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Lighthouse Baptist Church
Freedom
(upbeat music) - Thank you for listening to this message. Brought to you by the audio ministry of Lighthouse Baptist Church. It's connected in New York. For more great content, please visit us at lighthousebaptist.org. Now let's open our hearts and minds to the word of God. (upbeat music) - Come on, and hopefully that goes well. - All right, so here in the main service, we're gonna be talking about finding real freedom. Finding real freedom. Of course, we are celebrating freedom. We're celebrating liberty here on this July 4th, but we need to realize where real freedom comes from. And I wish you could see what I see. There is like a herd of children going that way, it's great. All right, so let's stand. We're gonna read a verse from 2 Corinthians chapter three, 2 Corinthians chapter three. And then we're gonna jump right in to the message this morning. How many of you are already getting hungry, ready for like the dinner afterwards? Anybody, anybody with me, all right? I'm thankful that I don't smell anything yet because once it does, then I'm afraid that it's gonna be caught on the microphone, my stomach growling, and that would not be great. So 2 Corinthians chapter three is what we're gonna look at this morning, verse number 17. 2 Corinthians chapter three, verse 17 says this. Now the Lord is that spirit. And where the spirit of the Lord is, say those last three words, church, there is liberty. Amen to that. Let's pray, let's ask God to reveal Himself to us from this message and that it will be used to impact our lives today. Heavenly Father, Lord, we're so grateful. Well, for the opportunity that we have in America, the freedom that we have to worship you. But I ask that this morning, Lord, that as we look at what real freedom is and how we can really find it, what I ask that you touch our hearts. What if we know you as our Savior, Lord, that it would touch our hearts to do something with that knowledge? If we don't know you, what I ask of it today would be the day that we find real freedom. But we're so grateful for what you've done. We're so grateful for this country. In order to pray this all in the wonderful, precious, holy name of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen, thank you, you may be seated. Thank you. I want to say this too. We had outreach this past Saturday. I had little faith, okay? I'll just tell you. Oh, you have little faith. I think Jim texted me that morning and he said, are we still doing this? It's gonna rain. And I said, okay, what we'll do, we'll still assemble. We'll kind of go through the maps and we'll talk about what we're gonna do and we'll pray for our community. I never dawned on me to pray that God would stop the rain, but anyway, that's beside the point. So we assembled, we talked about the maps. We kind of went through everything, we prayed. And then we went out and it was awesome. By the way, there was like 30 people here. It was outstanding. And again, oh, you have little faith. I had this box of flyers, basically these door hangers. I'd make a lot of it'll ask us a few weeks and then I can buy some. It didn't really have like that much left because people took too many. And we're praising the Lord for it. I have a new order for a bunch more coming. But thank you, church, for coming. Thank you for doing that. I know it may have been scary, but I don't think it was that bad. Travis went with his whole crew. They finished up in like five minutes. I think he came back, got another one. And so Travis, I think you can attest this morning that if you're a family can do it, everybody else can, right? And so here's the thought. This coming Saturday, we're gonna do a special one, okay? We're not canceling them in prayer breakfast, okay? It's just changing a little bit. We're gonna come together. We're gonna have breakfast. We're going to pray together, but I want the whole family to be part of it. I don't just want it to be guys. And since we're doing outreach anyway, let's just tie that in to outreach, right? And so come on out this Saturday. We'll have breakfast as a family. We'll have a bunch of flyers or full size eight and a half by 11 or is that the right size? Yeah, the full size sheet of paper that we'll be handing out to people, it's gonna be on card stock. So come on out, okay? I wanna encourage you in that. One of the great freedoms we enjoy in America is to share the gospel, okay? And so let's take advantage of that. Let's do it, let's reach our community. Let's do it to the best of our ability. And I really believe that God will use it in a mighty way, okay? If you kind of believe that too, just say amen, okay? We can do that, amen, right? We believe God wants to save people, right? And so we need to be in the business of that as a church, okay? So you see people, you want more tracks, go out this, not now, don't do this now. Walk out those two doors, walk past the coffee room 'cause nobody likes coffee, okay? Go to the next hallway and then you'll see a bookshelf that's got a huge box that has these tracks in them that look like this. They say you're invited to Lighthouse Baptist Church and then find help, find hope, find home on the front, on the back, it's got the gospel with our service times. So if you're like, when do we meet on Wednesday, which sometimes happens when you're talking to people, you can just read it right on the back, okay? So invite people out, do that and share your faith. Okay, speaking of that this morning, finding real freedom. The whole point this morning is to share the gospel, okay? Many times when we have a dinner on the grounds, people will come for the food. But I want you to also understand, if you already know Christ as your Savior, I want you to realize that you have tremendous freedom in Jesus Christ and that is a great thing, right? Okay, yeah, we're following along, good. Okay, so I have 30 minutes until we normally end, but we have food here. So I can go as long as I want, right? Sweet, okay, pretty much, preach the word. All right, so here we go. First of all, point number one, if you're taking notes. I encourage you to take notes this morning, especially if you are looking to share your faith, the verses that I'm going to share with you are verses that I would encourage you to not just write down and be familiar with, but to eventually memorize. When you're sharing the gospel and you have your Bible and you start talking to somebody about your faith and you go to Romans chapter three, it's kind of hard to read it when it's like this, right? When it's backwards. And so when you have the verse memorized, you can quote it and they can read it, which is a great thing. And so I'd encourage you to memorize these verses if you know Christ as your Savior. If you don't, I pray that you will know Him this morning. So first of all, point number one, we have to understand our need. Okay, if we're gonna find real freedom, we have to recognize that there is a need. There is a need. First of all, I want you to recognize with our need, it's surety, okay, that it is a sure need, okay? If you want to know how it's spelled, you can figure it out, okay? It's surety, okay? First of all, what I want you to recognize is that all of us are sinners. Go to Romans chapter three, verse number 23. Romans three, verse 23. If you don't have a Bible, there are Bibles actually in the pew. So go ahead and grab that and follow along this morning. We will look at a lot of different verses. So if you can't quite get there, I get it, okay? I understand. But at least try your best, okay? So Romans chapter three, verse number 23. Again, a verse that if you don't have memorize, I would encourage you to memorize it. It is a great one. So it says this, for all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Do you recognize what that says? It doesn't say some. It doesn't say just Enrique, okay? It says all, which it means all, okay? All means all and that's all that all means, okay? So if you're curious, all means all. It means you, for all have sinned. I think when we think about sin, I think there's some pretty easy ones we can kind of think of, first of all lying. How many of you've ever told the lie before? Well, you didn't tell the truth. I'm not including the lines where you're like, it wasn't all of the truth. It was partially truth, which is guess what, a lie. All of us have lied. So I want to make that very clear, that all of us are sinners. We have sinned and by the way, we could go on a much deeper list than just lying, okay? Because Jesus even goes beyond that. He says, okay, you look on a woman to lust after her. You've committed adultery in your heart. Hey, you hate a brother without a cause. You've committed murder in your heart. And so Jesus takes it a step further. But look at this one too. Look at James chapter two, James chapter two, verse number 10, all of us are sinners. I think we've got to realize that there are some people that commit very heinous sins, right? There are people that murder people, that are people that have done a whole bunch of terrible things. But the Bible's very clear that even if you are a great person and you offend in just one point, meaning you've broken the law in just one area, you are guilty. James chapter two, verse number 10 says this. "For whosoever, that means anybody shall keep the whole law." Meaning you're doing great. And you've kept all of the commandments. Look what he says, and yet offend in one point. What does it say? He is guilty of all. You know what that means? All of us are law breakers. We have violated God's holy law and therefore we are sinners. That is terrible news, isn't it? That is harsh, I understand. But don't worry, it gets worse, okay? So it's sureatee. You are a sinner. You have violated God's law. And how many is getting distracted by that? I keep going, oh, wow, it's moving, okay. Nobody, okay, I'm the only one. Point number two under our need. It's sureatee, second of all, it's sentence. What does, okay, so you're a sinner. How, oh, thank you, thank you, Harry. Oh, sweet, okay, what does that mean? I'm a sinner, okay, everybody is. What does that mean for me this morning? If you are already in James, go to James chapter one, just one chapter over. I want you to make this very clear. Sin must be punished. Sin must be punished. So it's sureatee, it's sentence. Sin must be punished. So we are sinners, therefore there is a punishment that is tied. James chapter one, verse number 15 says this, then when the lost half can see, they bring a force in and sin when it is finished, bring a fourth death. Do you know what that means? Sin brings death. The punishment for sin is death. Don't believe me, go to Isaiah chapter 59. Isaiah 59, now that is in the Old Testament, so you're going to travel a little bit, Isaiah 59, verses one and two. Isaiah 59, verses one and two. Of course, Isaiah was a prophet to the nation of Israel, a prophet that honestly, when you look at the beginning of Isaiah, you see that he was going to be rejected as he preached his message. The nation of Israel is much like what we see in our nation today. It is a nation that has rejected God. It is a nation that has turned his back on God at this point and God was going to judge. Isaiah 59, verses one and two, says this, "Behold, the Lord's hand is not shortened that it cannot save." Isn't that awesome? Meaning it's not like you're drowning and God's like a T-Rex arm, okay? Like I can't help you. His arm is not shortened and then he cannot save. Neither his ear heavy that it cannot hear. But your iniquities, your sin, your violating of God's law, have separated between you and your God and your sins have hid his face from you that he will not hear. Do you see what that says? Your sin has separated between you and your God. It has created a gulf between you and him. Look at Romans chapter six, Romans chapter six, verse 23. This is probably the one that many of our church is familiar with. Romans chapter six, verse number 23. Again, church, if you don't have this memorized you need to because it's really that good. Romans six, verse 23. I love the book of Romans. It's probably my favorite book of the Bible. And Romans six is probably my favorite chapter in the Bible. You want to know church how to live right and what it really means. Romans six is a great, great passage. Romans six, verse 23 says this, "For the wages of sin is death. But the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord." How many of you have a job or have ever had a job? Okay, okay, good. If you've had a job, you know what a wage is. It's a payment. When I worked at Arby's back in the day, way back in the day, my wage was $5 an hour. I know, you guys, you guys are lucky, okay. My wage was $5 an hour. I worked for every hour I worked. I got $5 and of course the government took their part, okay. A wage is a payment, okay. It's what you deserve for your work. The wages of sin of you and I sin is death. It is separation from God forever in a literal place called hell. I don't like to say that, but it's the truth. Hell is a terrible, terrible place. It is a place of torment. It is a place of separation from God. It is a place of utter darkness. It is a place that I don't want anyone to go to. But that is the payment for our sin. It is what we rightfully deserve because we have rejected Jesus Christ. But here is the great thing, okay. So first of all, we saw our need, it's surety, all of us are sinners. It's sentence. There is a payment that has to be paid, but look at point number two this morning, his sacrifice. So first of all, we saw our need. Now let's look at his sacrifice. This is a great thing. So first of all, I want you to kind of understand this. It's intent. Why is God going to do what we're gonna talk about? Look at John chapter three, verse number 16. John three, verse number 16. A great verse that probably is the most common verse that people in the world know. Sadly, they don't really know the full intent of it. Why did God do this? Why is this verse so great? John three, 16. Jesus is talking to Nicodemus in John chapter three, a rich, a ruler, a Pharisee, a religious guy. He's talking to him, he had come to Jesus at night and basically asked him, hey, who are you? And what are you doing? Jesus goes through different things and he says, hey, you must be born again. And he gets to this point in John chapter three, verse number 16, he says, for God so loved the world that he gave, whoo, his only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but of everlasting love, of everlasting life. Do you see what it says? For God so loved the world. You know that means God loves you. You personalize it. God loves you. And church, by the way, that means God loves the people that you may not. So often Christians, especially in an election year, get very unloving. Can I share something with you? God loves your political rival. God loves those people that do not stand for what you stand for. God loves the people that may have a very different definition of love than you have. So what is the answer? The answer is, well, we're about to talk about. Look at this, for God so loved the world. His love was not just a feeling. His love moved him to an action. Look what it says that he gave his only begotten son, Jesus Christ. God loved the world enough that he gave his son for you. I love my son. My son is Josiah, and he is a great little kid. He probably hugged most of you. He's a great little guy. I would not give my son for any of you, okay? Just clarifying that. I'm not giving my son up. I'm not doing it. But God loved you enough that he willingly gave his son for you. And remember, who are you? You are a sinner. You have violated what God has done. God loved you enough that he gave his son for you. Look what it says that whosoever believeth in him should not perish but have everlasting life. If I gave my son for somebody, I would have a much higher mark than what Jesus has. Jesus goes, look, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, meaning they should not go to hell, but they can have everlasting life. Second Peter chapter three, verse nine says this, and I want you to go there again. Second Peter chapter three, verse number nine. We've plenty of time. We've still got 19 minutes before I was supposed to be done. You all know that's not gonna happen, okay? So second Peter chapter three, verse number nine. This is a great verse because it really shows us God's heart. Second Peter chapter three, verse number nine. I'm gonna wait for you to get there. I'm still here in pages turned. So we're gonna wait, we got no rush again. So take your time. Second Peter chapter three, verse number nine. This is a great verse showing us God's desire. What does God want? He loved us enough to send us his son, but what does God desire from that? Look at what it says here in second Peter, chapter three, verse number nine. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise as some men count slackness, but is long-suffering. He is patient to us word, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. What is God's desire? His desire is that the whole world will know him as our savior. That is his desire. Back there on the wall, I get to see it, none of you do, unless you wanna turn around, if you do, I don't care. There is a map of the world, and that is our missionaries. As I look at that map, it's a big place. As I look at that map, I think of countries that have billions of people, and I don't know how we're gonna reach 'em, but the truth is this. God doesn't want anyone to go to hell. God does not want anyone to go to hell. Even on the cross, he asked God to forgive those who hung them there. He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. The truth of the matter is, though, that many will reject Jesus Christ. The truth of the matter is that all of us have a decision, and we'll get to that in a minute. But first of all, I want you to understand the intensity of what his sacrifice really meant. Why did Jesus go through what we're about to talk about? So first of all, Christ's payment exposed. Why did he come? First Timothy chapter one. First Timothy chapter one. First Timothy chapter one, and we're gonna look at verse number 15 here in a minute. First Timothy chapter one, verse number 15. First Timothy chapter one. Why did Jesus Christ come? Why was he born of a virgin? Why was he laid in a manger? Why did he live a sinless life? What was the purpose of all of it? Was it just to give us a good story? Something we can share during Christmas? No, it's no much more than that, Church. First Timothy one, verse number 15 says this. This is a faithful saying and worthy of all acceptation that Christ Jesus came into the world to do what? To save sinners. Paul of course says of whom I am chief and I would say get out of the way Paul is me, okay? But anyway, he came into the world to save sinners. That was the purpose of his coming. Why did Jesus come? It wasn't just a good story. It wasn't so we can have Christmas. He came to save sinners. Now let's look at the payment that he made. Go to Matthew chapter 27. We're gonna read quite a substantial part of scripture because I think it's good for us to get this. So go to Matthew 27. If you haven't turned to anything else, turn to Matthew 27. Matthew 27. And we're gonna start with verse number 22. And like what I said, we're gonna read all the way down to verse number 51, okay? It's gonna be a long passage, but we've got to get this. We've got to understand what Jesus really did. Matthew 27, beginning with verse number 22. I'm gonna start reading and if you're not there yet, hopefully you can find us where we are. Pilate say a thunder then. So we're kind of starting into the middle of the story here, okay? Pilate say a thunder then. What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ? They all say unto him, let him be crucified. And the governor said why, what evil hath he done, but they cried out the more saying, let him be crucified. When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but rather a tumult was made, he took water and washed his hands before the multitude saying, "I am innocent of the blood of this just person." See you to it. Then answered all the people and said, "His blood be on us and on our children." Terrible statement, by the way. Then released he barabbas unto them. And when he had scourged in Jesus, he delivered him to be crucified. And the way that scourging was a terrible ordeal. It would have had glass and bone on it. It would have ripped his flesh from off of his skeleton. It would have been terrible and would have been far more than we could even bear. Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the common hall and gathered unto him the whole ban of soldiers. And they stripped him and put on him a scarlet robe. And when they had planted a crown of thorns, they put it upon his head and a reed in his right hand and they bowed the knee before him and mocked him saying, "Hail, King of the Jews." And they spit upon him and took the reed and smote him on the head, driving those thorns deeper into the skull. And after that they had mocked him. They took the robe off from him and put his own raiment on him and led him away to be crucified. And as they came out, they found a man of Cyrene, Simon by name, him they compelled to bear his cross. And when they were come onto a place called Golgotha, which is to say a place of a skull, they gave him vinegar to drink mingled with gall. And when he tasted their earth, he would not drink. And they crucified him and parted his garments, casting lots and it might fulfill, which was spoken by the prophet, they parted my garments among them and upon my vesture did they cast lots. And sitting down, they watched him there and set up over his head this accusation written, "This is Jesus, the King of the Jews." Then were their two thieves crucified with him, one on the right hand and another on the left. And they that passed by reviled him wagging their heads and saying, "Thou bet destroy us the temple "and build us in three days, save thyself, "if they'll be the Son of God, come down from this cross." Likewise also the chief priests mocked him, mocking him, with the scribes and elders said, "He saved others, himself, he cannot save." If he be the king of Israel, then now come down from the cross and we will believe him. He trusted in God, let him deliver him now, if he will have him, for he said, "I am the Son of God." The thieves also which were crucified with him cast the same in his teeth. Now from the sixth hour, there was darkness over all the land unto the ninth hour. And about the ninth hour, Jesus cried with a loud voice saying, "Ili, Ili, lama, sabakthani." That is to say, "My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?" Some of them that stood there, when they heard that, said this man, "Calleth for Elias." And straightly one of them ran and took a sponge and filled with vinegar and put it on a reed and gave him to drink. The rest said, "Let be, let us see whether Elias "will come to save him." Jesus when he had cried again with a loud voice, yielded up the ghost and behold, the veil of the temple was rent in twain from the top to the bottom and the earth did quake and the rocks, rent. That church is what Jesus did for you. A terrible death, a death that we deserved. But why, why did he go through all of that? Why, why? First Peter 2, 24. First Peter 2, 24, this is a great, great verse. First Peter, chapter two, verse number 24. I love this verse, and by the way, a verse, again, you need to memorize if you don't have it yet. First Peter 2, 24. This verse should impact our hearts and if you don't know Christ as your savior, this is the whole point of why he did what we just read. First Peter 2, 24, says this. Who, speaking of Jesus, his own self, bear our sins and his own body on the tree, that we being dead to sin should live unto righteousness by whose stripes you are healed. Do you understand what it's saying here? Christ bore our sins on the cross. Why did he go through what we just read? Because he took our sins upon himself. He paid the payment for our sins. Why? So that you and I could know real freedom so that we could be free. That is the truth of why Jesus came. So we saw, first of all, our need. We saw Jesus's sacrifice, which I think all of us can understand. It was very intense and he went through it for us, for me, for you. He went through all of that for us. But here's the part where we all have to make a decision. All of us have to make a decision. So point number three this morning, our decision. This is when it comes down to brass tacks. All of us can understand that we're sinners. All of us can understand that there's a price that has to be paid. All of us can understand that Jesus died for our sins. But if we don't make the decision, I'm about to tell you, all of that knowledge means nothing. It means nothing. So our decision, first of all, we have to understand that there are simple requirements, simple requirements. God requires that you leave all other beliefs behind. It's not Jesus plus. It's not Jesus plus good works. It's not Jesus plus baptism. It's not Jesus plus church membership. It is not. John 14, six, Jesus could not have been more clear when he said this, Jesus say unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comeeth unto the Father, but by me. Jesus is not a way to the Father. He is not a way to heaven. Jesus is the only one. There is no other way to him. There may be good people. I talked to a good person yesterday. As far as I know, he doesn't know Christ as his savior. Good people still go to hell. And that is just the truth. So first of all, God requires that you leave all other beliefs behind. It's not Jesus plus Muhammad. It's not Jesus plus good works. It is Jesus plus nothing minus nothing. God requires that you come to him in faith. Pastor Pete shared this verse, and I added it to my notes because I can do that. Galatians chapter two verse number 16. I want you to go there, Galatians two verse number 16. Galatians two verse number 16. And after that, we're gonna go one more book, one more book to the right. I had to remember which way it goes. One more book to the right and Ephesians chapter two. So if you find it real quick, go over to Ephesians chapter two and kind of have them both with your thumbs. You can do that. Galatians two verse number 16 says this. And I'll wait, I hear pages still. Galatians chapter two. Verse number 16. It says this, "Knowing that a man is not justified "by the works of the law, "meaning the good things that we do, "that the good things that we know God expects, "like not lying, not killing somebody, "treating people kind, that kind of stuff. "Knowing that a man is not justified "by the works of the law, "but by the faith of Jesus Christ. "Even we have believed in Jesus Christ "that we might be justified, declared righteous, "by the faith of Christ, "and not by the works of the law. "For by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified. "You are not the exception." There are no exceptions. Ephesians chapter two verses eight and nine, and these are the verses that I've encouraged you to really memorize. Ephesians chapter two verses eight and nine are probably some of my favorite verses, one of my favorite verses, a couple of the favorite verses, this is two, a couple of favorite verses. I like to share when I'm witnessing to somebody. Ephesians two verses eight and nine. It says this, "For by grace are ye saved through faith, "and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, "not of works, thus any man should boast." I wanna kind of define some terms for you because there are some terms that maybe you don't quite understand. First of all, "For by grace." What is grace? That is God giving us that we don't deserve. We've already understand, we've already talked about this, that all of us are sinners, and we rightfully deserve separation from God. So what is this grace? God giving us that we don't deserve. I don't deserve heaven. I don't deserve to be with him forever. But God can give that to me when I come through his terms. For by grace, God giving us that which we don't deserve, are ye saved through faith? What is faith? It means complete dependence. It means you're not kind of like, eh, you can't really see that 'cause I'm saying mind the whole bit. Like, eh, I'm kind of leaning on Jesus, but I don't really know. I can always go back. No, it is complete dependence. And then not of yourselves, look at the verse, and then not of yourselves. It is the gift of God. God wants to give it to you. Meaning, you don't earn a gift. Some of you have given us gifts. We didn't know it's yet, okay? We didn't earn it, you gave it to us. You said, "Hey, I wanna help you out." Here's the thing, a gift is not earned, it is given. When you get a gift, you have an option. Many of us don't take the option, though. If I was to give, I don't know what can I give? Okay, I'll do this. Why not, I haven't walked yet, I can walk around. Poor guy on the camera has been moved today. He's like sitting down, he's not even doing anything. All right. Alan. This is Alan, by the way. Came with us on outreach yesterday. A friend of Enrique, at least that's what he claims. So, if I go up to Alan and go, "Hey, I wanna give you this notebook." It means nothing, there's literally nothing in it. Okay, but anyway, I'm not actually giving it to you, I want it back, 'cause it's kinda how I keep my brain, okay? So if I say, "I want to give this to Alan." If I go, "Okay, Alan, I wanna give this to you." Good? But, wait a minute, you gotta come to outreach for the next, you know, six weeks, okay? (audience laughs) He was just right, okay. I go, "Hey, Alan, I wanna give this to you." But wait, wait a minute, wait a minute. You don't just tie 10% to this church, you have to tie 50, okay? Amen? (audience laughs) Wait, Alan, Alan, I wanna give this to you. But wait, but wait, you can't be Enrique's friend anymore, that's probably easy, okay? No, what is a gift? I say, "Hey, Alan, I wanna give this to you." What does he have to do? Do you understand? The gift of God is this, he wants to give it to you. But so often we go, "Wait, but I have to clean up my life." No, you can never clean up your life good enough. God says, "Hey, I wanna give it to you, "and you accept it through faith." I want that back, thank you. (audience laughs) So do you see what I'm saying? So often we expect all of these people to change, well, they have to give up smoking, they have to give up drugs, they have to give up whatever. No, you are wrong, they don't. They don't, they have to come by faith. You are not saved by works. You are saved by simple, child-like faith. You don't have to have all the answers. Understand what I'm saying? You have to trust in the one who does, and you have to place your faith in him. I found this kind of amazing story. It's about a person named Kunta Kinta. I don't know if I'm saying that right. But she lived free among the Mandinka people of West Africa becoming a Mandinka warrior at just 15. But then as he gathered wood for a drum outside his village, slavers captured him. Stacked away onto a slave ship, piled up with 170 other slaves. He was hauled to America and auctioned off his property. To be bought and sold, used and abused. But he kept his memories of freedom alive and passed them on to his daughter, Kizzy. She was born a slave and never knew freedom firsthand. But she passed on her father's stories. That day finally came after Kizzy died when her grandchildren finally tasted freedom for good. This is the story of roots as told by Alex Haley. Do you, dear friends, long for freedom? The day of release? Yes, I know you're American citizens born in the land of the free and the home of the brave. But like Kizzy, you and I were born as slaves. Captives to sin. How sweet the words of liberation and freedom that Jesus speaks to our poor oppressed crushed souls. He speaks not of stories of the past or dreams for the future, but of true freedom found only in his precious blood. Allow that theme to echo into your heart as the Holy Spirit breaks your chains through these words of Jesus. Call out to him. Believe in your heart that Jesus died for your sins and accept his free gift this morning. Church, here's where we are. We're at the point of decision. I'm gonna ask all of us to please stand and we're gonna have a time what we call invitation. It's a time where we do real business with God. And some of us may know Jesus Christ and you've known Christ longer than I've been alive and I get it. The church, when was the last time it impacted your heart? When was the last time you were moved to do something about it? To those in this auditorium who do not know Jesus Christ as their savior, here is my plea to you that you will not walk out those doors and go downstairs and eat the food. But instead you'll finally get it settled. God doesn't desire that you walk out without. God desires that you know him personally. And even though my stomach is growling, I would love to share the truth with you. So as this invitation goes, I would encourage our church family who knows Jesus Christ as their savior maybe commit yourself to be a little more faithful and witnessing to go a little further. For those who do not know, I encourage you to get my attention this morning. I would love to even have to go back and have Mike dismiss us in a word of prayer before we eat so I can share the truth with you. All right, let's pray right now and then every head bow and every eye closed as we do business with God, okay? Heavenly Father, we are so grateful for your word. But we are so grateful today, Lord, for the freedom that is really found in you. But yes, we enjoy wonderful freedoms in America. And yes, Lord, I am so grateful for them. But Lord, more than that, I am grateful for the freedom that is found in you. But I ask that if there's anyone in here today under the sound of my voice that does not know you as our savior, but that they would get that settled today. But maybe they have doubts, maybe they don't know. But I ask that you would just move them to a point of decision, move them to a point where they say, finally, I'm going to get the answers that I'm searching for. We're working a mighty way this morning. But help us, Lord, as your people, but to make me surrender, Lord, in a greater way to getting your truth out to others. But we're so grateful. And once again, we pray this all in the wonderful name of our savior, Jesus Christ. Amen. All right, church. Let's do business with God. ♪ We hope that message was an encouragement to you. To stay up to date with us, please follow us on Twitter and like us on Facebook and LBC's connected again. If you would like more information on how Heaven can be your home, please visit LighthousePaptist.org/TheGospel. ♪ (upbeat music)