evidence to try to answer the question,

did Jesus really die on the cross? And here was a peer reviewed medical study done by the Journal of the American Medical Association. Here's their conclusion. They said that clearly the weight of the historical medical evidence indicates that Jesus was dead before the wound to his side was inflicted.

We know for sure that the execution happened. Jesus was dead. The second piece of evidence is that the the tomb was empty. The empty tomb is verified by everybody. The disciples, you just heard their account, they said that the Roman officials or the Jewish leaders took the body but we have secular non Christian historians

recording what the Roman officials said happened to the body. They didn't say the body was there. They claimed that the disciples took the body, but everybody's in agreement there was no body in the tomb. And you've got to remember,

there's multiple groups that wanted to. They tried everything that they could to stop the spreading of Jesus' message after his death, but they had there was a smoking gun that they had if they could if they could use it. All they had to do to stop the message of Jesus where people are proclaiming that he's alive is go take the body and show them, yet nobody was able to do it. Why? Because the tomb the tomb was empty. The third piece of evidence that you've got to consider that I think proves the resurrection

is the eyewitnesses that claim that they saw Jesus.

You realize it's not one or two people that said that they saw Jesus. We have one room where there was 500 people that were there that saw him on the same day. In total, there's somewhere between seven and eight hundred people that claimed and testified that they interacted with the resurrected Jesus.

You could write off one or two people as crazy but seven to 800, again, you got to remember the gospel writers as they're writing all of this stuff down, they were writing this at the same time that these eyewitnesses would have still been alive. They could have gone and they could have interviewed them, they could have corroborated

their story and yet still none of them encountered. I think all three of these pieces are are pretty compelling pieces of evidence that maybe the resurrection really actually happened but I think they all pale in comparison to what I think is the most compelling evidence for the resurrection.

The hardest piece of evidence to ignore, it's the emergence of the early church. Now that was a tough one to get an e for but I worked at it for a while. The boldness of the apostles, the transformation

of the disciples. You gotta remember, these are guys that the day before they're running, they're hiding, they're fleeing, they're publicly denouncing that they ever even knew Jesus. We have no association to him and yet in a matter of moments,

all of them have an about face, they all turn and they all stand and say, Jesus is alive. I've seen him, and it they go on to lose everything. They lose businesses. They lose reputation.

They lose families, and ultimately, they will lose their lives, and what you have to be convinced of is that they were all doing it for what they know for what they know to be a lie,

that they were all willing to be boiled in vats of oil, crucified upside down, beaten and thrown off of buildings for something that was not true. See, history tells us some things that people might be willing to die for what they think to be true, but I promise you, they will not die for what they know is a lie. Here's the principle.

Liars make terrible martyrs, yet for some reason, all 11 of the closest followers of Jesus go from hiding and running and fleeing to boldly proclaiming to everyone that would listen, Jesus is alive. I've seen him and you have to ask the question, what happened? What took cowards and made them bold?

And again, I wish I could get you there completely based off evidence alone, but my submission to you is that you have to overlook a lot of glaring pieces of proof that the resurrection

didn't happen, but more than it being something that happened historically, I wanna try to prove to you why the resurrection and how the resurrection changes

everything.

Again, you gotta remember the linchpin of the Christian faith. It's not did Jonah survive in a whale or not. That that sounds crazy. The linchpin of the entire thing is did Jesus come back to life or not because if a dead person came back to life and he says a dude lived in the belly of a whale, I'm gonna rock with it. People will go, how do you believe that stuff? I'm like, you gotta remember the cornerstone of our faith is we think a guy was dead and he came back to life. Let's focus on that thing because that's the craziest claim that we make and if that's true, the rest of it is much easier to begin to wrap your head around. But here's the first thing that the resurrection does for us. The reason that today we're gathering talking about Jesus, The reason that 2,000,000,000 people will gather around the world talking about Jesus this weekend is because it's the resurrection

that forces us to reconsider the teachings of Jesus. It's the resurrection that verified the life and the teaching of Jesus.

You have to remember, Jesus was not the first person to claim to be the savior of the world. Heck, you could probably go to Downtown Phoenix today and find at least three people that they would claim they're the savior of the world. Right? He's the only one whose movement didn't stop with his death. His movement actually began and caught like wildfire

after his death and so it's because we believe he came back to life that we then go, okay, well, what did he say on the time that he was here?

With the teachings that we do have recorded, what was he talking about? Well, there's a couple things that are pretty important to see. Mark chapter eight verse 31 says that Jesus began to tell them, the son of man must suffer many terrible things and be rejected by the elders, the leading priests and the teachers of religious law. Jesus is saying, I'm going to be killed but three days later, I'm gonna rise from the dead. You gotta remember, Jesus predicted

the future and he fulfilled it. That is something that is reserved only for God and here's why that matters to us sitting here today.

If Jesus was able to predict his future, I promise he can predict yours as well and here's my submission to you today is to begin to learn how to trust a very uncertain future to a very certain God. To take what feels unknown to you and put it into the hands of a God who two thousand years ago made himself

known and I'm telling you, I know in this world today it feels like it's getting crazier and crazier. There's wars erupting all over the place. There's division that's in our homes. There's division that's in our country. It's ripping families apart and it's easy to feel uncertain in the middle of all of it.

And here's my submission to us today, is that there's a God that is available. There's a God that wants to begin to help you walk not with anxiety but with peace, but it requires you to begin to realize that the resurrection potentially changes

everything because Jesus predicted the future. He predicted his death and then he fulfilled it. You also gotta remember, Jesus' message is one of those that that sometimes is at odds with how we as people like to naturally treat Jesus. See a lot of us don't have problems with Jesus as long as as long as we keep him in the category of just being a good teacher and I'm and most people are okay with Jesus being like a path to get to heaven and yet that that's your truth but I I think my truth is different. Well, you can't have it both ways. If the resurrection happened,

then you've gotta begin to look at some of the things that Jesus said because Jesus did not come saying, hey, the the truth is within you. There's goodness within you. Just look within you and eventually you will make your way to God. He didn't come with a message saying that when you get to the end of your life, there's gonna be a cosmic scale where your good and your bad are going to be weighed and hopefully the good slightly outweighs the bad. No. He came with a message that said there's only one way to the father and it's through me. If you wanna know who God is, look at me. I only do what I see my father in heaven doing. He went so far to say that nobody will get to the father except through me. He says in John chapter 11 verse 25, I am the resurrection and the life. Anybody who believes in me will live even

after dying. He says that he's the resurrection,

he's the path, he's the way and it requires every single one of us today to make a decision of who is Jesus and the category that most of us are tempted to put Jesus into, I'm telling you is not a category that you can put Jesus into. He can't just be a good teacher if the resurrection

is real. I'm reminded this morning. I I want to remind all of us this morning that Jesus Jesus is not a dead teacher to be admired. He's a risen savior that demands to be followed and to know Jesus as a savior is very different than to know Jesus as a teacher.

He didn't come with some good principles to make your life better. No. He came because you and I, we don't have the ability to make ourselves right and good enough before God. We cannot satisfy the wrath of God on our own. You can't fix your life enough.

You need a savior. You need something inside of you to be healed. You need to be saved from something. Here's the other thing that I believe the resurrection does is the resurrection gives us hope that things can actually change.

It doesn't matter how bad it feels. It doesn't matter how far gone you think you are. The resurrection reminds us that hope is always available. Change can always come. That God is still in the business of making the impossible

possible but it requires us to realize that man, we don't our human our humanity is pretty frail. Our ability to change ourselves is pretty limited.

Let me prove it to you. Some of you may 2026 was like your year, like you woke up on January 1 and you're like, this is the year. I'm losing 15 pounds this year to the glory of God. And we're now in April and you've got 20 pounds to go. You know, you're like, I just it seems like it's going the wrong way.

And if we're honest with ourselves, I know we like to think that we're much bigger and stronger and better than than we like to present, but the truth is our our humanity is frail, but the invitation of Jesus is limitless and there's true life that can be found in him,

but it requires us to do something with the resurrection. Paul says in first Corinthians chapter 15, if Christ has not been raised from the dead, then your faith is useless and you are still guilty of your sins. Paul's conclusion is that if the resurrection didn't happen, then we're all host

and all we have is striving and working harder and trying to figure it out but but if Jesus actually conquered death and the resurrection is real, then we have access to a power source beyond our own understanding but here's what we gotta realize today, that Easter is not about celebrating a resurrection,

it's about experiencing a resurrection. And trust me, I'm all for celebrating the resurrection. Let's throw parties, let's have gatherings but let's not forget that Jesus didn't die for us to celebrate

resurrection. He died so that we can experience resurrection power inside of our hearts so we can begin to tap into a power source beyond our abilities. Here's what Romans chapter eight verse 11 tells us. It says, the spirit of God who raised Jesus from the dead lives in you.

If you find yourself here today exhausted from trying and striving and trying to figure it out, if you feel like, man, I I I've done everything that I can and I just don't know how to how to put this life back together, let me tell you the invitation of heaven to you is that you you actually you can't fix yourself.

You can't figure it out. You can't do it all yourself. You can't rebuild that which is broken but there is a power source that you can tap into by bending the knee to the lordship of Christ where the spirit of God will begin to take residency inside of your soul, and it's the same spirit that took a dead man and brought him back to life. That same spirit wants to help you begin to revive the the purpose in your life that you walked away from. He wants to help you revive the marriage that feels like it's on the verge of collapse. He wants to help you revive the calling that used to be on your life. He wants to help revive the dead things that are there in your life, but again, it requires you to do something with the resurrection.

It forces you to make a decision of who is Jesus going to be. Is he just gonna be a good teacher or is he actually the savior of the world? Last point that I have for you, the reason that I think the resurrection changes everything is the resurrection reminds all of us today that death is not the end of our story.

Death is but a doorway. Death is but a transition. It's not the end and and there is good news in that yes and amen. The scriptures tell us that there will be a day where the ultimate enemy, death, will be defeated

and all the pain, all the tears that have been cried, all of those will be wiped away and eventually we will get to spend eternity with our loved ones who've passed away. And I know for some of us, man, we've lost people this year,

and the resurrection proves that there's life beyond the grave, and that should give us hope that we'll get to spend eternity with them. It's why the scripture says that we mourn, yes, because our hearts are broken,

but we don't mourn like those that have no hope because we know we'll see them again. For those who are in Christ, death is but a transition. But death not being the end of our story also should be pretty sobering to us

because we all know that there's a one to one exchange and every single person in this life will eventually die, but we we live as if that's not true. We live as if we'll live forever, but the truth is that all of us at some point, whether it's seven years or ninety seven years, all of us at some point will breathe our last. You will close your eyes for the last time in this life, and you will transition into the life that is going to come.

And the question is is if death is but a doorway, if death is not the end, what happens to you when you die? See, the Bible tells us the Jesus that rose from the grave tells us

that every single one of us at some point will stand before God in judgment and to be absent with the bodies, to be present with the Lord. And the moment you die, the moment you pass from this life into the next life, you will stand before God in judgment, and he's going to judge your life.

He's gonna ask you, what did you do with the life that I gave you? He's not gonna ask about the money that you gave to charities, how big the business was, how successful the family was. None of that is what's going to count in eternity. He's gonna ask every single one of us a singular question.

The question that every single one of us will be asked that we need to be prepared to answer at some point is what did you do with my risen son? What did you do with the resurrected Jesus? Did you just stuff him in the category of a good teacher?

Did you just try to learn some principles from him, or did you begin to realize that if the resurrection is true and real, that Jesus is much more than just a good teacher and that he's actually the savior of the world? And his invitation to us today is to learn to truly, truly live.

Again, I wish I could tell you, man, the stakes don't matter, but the bible says that all of us are without excuse. The bible goes so far to say that even nature is crying out to the glory of God.

That everything we interact with is crying out that there is a created order to all of this. There's a creative designer behind it all. And the question is is who is he? My submission to you is that Jesus proved that it was him two thousand years ago when he came back to life. The question for you today is what are you gonna do with Jesus? The ball. The ball is now in your court. You have to make a decision.

You have to reconcile with who is Jesus. And I just need to remind you, the scriptures tell us that that our earthly our earthly decision is what determines our eternal destination.

What does that mean? That God is making himself known to all of us, and you get a choice. You get a choice to say yes to Jesus or not. You can choose to walk away. You can choose to continue to live your life, to be the Lord of your own life, do your own thing,

or you can choose to bend the knee to the lordship of Jesus and step into what the scripture says is truly living, a life that is abundant and full, but it requires you to kinda get to the end of yourself. And so this morning, the question is is how do we practically

do that? Let me share with you so what I think is the best news of all. Romans chapter 10 verse nine says, here's what it means to accept Jesus into your life. All you have to do is openly declare that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead and you will be saved.

Here's what's amazing about the invitation of Jesus. It's the only world religion that doesn't say, figure out your life. Get rid of the addiction. Stop the pornography thing and then come back to God when you've when you've perfected yourself. No. This is the paradox of Christianity is that you and I can't fix ourselves,

but there's a God that proved that he's trustworthy, who's open, who's extended an invitation to us, and all we have to do is believe

and accept that he is who he claims to be and invite the spirit of God to move in us, and that what God will then begin to do is to take us through a process where the holy Spirit will begin to change us from the inside out. He'll begin to transform the brokenness out of us, but it starts with you making a decision.

It starts with us bending the knee saying, Jesus, man, I've tried everything that this world has to offer. Now, I'm giving you my life, you and and I have to make a decision today. What are you going to do with Jesus?

I wanna give some of you an opportunity today as we close our service. I'm gonna ask everybody if you would just close your eyes and bow your heads. I wanna create an intimate environment where the spirit of God who's been moving all weekend is gonna continue to move in the hearts of many of you today.

I just want to remind you, I know it feels like you're here randomly, but there are no coincidences in the kingdom of God that what happened behind the scenes God orchestrated all types of events and details to get you in this room.

And just like I sat in a church like this twenty years ago, feeling like the spirit of God and the pastor who's on that stage was talking specifically to me. I've since learned that that was the spirit of God that was trying to get a hold of me. That was trying to get my attention just like he is with some of you right now in this room. Let me encourage you. Don't don't don't shy away from it. Don't back away from it. Instead lean into it and say, Jesus,

I see you. I hear you. I'm saying yes to you. If you're here today and you want to confess with your mouth and believe in your heart that Jesus is Lord, I'm gonna ask you on the count of three to just throw your hand up in the air so I know who I'm praying with. And I'm gonna believe that some of you are gonna put miracles in motions in this place. There's already hands going up which is what I love. One, if this is you, put your hand in the air. Two, you know this is your moment. Three, right where you are. Hands up all over this room. Don't be ashamed. There's hands going up all over this auditorium. Literally dozens and dozens of people right now saying yes to Jesus.

Father, we see every hand responding to you. Keep your hands up proudly. Reaching out to heaven saying, Jesus, I'm I'm reaching for you. I'm surrendering my life to you. You prove that you are worthy of my worship two thousand years ago when you when you came down and dwelt among us. You lived the life we couldn't live. You died the death that we deserve. You can put your hands down.

If that was you or you know it should have been you, the prayer still counts. I want to encourage you. Pray a prayer like this with me in the quietness of your heart. Just say, Jesus, with all the faith that I have, I give you my life. I give you my past, my presence, and my future. Thank you Jesus for dying for me.

I choose from this day forward to live for you. Jesus come into my heart now and set me free. It is in the holy, precious, mighty name of Jesus all God's people said. Come on. All God's people said, amen and amen.