(This transcript was generated by AI. Apologies for any inacuracies)

He has risen and we are here to celebrate today a risen Savior and what that means in our lives.

Anybody glad to be here for Easter weekend?

And again, we celebrate because we have a hope inside of us, those of us who have put our faith in Jesus, His death, burial, and resurrection.

We have a hope inside of us that will outlast anything.

No matter what goes on on the outside, we got a hope on the inside.

Come on, let's celebrate this hope we have in our resurrected Jesus today.

And if you don't have that hope, if something has stolen, you know what, your life away from you, our prayer is that, you know what, you would meet Jesus today in a powerful way and really come to know who He is.

The one who came, gave His life on a cross, defeated death, rose from a grave, ascended to heaven, and made an announcement that He is coming back.

Come on.

We have hope He is going to come back.

He is gonna return.

The Bible says He is gonna put every enemy underneath His feet.

So I thought we could celebrate today.

So I had them to go out and get some balloons.

Come on.

Anybody like balloons?

Come on.

And I really believe that, you know, many of us in the room, we do like balloons.

Balloons tend to draw our attention to what is happening.

And so I said, hey, go get some balloons because there's something happening here today.

It's where we're gonna celebrate here on Easter, the resurrection of Jesus.

Anybody ever gone to a birthday party where they had balloons?

Come on.

Anniversary.

Some of you love balloons all over the house for your birthday.

I know what I'm, I know some of you.

We got some of them in the room today.

They want the office decorated.

They want their bedroom decorated.

They want their living room decorated.

And they need balloons everywhere to celebrate another year of life.

So if that is you, I want you to know we have something greater to live for and to celebrate.

His name is Jesus.

Come on.

We see balloons everywhere, but let's celebrate and give him some praise in this place today.

You know, there was a story of a man who used to stand on a street corner and he was actually a great salesman.

He sold balloons, bouquets a lot like you will see at a birthday party or a wedding anniversary or some sort of celebration.

And so he sold bouquets a lot like this and he wanted to sell a lot of balloons because he had a big family.

So he needed to make a lot of money and sell the balloons on the street corner.

So in order to sell the balloons, what he would do each and every day is he would go to the street corner and he would just simply, to captivate people's attention, he would go to the street corner and he would just release one of the balloons into the sky.

And this was so that everybody around him would begin to be captivated by what was going up just like many of you are in this room right now.

You're all looking up.

Come on.

And everybody was captivated by the balloon in the sky and they would simply make their way over and purchase some of the balloons and then he could make money and feed his family.

It was his way of captivating people's attention.

He would release a different color balloon every single day he went out on the street corner.

And there was a little boy who sit over on a bench and he noticed what the man was doing every day.

But the little boy became very, very upset.

And the reason he became upset is the man would release all colors of balloon but his favorite color.

He had a favorite color.

And the little boy's favorite color was blue.

And so one day he got the courage to get off the bench and go up to the old man who was releasing the balloons and he said, you know, sir, why don't you ever release the blue balloon?

Because blue is my favorite color.

And he began to dialogue with the old man and say, you release every other color of balloon but you never release the blue balloon.

And I'm very upset because the blue balloon never flies high.

And the man looked at the little boy and began to talk to the little boy.

And he said, son, it's not the color of the balloon that makes it fly high.

It's what's on the inside of the balloon that makes it fly high.

And the moral of that story is it's not the color of your skin on the outside that gives you a hope on the inside.

It's the one who comes to give you the hope on the inside.

It's not the shape of your body.

It's not the color of your skin.

It's not the size of who you are.

It's not where you come from.

It's because there's a God who loves you.

And if you will trust that love he showed on a cross and that power he demonstrated through the resurrection, the right stuff can get on the inside.

It's not the color.

It's not the shape.

It's not the size.

It's a pretty incredible statement that man made to the little boy.

And what we can all understand on this resurrection weekend, it's no matter who we are or what background we come from, God came to give us hope.

And we're gonna talk about that hope today because the reality of it is, as many of us, we don't have that hope living in us.

In other words, everything that happens to us and around us defines who we are.

And whenever good things happen around us, we can tend to get a little bit more happy.

And whenever something horrific comes into our life on the outside, we can become very depressed, oppressed, feel deflated, feel flatlined, feel like we're derailed and feel like we'll never have hope again.

But I wanna encourage you in something today.

Life has challenges.

And I wanna encourage you.

There's a hope that can live inside of you that will help you navigate those life's challenges.

And it don't mean that those challenges aren't gonna come, but that hope in a resurrected Jesus can begin to change everything.

And you don't have to stay where you are, flatlined, deflated, derailed.

You can begin to get this hope breathe into your heart and your spirit this Easter weekend and it can change everything.

I remember when I breathed new life in October of 1998.

As a young kid, I'd been taken to church often.

I'd heard the story about the cross of Christ.

I even knew about some of the journeys through the Bible.

And back in that day, I'm kind of an old guy, they taught on like flannel graft.

You don't even know what flannel graft is because we have graphics and cool stuff today.

But they would teach Bible stories by these little things that you would just stick up on a board somewhere and you'd say, you know what, that's Jesus or that's whoever and this is Mary.

And they had these things they would stick up on an old flannel board and I was like, that's so boring.

I don't know if I ever want that.

And again, we can be boring sometimes with the story too, but the reality of it is, is the story of a resurrected Jesus is not boring.

Come on.

It offers new life.

But if you'll come to understand that, you know what, life isn't meant for you to achieve alone, but it's meant for you to have a living hope inside of you and you to navigate life, then you can begin to do amazing things with your life.

But until we receive, by faith, what God offers every single one of us, the reality of it is, is our hope gets deflated because our hope is too low.

I want you to get your hopes up today.

I want you to begin to have hope in who Christ Jesus really is and what that means for your life, no matter what relational challenge you're going through.

No matter what sickness has attacked you on the outside, attacked your body.

No matter, you know what, what has come against you, what accident in this world has happened to you, I want you to know Jesus offers hope.

No matter what you've done in your life, and you know what, maybe you've been running from God all your life because you did something when you were 15, 16 years old and you feel like God doesn't want you back.

I need you to know that's what Resurrection Weekend is all about.

It's not about proving who we are to God and it's not about being disapproved by our great God.

It's about knowing who we are as human beings and knowing who God is and what he can do to restore our lives.

My friend, the power of the resurrection is huge.

It's not just an age old story that we talk about over and over again.

It's something that can really come into your heart and your life and begin to elevate your life and help your life rise up like the balloon rose up if you will receive it into your heart.

But you know what, we have to act by faith.

We have to begin to respond to what God is doing.

Amazing things happen when we do a journey and we're all on this journey called life.

But what happens is things come in day after day, week after week.

And if we're not careful and our hope is not anchored in the right stuff, the wrong stuff gets into our heart and begins to weigh us down.

The reality of life is this, that God created us to be in communion and relationship with him.

And God put us in this earth to represent him on this planet.

He never intended for the enemy, your flesh or anything around you to overtake your life.

But the reality is that sin entered this world and the things around us can take over our life if we're not careful and to begin to deflate our life.

See, the Bible says in Romans chapter three, verse 23, that we have all sinned and fallen short of God's glorious standard.

Now, that's not hard for me to recognize about myself.

I recognize that I don't live up to what God designed me to be.

And if I begin to recognize that, the natural response is, you know what?

Well, I'm gonna try harder.

I'm gonna strive more.

I'm gonna do more.

And the more I try to do and strive and I heave at trying to prove myself to be in God's goodness, the more I feel deflated.

We have a word for that.

We call it religious activity in the church.

And can I tell you something?

If you're weighed down today and you feel deflated because of religion, God has something he wants to speak into your heart today.

On the other side of that, whenever bad things happen in our life or we do something wrong, on the other side, what we try to do is we try to run from God.

That's what sin does to us.

Tries to make us hide from God like he can't see us.

And we feel like, you know, well, God, you don't want me anymore.

So I'm just gonna quit.

I'm gonna pull over to the side.

I'm gonna throw in the towel.

You got some people who are trying to prove themselves to God and some people who have given up on God because of what has happened in their life.

I wanna paint a picture for you today.

And I want you to know what God's glorious standard is for humanity.

It's found in Genesis chapter one.

The Bible says God created human beings in his likeness, in his image.

And he placed the man and the woman in the garden to be in communion with him, right relationship with him.

And they had a job.

And their job was to represent God and govern the earth and not let the earth overtake them.

But the Bible says in that garden, they were deceived.

And because of their deception, they believed that God was holding out on them.

And they stepped away from God and did what God didn't ask them to do.

See, and the Bible says at that moment, sin entered the world.

What is sin?

Sin is a picture word.

And it literally means this, missing the target, missing the bullseye.

Missing the bullseye of what?

God's glorious standard.

And the Bible says we've all missed the bullseye of God's glorious standard.

We've all sinned against God because sin entered the world and we inherited a sin nature.

In other words, we're bent towards sinning.

And it don't take a rocket scientist in here to realize that we have all stepped out of God's amazing will and plan for our life.

Because when we look around, the world has overtaken people instead of people governing the world, come on.

Sin entered the world.

But Jesus came and he said when he took his last breath on that cross, he says, it is finished.

What did those words mean?

They mean it is paid in full.

No longer, no longer do people have to be penalized because of their sin or their sin nature.

I shed my perfect blood on a cross to pay for that, to receive that love in your heart today.

It's been paid in full.

But the good news is that Jesus just came to pay a price for sin to forgive you on a cross.

The good news, that's what the word gospel means.

It means good news is that Jesus also conquered the grave and by God's power, he resurrected from a grave so death didn't hold him back.

And he began to display that God has power in your life too.

The Bible says that you and I right now are not only forgiven for our penalty of sin, but it says that we can overcome the power of sin in our life by operating in communion with God.

And what the Bible also teaches us that this old earth suit that we're living in, this flesh, this body, will decay.

But we have the opportunity to live forever with an endless hope in Christ Jesus if we'll trust him by faith in who he is.

The death, burial, and resurrection of Jesus has come.

He come to pay the penalty of sin.

He resurrected from a grave so we could have power over sin instead of the world overcoming us.

So when we sing that song, I can overcome anything because you know what?

The battle's already been won on the cross.

What we're really saying is when life comes at us, because it's coming at you, and it's gonna come at me, but I know because of the hope that lives inside of me that Christ Jesus gives me in a resurrected savior, I can get over the sin, I can get through life, I can be a overcomer because I know that God is for me and he's not against me.

You wanna fly high?

You wanna stop letting that guilt weigh you down?

You wanna stop letting that shame weigh you down?

Then respond to the good news of Jesus.

The Bible says what we need to do is repent of our sin.

So another word that simply means this, turn away from it and put our faith in who God is and begin to walk with him and walk towards him and listen to the power of his spirit speaking to our life day in and day out.

It can change everything, my friend.

And Easter is an announcement that it's not just for me, but it's also for you.

In other words, Easter's for all of us.

Easter's for you.

Make that personal today.

The death, burial and resurrection of Jesus is for you.

So you don't have to carry that heaviness.

Be deflated, be defeated, be derailed.

And again, I go through moments.

We all go through moments.

We all have different challenges.

I'll guarantee you that every single one of you walked in here with a challenge today because that's what life brings.

But what we tend to do is we can tend to compare our experiences to all the other balloons.

Instead of letting God put the right stuff in us, we tend to look at all the other balloons and wonder why they're flying high when God says you need to make a personal decision and let me breathe life into you.

See, Jesus' closest friends, they felt the same way you and I felt.

And the Bible says the night before Jesus was nailed to the cross, that he was hanging out with his disciples, that would be his students, his friends.

He'd been teaching them for three years.

And they've been walking with Jesus, they've been seeing him do miracles, they've been seeing him do all of these things.

And that night he chose to celebrate what we know today as the Lord's Supper or Communion.

And he met with these disciples, and he prayed with these disciples, and he was betrayed by one of these disciples in that room named Judas.

But then Jesus decides to sing a hymn, sing a song, and go for a walk with the rest of them.

And you see, these people had the same problem that you and I have.

They had the sin problem.

And one of those that Jesus was walking with, his sin had overtaken him and made him a very prideful person.

His name was Peter.

And Peter followed Jesus, walked with Jesus, but Peter wanted to be the greatest of all of them.

And he didn't recognize that it wasn't himself that makes himself great, but it was God who breathed life into him that would make him great.

And they had argued with each other about who was going to be the greatest in the kingdom that Jesus was going to come set up.

And Peter's like, man, I'm the man.

Or if you're a lady in the room, I'm the woman.

And pride had entered his heart, and all kinds of things had entered the hearts of those who knew who Jesus was in the flesh.

And Jesus takes them on a walk, but what he teaches on this walk is something remarkable.

And I want you to know today, what he teaches on this walk is what he wants to say to you if you're online or in this room today.

Let's take a look at it.

It's found in your Bible in Mark chapter 14, verses 26 through 21.

The Bible says that this group with Jesus, they sang a hymn and they went out to the Mount of Olives.

And on the way, Jesus told them, all of you will desert me.

Imagine that.

Everybody's going to walk away from me.

He says, for the scripture say, God will strike the shepherd and the sheep will scatter.

In other words, Jesus is saying, I'm the shepherd and you're the sheep.

And when what everybody's getting to happen, you're going to, you're going to, you're going to leave me.

And of course, you know, Peter and his prideful self, he begins to respond to that.

And Jesus says, but understand this, but after I'm raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and I'm going to meet you there.

So Jesus declares here, I'm getting ready to die and y'all aren't ready for this.

And you don't really understand who I am.

But after I'm raised from the dead, keep in mind, I'm going to Galilee and I want to meet you there.

And Peter said to him, even if everyone else deserts you, I never will.

I'm going to stay right with you, Jesus.

Jesus replied, I tell you the truth, Peter, this very night before the rooster crows twice, you will deny me three times that you even knew me.

No, Peter declared empathetically.

Even if I have to die with you, I will never deny you.

That's what Peter said, but it is different than what Peter did.

Because if you continue to read the story, the Bible begins to show us that that very night Peter denied Jesus as they came to capture Jesus to prepare him to go to the cross.

In other words, Peter walked away and his sin, his prideful sin caused him to deny Jesus.

He became afraid.

He became fearful.

He became stricken by what was happening in the moment.

And the Bible says he didn't do what he said he was going to do and he denied Jesus.

The reality of it is, is we've all denied Jesus with our sin.

We haven't trusted God to be who he says he can be.

And if we don't trust God to be who he says he will be, then what happens is these things that get into our life will begin to weigh us down.

But if we do, God can change everything.

And I do believe what Jesus said to those disciples.

And Peter is what he's saying to somebody in this room or online today.

When I rise from the dead, I want to meet with you.

See and that's the reality of the resurrection in spite of who we are and what we've done and how we've denied God with our sin, our shame, our guilt, and all of these things, God resurrected from a grave because he still wants to meet with you.

And I'm not an angel, can't you tell?

But the reality of it is the angel delivered a message to those disciples.

And Peter, when Jesus came back from the grave, that began to change everything.

And I do believe if you listen to this message after Jesus resurrected from a grave and it gets in your heart, this very day it can change everything for you too.

But you have to respond by faith.

See remember, Peter had denied Jesus.

So where is Peter during all of this crucifixion and all of this stuff that is happening?

Well he ain't celebrating.

He's hid out somewhere with his face on the ground because he is scared.

He is afraid.

He is hurting because he did what he said he wouldn't do.

He's feeling pain.

He's feeling agony.

He's feeling the weight of sin in his heart.

And he's probably crying his eyes out somewhere and saying, I said I wouldn't deny Jesus, but I did.

And Jesus told me I was going to do this.

And Peter is weeping somewhere because he wasn't the man that he said he could be.

Agony, hurts, pain, began to flood Peter's life.

And my friend, I don't know what has you possibly weighed down from the hope in Christ Jesus today, but my prayer is as I read through these next few verses of scripture in Mark chapter 16, God will by his mighty power breathe life into your spirit.

Let me read it to you.

The Bible says this in Mark 16, Sunday evening, when the Sabbath ended, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome, they went out and they purchased burial spices so they could anoint Jesus' body.

This was the custom during that day when someone had died.

And then very early on Sunday morning, just at sunrise, they went to the tomb and on the way they were asking each other, who will roll away the stone for us to the entrance of the tomb.

But as they arrived, they looked up and they saw the stone, which was very large and it had already been rolled aside.

And then when they entered the tomb, they saw a young man clothed in a white robe sitting on the right side.

And the women, they were shocked, but the angel said, don't be alarmed.

You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth.

He was crucified and he isn't here.

He has risen from the dead.

The angel says, look, this is where they laid his body.

Pay close attention.

Now ladies, go and tell the disciples, those who deserted me, including Peter.

That's a remarkable two words in the Bible.

Go tell the disciples, including Peter, the one that said he would never deny me.

You go tell the disciples, including Peter, that Jesus is going ahead of you to Galilee.

You will see him there just as he told you before he died.

My friend, that my friend, that's a remarkable thing because the reality of it is, is Jesus knowing that they would deny him and sin against him, he went to a cross anyway.

And before he went to that cross, he said, I want to meet with you after I go to that cross in spite of who you are and what you're going to do.

You may have been denying God in this place all of your life, but you need to understand he resurrected from a grave because he wants to meet with you in 2024 on Easter weekend.

In other words, you go tell them, I still want them, I still want them to come to me.

I still want them to meet with me.

I came back from a grave because somebody needs to meet with me.

I'm not an angel, but I am a messenger of the Word of God to your very soul right now.

And what I'm trying to tell you is if you're feeling deflated, hopeless, lifeless, you're feeling derailed, I'm not saying that life in all the circumstances around you on the outside is going to change, but I do believe this very day, you can have a hope inside of you that will outlast anything that you're going through.

So as the ladies went to tell Peter that Jesus wanted to still meet with them in Galilee, Peter had a decision to make.

All the other disciples had a decision to make.

Am I going to get up from my sin and am I going to respond by faith to meet Jesus where he said he wanted to meet with me?

And today you and I are going to have the same opportunity.

I don't know what you walked in here with, but I know what the scripture says.

It is by faith through God's unmerited favor, amazing grace, that we are saved.

It's not by works that we have done so we can boast about it, but it's God's glorious hope that he shows through Christ Jesus that we can respond to by faith.

And the question is, is do you want to respond to that message by faith so you can walk out of here forever changed in the circumstances?

I'm not going to stand here on this platform this Easter weekend and tell you that life is going to be easy from this point forward, but what I am going to stand here and tell you is if you truly receive this message by faith that no matter what goes on on the outside, you can have an anchored hope in a resurrected Jesus on the inside and you can keep on keeping on.

But you've got to receive it by faith.

So how do we do that?

Well, the Bible tells us how we do that in Galatians chapter two, verse 20, and I want to read it to you and then give you the opportunity to respond this Easter weekend.

This is what it says.

Galatians 2 20 says, here's how we respond.

My old self has been crucified with Christ.

The writer says it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me.

So I live, he says now in this earth suit, in this earthly body, by trusting in the son of God who loved me and gave himself for me.

In other words, I lay down my old self.

Every single one of you in this room, out in the overflow, wherever you are, you should have received a balloon like this inside or when you walked inside today.

And if you need to respond to the resurrected Jesus and what he did for you on a cross and the power of the resurrection, I want you to go ahead and hold that balloon in your hand.

And today could be your day of salvation because you're trusting who Jesus really is.

Today could be the day that God breathes hope into your spirit.

Today could be the day that the very spirit of the living God comes to live inside of you because you truly trust who Jesus is.

And if you need to do that today by faith, in just a moment, we're going to sing a song about the work and the battle that's already been done.

And I'm going to ask you to just simply slip out from where you're standing.

We're going to give you time to do this and just come to the front up here.

There's going to be people standing all around and drop your balloon that represents.

I just surrendered my old life to Jesus.

And then after you drop your balloon, what's going to happen is people are going to give you a little bracelet that looks like this.

It says, I said yes to God.

And they're going to just simply hand that to you and allow you to go back to your seat.

What is all this is?

It's not just getting a bracelet.

It's saying today is the day of my salvation.

Today is the day.

Easter 2024.

I came to an arena and I heard a word where God pierced my heart and he gave me hope in my forgiveness of sin because of what Jesus did on a cross.

And he breathed life into me because for the first time, I trusted the resurrection of Jesus and I have the very living hope inside of me.

So when we begin to sing this song, I'm going to ask you to respond.

The Bible says this in Romans chapter 10, verse 9, it says, if we openly declare that Jesus is Lord and we believe in our heart that God raised him from the dead, we will be saved.

So again, I don't know what business you need to do with God today, but I do know that God wants to do some business and meet with some people in this place today.

So let's everybody all over this room, go ahead and stand to our feet.

And if you need to do business with God today and come forward and surrender the old life, repent of your sin and move forward with the new life, we're going to say this prayer and maybe in the quietness of your seat, you want to respond to God, say this prayer to him and then respond to him by coming forward and doing what I just said you could do.

Every head bow all over this place online in the overflow.

And today, maybe God spoke to your heart.

Maybe you've been battling sin all your life, but I want you to know today that God wants to meet with you.

That is you just right where you stand, say God today, I surrender.

I repent of my sin and I trust in the cross of Christ and his blood to forgive me.

And I believe he was resurrected from a grave so I could have hope living inside of me.

So God, today you want to move forward in spite of what life brings at you with that living hope in him.

And a proper response is just to God, thank you for the gift of salvation and the gift of freedom that he came to give any of us who would dare receive it by faith.

Just right where you stand right now, tell God, thank you.

And again, if you need to lay down the old life and pick up the new life, you're going to respond when I say amen.

So today it's in Jesus' name I pray, amen.