Amen. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. That's the word of God. Amen. Amen. Alright, listen, why don't you go ahead and have a seat. We're gonna let musicians at each of our campuses, uh, clear out here. Guys, thank you so much for leading us and worship the way that you guys do. And, uh, it's so good to be with you. Hello, to those of you who are watching this at Mid Rivers in, in Grants Trail in Fenton, and those of you're watching online, it's just good that we get to do this together, but do those words that I just read, do those sound familiar to some of you? Uh, my guess is when you hear those words, they hit different for different people. I mean, some of you might hear, uh, hear that verse and think, oh, I like, I've got questions about that. It doesn't make sense to me. Some of you're like, man, those words ring really true. I'm really grateful for them. Uh, some of us are familiar, some of us not so much. But my guess is most of us, most of us have heard these words because, uh, because they're, they're like some of the most famous words in all of scripture. I mean, you see 'em everywhere. In fact, maybe you've been to, uh, places before where you've seen it like you were driving by a and and you saw it on a billboard or something like that. Or you saw, saw somebody at like a sporting event right on the street corner or up in the stands holding up this sign, John three 16. That's the verse. That's the verse. It's a really famous verse, and it's actually really famous for a reason. Now, um, here's the thing. Even if this isn't familiar to you, my guess is if I asked you if this, those words that I just read, sound familiar, all of you should be saying yes. You know why? Because we just sang them. You were singing it, it was in the song and you were paying attention, right? So here's the thing. Uh, the reason that these words are so important is because honestly, uh, this is, uh, this is like the, the, the message of the Christian faith kinda summed up in one sentence. I mean, we, it's, it's the gospel wrapped up in, uh, in just a few words. And these are the words of Jesus. And we really do believe that they are true. So I wanna read them to you again, uh, because I just think they're so important. So, uh, listen to this. And once again, this is John three 16. But here's the thing. I'm gonna read verse 17 as well. 'cause if you want the whole story, I think you need both verses. For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life. For God did not send his son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. This is the gospel of Jesus Christ, that God has sent his son into the world to save it, to make a way for humans, for you and me to be reconciled to God and to experience this eternal life with him. In fact, for the entire all of creation, the whole universe to be reconciled to God, which this is the gospel, which by the way, side note, that word gospel is kind of a funny word, isn't it? It's one of those words that we only hear like in church, outside of the church, you might hear people say things like, we talk about gospel music, and so we all know what that means. Or, or we might say like, uh, uh, it will tell a story and somebody will say, that's the gospel truth, which usually means it's, it's not right. But that's, um, that's, that's the, that's how we'll use that word. Other than that, we just hear it in church and it's kind of gospel gospel for me, it's one of those words that starts to sound funnier the more I say it, and the more it loses its meaning. You know what I mean? Gospel, gospel, gospel. Sometimes people will put that long gospel gospel. See, now it sounds weird to all of us. What, what's that called when a word starts semantic satiation, when a word starts to lose its meaning. It happens with this word gospel. So what does that word mean? It's actually an old English word. So when the early, early, uh, translators of the New Testament were translating it from the original Greek, because that's the language that it was written in, into English, so that we could read it and understand it, they started to use this word that was in their language gospel every time they saw a Greek word. Uh, in the New Testament, it's that Greek word evangelian. Uh, now both of these words mean the same thing. It's a good replacement. 'cause they both really basically just mean this good news, good news. So whenever you see that in your New Testament, you can know that this is the word that's there. And by the way, it it, you might be connecting dots here. This is where we get our word for evangelism, which just means sharing the good news. We believe those of us who follow Jesus are called to just tell people, Hey, can I share some good news with you? That's what evangelism is all about. It comes from this word. Here's my point. If you're kind of new to this whole church thing, and maybe that word sounds kind of weird to you and you've got questions about what all of that means, um, why we use the word gospel so much, it's simply this. We believe it's actually true that there is a creator who created this entire universe. And the reason that he did it was out of love. And he loves us. In fact, he loves us so much that when the story went off course and the world started to fall apart, he didn't just sit back and watch it burn. In fact, he did not consider it too much to spare his only son so that this world might be reconciled back to him. That's how much he loves us. And when you start to get your head around that, that's like as good a news as it gets. And so we believe this, that we live in a world that's broken, but help has come and it is still coming. There's a rescue operation underway, and that's the big, big story. But what's amazing about this big story is that it's also deeply personal. I mean, if I was gonna just kind of tell you like the gospel in my own life, how it's really, really personal for me, well, it would sound probably something like this. There was a time in my life where I was broken, lost, alone. That's my story. But it doesn't end there. I found healing and identity and grace through Jesus and his church. That's my story. Now, my guess is that, that there are so many of you who could get up here and you could tell a similar story about how this gospel, this good news, has made its way personally into your life. Because this good news is breaking out all over the place. Uh, this is just a part of what this, this, this looks like this plan of god's to save the world. It's happening all over in so many ways, which gets us to the Lord's Prayer. See, we've been in this pray like this series now for a couple weeks and, uh, uh, uh, our lead pastor Greg, has really been walking us through this line by line. And it's been so good 'cause we've, we've talked about, uh, that we get to come to a heavenly Father who loves us and bring our prayers to him. We got some warnings early on that Jesus gave us about not like trying to be too showy with our prayers or thinking that by repeating a prayer over and over again, that that's some sort of magical incantation that God's forced to hear. And last week we talked about how we are to hallow his name. We're praying that his name would be hallowed in this world. And when we start to understand the name of God or the names of God, well he meets us in the middle of all of that. It's been such a good conversation. But lemme just tell you for me what has been like, as I've been in conversations over the last couple weeks around here in my small group, and even in like my personal prayer time, one of the things that I've noticed over and over is how much I hear people saying, I really want to get better at this. Like, there's so many of us that really are saying, I want to be able to communicate with God in this way, and I want to grow in this. And that's so amazing. That's so encouraging to me. And I think that today is gonna be really, really practical if that's you. Now, for some of you, oh, by the way, if that is you and you really do wanna practice this, I wanna just tell you next weekend for church, you should come early at all of our campuses. Uh, we're gonna open our doors to our rooms about 20 minutes early, and we're gonna have some time for prayer and reflection. And followers of Jesus are, will be invited to take communion during that time. And there'll be some music going on and some cool things in each of our rooms. And we just wanna invite you to come and, and, and pray. Put this into practice. And there'll be some pastors who will kind of guide you a little bit through it. But we're doing that next weekend, 20 minutes before every service. So come early, okay? We'll remind you later this week. But if there are some of you who are listening to all that and going, I, I I don't know. I I'm still early at this and I, I'm, I've got questions about how this works and maybe I'm not sure there's a God that I can pray to or maybe, maybe, I think it's kind of a waste of time. Maybe there's roadblocks to keep you from, uh, praying to God. It could be some kind of doubt that you're kind of wrestling through, or maybe it's something else. Maybe you're angry at God about something. Maybe you're carrying, uh, shame or guilt for, uh, for things and you just wonder what it would look like to approach a holy God. Listen, all of that, um, is good and we're gonna talk about that. But let me ask a question now that I think can get all of us on the same page. Is there anybody here that needs to hear some good news? Yeah. Yeah. Have you heard bad news lately? Yeah, I have. I'll tell you, this week I was talking to a friend and they said they heard bad news and it was like getting punched in the gut. I know what that feels like. I mean, you look at things that are going on, sometimes it's personal things that are going on in our lives. Sometimes it's really, really big things. Is there anybody here who feels alone these days? Is there anybody here who is wondering where this whole story is headed? And you're concerned? You, you're like daily worried about the future and where everything's going? Anybody here just kind of overwhelmed with the headlines, whether it is the political stuff that is going on here or, or, uh, like hurricanes in the southeast, or if it's these, these conflicts that are happening around the world in the Middle East, in in Ukraine and Russia, all of this stuff, it's all happening. And I'll tell you, I think it gets us to a place where we just, we need some good news, don't we? I do. Well, Jesus tells us that we should pray like this. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And I think that if we can start to understand this part of the prayer, it's the heart of the Lord's prayer. It's practical. Jesus says, we should pray for the kingdom of God to come. And when we understand what that means, when we pray for that, well, I think it can give us hope. I think it will begin to recognize just how good a news that actually is. We want God's kingdom to come. We want that good news to be true for us, true for the world on Earth, that isn't as it is in heaven, but true for me. So before we go any further, maybe we, we should stop and pray just that can, can we do that together, father? Um, we really are overwhelmed by everything that goes on in our lives. And, um, it's all the time. But lately it just, it, it seems like a lot. God, we, we pray, uh, for people in the, the southeast of the United States in Florida and Tennessee and Georgia and the Carolinas and Virginia. God, would you just, would you now help these communities as they now figure out how to, uh, get themselves unburied from everything that's happening, rebuild their homes, rebuild their lives, their communities, God, be with them in their grief? We pray for, uh, people in Israel and the Gaza Strip and, uh, that entire region, God, that there would be peace. Would you, would you lead them to peaceful solutions? God, same for Ukraine and Russia. God, we just pray for things that are going on, but even the conflict that's happening in our own land, God, in all of it, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. So now Holy Spirit, speak to us through your word. Speak to us through this prayer. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. Well, again, I think this idea of praying that God's kingdom would come on earth is actually, it's, it's important. It's as practical as it gets for those of you that are trying to figure out how to grow in your prayer life, I think this is connected to all of the ways we're wanting to learn how to pray more and more. But I want to just say at the outset, it's also kind of a hard thing for us to wrap our heads around what it means for us to be praying for a kingdom. Because I don't know if you notice, but most of us, like we don't live in a kingdom, do we? I mean, there's maybe some of you who are watching online. I don't know where you're watching from, but, uh, for us here in the good old us of a, I'm pretty sure our whole story is based on the fact that we kicked the king out, right? I mean, that's the story. That's America. We said, listen, we don't want a monarchy here. We're declaring our independence. We want you out. We're gonna be a what? A republic of the people by the people. And for the people, I feel like we should, like the march should be playing now or something. Listen as no, as important as, uh, as, as, as that is, I think to our history as a nation, our identity, our understanding of even the political stuff that's going on these days. It's all really, really important. But here's my point. I I actually think that we're, we're being a little bit intellectually dishonest when we talk about kingdoms in that way, because I was watching, uh, reading a theologian earlier this week who, who kind of pointed this out and I was fascinated by it. When you look culturally at the United States, we are obsessed with the monarchy, aren't we? Did you know that 22.8 million Americans tuned in on television to watch Princess Diana and, and Prince Charles get married? That was in 1981. You guys are like, well, that was like over 40 years ago. Well, the same number of people tuned in to watch William and Cape get married, 29 million, watched Harry and Meghan. So there you go. And do you guys remember just not long ago when the queen passed away, we were all so sad, weren't we? We were like, oh, the queen. We've known her for such a long time and we feel like we know her personally. I feel like I know all about her. And you know why we feel that way? Because 80% of the TV shows in this country are about the royal family. We're obsessed with it. When we talk about like, uh, like people who are great, we, we use this kind of language. Elvis is what? The king? The king, yeah. Beyonce. She's the queen bee. Uh, Michael Jackson, the king of pop. If you listen to country music, we have Woohoo, king George, right? And then there's Prince who's hard to describe, but he's prince. We, um, we, we, we love watching movies with our kids about princesses. And then sometimes we save up a whole bunch of money and we spend it at the Magic Kingdom. We watch movies about the King of Godo and a Game of Thrones. Alright, you get the point. Now, why is it that we're so obsessed about this? Here's what I would love for you to do. I want you to just take a stab at why you think we in the United States are so like preoccupied with the monarchy and kings and kingdoms and queens and all that kinda stuff. I know it's a mixed bag. There's downsides to it, and I think we're familiar with those and you can share those with each other too. But just take a second now and turn to the people around you. Go. What is it about kingdoms and kings and queens that just, I don't know, it just draws us in, talk to each other. Let's, uh, Let's Just, uh, let's just hear in Chesterfield, just, uh, somebody just shout out at me. What, what is it that you guys were talking about? What do you think it is? Hierarchy and comparison. Say it again. Hierarchy And Comparison. Hierarchy and comparison. Oh, interesting. Okay. So that's kind of a mixed bag in and of itself, right? But there is something about us that is fascinating with people who we kind of view as at the top and how did they get there and what does that mean about them? Yeah. Okay. What else? Power. Power. Who said that? Yeah, somebody said that last night. And I, I'm fascinated by this because we're interested in power dynamics and, and how that works and abusive power. And, uh, the truth is we want people who will wield power in for goodness, for good things, for in a healthy way, right? I think that's part of it. If you really get down to it. We were just talking about this, uh, the music team. I'm sorry. Yeah, go ahead. It's because it's, It's Oh wow, okay. It's easy. It's, it's uh, it's straightforward. If a king is in charge, what he says goes right. We don't have to build this really complicated form of government with checks and balances and all of that kinda stuff. That's a great point. That's a great point. Again, it comes back to, I think what he's talking about when it, when it comes to power. Um, I think at the end of the day, part of our fascination with it is we all, we all kind of like the idea of a king. We just want it to be a good king. Isn't that right? And the thing we've learned is what? There are no good kings except for one. So when we understand like what it means when Jesus says, we pray thy kingdom come, I think this starts to kind of open things up for us a little bit. Uh, this is such an important question. What does Jesus mean by a kingdom? Because Jesus talks about the kingdom like all the time. He would tell all of these stories to people, these parables, and he would often start them with this phrase, the kingdom of heaven is like, and then he would go on from there. He would talk about how the kingdom of God is, of God is near. Go back. Earlier this summer, one of our pastors, Ben Horsman taught us about Mark chapter one, verse 15. It's a really impor important verse. In fact, he helped us like memorize it because he said, you need to know this verse. And, uh, let's just go back and look at it again. What is, what does Jesus say there? He says, the time has come, the kingdom of God has come near repent and believe the good news. There's Jesus again talking about the kingdom. Like it's a really big deal. And that phrase there at the end, the good news, it's the word you think it is in the Greek. In fact, some of your translations will use the word gospel here. What? This is the good news that Jesus came to proclaim. And boy did he proclaim it. He talked about it all the time. Sometimes it got him into trouble. Sometimes it inspired people and they wanted to follow him and learn more about this kingdom. But other times it stirred people up and it made them angry. When Jesus is hanging on the cross, they hung a sign over his head that said, what king of the Jews? Now they were mocking him because they were so angry that he had made that claim. Turns out in those days, in the time when Jesus was on this earth, uh, Jewish people and a lot of non-Jewish folks knew what they thought. They knew what Jesus was talking about when it came to the kingdom. They were like, oh, is this so Jesus is claiming to be Messiah? Well, we know about that because Messiah is this, this thing that that, that, uh, the prophets have been talking about for hundreds of years, that there's one who would come, who's been anointed by God to be the next king over Israel and he's going to reign and like come into power. Well, if that's what Jesus is talking about, we get it. We can like it all makes sense to us. In fact, we think we know what we want that to look like. See if you know Israel's story, uh, the truth is that, um, like they, they were like, this means that the king has come, he's gonna raise up an army now and he's gonna kick Rome out of our beloved homeland and we can finally establish the nation of Israel as it was in the glory days. The kingdom has come, ah, let's go grab your swords, grab your spears, grab your weapons, have fun storming the castle, let's go and take this thing over. Let's go. That's what they thought this was all about. See, they had in their heads what the kingdom was supposed to look like based on their current situation that they were in. If you know Israel's story, uh, part of it goes like this. They would say that, that for hundreds of years now, um, they had been living in exile. They were occupied and subjected to four different empires. In, in, in it starts with Babylon. They get kicked outta their home land. Babylon gets taken over by Persia, Persia, by Greece and then Rome. And by the time you get to the time of Jesus, they were sick of it. And they were ready for something to change. They were ready for, for, for life to, to begin to, to take on a different kind shape. And there had been these campaigns in the past where like they were gonna, they were gonna like do this. And they thought they had had a couple of people that looked like Messiah, but here's what they thought the kingdom was gonna look like. This was the gospel. The good news for them that Messiah King would come and marshal an army to rise up and kick Rome out of their homeland, reclaim their independence and reestablish the kingdom of Israel for God's chosen people. That's a lot to fit on a piece of cardboard. But, um, you need to understand this expectation that this is what Messiah was coming to do was so strong in those days, that even when Jesus came and he acted totally different than what they expected, they still thought this was the plan. Even when like he was ultimately rejected by the Jewish leaders and he was crucified on a Roman cross even after the resurrection, when he appeared to his disciples and they, and like blew everybody's minds, they still thought this was the plan. Look at what they say in Acts chapter one. Luke tells us this is after the resurrection. This is after they've shared meals with Jesus in his resurrected body. Look at what they ask him. They say, Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel? Hey Jesus, that whole resurrection thing, like, wow, is it time Like, like now? Now do we get to go do this now is now when we get to restore the kingdom to Israel? See, we won't look at Jesus's answer to them today. We've looked at it before. It's beautiful. Go read it on your own. Let summarize it for you. He looks at his disciples and he says, guys, you have no idea how big this is. You just wait. In fact, you don't have to wait that long. The point is that what Jesus had really come to do was so different from this. What he had come to do was to uh, to to rise up against sin and death and evil once and for all and to set us free from those things. And it was not just for the Jews, it was for the Jews and the non-Jews, the Jews and the Gentiles. In fact, revelation tells us every tribe and tell and nation this story was just so much bigger. See, sometimes when we pray for God's kingdom to come, where we get stuck is when we start to put it up against our own expectations of what we think that should look like. See, we hear this story about these people in Jesus' time, and we ask like, how did they miss it? It just seems so obvious. I mean, they had Jesus there. He was telling them stories about what the kingdom was like. Were they not paying attention when he rose from the dead? Did they not realize that maybe there was something bigger going on here? And we look at them and we go, how did they miss it? But here's the point for us today. You ready? We miss it too. So often we think we know what God's kingdom is supposed to look like. And, and every time we do this, we just, we, we, we, we miss it. And all of this can mess up our prayer lives. Like huge. Jesus says that we should pray to our heavenly Father. Father, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Part of that is a letting go of control and saying, it's in your hands. God, I want your kingdom to come. I'm trusting you with this. Uh, and when we get our minds around this, it will change the way that we pray. So lemme just show you, uh, in t Wright, he says, when he first learned the Lord's prayer, he thought that that one line thy will be done was like a line of resignation. It was like, uh, like a shrug of the shoulders. He said, I guess thy will be done. I I you're gonna do what you're gonna do. God. So just, yeah, do it. Now, that might sound kind of silly to somebody, but oftentimes we, we pray like this or it's why we don't pray is we just say, well, listen, God's gonna do what he's gonna do. So I guess, yeah, cool God, you do you, and that's the way we pray now, is that what Jesus is trying to teach us here in this prayer? Lemme show you a one off of it. Sometimes we, we, we couch it a little bit and it sounds like this. Hey God, um, I'm fine. Don't worry about little old me like I know you've got other people who have a lot more going on and they need you way more than I do. And I know you've just, it's a lot for you to be running this universe. And so I'll just stay over here in my corner and I'll be okay. I I, I don't wanna bother you. Underneath that is a shrug of the shoulders. Do you hear it? It's a resignation. My life is just gonna be what it's gonna be again. Is that what Jesus taught us to pray? Now, there's another extreme to this. The other side of the coin is for people who think they know exactly what God needs to do, they know exactly what the kingdom needs to look like. And so they pray with great expectation, God, this is what I want you to do. I want you to do this for me. I want you to do this for the people around me. And God, this is how you have to do it. And when God doesn't answer their prayers exactly the way they asked, well we're left feeling like confused, disappointed, maybe angry, resentful, because this is the prayers where people start to pray like God is a genie and a lamp. But we know that story, don't we? You remember Robin Williams? No. If I got the wrong crowd, he had cuffs on his arms. Do you remember that? Because he was a slave to the person who was in possession of the lamp. That's not God. God is our heavenly Father and he's in charge. He's a holy God, and he knows what he's doing and he will not be manipulated by people. And yet he invites us to come to him and pray. Now, close to that is another way we do this, where we start, it's like another trap we fall into, which is that we think that once we've prayed for something, then the goal is like our task is to act as though God has already answered that prayer. This is an idea where we say, look, I, I I'm gonna, I'm gonna say this and then I'm gonna believe that it's already happened, that God has already answered that prayer. Because if I don't, then it's going to be reflection on my lack of faith. I'm gonna name it and claim it. Guys, I need you to know that's unbiblical. We can absolutely name and claim the things that scripture says. We can name and claim like his grace and his goodness and and hope. But beyond that, the, the truth is that God doesn't make those kinds of promises to us because, uh, we're trusting him with this. And so, uh, now there's another way that this gets twisted for a lot of us where, where we start to say, God, I, I'm, I'm gonna pray all of these things and then it's gonna be how I re responded to people around me. Like I need to act as though you've answered all of those prayers because I'm a witness to you and your goodness. And I want people to know that. Like once you trust in Jesus, then life is amazing. And so, uh, we start to kind of dress that up a little bit and we act like God makes life perfect for us. And so our stories sometimes start to sound a little bit like, uh, this, we say, listen, um, uh, life is broken. Uh, it's full of trouble. There's no hope without Jesus. But then I found Jesus, and now life is perfect. I never face any trouble 'cause Jesus is here, right? And we walk around like this is perfect guys. This is, this goes back to what we talked about week one of this series. This is hypocritical. It's just not true. We're putting on a, we're putting on an act. It's not real life. And those of us who follow Jesus need to get better at telling our stories. Because the truth is, sometimes life doesn't quite go like this. And this also affects our prayer life because sometimes we get to this place where we start to think that like, um, part of of of, of how we do this is we pray, uh, in subtle ways. We pray as though like we're already all cleaned up and we know exactly what a good prayer is supposed to sound like. And so we'll do this in front of people. We'll pray for what we think we ought to pray for. We know the good things that like good Christians pray for. So we will, we'll do that. That doesn't work. I love this quote by Dallas Willard. Look at what he says. He says, prayer simply dies from efforts to pray about good things that honestly do not matter to us. Pray about things that matter to you. 'cause they matter to God too. See, Jesus said that the kingdom of God is good news. And if that's true, if we really understand what he's saying, the kingdom of God is bigger. It's better. It's more than, it's more beautiful than anything that we could ask or imagine. And so that's what we get to look forward to the kingdom of God. Uh, if we really understand what Jesus is saying, then it's, it's like perfect justice, absolute peace, wholeness, wellness, relationship, love. It's all of these really good things. It's life according to the creator of life. It's ultimately everything that we long for. But now here we live in an in-between time where the kingdom of God has come, but it has not yet fully been like arrived. And so in this, in-between time where we're not there yet, we pray that God's kingdom would come, that his will would be done on earth as it is in heaven. What we need to be praying is like with this thick tension in our prayers. God, this is not right. This is an ally is supposed to be God. I'm hurting right now and I need your help. I need healing for my friend. The world is broken, and God, I need you to clean it up. Father, I need you in my marriage, in my, with my child, in my job, with my relationships in my neighborhood, there's this thing that's weighing so heavily on me that I need you. I need the, the shame and the guilt that I carry for so long. I need you to come. I need the king to be in my life and to bring the justice and the peace and the wholeness and the grace and the forgiveness and the life that only you can bring. God, I don't have all the answers. I know what I want, but I also know that you know best. So God, you will be done. I can only trust you with this. And I just help me to trust you on earth as it is in heaven, but not just earth, this earth I need this. I need your will to be done in my life. So let me tell you what I tell people all the time when we're wrestling with prayer, you need to understand that you have a heavenly Father who loves you and you can cry out to him for what you need. Every little thing you can cry out to him. And you may not get the words right every time. And that's okay because God knows you and he loves you and he longs for these kinds of conversations. So you bring it to him and you cry out to him and you lay your burdens down at his feet. I always tell people that God's shoulders are big and he can bear the load of all of your anger, all of your frustration, all of your pain. You can beat his chest and he will receive it even when it ain't pretty. We pour it all out and then, and then we trust. See, every time that you see ways in this world where it is not as it should be, ways in our own life where it's broken and things are frustrated, and we know that only God can set things straight, this is the prayer we pray thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as is, as it is in heaven. Craig Keener says this prayer is for the desperate. And this is something that Jesus understands. See, he isn't suggesting that these words are easy. In fact, praying this prayer is one of the hardest, bravest things we can do. But what we get to is this life is not perfect. But I, but I never face trouble alone because Jesus is here. This is the good news. This is what we clinging to. Jesus is here and he gets it. And you know what? This prayer was hard for him to see. It was the very night that Jesus was gonna be arrested, handed over to the Roman authorities, ultimately, uh, uh, to, to be crucified. He's in the garden of Gethsemane and he's asked his friends to stay up and pray with him, but they've all fallen asleep. And so now he's all alone. And scripture tells us that while he is alone, he gets down on his knees and he begins to pray. He knows everything that's about to happen. He knows that he is headed to the cross and he knows that in the InBetween time, he is gonna be arrested, mocked, kicked around, stripped, whipped, beaten within an inch of his life, spat upon mistreated, made fun of. And then there will be nails that will pierce his hands and feet and he will be hung on a Roman cross to die. But on top of all of the physical suffering that Jesus is about to endure, there is also this weight, this burden. He knows that all of the sins of all of the world for all time, the evil of humanity, the things that have happened, the bloodshed, the, the violence, all of that, the weight of it all is going to be weighing him down on his shoulders. And in there's a moment that's coming where for the first time in all of eternity, the Father will turn his face away from the sun. Jesus knows this is about to happen. And scripture says, Luke tells us that in this moment, as he's praying on the Mount of Olives, just like an olive is pressed to squeeze out the oil, Jesus is so crushed between the, beneath the weight of what is about to happen, that he begins to sweat drops of blood. And then he cries out the most intimate prayer that we see in all of scripture. Abba. Father, nothing is impossible for you. Take this cup from me, yet not what I will, but what you will. And in this prayer, Jesus echoes the prayer that he teaches us to pray. Father in heaven, your will be done. Scholars say that, that in many ways, this moment right here is when all of the promises in Jesus are fulfilled. Once he had resolved to do what he had come to do, the rest of it just, it, it it took place. This was the moment where Jesus surrendered his will to the Father. And this is the good news, the gospel of Jesus. And we have to understand that this is what it looks like. God so loved the world that he sent his one and only son to save it. And that is how the kingdom of God draws near. If you want to know what the kingdom of heaven looks like, you have to look at the king. See, our hope is not like it. It's not in a place that's some, uh, way far off place that we just hope we get to when we die. That is not what scripture teaches us on earth as it is in heaven. Heaven is coming here, but our hope isn't in a place at all. Our hope is in a person, the king. And if you want to know what the kingdom is like, you look at the king. So watch him now. Watch him now willingly submit himself to his father's, will watch him as he dies on a cross so that in his death he might experience a resurrection and defeat death once and for all so that we might have life with him. Watch him as he heals the sick and raises the dead to life and invites the little children to come to him. Watch him as he tells stories about the kingdom and he shares meals with his friends and they laugh together. And in all of this, he starts to tell stories about the kingdom and tells them that the kingdom is gonna be like a really big wedding party. If you want to know what the kingdom is like, look at the king. So in the, uh, uh, the Chronicles of Narnia, it's the stories that CS Lewis writes that it, there's this place where the four children that have found their way into this magical land here, the name of Aslan, for the first time now Aslan is the king of Narnia. He's been gone for a long time, they say, but he's this great lion. And there are now rumors, uh, among the citizens of Narnia that Alan is on the move that he's starting to approach. See, because he's been away, the entire land of Narnia has been trapped in this enchanted winter where it's always winter and never Christmas time never seems to pass, and life is just kind of frozen. But now they hear that azlan is on the move and things are beginning to thaw. And it is one of in the moment where one of the citizens of Narnia, Mr. Beaver is telling these four children about this. He says, Azlan is on the move. And this is the first time they've heard his name. And now a very curious thing happened. None of the children who knew Aslan was knew him any more than you do. But the moment the beaver had spoken in these words, everyone felt quite different. Perhaps it has sometimes happened to you in a dream that someone says something which you don't understand. But in the dream it feels as though it had some enormous meaning. Either a terrifying one which turns the whole dream into a nightmare or else a lovely meaning too lovely to put into words, which makes the dream so beautiful that you remember it all your life and you're always wishing you could get into that dream again. It was like that. Now at the name of Aslan, each one of the children felt something jump in its inside. Edmund felt a sensation of mysterious horror. Peter felt suddenly brave and adventurous. Susan felt as if some delicious smell or some delightful strain of music had just floated by her. And Lucy got the feeling you have when you wake up in the morning and realize that it is the beginning of the holidays or the beginning of summer. Lewis is trying to help us understand what it is like when we start to hear the name that the kingdom of God is coming. So in Narnia, things begin to thaw. Christmas comes, they start to see signs of spring. Spring hasn't come yet, but it's fast approaching. So this is what this looks like for us. We see glimpses of the kingdom breaking out all over because each time somebody's story is changed by Jesus. Each time the grace enters into the story and transforms things. We see glimpses of the kingdom. Every time a life is saved, a a relationship is healed. Every time a prayer is answered, the kingdom of God breaks onto the scene. And we start to see that winter is beginning to thaw and the kingdom of God is at hand. And now all of a sudden our churches start to feel like these outposts, these embassies of a foreign, a kingdom that is from far away. And we, Paul says, we become ambassadors. It's like we're representatives of the kingdom of heaven who get to go around walking around this earth and declaring good news. Now how do we do that? Well, we tell stories. See, I said at the beginning of our conversation, I asked you guys if you needed to hear some good news today. Well, here's what we're gonna do. Uh, in just a minute, we're gonna end with a song. And let me just say this. Um, I know you people and I love you people, and I know that sometimes it's so tempting at the end of a service like this to get out early and beat the traffic. I'm telling you, if you do that today, you're gonna miss what you came for. This is it. This is it. We live in this in-between time, but there are glimpses of the kingdom that are popping up all over the place. And when we see this and we hear this good news, then it is encouraging because now we live with this hope. We're waiting for things to be made right. Again, like Paul says, the world is groaning for Jesus to come, but in this time we don't have to wait for good news because there are echoes of the kingdom all over the place as land is on the move. And so we pray honestly, boldly, desperately, father thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And does God answer that prayer? Let these people tell you.