Skip to content What's Your Distraction? Jun 17 · 39 min ...more
What's Your Distraction?
June 17, 2025 · 39 min
Join us to learn from women of the Bible who lead by example in serving the Lord, starting with the story of Mary and Martha.
Series Adam Mesa Sermons June 17, 2025 · 39 min · Adam Mesa Sermons
Join us to learn from women of the Bible who lead by example in serving the Lord, starting with the story of Mary and Martha. ...more Show the full description Show less Join us to learn from women of the Bible who lead by example in serving the Lord, starting with the story of Mary and Martha.
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Adam Mesa is Lead Pastor of Patria Church and speaks to a congregation of 12,000 about how the gospel of Jesus Christ brings purpose to every life. Patria
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Choosing Presence Over Distraction 0:01 Welcome to the ALSC podcast. Here at ALSC, we seek the lost, teach the found, and send the disciples. We truly hope you are encouraged by this week's message.0:13 We're continuing a series that we started at the top of May. What we wanted to do for May and June is tackle on a series that we're calling Wonder of Women and Fathers of Faith. We wanted to spend May0:25 talking about wonder of women. Women in the Bible who are truly wonderful women, who've committed to the things of Lord and give us an example of what it means to follow God, both as a man and a woman. And0:37 then next month, starting next week, we're gonna start our fathers of the faith series as pastor Diego will launch it off next week. And so we wanna continue this thought today by jumping in and talking about an0:49 individual in the Bible by the name of Mary. And no, it's not the Mary mother of Jesus or Mary Magdalene. It's another Mary who had a sister named Martha and a brother named Lazarus. That's who we're gonna1:00 share about today. So would you join me if you brought your Bible today? You could turn to Luke chapter 10. We're gonna start in verse 38 today. So if you brought your Bible iPhone, iPad, anything like that,1:12 feel free to open it. You could turn to Luke chapter 10 or you could simply follow along with what's gonna be on the screen. If you have your portion or you're ready to go, would you join me in the honor of standing for1:24 the reading of God's word as we're going to read the scriptures today and allow God to speak to us in this moment on this Pentecost Sunday. May the spirit of God move to us today. So,1:36 Luke chapter 10 verse 38, here's what it says. Now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. And she had a sister called Mary who1:48 sat at the Lord's feet and was listening to his teaching. But Martha was distracted with much serving and she went up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve2:00 alone? Tell her to help me. But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things. But 1 thing is necessary,2:12 Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her. Let's pray this afternoon. Lord, we pray and we come to you come to you today Father God and we pray Lord that your words speak to us2:24 Father God. In the day of Pentecost as the spirit went forth, we pray in this moment Lord as your word goes forth may the spirit begin to speak to us and minister to us Father God. May we be impacted by the message2:35 today. Looking more and more like Jesus in our lives. And may our hearts yearn for you today Lord that you show up in miraculous ways. May your word speak to us today and may we2:47 radically be transformed as we stand before you Lord. In Jesus name, amen and amen. You may be seated. Thank you so much. Before we jump in, to the message and hear some of the truths that we2:59 learn within this passage, it's important first for us to understand some of the context clues that we see within this scripture. I know many of you guys have read this passage before,3:11 and a lot of times when you read this passage or you've heard a sermon on this passage, it's always been true, but a lot of times the emphasis is merely on a pretty simple parallel, which is that Martha was3:23 serving and distracted with serving while Mary was sitting at Jesus's feet. And a lot of times the message is pretty simple. Are you willing to sit at Jesus's feet? But when we know the cultural3:35 implications of what's being talked about in this passage, that's when we can truly be challenged in our lives the way that the scripture entails. Because there's a lot of cultural context clues in what we3:47 read today that we may blow past. In the same way in today's culture, if I were to tell you that this weekend I had a tailgate, your mind immediately paints a picture and pretty much all of3:59 us can agree somewhat we know what a tailgate is. We know it's probably going to be in a parking lot, it couldn't include an RV or a truck, and the bed could be open, and we could be cooking something like sausages, and4:11 burgers, and hot dogs. If I say I had a tailgate, most of us know what that means. But if you went to someone and you had a time machine even a hundred years ago and told someone you had a tailgate this weekend, they4:23 would have no idea what you were talking about. They would think, did you have an animal's tail for dinner? They would think to themselves, what about a gate? There's gates4:35 don't have tails. They wouldn't know what you mean until you start explaining, oh, where I come from, we have vehicles where you can pull the tail the back end of the car, and you can cook and do other day. Oh, okay. Now4:46 I understand the context. Now I can paint a better picture of what you did this weekend. This is what we read today in this passage in a few moments. So I want you to check this out. If you have your Bible, you can4:56 follow along, or you can look at the screen with me. Here's the passage we just read. It says this, now as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village. It was very common if you read your Bible, Jesus5:08 is pretty good friends with Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. Most theologians believe this is the same Mary and Martha who was the sibling to Lazarus, who later on we see that5:19 Lazarus is the 1 in the Bible who died and Jesus came late. Mary and Martha were upset at him that he came late, and then Jesus speaks to Lazarus and says, Lazarus come forth and he raises from5:31 the grave. And so that's the same individual and family. So Jesus knows this family really well. They host him all the time. Jesus in many ways was was a vagabond. He would travel and5:43 only by the generosity of others would he be housed. And so Jesus, would often go to a city and village and he would trust that as he was teaching the gospel, people would house him, feed him, clothe him along5:55 with his disciples. They trusted God to provide. And so Mary and Martha are those common people in the town of Bethany who loved loved to host Jesus. Martha loved to6:07 have Jesus at her house. And so what happens is, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house. More than likely, she was the oldest, sister of Mary and Martha. And she6:19 had a sister called Mary who sat, so this is important, sat at what? The Lord's feet and listened to his teaching. So it's important to note right away6:31 what is Mary doing. She's sitting at the Lord's feet listening to his teaching. What we don't recognize, here's where the cultural thing comes from in, we don't recognize that in Jesus's6:43 day, women did not sit at the feet of a rabbi when they're teaching. Only men could do that. And it was the job of the man to6:55 receive the rabbi's teaching and then go home and tell his wife or tell the children. Now, there'll be times where he may publicly preach and there could be women and children present, but in7:07 a private setting, in a discipleship setting, women did not sit at the feet of their rabbi. So right away, we know that Mary is a rebellious7:19 person against culture. Culture tells Mary she's not allowed to do this. Mary7:30 disregards culture and says, I am sitting at my Lord's feet. All why in a few moments, we will see Martha serving, doing7:42 what culture tells her she ought to be doing. So Martha ought to be in the kitchen and that's where she is. Mary's7:54 supposed to be in the kitchen with Martha, but Mary's at the feet of Jesus's feet, at the feet of Jesus with all the other men. So everyone would have been there and been8:06 like, Yo, can you believe this chick? The audacity on this woman. She think just because this her family house,8:18 she gets to see that Jesus is big. Who she thinks she is? Uh-uh. Nuh-uh. And so then what happens is we see where Mary's at, and then now we see8:30 Martha. And then, but Martha was here. Here's Martha. Martha was distracted with much serving and she went up to8:42 him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone? Tell her then to help me. This is Martha's breaking point. Have you ever had a8:54 breaking point before? I know if there's mothers in here, you definitely have had a breaking point. This is Martha's breaking point. We can actually see that this is more than likely a pretty9:05 common thing between 2 sisters. So Martha has hit her mental health moment. She's gone to Jesus and she's lost it. She said, can't you see that my sister9:17 has left me here to do all the serving the way that culture tells me I must be doing? All while my sister is breaking culture and sitting at your9:29 feet. Tell her to get off her butt and help me. This is what she says. Then it says this, but the Lord,9:41 here's Jesus' answer, Jesus answered her, Martha, Martha. If you see the name repeated twice or a word repeated twice, in the Greek and Hebrew there's no such thing as punctuation. They9:53 didn't have commas, periods, exclamation points. So if the writer ever writes in Greek or Hebrew something twice, it means it's an exclamation point. So it means Jesus was yelling at that moment to get10:04 her attention. So he would have said, Martha. So my wife's here, sometimes I gotta do that in the house. Ashley.10:16 Come here. Okay. Bring it down. I gotta get that attention real quick. Martha, Martha, Jesus says. And he says, you are anxious and troubled. Wait, what? I10:28 thought she was serving. Hold on. She's anxious and troubled about what? Many things. But 1 thing is necessary, Mary has10:40 chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her. Wait, wait, wait. I've always heard that Martha was just serving10:52 and that's a good thing. She should have went back to serve. You know, I've always been taught that what Martha should have done was she should have stopped serving, sit at Jesus's feet, and then when his message was11:02 done, go back to serving. But but wait, but Jesus says Originally, it says she was distracted with serving, but when Jesus talks to her, he doesn't invite her to sit down.11:14 He tells her something about herself that no 1 else knew. He said that you are distracted with serving. Why? Because you are anxious and troubled. And11:26 so therefore, it means that Martha is distracted with serving, not because it's the right thing to do, but because distraction is her escape from her anxiety11:38 and her troubled thoughts. And so busyness becomes the vehicle for her escape. And so you may sit there and you11:50 say, I don't get distracted by serving, but you get distracted by working. You get distracted by drinking. You get distracted by shopping.12:03 You get distracted by hanging out on weekends. You get distracted by staring at the TV. You get12:18 troubled thoughts. So Jesus doesn't praise Martha for serving. He doesn't even focus on her serving. He focused on what it is that's12:30 going on in here. Martha, you're a busybody. You want to know why you're a busybody? It's because you don't know how to sit still and sit at my feet. You12:42 don't know how to break your cultural custom and become a disciple of mine while your sister is being ridiculed and ostracized more than likely, everyone in this room is probably gossiping12:54 about Mary who's sitting at his feet. And all of a sudden, Martha is doing everything that she thinks culture is supposed to approve her of. So therefore, she's saying, see Jesus, I13:06 mean, I I lift my hands during worship. Hey, Jesus, I come in and I said all the things. And a lot of times, that's what we do is we think just by being in the room like13:18 Martha was and being busy that that's enough to become a disciple of Jesus. But sitting at his feet in stillness and13:30 silence and letting him minister to your anxiety, That's what I don't think Martha was ready to do. And so therefore, she thought, if I just host Jesus in my home,13:41 if I just come to church on Sunday or maybe even I start serving, maybe that'll be enough to be busy where I don't have to think about my life anymore.13:53 Because he says you are anxious and troubled about many things. He didn't even have the time to list. The woman at the well, he listed all her husbands and boyfriends. Martha, he's like, it's many14:05 things. It's many. Yeah, but what is it Jesus? It's many for you. Many for you. Wake up, there's a new many for you. And how many of us feel that way? Every day we wake up, there's a14:17 new anxiousness, There's a new anxiety. There's a new troubled thought. We go from 1 troubled thought to the next troubled thought. We go to 1 anxious thing to another anxious thing. That is where we find ourselves.14:30 You know, this past weekend or this past week, my son Matthias graduated from preschool. So he's gonna go into kindergarten. And so it was a big day for him. He had a little cap and gown and all that kind of stuff like14:40 that. And so 1 of the things that happened was as part of graduating and part of his next step, we said, hey, let's just spend the weekend hanging out together. And he had his little suit and he was all dapper. And then14:51 over the weekend when I had a little time, we went down to LA down at Dave and Buster's in LA. We had to do a couple other things. And so on our way home late at night, it's about 10 o'clock at night, Mathias is still15:02 awake. Thomas, our the youngest has already fallen asleep. And so Matthias says, daddy, I have an idea. Because we have like a little playlist where we just keep adding like his favorite songs for movies and stuff15:14 like that in in the playlist. So like Lego Movie and Super Mario Brothers, all that. So he goes, daddy, I got an idea. How about I name the song and then I'll play it on my iPad and then you play it on the car? So he15:26 was saying, let's sync our songs up and I'll put my iPad on the loudest and you put the car on the loudest. So I'm thinking, okay, sounds like it could be a fun game. I don't know how successful this is going to be. And15:38 so he would go, okay, Super Mario Brothers theme song, 1, 2, 3, go. He would press play on the iPad, I would press play on my car. Well they're all up They're all connected to the15:49 cellular signal so we have to have service and all that. So my song would play and then his song would play 3 seconds later. And it would be the most annoying thing you've ever heard in your life. Have16:01 you ever had 2 TVs going on in different rooms and it's like the same thing? Maybe it's the Super Bowl or something. It just it's annoying. All you could think about is how off cute it is. And so he would go a couple16:13 seconds in, he said, no daddy, no daddy. Start it over. Start it over. I'm like, okay. So we'd start it over, 1 2 3 go. All of a sudden, bum bum bum bum bum bum bum, then his bum bum bum bum. Okay, it's not in sync16:25 again. Oh my gosh. Ashley, I look over at her because she had a long day with the boys. I was at work most of the day, she had the boys the whole day, she was tired. I see her going like this. She's like because his16:36 iPad's behind us, my car's going off, 2 day I mean it's just it's pure chaos. And I'm thinking, no, we're we're gonna stick to this. This is what he wants to do. So I go, okay, ready, set, go. We both press it at the16:47 same time and boom, a symphony. We're matched. His iPad's in sync, my iPad's in sync. All of a sudden, it's got a cool rhythm. We can hear it behind us on his iPad, we can hear it in the16:59 car, we listen to the whole song without restarting it. Why? Because now it was in harmony and now it was synced up to each other. I wonder how many of us deal with anxiety17:11 and troubled thoughts because you and I are out of sync with Jesus. I want I wonder I wonder if that anxiety, this thing right here that we feel, is17:23 because we are out of tune with Jesus. Mary understood what it meant to be in tune with Jesus. It meant against all cultural inclinations, it's my job to sit at17:35 the feet of Jesus and ingest everything he has to teach me. But Martha knew if I just stay distracted and in the room, then I don't have to be responsible for the17:47 things that Jesus teaches. And so if I'm just near him enough, that ought to be good enough. Right? That ought to be good enough to go to heaven. That ought to be good enough to have a relationship with God. I17:58 just gotta do all the things that they do and say all the things that they do. So I mean, I gotta go to church sometimes. Sometimes I gotta maybe make a sign of a cross.18:11 Little cross bumper sticker in my car. Oh, I know this. I'll change my Instagram bio. I'll put Jeremiah 20 nine:eleven in in the caption. But Matthew chapter 7, Jesus gives an18:22 inclination of what it would look like for people who are in the room, but unwilling to submit to the feet of the savior. And so it says in Matthew 7 21, not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord will enter the18:34 kingdom of heaven, but the 1 who does the will of my father who's in heaven. On that day, many will say to me, Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and cast out demons in your name and do many18:46 mighty works in your name? And then will I declare to them, I never knew you depart from me you workers of lawlessness. What Jesus is saying is he's saying there will be people who will18:58 say, what I'm trying to do is I just want the label of Christian so that it'll ease my conscience and give me a distraction to the things that I actually really have to face. And what I really have to face is my19:10 anxiousness and my troubled thoughts. What I really have to face is my sin. And so what happens is is we have a case with Martha, where I'll I'll write this right now. We have a case with Martha. What she19:22 wanted to do was what Martha wanted to do is Martha wanted to figure out this thing called life, this game of life. That's what we try to find ourselves in. That's like us. So for her,19:34 she's hosting Jesus, he's in town, she's getting food, she's getting water, she's setting out all the blankets, the rugs, the mat, she's doing life. She's trying to figure out how to19:46 do life. That's what she wants to do. And that's where we find ourselves. I'm just trying to do life. That's why I go to work, I got a 9 to 5, that's why I'm working on this thing, that's why we got19:57 kids in sports, that's why we're doing this and we're doing that. Why? Because we're staying busy with life and we're hoping that life just progresses more and more. But how many of you guys know for those that have20:09 lived life, it goes from 1 anxious thought to the next anxious thought. So at first, when you're a young man and a young woman, you're just trying to figure out what job will I do. Then you find the job,20:20 and the next thing you know, you have to figure out, can I even retire with this job? I'm gonna get old 1 day. What will I do? At first, you have kids and you think to yourself, I'm just20:32 trying to figure out how to parent. And then all of a sudden they're teenagers and they just start getting hormones and start doing whatever they want and start yelling at you and you're going, what is this20:44 thing that I raised? And it goes from that, and then they go, oh yeah, you're supposed to help my college and pay for my college. And you're thinking to yourself, we have a hundred dollars in the bank account.20:57 Your spouse on your wedding day, you thought, this is gonna be the greatest day of my life. And then year 4, hello? Year 7, hello? You're going, no 1 told me marriage was gonna be like this. So it goes from 121:08 anxious thought to 1 anxious thought, 1 troubled thing to another troubled thing. And so what Martha's trying to do is trying to do like many of us. I'm just trying to figure out this game called21:20 life. But then there's Mary, and what she's trying to do is she wants to live. There's a difference21:33 to trying to do life to living. We have a say here at our church that to live stands for this, living in view21:45 of eternity. So what Mary's learning with Jesus is in order for me to live, I have to live21:57 in view of eternity. And what Jesus is trying to get us to understand is I gave my life so that you can live.22:12 And if all you're pursuing is your life, Jesus gave his life so that you could live, but all you're focused on is living your22:24 life. And so we ask ourselves, why am I continually anxious? Why am I continually troubled? Because you're distracted. That's why. And22:36 that's why Martha was distracted with serving, Not necessarily because she was happy to host, it was because if I get distracted with serving, it means I don't22:47 have to deal with living in view of eternity. Because if it If I live in view of eternity, you wanna know what you're not allowed to take with you in eternity? Anxiety23:01 and troubled thoughts. You can't take this. You can't take trouble thoughts into eternity with you. You can't take your anxiousness to23:13 eternity. You can't take your 4 0 1 k into eternity with you. You can't take your house with you into eternity. And guess what? The only way you could take your kids into eternity with you is if you teach23:24 them how to live. And so at what point at what point will we stop trying to just do life? And we23:36 start really equating and saying, every choice I should make should be the 1 that lives in view of eternity. At what point can I find myself no longer like Martha which is distracted with23:48 serving so that I don't have to face my anxiety and my troubled thoughts? But here Mary is, on top of the ostracization, on top of the cultural norms, she's rejecting those things. She's not only24:00 doing that, but she is receiving the message that Jesus is teaching. How do I know that? Well, the scripture tells us. If you're taking notes, the first point that we just visited right now was Mary24:12 teaches us what it means to have a calling over culture. Because I'll tell you this, to be a Christian in America today, you're gonna have to choose Jesus's calling over your life over culture.24:24 That's what it takes to be a Christian today. And Mary was willing to go against the cultural grain to trust Jesus. And what happened is she chose the voice of Jesus, the calling24:36 over the culture. And then the next thing that she teaches us is she teaches us what it means to pursue Jesus's presence over possessions.24:48 His presence over our possessions. Most theologians believe the multiple stories about Mary and Martha are the same Mary and Martha throughout the story. And25:00 so in this passage we just read, it says he walked into a village. Then later on in John chapter 12, it teaches of another Mary and Martha at Bethany, which most theologians believe it's exactly the same25:12 Mary and Martha we just learned about right now. So in this story that we just read, we see Martha distracted with serving as a way to escape from her anxiety and troubled thoughts. We see Mary25:24 rejecting cultural norms to worship Jesus. And then now, we have another circumstance where we find Mary and Martha in the story once again. And now this is in John25:35 chapter 12. I want you to look at this and check this out. Here's what it says. 6 days before Passover, so this is Holy Week. So Jesus is days away from being,25:47 committed, by Judas and rejected by Judas and thrown under the bus by Judas. And so then he's gonna be arrested, tried, crucified, and eventually 3 days later, resurrected. This is that week. And so this is25:59 the last week of Jesus's life. Whose house is he gonna visit right outside of Jerusalem? I wonder. Maybe it's good friends he spent a lot of time with. So 6 days before the Passover, Jesus therefore came to26:10 Bethany where Lazarus was. Lazarus had just resurrected him from the grave as well. So they're hosting a dinner for Jesus as as a thank you. So it says, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. So they gave26:22 a dinner for him and Martha What does she do? Martha. Didn't26:34 Jesus talk to you about this already? Why would John chapter 12 put this? This ain't even the same book. We read from Luke, now we're in John, and where do we find Martha once again? Serving.26:47 Martha, what's happening? But Mary can't be in this story, and if Mary is in this story, then she's gonna be in the kitchen with Martha too. Gotta be. Right? Maybe. And Lazarus26:59 was 1 of those reclining at the table. And then Mary therefore took a pound Okay. Okay. Okay. So Mary's here. Is she in the kitchen? She therefore took a pound27:11 of expensive ointment made from pure nard. She took a pound, which was a year's worth of salary, a pound of perfume.27:24 Oh, okay. She's probably gonna prep the dinner table and spray just like us. We take Febreeze and that's why she took a pound. And she took a year's worth of perfume because she's trying to set the the smell of the house27:36 because she's she's gotta be back in the kitchen like culture tells her she has to be in this story. She's she's gotta be back in that place. Right? Took a panoplate made from pure nard and anointed the feet of Jesus27:48 and wiped his feet with her hair? Okay. Wait. So now she does a burial ritual on him? That's what28:00 you did when people died. You anointed their body with oil. Mary, are you crazy? Since we last met you, did you lose your mind or something? You walk in,28:12 Jesus is living. He's sitting in your home and you break an oil that's worth a year's worth of salary. You rub it on his feet and then you wipe it with your hair. Have you lost your mind?28:23 Jesus is live. Even the disciples at this point didn't know Jesus was going to die. The disciples, Peter still hasn't even cut the soldiers ear28:35 off in order to try to start a battle against Rome. But here's Mary, she's preparing Jesus for death. What? And it says28:47 the house was filled with fragrance of the perfume. And then Jesus got 1 of his disciples. But Judas Iscariot, 1 of his disciples who was about to betray him said, why was this ointment28:59 not sold for 300 denarii and given to the poor? Oh, Judas, you care about the poor. Right? He said this, oh, not because he cared about the poor, but because he was a thief. You29:11 ever hear criticisms from outside people about why you're a Christian and why you're doing this and why you're doing that? That was Judas. He was that guy. But did he care about the issues they were raising? No. He29:23 didn't care about the poor. He was a thief and having charge of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put in it. He used to steal from Jesus's money bag. Jesus said, leave her alone29:35 so that she may keep it for the day of my burial. For the poor you will always have with you, but you do not always have me. Here's what29:46 Mary understood. Mary understood in order for her to live, Jesus had to die. No 1 else at that point had come to29:58 that revelation except for Mary who obediently sat at Jesus's feet and listened to his words. So as his30:10 disciples would hear Jesus say, on this day my body will die and 3 days later I raise it up, they're going, oh, he's speaking in allegory and Mary's going, oh, he's serious. He gonna do it.30:22 When he would say things like, I must give up my life so that you can have your life, and I must carry my cross. They're going, man, he crazy. He using these cross illustrations, and Mary's30:34 like, no, no, he's going. Why? Because she wasn't distracted. She wasn't distracted. When Jesus spoke, she listened.30:47 Corrie 10 Boom, a great author and writer, she she said this concerning our faith. The measure of a life after all is not the duration, but it's donation.30:59 I think to myself, Jesus only lived to 33 years old, but he donated everything to us. And so then in my own life, whether the Lord grants me 90 years, a31:10 hundred years, 80 years, 70 years, it is not an amount of time. The question for your life is is what have you donated in your life? What of your life have you donated?31:23 Because you can spend your whole life busy, busy, busy, busy. And you could get to the end of your life and say, actually, I feel like I've not used my time wisely. You31:35 only get to live this life once. We get an eternal life, but the life that we know it today, you only can do it once. And for me, I'd rather do it at the feet of the savior31:47 that teaches me to live in view of eternity, than rather live this life and try to play the game of life, to try to make as much money as possible, have as many riches as31:58 possible, houses as possible, or just to barely scrape by. That's not the life I'm interested in living. The life I'm interested in living is the 1 where I can give Jesus all of my32:10 burdens and all of my troubles and all of my anxieties and he will exchange my sorrow for joy. And so today, we32:22 can be like Martha, find ourselves distracted, find ourselves anxious, find ourselves with troubled thoughts or we can do what32:34 Jesus teaches us to do which is to give him your cares, give him your shame, give him your burdens, give him your worries and he will exchange your sorrow for joy and he will give you a32:46 yoke and a burden that's easy and light. 1 that's full of peace, not of worry. 1 that's full of joy, not of anxiousness. And so if you're here today, this isn't a Salvation appeal32:58 right now. We'll do that in moments. But if you're in here today, whether you're in the courtyard or in this place and you're struggling with that anxiousness, you find yourself distracted and trying to be distracted33:09 because you don't wanna deal with your troubled thoughts. You don't wanna deal with your anxiety, but you're saying today, I want to give that up. I don't want to live like Martha and then find myself at the end of33:19 Jesus's story of redemption and then find myself back to distracted and serving. What I want to do is I want to find myself safe in the Savior's arms. And so if you're here today and33:31 you're struggling with the anxiety, you're struggling with troubled thoughts and you're distracted and you're saying, God, I want to give it to you today. I just want to encourage you in this moment to be bold to raise33:41 your hand up in the air because I want to pray for you. So keep your hand up raised so that I would pray for you. This hand's going up all over. We're going to trust the Lord in this moment. We're going to give this33:50 moment to God, consecrate ourselves, allow the Holy Spirit to move. I don't know what that looks like for you. That may be a doctor's report. Job that you've been needing or34:02 looking for. Some type of move of God you've been looking and needing for. That may be in your marriage. That may be with your children or grandchildren. That may be in your finances. But whatever the anxiety is,34:12 whatever that worry is, just want you to lift your hand up. We're gonna pray and we're gonna give it to the Lord right now. So God, I pray as our hands are raised, Father God, may this be a symbol of surrender, Lord.34:22 This is no longer in our hands or our care. We recognize, Lord, that Jesus, you have paved the way to peace and joy. Jesus, you gave your life so that we can live ours. So, Lord, right now34:34 I pray, Father God, that every burden, every chain, every worry, every anxiety right now is being diminished and destroyed in Jesus name. I believe Lord that whatever the34:46 enemy is throwing at them, Father God, may they gird up right now to trust in the Lord and lean not on our own understanding, Father God. May you continue to speak to us and your spirit pour out right now, Father34:57 God. I pray for everybody's minds, Lord. May you give them peace, Father God. I pray for the broken hearts right now. May you give it life right now, Lord. I pray, Lord, that we are more than conquerors through Jesus35:08 Christ, that Jesus bore our shame, he bore our iniquity, and he bore our grief, Lord. I believe Lord that we are free in Christ and free indeed. And Jesus Christ is the author and35:20 finisher of our faith, and he's the healer that we look for today. We believe the Spirit of God right now is lifting burdens, lifting shame, and lifting anxiety off of us right now. Lord, I believe35:32 for a rest like no other tonight, Father God. I pray Lord for a peace like no other tonight, Father God. And may we continually, continually trust your work, Lord.35:44 May we put our hope not in the game of life, but in the 1 who lives today named Jesus. We live because you live God. And so God, we pray for freedom and healing35:56 right now in Jesus name. Amen and Amen. Can we thank God for what the Lord may have done right now? As the36:08 weeks come, if the Lord does anything in your life, would you please let someone on our team or 1 of our pastors know. We would love to know a testimony of what God's doing in your life today. Before we leave right now36:19 in a matter of moments, we got plenty of time. If you just give me 2 more minutes. Right now I want to make an invitation of faith. If you're here today, right now we just prayed for a deliverance. But more than all the36:30 greatest deliverance of all that happens is the 1 word God delivers us from a future pain. From a future eternity that separated from God. And so God gives us a opportunity today to36:41 say yes to Jesus which offers us a relationship with him and an eternity in the presence of Jesus. The Bible says that if we receive Jesus as our Lord and savior, the 1 who died on the cross36:53 for our sins, and if we believe in our heart that he resurrected, the Bible says we will be saved. 1 day you and I will stand before God. Heaven is opportunity and a choice for37:05 all of us that we can receive Jesus, repent of our sins and say yes to the cross. God does not send people to hell, Jesus People choose hell. If you can't choose Jesus37:17 on earth, why would you want to choose him in heaven? If you don't want Jesus' presence on earth, why would you want his presence in heaven? And so rejection of Jesus is a rejection of heaven. But an acceptance of37:29 Jesus and a repentance of self is an acceptance of heaven. And it makes us as Romans 8 says, it makes us heirs of Christ. And so if you're here today and you've never given your life to Jesus Christ and you're37:40 willing and ready to receive that goodness and mercy, we're gonna say this prayer out loud. And by no means the prayer is not the thing that saves you. What we're doing is we're affirming the work of the spirit right now37:52 in your life. And so family, would you all join me whether you're in the courtyard or in this place and join me in saying this, dear Lord Jesus. In this moment, I say yes to you. I believe in my38:04 heart that you died on the cross and you rose 3 days later. In this moment, I confess of my sins and I38:15 choose to follow you for the rest of my days. In Jesus name, amen. Amen. Can we praise God in that moment?38:29 We really hope you enjoyed the message. And if you said yes to Jesus, we just wanna say congratulations and give you a free devotional to help you walk out your faith. Click the link in the description or38:41 head over to grow dot faith to download your devotional. Oh, and be sure to subscribe and share this podcast with your friends. Thanks for listening to a l s c podcast, and we hope you tune in again.In this video 0:00 Choosing Presence Over Distraction1:02:32
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