Episode Transcript
[00:00:08] Good morning, 1115.
[00:00:10] Good morning. If I have not met you, my name is Michael Fueling. I'm the lead pastor here at the village church. If you have a Bible, you can open it up to the book of Leviticus, chapter 23. And I want to start off this message with a question. It's called a rhetorical question, which means do not answer out loud back. All right?
[00:00:33] Have you ever kept a sinful thing in your life, even though you knew it needed to go?
[00:00:43] Like, if you ever kept something that you knew was sin, you knew God didn't want it for you, and you kept it, and you looked at it, you knew it, and you're like, you know what? I'm gonna hold on to this maybe a little while longer. My hunch is that if we're all being honest, every single one of us have done this. Now, if God has brought something to your mind, here's my question for you. What was your excuse? What was your excuse for knowing something was sin and then choosing to keep it in your life? Okay, so, as a parent, I've heard a lot of excuses. As a pastor, I've heard a lot of excuses. But as a human being, I have given a lot of excuses. Amen. To anyone else here. Like, we are the kings and queens of excuses. So I want to share with you a handful of excuses that I have heard in different ways. And, guys, I think you'll just be reminded we are professional excuse givers for keeping sin in our lives. Here's one.
[00:01:39] It's not hurting anybody right now, so who cares?
[00:01:44] I know she's not a Christian, but what if I don't find anybody better?
[00:01:50] But if I tithe, what if I won't have money later?
[00:01:55] I am not qualified or godly enough to do it.
[00:02:01] My friends will disown me if they find out.
[00:02:07] If I don't do it, they will fire me.
[00:02:12] I mean, there's all sorts of interpretations on this subject, so who's to really say it's wrong?
[00:02:18] The Bible might say it's wrong, but I don't feel convicted about it.
[00:02:24] God will forgive me anyways, so a few more times can't be that bad.
[00:02:31] Once I get through this difficult time, then I'll stop.
[00:02:38] I need this to cope with the stress I'm under.
[00:02:44] I can't help it. It's just the way I am.
[00:02:48] I'll make up for it by doing good things later.
[00:02:54] I'm not ready to give this up.
[00:02:58] Anybody recognize any of those in your own life? I hope none of you, like, kick the person next to you. Yeah, you're the queen of excuses. You're the king, right? So the moment you trust in Jesus, you tell God, I am so. I have sinned against you. I believe in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. But there, when you become a Christian, whether you fully understand it or not, you are making a deal with God in this moment. And effectively, what you're saying is, not only am I sorry for my sin, of which you had to die and pay for when I see sin in my life, what you're agreeing to when you become a Christian is, I'm going to get rid of it the moment I realize it. And yet here we all are, a whole bunch of people who trusted in Christ and who have held onto sin far too many times for far longer than we ever, ever should have. Now, there's an old puritan word that I love, and I want to share it with you. It's the word mortification.
[00:03:51] And mortification means to put known sin to death so that the moment you realize something is sin, because we don't always realize it at first, but the moment you realize that something is sin, we step back and we say, nope, I made a commitment to Jesus that when I see sin in my life, I'm actually gonna get rid of it, and I'm gonna follow Christ. Now, here's the deal. For most Christians, killing sin is not a natural instinct, which is why when somebody becomes a Christian, when they are a young believer, and we are discipling them, one of the first skills that we need to teach somebody is how to identify and to get rid of sin. Because if you don't learn that when you are a young Christian, as you grow up, it gets more and more challenging to get rid of sin that is in your life. And so this is why we take people and we say, when you're young in the faith, no, we're actually gonna teach you how to find sin and how to get rid of it. So I'll just take a minute here on the front end. Three ways that we spot sin. Like, how do I know if something is actually sin? And here's the first way God's word says, so how did the nation of Israel know what was sin and what was not?
[00:05:06] Because you can't just read God's mind. And so what God did is he gave them his word, and it was crystal clear you should not do this, and you should do this. These things are wrong. These things are good. Like, when God's word says, something is sin, and that is the easiest way that we know that something is actually sin. And so if there's a part of your life that is contradicting something the Bible explicitly says is sin, the moment you realize this, if you're going to be a Christ follower, here's what we do. We say, okay, that's sin. And I need to go now down a path to figure out how to get this thing out of my life. How do you know something is sin? Number two, God's spirit convicts you. John 16 eight says, the Holy Spirit will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment. You guys know that little voice that's like, I know that. You know that I know that this thing, you shouldn't be doing it. You should stop it. And then you, like, put fire on it and quench it and don't listen to that voice. And then it just keeps coming back. Anybody know the voice of the Holy Spirit when you are holding on to something that you know and he knows is sin and he doesn't want it in your life? Sometimes we ignore the word of God, or we may not even know what the word of God says, but the Holy Spirit, he just is, like, unrelenting. Like, this thing, this person, this addiction, it needs to go, how do you know something is sin? Number three, God's people love you enough to actually call it out.
[00:06:27] When people call out sin in our life, there are two kinds of sin they're gonna call out. One is what we call explicit sin, meaning you are actually violating an explicit command in scripture. So, like, if you murder somebody and I call you out on that, God says, don't murder, and you just killed that person, and that is wrong, right? Or if you are stealing or you are lying, these are, like, provable, measurable offenses. It's easy to cut, confront people on things that are explicit and measurable. There's a second kind of sin, and it's actually really hard to be confronted on. And we call this implicit sin, meaning we are breaking not a biblical law. Like, do not murder, do not steal, but we are violating a biblical principle. Let me give you an illustration.
[00:07:12] Pride.
[00:07:13] How do you confront somebody on pride? Like, how do you measure pride? Pride is one of those things that it's. It's like, hard to look at something and say that was explicitly pride. But it's also one of those things that if someone comes up to you and they say, I think I'm seeing pride in you. I mean, here's one of the first things that we need to understand about pride. Pride is inherently defensive. It will protect itself. What do you mean, I'm prideful? What do you mean? Number two, the last person, I don't know if you're aware of this, but you know who. The last person to ever know they're prideful is the person who's prideful. Because what pride does is it camouflages itself so that you can never see it for what it is. Almost always. There are two ways to learn you're prideful. One is someone tells you because they love you enough and they're willing to take the risk to confront pride. By the way, it's a risk every time because it is defensive. The other way is, some of you, you've had this. You have the unusual or awkward privilege of listening to yourself on audio or watching yourself on a video and seeing what it's like to be on the other end of you. And then you do and you're like, oh, I don't like that at all. How many of you want to, like, be recorded teaching the Bible or doing something like that? Very few of you. Right? And so, for the vast majority of us, do you know how you're going to learn you're prideful? Someone's going to love you enough to take the risk to tell you, even though they know deep down inside, it is the most difficult sin to actually confront. Now, that's just one of them. These are implicit sins. So how do you know when something is sin? God's word says so. God's spirit convicts you. Or God's people have the courage and the love to come up to you and say this. Now, here's what you should be asking, Michael. We're in a series on Leviticus and the feast. What does all of this have to do with any of that? It has everything to do with it. So, Leviticus 23. Before we jump into that, I want to give a brief overview of what Pastor Dean talked about last week. The three main reasons that God gave the nation of Israel feasts and festivals. You guys ready? Number one, God gave them Old Testament feasts to prepare Israel for Jesus arrival. And so God was prepping this nation for centuries and millennia for the inevitable coming of the messiah. Now, when you tell your children or your people, your students, or whatever it is, you tell them, hey, as a dad or mom, I need you to clean your room. I need you to do the dishes. I need you to go do the thing. You can't treat your brother or sister this way.
[00:09:38] Are you going to tell them why you're doing it every single time? Probably not. And at some point, you're like, I don't have to tell you why. I understand why is your favorite question. But as your dad, as your mom, as your grandma or your grandpa, if I tell you to do it, just trust me, you need to go do it.
[00:09:53] But why do we tell our kids to do these things? Our kids could look at us and say, who cares if I make my bed? Who cares if I clean my room? Who cares if we don't do the dishes? Who cares if the house is a mess?
[00:10:05] Well, it probably doesn't matter a ton right now, but the reason we tell our kids to do things is because we are forming something in them for when they're adults and we are actually having them do things that they don't fully understand, so that when they grow up, they go, oh, I get it. You're teaching me actually how to take care of stuff. You're teaching me how to actually live in this world as an adult. You never told me all the ins and outs of the whys, but you were actually up to something in the way you raised me. Striking that as we talk to multiple people who have grown up, those whose parents didn't discipline them. There is a strong loathing for moms and dads as kids grow up, to parents who didn't discipline them, but the moms and dads who had a healthy disciplinary process in the home. These kids usually grow up to have a deep love, affection, and appreciation for their mom and dad. Isn't that interesting? But what are we doing in these moments? But we are forming them for the future. We're preparing them for the inevitability of adulthood, which is going to come like a freight train. Number two, Old Testament feasts instilled God's core values into the soul of this nation. And again, there's no way to know what's important to the heart of God unless he tells us. What God did is he created holidays, feasts, festivals, memorials around these really important core values. This is striking. Like, in America, we have what's called memorial day. We just celebrated it, and we do something really weird on Memorial Day. It's a day where we're celebrating people who have been killed as they defended our country.
[00:11:39] So we throw parties, we get all of our family and friends together, and we eat and we celebrate. Isn't that kind of a weird thing? Right, but what happens when you throw a party and you celebrate and you do it every single year? You start to form core values inside your kids. And the next generation, they start to realize that actually we need to appreciate the men and the women who stood for our freedom and died. And so culturally, you begin to develop these core values. And this is exactly what God did for the nation of Israel. You're going to see as we go through these feasts and festivals, each one of them reflects a core value to the heart of God that he was instilling into this nation by creating an annual celebration. And one of the absolute best ways to get values into the heart of somebody is to throw a party every year and to celebrate it. Apparently, psychologically, God knows us because he made us, and we respond really well. Old Testament feasts, they created a culture, number three, that lasted generations.
[00:12:37] And so what we find is that this wasn't just for one generation, but God created not just a law, but an entire calendar that has weekly rhythms, monthly rhythms, annual rhythms, to reinforce all of these values, not just for one generation, but for generations to come. And this brings us to Leviticus 23. Welcome to the feast, the festival. The celebration of. This is going to sound weird. Unleavened bread. Mesmerizing. All right, the feast is directly connected to Passover. Most people think that Passover and unleavened bread are the same thing. And so Passover happens on the first month of the year, on the 14th day. And Leviticus 23 five says this. In the first month, on the 14th day of the month, at twilight, is the Lord's Passover. In fact, Passover is technically a day, but Passover is a meal that happens at twilight. The feast of unleavened bread doesn't start until the next day, not the 14th, but the 15th of the first month. And so here's what verse six says. The 15th day of the same month, one day later after Passover, is the feast of unleavened bread. And who is this feast to, by the way? It's to the Lord. For seven days, you shall eat unleavened bread.
[00:13:58] Verse seven says, on the first day, you shall have a holy convocation. And so the first day of unleavened bread is the Sabbath. So they're not just worshiping, but they are bringing gifts, and they're bringing very expensive gifts to Yahweh. You shall not do any ordinary work. You shall present a food offering to the Lord for seven days. On the 7th day, there's another holy convocation. So unleavened bread begins with worship on the Sabbath. It ends a week later with worship on the Sabbath.
[00:14:25] The weird thing about the feast of unleavened bread is that it strangely focuses on a seemingly insignificant object.
[00:14:38] It seems to have this really intense focus on the dough that mothers were preparing on the day when God freed them from Egypt. God created an entire holiday out of dough.
[00:14:54] All right, let's learn why. Exodus 1215. Go back a book. I'll put it on the screen for you. Moses instructs Israel, seven days, you shall eat unleavened bread. On the first day, you shall remove leaven out of your houses. And so you would go around your entire house, anywhere there was leaven, you made sure you got rid of it. Then it says, for if anyone eats what is leavened from the first day Sabbath, until the 7th day, the Sabbath the next week, that person shall be cut off from Israel. Guys, that feels like intense for bread, doesn't it?
[00:15:33] Verse 19 reiterates the threat. For seven days, no leaven is to be found in your houses. If anyone eats what is leavened, that person will be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he is a sojourner or he is a native to the land. Oh, you're visiting. Oh, welcome. Oh, you have leavened. You're dead. No, like, this is serious. Like, there was going to be no violations whatsoever in the nation of Israel during this week. Go forward to the Book of Deuteronomy, chapter 16. And what you'll see in the Bible is that the first five books is that these feasts and festivals are talked about a little bit in each of these books. Deuteronomy 16 three gives us a little bit different insight.
[00:16:15] Seven days you shall eat with unleavened bread and listen to what God calls this bread, the bread of affliction for you. You came out of the land of Egypt in haste that all the days of your life you remember the day when you came out of the land of Egypt. Let me illustrate why God took this seemingly insignificant object, dough, specifically unleavened dough, and created an entire annual week festival celebration out of it, if you can. I want you to imagine, for 400 years, you and your family and your ancestors have all been slaves. But the worst kind of slaves, beaten and oppressed the vast majority of the adults, they die young.
[00:17:18] Your daughters have been violated, your sons beaten into submission, the will of your dad broken, the hope of all the children dashed.
[00:17:30] 400 years later, you are wondering. You've heard about Yahweh, the God of Israel, and you mostly feel like an abandoned child.
[00:17:39] This nation has tormented you and your children, your grandchildren, your mothers, your fathers, your grandparents for generations.
[00:17:47] And then, and something miraculous, Yahweh inflicts ten plagues on the gods of Egypt, humiliating them, shaming them, showing their utter impotent powerlessness. And in the 10th plague, he goes after God, in the flesh, pharaoh, and goes after the son of God, Pharaoh's son, and shows his weakness and inability to go toe to toe with the God of Israel.
[00:18:15] And God shows up and God is going to look at these people and say, I'm going to set you free. It's been 400 years. I'm going to shame this entire nation and all of their gods. The process, now, listen, if you were a slave and God came to you and said, the time to go is now, get up, leave your houses. You have a two hour window. Leave. What do you do? Village church. You get out, you run as fast as you can.
[00:18:41] Now, God did something very gracious to the nation of Israel before he came and told them to get out. He told them, listen, you're gonna have some bread.
[00:18:54] And I don't care where it's at in the process, you take the bread and you leave.
[00:19:00] Because here's what God knew. If God didn't warn them about this dumb thing and the bread, and he came to them in the middle of the night and said, get up, it's time to go, here's what people would say, but the bread is not ready.
[00:19:18] But I got to put the leaven. We can't leave with unleavened bread. God, we need a couple hours, and this is what he's preventing them from. You want to talk about dumb excuses to stay in Israel or Egypt, dumb excuses to stay in the slavery of your sin, but we have to have leavened bread. We can't do unleavened bread. And God's like, listen, who cares about the bread? And so he tells them beforehand, like, basically, I'm gonna wake you up and I'm gonna call you out, and it's gonna be before the time when your bread is leavened. And so you get up and you take this unleavened bread and you don't worry about the leaven. I know you love a good loaf of leavened bread. Don't worry about the bread.
[00:20:00] When I tell you to go, get up and leave. And apparently God knew that the nation of Israel, I mean, from that moment on, and all of us, we needed to be reminded that when God says, get rid of sin, get out of Egypt, we need to do it immediately. And apparently he knew that not only Israel, but we need to be reminded on a regular basis that the people of God, we didn't just have our blood and our sins paid for by the blood of the lamb. Jesus. We actually need to be reminded now that you've been forgiven. Kill sin wherever you find it. He knew they needed it. Now, there's a meme that has haunted me for some time now, and it's a picture of a freshly baked loaf of bread. And here is the quote on it.
[00:20:46] As an adult, I am shocked that I still cannot control myself around warm bread.
[00:20:54] Like, you know who you are, by the way. I will go to your house, and there are some of you. You love to make bread. And I'll be like, I might have been on a diet for 30 days. I'm killing it. I'm, like, doing so well, and then all of a sudden. But I made warm bread, and it's leavened and it's fluffy and it's hot, and I'm like, what diet? I have no idea what you're talking about. Like, do you have butter? Can we just put tons and tons on it? I mean, this is so amazing. And it's, like, striking to me. And, like, God is literally, like, can we just agree on something? Unleavened bread is. That's terrible. Like, anybody who likes unleavened bread more, it's because you're gluten intolerant. That is why. 99% of people who are going to compare, like, a fresh baked loaf of leavened bread versus a matzah cracker, right? We're going to take the bread any day. He's even like, it's the bread of affliction. Like, who wants to eat that? And so we take communion, and we're like, man, I don't think I really like this communion. It's not supposed to be good. It is not supposed to be delicious, and it's not a amen, moms and dads, to all of your children.
[00:21:58] And so, like, this idea, like, God is just like, I agree. I agree with you guys. Unleavened bread is miserable. But give me unleavened bread and Jesus any day over leavened bread and Egypt. Give me the freedom of Christ, even if it means I have to eat unleavened bread for the rest of my stinking life. I will give up leavened bread if it means I get Jesus. And yet there are these. These people are like, well, if you hadn't told us, we probably would have been like, but what about the bread? No, I mean, it's just so good. We can't.
[00:22:28] Guys, I don't know what the leaven is in your life. I don't know what this specifically represents. You probably know at this point, but whatever you are holding onto that is keeping you in Egypt. Stop it. Throw it out. Let it go. Do what you have to do, because unleavened bread with Christ is better than a great loaf of bread and slavery in Egypt. And so God takes every year, this feast, this festival, and he's like, listen, I need to remind you that every, every single year, you're gonna go through every part of your house as a metaphor, as a living illustration, and you're gonna just hunt down every little speck of any kind of leaven whatsoever, and you're gonna get rid of it as a reminder of how I want you to treat this sin in your life.
[00:23:11] And the moment you see it and you realize it, you're like, there's loving right there. You don't get to turn a blind eye because, oh, it tastes so good. And this is what God's call is. And so he creates this entire feast, an entire festival about dough, because the dough was a great reminder. Well, God, we can't leave Egypt now because the bread's so good. You can.
[00:23:34] So at the beginning, we talked about how every one of these feasts and festivals, God designed them to instill a cultural value in the nation of Israel. And the first one we talked about was Passover. And the cultural value is this. And there's no way to know this unless God tells us.
[00:23:53] Without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sins.
[00:23:58] Without the shedding of blood, like your sin has separated you from God. And the only thing that will make it right is the shedding of pure, holy blood, and that is the lamb of God, Jesus Christ.
[00:24:08] And another core value, not just, by the way, for the nation of Israel, but God's people in whatever millennia you find them in. Another core value is anything that tethers us to Egypt, anything that tethers us to slavery, we do everything we can to get rid of it and to leave it behind.
[00:24:26] Leaven is the dumb thing that keeps you from the best thing.
[00:24:33] Leaven is the dumb thing. You're like, oh, I mean, the bread is so good in Egypt, and you're like, but you could have freedom if you left the bread behind, or at least the leaven. And all of the time we do this, every one of us in this room, myself included, we choose the slavery of a sin over the freedom that is in Christ.
[00:24:55] And so we stop and we just say, we are no longer going to do this anymore. I have been tolerating sin in my life for far too long. And it has never served me well. It has never gone well for me when I give myself over to it. So why do I keep doing it? Because it tastes objectively so good. And even God admits it tastes good. It tastes good. Leavened bread fresh is delightful, but it's not worth your freedom.
[00:25:24] Now, what I want to do is I want to share with you three. So what's number one?
[00:25:30] Leaving Egypt. It hurts when God calls you away from sin. When God calls you away from slavery, he's always calling you to three really sacred things. The first thing he calls you to is worship. And we see this the moment. I mean, Passover, your sin is paid for by the blood of the lamb. And the very first thing you do in the next day is you worship. The feast of unleavened bread is about getting rid of the sin. It's about worshiping God. It's about giving him your everything. It begins and it ends with offerings and an intense pursuit of weeding out sin.
[00:26:05] But when God calls you away from sin, he always calls you to wilderness.
[00:26:11] And I want to just be honest with you guys. I hate the wilderness.
[00:26:15] When you leave the familiarity of Egypt and the delightful taste of leavened bread and all the things that come with it, the things you know, and you have to put that aside and you have to go into the unknown.
[00:26:32] It's really, really hard. And when people leave behind key relationships or they leave behind addictions, or they leave behind the things that have tethered them to sin, most people go through a season of sadness, of grief, of loss, because your identity has been bound up in these things, and they've had a powerful impact on your life.
[00:26:53] And so when you go into the wilderness, one of these you have to understand is that it is a process to leave the old life behind and to learn what it means to live in the freedom of Christ. And it is not unusual that after a very short time, some people even go into depression as they leave their old life, by the way, that is normal. But Israel taught us a really important lesson, by the way, because when they left Egypt and they saw the miracle of the Red Sea and all the miracle of the ten plagues, almost immediately, you know what they started to do?
[00:27:23] I mean, Egypt wasn't that bad.
[00:27:27] I mean, we had food, at least, and the bread was so good.
[00:27:33] And what happens is you go through this wilderness, and one of the great temptations in the wilderness is that we don't actually endure the difficulty of leaving sin behind. And we start to remember, and then something funny happens. Because you know what the Israelites did that actually made it so that almost none of them got out of the promised land? Of all the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, plus, only two men made it into the promised land from that crew, who knows their names? Joshua and Caleb. Only two.
[00:28:02] Because when they got out for a little while, you know what they started doing?
[00:28:05] Grumbling and complaining. I mean, where's God taking us? I mean, I didn't know it was going to be this hard. I mean, things were better back there. And I don't know. Rumor has it, apparently, God hates grumbling and complaining. So, like, if you are leaving a life of sin, can we just agree the wilderness isn't a blast?
[00:28:22] The wilderness is not the most fun place, but it is the doorway to freedom. And you can go back, but I can't guarantee you're going to get another chance to get out of the slavery of that thing. But when God says it's time to go, you've got a two hour window. Get out now. Who cares about the bread? Move on. You get up and you go. And here's the deal. Most people give up because they don't realize how hard it is, because they'll be in the wilderness. And I want to tell you right now, the wilderness is challenging. Which brings me to the third thing, that if you're going to actually leave Egypt, you're going to have to face, which is hardship. I'm going to tell you why leaving Egypt is hard.
[00:28:55] Sin is powerful.
[00:28:58] Sin lives off of your soul and your future, and it does not die easy. And it will do anything it can to survive, which is why when you kill sin, you have to kill all of it. You leave a little molecule of sin, it's like love, and it grows into something much bigger. And so most people, when they get rid of sin, they're like, I'm gonna get rid of 99% of it. And that sneaky 1% always comes back, doesn't it? And you know exactly what I'm talking about, which is why the people of God, we don't leave an ounce of love. And when we find known sin in our life, we go and we clean out the entire thing. We're like, we're not tolerating an ounce of this because every bit that I tolerate now is gonna come back and grow into something bigger later.
[00:29:37] And so I can tell you this on the front end, I can tell you that the freedom that Christ offers you is exponentially better than the slavery of Egypt. But I can tell you that the pathway out of Egypt into the promised land is challenging. It is emotional. It is filled with multiple gut wrenching decisions. You will be sad. You will cry. You will have to leave things, addictions, and people behind you. But I am telling you, give me unleavened bread with Jesus any day, than leavened, warmed, wonderful, buttery bread and slavery in Egypt. And now that you know this, when it gets hard, you don't go. I didn't realize this was going to be this hard. And I'm telling you, it's hard, and it's going to be difficult. Sometimes the deeper you are into Egypt, the longer the process.
[00:30:27] Sometimes the wilderness season can take months or years.
[00:30:30] But I am telling you, do not give up. Do not run back to Egypt. Do not be deluded. Well, there was food and warm bread. Ignore all of that. It is the deception of sin that is committed to feeding off of your soul and your future. Do not feed it. Starve it to death. Future, you and Jesus want you to starve it to death, and you can do this through Christ.
[00:30:54] I'd love to say they lived happily ever after for that nation of Israelites. They did not. They wanted to go back. They grumbled, they complained, and they might not have gone back physically, but they went back in their heart.
[00:31:07] They went back in their heart, and they loved the gods of Egypt. They loved the sin of Egypt, and they took that with them into the promised land, which is why God basically said, there's a whole bunch of blessing I wanted to offer you, but I will not let you take this junk into my promised land. You're all going to die in the wilderness, and it will be your children and the next generation who actually received, receive the blessing. Strong words. But God stood by it and protected an entire nation.
[00:31:32] Number two, Christian.
[00:31:35] Get out. Stay out and don't go back.
[00:31:41] But our bread isn't ready yet. Gosh, we are the kings and queens of excuses, aren't we? Who? I want to say it again. Who cares about the stinking bread?
[00:31:52] If I have to eat unleavened bread with Jesus, the bread of affliction, then I will do it.
[00:31:58] Remember, leavened bread represents the thing keeping you from getting out of slavery.
[00:32:04] And I just want to say this again. Get out. Stay out and don't go back. First Corinthians five, seven, eight. The apostle Paul actually shows us what it looks like as believers to really obey this principle of the feast of unleavened bread. He says this cleanse out the old leaven that you may be a new lump. I hate that word, but it's here so that you may be a new lump as you really are unleavened. And this is like, listen, I already saved you through Passover, the blood of Christ. I have cleansed you. Stop trying to put loving into something that's not loving. You don't need it. It's not good for you. Leave it alone. For Christ, our Passover lamb has been sacrificed. Let us therefore celebrate the festival not with the old leaven, the leaven of malice and evil, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth, meaning the purity of a clean conscience. That I am who I say I am, and I'm living in the truth and reality of living with Jesus.
[00:33:04] Number three, I want to talk to those of you who are not christians in the room.
[00:33:08] Don't be that guy who needs to hit rock bottom before they run to Jesus.
[00:33:18] I'll give you a few reasons why.
[00:33:21] Number one is that many people die on the way to rock bottom.
[00:33:26] And when you die, there are no second chances.
[00:33:30] And there are many people that rock bottom is the very thing that actually ends up killing them anyways. And let me say it again, there are no second chances after death.
[00:33:40] Some people hit rock bottom, and people think in their brain, oh, I can handle it. I can handle it. But for those of you in the room who hit rock bottom, you would tell you that it is a miserable hell that you would never wish upon anybody. And there are some people that when they hit rock bottom, it is so bad, it is so lonely, it is so devastating that they can't even pick up their head to call on Jesus. And they live in this rock bottomless until the day they die.
[00:34:08] Here's a great news.
[00:34:10] You don't have to be the person who hits rock bottom.
[00:34:15] You actually can be wise and say, that does not sound delightful. In fact, I would rather come to Christ now than have him let me hit rock bottom before I turn to him.
[00:34:28] So there's this phrase that. That I often hear. Mostly men, by the way, sometimes women, but mostly men, they will say. And it's a phrase that drives me nuts.
[00:34:39] And if you have said it, I want you to know I have said a whole bunch of dumb things. I think this is one of those dumb things that we say. I've said a bunch of dumb things in my life and I've had to take them back. Amen. Anyone else?
[00:34:50] And if you are sitting, like, next to somebody and you have said this to them, it is. Okay. I'm not trying to shame you, but I would love to encourage you. Here's the dumb thing that I hear people say.
[00:35:02] I'm one of those persons who has to learn the hard way.
[00:35:08] What?
[00:35:09] No, you're not.
[00:35:13] That's not, like, in your DNA, by the way. I'm one of those persons who has a bald head. Yes, I am. I am not one of those persons who has to learn the hard way. That is a decision. That is a choice.
[00:35:26] You right now can unchoose this choice.
[00:35:30] Why would you want to be the person who has to learn the hard way? Why would you want to be the person that your children and grandchildren look up to and say, dad had to learn the hard way. Mom had to learn the hard way? That is not what you want. And do you look at your children and say, I want you to learn the hard way. You want to spare them from the misery and the pain and the hell of rock bottom. And so here's the deal. If you're the kind of person who's like, I got to learn the hard way, I have great news. You can stop that insanity, and you can come to Jesus today and say, I am not going to be that person any longer. That prideful, stubborn, rebellious heart. I'm going to kill it because I see it, and I don't want that. And so, God, I'm going to come to you and I'm going to say, listen, I am sorry for my sin. I know it's wrong. And before I hit rock bottom, I'm going to turn to Christ and I'm going to find the sin in my life. I'm going to begin the arduous, excruciating, by the way, lifelong process of hunting down sin in my life and getting rid of it. And I guarantee you there are a whole bunch of men and women here who have said or grew up with this. I'm going to learn the hard way. And they would look at you and say, don't, please. Please don't learn the hard way. Please don't hit rock bottom. It's hell. And there's no reason for you to do it, because right now you have the ability to come to Jesus and say, I want to avoid that. Will you save me? Will you forgive me? And will you show me the pathway to life that is through Christ? And if you are here, and you're just like, I have never trusted in Christ, and I didn't even realize I needed to until today, like, come tell one of us upfront. We would love love to come alongside of you, champion you, resource you, encourage you and help you take a next step. Because I'm telling you this, whatever fresh bread and leavened bread and warm bread and buttery bread you have to leave behind Jesus is worth it. Give me unleavened bread with Christ any day. Amen. Village church let's pray together. Father, thank you for the feast and the festivals. And it's so funny that this thing, dough and leaven have such spiritual significance. But God, we are just reminded that there are so many things that tether us to Egypt and to slavery and to sin. And we love them, we have enjoyed them. We run to them, they make us feel safe, they make us feel comfortable.
[00:37:45] But God, if it really is not from you, would you give us the strength and the courage to not wait but to leave, to follow you, whatever that next step is? So God, thank you for your holy spirit that empowers us and convicts us. And so God, may your same holy spirit that is bringing conviction be the one that gives us the courage to take a next step so that we can be people who hunt down and weed out sin in our life.
[00:38:16] Lord, thank you for the passover lamb. Jesus, thank you that our sin has been paid for by the blood of Christ. And thank you that by the power of the Holy Spirit we have, we have the ability to hunt down sin and to begin to get rid of it in our life. So thank you for that. May we be evermore individually families in a church more and more holy, more and more like Christ. And in the process, we give you all the glory because it is all from you, for you, through you and to you. In Jesus name. Amen. Village church amen.
