Okay, if you can turn your Bibles with me to Hebrews chapter 2, I'll be reading from verse 14 to 18. Our main focus this morning is going to be on the two verses, 14 and 15. But I'll be reading all the way down to verse 18. "Therefore, since the children share in the flesh and blood, he himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death he might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.

For surely he does not give help to angels, but he gives help to the descendants of Abraham. Therefore, he had to be made like his brethren in all things, so that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of people.

For since he himself was tempted in that which he has suffered, he is able to come to the aid of those who are tempted." Let's pray. Gracious Father, we want to thank you again for opening our eyes to see what it is that we have in you, to regenerate our hearts, allowing us to see the hope that we have in Christ, to know, Father, that this life isn't final, that all our hopes, Lord, will come into fruition when Christ come in full glory.

Help us, Lord God, to look to your word with a renewed perspective, renewed mind, not simply to make this life better, but that our hope in Christ may be more solidified, our understanding of your grace deepened, that our life, Lord God, would bear fruit in every way. Help us, Lord, to look into your word without prejudice and to apply it, Lord, willingly and obediently.

We thank you, Father, in Jesus' name we pray, Amen. You know, if I was to ask you, like, what your opinion is and how many people do you think in this world are atheists? I'm not going to, for the sake of time, I'm not going to actually ask you to raise your hand, but most likely the number that you are thinking is probably a lot higher than the reality, especially because of where we live, and especially because many of us have experienced life on the university campus, and as a result of that, you kind of have, we kind of have a skewed view of the world and thinking that, you know, we're surrounded by atheists.

That is not the actuality. The actual number of people who claim to believe in something supernatural, whether that's God or something else outside of that, more than 84% of the world consider themselves religious. They believe something happens after life and there is a higher being, higher power. It doesn't mean that 16% are atheists.

Out of the 16% who do not claim to be religious, only 7% say that they are atheists, and the other 9% say that they are agnostic. Agnostic meaning that they haven't decided one way or the other. That they wouldn't be surprised if there was God and they wouldn't be surprised if there wasn't, but if there is a God, we don't know.

We don't have any way to get to him. That's what an agnostic is. So in actuality, the number of committed atheists are 7%. Now, if you had any conversation with a committed atheist, you'll find that among the 7% who are atheists, a huge chunk of them are not atheists because of science or reason.

Many of the atheists are atheists because they had a problem with the church, or they were burned, or they had bad experiences. So in actuality, what we think of an atheist are very small percentage of the world. Of the 84% who say that they believe in something, 60% of that are monotheists, meaning there's two main religions, Christianity and Muslim.

Over 60%. Out of the 60%, about 36% will say that they are Christians, and they're lumping Protestant and Catholics together. And then the others are the different Muslim sects that they have. If we're not careful, we can automatically think when somebody, you know, whether it's a movie star or basketball star, they come up and they get a reward and I want to thank my God.

They say, "Oh, he's a Christian. He's like us." Or they would mention something about some supernatural power and how they prayed, and automatically we think, "Oh, they must be like us." The distinction between a Christian and a non-Christian is not a belief in God or not believing in God.

That is not a distinction between a Christian and a non-Christian. A distinction between a Christian and a non-Christian is how do we view Jesus Christ? Who is he? What is his identity and what did he do? That's the distinction. So if we make that the distinction between a believer and an unbeliever, what is the actual percentage?

Now, years ago, in order to distinguish between the liberal Christians or Christians who reject the inerrancy of the Bible, anything supernatural, resurrection of Christ, and the evangelical Christians who confess the fundamental doctrines of Christianity, we started using the term "evangelical Christian," where we believe in the fundamental doctrines. So whether you are a Baptist or a Presbyterian or whatever denomination, if you believe in the fundamental doctrines of Christianity about Jesus, life, death, resurrection, the gifts, the eternal kingdom that's coming, that would make us evangelical, no matter how your church may look like.

In today's circles, even that term "evangelical" has become watered down, and there are people who are claiming to be evangelical who are dismissing the identity of Christ. It doesn't matter what you believe who Jesus is as long as it works for you, and that has penetrated even into the evangelical church.

Now, why the identity of Christ is so important, why that's the dividing line between a Christian and a non-Christian, is because from the very get-go that's spelled out for us in the scripture. Today, very few people deny the existence of the human Jesus Christ, because there's too many historical evidences.

Whether it is a Jewish scholar or a secular scholar, there's nobody who denies that the human being Jesus Christ actually existed. The question today that's being debated, outside of the church, is "Was that Jesus God?" In the early church, that was not an issue. In the early church, they didn't discuss about Jesus' deity because they had people who were eyewitnesses of Jesus Christ.

They had disciples who actually walked with him. 500 people saw the resurrection of Jesus Christ. They saw the miracles. He raised people from the dead. So, in the early church, the main struggle was not "Is Jesus God?" The main struggle was "Was Jesus really human?" And you see that in the authors of the New Testament, that how can this God, who was able to do these fantastic things, that he even laid down his life and then raised it up again, how can that be a human being?

In 1 John 4 2-3, John wrestles with this false doctrine. "By this you know the Spirit of God. Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God. And every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the Antichrist." Now, obviously, John is not saying comprehensively that if you confess Jesus' humanity, that that makes you a Christian.

He's dealing with a very specific false doctrine that was beginning to spread in the early church. That Jesus came, he appeared to be human, but how can the God of the universe, who created all things, take on finite man's body? Why would he do that? Well, the author of the book of Hebrews is dealing with that in this text.

In verse 14 and verse 18, he gives two specific reasons why Jesus had to be a man. There's two things that he mentions. In verse 14, he mentions that he had to be flesh in order for him to experience death. He had to be human being, because only a human being experiences death.

God does not experience death. He's immutable, He's eternal, He's all-powerful. So in order for Him to taste death on our behalf, He had to become a human being. Not an appearance of a human being, not something that looked like a human being, but a human being. Second thing he says in verse 17, he became a human being in order to be a sympathetic high priest.

He could have been a high priest from a distance, but he didn't want to become just a high priest. His intention was to bring us to Him. In order to do that, he had to experience everything that you and I experience in order for him to be a sympathetic, that he can relate to us.

Now, I'm going to get to the second part next week, verse 17. Today I'm going to be primarily looking at verse 14 and 15. I started this week thinking I'm going to cover it all, but I don't want to skim through any of this. So the first thing that he says in verse 14, and I want to look at these two lines in verse 14 and 15 and really understand in depth what he is saying.

Verse 14, "That though death, that through death he might render powerless him who had the power of death." He had to become a human being in order to make powerless him who had the power of death. So who has the power of death here? I mean, it's right here.

It's in English. Satan, right? That's what it says. Wait a second. Doesn't the Bible say that God is the author of life? How did death come into humanity? As a penalty of sin. God is the one who said, "If you eat of this tree of knowledge of good and evil, you shall surely die." So he's the one who cursed mankind.

So when he says that Satan has the power of death, what does that mean? If you read this outside of the context of all of scripture, you can mistakenly think that the spiritual battle is between God who has the power of life, Satan who has the power of death, and that we are in this struggle to fight Satan.

And then if we are strong, the church is strong, God wins. And then if the church is not strong, we don't evangelize, share the gospel, Satan wins. If you see demonic movies, like horror movies, that's kind of how it gets presented, right? You have the cross and the Bible and then it hisses and then Satan would come and the devil would overpower the priest and they go back and forth.

And obviously this is Hollywood, so typically the demons win. Scary movies won't be scary if at the end the demons die and then they disappear because they need to make money. It's sad to say so many people's understanding of demonology is not from scripture but from Hollywood. And so our fear of the demonic world, the mystery of the demonic world, oftentimes when I hear people to think an emotional attachment to this demonology, is oftentimes coming from false understanding of what the scripture says.

And it's coming from Hollywood, outside of reality. So what does it mean then? If that is not what the scripture says, if Satan is not the ultimate authority of death, what does that mean? Just like Jesus has many titles, and every one of these titles kind of explains his identity and his work, Satan also has many titles.

The first title that we are given of Satan is Lucifer. Lucifer literally means the morning star. That sounds like a beautiful name for Satan, right? And typically when you think of the idea of the devil that you see on, you know, he's sharp, he's ugly, his face is melting off, and it's like, my name is morning star.

It doesn't fit his name. But the reason why his name is first Lucifer is because that's how God created him. God created him to be a beautiful creature. He was chief among the angels. We see Archangel Michael, Gabriel, all of them were under the authority of Satan. The Bible describes when he rebelled against God that he was so influential he took a third of the angels with him, and so a third of the demons are in rebellion against this God.

So his first name that we know is Lucifer. We know him as Satan. The word Satan literally means an adversary. When he rebelled against God, his intent was to go against whatever God is pushing. God is seeking his glory and he's seeking it through the salvation of mankind, and he's working day and night to oppose that.

He's the adversary. Jesus refers to Satan as the ruler of the world in John 12 31. Paul calls him the prince of the power of the air in Ephesians 2 2. John also says in 1 John, the whole world is in the power of the evil one. But ultimately in 2 Corinthians 4 4 it says the God of this age is Satan.

So we know two things about Satan. One, he's extremely powerful. He is very, very powerful. He is the most powerful angel outside of God. Second, his whole work is to oppose God, is to go against God. The word that is used here to describe Satan is not any of the words.

The word that is used to describe Satan, the word that is translated devil here is Diabolos. You probably, some of you guys who know Spanish, you can already tell Diablo, the devil. In Greek, Diabolos means the accuser. He's the prosecutor. In other words, when he says that Satan has the power over death, what he is saying is, as the accuser, anyone who is guilty, he is the one who stands before God, accusing him of his sin, that leads to death.

So when the Bible describes Satan as having power over death, it means that the accuser has the power over the guilty one. And so when Christ comes and he dies and he resurrects and he covers us, we are no longer guilty. So he has taken the power of death out of his hands.

So we are free. In Colossians 2, verse 15, it says, "When he had disarmed the rulers and the authorities, he made a public display of them having triumphed over them through him." He disarmed him, because there's nothing to accuse anymore. Because when God sees us, he no longer sees the guilty.

So the devil, the accuser, the prosecutor, has no authority over our lives. If you watch too many scary movies, you know, typically it creates fear of the demons. Now, there should be a healthy respect, because they're powerful. The Bible describes them as powerful. They're more powerful than any angel we know, at least Satan is.

But Satan has no power over a man or a woman who has been cleansed by the blood of Christ. We belong to God. The Holy Spirit makes his indwelling in us. So what you see on the Hollywood movie screens is not, not only is it not accurate, it is blasphemous.

He does not have that kind of authority. In fact, every time we see Satan in the Bible, he is under the umbrella of the authority of God. Remember when Lot, in the beginning of the book of Job, he comes and he wants to test Lot, and he has to ask permission.

The only reason why Lot is a man of faith is because you protected him. Take that hedge away from him and let me at him and see what happens. He had to get permission, and God permitted him. When Jesus was headed to the cross, Jesus, Jesus says to Peter, "Satan has asked permission to sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you so that your faith would not fail." So even when he wanted to attack Peter, he didn't have any authority.

He had to ask permission. Every instance where we see the demons in front of Jesus, they're not sharpening their knives and saying, "Let's get at our enemy." They bow down on their knees in terror. "Son of God, why have you come before your time to torment us?" And they knew that the God who had the authority over their souls was standing before them.

They stood in terror, just like all the other angels and seraphims and all the elders of the vision that we see in heaven, and they are bowed down in worship before this holy, holy, holy God. We see the same terror among these demons. When Jesus Christ came, took on human form, he died and was resurrected for those who believe we have been set free from that power.

Only people who have truly been set free from that power really understands what it means to be a follower of Christ. You know, I've been mentioning, I've been posting up what's going on in India. Modi, who became the second election for to be a prime minister in India. During his reign, if you want to call it, or his rule, persecution, violent persecution against Christian has risen 450%.

And we're not talking about people making fun of Christian names. We're not talking about going to work and Hindus not inviting Christians to their lunch parties. We're talking about people literally getting stoned, beaten, some of them put to death. That has risen 450%. And that's why they were very concerned that if he gets re-elected, that that militant Hindu party, that which BJP, that which Modi is from, is going to be even more emboldened.

So they're concerned if in six years it rose that bad, how much more violent are they going to get once they know that he's starting a new reign. Not only did he win the second election, he said it was a landslide. The general consensus in India is that what was happening in the last six years, they want it multiplied going forward.

So the Christians are very concerned. But in the midst of this, there's good news. And the good news is, about 10 years ago, when they did a survey of the number of Christians in India, it came out to about 2.6%, which is a very small percent, considering that it's considered an open country, where missionaries have been there for hundreds of years.

In the last 10 years, the percentage of Christians has risen from 2.6 to over 5% in the midst of this intense persecution. You guys know, those of you who've been with us in China back and forth, that when we first went into China, the openness to the gospel, not the government, but the people.

But every year that we've been in China, it's gotten harder and harder and harder, not because of the pressure of the government, but because people have been exposed to wealth and freedom. And so lukewarmness began to come in to the Chinese church. 10 years ago, we were hearing about the multiplication of the underground church just spreading like wildfire.

But in recent years, especially after the Beijing Olympics, that that hunger began to just die. And even the churches that were established, they're having problems with nominal Christianity. Only recently in the last couple years where the persecution has been revamped, we're also hearing with the intense persecution that the underground church is starting to get remobilized.

And we're hearing horrible news of persecution, but along with that, a revival of the underground church. The reason why I share this is that throughout history and throughout history in scripture, the truth of the gospel has always spread from a few who genuinely believe bearing a lot of fruit.

And very rarely is it a lot of people bearing a little fruit. Because the power of the gospel is not in us. It's not in us. It is not our effort. It is not our talent. It is not our organization. It is when we surrender our life to the truth of what we see in the scripture.

If we genuinely believe that the Son of God came and lived among us all for the purpose of rescuing us from the one who had the power over death, and that belief, that true belief, that genuine faith changes genuine Christians. And true fruit come from that. Charles Wesley, in his hymn "And Can It Be" writes about that truth.

"And can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior's blood? Died he for me who caused his pain for me. Who him to death pursued. Amazing love, how can it be that thou my God shouldst die for me? Amazing love, how can it be that thou my God shouldst die for me?" And then the second part goes, "Tis mystery all, the immortal dies." He's talking about the incarnation of Christ.

It's a mystery. Like why would God come? He's reiterating what the early church had a problem with. Why would the immortal take on human form? Why would the infinite become finite? "Tis mystery all, the immortal dies. Who can explore his strange design? In vain the firstborn seraph tries to sound the depth of love divine.

Tis mercy all, let earth adore. Let angel minds inquire no more." "Tis mercy all, let earth adore. Let angel minds inquire no more." The beginning of sanctification is wrapped up in this song. It's when the mystery of the gospel begins to make sense to us. And we are impacted by this truth.

That's the beginning of sanctification. Not determination, not organization, not money, not education, but this truth, this mystery. And trying to figure out, why would he do this for me? What is man that you are so mindful of him? Why did he come? Second part of it is, I think it kind of points us even further into this mystery.

Verse 15, "And might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives." Before we just skim through it, let's ask a practical question. How many of you came this morning aware of death? Especially at a young church. How many of you are gripped by this fear of death?

And you felt this bondage because you're afraid to die? Maybe a few, maybe a few, but you don't think about that. Let alone feel being bound by it. What does he mean by this? Well, here's something interesting. The Greek word for death is thanatos. Think about it. The Greek word for death is thanatos.

Now why are you giggling? So anybody who's watched Endgames, right? Or he was on another one too, right? His name is thanatos. And the word is a Greek word for death. Right? Spoiler. So that's where they get the name, thanatos. His name means death. But what does he mean?

What does the Bible mean when he says that the power of death, the fear of death has subjected all of us to slavery? Well, the word for life, because death is the absence of life, just like darkness is the absence of light, death is the absence of life. Life in the New Testament is primarily described as zoe.

Not you have 75 years to live, but the life, right? And the best way to describe it if somebody goes bungee jumping or roller coaster or they go somewhere, man, I feel alive. Right? Zoe, described in Vine's Expository Dictionary says this, "Zoe is used in the New Testament of life as a principle." Life in the absolute sense.

Life as God has it. "That which the Father has in himself and which he gave to the incarnate Son to have in himself." In John 5.26, "And which the Son manifested in the world," 1 John 1.2, "from this life man has become alienated in consequence of the fall." In other words, death is the absence of this zoe.

It's the separation from the author of life. Life gripped by fear of death is described for us in Ephesians 4, 18-19. "Being darkened in their understanding, excluded from the zoe of God," life of God, "because of the ignorance that is in them, because of the hardness of their hearts, they having become callous, having given themselves over to sensuality for the practice of every kind of impurity with greediness." Okay, let me wrap this up and what he's saying.

That all this desire of greediness, sensuality, impurity, all of this is wrapped up because they have become excluded from zoe. And I've mentioned this before, I think maybe end of last year I mentioned this. A quick and easy way to understand this is FOMO, fear of missing out. Because mankind has been separated from the life of God, we are trying to live because naturally, our natural instinct from the moment that we are born is to live.

We learn how to suck. We didn't go through school to learn how to suck. All of a sudden, the mom produces milk and the baby comes and they know he needs to eat. And so the moment he is born, instinctively he is kicking to live and that's why he's crying.

And all our life, instinctively we want to live. That's why we avoid danger, that's why we pursue certain things, because we want to feel alive. But the problem is, because we have become alienated from this life, this fear of dying, fear of missing out causes us to pursue things that have nothing to do with God.

Ray Stedman, in his commentary on Hebrews, in this particular verse, he says this, "Since death is the absence of life, spiritual death is already present in human affairs, appearing as depression, fear, boredom, despair, waste, limitation, and defeat. The devil's lie is to convince many that they can avoid such experiences by amassing wealth, maintaining youth by strenuous exercise, or expensive treatments, searching for adventure, falling in and out of love, gaining the marks of success, indulging in widespread travel, satisfying every whim, and so forth." In other words, this is how Pastor Ray Stedman describes what he is saying here.

People who are gripped by fear of death are enslaved because of their fear of missing out. Isn't that the reason why we want to get a better job? Why we look forward to the weekend? And why many people stay off of Facebook? Because they look at Facebook and they see all the great things that everybody else is experiencing and then it produces in them a coveting, and this coveting causes them to pursue things that they don't need or may not have even wanted?

Because they're afraid that if I make this decision for Christ, I'm afraid that I'm not going to get that. If I don't give enough money, if I don't get this job, if I don't put enough money away, there is this fear. None of that is sin in and of itself.

But mankind is described as people who have been gripped with this fear of death. Some of the most famous words in the Constitution that describes the principle behind the U.S. Constitution. You know this, we learned it in school. It says, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness." Life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness.

None of these things. Nobody reads that and says, "Oh my gosh, what kind of a lousy country is this?" It's a great country because of this. That we have the freedom to pursue things that we believe is going to produce life, produce joy, and produce liberty. But in a fallen world, people who are filled with, are gripped with fear of death, this pursuit of life leads to death.

This pursuit of liberty in our fallen nature produces bondage. This pursuit of happiness produces greater sorrow. And that's why Jesus says in Matthew 10, 39, "Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it." Because our natural instinct to want to live causes us to pursue things that produces death.

That's what he means. When Christ came and he was crucified on the cross, and he says, "We have also been crucified along with him." So all this rat race that we're tied up in, that causes so much pain and sorrow, broken marriages, broken relationships, all this desire to be somebody, is producing death, and bondage, and sorrow.

Jesus says, "Come, pick up your cross, and follow me." He who loses his life because he finds his life in me, will truly find life. Galatians 5, 13, "For you are called to freedom, brethren, only do not turn your freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love serve one another." That's why if we're not careful, religiousness can cause more bondage if we're not careful.

Because what God called us to is freedom. Why do we worship God? Because it produces greater joy. Why do we follow Christ? Because I find life there. Why do we submit ourselves? Because I find liberty. You know what the preamble of the satanic church is? There are many things that they believe, but the primary thing that they describe at the center of the satanic church, it says this.

The founder of the satanic church that was established in 1969, in Hotel California, and I mentioned this a while back, the song Hotel California is describing the satanic church. And Anton LaVey says of his church, "Nothing is to be gained by denying oneself pleasure. Religious calls for abstinence most often come from faith that view the physical world and its pleasures as spiritually dangerous.

Satanism is a world affirming, not world denying religion." You know what was interesting? I was reading this week about Anton LaVey and what his beliefs were about satanism. And even though he's considered the father of satanism in the modern generation, he said he himself doesn't believe in satan. He says he's an atheist.

The only reason why he created this church was to give freedom to those who are bound by religion so they can just live any way they want. He said he doesn't believe in satan. He says people who believe in satanism are idiots. Those are his exact words. Yet he established this church and he said the primary reason is to give freedom.

There is no such thing as sin. Just do whatever you want. The Bible describes the fall of mankind, the grips that satan has on mankind in 1 John 2, 16. "For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the boastful pride of life is not from the Father, but from the world." Christ came to set us free.

In fact, his very first words when he began his public ministry, he went into the synagogue and he quoted Isaiah 61, verse 1, which was a messianic promise that when the Messiah comes, that this is what he was going to fulfill. And he read this, "The spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted.

He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim the liberty to captives and freedom to prisoners." That's how he described why he came. He described his human life and human death to free us from the bondage of sin. Again in John 8, 31 and 32, it says, "If you continue in my word, then you are truly disciples of mine and you will know the truth and the truth will make you free." And then verse 36, "So if the Son makes you free, you will be free indeed." Because in our Constitution, we have the liberty to pursue life, liberty, and happiness.

You know, one of the chief things about living in this country, it's free. And I think that's awesome that we have religious freedom. We don't have to worry about the government coming down on us, at least not yet. But in this liberty, the Bible describes liberty as being freed from this bondage of sin so that we can find true life in Christ.

Until we find liberty in Christ, we will automatically be bound by the things of this world. Because we live in fear that if we give too much to God, that we will lose our liberty. That if we pick up our cross, that we will lose our joy. That if we give all that God demands, that we will nullify our life.

And that is a deception of the devil. And that's why Jesus says, "If you find life in me, come follow me." You know the perfect example of a man who was truly set free was Apostle Paul sitting in prison, ready to die. And he writes in Philippians 121, "For to me to live is Christ and to die is gain." How do you destroy a joy of a man who has already been crucified?

Death to him is released from this bondage and being set free. People wonder why so many people around the world sacrifice everything, go to weird parts of the world, eating strange food, putting their kids in danger, simply to spread this doctrine about Jesus' incarnation and resurrection. Why do they do that?

Someone who is not set free will never understand. We'll always look at that, maybe in admiration. If you grew up in the church, I admire that from a distance. And our testimony is always secondhand. We read something, we heard something. You know, we put the two and two together, we exposited the text, and we look at that and say, "Well, I heard these great things of testimonies and I share this with you." And we're always regurgitating other people's testimonies, but we ourselves do not know.

Why do we come to church? Are we trying to appease God? Do we think that if we give enough and serve enough that God's going to bless our family and our business is going to get better? Is that why we're here? And you do not realize that that's the reason why you're here.

You are still under bondage. He came to set us free. We come here because this is where we experience freedom. Why do we worship God? Because I feel the most alive when I am worshiping God. More than NBA finals, more than anything else, I feel the most alive when I am near Christ.

That's why I come. And that's why you come. And if for any other reason, you are in bondage and you know it. That's what He means. His incarnation, He came, He took on flesh, and He suffered for our sake. And He tells us to come. Until this world becomes nothing, it will become too much.

Why are these Indian pastors? They're not old men, they're not young men. You know the average age of these Indian pastors that we've been ministering to or trying to support? The average of these, age of these people are somewhere between 28 and 44. That's exactly where we are as a church.

Average. Some of us are a little bit higher, some of us are a little bit lower. But that's the average age of the pastors. They look a lot older. When I first went there, I thought these guys were at least in their 60s, but found out the majority of them were somewhere right around there, 28 to 43.

So out of the 45, 50 pastors that we support, only about one or two of them are not married. Majority of them have very young children at home. Infants, two-year-old, five-year-olds. If they're old, maybe about 10 or 11, 12-year-olds. So they're right in the thick of things, like many of our church families.

And yet, they leave them behind for periods, and they walk into dangerous places, risking their life to share this strange doctrine of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection. An individual who does not know the life of Christ will never understand that. Why would you risk your life? Why would you risk your young children?

When the whole world, every decision they make is to protect their children, why would you risk that? Until you understand, until you are freed from the bondage of this world, you'll never really fully understand that there's more life in death in Christ than all the success that you can muster up in this world.

They go because the worst tragedy in life is not dying early. The worst tragedy in life is not getting sick and not having food on the table. That is not the worst tragedy in life. If you believe what you and I profess to believe in Scripture, the worst tragedy in life is dying without Christ.

That's not me. That's not my interpretation. That's not breeding community church. That's what all Christians believe and profess. The problem is our life and doctrines don't match up. And that's what we're trying to do. That's what discipleship is, is trying to match up our life and our confession so that it would be consistent.

My prayer this morning as we come to the communion table, that we would, again, deeply consider what does his broken body symbolize by the bread and his shed blood symbolized by the grape juice? What kind of impact should that have? How consistent is my profession in my life? Do I truly believe in the incarnation of Christ, that God himself walked in my shoes to set me free?

Are you truly free? Have you been set free? Are you declaring freedom with your mouth but in your life are living in bondage? So as we open up the communion table, I invite you to take some time to seriously reflect and consider. Lord, help me. Open my eyes to see.

I believe. I have weak faith. And so through the communion table, when you are ready, one by one, we ask you to come. And again, if you're on the side, come through the side and go down the middle so that we don't create traffic here. And again, we want to remind you that the communion table are for those who have been baptized.

If you made a profession of faith and Christ has covered you through his blood, then you are welcome to come because it's, the communion table is more like an anniversary of someone who has been united with Christ. If you don't know that you have been united with Christ and you haven't done so, we ask that you would remain in your seat.

And if God is speaking to you and that maybe you've been at the church all your life and you just assume that you're a Christian, but now that the gospel is becoming more clear and you realize that that's not it, I really want to encourage you to seek out leaders, seek out brothers and sisters in Christ.

Ask them, how do I become a Christian? How do I get forgiven of my sins? So if you haven't done so, we ask that you guys would sit, just continue to pray and seek and then again, come and talk to us so that we can help you out. And for those of you who are coming to the table, please come with reverence.

In fact, in Corinthians, it says, "Those who eat and drink of the blood and of his flesh in an irreverent manner, eats and drinks judgment upon himself." In other words, this is sacred. So as you come up, again, it's not, nobody earns their way up to the communion table.

We humble ourselves by acknowledging that we are sinners and that the only hope that we have is the blood of Christ. And so as we confess our sins to come up and to celebrate what he has done for us. So let me read the passage for us before we open up the table.

And then as you are ready, we invite you to come one by one. First Corinthians 11, 23 says, "For I received from the Lord that which I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus in the night in which he was betrayed took bread. And when he had given things, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you.

Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, he took the cup also after supper saying, this cup is a new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes." Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we pray that as we participate in this sacred event, that you would sanctify our minds, our thoughts, and our lives. Help us Lord God to celebrate your grace. Help us to remember that we live because Christ died for us. Help us Lord God to have an attitude of genuine gratitude in our hearts, that everything that we do will be an overflow of that mercy you've given us.

So I pray that you would anoint this time, may it be a time of blessing to your church. In Jesus name we pray, amen.