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The NEED

Close or Distant

Ryan Story · Sunday, 25 May 2025 · Romans 3:9-20 · 36:57 · 6,107 words

Romans S5 · 3:9-20

Listen to this message

The pastor shows how the impact of words depends on who speaks them, illustrating with everyday moments like a simple text or a family comment. Turning to Romans chapter three, he stresses that all are under sin and that God’s truth should be drawn close, not pushed away. The sermon urges each listener to examine whether the gospel feels distant, and to respond with repentance, faith, and renewed devotion. He concludes by calling everyone to let Scripture’s truth shape their lives today.

What this sermon is about

Ranked by keyness against every other sermon in the corpus. Each one is a word this sermon actually said — nothing here was written by a model.

close 27 distant 9 read 32 push 13 able 20 something 31 closer 8 truth 26 ryan 6 despite 6 pull 10 draw 10

Topics

Sin 6 The Gospel 5 Prayer 4 Salvation 1 Righteousness 1

Scripture referenced 26

Verified against the transcript. A reference the recording does not support is never listed here.

Romans 3 11:11 Romans 3 11:14 Romans 3 11:43 Romans 3 11:59 Romans 3 12:37 Romans 3:9 12:37 Romans 3 14:54 Romans 3:10 14:54 2 Timothy 3:16 16:30 Romans 3:10 17:13 Romans 3:10 18:49 Romans 3:10 19:22 Romans 1 20:13 Romans 3 20:15 Romans 3 22:59 Romans 3 24:47 Romans 3 25:03 Romans 3 27:52 Romans 3 28:35 Romans 3 28:59 Romans 3 29:03 John 3:16 29:14 John 3:16 29:41 John 3:16 29:59 Romans 3 31:26 James 4:8 35:25

Transcript

Every word, as spoken, with the second it was said. Each word links to its own entry in the index.

Pre-service announcement — 9 lines, 0:40. Excluded from every count and search on this site, kept here so nothing is hidden.

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Thanks again for joining us and we hope you're blessed by today's message.

Good morning, how's everybody on this Memorial Day weekend?

For those of you who came and joined us online, thank you for just making time to be here.

So my name is Ryan, if by chance you don't know me, I'm the family pastor here.

So that's a fancy way of just saying I oversee everything from 0 to 28.

So we have a great team that kind of helps us with a lot of different things,

whether it be nursery or our...

Our River kids, our River students, our River young adults.

So for me, as Noble was even saying, if you have kids, you got River kids,

you got someone in elementary school, you have a middle schooler, you got a high schooler,

we have awesome activities going on, awesome programming,

just awesome ways for them to be able to connect with the church and ultimately hear the gospel.

So again, love to be able to meet you after the gathering.

But for me as a family pastor, one of my favorite events we do every year is the Send a Kid to Camp auction.

So that actually took place last Sunday.

I just want to be able to say thank you for your generosity, thank you for your support,

thank you for your prayers, but we as a church were able to raise $41,000 to be able to send kids to camp.

So for everybody who donated, everybody who just prayed behind that, thank you,

because honestly, I can say I'm a big numbers guy, so I am crunching the numbers daily.

And man, we use every penny, and it's a beautiful thing when we get to send over 200 kids

just to be able to go to camp, hear the gospel, and ultimately see lives get transformed.

But for us today...

I'm excited to be here just to be able to fill in for Pastor Caleb.

So one of my friends, a guy I've known for a long time, and he knows more embarrassing stories than me than I care to count,

but I'm just blessed to be able to fill in.

But for us today, let's pray, and let's just see what God does this morning.

So let's pray.

Heavenly Father, Lord, we love you.

Lord, thank you so much that, Lord, your love starts everything.

Lord, your love is in everything, Lord, and Lord, ultimately your love never ceases.

So Christ, for us, be with us today.

Let's not let today just be a normal day where we woke up and we just...

check the boxes off of religious duty, Lord.

I pray today is a day where your word, Lord, your gospel, Lord,

the truth that you have given us, Lord, is something that just echoes in our heart, moves us closer to you.

So Lord, for whatever distractions, whatever anxieties, whatever difficulties that any one of us have today, Lord,

thank you so much that we got a place where we can put it right at your feet, at your cross, Lord.

So Lord, today, I pray that you move.

Lord, I pray you do something amazing.

Lord, and I pray that ultimately people move closer to you.

Be with me, guide me, direct me.

But Lord, we love you.

And we pray this all in your beautiful name.

So, I've been fascinated with something in my own life as of late,

where I've been really, really focused on how I respond to things.

So I'm learning this fancy thing called empathy, and it's not a go-to trait for me.

So I'm kind of learning what the difference between empathy is and sympathy is.

And I know it's like, but Ryan, you're a pastor, and Ryan, you're a grown man.

We all started at a different place and different tools in our toolbox.

But for me, realizing that how I respond to certain conversations is a reality.

One of the things I've been reading in the book is it doesn't matter if it's a big thing or a little thing.

If there's no details in how you respond to something, it's not always the best thing.

So if something's going bad, it could be just a minor inconvenience.

Something so small.

But for whatever reason, we make it into a big deal.

And specifically, I've been looking at conversations that I'm,

having with people.

And the thing I realize is there are sometimes, and maybe you can understand this,

there's sometimes things are said, and they feel close.

They feel personal.

Like, you really take it to heart.

And these can be good things, these can be bad things.

But whatever it is, like, there's something that can be said, and you're like,

man, like, I'm really taking that to heart.

But then there's other times you can hear almost even the same thing from a different person

or from a different context, and it's kind of distant.

So let me give you an example.

So let me give you an example.

So let me give you an example.

Let me give you some examples that I've seen.

So one of the ones that I realize is getting the text, okay, or K.

It massively depends on who's sending that.

If I get that from a coworker, I get that from a friend, I get that from anybody.

If you just get, like, the K, you're like, all right, whatever, you move on from the day.

But man, oh man, if I get okay from my wife, warning bells are going off.

What did I do?

And the worst is if it's okay, period, or even just K, period.

Doesn't matter what it said.

Doesn't matter who says it.

But there are times you can hear okay.

And again, like, you take that really personal, and there's times it can be distant.

One of the ones I've actually seen is love you.

So it's really funny.

Pastor Noble and myself, like, yeah, we'll say we love each other all the time.

We've known each other for, like, 10-some-plus years.

But again, we can turn around and say I love you.

And again, that still matters.

That's still something that's close.

But some of the favorite people who say love you are my wife and my kids.

So much so that I know my kids are brought up in a very healthy household,

and they take it.

They take it after their mother, and they take it after my in-laws,

because they say I love you all the time.

It's very new for me.

So I'll just be sitting there playing Nintendo Switch, not really paying attention,

and my daughter will just walk by in a drive-by, I love you.

Just, I love you, Dad.

Thank you.

I appreciate that.

Then there's some more difficult ones.

I was wrestling around with the boys this week.

I got two sons.

And again, we were slapping each other's hands, just playing some goofy game.

And I mean, I made sure that I showed I'm 40.

I'm alpha male in this household.

And again, I kind of hit my son a little bit harder than I wanted to by smacking him.

He's like, you hurt me.

And man, that one dug deep.

Again, where is that on the chart?

Is it distant?

Is it far away?

Or is it close?

Turn around, and again, my sons will poke fun at me,

and then I can turn around and poke fun back at them,

and I'll make fun of them.

But you hurt my feelings.

I'm like, praise God, you guys are emotionally healthy,

and praise God, you guys understand this stuff.

But for me, I'm like, oh, man, that goes right to the heart.

But as much as my kids turn around,

and saying, hey, that hurt me, or hey, that hurt my feelings,

like if my wife ever says that, oh, my gosh, that's devastating.

And I think this shifting between distant and close,

this shifting between near or far,

like this happens because, again,

we realize that there's relational stock in who's saying it

and what they're saying.

So good, bad, ugly, criticism, whatever it might be.

Like if you hear somebody who really, really loves you say,

hey, a positive thing, man, we, we, we,

we should really, really take that to heart.

A lot of people will come up and, hey, great job on Sunday,

great, great preaching pastor, that was a good job.

And I struggle with compliments, but in the same right, thank you.

One of my favorite car rides home, when I look at my wife,

how do you think I did on Sunday?

Like, I think you did good.

And I go take some time with Jesus.

How do you think I did, Lord?

Well done.

Okay, cool.

But for us, it really does depend on who's saying it

and what they're saying.

And I think this happens a lot in life,

and I think we can all relate to this, like in marriage.

We can relate to this in parenting.

We can relate to this in marriage.

We can relate to this at work.

The words of people closer to us have greater impact

than those further from us.

If a stranger walked by me and said,

hey, you look doofus, or hey, you're not that good at this,

like, okay, I don't know you.

But if I walk out of the house and my wife's like,

you look ridiculous, like, I'm changing my outfit.

So this happens, though, so often in life.

But I also think that this happens in our walks with Jesus.

Have you ever had times where the Bible, a sermon,

like sitting in prayer, man, like, you're just,

you're drawing it in, it's just so personal,

like, you're just, like, in that moment,

you're in that listening, like,

whatever is happening in your heart,

God is just speaking audibly to you.

You're drawing it in, it feels personal,

you feel like you're closer.

But then let's all be honest.

There are times during when we're reading the Bible,

there's times during sermons,

there's times during prayer where, again,

it just feels distant, feels far.

And I think one of the most tragic things that can happen

in our lives is when we're reading the Bible,

in our hearts, is when something is meant to be close

and personal, it's supposed to be near to us,

becomes distant, becomes far.

And I think when that happens,

if it's words with your spouse,

if it's words with your kids,

and most importantly, if it's words,

an affirmation from the Lord,

when that stuff becomes distant,

these just become warning signs

that there's something off in our heart.

There's something off in our worship.

There's something off in our relationship with the Lord.

Well, Ryan, how does my,

how does my relationship with the Lord impact my marriage?

How does the relationship with the Lord

impact my parenting?

How does my relationship with the Lord

impact how I am with my coworkers?

Because you can't be in a good standing with God

and be in a bad standing with people and vice versa.

You can't be in a bad standing with people

and say, man, everything's going great

with my relationship with the Lord.

But for me,

when something should be close,

we push it away.

That not ought be.

So I'll study in Romans chapter three,

if you've got your Bibles,

feel free to go to Romans chapter three.

We're going to pick up there.

I felt this tug in my life.

So when we first said,

hey, we're going to read Romans as a church,

I'm like, oh, great.

I've read Romans several times.

I've done studies of the book of Romans.

I got a bunch of commentaries on the book of Romans.

But for me, when I was putting this sermon together,

I was like, no, like I want to read Romans

and moreover, let the word of God read me.

I want it to change me.

I want it to alter me.

I actually want to walk away changed.

And while I was reading Romans chapter three,

I felt this tug.

I was turning myself,

I was turning myself into an academic.

I was turning myself into something.

This is too familiar.

And I was, I was pushing God away.

Well, I don't want that truth close.

I was turning around and taking Romans chapter three

and I was generalizing it.

I was impersonalizing it.

And I was, I was distancing myself from it

instead of looking inside of my house,

my heart and taking stock.

So for us up until this point in Romans three,

Paul has done a really good job

putting everybody into like,

kind of like one box.

So again, he's building,

this case of sin for Jews and Gentiles.

A Gentile is somebody who,

who doesn't come from father Abraham's line,

but he's hitting one truth that everybody sins.

And in Romans chapter three, verse nine,

Paul says, what then?

Are Jews any better off?

No, not at all.

For we have already charged

that we've already determined.

We've already figured this out

through everything up until this point.

We've already charged that all,

both Jews and Greeks are under sin.

I want to make sure we're all on the same page.

When I say sin,

it's not just that fancy religious term that we,

oh, everything is sin.

And then we just move forward.

No, no, no.

Sin is, sin is missing the mark.

Sin is, sin is rebellion for us against our creator.

Sin is, is again, that pride saturated,

self-saturated, self-focused,

egotistical, rotting toxin thing

that pushes you away from God.

And if you've been studying Romans up until now,

you see sin several times.

You see a disease, you see a toxin,

more specifically,

you see death.

What do we see here?

For we have already charged that all are under sin.

And the funniest thing,

when I first read that,

I let out a,

whew, okay, we're all sinful.

No one, no one does good.

Everybody's failed.

Like I felt like a kid in high school again,

where like a teacher's turned around,

like every single one of you

did really poorly on this test,

where you're like, hey,

if everybody did really poorly on the test,

it's not my fault.

It's everybody's fault.

But I let out this,

okay, go sweet.

It's all, we've all missed this.

But even in that statement though,

okay, we've all missed the mark.

We've all sinned.

Everybody is under sin.

Like, look what we did with that statement.

Look what we did with that truth.

We've turned around and taken something

from the word of God

and we've pushed it out.

Because again, when it says all have sinned,

all are under sin,

guess what?

I'm part of the all.

All of humanity is part of the all.

There's no curve.

There's no, hey, this guy did 99%.

No, no, all have sinned.

And while I was looking at this

and I was struggling with this push and this pull,

the next four words,

it hit me like a truck.

In Romans chapter three, verse 10,

just the first four words,

it says, as it is written.

As it is written.

Before we get to even the rest

of what Paul is trying to say,

when it comes to, again,

case by case study to be able to prove his point

that every single person's sin,

I sat on these four words,

as it is written,

and I came to the realization

when something is written in the Bible,

God's perfect and true word,

something that,

something that will never be changed,

it'll always be preserved,

something that will be with us all the way

until the time that we see Christ again,

for us to be able to hold on to God's perfect word.

When something is written in the Bible

and you read it,

or you hear it,

or you listen to it,

or is it far away?

Let me hit it in there.

I just read that all have sinned.

All are under sin.

And my first response was to turn around

and take it there.

Then the next statement I read,

as it is written,

do we take the word of God?

When we read God's word,

what do we do with it?

And yes, I understand.

Yes, you gotta make sure

there's proper application,

and you gotta make sure

you're reading it correctly.

So again, when we rightly divide the word of God

and we're making sure

that we truly understand what it means,

I'm all there.

But 2 Timothy 3, verse 16 says,

all scripture is breathed out by God.

It is him who wrote it.

It is him who said it.

It is him who inspired it.

But it says,

but it's breathed out by God

and it is profitable for people

for correction,

and for training in righteousness,

that the man of God may be complete,

equipped for every good work.

Again, another one of those verses.

What do we do with that?

The word of God is breathed out by God.

It's so beneficial for us

to be able to read what the Bible says

and rightly apply it to our life.

When we read that

and we take that with Romans 3, verse 10,

it says,

as it is written,

what do we do with the Bible?

Is it close?

Is it something when we read it,

we're like, oh, wow,

I've got to reflect on my life.

I've got to alter some things.

More importantly,

I need to hit my knees and pray

and ask God to transform me

from the inside out.

Do we accept the fact

that the word of God

is going to teach us,

and train us?

Or when we turn around

and we use the Bible

and we read something,

we're like, nah,

culturally relevant anymore.

Or we just read something

and be like,

that kind of hurt my feelings.

What do we do with the word of God?

Because for us to understand

the next eight verses,

we have to determine

what do we do with the word of God?

When we read it,

do we draw it close?

Because God has given it to us.

God has given it to us

for some amazing beneficial things.

Most importantly,

to know him better,

to live in a way

that's pleasing to him,

to be able to show us

that there is no shot for us

to be able to live a life without him.

But do we draw that close?

Because the next eight verses,

what it's considered,

it's a stringing of pearls.

So what Paul does

is he goes into the Psalms,

he pulls some stuff from Isaiah,

and he's stringing along truth.

And he's,

he's pulling different Psalms

from different places,

and he's putting it all together.

So when it says in Romans 3, verse 10,

it says,

as it is written,

Paul is quoting God.

He's not quoting philosophy.

He's not quoting TikTokers.

He's not quoting influencers.

He's quoting the author of salvation.

He's quoting the creator of the universe.

He's quoting our heavenly father.

But he strings these truths along.

And what these are

is about 14 indictments,

of why we're all under sin.

So to start in Romans,

Romans chapter 3, verse 10,

it says,

as it is written,

no one is righteous.

No, not one.

No one understands.

No one seeks for God.

All have turned aside.

Together they have become worthless.

And no one does good.

Not even one.

Their throat is an open grave.

They use their tongue to deceive.

The venom of asps is under their lips.

Their mouth is full of curses and bitterness.

Their feet are swift to shed blood.

And their feet are swift to shed blood.

Their paths are ruin and misery.

And the way of peace they have not known.

There is no fear of God before their eyes.

I think a lot of times,

like when we read the Bible,

man, like Romans 1,

like throws a hammer down.

Like so does Romans 3.

Because what does Paul just say?

In the truth, again,

this is something written in the Bible.

No one is righteous.

No, not one.

When we hear that, what do we do?

Pull that in?

Oh man, I'm falling.

I'm not in the relationship

that I should be in.

I should be with my creator.

Do we push it out?

I don't want to accept that.

Because one thing that blocks us,

our hearts from truth,

one thing that blocks us from taking the Bible

and actually rightly applying it to our heart

is when we start looking at it.

And again, we're not personalizing it

because our heart doesn't want to accept it.

The reason why our heart doesn't want to accept it

is to go back to when do we start accepting things

as close or far away

because we got to relook at our relationship with Jesus.

We might not be as close to him as we thought we were.

Because the reality is Jesus doesn't move.

God is always there.

God says, I'm the door.

All you got to do is knock.

God says, the sheep will know my voice.

It's us who wander.

It's us who push away.

It's us who can't recognize his words.

So one of the things that blocks us from, again,

pulling the truth that is found in the Bible,

we don't want to listen to it.

I read a fascinating study in 2021.

There's a study that 81% of people

think that they are the best human being they know.

Let that marinate for a second.

2021, 81% of people are like,

I am God's gift to all of you.

What?

It's in 2021.

The world is going through some things in 2021.

And people are walking around being like,

no, I am the best person I know.

I am the moral compass for everybody at work.

They don't know how to work.

They don't know how to think.

They don't understand anything.

It's me.

You're looking at your family.

And again, you're doing dinner table

and you're just looking at crowd like,

man, I'm so glad that I'm here

holding everything together.

81% of people think that they are the best person

that they know in all of humanity.

That 81% also is self-professing Christian.

That 81% people who come to a church,

they listen to gospel preaching.

You want to talk about self-righteousness and delusion

compared to what we just read in Romans chapter three.

No one is righteous.

No, not one.

No one seeks God.

When they speak, it's poison.

When they walk, they're ruining everything.

They are swift to shed blood.

Man, I'm part of that 81%.

No, but you look at that.

Why would somebody think that?

Why would somebody be deceived by that?

Because how close?

How close do we pull the truth that we find in the Bible?

So God's word puts humanity in this box.

When Paul is writing this stuff

and God is directing this pen,

hey, here's the Jews

and you guys had your own kind of upbringing.

Here's the Gentiles

and here's what you guys had going on.

But guess what?

All of you are broken.

All of you are under sin.

But how a heart responds to the truth of Romans three,

the truth that we are all under sin,

shows really where we're at in our walks with God.

So how do you respond to that?

How do you respond to that?

You are sinful.

You are fallen.

You are rebellious.

But guess what?

So am I.

How do you respond to this?

Because the realness of the gospel,

the realness of Jesus Christ,

the realness of what the Bible shows

is never meant to be something that we push away.

Watching somebody push away the grace, the love,

everything that comes with Jesus Christ

is one of the most heartbreaking things in the world.

I've sat and I've preached to students.

I've prayed with students.

I've watched young people just grow up.

And again, they've just never,

they've never grabbed onto Jesus.

They never reached out to him.

They always tried to keep it at arm's length.

But in Romans chapter three,

it's all of our story as it is written.

This is all of humanity.

And I'm not one to necessarily change the Bible.

I understand that that's like a giant thing that you don't do.

But when I went back and read Romans chapter three after this,

like I'm going to take this truth

and I'm going to get it as close to me as I can.

I want to personalize this.

So I went back and read it.

And again, no one is righteous.

No, not one.

I'm part of the no, not one.

I'm not the one.

Jesus was the one I missed.

I'm part of that equation.

No one understands.

No one sees God.

Different parts of the Bible.

Again, it says that a fool says that there is no God.

Yeah, I'm not, I'm that fool sometimes.

Instead of saying it all have turned,

I put, I have turned aside.

Together, I have become worthless.

Ryan does no good.

Not even once.

My throat is an open grave.

If I don't have Jesus, all I do is speak death.

Even to those people who I love and I care about.

I use my tongue to deceive.

Do we really want to start talking about lying

and speaking truth and honesty?

Because man, speaking truth and honesty all the time

is hard, difficult.

But it says the venom of asps is under my lips.

My mouth is full of curses and bitterness.

Have you ever come home and really, really upset

with an employee, coworker?

You ever been upset with a family member

and just sits there?

It just alters your mood, alters your day.

Yeah, we're getting real personal now.

My feet are swift to shed blood.

That's a heavy one.

Because Jesus turns around and he talks about

when you hate your brother, you're actually,

you're actually murdering them.

Because I think a lot of us would read this

and be like, no, I would never murder somebody.

No, probably not.

I'm a self-proclaimed pacifist.

And I try to avoid altercations to the best of my ability.

Like, I would never physically try to hurt somebody.

But man, in my head, I'm really hating you.

Destroying you in my brain.

I'm hoping ruin hits you.

Yeah, I didn't necessarily murder them in a physical sense.

But in my brain, spiritually, when Jesus says,

again, when you hate somebody, you murder them.

Changes the way you look at it.

There's a path, there's ruin and misery.

The way of peace is not known to me.

Constantly at war, I'm constantly warring with myself.

Constantly warring with my creator.

I'm constantly warring with my father in heaven.

Because there is no fear of God before my eyes.

See, because if we take Romans 3 and we make it academic

and we push it away from us,

it doesn't become much of a response.

But God's word calls us to pull this in.

God's word points us to truth.

And while we are all under sin, we get to go over this

in the next couple of chapters of Romans.

While we are all incapable of living a life

that brings us into a right standing with God.

We are all incapable of living a life

that is not saturated with sin.

All we do is disobey God.

All we do is hurt others and ourselves because of our sins.

All of us are in need of rescue.

That's what the most beautiful thing

about Romans chapter three is,

is this doesn't end the book of Romans.

For the next couple of chapters,

we get to read about the beauty of the gospel.

We get to read about how we are justified,

how we are set free, how we are brought close to Christ.

Because unless there is something to be saved from,

there is no reason to point or preach to salvation.

Because Romans chapter three shows

just how far we are from God.

Romans chapter three just shows how toxic that sin is.

But the beauty of the gospel, it doesn't end with our sin.

It starts with John 3:16.

And I love 3:17 'cause I added in there,

"For God so loved the world that he gave

"his only Son, that whoever believes in him

"should not perish but have eternal life.

"For God did not send his Son into the world

"to condemn the world, but in order that the world

"might be saved through him."

Because one of the things that can also happen

is when you say John 3:16, what do you do with that verse?

Oh, God saves all of humanity but not me.

God can bring anybody closer but not me

because you don't know what I've done.

Lord, you don't, Ryan, you don't know how I've hurt people.

Lord, you don't know what I've done in my faith.

Family, Lord, you don't know what I've done in my life.

When we read something like John 3:16,

in the same way that we can push away the truth

that we have sinned, we sometimes can push away the fact

that God loves us so much that he sent his Son

to live the perfect life that none of us could.

And that perfect Son with the joy set before him

endured the cross and he died, but beautifully,

he did not stay dead because he rose again

three days later in victory to bring

us, to reclaim us, to restore us back to him.

Do you pull that truth in?

Do you push it away?

Because the truth of the gospel is never meant

to be held at arm's length.

It's never meant to be something like, oh, I'll respond to that later.

I'll work that out in a little bit.

No, the truth of the gospel is meant to be pulled in.

But a heart captured by Jesus, running to Jesus,

never keeps Jesus distant.

And despite how fallen we are, despite how bad we can be, truth that God

For me, when I was reading this, despite how fallen we are, despite how off we are, while

reading Romans 3, I came to the conclusion that the gospel deserves a response.

The word of God deserves a response.

So what is your response to the gospel?

Is it close?

Because if you're here and you're like, man, I know the gospel.

I love the gospel.

I've sent through Bible studies, love reading my Bible, I love praying.

Anytime you hear the gospel, that still should bring a joy to us, an excitement to us.

Those who know that Jesus has rescued us like that.

That's never something we're like, all right, I'm past that truth.

No, no, that's something that we should always pull closer to us.

Thank you, Jesus.

Because we know that our days can be good.

We know our days can be bad.

But the fact that Jesus Christ still sits on the throne, we know that the truth of the

gospel always remains.

What's your response to the gospel?

I pray if you're here and you know it, like you're drawing it close.

I cherish this.

I believe in this.

It's the most cherished truth I have in my life.

God loves me and saved me.

And despite the fact that I was a whore.

I was a horrible sinner.

Despite the fact that I rebelled against him, he loves me so much that he allowed me to

walk in front of him and he would even boldly say, well done, my good and faithful servant.

What's your response to the gospel?

Do you bring it close and you make it personal?

Maybe you're here and you hear the truth of the gospel, distant, foreign, it's impersonal.

I think there can be kind of like two sets of people in this.

There can be somebody who's never cried out for Christ for salvation.

Then there's somebody who knows Christ, believes in Christ, cherish the gospel at a really,

really high value at one point.

It kind of punches you in the face sometimes.

Marriage can be hard.

Work can be hard.

Finances can be hard.

It's difficult to live.

And again, you know Jesus, but man, it's just not as cherished as you wish it could be.

You're here and you know Christ and your next step is not salvation.

Your next step is coming back to him.

Beautiful thing about Jesus is very simple.

It's prayer, repent, believe, stop doing what you're doing, come back to him.

But if you're here and again, your next steps is again, maybe it's baptism.

Maybe it's getting connected, serving.

Maybe it's finding a girlfriend.

Maybe it's a growth community.

Maybe it's just finding somebody that you can talk to.

Don't let this 35 minutes just be something where you're like, man, that was entertaining

That was great.

No, do something with your life.

If the gospel is not close to you, don't leave here just being like, oh man, that was really

Moving forward, let's go home.

Let's go flip some burgers this weekend.

Don't do that.

Bring it close.

But if you're here or you're joining us online, even you listen to the sermon way in the future,

if the gospel of Jesus Christ, if the fact that we are sinful people and Jesus rescues

It doesn't condemn them, saves them through him, saves them through his name, saves them

through putting our faith in him.

If you're here and you don't know Jesus, maybe the greatest Memorial day weekend for myself,

the church is celebrated in heaven.

If you came to him, you're able to confess that you were a sinner.

You were able to look at your fallenness.

You were able to realize that I cannot save myself, but you know what, Jesus, thank you

so much that you did.

And if you're here and you want to bring the gospel close, we would love to be able to

pray with you.

You can meet him in your seat.

He's right now.

All you got to do is pray.

I need you in my life right now.

And we would love to talk with you, love to help you get connected with what God is doing

here.

But for all of us, and my favorite verses in the Bible is James 4:8, draw close to Jesus

Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, we love you.

Thank you so much for who you are.

Lord, thank you for giving us the ability to come and praise you, worship you, know

you.

Lord, I pray if anything came out of my mouth that was profitable or necessary, Lord, I

pray that that truth is from you.

And you alone.

But for anybody here who knows the gospel, Lord, who believes in the gospel with all

their heart, Lord, it just cherishes it, Lord, and they bring it closer every day, Lord,

please keep them, guide them, protect them from the evil one, Lord.

But Lord, for most of us, Lord, we probably live in that struggle.

But Lord, right now, as we prepare to worship you one more time, Lord, I pray that you draw

so close to us, Lord, we're able to just not be able to choose anything else, but draw

in close to you.

So Jesus, thank you so much for making yourself near.

Thank you so much for making yourself accessible, but Lord, if there's any heart, if there's

any person here, Lord, who does not know you, Lord, I pray that every single one of us is

able to draw closer to you.

So Christ, we love you.

And Jesus, we pray this all in your beautiful name.

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