WEBVTT 00:00.844 --> 00:01.204 [SPEAKER_00]: There you guys. 00:01.224 --> 00:05.969 [SPEAKER_00]: We put our hands together for Southern Cross Kids Camp and for Discovery Community Care. 00:05.989 --> 00:08.071 [SPEAKER_00]: Wow. 00:09.575 --> 00:17.260 [SPEAKER_00]: what incredible stories and thanks to our arts department for capturing those stories so well. 00:18.821 --> 00:37.072 [SPEAKER_00]: As eleven twelve year old our family headed up north to theme park territory and I was excited because you know the fastest rides the best rides I was ready to ready for those and you want to get there early right you want to get there before the lines you can be at the front of the line so that when they open the gates you can 00:37.632 --> 00:44.261 [SPEAKER_00]: Go, go, go to the best rides fast, and then because the lines are so long, you might be able to get a second go. 00:44.281 --> 00:51.811 [SPEAKER_00]: So we were there, we got up, we got there a little bit late, but then as we were driving around, the theme park, we couldn't find the entrance. 00:52.672 --> 01:06.986 [SPEAKER_00]: And the worst part about that is you can see everything that's happening inside the theme park from the outside because you big roller coasters and things that drop down things that spin around and you can see it all so the anticipation is there. 01:07.407 --> 01:09.168 [SPEAKER_00]: You're like, there it is, but we 01:09.889 --> 01:11.931 [SPEAKER_00]: for the life of us couldn't find our way in. 01:12.291 --> 01:18.956 [SPEAKER_00]: And we're driving around the outside, around the outside, and we're not like, you know, we can navigate. 01:19.016 --> 01:21.258 [SPEAKER_00]: It's, you know, we're pretty good at finding our way around. 01:21.558 --> 01:26.802 [SPEAKER_00]: But for whatever reason, you know, we end up getting in that light, and of course, and everything's already started. 01:27.162 --> 01:29.484 [SPEAKER_00]: And you're like, oh, man, the, the party's already begun. 01:29.564 --> 01:33.427 [SPEAKER_00]: So you got that, that real fear of missing out before you get 01:33.907 --> 01:50.472 [SPEAKER_00]: inside the theme park but I wonder sometimes you know whether our church can be a little bit like that where people love to see what's going on the inside they can see what's happening but they just can't find a way in they just can't find the entrance they can't find the door sometimes I think it's like that with our own lives 01:51.152 --> 02:02.036 [SPEAKER_00]: People can see the beauty, they can see the grace, they can see the goodness that's happening in your life, the joy that you have, the peace that you have, the kindness that you have, but they're just looking for a new front door. 02:02.457 --> 02:10.100 [SPEAKER_00]: They're looking for a way to get into your life, to be able to experience what you experience, to be able to see what you see. 02:10.720 --> 02:15.522 [SPEAKER_00]: And so the title of the message today is who's at the front door, who is there because in our lives, 02:16.367 --> 02:23.110 [SPEAKER_00]: There's people knocking, wanting to get in and to be able to meet with you, to be able to engage with you, to be able to find out about what's going on in your life. 02:23.410 --> 02:31.875 [SPEAKER_00]: In our church, it's exactly the same that our people who are on the outside and look if we don't exist for the people who aren't here yet, we don't exist at all. 02:33.015 --> 02:37.277 [SPEAKER_00]: What if our worship was measured not just by what we sung and we sung some beautiful songs today? 02:38.298 --> 02:39.458 [SPEAKER_00]: No doubt we'll sing again. 02:39.498 --> 02:44.681 [SPEAKER_00]: What if our worship wasn't measured by the songs that we sung but by who we serve? 02:47.130 --> 02:49.851 [SPEAKER_00]: because renewals not meant to stay inside the building. 02:50.812 --> 02:51.612 [SPEAKER_00]: It spills out. 02:52.592 --> 03:00.556 [SPEAKER_00]: Renewable needs to touch the street, our region, the sheds, the workshops, the shed tables. 03:01.937 --> 03:03.718 [SPEAKER_00]: This is about freedom. 03:04.898 --> 03:11.201 [SPEAKER_00]: This is about joy and we're focusing on our partners, our local partners, Discovery Community Care, Southern Cross Kids Camp. 03:12.308 --> 03:18.773 [SPEAKER_00]: And we see that mercy is actually mission and that neighborhood renewal is kingdom work. 03:18.793 --> 03:23.797 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's read this passage of Scripture together as I have fifty-eight, verse six to ten. 03:24.338 --> 03:25.238 [SPEAKER_00]: It's up on the screen. 03:25.298 --> 03:27.600 [SPEAKER_00]: Is this not the fast that I choose God says? 03:29.001 --> 03:32.264 [SPEAKER_00]: To lose the bonds of wickedness, to undo the straps of the yoke. 03:33.216 --> 03:36.199 [SPEAKER_00]: to let the oppressed go free and to break every yolk. 03:36.539 --> 03:41.903 [SPEAKER_00]: Is it not to share your bread with the hungry and bring the homeless poor into your house? 03:42.524 --> 03:52.872 [SPEAKER_00]: When you see the naked recovery, not to hide yourself from your own flesh, then shall your light break forth like the dawn and your healing spring up speedily. 03:53.653 --> 03:57.614 [SPEAKER_00]: Your righteousness shall go before you, the glory, the Lord shall be your rear guard. 03:57.874 --> 04:01.555 [SPEAKER_00]: When you call the Lord with answer, when you cry, you'll say, here I am. 04:02.335 --> 04:13.918 [SPEAKER_00]: If you take away the yoke from your midst at the pointing of the finger, the speaking of wickedness, if you pull yourself out for the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then shall your light rise in the darkness. 04:15.698 --> 04:18.799 [SPEAKER_00]: And your gloom be as the noon day. 04:20.233 --> 04:44.299 [SPEAKER_00]: The ancient worship life of Israel was sent it around a city called Jerusalem and inside the city was a temple and every single year pilgrims from all over the land would make their way toward the temple and Jerusalem was set up high so you could see it and they would send the steps all the way up to the city and as you got closer to the temple you could smell the incense. 04:44.719 --> 04:52.586 [SPEAKER_00]: You could hear the songs, you could see the cattle lined up who were there, not to worship, but to be part of the worship. 04:52.846 --> 04:53.987 [SPEAKER_00]: Nudge, Nudge, wink, wink. 04:54.327 --> 04:57.370 [SPEAKER_00]: It was a time to be alive. 04:57.430 --> 05:02.474 [SPEAKER_00]: There was this sense to which we were coming closer and closer to the presence of God. 05:02.874 --> 05:06.357 [SPEAKER_00]: We're going to meet with God in this place. 05:07.098 --> 05:12.002 [SPEAKER_00]: And the worship of Israel was known throughout the land, the songs were amazing. 05:12.680 --> 05:14.041 [SPEAKER_00]: were beautiful and credible. 05:14.662 --> 05:21.647 [SPEAKER_00]: They love to put on these elaborate shows these displays of worship and yet in the midst of what was going on. 05:22.908 --> 05:25.790 [SPEAKER_00]: Israel's worship had become compartmentalised. 05:25.810 --> 05:31.594 [SPEAKER_00]: You know when you compartmentalised stuff, you have one thing that's going on over here. 05:32.075 --> 05:35.898 [SPEAKER_00]: You have a little dividing wall and then you have another world going on over here. 05:37.503 --> 05:56.136 [SPEAKER_00]: and through the prophet Isaiah, who stands and speaks in the same tradition as Amos and myocary and Jeremiah, through the prophet Isaiah, God started to address this compartmentalization saying, you song sound beautiful, but I actually don't list like listening to them. 05:57.777 --> 06:04.802 [SPEAKER_00]: You're display the incense that smells great, but to my nostrils it's irritating. 06:05.703 --> 06:05.983 [SPEAKER_00]: Why? 06:07.470 --> 06:10.512 [SPEAKER_00]: Because in your midst, there are people going hungry. 06:11.692 --> 06:16.255 [SPEAKER_00]: There are people who are being held to ransom, high rates of interest. 06:16.555 --> 06:19.377 [SPEAKER_00]: There is a sense that there's extortion going on. 06:19.957 --> 06:23.879 [SPEAKER_00]: In the midst there's gossip, there's slander, you're speaking bad about one another. 06:24.179 --> 06:34.205 [SPEAKER_00]: And yet when you come to me and you offer your praise and your sacrifice and your worship, you want it to sound so beautiful, but it actually sounds pretty gross. 06:38.186 --> 06:44.975 [SPEAKER_00]: God funders his dissatisfaction with worship that sang, but did not serve. 06:46.557 --> 06:54.168 [SPEAKER_00]: The poor were being overlooked, the oppressed were being unheard, and yet the worship was flourishing. 06:54.829 --> 06:55.470 [SPEAKER_00]: How can it be? 06:56.914 --> 07:02.739 [SPEAKER_00]: You see, God's law that He gave through Moses was always justice-centered. 07:03.239 --> 07:05.781 [SPEAKER_00]: It was always justice-shaped. 07:05.841 --> 07:07.142 [SPEAKER_00]: There were gleaning laws. 07:07.222 --> 07:10.265 [SPEAKER_00]: Most of the people were subsistence farmers. 07:10.525 --> 07:12.867 [SPEAKER_00]: So they had land that they would look after. 07:13.227 --> 07:19.232 [SPEAKER_00]: And God mandated that the edges of the properties would be left unharvested. 07:19.332 --> 07:19.733 [SPEAKER_00]: Why? 07:20.273 --> 07:23.276 [SPEAKER_00]: So that those with nothing could come around at the end of the day. 07:23.956 --> 07:35.227 [SPEAKER_00]: After all of the workers had finished and everyone had down tools and gone home, then those who didn't have enough were able to go round and get the scraps from the edges of the land. 07:35.927 --> 07:37.429 [SPEAKER_00]: They were gleaning laws like that. 07:37.469 --> 07:40.071 [SPEAKER_00]: There was a debt release every seven years. 07:41.443 --> 07:44.765 [SPEAKER_00]: almost an economic reset that would take place. 07:44.885 --> 07:51.269 [SPEAKER_00]: And if you owed money, you were able to be reset and release from that debt every seven years. 07:51.349 --> 07:56.152 [SPEAKER_00]: This was so that nobody got trapped in a never-ending debt cycle. 07:56.572 --> 07:57.513 [SPEAKER_00]: It was mandated. 07:57.553 --> 07:58.634 [SPEAKER_00]: It was in the law. 08:00.145 --> 08:13.031 [SPEAKER_00]: There was Sabbath rest, which was also a law in Israel, where not just the workers, but the slaves and the servants and even the cattle guys had to have a day off. 08:14.472 --> 08:15.793 [SPEAKER_00]: You weren't allowed to work. 08:16.053 --> 08:26.878 [SPEAKER_00]: Now, I know we have a five day working week, but I guarantee you that a twenty four hour period of rest for any one of us sounds just like a fantasy. 08:28.160 --> 08:43.210 [SPEAKER_00]: And yet it was in their book, a seven, a twenty four hour rest, to stop people getting enslaved and entrapped in a never-ending work cycle, what about every fifty years when they call the year of Jubilee? 08:44.671 --> 08:48.373 [SPEAKER_00]: And you might at your family might have fallen in hard times and you would to sell your property. 08:49.338 --> 08:52.700 [SPEAKER_00]: and you had a couple of generations that were doing it really tough. 08:52.760 --> 08:59.204 [SPEAKER_00]: Every fifty years could achieve a big reset and everything goes back to its original owners. 09:00.365 --> 09:03.467 [SPEAKER_00]: A year of Jubilee to stop people getting trapped. 09:03.667 --> 09:07.049 [SPEAKER_00]: But Israel knew this and yet they ignored it. 09:07.329 --> 09:09.571 [SPEAKER_00]: They said, let's just make the temple worship sound real good. 09:10.692 --> 09:11.972 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's tune up the voices. 09:12.673 --> 09:13.954 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's tune up the hops. 09:14.789 --> 09:21.917 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's get all of the biggest and the best and yet let's ignore the vulnerable in our midst. 09:23.679 --> 09:28.664 [SPEAKER_00]: And so God speaks to them about this because this isn't just their story, isn't it our story too, guys? 09:29.585 --> 09:31.827 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't we live in an age of consumerism? 09:32.948 --> 09:36.773 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't we live in an age of maybe come on spiritual consumerism? 09:38.003 --> 09:41.006 [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I like those songs, so I like those to my playlist. 09:41.326 --> 09:45.610 [SPEAKER_00]: I like that preacher, so I'll add her or him to my playlist. 09:45.830 --> 09:47.452 [SPEAKER_00]: Oh, I don't really agree with that. 09:47.492 --> 09:49.894 [SPEAKER_00]: That's not really my vibe, but I'll go with this. 09:50.195 --> 09:58.903 [SPEAKER_00]: And so I can curate a spiritual life for myself that's all based around my needs and my particular little likes. 09:59.423 --> 10:01.926 [SPEAKER_00]: And then that will serve me really, really well. 10:01.986 --> 10:03.187 [SPEAKER_00]: Now it's convenient, isn't it? 10:04.362 --> 10:08.565 [SPEAKER_00]: But sometimes in I feel a bit low, I can also do that with my online shopping. 10:08.865 --> 10:11.887 [SPEAKER_00]: And I can select all the little things that are on my wish list. 10:12.127 --> 10:13.428 [SPEAKER_00]: And I can have them all there. 10:13.488 --> 10:18.471 [SPEAKER_00]: For when I'm feeling a little bit sad, I can just go in and tick, tick, tick, tick, and select all of those little things. 10:18.831 --> 10:20.772 [SPEAKER_00]: And they can make my life just a little bit better. 10:21.013 --> 10:24.575 [SPEAKER_00]: We live in a world that's just geared around consumption. 10:26.356 --> 10:32.140 [SPEAKER_00]: Whilst we can tend to overlook in the midst of our spiritual buffet. 10:33.272 --> 10:35.133 [SPEAKER_00]: those who aren't at the table. 10:36.894 --> 10:51.742 [SPEAKER_00]: There's some beautiful Hebrew parallelism in this passage that connects justice with healing and mercy with light. 10:54.623 --> 11:01.787 [SPEAKER_00]: Where God says, if you attend to the issues of justice, then you're healing or calm. 11:03.235 --> 11:10.859 [SPEAKER_00]: says, if you attend to the issues of mercy in your midst, then your light will come. 11:12.360 --> 11:17.103 [SPEAKER_00]: And they're placed right there side by side so that nobody can miss the connection. 11:17.783 --> 11:20.225 [SPEAKER_00]: Now this is protest poetry at its best. 11:21.165 --> 11:24.067 [SPEAKER_00]: But it's not just a protest, it's an invitation. 11:24.087 --> 11:31.932 [SPEAKER_00]: An invitation that says, the worship God desires is a poured out life. 11:33.066 --> 11:35.107 [SPEAKER_00]: not just a poured out song. 11:36.688 --> 11:42.251 [SPEAKER_00]: He's not rejecting their worship, but he's redefining it in human terms. 11:43.532 --> 11:46.314 [SPEAKER_00]: God never separates holiness from holiness. 11:47.815 --> 11:50.897 [SPEAKER_00]: Wasn't this one of Jesus' big gripes with the Pharisees? 11:51.857 --> 11:55.899 [SPEAKER_00]: He said, you worship me with your lips, but your hearts are far from me. 11:56.920 --> 12:01.643 [SPEAKER_00]: You've made the song sound nice, but you don't make people experience the same thing. 12:05.473 --> 12:14.980 [SPEAKER_00]: We can't separate holiness from wholeness to be holy means we are constantly and in progress of being becoming whole. 12:16.721 --> 12:21.225 [SPEAKER_00]: So it makes me think that firstly, God's idea of worship is wider than ours. 12:22.286 --> 12:34.515 [SPEAKER_00]: We tend to think of worship as something that happens from a platform or from a chapel or from a sanctuary or we tend to think of worship in those kind of ceremonial terms. 12:36.456 --> 12:45.145 [SPEAKER_00]: But it's not just when we read Isaiah Fiftet, it's not just the praise that we lift up, but it's the people that we lift up, too, that is also worship. 12:47.066 --> 12:49.329 [SPEAKER_00]: James, the brother of Jesus and the New Testament, 12:50.317 --> 12:58.603 [SPEAKER_00]: Says this, religion that our God, that God the Father accepts as pure and faultless as this, to look after orphans and widows in their distress. 12:58.924 --> 13:03.407 [SPEAKER_00]: So real worship, guys, moves towards the margins, moves towards the edges. 13:04.308 --> 13:05.749 [SPEAKER_00]: But history echoes this as well. 13:05.809 --> 13:08.891 [SPEAKER_00]: Anyone heard of a guy called William Wilberforce, right? 13:08.971 --> 13:11.313 [SPEAKER_00]: He had a great deal to say about slavery. 13:12.777 --> 13:20.922 [SPEAKER_00]: and was a deep part of adjusting the way that society saw slaves in the modern era. 13:21.942 --> 13:22.983 [SPEAKER_00]: And you know what he called that? 13:23.623 --> 13:24.764 [SPEAKER_00]: He's working that space. 13:25.604 --> 13:27.725 [SPEAKER_00]: He called it real religion. 13:29.066 --> 13:36.030 [SPEAKER_00]: Not just what happened in Sunday, not just what happened inside the auditorium, but real religion. 13:37.223 --> 13:39.886 [SPEAKER_00]: was affecting public policy. 13:40.427 --> 13:43.871 [SPEAKER_00]: Justice is the kind of song that God never grows tired of hearing. 13:44.572 --> 13:49.517 [SPEAKER_00]: Can you imagine being there in Israel and God's going, guys, I'm just so tired of your music. 13:50.611 --> 13:52.192 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm just tired of it. 13:52.832 --> 13:57.253 [SPEAKER_00]: It's boring and it's annoying and it's one note. 13:58.334 --> 14:01.015 [SPEAKER_00]: Show me some worship that's got some changes. 14:02.035 --> 14:03.355 [SPEAKER_00]: Some transition to it. 14:03.395 --> 14:07.097 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's lift up some people rather than just lifting up the words. 14:09.177 --> 14:10.198 [SPEAKER_00]: So who's your neighbor? 14:10.218 --> 14:12.278 [SPEAKER_00]: Not just your postcode or your street address. 14:13.879 --> 14:15.399 [SPEAKER_00]: Write the team that's couch surfing. 14:15.419 --> 14:17.320 [SPEAKER_00]: What about the book that's just lost his job? 14:18.641 --> 14:19.601 [SPEAKER_00]: Who can you draw near? 14:20.909 --> 14:21.789 [SPEAKER_00]: Who's at the door? 14:23.330 --> 14:24.370 [SPEAKER_00]: Who's around the corner? 14:25.810 --> 14:28.631 [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe a dinner table could be the next place of divine worship. 14:30.151 --> 14:32.212 [SPEAKER_00]: Secondly, justice is a form of revival. 14:32.412 --> 14:38.494 [SPEAKER_00]: We pray, and I love we pray for renewals, say God, send your Holy Spirit, renew our region. 14:38.714 --> 14:40.434 [SPEAKER_00]: Do so, do a work in our hearts. 14:40.674 --> 14:41.614 [SPEAKER_00]: We're hungry for you. 14:41.894 --> 14:44.015 [SPEAKER_00]: I want that, and we continue to pray for that. 14:46.120 --> 14:52.282 [SPEAKER_00]: But Isaiah says that revival looks not just like full churches but full bellies. 14:53.863 --> 14:59.505 [SPEAKER_00]: Revival looks like bread in hands and homes opened and chains broken. 15:00.925 --> 15:03.126 [SPEAKER_00]: Jesus did launch His ministry with miracles. 15:03.186 --> 15:07.587 [SPEAKER_00]: We know that, but also with a very, very clear mandate. 15:10.308 --> 15:15.550 [SPEAKER_00]: When He set the spirit of the Lord as upon me to proclaim good news to the 15:19.825 --> 15:22.346 [SPEAKER_00]: and to set the oppressed free. 15:22.386 --> 15:25.568 [SPEAKER_00]: This was his first sermon, lifted straight out of Isaiah. 15:28.289 --> 15:42.857 [SPEAKER_00]: In Naughton, over four, there was a great historical phenomenon called the Welsh revival, and it was characterized by deep spirituality, a deep returning to Jesus. 15:44.058 --> 15:44.758 [SPEAKER_00]: But you know what? 15:44.918 --> 15:47.059 [SPEAKER_00]: As churches got fuller and fuller, you know what? 15:47.099 --> 15:48.260 [SPEAKER_00]: Got empty or an empty year? 15:49.283 --> 15:52.246 [SPEAKER_00]: police stations, jails. 15:54.048 --> 15:56.690 [SPEAKER_00]: Families were restored and reunited. 15:57.471 --> 15:59.232 [SPEAKER_00]: People came back together. 15:59.333 --> 16:06.960 [SPEAKER_00]: So the signs that God was on the move wasn't just that spiritual vitality was up, but that crime was down. 16:09.442 --> 16:11.825 [SPEAKER_00]: That's real justice. 16:12.785 --> 16:14.127 [SPEAKER_00]: That's real religion. 16:15.477 --> 16:19.018 [SPEAKER_00]: Now I know what some of you are thinking, you're thinking, what about the word? 16:19.839 --> 16:21.579 [SPEAKER_00]: We need to teach people good doctrine. 16:22.159 --> 16:28.022 [SPEAKER_00]: We need to preach otherwise we're gonna turn into a social club like rotary or something else. 16:28.082 --> 16:31.323 [SPEAKER_00]: Hey, let's not forget about Jesus the word. 16:31.603 --> 16:35.524 [SPEAKER_00]: The word became flesh and dwelt among us. 16:35.984 --> 16:38.245 [SPEAKER_00]: When someone said, I wonder what is Jesus? 16:38.285 --> 16:39.386 [SPEAKER_00]: What does God look like? 16:39.486 --> 16:42.347 [SPEAKER_00]: Jesus said, if you've seen me, you've seen the Father. 16:44.283 --> 16:47.026 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm here to show you what God looks like. 16:47.286 --> 16:48.707 [SPEAKER_00]: He didn't stay in heaven. 16:48.747 --> 16:53.752 [SPEAKER_00]: He became a man so that we could see, touch, feel, experience him. 16:58.577 --> 17:08.427 [SPEAKER_00]: If our gospel stops at the pulpit and never reaches the full path, it's incomplete. 17:10.462 --> 17:11.543 [SPEAKER_00]: Aussie's love fairness. 17:11.923 --> 17:12.283 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't we? 17:13.004 --> 17:14.825 [SPEAKER_00]: We love a good fair go for everyone. 17:15.606 --> 17:19.128 [SPEAKER_00]: But I love how the gospel takes it even further and says, I'm not just going to give you fair. 17:19.168 --> 17:20.089 [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to give you grace. 17:21.209 --> 17:23.291 [SPEAKER_00]: We're going to go over and above fair. 17:23.891 --> 17:25.052 [SPEAKER_00]: No one gets what they deserve. 17:25.452 --> 17:26.953 [SPEAKER_00]: Everyone gets more than they deserve. 17:27.934 --> 17:29.115 [SPEAKER_00]: And that's true with the gospel. 17:30.948 --> 17:33.090 [SPEAKER_00]: So make justice your active worship. 17:33.110 --> 17:41.096 [SPEAKER_00]: Hey, sign up to serve at food stop or DCC one of those other sign up to go on a on a on a camp on a on a southern cross kids camp. 17:43.257 --> 17:43.958 [SPEAKER_00]: Give with joy. 17:45.539 --> 17:50.082 [SPEAKER_00]: Thirdly and finally the personal healing begins with community reorientation. 17:50.122 --> 17:52.084 [SPEAKER_00]: Now I'm sorry about the wordiness of this point. 17:53.065 --> 18:00.947 [SPEAKER_00]: My apologies, I tried my best to make it a little bit easier, but it is what it is we can deal with it. 18:01.147 --> 18:01.427 [SPEAKER_00]: All right. 18:02.267 --> 18:07.069 [SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah says, your healing will spring up after you've poured yourself out. 18:08.249 --> 18:18.552 [SPEAKER_00]: Isaiah says, undo the chains of injustice, take the yoke off people, stop burning them, and then the healing that you so seek after will come. 18:19.558 --> 18:27.863 [SPEAKER_00]: You're in darkness and you're saying, God bring me the light and you're saying, yeah, deal with your own house first and then your light will come. 18:29.424 --> 18:34.586 [SPEAKER_00]: Personal healing, there's things that you're carrying in your heart, things that aren't right, things that are broken. 18:35.087 --> 18:44.332 [SPEAKER_00]: And God is saying, if you can address the issues of pain or disorientation inside of your control, then your light will come. 18:45.546 --> 18:51.551 [SPEAKER_00]: Dr. Paul Brand, I don't know if you've ever heard of this guy, he grew up in India, his parents were missionaries there. 18:52.272 --> 19:03.501 [SPEAKER_00]: And he grew up in really marginalized communities in the country of India, and then he became a doctor, and he became a specialist in the disease of leprosy. 19:04.262 --> 19:16.050 [SPEAKER_00]: Now up until Paul Brand, common thought was, and medical thought was that leprosy was a disease that attacked the skin and caused these wounds. 19:17.371 --> 19:22.635 [SPEAKER_00]: And Paul Brand discovered, actually leprosy is in a skin disease, but it's a nerve disease. 19:23.521 --> 19:27.582 [SPEAKER_00]: And it reduces people's sensation and sensitivity to pain. 19:27.642 --> 19:28.823 [SPEAKER_00]: So it causes numbness. 19:29.483 --> 19:30.903 [SPEAKER_00]: Now you think that would be great, right? 19:30.963 --> 19:35.425 [SPEAKER_00]: But if you've got nothing telling you that the thing you're touching is hot, what happens? 19:37.185 --> 19:37.825 [SPEAKER_00]: You just hold on. 19:38.766 --> 19:40.266 [SPEAKER_00]: And then what happens when you hold on? 19:41.706 --> 19:43.767 [SPEAKER_00]: You get mega, mega burned. 19:44.747 --> 19:49.829 [SPEAKER_00]: Or if you're walking for days on days, on days, on days, and days, and you've got blisters all of your feet, but you don't know. 19:50.769 --> 19:52.950 [SPEAKER_00]: Because you've got no pain telling you, what happens? 19:53.947 --> 19:56.229 [SPEAKER_00]: or that gets worse and worse and worse and worse. 19:56.569 --> 20:04.255 [SPEAKER_00]: And so Paul Brand, as a doctor, as a really alerted man, went back and lived with the marginalized communities that he grew up with. 20:05.076 --> 20:09.540 [SPEAKER_00]: He went back and lived in the and became a world leader in, in leprosy treatment. 20:10.220 --> 20:16.966 [SPEAKER_00]: And then he went on to make this really profound theological reflections about the nature of pain. 20:18.907 --> 20:22.130 [SPEAKER_00]: Because his experiences of pain and numbness 20:23.677 --> 20:28.561 [SPEAKER_00]: Told him and shows us that pain, even though it's unpleasant, it's actually a gift. 20:30.162 --> 20:33.805 [SPEAKER_00]: Because it's a sign that something matters. 20:35.427 --> 20:38.629 [SPEAKER_00]: It's a sign that something is important. 20:41.051 --> 20:45.295 [SPEAKER_00]: He said, the greatest challenge to faith is not the problem of pain. 20:46.556 --> 20:47.617 [SPEAKER_00]: It's the problem of pleasure. 20:48.973 --> 20:58.696 [SPEAKER_00]: Pain forces us to attend to something beyond ourselves, which is why I believe it's a gift and it's why oddly enough it may be the doorway to grace. 20:59.096 --> 21:00.717 [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe your doorway, friend. 21:02.738 --> 21:06.499 [SPEAKER_00]: A doorway to grace is to attend to that pain. 21:07.419 --> 21:15.542 [SPEAKER_00]: If you lift off the burden, if you let their press go free, if you feed the hungry, then your light will come, it becomes a doorway. 21:16.968 --> 21:20.009 [SPEAKER_00]: So what if that person that you ignore is your doorway? 21:20.029 --> 21:28.911 [SPEAKER_00]: Aussies, we love resilience too. 21:29.071 --> 21:29.371 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't we? 21:29.411 --> 21:32.512 [SPEAKER_00]: We love fairness, but we love resilience sticking together in hard times. 21:33.712 --> 21:35.193 [SPEAKER_00]: But this isn't just about self-help. 21:36.186 --> 21:37.566 [SPEAKER_00]: This is about shared strength. 21:37.706 --> 21:43.067 [SPEAKER_00]: This is about coming together so that each of us can bring the strength that we have to help the other. 21:43.507 --> 21:45.208 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't wait till you feel qualified. 21:45.588 --> 21:50.809 [SPEAKER_00]: Don't wait for the calendar to get all cleared up because it will never, it will never happen just start now. 21:52.809 --> 21:56.170 [SPEAKER_00]: Levi's eye of fifty-eight before you preach it. 21:56.810 --> 21:59.330 [SPEAKER_00]: Who needs your compassion more than they need your answers? 22:01.171 --> 22:02.071 [SPEAKER_00]: Who needs your presence? 22:04.033 --> 22:07.575 [SPEAKER_00]: more than they need your perfection over their life. 22:08.436 --> 22:10.998 [SPEAKER_00]: This is where justice meets the ground. 22:11.918 --> 22:26.468 [SPEAKER_00]: If I can just brag on DCC and on Southern Cross for just a minute, DCC serves over five hundred individuals a week from that house and from food stop and from all the related programs that we do. 22:30.459 --> 22:34.844 [SPEAKER_00]: We rescue over two point five tons of food every week. 22:35.685 --> 22:47.579 [SPEAKER_00]: Two point five tons of food that's going to go to landfill that actually gets to go into households, local families, people who can raise a family on that. 22:48.762 --> 22:55.385 [SPEAKER_00]: Your hundred families connected, food, community, mentoring, and every meal has a story, right? 22:56.165 --> 22:59.686 [SPEAKER_00]: Every smile is one step toward dignity. 23:00.807 --> 23:10.251 [SPEAKER_00]: Every kilo of food rescued is one less burden on a family, and another reason to actually believe in a Jesus who's telling a better story who speaks about a word. 23:12.232 --> 23:17.734 [SPEAKER_00]: So when we think about our giving, we think about vision offerings, it's not just a donation, but this is devotion. 23:19.171 --> 23:25.921 [SPEAKER_00]: This is about volunteering our hearts, not just our time, giving from our overflow, about Southern Cross. 23:26.562 --> 23:34.514 [SPEAKER_00]: The story we heard this morning of a young kid who's come out of a really rough background who now becomes a community leader. 23:35.420 --> 23:54.069 [SPEAKER_00]: And there are stories upon stories upon stories of young people who step up to lead in their communities, because of the memories and the love and the attention that's given to these kids in the context of a certain cross-kids' camp. 23:54.089 --> 23:55.129 [SPEAKER_00]: It's absolutely incredible. 23:55.429 --> 23:56.670 [SPEAKER_00]: Banjo can come and join me. 23:58.769 --> 24:04.872 [SPEAKER_00]: So as we think about the person of Jesus, we think about the Word of God, but we also think about the work of God. 24:05.593 --> 24:12.256 [SPEAKER_00]: Because Jesus didn't just believe Isaiah fifty-eight, he lived it. 24:14.017 --> 24:16.478 [SPEAKER_00]: He loosened the bonds of those who were oppressed. 24:18.099 --> 24:24.883 [SPEAKER_00]: He fed the hungry on hillside, he had meals without costs, he welcomed children, even when others sent them away. 24:26.203 --> 24:27.244 [SPEAKER_00]: He poured himself out, 24:28.644 --> 24:29.325 [SPEAKER_00]: even to death. 24:31.286 --> 24:34.269 [SPEAKER_00]: And at the cross, he brought together justice and mercy. 24:36.230 --> 24:37.331 [SPEAKER_00]: He broke every chain. 24:38.392 --> 24:41.334 [SPEAKER_00]: The chain of sin and death over our lives too. 24:42.856 --> 24:45.298 [SPEAKER_00]: And so guys, I want us to be a church. 24:45.678 --> 24:53.644 [SPEAKER_00]: The dream is that we're a church that sings with compassion, but also serves with action, that sings with beauty. 24:53.684 --> 24:57.868 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's, for sure, let's offer our songs, but let's offer our lives. 24:59.341 --> 25:03.673 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's renew our community with justice, with mercy and with presence. 25:04.616 --> 25:07.564 [SPEAKER_00]: Let's be his body broken before the world. 25:09.069 --> 25:09.430 [SPEAKER_00]: And so