We certainly appreciate authenticity, don't we? I mean, we don't want Vanilla Ice back up here, right? Yeah, he is in jail. I saw that the other day. Somebody else watches the news. Wow. Well, it is good to be here. This is like family to me. I've known Lance a long time. You know, Lance, I've just realized that this January was 20 years for me. 20 years ago, I left the FBI to go into ministry. And it doesn't seem like it's been that long. But I wanted to take a moment, first of all, to thank you for supporting us. You guys support our ministry, both in India and wherever God takes me. And if you haven't spent any time around me or you don't know much about me, I've kind of been a guy who God called me from the FBI into ministry 20 years ago. And if God says, go somewhere, I kind of say, OK. And I don't have a real plan sometimes. I think the Christian life is much more responding than planning. All the business people out there just going, what did he just say? I can't believe he just said that. But the Christian life is a lot of response. And God called me 20 years ago. And through people like you who support what we do, we're able to go. And we just established a training center in Northeast India that trains people from the country of Bhutan, Nepal, and from Northern India. And they're training people to go out into persecuted areas and share the gospel and plant churches and start mission schools. And we couldn't do it without people like you. And I appreciate you being a part of that, both through prayer and finances, and also to help me to go to Israel with Lance last year. It was one of the highlights of my life. And I am leading a group this November and would love for you to go. I did talk to the people over there in the IDF, the Israeli Defense Force, about security. And it was really amazing how the American media, I know you find this hard to believe, but they distort things. And it's really, I feel so comfortable I would take any of my children over there, my young children, of which I have four, soon to be five, We've adopted four from China, and we're about to adopt our fifth. Next month, Lori's going to bring another little girl, Rebecca, home. And I happen to have one of my sons here and his wife, Stephanie, who is a daughter to me, and they're here. And some of you may know Russ, but I'm very grateful that they got to drive down from Dallas and bring my grandson to me for a little while to be able to spend a little time with him. But I do want to thank you. I don't take it for granted. And like Paul says, whatever you give to me is being put to your account in heaven. And so lots of people are hearing the gospel because of the fruitfulness of the ministry here. And Lance, I'm so grateful God put it on your heart to come here and plant this church and to be a part of leading this group. That is my family out there. We do have one daughter, Rachel, who is waiting on a heart transplant. She is 10. Some of you may remember that. And she is at a 1A status now, which means she is absolutely at the top of the list. And we're praying that she gets a heart soon. She continues to defy medicine and the doctors, because she had a 14-day life expectancy three years ago. So we praise God for that. Let me ask you a question about your view of what it means to follow Jesus. Has your view been shaped more by the Bible or by the tradition you grew up in? When you think of a follower of Jesus, is that something that's a positive thing to you or is it something that's a negative or it could be both, a mixture? We live in a world that means something very different. I'm sure that the guys that were paraded out on the beach over in Libya a week ago and beheaded, what some of you don't know, and the media certainly didn't report, is that they were singing praise songs as they were being beheaded. Now, how in the world could you be singing praise songs when you're about to have your life taken from you? except by the power of God in your life. And we unfortunately live in a culture that celebrates more what's on the outside than what's on the inside. Very not unlike the way it was in Jesus' day. In fact, that's why Jesus came to expose religious hypocrisy. And to set people straight into what it meant to be an authentic follower But I just want you to think it for a second of your own life. Don't think about anybody else Not your husband if you're a wife and not your wife if you're a husband not your kids But I want you to think about you and your own following of Jesus Christ and what that means and has it been shaped more by tradition our culture Or has it been shaped by the Holy Spirit working through the power of his word? Because today there's a story in the Bible that I'd like to share with you of a guy that many of you may know as Matthew. He wrote the first gospel in our Bible. And I want to give you a little more insight into Matthew and kind of Look at him as a poster child for what it means to be an authentic follower of Jesus. And I hope you'll be encouraged by this, and I hope that you will reflect upon your own life. Because, you know, if you come in here and you hear what God's Word says, and you walk out that door and nothing changes in your life, then it's really futile, isn't it, to spend the time? So it's important for us to examine ourselves anytime we come to hear the Word of God. So I want to give you a little bit of background, you know about Matthew There's four Gospels Matthew Mark Luke and John that tell different perspectives about Jesus Matthew tells he's his audience was really the the Jewish people and he was trying to communicate to them about Jesus being the Messiah he was presenting it from that point of view mark was presenting to Gentiles and he was presenting Jesus as a servant and Luke was also presenting the Gentiles as the son of God, the humanity of Jesus, even though he was God. And John was presenting the deity of Jesus. He was the sent one from God. And that's why in Matthew you see a genealogy, and also you see it in Luke. But in Mark you don't see a genealogy, because a servant doesn't have a genealogy, really. Nobody cares where a servant came from. John presents a genealogy, I bet you didn't know it, but his genealogy is in verse one when it says, in the beginning was the Word, the Word was with God, and the Word was God. You see, God has no genealogy, does he? And that's John's audience, he's writing. But Matthew is presenting Jesus as the Messiah, and he's presenting it, and he's presenting how Jesus fulfilled these Old Testament prophecies. But he also presents that Jesus came to restore Israel, not just the land of Israel from Rome, like a lot of those people thought, but to present Israel, the spiritual Israel. You see, that's why Matthew presents 5, 6, and 7, in chapters 5, 6, and 7, what we know is a Sermon on the Mount, and it was awesome because we got to go to a place that they believe that that's where that was, and sit up there, and think about what he said. Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness. For what? They will be satisfied. And blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the whole earth Blessed are the peacemakers for they will be called the children of God and and he is presenting all these things in and all through chapters 5 6 & 7 what we see is Jesus confronting the hypocrisy because he says listen you've heard that it was said that if you if you you know you you're with a woman then you commit adultery and that's it goes against the law but basically if you look at a woman and you lust I say to you then you've done the same thing If you look at somebody and you commit murder, you know that's against the law, but I say if you hate someone, it's the same thing. So Jesus took it beyond just the external and brought it to the internal. He talked about fasting, he talked about prayer, and he talked about how everything the Pharisees had promoted on the external, Jesus demolished it and said, listen, you guys are just whitewashed tombs. You're nothing. Your outside is clean, but the inside is dirty. And that's why Matthew was trying to communicate to these people that Jesus came to stop that, to change it. And then he starts in chapter 8, and he presents three sets of miracles. There are actually three sets of three. There's three miracles and then a response. Three miracles and a response. Three miracles and a response. The first three is Jesus heals a leper. And then he heals Peter's wife. And he heals a centurion servant and he does those things to show Matthew showing that Jesus has authority as the king, as the sent one, the Messiah. He has authority over disease. And then we see the response to that. Some superficial people came up to him and said, Hey, I want to follow you. Why? Because this guy's healing people. what does he say listen the foxes have holes birds have nests son of man has nowhere to lay his head I want to follow you Jesus but but I got to go bury my dad first let the dead bury the dead Jesus would have failed evangelism seminars and courses at most seminaries with that kind of teaching right it's not the kind of teaching you hear today We're like, we're wanting to do everything to dumb down the gospel, to water down the gospel, to make it palatable to people. And Jesus is telling these people, listen, you don't really want to follow me unless you're willing to do these things. And so we see that their response wasn't that good to that first set. Well, then he calms the storm, he heals demons, and then he does something that only God could do. He forgives sins. Don't you find it interesting that the guy who was let down into the house. This was near Capernaum We got to go to Capernaum while we're over there was really neat. It's a very small city But this guy was let down through a roof Jesus had been teaching and Jesus told the guy your sins are forgiven Now what's amazing about it is this guy didn't do anything. He couldn't do anything He didn't raise his hand and say I want to follow Jesus I He didn't fall to his knees and repent and say anything Jesus looked him in the eye and said your sins are forgiven Which shows me that God is sovereign Because God knew he was one of his kids You see that that man's name was written in the Lamb's Book of Life before the world ever began Jesus knew it Jesus wanted him to know it And so he said, your sins are forgiven. Now this threw the Pharisees into just a tissy, man. They were really, really upset. They go, who is this guy that can just go in here and forgive sins? And here's where our passage starts out today in 9. Because we see two responses to what Jesus did the first response is Matthew himself He's a sinful man and he and Jesus comes along and he says follow me Let's read in Matthew 9 and verse 9 to 17 Just follow me along starting in verse 9 Now as Jesus went on from there And there was just being with a man who said, he said, your sins are forgiven. He saw a man called Matthew sitting in the tax collector's booth, and he said to him, follow me. And he got up and he followed him. Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and they were dining with Jesus and his disciples. Now when the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, why is your teacher eating with the tax collectors and the sinners? Now when Jesus heard this, he said, it is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means. I desire compassion and not sacrifice. For I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners. Then the disciples of John came to him asking, well, why do we and the Pharisees fast, but your disciples, they do not fast. And Jesus said to them, the attendance of the bridegroom cannot mourn as long as the bridegroom is with them, can they? But the days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast. But no one puts a patch of unshrunk cloth on an old garment. For the patch will pull away from the garment and a worse tear will result. Nor do people put new wine into old wineskins. Otherwise, the wineskins burst and the wine pours out and the wineskins are ruined. But they put new wine into fresh wineskins and both are preserved. Lord, in the next few minutes, my prayer is that you would just open our hearts to receive your truth. That as we sit here. That Lord, you would speak through me and your word. To remind us of your great love, what you've done. And that you have called us to be authentic followers. Thank you Father for Jesus Christ come Holy Spirit and teach us in Jesus name, Amen. So, Matthew uses himself as an illustration here, because what had just happened, he was telling you about this man who was paralytic, he was paralyzed, who Jesus looked at and said, your sins are forgiven. And he also just said that the Pharisees got up in arms about it, and he wanted to give an illustration, and he could think of no better illustration than his own life. Now, when you think of the name Matthew, it may remind you of somebody you know today. It may remind you of Matthew in the Bible, and you think, wow, Matthew is where we get the gospel. But I doubt very seriously you know how despicable Matthew really was. We hear about him calling, and he was a tax collector, but we don't really understand what that term means. Let me give you an example. Probably right now in our culture, One of the greatest threats that most people in this country feel to our security and safety is ISIS or ISIL. So imagine for a second somebody in this community that you found out really supported ISIL. And they did everything to support them. Would you think that that person is somebody that you wanted to extend the gospel of Jesus Christ to? For most of us, our concern would be inward. We would be worried about our lives. We would be worried about, who is this person? Why did they turn on America? Why have they turned their back on their country, on their people? That's the way people felt about tax collectors. You see when Rome went in and took an area what they would do is they would exact taxes They would get taxes from the people and they would have two different types of tax collectors They would have one which was like a general tax collector called a goodbye a Goodbye, and and the goodbye would be the person that would collect what the three major taxes you had a property tax Yeah, somebody's laughing. Maybe goodbye. Could you say goodbye to your money anytime the tax guy comes? but it was it was goodbye you won't forget that term right but so you so you had a property tax you had like a poll tax which was just like for being born and you had an income tax and that was one type of tax collector but there was another type called a mocus M-O-K-H-E-S. And a MOCUS was like a special use kind of tax collector. They would collect taxes on like the roads, on commerce, on you wanting to cross one bridge or a street, anything like a boat tax if you came into the Sea of Galilee. And Matthew was called Levi. And we know that from Mark and the Gospel of Luke. His name was Levi. he was a mochus, but even within the mochus there were two types. There was a big mochus and a little mochus. The big mochus was a guy who wouldn't let himself be seen collecting those taxes, so he would hire somebody so he could be a behind-the-scenes guy. He could still go into the temple. The little mochus was so greedy he didn't trust anybody and he would go in himself and sit at the table to collect the taxes. The little Mochus was one of the most hated people in all of Jerusalem or the city. because they were seen as traitors and they would extort money from people. They would actually have the Roman soldiers behind them when they would go because they they had to collect more than they should have for their own benefit. They would do that. That's how they built up their wealth. And so they would they would really oppress people. And every time the people might say you know what I don't think I can pay you this month. then he would call the Roman soldiers to come over and threaten them with force to throw them in jail if they couldn't pay. And that was Levi, Matthew. It's important to understand that because those people, the little moccasin and even the goodbye, even the big ones, they were put on a list with swine and every other unclean animal that could not even go into the temple. They couldn't go into the synagogue. And for the Jewish person, that was everything. That was everything. And that was Matthew. In fact, one rabbi had said no mochas could ever be saved. And so Matthew says, you know what? I want to show the scope of what Jesus can do when he says your sins are forgiven. So he uses his own life as a as an example. And he starts off by by telling he came along by my table and he said, follow me. And I left. But the way he says it is different than even Luke says it. If you go in Luke and you look at Luke's gospel, Luke says he left everything. Matthew was so humble, he wouldn't even say he left everything. He just said he came and called me and I followed. It's really interesting. If Matthew was alive today, Word Publishing would contact him. They'd have an on-book tour talking about how great his life has been now since he's followed Christ and telling everybody. About what a difference jesus has made his life and like most biographies his book would be more about him than it would be about jesus but Matthew took one sentence to tell us about his conversion the second greatest conversion in the whole bible paul being one of the greatest He was the second greatest and he uses one sentence one sentence to tell how he came to christ You know why because he knew who he was And he didn't want anybody thinking more of him wanted him thinking everything about Jesus and that's why he told what he did. So that's the background of this passage and Jesus teaches us some things through Matthew's life and and you've got a little outline in your bulletin and if you want to jot these down I'm gonna give them to you and then we're gonna talk about them for a second. The first one is is people who are fallen or why Jesus came. That's so clearly stated in the text that it really needs no explanation, but people who are fallen or why Jesus came. Second, people who are forgiven naturally want to glorify Jesus and share him with others. Matthew didn't have to go to any evangelism class before he threw a party for Jesus. Just naturally happened. He didn't have to learn how to do it, it just happened. Third, people who are self-righteous and self-focused are people who care more about their reputation than the welfare of others. People who are self-righteous and self-focused care more about themselves than they do other people, and that's just obvious too. Fourth, God calls us to be authentic followers. The key word there is not authentic, although we should be authentic. I know a lot of people that are authentic, but they're not followers of Jesus. OK, God calls us to be authentic followers, not keepers of religious rituals. And finally, God calls us to follow his plan, not our version of his plan. And we're pretty good at that too. God calls us to follow his plan, not our version. So let's look at this passage. As Jesus went from on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting in the tax collector's boot. A couple of observations about that. Did Matthew go seeking Jesus? Or did Jesus seek Matthew? You see, Jesus came into Matthew's life Jesus had been doing miracles in Capernaum. He had been doing lots of ministry there, so Matthew would have known. But why do you think maybe Matthew didn't pursue Jesus? Probably because he was a guy like I met up in New York named Mark. See, I was speaking at a retreat up there, and this guy comes up to me after one of the sessions, and he's crying. And he says, Is it even possible that I could have the kind of faith you have? Listen, my life has been so bad. He was a drug addict. And he had spent his life in and out of rehab centers. And he was just weeping because he wanted forgiveness. And he didn't feel like he qualified. And for a lot of people, they think they have to qualify to follow Jesus. But Matthew probably thought that too. You see, because he was hated. And what does Jesus do? He comes right into his life and he says, come follow me. Why? Because Matthew's name was written in the Lamb's Book of Life before the world was ever began. And it wasn't because God knew Matthew was going to choose him. That was not. Because that still puts the emphasis on us. And I hear that all the time. Well, God knows that we're going to choose him, so he chooses us. That's ridiculous. That still puts it in our court. That makes us the ones who decide. And what it does is it goes against Ephesians 2.8.9 that says, for by grace, Are you saved through faith? It doesn't say by faith you're saved through grace. It says by grace, which is his grace extended to us. None of us deserve it. Not one person. Matthew didn't and so. Jesus comes into his life and he says, come follow me and I talked to Mark in New York. And I prayed with Mark. And he was so excited. That God would take somebody like him And I wish I wish I could have had a picture but it was such a sacred moment I wouldn't have wanted a picture, but I just wish I could show you his face To hear that Jesus could forgive even him Sometimes we forget that Jesus taught us through Matthew that people who are fallen are why he came but see the disciples They're trying to figure that out. The Pharisees certainly didn't get it. Because as soon as it happened, it says, then it happened as Jesus was reclining at the table in his house. Matthew takes him into his house. He's so excited. He wants his friends to hear. And the Pharisees, what is their response? Who is this man? What is he doing? Because many tax collectors and sinners were in there and they saw it and they said, why is your teacher eating with these people? Doesn't He know who they are? And Jesus says, I came for sinners. I didn't come for the righteous. How many righteous people are in the world? I think the Bible says zero. Zero. None are righteous. No, not one. He's not really talking about righteous. He's talking about those who perceive they are righteous. You know why He says that I didn't come for the righteous? Because those who think they are righteous don't think they need Jesus. He came. And Jesus taught us that He came for people who were fallen. That's why, folks, we have to preach about sin. That's why we expose sin. It's not to be judgmental. It's not to look at you as if you've got something that I don't have. But it's to expose sin because if you don't know you're sick, you certainly ain't going to be looking for a cure. True? If you don't know you're sick, why would you even want a cure? It's not judgmental to preach what God calls sin, sin. It's so that people would recognize that they need Jesus. They need a physician. They need somebody to heal them. Because that's why he came. He came for the fallen. Well, I was struck by the fact that Matthew went right away and threw a party and who else is he going to invite but prostitutes and other tax collectors, right? The guy has no friends except those kind of people. It's not like any of the, you know, the Pharisees or the scribes are going to come hang out with him. So he just naturally wants to invite those people that he knows to tell them what Jesus has done in their life. In fact, the Billy Graham Association, they do outreaches and they call it a Matthew party where you invite people to your house to share the gospel with them. Can I just ask you a question? When's the last time you did something like that? And you go, I've never done anything like that. Whoops. That's not a good thing. That's why we're here. He leaves us on the earth so that we can be vessels of his mercy to the lives of people around us. I've said this before that you know a lot of times once we start following Christ. We completely sever all relationships with unbelievers Do you know some of the I've got some good friends that are unbelievers that I hang around with and they are authentic, but they're not followers of Jesus and But I like hanging with them to talk to them now. I don't partake in what they do That would go against god's word, but I spend time with them and I invite them to lunch. I invite them to breakfast I invite them to sporting events. I want to share with them because jesus has so radically changed my life People who are forgiven naturally want to do that. You see, it started, I didn't have near, see, I grew up in a church that taught me that if I didn't share the gospel with this person over here and they went to hell, it was my fault they went to hell. That's what I was taught, that they went to hell because I didn't share the gospel with them. So I grew up sharing the gospel out of obligation, not out of joy of what God had been doing in my life. And it wasn't until I was in the Marine Corps and I had a near-fatal accident that God got my attention, revealed to me the depth of how sinful I was, and the hope that He gave me to change my life. And I wanted to tell people after that. I wanted to share with them. I wanted them to know that I was changed, and I wanted them to know that they could experience the same thing. I think of Zacchaeus, he was another mokos, another tax collector. You ever wonder what drove him up in that tree? Just to see Jesus? What would make a man climb a tree to see Jesus? There's this old pastor that preached one time, and I love the way he presented it, and he basically told all the different stories of Jesus healing people in that little area. And he told it through a basically a little. He concocted this story about Zacchaeus being a tax collector going to each one of these people wanting to get their taxes, and they said they couldn't pay him. And then they said, can I just have 30 days and then? He said, OK, I'll give you 30 days and then he came back after 30 days and he saw a woman whose son was dead who had come back to life. He saw a blind man who was blind, could pay Zacchaeus because he wasn't blind anymore you see these Bible stories are all interrelated these are real people living in a real place that was one of the great things about going to Israel you could see it when we read the Bible we sterilize it a lot of time and it happened a lot of time we don't think about it but a tax collector would have interacted with these people just like Matthew did Matthew saw the stories he just didn't think that God would take him and Zacchaeus was driven up into that tree and he saw Jesus and Jesus goes by and says hey Zach come down I'm going to your house to eat today and he goes what me He said, Lord, I'll give away, I'm gonna pay back everybody I've stolen money from and give them four times as much. Now, I don't know many people that have trusted Christ in this country that have done anything like that. But he was real. He knew who he was, and it had changed his life radically. People who are forgiven wanna glorify Jesus and share him with others. What about you? Has he changed your life? Do you know to the depths of where you were? Because for most of us, we're pretty good people. Most of us, we're not into deep addictions. We're not into really bad stuff. And I think it's a lot easier for us to resemble the Pharisees and their struggles than it is the prodigal son and his struggle or Zacchaeus or Levi. It's a hard message. was really convicted as I read this because what happens is we come to Christ and we do have an initial joy but then as we spend time in the church around Christians we tend to forget that we are those people that's why Paul reminded people he said such were some of you Remember when he wrote him? Such were some of you. You did these things too. Remember? Don't forget. Why? Because when you start to forget, you start to look down on people that struggle. And you start to think that even ISIS people are beyond the reach of Jesus Christ. You know what I was wondering? Those guys who were beheading those guys, what were they thinking when they were singing? They had to be going, what kind of God did these people serve? Because those people serve a false God. They serve a God that is not personal, that they can't call Father. But I wonder what they were thinking when these people were singing as they were getting ready to behead them. Yeah, I'll tell you, He's a God who's great, who's merciful, whose love is far-reaching. And the Pharisees didn't like that at all. When Jesus heard this, he told them, he said, listen, it's those who are healthy, not those who are healthy, who need a physician, those who are sick, go and learn. I desire compassion and not sacrifice. He's quoting Hosea. He doesn't desire sacrifice. He wants our compassion. You see, the Jewish believers, they had three basically tenants of what they were to do. They were to pray, they were to give alms and they were to fast twice a week. They would pray, give alms, and fast. The alms is helping the poor with their funds. And if they did that, they were considered good people. We do the same thing. We go to church, we read our Bible, we pray, and we're good people. Can I just say that if there's anything good in any of us, it's nothing to do with what we do. It's Jesus Christ living in us. That's it. It's easy to become self-righteous and self-focused, especially in the culture in which we live. We have a very individualistic culture here, very different from a lot of cultures in the world. It's not a bad culture. We've got a lot of great things here. It's awesome, the freedom that we have here, but we've squandered it. We've squandered it. And we've become self-focused. So much so that many of the churches in this country have no resemblance to the New Testament church. who become self-righteous. And you know, Jesus, in Luke 15, tells three stories. The only time in Scripture He tells three stories to illustrate one point in a row like this. Let me just read Luke 15 to you real quick, just the first verse, and see if it sounds familiar to what He just said. Now, all the tax collectors and the sinners were coming near to Him to listen to Him. Both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, This man receives sinners and eats with them. Does that sound familiar? Didn't he just say the same thing about what's going on at Matthew's house? And what does Jesus say? So he told him this parable and he starts, he tells him about a shepherd that has a sheep. 99 are here, one goes away. What does he do? Does he stay with the 99? No, he goes after the one sheep. And it says, when that sheep comes back, the angels rejoice, right? There's more rejoicing over heaven, over one sinner who repents. The key word there being repents. than the 99 who need no repentance. Then he tells a story about the coin. Then he tells a story about the son. We all know the story. In the story of the son, the key thing happens when the son comes to his senses, he repents, he turns back to the father. And then what happens? The only time in scripture you see God running or Jesus running anywhere, the father's running to him. Why? Because he's repentant. See, the key is repentance. The message is repentance. Well, if you have nothing to repent of, how can you really understand what He's done? You see, that's why it's important for us to be honest with people. You know what? Can I come to Jesus if I still drink a beer? You know what I tell people when they ask me that? Do I have to give up drinking beer to come to Jesus? I say, you know what, if you know who He is, you won't want to hold on to anything. Because that's the truth. I said, if you're still thinking about what you've got to give up, then you really don't know who you are and you don't know who he is. Because once you know who you are and you know what he can do for you and who he is, you don't care about anything here. There's a book called Radical, it should be just called Normal, because it's not radical to live the Christian life. It shouldn't be radical to live a Christian life. If you understand that Jesus delivers you from the pit of hell, He delivers us not only from hell as a destination, but He delivers us from hell every day here on earth. Because I don't know any addict, I don't know any person who's in an adulterous affair, I don't know anybody who commits sin as a pattern of life who's happy about it. Nobody. Some of the most miserable people in the world have all the money and fame in the world, but they live a life of immorality and just apart from God, and they're miserable. And so when you know who Jesus is, you don't want to hold on to that, because He can redeem you from that. That's why, you know, Lori and I, we hold on to life like this. Who goes and adopts a child who has a dying heart? And they're going to die, and you're told, this child is terminal. Do you know that? Well, yes, but we're idiots. We're going to adopt her anyway. That's what it comes across as to the world, right? Who goes and adopts two children with Down syndrome? Who does that? You know, when you go and do that, you're saying, I want to take care of this child for the rest of life. Not because it's going to make our life comfy cozy, It's not adding anything to the value of our life, although it does, surprisingly. It's amazing what it does. Abby, the child we adopted last November, is amazing. She's got autism and Down syndrome, and she absolutely has rocked our world in a very positive way. But who does that? Certainly not of the world. And I'm telling you, it's not because Doug and Lori are just great people, because we're not. All you need to do is spend about 24 hours with us and you'll figure out we're not great people. We're human just like everybody else. But God is so radically forgiven us that we told him we will say yes to everything, which is really what we should say as Christians. Because to say no, Lord is kind of an oxymoron, isn't it? I mean, you can't say no, Lord, because you have to take the Lord off and just say no. Because if he's your Lord, you're going to say yes to him, right? When you understand what he's done, you're willing to say yes. But not the self-righteous. They don't think they need him, see? That's why they can say no to him. Well, he goes on in verse 14. Matthew brings up what the disciples of John said. Now, it's interesting. These are the disciples of John the Baptist. And my question is, Why aren't they still identified as disciples of John the Baptist when Jesus is on the scene? Because didn't John the Baptist say, hey, this is the guy you should be following? I think he did. If you go back and you look in John, he said, hey, I must decrease, he must increase. You need to be following him. So these guys obviously didn't get that message. And they're still doing the same thing. They're fasting twice a week. They're praying. They were baptized, and that's good. But it fell a little short because Jesus just didn't come to remodel the Jewish way of thinking. He didn't come to renovate it. He came to completely alter it. And so Jesus tells them these stories. First he says, listen, when the bridegrooms here, you don't fast. You see, they were just fasting to fast twice a week. Didn't matter what was going on. They just fasted. They didn't even know why they were fasting. And do you know in all the Bible, God only commanded one fast, and it was on Yom Kippur, it was the Day of Atonement? That was the only fast really God required. Now, it didn't mean that they didn't fast other times, and we see that in Scripture, but even today, I know people who've reduced fasting to a formula to get God to do what they want Him to do. That is not why people fasted in the Bible. And Jesus makes that clear in this passage when He is explaining that fasting is when you're mourning over something and you're crying out to God. You could care less about food, and you just cry out to God because you want to cry out to Him. But we have reduced it to a formula. I'm going to be fasting next week for this thing because I want God to move in it. And almost like if we do this, then God's obligated to do this. Now, I'm not saying that it's okay to fast, but we do the same thing with prayer. How many times have you sat down at a table to pray over your meal? Lord, thank you for this food, bless it to our bodies, and bless our bodies for your service, amen. You say it without even thinking, it just rolls off your tongue. You're not interacting with the creator of the universe over this meal that he's provided for you. You're just rolling off something because it's ritual for you. I've done it. I've done it with my kids in prayer, just praying, just spitting stuff out, not even thinking about who I'm communicating to. It's just ritual. And Jesus says, listen, guys, you've got the bridegroom here. Now's the time to be joyful and excited. But there will come a time of mourning when you will fast. He calls us to be authentic followers, guys, not keepers of religious ritual. Do you ever pray like that? Do you ever had a moment where you prayed and then you forget, well, you didn't even know what you prayed because it was like you were on autopilot? Just kind of happened? I hate that. Because that's not what He wants. He wants us to be conversational. You know when Paul says, pray without ceasing? How do you pray without ceasing like we pray at the dinner table? Can't do that. He wants it to be an interaction between us on an intimate level and Him the God of the universe, but also our dad. See, no other religion teaches that the God of the universe is their dad. Can you imagine getting up in the morning, your wives out there and your husband going, I love you, honey, I will see you later. We do that, don't we sometimes guys? I think of that movie, what was it? I don't even remember what it's called now. Arnold Schwarzenegger. It's like a Christmas movie. I don't even know what the movie's called, but he's after this toy. But he's on the phone with his wife, and he goes, by the way, you're my favorite customer. His wife goes, what? He just said it without thinking, and that's what we do all the time with God. We just throw stuff to him. Instead of understanding, he wants intimate fellowship with him. Intimate fellowship. He calls us to be authentic followers. Well, Jesus gives him these last two illustrations. He gives an illustration of a piece of garment that has a hole in it. And what happens is when you would wash stuff, what does it do? It shrinks, right? So over time, this garment would get worn and it would already have shrunk. And so if you take a new piece of garment to patch a hole, then it's going to be stronger than the outside garment. So when it's washed, that new garment is going to shrink and it's going to pull and make the hole bigger and actually tear. And that's what Jesus is telling them. And for the wine skins, what they would do is they would take an old animal skin and turn it inside out and pour wine in there. And then when the wine was gone, they would set it up. And after a while, the wine skins would get brittle and hard and you would put fresh wine in there. And instead of being soft where it could expand, it would just burst. And the whole point of both of those stories is, is that Jesus is not coming to just reform Judaism. He's not just coming to change the way the rabbis do and alter it a little bit. He's completely changing what they believed in. And some people take this to mean that the Old Testament was law and the New Testament is grace. But law and grace have always coexisted and always been a part. Jesus said, I didn't come to do away with the law, I came to fulfill the law. That's not what he's talking about. He's just telling them, listen, I'm not coming so that you can just alter your version of the plan a little bit. It's completely changed. I want intimacy, I want fellowship, I want you to be an authentic follower, that you show an allegiance to me and who I am and why I've come. But the Pharisees didn't see, they didn't think they needed repentance. They didn't think they did. They didn't think they needed forgiveness. And I know a lot of people who call themselves Christian who don't think they need God's forgiveness. Do you know, it's not just a one-time deal. It's not just, I come to Christ and I'm forgiven. We need daily forgiveness. You know why? Because it says in 1 John 1, 9, If we confess, and it's an ongoing confession, if we confess our sins, he is faithful to forgive our sins. Or in Galatians, where he says, are you so foolish, Galatians, to think you started in the spirit, but you're gonna be sanctified, basically, by your flesh? See, we need God's mercy every day. But a lot of times, we as Christians forget that. A lot of times we as followers think that we're, you know what, I live a good life. I don't really need God's forgiveness. When's the last time you really self-examined? You know, every time before we take communion, we're supposed to examine ourselves. But I challenge you that we should do it on a daily basis and check ourselves. And then when we see something in our life that does not reflect Jesus, we say, Lord, I'm so sorry. Thank you for the cross. The cross is not just a pretty necklace. It's not just a thing we put on church buildings. It's a symbol of hope that he took care of all of our sins. And you know what? Most people today don't even know that the Bible teaches that God wants a dependent. Intimate relationship with us. He wants that relationship and he wants it to be one where we interact in a personal way with him. And when mankind came on, they stopped doing that. Eve was tempted in the garden and chose to go her own way. And that curse has been passed down through every human being. That's why Jesus had to be born to a virgin, because God just put himself in the human body inside of her womb. But because of our selfishness and self-led nature, we've been separated from God forever. And the Bible says that God in His mercy sent Jesus to rectify that. Jesus lived a perfect life. He healed the sick. He raised the dead. He said, I'm going to die on a cross, and three days later, I'm going to rise again, and I'm going to prove that death is conquered, sin is paid for, and the only thing that I require is your faith, your trust in that. Repent of trusting in yourself. Follow me. And we've reduced it to a formula where you raise your hand, you pray a prayer, invite Jesus to your heart. And it doesn't even say that anywhere in the Bible. Because he wants authentic relationship. He wants us to be in relationship where we trust him. And when we do that, you know what? I think three things are happening in our life. True believers in Jesus, one, they follow the Lord. They follow him. What does that mean, Doug? People want a formula. People always ask me, guys come up to me, what does it mean to really follow? It means to follow him. It means, first of all, to know him, you have to know what this says. And one survey had that 90% of the men that call themselves evangelical Christians read the Bible less than one hour a year. How can you know Him to follow Him if you don't know what His Word says? The second thing is have compassion on unbelievers. When you see people that don't follow Jesus, what's your first thought? Is it compassionate? Is it anger? You see, this is convicting stuff. And it hits me just as hard as it hits anybody out there because I can so easily be sucked into the world of looking down on somebody when I forget where he's delivered me from. Our human condition lends itself to that. And you know, he says, have compassion. I came, I don't desire your sacrifice. I want you to be compassionate. Oh, if the world knew Christians were compassionate. If they just knew who we really were, right? That we really are compassionate people, we just haven't done a good job of showing it. But God wants us to be His vessels of light. He says, you are the light of the world. You are the light. It's his light in us, guys. And he wants us to be compassionate people. And finally, he wants us to reject legalism and ritual. Don't buy into that. Don't be a person that gets up and just reads your Bible because you gotta read your Bible. Read your Bible as if you're reading a love letter from somebody who really loves you and is communicating something to you. Don't just pray because you know it's the right thing to do. When you go in to pray, if you don't have anything to say to God, then just sit there in His presence and say, God, you know what? I don't even really know what to say today, but I'm just going to take a few moments and sit in your presence, and if you want me to know anything, feel free to let me know. That is better than going in there and running your mouth for 30 minutes telling them stuff that you don't even feel. He wants us to be authentic followers. Because the moment we start moving into the fake category, it's very easy to become arrogant and look down on other people. Because we've got a role to play. We're not like them. We don't do like them. And as believers, you know what He wants? He wants us to be one with other believers. John 17, He says that. His prayer is that we would be one. The world would see. I wish sometimes, I was in the Marine Corps for eight years, I wish sometimes that the church had the camaraderie that the Marine Corps had. But you know what? In the Marine Corps, they break you down. I mean, you're broken. Everybody's broken. Nobody gets in the Marine Corps that's not broken if you stay in. They break your will, and then they build you up, and you come out knowing you're a Marine. but you know who you were before you came in and you know who you are after. Why don't we do that in the church? Why do we forget who we were and what God has done for us? We should look at our brothers and have a great love and affection for them. He calls us to be authentic followers. Let's pray. Father, thank You so much for Jesus Christ. I thank You, Lord, for His love for us. I thank You for what He did on the cross. Lord, so often in life, we just forget. We forget where You delivered us from. We forget the penalty that and where we were headed without Jesus we become arrogant we become complacent we become so many things that are contrary to what you desire help us to live as your kids Lord as people that live with the knowledge that you're our dad and that that we're we're not perfect but we're real and we love you and we want to follow you just like Matthew did I thank you for Matthew and what you did in his life and today if you're here and you haven't trusted Christ or maybe you have and it's just been something that's. Been a ritual for you. Maybe today is a day that you want to just. Acknowledge in your heart that you've not really been authentic with him and that you want to start following him today and you want to place your faith in what he did on the cross. And let him change the rest of your life. He could change the course of your life. Today. to give your life meaning, to give your life hope, to give your life peace, even in the midst of very stressful and unpeaceful times. And if that is your desire, just tell them right where you are. Maybe you're a believer follower and you just haven't been living right where you are. Would you just deal with God in your own way right now of what he is communicated to you? Maybe some message that he you got through his word today. Something just remember he says if we confess he will forgive. Lord, hear hear our prayers. Have mercy on us and thank you so much for your son Jesus. Let us go out today as. Your followers. Shining your light in Jesus name, amen.