He Comes Home
First B Jackson
2022-03-13

Automatically transcribed. Where this and the recording disagree, the recording is the record.

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Alright. Good morning, everybody. How are you? You missed an hour of sleep, and you're still here, and you made it. I've got a verse from first Corinthians two nine to lead us into worship.

But would and and would you stand? We'll we'll we'll stand and sing together. But the verse from from first Corinthians is, no eye has seen and no ear has heard and no mind has imagined what God has prepared for those who love him. Ain't that great? Let's start by singing beautiful one.

A

wonderful, wonderful so wonderful is your unfailing love cross has spoken mercy opened my eyes to wonders anew. You captured my heart with this love, because nothing on earth is as beautiful

announcements. Y'all can is this thing on, Nick? I think it is. Can you hear me now? Okay.

Good. Announcements. Monday nights at first b. What's happening, Carl?

We are on tomorrow at 06:00. Naomi is gonna make lasagna and bread and desserts and salad. So the food will be great. And you know what else though is great is we're starting a new book. So we'll be in James.

We're starting James tomorrow. And, this first chapter is about perseverance through trials. Yep. Perseverance through trials. I think it's gonna be it's a great practical book.

I think it's gonna be helpful. So 06:00, meal, music, message.

Practical wisdom. Meal, music, and message starting at six. Gospel conversation after the fact. So, he'll go through it, go through the passage, first nine or 10 verses or so, and then we'll go from there and kinda talk about it Awana is happening at the same time. That's kids club happening right here in this room and it's a good good time and I think we're going to take spring break off but we're on tomorrow night, okay?

We're on tomorrow night. So, kids matter to God. Bring em in. It's a fun time. If you want to get the Emails from church, please sign up at firstbjackson.org.

That'll help you. If you're not yet getting first b through the Bible reading through the Bible together, that has been so good. I'm loving that. That to me is a not just a time of Bible reading but it's kind of a word of testimony for the people who are who are writing it. They give us a little blurb about themselves before starting.

It's so good. That one you already know. Good. Anybody else have any announcements? I just wanna praise God this morning.

Announcements are my least favorite part of the service but I I am all willing to do em. Nobody's saying anything else. Stand up and praise God with us then. Thank you.

My history, your faithfulness is one beside me. The windstorms made way for spring. And every season from where I'm standing in, I see the evidence of your goodness all over my life. See promises in fulfillment all over my life, all over my life. See the cross, the empty grave.

See the cross, the empty grave. Yeah. That ends his endless all my sinner away because How do we wanna just pause just for a moment to say thank you for your faithfulness? Thank you for your faithfulness through everything throughout our entire lives. And, truly, would you help us remember when we are weak?

Fear may come, but it will also lead. Help us through. In Jesus' name, amen. I count on one thing. The same God that never fails will not fail me now.

You won't fail me now in waiting. The same God who never leaves is Oh, Lord, as we sing that song, would you teach us? Because, God, that is not our natural inclination all the time to praise our way through. But, God, would you give us the strength, the energy, the courage, everything that we need? We can't always we can't see what you can what you can see.

We don't always see that bigger picture, God, but would we trust? Help us in our unbelief when we we don't want to believe, when we can't believe right now. Help us to believe that you're truly working all things out for our good and your glory. And we You're gonna have a seat here for for a moment. This is the worship through giving part of the service, and I'll invite the ushers to come on forward from, James one seventeen.

This was all fresh in my mind since we're starting James. But it says every good and perfect gift is from above. Let's be reminded of that. Coming down from the father of heavenly lights who does not change like shifting shadows. May

we pray? This morning, thankful to be here. Thankful, Lord, to have breath in our lungs, to be able to breathe out praises to you, Lord. As human beings, we look around us and see things, and we tend, Lord. We tend to see the bad, not the good.

Study after study after study has shown that people in general are nine times as likely to say something bad as something good. Lord, may that not be true of us. May we look at the circumstances and find your mercy and your grace and your love in it. The goodness of God, may that pervade our lives. I pray, Lord, that we concentrate on seeing the good that is there and looking for the good that we can't yet see.

In Jesus' name, Lord, I ask you that you would spread your good news, your gospel, good news of the the sacrificial, loving death of Jesus where he voluntarily laid down his life to take the penalty for our sin. Lord, also to rehabilitate us, not just, that legal transaction, Lord, but to to actually make the way for transformation. I pray that we would be willingly and humbly bowed before you As your adherence, as your subjects of the sovereign king, Lord, I pray that we would be in obedience to you and your word. Would you take, Lord, these offerings that we give? Would you spread your kindness and your love and your goodness throughout this world, this celestial ball, as the song says?

Would you do it, Lord, to the very uttermost parts? I pray that you use us and our witness, Lord. We will overcome, but it's by the blood of the lamb. Others will hear because of the word of our testimony. What do we do with Jesus?

What do we say about Jesus? Would you have his praise ever on our lips and readiness to defend the hope that's in us. In Jesus name, amen.

Of the goodness

of God I love your voice you have led me through the In darkest night, you are close like no other. I've known you as a father. I've known you as a friend,

Children's church is happening downstairs and there they go. I've been I've been getting a lot of prayer requests this week and I I just want to pray before I start for some of those. God almighty, for those requests of the week that we've shared on the prayer chain and some we haven't, lord. I just wanna pray for for healing for one thing, for healing for those who are suffering. We know that Lowell Glick, a friend of a friend here in this church.

Lowell and Sherry have been serving in Mexico for more than twenty years, twenty five years or so. And Lowell's body is is riddled with cancer right now, Lord. And in our limited view, we look at that and we just get discouraged, and it's the worst thing that could happen, Lord, in our minds, but that's not true. Would you show us, Lord, that that's not true? I pray, Lord, that his treatments would be successful, But Lord, I pray that you would prepare the hearts of Sherry and all the people that they've been serving for a new vision of you.

I pray, Lord, that you would use this, what we see as a horrible circumstance in the lives of so many. Also, if if there's anybody here who's moved to help in that situation, I pray that too. For Hayden Isler, the seven month old son of somebody I married a while back to her husband who has cancer. Lord, I look at that, and it's really hard for us to adjust that seven month old with cancer. Lord God Almighty, would you help us would you help us to continue to praise you when we see difficult and desperate circumstances for Claudia Stephenson, a dear, dear friend from Columbus, Georgia, wife of a doctor, and, delight for all these years.

She's suffering right now. She's hurting. God Almighty, our experience here below is filled with extreme highs and some pretty low lows. Lord, would you help even us out, as we praise you in the storm in the midst of it all? I pray, Lord, that we would not be tempted or to doubt or to fall away.

As the collective of this church, Lord, the burning hot fire of your word in us, I pray that we would keep each other strong, that we would keep each other's fire stoked. In Jesus' name, if there's someone who's fallen away and it's just an ember outside of the fireplace and beginning to grow cold, may we, Lord, bring them back in. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. Alright.

Matthew 12, Mark three, and Luke 11. All of these, I think are the same. I think they're the same story in some harmonies of the gospel including Thomas and Gundry, the ones that I usually use. They leave Luke out of this, but it's the same story. Sounds like the same story to me.

They leave him out for various reasons. But Jesus is responding to accusations and attack on his ministry. That might sound like, oh my goodness. Here we go. What a fight.

He's responding, and I think as graciously as ever, but he's pointing out what is happening right there. So this is what it looks like. Matthew, Mark, and Luke. That's Matthew goes on a little longer than the rest. We'll do Mark first.

It's the shortest, and we're gonna just jump right into scripture. What I try to do is just say what it says. Since it says it three times in slightly different ways, we're going through a harmony of the gospel. We're doing Mark, then Luke, and then we'll go to Matthew, finish up, and we have a testimony at the end. So testimony time at the very end.

Mark starts off this, and this is actually the thing I probably put most more time in than anything else this week on this message. And he comes home, that little asterisk in the new American Standard Version is a historical present. It means he came home, but it's putting you right there in the action. He comes home and the crowd gathers again to such an extent that they, that means Jesus and his disciples, couldn't even eat a meal. They couldn't do anything.

They were right there pressed, a mighty throng as it were all around them. And then it says, and when his own people and people argue over what this means, his own people, could be family, could be friends, could be old friends, his own people, folks from Nazareth. I don't really know, but it's his own people. Could be his disciples. Could be.

I don't really know exactly what it is, but since I call myself one of his people, I wanna pay attention to it. Okay? Would you agree with that? We are his own people, are we not? So it says, he comes home, crowd gathers again to such an extent that they could not even eat a meal.

I think this is in Capernaum. And you'll remember from last week and the week before, Capernaum is one of the cities he said, woe be unto you Capernaum because if the miracles that happened to you, it happened anywhere else. They would have repented long ago and turned to the gospel and so he comes home. They're pressing in on him and his own people heard about this and they came out to take protective custody over him. We gotta get him out of there.

He's healing all these people and they're just pressing in on him. He's not getting any rest. I mean, we all know he often withdraws into the wilderness to pray, but he can't be doing that right now because people are all around him all the time. We gotta get him out of there. So they're figuring out a plan to go take custody of him, and that sounds like, well, that's nice.

And then we see this. For all of his own people, they were saying, he's crazy. He's lost his senses. Do you ever think Jesus is crazy? Be honest.

Yeah. Is that the way you're going to do this, lord? You're going to die on a cross? I mean, his own disciples had that kind of feeling. God, Jesus, does not always make sense to us.

It's not the way that we would do it. Of course, we're limited finite human beings and he's almighty God. But they came out to take custody of him, trying to protect him, I'm sure, before they were saying, he's lost his senses. He can't keep doing this, his own people. So I hope I answered the question with a, uh-uh.

I'm not sure who it is, but I know if I'm reading the gospels, I'm reading it from a hermeneutic of goodwill. A hermeneutic is the way that you see scripture. If you read scripture, believing scripture and believing that God is good and that he cares because he does. If you read scripture from a hermeneutic of goodwill and not a hermeneutic of skepticism, which if you watch TikTok, 97% of them. Okay?

There's a skepticism about the gospel and a skepticism where people make all kinds of fun of the first three chapters of Genesis or of the way that God chose to save mankind. But if you're looking at it from a hermeneutic of goodwill, it really helps, and it's not as crazy as people make it out to be. He's lost his senses. The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, come down from Jerusalem. It's because it's about 3,500 feet above Capernaum.

So coming down down the hill. Some of y'all have been there, walked down that hill, or ridden down in a bus. That's what I did. The scribes who came down from Jerusalem were saying, he's possessed by Beelzebub. Beelzebub.

It's another word for Satan. It actually means lord of the flies. Y'all remember that book? Lord of the flies, Beelzebub. What's strange about that, it means lord of the flies, but the reason is because of death, flies gather on the dead.

Isn't that awful? Lord of the flies. And actually, because flies also gather on dung, Baalzebub, like from the Old Testament, Baalzebub is lord of the flies, and then Baalzebub is kind of a play on words. Some people think that it's lord of the dung. That's not somebody to worship.

There it's kind of a term of derision for Satan, but it's Satan. He's possessed by Beelzebub, and he cast out demons by the ruler of the demons. And so, he called them to himself. It does not say that they were saying that to Jesus. It just says that the scribes were saying that.

And so he called them to himself and he began speaking to them in parables knowing we see in Matthew what was in their hearts. How can Satan cast out Satan? Think about that. Think about that. If he if there's somebody who is a powerful, you know, evil, malevolent being, how is it that he can cast himself out?

How can Satan cast out Satan? If a kingdom is divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. That makes sense? Yeah. Does it make sense in The US Of A right now?

We've got to do something to bring us together. The only way I see out of it is gather around the central figure of all history really individually for ourselves. The Bible tells us very few are gonna do that. But a kingdom divided against itself, that kingdom cannot stand. If a house is divided against itself, that house will not be able to stand.

We brace houses to be able to stand. We don't divide them against themselves. If Satan has risen up against himself and is divided, he cannot stand, but he is finished. It means he has an end. There is an end to Satan, and it's sure, and we know it, and we've covered the rest of the New Testament and some of the old, and we've seen it.

But if Satan has risen up against himself, he he's divided. He cannot stand, but he's finished. If he's working on these people to demonize them and possess them and oppress them, why is he gonna cast them out? Why would he? Jesus is reasoning with them.

He's refuting them first and then he's explaining and then he'll exhort but but no one can enter the strong man's house and plunder his property unless he first ties up the strong man and then he will plunder his house. Now, if you're wondering about this analogy, the strong man here is Satan and he's just using it as an analogy saying, the first thing you gotta do if you're gonna take over someone's property is you gotta tie them up first. Jesus was already doing that. Now, of course, the cross would be a big, huge blow to that, but he's already doing it. His miracles are showing that he has the power and authority to do it.

Truly, say to you, all sins fallen short. All sins will be forgiven, the sons and daughters of men. There is nothing, no action that you can do that cannot be forgiven. This is saying no. All of the sins will be forgiven, the sons and daughters of men.

And whatever blasphemies they commit. Now we don't use blasphemy very often these days. They probably used it a lot more than we did. If you watch the Google you ever look anything up on Google, and it'll tell you the word usage over the years, and it kinda drops and it rises, how often it shows up in print. Blasphemy comes and goes, but we don't use it very often.

When we do, it's almost always in a colloquial context. Very seldom. And there are preachers that still do, I'm sure. There are some Christians who still do. But I wanna just kinda look at what it is.

Blasphemies because since we use it mostly colloquially, this one is one. Okay? That's blasphemy. Where are my mechanics in car people? Gear heads in here.

That's a '55 Chevy, obviously. Post two door hardtop. And it has in it a 04/26 Hemi. Blasphemy. That's what they named it.

It's Blasphemy. It's got a Hemi in it. That's a Dodge motor for those of you who don't know. It's most classic of all Chevys and it's got the most classic of all Dodge motors in it. Blasphemy.

That's kind of the way we use it. Oh, you like so and so, I don't care who it is, Broncos, Chargers, whatever it is. Oh, blasphemy. We throw it up there colloquially. Well, the reason we use it colloquially is because this is what it means.

It is abusive or scurrilous language. That's bad when your definition needs another definition. Scurrilous, making or spreading scandalous claims about someone with an intention of damaging their reputation. That's the intent behind blasphemy. It is a scurrilous attack on his integrity.

And in our case, it's a scurrilous attack on his integrity, God's integrity. And it happens all the time in our world, all the time. I hear it every day, multiple times a day, where people are taking a God that is good and loving and caring and diminishing him or trying to. Ultimately, that is not going to happen. Blasphemy.

Abusive or scurrilous language, if you keep on going on, literally, blast is one word and then theme is another. Literally, is someone who is slow or sluggish to call something good that really is good. Think about that. And they are slow to identify what is truly bad, something that really is evil. So they look at good and evil, and the definition goes on.

Blasphemy switches right for wrong and wrong for right. It calls that which God disapproves right. And Romans one twenty five says, that exchanges the truth of God for a lie, and it can be any lie. Right? It can be anything that's not true that you switch it for.

And I feel like we're overcome with it. Truly, say to you, all sins will be forgiven, the sons and daughters of men, and whatever blasphemies they commit, whatever they have said can be forgiven. Now this gets to be the unpardonable sin. This is this is the verse right here. But whoever blasphemes against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness, but is guilty of an eternal sin.

So we have a limited and finite amount of time on this earth. We have a certain number of days, hours, minutes, whatever. We have a certain time. And if we reject the Holy Spirit, that is something that lasts forever. Whoever blasphemes or calls what the Holy Spirit calls good, bad, calls what the Holy Spirit calls bad, good, Whoo.

Against the Holy Spirit never has forgiveness. If we were to look in John, we would see the the the role of the Holy Spirit. I think we're gonna hit it again later on, so I will hold off right now. But John says that the the Holy Spirit is to convict us of our sin, to convince us of God's righteousness, and to illumine his word where we can understand it. So pushing that away is a very dangerous proposition.

And it says now, why Jesus said this? Why Jesus said that about blaspheming against the Holy Spirit is because that's what they were doing. Because they were saying, he has an unclean spirit. And what spirit did Jesus have? The Holy Spirit.

And because those people were saying, Beelzebub. They're calling the Holy Spirit of God, Satan. That's exchanging good for bad and bad for good. Right? That's blasphemy.

And he's giving them graciously, mercifully, a warning. This is what you're doing. As long as you're drawing breath, you still have a chance to change your mind. And all blasphemies that you commit will be, but not accepting what the Holy Spirit says is good and bad is a perilous, perilous thing because we don't know when our lives will come to an end. So that was Mark.

Here we go in Luke. It's just about the same thing, a little bit longer. A read it faster and I'm a get to Matthew. He was casting out a mute demon. Luke says, it was a mute demon.

So this guy had been struck literally dumb by this demon. And when the demon had gone out, the man who was previously unable to speak and everybody knew it, talked. And the crowds were amazed because this guy's never been able to utter anything. He's been trying rudimentary signs to get his point across for years, and all of a sudden, he's speaking. And that's amazing.

But some of them said, he cast out the demons by Beelzebub, the ruler of demons. I think we have a tendency also to give the devil more credit than he deserves. And we say give the devil his due, but I think we give him more than he's due a lot of the time. If we see something amazing, we think, what kind of powers of darkness did this? This man was set free and their immediate thought was, Jesus cast out demons by Beelzebub, the ruler of demons.

Others to test him were demanding of him a sign from heaven. They just saw him heal a mute man right there. Literally, two sentences ago, he heals a mute man and then they say, no, show us a sign. The sun came up this morning. You know what?

I did that. He he didn't say that though. He didn't say that. Everything that happens holds together because of him. And he said to them, because he knew their thoughts, he said, every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste.

A house that's divided against itself falls. He's asking for unity right here, by the way. He wants unity in the body. He knew their thoughts. He said to them, every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste, and a house divided against itself falls.

And if Satan also has been divided against himself, how will this kingdom stand? How will his kingdom stand? For you claim that I cast out demons by Beelzebub. Yet if by Beelzebub, I cast out the demon, by whom do your sons cast them out? I I didn't didn't do this on purpose.

I have been getting a lot of prayer requests, but those Pharisees, I imagine, a lot of people are saying, please be praying for so and so. Please be praying for so and so. Please be praying for so and so. And if if if there was somebody who could cast out a demon by a miracle of God, and that was a possibility. Pharisees did believe that in the afterlife, they did believe in angels and resurrection, and they did believe that God was still active in the world.

And so Jesus is saying, y'all do this too. Y'all try to set people free. Now, the fact that they had failed with this mute guy and with others doesn't mean anything. He's saying, if I do it and cast them out and you say it's by Beelzebub, what would you say if one of your own sons prayed for somebody and they actually got well? Would you would you say that was a demon?

Or would you say, wow, God's power and his grace and his mercy worked through the prayer of my whatever. Therefore, they'll be your judges. Those very ones that believe in the power of God, they'll judge you on this. This is a unique generation too. This generation of knowing Jesus in the flesh but not having access yet to his Holy Spirit.

This is a unique generation, and he he mentions that in Matthew. He even kinda goes a little further with it, but if I cast out the demons by the finger of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Now, that's what was happening. God, the same one who wrote their law, the finger of God. Think about that.

The finger of God wrote the law and know they love the law. If I cast out demons by that very finger that wrote your law, which will stand, by the way, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. Pay attention to what God is doing. When a strong man fully armed guards his own house, his possessions are secure, but when someone stronger than he attacks him and overpowers him, that man takes away his armor on which he had relied and distributes his plunder. All of the arsenal of the devil is easily overcome by God.

And that's what Jesus is alluding to here. The one who's not with me is against me. I know that you think you're for God. I know that you do, he's saying to the pharisees, but the one who's not with me is against me. All of your religiosity is tearing down rather than building up.

All of that that he was saying about Chorazin and Bethsaida and Capernaum, not recognizing what was going on, but Tyre and Sidon and Sodom, and he'll get to in Matthew, Nineveh, and queen of the South. When the unclean spirit comes out of a person that passes through waterless places seeking rest oh, wait a second. The one who is not with me is against me, and the one who does not gather with me scatters. We're gonna be on Jesus' side or we're gonna be against him. It's one or the other.

And either you're gathering in or you're scattering, you're making it worse in the way you use your words, in the way you use your life. You're either gonna be gathering people into the kingdom of God or you're gonna be scattering them. One or the other. When the unclean spirit comes out of a person that passes through waterless places seeking rest and not finding any. So this is, I believe, is a seeking to rid yourself of your own demons.

Okay? Even in community, but not trusting in Christ or his Holy Spirit. This is our trying to do whatever it is we can do to shake our own demons. When the unclean spirit comes out of a person and passes through waterless places seeking rest and not finding any, it then says, I'll return back to that house from which I came, that host. And when it comes, it finds it all swept and put in order, and then it goes, and it brings along seven other spirits more evil than itself, and they come in and live there.

And the last condition of that person becomes worse than the first. So to pull yourself up by your own bootstraps and work on it yourself and just concentrate more and more and more on behavior modification, if you succeed in getting rid of whatever sin it is that you had on your own. When it comes back, it'll be in an even more powerful form. Does that make sense? Pride is the most powerful of those forms, by the way.

That's what got the devil thrown out of heaven. Right? I will make myself like the most high. Get too big for your britches, and then pride is a horrible, horrible thing to and that the last condition of the person becomes worse than the first. I think he was actually talking to the Pharisees right there too.

He's like, you have no idea how bad this is. And you can just rely on me, but you're resistant to that. So that's Luke. Matthew, this is the same section that we've covered in Matthew. So, that's what I'm going to cover now.

So, three times is a charm. I hope but the rest of that right there, I'll see how time goes and we'll get to it, okay? Might get to it next week. Then, a demon possessed man who was blind and unable to speak. So, Matthew says, he was mute but he was also blind.

What a terrible condition. You can hear but you can't speak. You can't see. Demon possessed man who's blind and unable to speak was brought to Jesus and he healed him so that the man who was unable to speak, talked, and he could see and all the crowds were amazed and were saying, this man cannot be the son of David, can he? Can he?

This is messianic. It looks like it might be him but this can't be him. Right? I mean, the Pharisees are telling us this is not him. This certainly, this can't be him.

But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, this man cast out demons only by Beelzebub and the ruler of demons. This is them answering to the people who are wondering if maybe, maybe the Holy Spirit is saying, listen to this guy. Pay attention. He's the one. And the Pharisees were saying, this guy does it by the devil.

It's done have anything to do as bad. Don't listen to this horrible heretic. He's not one of us. He's not one of you. You don't want to follow after him.

He cast out demons only by Beelzebub and this is and knowing their thoughts, Jesus said to them, same thing we've read before, every kingdom divided against itself is laid waste. No city or house divided against itself will stand. And if Satan is casting out Satan, he has become divided against himself. And how then will his kingdom stand? And if by Beelzeba, I cast out the demons, by whom do your sons cast them out?

Therefore, they'll be your judges. Those who have put their faith in God because that happened before Jesus. Right? There were those who are faithful to God and the provision that he would make all the way back to Abraham and beyond. So anyone who's put their faith in me and has been gifted by God to be able to cast out demons up to this point, those are going to be your judges.

But if I cast out the demons by the spirit of God, Luke said, finger of God. Matthew says, by the spirit of God, the power of God, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. And verily, it had. Truly, truly, it had. Or how can anyone enter a strong man's house and carry off his property unless he first ties up the strong man?

I am right now, Jesus is saying by saying this, I'm tying up that strong man. I'm letting you know I've got the power to overcome it. Then he'll plunder his house. That kinda happened on the cross, didn't it? The one who is not with me is against me.

The one who's not with me is against me. This is interesting because in context, this makes perfect sense. Y'all think you're with me and you're not with me. You think you're on God's side, but the truth is, I'm on God's side, Pharisees, and y'all are not. You think you are.

You think you're the guard of the law. You think you're the guards of everything that's good and holy, but you're missing the point of all of that, which is Jesus says, me. The one who's not with me is against me, and the one who doesn't gather with me scatters. Now in another place it does say that let those tares grow up among the wheat. Don't worry about it.

You know, if I'll get to it when we get to it. How about that? The one who's not with me is against me. The one who does not gather with me scatters. Therefore, I say to you, every sin and every blasphemy.

Okay, blasphemy coming up again. Saying, that which is good is bad and that which is bad is good. Oh, there are so many religious wars have been fought. I'll just chunk it all. How many of y'all have heard that this week?

Okay. I'm not saying war is good. I'm not saying religious war is good. It's terrible, but most of those religious wars were blasphemous. Okay?

Most of them. Well, probably all of them. Therefore, I say to you, every sin and blasphemy, there it is, abusive or scurrilous language, slow to call good, good, and slow to call bad, bad, switching right for wrong. Every blasphemy, every sin shall be forgiven people, but blasphemy against the Holy Spirit shall not be forgiven. You've only got a limited time.

You've only got the breath in your lungs that you have, and with that breath, you need to be listening to what the Holy Spirit of God is saying. Whatever means he's using to say it and accepting it, praising God with it. Whoever speaks a word against the son of man, which they were doing right then. They're speaking a word against the son of man right then. Whoever speaks a word against the son of man, it shall be forgiven him.

But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him. These Pharisees, a lot of them would be alive when Jesus was crucified, and they'd be alive when he was resurrected. They'd be alive after the day of Pentecost. They would be alive when the Holy Spirit really has an increased presence in the world, a restraining presence on evil. And he's saying, remember these things mercifully and graciously.

It sounds harsh because it is the unpardonable sin. Right? And people argue over it. I have more questions about what's the unpardonable sin. Is it suicide?

Is it divorce? Is it this? Is it that? I'm like, it's not listening to the Holy Spirit when he's actively speaking saying, trust Jesus. Either in this age or in the age to come.

So I'm gonna read John sixteen one through 15 quickly right here. I still have a testimony. It's worth staying, I promise. These things I've spoken to you so that you will not be led into sin. This, they will ban you from the synagogue, yet an hour is coming for everyone who kills you to think he's offering a service to God.

These things they will do because they have not known the father nor me but these things I've spoken to you so that when that hour comes, when their hour comes, you may remember that I told them to you. However, I didn't say these things to you at the beginning because I was with you. You could ask me any question you wanted to and I'd tell you the answer. But now, I'm going to him who sent me and none of you asked me, where are you going? But because I've said these things, grief has filled your heart.

You're bewildered by the circumstances. Grief has filled your heart just thinking I might go away. But I tell you the truth, it's to your advantage that I'm leaving. For if I don't leave, the helper, the Holy Spirit won't come to you. But if I go, I will send the Holy Spirit to you.

And he, when he comes, he will convict the world regarding sin. Who is he gonna convict? The world. God is actively working in every tribe, tongue, nation, and he's actively working to convict them of their sin. And righteousness, his own righteousness, and judgment because there's a day coming.

You don't know when it is. You don't know when your day is, much less the great and mighty day of the Lord. Regarding sin because they do not believe in me. So that's the reason that I'm actively working on convicting people of their sin. Call it conscience if you want to, but God says that he's actively working in the world through his spirit to convict of sin because they don't believe in me.

In regard in righteousness, because I'm going to the father and you no longer gonna see me. In regard in judgment, because ruler of this world has already been judged. That strong man has already been tied up, and he has his future ahead of him for sure, and I wanna save. That's what I came to do. I have many more things to say to you.

Oh, the preacher's line. I love this line. I have many more things to say to you but you can't bear them at the present time. But when he, the spirit of truth, that's the Holy Spirit comes, he will guide you into all the truth. Amen.

Don't resist him. The wind of the Holy Spirit blows where it listeth in John three. Don't ever brace yourself against that wind. When he, the whole Holy Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth for he will not speak on his own, but whatever heals, he'll speak and he'll disclose to you what is to come, and he'll glorify me and he'll take from mine and will disclose it to you, my father, and all these things that the father has are mine, everything. All the truth is my truth.

This is why I said that he takes from mine, and I'll disclose it to you. So that's it. I've got a little more, but I'm gonna cover it next week. I am gonna invite Melissa, if you'll come forward. And Chris, if that's by the plan.

You're you are older than me. That's true. I have some glasses you can use. She's a day older than me and so much wiser.

Got my Kleenex.

Hold it close like an ice cream cone.

I'm Melissa Ripley Thompson. This is only the beginning. I'll be okay. My husband, Chris Thompson. Most of all know me as Ripley, believe it or not.

So I moved here in 1991 with Kurt. I was 19. We sold everything we had in Texas which was all at $500 and moved here with a cab over camper and no job, nothing. We pulled into the Teton Valley or Teton Village KOA, found a spot to park our truck and worked. They gave us a job.

We started what I don't I look out here and I see probably I know half of you all now because there's half of you all that I don't really know, but we started a vacuum store here in 1993. And it grew from an eight by 10 storage shed to its 3,100 square feet now all by God's hand and Kurt would always say Kurt was the manager, God was the owner. Had three babies here. They're all adults out in the world. Kylie's a nurse in Idaho Falls.

Kate's married in Colorado, and Kim is at Boise State. I was married for twenty nine years. And then New Year's Day, most people celebrate starting the New Year. I was in the emergency room with Kurt. He had a massive aortic dissection.

His heart split. Ray said at his funeral it was so big, which is so true. It split from where it connects to your heart all the way down to his kidneys. And he didn't make it and the weather was horrible. We couldn't lifelike, we couldn't do anything.

But that changed everything. But I wanna tell you just a tiny bit about Kurt real quick and then I'll tell you about how God worked that whole New Year's Day. I just remember in my mind, God kept saying, it's fine, it's fine, it's fine, you know. And I kept saying that and one of my kids was like, it is not fine. I'm like, okay, this very second right now it is not fine but it's gonna be fine.

This was eight things that Kylie wrote she says here's eight things I learned from you dad and she wrote this Father's Day of twenty sixteen and she was a teenager that really did give us all our gray hair So this was so encouraging that she would write this so she would have been 18. I think that's right. She said, I learned hard work. If I want it, you taught me that I can go get it. It might not be easy, but if I work hard, can pursue whatever I put my mind to.

Self respect. You taught me that I'm valuable and not to let anyone try to tell me otherwise. Loyalty. Your outstanding dedication and commitment to mom is always something I will reflect on in any future relationship I may have. Number four, how to change a tire?

Well, think I understand the concept. Kurt never let he had three daughters. We never got our nails dirty, we never never shoveled snow, we never did any of that. So when he died on New Year's Day, I pulled a bicep muscle trying to shovel the driveway and then the entire community came around and I never had to do that again. And I learned how to fix vacuums which wrecked all my nails too so it was all good.

Money does not buy happiness even though money may be a byproduct of hard work, you taught me that I never need any more money than it takes to be comfortable because it is not by any means the root of happiness. Stand behind what you believe in. If I really believe in something, you taught me to dedicate myself, be educated about it, and to defend it. That is so Peace, This is also very curt. It is not necessarily worth it to win a fight just because I know and or strongly believe that I am right.

Sometimes other factors of the situation are important and it's okay not to prove a point. I think that would help bringing people together more. Listen you taught me that sometimes in some situations it's not necessary to say anything at all and we learned that raising teenagers. Thank you for being such a great dad I love you your list maker daughter Kylie. So that's what Kai learned from him.

If you all knew Kurt, you totally could see how she could learn all that. So January 1, going through all of that, I realized and I hope you all do too, God does not give hard things to strong people. I'm not like this you know superhero wonder woman person. I am so weak but he gives hard things to weak people so that his strength is revealed through them because I could never have done it ever. And we learned to praise in the storm.

We learned that our joy is not in our circumstances and I think reading in Hebrews and all of the mention of joy with the body, It's only from the Holy Spirit that allows us to see the beauty from what may appear to be ashes now so that it's fine, it's fine, it's fine, was all in the ashes. And then I have to read you. So after that, a few weeks later, this was my best friend in high school. I've known him since I was in high school. He was in Texas, he lost his spouse in his thirties, four kids, his youngest was five years old.

To me, he's a strong guy, but I also know his heart is weak like mine. But God gave him that circumstance and grew him over all of that time. He never remarried. We kept in touch just very surfacely but I knew God said to to talk to him because he would understand and he would be the most helpful in my situation and he was it was amazing. So on Facebook a year this came up in my memories and I just have to read it because I'm like, wow, did I write that?

Because that's totally God. You know? But it was great because it was about I had just read that morning about Zacchaeus. I mean you all know Zacchaeus right? Like that whole story he was just a short guy.

Well at that in that time of my life his height had nothing to do with what I took out of the story. So my face Facebook post said I had such a God given thought today if you know the story of Zacchaeus he climbed a tree so he could see Jesus walking by. Now that's a pretty cool story but what really struck me today was that tree it had to be a decent sized tree to support his weight. God knew so many years of growth would be required for that tree so it would be there when Zacchaeus needed it to say to see the savior. God had grown that tree in advance for his purpose to help Zacchaeus see Jesus.

So Christopher Thompson was placed in my life thirty three years ago, and although we kept in touch, I believe God's purpose was to grow him through his trials and to grow through to grow me to be strong enough to hold me up after the death of my husband so I could see our sweet savior. God is so good to me and I'm so blessed to have a God who knows what I need and he has provided it years in advance. Isn't that crazy? I never would have thought. Because I in high school, I had no interest beyond just he's a really sweet friend and I knew who he dated, I knew who he married, I knew his wife.

But it was just now we have seven children together. I love saying that because it makes me feel like I had seven children. I have a grandbaby, and we're moving back to Texas. That's really the whole point of this testimony besides how amazing God is. Now, all these years, thirty years here, and I'm going back to Texas, have a grandbaby.

We got married on 04/03 02/01. I mean, and that was a Saturday. It was so odd that that would be a Saturday. So now we're starting a new adventure and it's not only about joy here, it's also about happiness. And I was telling Ray my favorite song these days are graves into gardens because that is my life right now, ashes to beauty.

But anyway, that's like I said, it's not me. I am weak, but I hope that through me y'all have seen the strength of Jesus because that's really what it's all about. We have a snowblower for sale if anyone needs it because we won't need that in Texas.

We're gonna sink. Wanna pray for y'all before we get out of here. Okay? So if I can get the band back up here. God almighty, we're so thankful for for Chris and Melissa and for what you're doing, lord in their lives.

I pray that you would show continue showing yourself as strong, lord. I think of the Old Testament verses says, the Lord looks to and fro and he's seeking someone in whom he may show himself as strong. May we be humble and willing. May we be able to raise our hands in the most difficult of circumstances, lord and praise you during the storm. Bring us through.

Thank you. Take them, lord. I've always said that my grandmother used to pray for people in ambulances. I pray for people in moving trucks. I don't know who they are but I know they ain't happy.

This this couple, I do know who they are and I do know that it's a happy move but I pray lord that you would take care of em in the in the move and in the unpacking of the boxes and that you would just continue to show yourself as strong through them and to them. Jesus name, amen. Amen. Would you stand with us and we'll sing? Addiction today.

I just want you to think back a few weeks ago and and think about the the verses that say, seek first the kingdom of God. Seek first the kingdom of God and everything else, absolutely everything else that you need will be added unto you. Seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all else will be added to you. In Jesus name, lord, we may we live our lives honoring and glorifying and praising you even in the hard times. Amen.