Mike Novotny - Why You Need Jesus?
The Decline of Christianity in America
When I was born back in 1980 here in Wisconsin, the United States of America, out of every 10 Americans surveyed, nine of them claimed to be Christian. Now that I’m middle-aged, here in my 40s and 2020s America, it is no longer the case. According to research done by the Pew Research Center, now it’s not even eight in 10 Americans, nor seven in 10 Americans, but just six in 10 Americans, most of them older, who claim to be Christian. They say if the trends continue and if I live the average lifespan, it won’t be six; it’ll be five, if not four. In one man’s lifetime, America will have gone from a supermajority—nine out of 10 people identifying as followers of Jesus—to a numerical minority: just four out of 10.
Now think about that for a second. That wasn’t a survey about whether people go to church every Sunday. It wasn’t about whether you make it when the kids don’t have stuff on the weekends or if you show up on Christmas and Easter. These were just people saying they religiously identify as followers of Jesus, as Christians. And from nine to six, perhaps trending all the way down to five or four, I’m curious, have you noticed that too?
Maybe as you think about your own family tree, the difference in religious passion between grandparents and then parents and then you, and maybe your children, have you noticed the trend trending away from Jesus? Can you think of whether your grandma had a Bible next to her bed? She was at church or Mass every single Sunday. But then with your mom, your dad, or your aunts or your uncles, you know some of them stayed religious and some of them kind of drifted away from all that. Or maybe in your own family, your mom or dad were all about Jesus, all about church; faith was a part of their life, saying prayers before bed, saying grace before meals. And now, as you think about you and your brother, your sister, your family, maybe a couple are still passionate about such things, and a couple definitely are not, and a handful are somewhere in the middle.
I’ve seen it in my own family tree. I wonder if you’ve seen it in yours, or maybe that’s your story or the story of the person you’re married to or the children you are raising, or the guy that you’re dating—older generations being much more religious, younger generations much less so. In fact, if you look at American members of Generation Z, about, I don’t know, 25 and under, it’s nowhere near six in 10. It’s not even five in 10. You’d be shocked if it were four, perhaps just three in 10 young Americans claim to be followers of Jesus. And it makes me want to ask this huge question: what happened? I mean, what changed to go from nine all the way down to six, perhaps five or even four? Why would people not just walk away from, you know, every Sunday church, but walk away from Jesus himself?
The Biggest Reason: The Unfiltered Jesus
If we had time, we could probably explore the many answers to that question, right? There have been television pastors who have hustled people out of money in Jesus' name, scandals in the Catholic Church—stuff that was covered up with parish priests. There have been man-made rules and just boring church services that don’t make sense, where it feels like they’re just going through the motions. There are all kinds of reasons why you and the people you love may have stepped away from church. But there’s one reason I want to talk about today that maybe you haven’t considered.
As I think about the Bible, it’s perhaps the biggest reason why people are not interested in Jesus or stop following Jesus or give up on the Christian faith: the unfiltered Jesus. I’d love for you to write this down. I think the biggest reason why people today, and throughout history, have walked away is because of the unfiltered Jesus. He’s offensive. By that, I mean if you don’t edit Jesus, if you don’t pick and choose your favorite parts of Jesus, if you just read who Jesus actually was and what Jesus actually said in the recorded gospels, you cannot avoid the fact that he was scandalously offensive.
I think the biggest problem Americans have with Christianity today is not the pastor—even though pastors can be a problem—it’s not the priest; it’s not the rituals; it’s not the rites. I think the biggest offense is Jesus. Here’s why I say that. I have borrowed this giant coffee filter that many of you appreciate here at church when I give you coffee for free. Think of what a filter does. A filter, whether we’re talking about a coffee filter, a furnace filter, a filter for the car you drove here to church, or a filter on your phone for your favorite pictures, takes what something actually is and turns it into what you want it to be. Is that an accurate definition? A filter takes the actual thing and transforms it into a thing that you prefer.
So, you know the actual thing is a bunch of coffee grounds—super mushy—and a bunch of water that you probably don’t want to slurp up off the bottom of your coffee cup. So we use a filter. We take what it actually is and we turn it into the flavored caffeinated drink—the thing we want it to be. Your furnace filter is a bunch of dust, stuff floating around with the air that you want. So you put a filter in so we take out all the bad stuff, and we end up with just the kind of air that we would prefer to breathe. Or how many of you use Snapchat in the room? Yeah, a bunch of you. Snapchat filters—we take, I must be old because I just don’t get it! We take an actual picture of a person and we can give them a giant mouth or make them look like they’re 100 years old, and my daughters love this kind of stuff. We take what the person actually looks like and we use a filter to turn them into what we want them to look like. Filters take what is and transform it into a version that we prefer.
Every single day, people are tempted to do the same thing with Jesus, right? I want to take the parts of Jesus that I like, that make me feel good—maybe the parts where he forgives me, he has time for me, he can rescue me, he can heal this cancer I’m going to see. I want a Jesus who gets me to heaven and watches over me on Earth. But sometimes we are very, very tempted to filter out the parts of Jesus that are not so easy to swallow. And that’s why I’m happy that you’re here. Starting today, and for the next few weeks, we are going to meet the unfiltered Jesus—the OG, original, unedited, unadulterated. I’m not going to share with you Pastor Mike’s personal thoughts or our church’s favorite quotes; we’re just going to read the things that Jesus actually said—no filters allowed in church.
It is going to be probably, I think, maybe two months of the most offensive church services you’ve ever been to. Are you happy you came today? If it’s your first time, I’ve already apologized to a bunch of people—like, hold on, they changed that belt a notch. But here’s why I want to do that: two reasons. Even though I can kind of anticipate a bunch of you being offended, maybe some of you not coming back, I think you have the right to know who Jesus actually was, right? Whether you believe in him or are done with him, I don’t think you should come to a Christian church and be surprised by him, right? I don’t want you to actually pick up a Bible a year from now after coming to church every Sunday and say, «What if I’m going to be a faithful Christian? I should probably not filter Christ.»
So for the next few weeks, I’m going to give you Jesus with all of his cringy sayings, with all of his rough edges, with all the times he just makes you want to walk out the door. I’m going to give you the real Jesus. You have a right to know who he was and what he actually said. At the same time, as we’re listening to Jesus, I want to show you why some people, despite the offense, stuck with him. If Jesus, in almost every sermon, was just dropping bombs that made the majority of people walk away, what was it about him that made some people stay? And why would you now, if Jesus with his words is just gonna smack you around and try to change you and call you to repentance and change your direction and your hopes and your dreams and your truth—like, why? Why would you stick with him?
The Sermon That Emptied the Church
So we’re going to explore the really hard things about Jesus and the beautiful things that make people give up everything to follow him, live for him, and believe in him. So if you’re ready for that, there’s probably no better place to start than the single sermon where Jesus was so offensive that, if my math is right, 99,7% of his church left. Can you imagine if I preached a sermon and there were hundreds of you here today and by the time I said, you know, throughout the sermon, a bunch of you were just popping up and leaving until two of you were left? What would I have to say to make all the rest of you leave? Did you know that in the Gospel of John, that’s exactly what happened to Jesus? Here’s the story: Jesus is starting to grow in popularity. A few people turn into a few dozen, a few hundred, and one day thousands of people are there, interested in Jesus, the way that he speaks, the miracles that he does. The Bible says that 5,000 men, plus the women and children, were all gathered around to hear Jesus.
That is when Jesus decided to pull off his most numerical miracle—what the Bible calls the feeding of the 5,000. A huge crowd is there; no one has anything to eat. So Jesus takes this kid’s lunchbox, has some bread, has some fish in it, and he says, «You get a fish, and you get a fish, and you get a fish, and here’s some bread, » and he multiplies this little kid’s meal until 5,000-plus people are totally satisfied. They’re stuffed, and they pick up the leftovers. The people realize, «Oh wait, if Jesus can do that, if Jesus wants to do that, if he has the power to do miracles and the love to do miracles for us, ” it’s a unanimous vote, and they want Jesus to be their King. So they track Jesus down; they end up finding him in a nearby synagogue in the ancient city of Capernaum, and there, as they’re gathered, ready to put the crown on his head, Jesus breaks out in a sermon that makes almost all of them walk out the door. Here’s what he said in John chapter 6: Jesus said to the crowds, „Very truly, I tell you, you are looking for me not because you saw the signs I performed but because you ate the loaves and had your fill. Do not work for food that spoils but for food that endures to eternal life, which the Son of Man will give you. For on him, God the Father has placed his seal of approval.“
Then they asked Jesus, „What must we do to do the works God requires?“ Jesus answered, „The work of God is this: to believe in the one he has sent.“ So the crowds find Jesus, who multiplied the bread, and Jesus says, „Hey, I know why you’re looking for me. It’s because you ate the bread, and I filled you up. But come on, let’s be honest. I could fill you up today, and by breakfast, you’re going to be hungry again. How about you work to come after me, not just for some temporary meal, but for some kind of bread or food that endures forever?“ The people are super interested! You know they were busting their backs in Galilean fields to try to feed their families. Now Jesus says he’s just going to give them this bread for free. They cry out to him, „Please, Jesus, give us the bread you’re talking about.“ And here’s how he responds. He says in John 6, „I am the bread of life. Whoever comes to me will never go hungry, and whoever believes in me will never be thirsty. For I have come down from heaven, not to do my will, but to do the will of him who sent me.“
Now to you, that probably seems like a really beautiful thing for Jesus to say. You want bread? It’s me! Believe in me! God sent me from heaven so your soul would never be thirsty, so your heart would never be hungry. He sent me to fill you up in the most beautiful spiritual way. That seems, maybe at first glance, to be a super amazing offer from Jesus. But there’s actually one word in that quote that made everyone cringe. Did you catch it? Heaven! Look at their reaction just a verse later: „At this, the Jews there began to grumble about Jesus because he said, ‘I am the bread that came down from heaven.’ They said, ‘Isn’t this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How could he now say, „I came down from heaven?”’ Wait, Jesus, come on! Don’t we know who your dad is? It’s Joseph, right? Didn’t my cousin grow up next to you? And your mom—it’s Mary, isn’t that her name? You think you came down from heaven? Come on, Jesus! I’m from Earth, he’s from Earth, she’s from Earth, and you are from Earth! Who do you think you are? You think you’re some angel that floated down from above, that you’re above us, better than us?“ They grumbled among themselves, „Who does Jesus think he is from heaven?“
Offensive Truth #1: Jesus Is Authoritative
The first incredibly offensive thing about Jesus I want you to write down is this: the reason that Jesus is so offensive is that Jesus is authoritative. Jesus does not claim to be your equal but to be your superior. He’s not just some guy who maybe has a little bit of wisdom to share or things to suggest that you believe. It’s not like you and Jesus; he says, „You are from Earth, and I’m from Heaven.“ You think according to the wisdom of man, I was sent from God. So if you think this and I think this, guess who’s wrong and guess who’s right? Every time Jesus says, „I’m right!“ Every time you disagree with me, you’re wrong. Every time you read something I say and you cringe, you don’t like it, or you disagree with it, it’s not because I have something to learn; it’s because you do. You are from Earth, I’m from Heaven. My job is to speak; your job is to submit. The crowd did not like that.
How about you? I’m not sure if it’s just me, but my heart has a huge problem with actual authority. I think I like the concept of authority on paper, but in real life, I get very moody about it. Like the government, right? I’ve studied the history of countries that don’t have a real government; I would not want to step foot in those places. I would not want to raise my daughters in those places. I love the idea of some structure with power and authority that can give me security and safety. I love that idea until, until the government says something to me that I don’t like—until I don’t agree with what the president or Congress mandates. „Who do you think you are mandating me?“
This is the land of the free, and I’m going to do what I want because I have the right! Or it’s something within us. I don’t care who you are; I don’t care what I don’t care how many people voted for you. You either do what I want, or I will loathe you deep in my heart. Or think of something as small as sports. On paper, I love referees! I really do! I’ve played soccer games where the ref can’t make it, and everyone says, „Let’s just play without a referee.“ Always a bad idea! Always a bad idea! It gets so dramatic. So I love the idea that there’s someone there that has authority, a whistle in his mouth, a card in his back pocket that can stop some beefy defender from snapping these skinny legs of your pastor. I love that—I love it until the whistle is coming in my direction.
Then, no, then it’s the grumbling Mike, the moody Mike, the „What are you thinking?“ Mike agrees! I like authority that agrees with me! I don’t like authority that doesn’t. Kids love the concept of parents, but there are one or two people who pay for my house, who will buy the food and then make it for me two, three times a day. They buy me a phone, help pay for my car, insure it. Kids love the concept of that until, right, until the curfew, or the screen time, or put the Xbox controller down, or „Because I said so!“ and then, „Who do you think you are?“ And it’s not just toddlers, and it’s not just teenagers—it’s all of us. We hate it when someone tells us what to do.
Did you hear not long ago, out of all the media that our church produces, we had our first-ever piece of truly viral internet content? You hear about this? It was a little one-minute clip where I was encouraging husbands to be like Jesus. Like husbands love your wives! Like don’t put more time into your fantasy football team; study her, listen to her, and love her like Jesus loves his church. It turns out that little one-minute clip was liked and shared by over 50,000 people, viewed multiple millions of times, mostly by female Instagram users. Very soon after, in fact, just a few days after we published the other part of that sermon, guess what was not liked and shared. Why is that? Because deep down, come on, all of us want the government and the referees and our parents and our pastors and our spouses and everyone just to do what we want. And when they don’t—in fact, when they don’t just disagree with us, but when they claim that we have to, when they tell us to obey, to change, submit, to repent—that brings out the monster in us.
And I just got to be upfront with you: this is how Jesus is. If you want to be a Christian or become a Christian, he’s not just going to offer you a few thoughts. To be a Christian means to call him Lord, King, and God. It means to bend your knee and submit. It means to read the Bible, and every time it bothers you, to say, „I must be wrong because he’s God.“ „My parents must have taught me wrong because he’s God.“ „The way I’ve been thinking about this—the way nine out of 10 of my friends believe about this—we all must be wrong because Jesus is God.“ He doesn’t suggest; he preaches. He has no interest in being your on-call counselor or your occasional life coach. He is either the Lord of all, or he isn’t Lord at all. Offended? Because he’s not done.
Offensive Truth #2: Jesus Is Essential
Look what happens next in John 6. „Stop grumbling among yourselves, ” Jesus answered. „I am the living bread that came down from heaven. Whoever eats this bread will live forever. This bread is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.“ And the Jews began to argue sharply among themselves, „How can this man give us his flesh to eat?“ Jesus said to them, „Very truly, I tell you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you.“ Oh, Jesus takes the filter off. He is as graphic and blunt and black and white and offensive. He says, „Unless you come to me, believe in me, eat and drink of me—unless my flesh and blood are in you—you have no life. It is categorically impossible for you to have a spiritual life with God or a future life in heaven unless you have me.“
Now, it might sound like Jesus is talking about the sacrament of communion. Any of you think of that? Eat, drink, body, blood? But that doesn’t exist yet; he hasn’t invented or instituted that yet. He seems to be saying just like your body needs to eat and drink to have life, so also your soul needs to eat and drink of me. If you don’t have Jesus in flesh and blood—Jesus giving his flesh and shedding his blood—you have no life that comes with God. It’s actually a brilliant metaphor. Now think of your body for a second. Your body, as complex and amazing as it is, has one huge flaw: it dies without outside help. Ever thought of that? You might be the strongest person in church right now; you might be the most beautiful person watching at home. But the way your body is, it’s impossible for your body to produce its own calories to survive unless daily bread comes from the outside. Unless food and drink feed you from the outside, from inside of you, you will die. Why do people starve or dehydrate? Because their bodies are incapable of producing what they actually need to live.
You need bread, Jesus says, or you’re dead. And in the same way, here’s this unfiltered claim: he says your soul—like the spiritual part of you—is absolutely incapable of producing what it needs to live with God. You can think for a long time; you can try your best; you can work hard to be a good person. But what is within you is as capable of living with God as your body is of surviving without food. Jesus says your body needs bread, and your soul needs me. And without me—flesh and blood, me living, dying on a cross, and rising—you have no life. There’s no other way. This is the second offensive thing Jesus said. I’d love for you to write this down. The essential Jesus is offensive. He’s saying, „Yep, I don’t just come with authority, but I’m not optional.“ If you want to pray and have God listen, I am essential. If you want to die and not go to hell, I am essential. If you want God to be for you and not absolutely against you because of your sin, I am essential.
You can walk away if you want, but sooner or later, you will die, and your death will be eternal. Jesus said, „Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life.“ And that’s when everyone left. John is honest about the reaction. He says in chapter 6, „On hearing it, this teaching, many of his disciples said, ‘This is a hard teaching; who can accept it? ’ From this time, many of his disciples turned back and no longer followed Jesus.“ The mega church was over. The crowd cleared out; they stacked up the chairs because the unfiltered, authoritative, essential Jesus was just too offensive.
Why Stick with Him? Because He’s Worth It
So I guess that begs a big question for you: what will you do? This was a hard teaching, was it not? Will you no longer follow him? Is this the last time I will see you in church? Are you reaching for the remote right now at home? You know why. If Jesus is going to tell you to change, to repent, that you’re wrong, if he’s going to ask you to stand by this book even if your friends think you’re dumb or backward or something phobic, why would you stick with him? Why would you join the increasing masses of Americans who say, „No, no, no! Maybe that’s for Grandma, but not for me!“
Well, there’s an answer in John chapter 6 to that question. It’s an answer that I heard in a very interesting way from a former drug addict a couple of months ago. I was wandering around our church neighborhood saying some prayers, and I stumbled across this collector shop, which caught my interest. See, when I was a kid, I was a huge collector: baseball cards, football cards, hockey cards, basketball cards, all the cards—starting lineups, Star Wars action figures. I had boxes and boxes and boxes of it; I loved collecting things. So I walk in and meet this guy—I’ll call him Rick—and I find out that he was a collector, and I used to be a collector. Somehow in the conversation, we both found out that addiction was part of our past, so it was a really honest, open conversation.
We ended up talking about the most expensive thing in our collection that we ever held in our hands. I told him a story about when I was in middle school. I was in a card shop in Green Bay, Wisconsin, and I opened this pack, and what is staring back at me but the golden face of Shaquille O’Neal! Yeah, Shaq’s rookie year! I don’t just pull the card, but a gold version of the card. The shop collector opens up the till and gives me a hundred bucks on the spot! Boom! And this guy says, „I had something way better than that!“ He tells me about these rare baseball cards he has—Derek Jeter and Alex Rodriguez—that were worth not hundreds but thousands of dollars. I asked him, „Oh man, do you still have them?“ He laughed and shook his head, saying, „No! This one day I was high and I traded both of them for a cheeseburger!“
All we could do was laugh! Like, he literally had something so, so valuable, but in an emotional moment where he wasn’t thinking straight, he gave up something so good for something so small! If you had to ask me why not bail on Jesus, I think I would just repeat that story. If you have Jesus, you have something in your hand that’s so valuable, and what you will get for living for yourself by your rules, your truth—what you will get for a comfortable life of doing whatever you want—is so small compared to what Jesus is freely putting into your hands today. In fact, in the midst of all his offensive things, you might have missed the incredible things that Jesus said. Let me show you a list of promises that I found right here in John chapter 6.
Jesus said, „I will give you food that endures to eternal life. God sent me for you, not other people, not better people! For you! You will never go hungry; you will never be thirsty. I won’t drive you away; I won’t lose you. It doesn’t matter your background; it doesn’t matter your baggage. Jesus says, ‘Come to me! ’ I won’t stiff-arm you and say you’re not good enough. I will accept the worst sinner in this room. And once I have you, I won’t lose you! I won’t let death take you from me; I won’t let cancer, I won’t let job loss or divorce or struggles with anxiety or depression—I won’t even let your own sin. I won’t lose you; instead, I will raise you up on the last day. He says you will have eternal life; I’ll teach you and you will live forever; you will live because of me! I’ve chosen you!“
You catch what Jesus is offering? Not that some expensive baseball card— not thousands of dollars. He’s offering you forever with God! He’s offering you the happiness of heaven! He’s offering to be there to advocate and save you on Judgment Day! He’s offering you a path to defeat death! He’s saying, „I will take everything that’s wrong with you and nail it to the cross! Yes, you will have to give up much to follow me; you will have to take up a cross and deny yourself. You will have to acknowledge me as your ultimate authority. But here is what I’m offering to you: eternity! Forever! You can walk if you want to, Jesus says, but don’t walk away from forever!“
Here’s how I would describe the real Jesus. It’s the last thing I’m asking you to write down today. I think we learn from John chapter 6 that the unfiltered Jesus is so offensive, unbelievably offensive, but he is so worth it. There’s a reason why lots of people walk, but there’s a compelling reason for you to stay.
A Word to the Younger Generation
So before I say amen and see what you do next, let me say two final things. First, I’d like to speak to those of you who are under 30. And second, I’d like to tell you the story of one of Jesus' best friends. So hands nice and high: who in the room today is under 30 years old? Yeah, a whole bunch of you—maybe half of you, a third of you! I want to be super upfront with you that it will probably be harder for you to stick with Jesus than it has been for me. If it’s true that when I was born, nine out of 10 people said Jesus is good and church is good and the Bible is good, I had a lot of people telling me to stay with Jesus, which was good! But now, as you make friends, as you date people, it is increasingly likely that they will not say that. They will tell you it’s time to close this book and step away from places like this—that we are the problem and not the solution.
I need to be honest with you: with your friends and your family, this might be harder than it was for your grandparents or your parents. All of us want to be encouraged and accepted, and there will be much less encouragement and acceptance for your generation. God could change the trends in a second, but if he doesn’t, there are going to be fewer and fewer people applauding as you stand beneath the cross of Jesus. But when that moment comes, there’s just one word I hope you can remember in your head: eternal. In the Gospel of John, this is a word that Jesus repeats and repeats and repeats and repeats. He offends, he offends, he drops bombs, but he always comes back to this word: eternal, eternal, eternal. Your friends might applaud, but what I’m giving you is eternal. They might give you a job; they might like your posts online, but what I’m offering you is life that is eternal. When you feel like the hot sun of people’s disapproval—please, I’m begging you to remember that no one on this Earth can offer you what is eternal, but Jesus can! And if you don’t bail on him, if you don’t reject or deny him, he will give you life that lasts forever.
Please do not trade a priceless treasure for a cheeseburger. Whoever believes in him will have eternal life. You know, some people think when Jesus invited Peter, James, John, and the apostles to follow him, they might have just been teenagers. Did you know that? They might have been a bunch of 18-year-olds looking back at Jesus while the grown-ups walk away. That’s why Jesus asked them a pretty candid question. John chapter 6 says, „You do not want to leave, too, do you?“ Jesus asked Simon Peter—always the first guy in the room to talk—he answered, „Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of, can you say it with me, eternal life! We’ve come to believe and to know that you are the Holy One of God.“ Yeah, Jesus, that was a hard teaching! Where are we going to go? Some Pharisee who makes it easy? He can’t offer me eternity! But we have come to believe that you are the Holy One of God, who makes sinners like us holy enough for God. Friends, Jesus is the bread of life—so offensive and so worth it!
Prayer
Dear God, I’m thinking of my daughters right now. They’re here every Sunday, but a time is coming when they won’t be in the backseat as Mom and Dad drive them to church. There’s going to come a time when they’re going to have to make their own decision about whether you’re worth it, whether you’re worthy. And I pray that you would do in their hearts what I can’t, that you would give them the kind of faith that can see ahead into their eternal future and believe that heaven is so much better, that Jesus is so much better, that you are always worth it, no matter what you cost us.
Father, there are people on planet Earth right now who are suffering fierce persecution. They’re losing their jobs; some of them are losing their heads because they believe that Jesus is worth it. I pray right now that you would give all of us who are here today, and especially Christians and people here in America, that same conviction—that no matter what it costs us, no matter how hard this gets, whether we’re the only one in the room, if you actually gave up your life for us to forgive every sin, then you must be worth it. God, the truth is, it’s pretty fun for us to get what we want, and it’s miserable for our hearts when we don’t. And so we need you to open our eyes to actually believe that at the end of the day, whatever we have to say no to within us when we say yes to Jesus, it is always the best choice. Give us that kind of faith, God, to see you, to trust you, and to sing with all the saints and angels of heaven: worthy and holy is the name of Jesus. It’s because of him that we pray all these things, and all God’s people said, amen.
Father, there are people on planet Earth right now who are suffering fierce persecution. They’re losing their jobs; some of them are losing their heads because they believe that Jesus is worth it. I pray right now that you would give all of us who are here today, and especially Christians and people here in America, that same conviction—that no matter what it costs us, no matter how hard this gets, whether we’re the only one in the room, if you actually gave up your life for us to forgive every sin, then you must be worth it. God, the truth is, it’s pretty fun for us to get what we want, and it’s miserable for our hearts when we don’t. And so we need you to open our eyes to actually believe that at the end of the day, whatever we have to say no to within us when we say yes to Jesus, it is always the best choice. Give us that kind of faith, God, to see you, to trust you, and to sing with all the saints and angels of heaven: worthy and holy is the name of Jesus. It’s because of him that we pray all these things, and all God’s people said, amen.