and then what....

Oh, come on, somebody. Jesus, I need you today. Jesus, I've got to have you today. Jesus, I need you today. Oh, I know somebody came with some heaviness of heart, but I know a God that is the creator of all heaven and all earth. I know a God who is the most magnificent, the most almighty, the most holy, the most righteous, the most oh somebody. He is the deliverer. He is the healer. He is the way maker. I know a God. I know a God. I know a God. Thank you singers today. Thank you tech guys.

Thank you ushers and security and teachers. Thank you. As you're being seated today, would you tell Wait, as as as as you're being seated today, would you just hug somebody and tell them I know a God? You know how cool that is to know God? Do you know how cool that is? This is This is where the bishop would sing a special, wouldn't it? Her Well, thank you, church. Can I say on pastor appreciation day that the vision that Pastor Sloan has? I'm just I'm just a young guy, right?

I mean, I feel like I'm old. I'm getting older. Got this little crick in my neck where I slept wrong. You know, like signs are there. It's it's showing. Uh but to to allow a to allow a young guy not not preaching time, not not even preaching time, but the ability to work and to do. I value that. I appreciate that because not everyone would. And I know we all got our we've all got our way or point of of of reference or point of uh love or point of he's he's a pastor.

But I'm I'm telling you as as a young minister that it it matters. It it makes a huge difference. And I I cannot tell you. I wished I had all the words. I wished I was Shakespeare. And then he it'd get real weird. weird. He'd be like, "Why are you writing a a sonnet to me?" You know, sounds like a love poem. He'd be like, "Stop. That's weird." Yeah. But if I could if I had all the words in all the world, I could not express how thankful, how grateful, how much I appreciate. Thank you, pastor.

Thank you, pastor. Today, they're going around. They're handing out Justin. He's handing out keys. If you can, every one of you, this is your key to keep. Now, believe it or not, because this building is 8,000 years old, that key went to something in here at some point in time. Someone had a reason for making that key. Uh, I don't I don't know why. We we don't know what they're to.

In fact, I told someone earlier, I was like, I would rather tear down a door than try and figure out where all these keys go. Like, it just it'd be a lot easier. But if you if you got that key with you, if you'll hang on to that, we'll get to it.

But I I want I want you to know something that I I I have been I've been preaching this month and and when I was laying when I was praying and and trying to get the heart of God for the direction for the qualified church for and and tying that into the priesthood that God was very kind to me and and I feel like he gave me the titles to every sermon, every topic, but he didn't give me all of it at once. Thank God because I couldn't carry it. All right, let's just be honest.

Like I I So I laid out all my titles. I'm like, "All right, this is" and I could not figure out how today's was going to work. I could not because it's not a very good title. I'll just tell you, it's not there's not to it. There's not much to it. And I was like, I have no idea. And as as the time has went on, as as the lessons have progressed and gone on, uh I feel like God has is has been been working on me as much as anything.

and he has he's been very kind in allowing me to to come to understand some things and and I I I I've felt in the spirit some things this month that I don't know that I've that I fully understand. Is it okay? Uh once again I'm just a young guy so that'll give me some leeway.

So in Genesis 1, we find that in Genesis 1 26 that God said, "Let us make man in our image and after our likeness and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and every creeping thing that creeps on the earth." Some creepy creepy things out there. Got one got one left. I'm keep a tally mark of every like off chuckle I get. All right. Genesis 1:27 says, "So God created man in his own image.

In the image of God he created him, male and female he created them." Genesis 2:7, "And then the Lord formed man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostril the breath of life, and the man became a living creature." Can you say, "I am made in the image of God." God might be uglier than we thought. got two tally marks. All right. Genesis 9 and five, we look at the uh it's it's it's it's no it's Noah's covenant with God, the noic covenant. Uh that is signed with the rainbow.

We think of it as God said, "I will never flood the earth again." Right? And we look at the rainbow and we remember he said, "Let this be a sign of our covenant." Well, guess what? There's still a rainbow. That means that covenant is still in existence. But in that he says uh in ver in Genesis 9 chapter uh or verse 5 he says and for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning from every breast I will require it and from man from his fellow men I will require a reckoning for the life of man.

Whoever sheds the blood of man by his blood shall by man shall his blood be shed. For God made man in his own image. His qualifier for the value of man was not man. His qualifier for the value of man was himself. The image of God. Can I tell you today what you do and who you are does not matter. Your value is not found in you. It's not found in an accomplishment. It's not found in a in a job title. It's not found in a position. It's not found in a marriage.

It's not found in a in a title of a mother or a father. It's not found in anything this world can give you. Your value is found in God. That is the end of the story. So much so if someone was to kill you, God said, I will I someone else has to kill them because they have desecrated my image. My image. Can I can I uh how astounding that is to me. We carry the fingerprints of God, the very DNA and the nature of God in our being. We didn't earn it. We don't deserve it.

But that's just that is the homeostasis of our being. That is just as things are. We are made in the image of God. He said it to Jeremiah like this. Before you were born, I knew you. I formed you. I made you. Your value I already I already gave it to you. You are not earning this. You're you're not you're not the value that Jeremiah presented was was not as a prophet. It was because God had purposed him. Forgive the got a whole bunch of tally marks there.

Nothing you've done can erase the image of God in you. Can I tell you body dysphoria, whatever that is, these guys that go around and and and and put the uh the horns in their head and the and the body the body mutilations and those things, all they are trying to do is remove the DNA from God from them. But it's impossible. You have the breath of God in you. He breathed into you. No matter what your past is, no matter who your family is, his DNA is deeper than all of that.

Your value is determined by God. That's it. The children of Israel got well well before that Adam fell and God was like, "Man, I can't I can't walk with you." And so, he begins the redemption plan. and he begins to walk. And and and last week I I talked about this a little bit with the children of Israel. God wanted to dwell with them, but they said, "We can't be around him. We're not worthy of it. He is a holy God. We're not." So they built a temple.

He said, "I'll build this temple so I can be in at least in their midst." We find though that that I find I should say that that resides in every one of us. the cleanliness that we've we when we when we anyone ever every anyone ever used bleach? I love bleach. My wife will not let me touch it. I ruin every piece of clothes that I have when I get a hold of bleach. It's like it cleans everything. It's like I don't even have to scrub it. It's already dead, you know? It just kills it.

It's like we're good. Love bleach. Now I don't use it anymore because I kept ruining clothes. I would accidentally bleach my clothes when washing. I don't know. I don't know how I did it. It just happened. Okay. But I when I think of cleanliness, I think of purity of of of getting everything away. I Oh, and and so many of us will do that. Some of us might be a little bit of a germaphobe and we carry around gerx in our pockets, maybe.

I mean, CO really brought some of that out and God hadn't delivered us all yet. So, we we look at and and the Sorry, I was thinking I was just thinking of somebody. So, you know, cleanliness, we we we get we get focused on cleanliness and and we look at we think of cleanliness as white, right? We we that first snow falls on the on the hills of Tennessee once every 10 to 15 to 20 years. Beautiful, nice and clean. It's like everything's quiet. The animals are like we're like this is great.

This is beautiful as long as it goes away. The cleanliness. We look at this. Uh David put it like this. He talked about white as snow, wash me white as snow. Uh the songs talk about let your blood wash me white as snow. How what kind of oxymoron is that? You never get blood in even bleach won't take blood out, right? I mean it it just that's not my sermon today. I'm sorry I I deviated. But we we we we get we get thinking about cleanliness and rightfully so. God's a holy God.

We're we we look in the mirror and we look at ourselves at our own uncleanliness and we get a a complex. We forget who we are. We forget we are made in the image of God. We get the complex and and and we're like, I cannot approach God because I will mess God up or God can't do anything with this. We get a complex. Luke Luke 8 talks about a lady with an issue of blood who pressed her way through the crowd who was unclean.

And by the law, when she touched Jesus, he was to become unclean by the law. But here's the thing with God, the law, the laws of no effect. Because as soon as she touched Jesus, she was clean herself. I I don't know if you know that, but I I feel like so many of us forget who we were. who we are, how God made us, how he created us in his image and his likeness, and we get so scared to go and touch the hymn of his garment. We get so involved of ourselves and say, "I'm just not worth it.

I couldn't do it. I I can't touch God. He doesn't want to be around me." And we forget that if we touch him, it works in opposite. He will clean us. The convert, the inverse of redemption. You see, he made us in his image and in his likeness. But I'm just going to be honest. I'm going to talk about Peter today. And Peter is maybe the greatest representation of all of us hard-headed, stubborn, mean, brash people in the world. No one in this church, just in the world.

Peter had such a such an interesting way about him. He always spoke before he thought. At least we hope. We hope he didn't think about what he said, right? Matthew 16 and verse 13. Now when Jesus came into the district of Cesaria Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say this that the son of man is?

Who who do people say that I am?" And they said, "Some say you're John the Baptist, others say Elijah, and others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." But he said to him, "Who do you say that I am?" Most of us are probably familiar with this. And Simon Peter replied, "You are the Christ, the son of the living God." And Jesus answered to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjonah." I don't know who Barjonah is. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my father who is in heaven.

And I tell you, you are Peter. And upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. He says something. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Everybody got your key? Whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. What a powerful word. Peter, you've got the key. The revelation of who Jesus is is the key. That's it. It wasn't Peter is the rock. It was the revelation is the rock.

Upon this revelation, I will build my church. I want you to know, Peter, that if you know who I am, you've got the keys in heaven and in earth. If you can just call on my name, you've got the key. In any situation and you find yourself in life, if you'll just say Jesus, you've got the key. If you'll just say Jesus, you've got the key. But that's not the end of the story. I got I need some helpers. I got some helpers today. Oh, y'all are slacking. Y'all better run. Y'all run now.

We're going the long way now. We're all waiting on you. No, I'm just kidding. We ain't going to wait on them. We going to keep going. Also, I got I got Seth up here today. Israel, don't worry about the chair. I got a chair. Y'all run though. They didn't run, did they, Seth? I get to pick on Seth again today. Come on. He's the only man I know that wears flip flops. So, I don't know what that tells you about him. I want y'all to Don't be scared. This is not corporate. This is not corporate.

This is singular. All right. Don't be scared. Don't everybody draw up. Okay. Don't everybody draw. I did. I gave him a couple days heads up on this. I wanted I wanted his feet to be clean. Okay. Thank you guys.

In John chapter 13 verses 1-9 says, "Now the now before the feast of the Passover, when Jesus knew that that his hour had come to depart out of this world to the father, having loved his own who were in the world, he loved them to the end." Verse two says, "During the supper, when the devil had already put it in the heart of Judas, the scariot, Simon's son, to betray him, Jesus, knowing that the Father had given all things into his hands, that he had come from God and was going back to God, rose, verse four, rose from supper and laid aside his outer garments, taking a towel, tied it around his waist.

He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples feet and wipe them with a towel that was wrapped around him. He came to Simon Peter and said to him, "Lord, do you wash my feet?" Jesus said, "What am I doing you do not understand now?

What I am doing, you do not understand now, but afterwards you will understand." Peter said, "You shall never wash my feet." Jesus answered and said, "I if I do not wash you, you have no share with me." Then Simon Peter said, "Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and head. We going to need a bigger bowl. Move to the bedroom." Yeah, we need to baptize him. Verse 12.

When he had washed their feet and put on his outer garments and resumed his place, he said to them, "Do you understand what I have done to you?" Not corporately, okay? But I want you to understand something. Jesus very gently, very kindly, they did not get warm water, said, "You know what, Peter? I need to wash your feet. He said, "I know what you're going to do, Peter. You're going to deny me, Peter. You're going to fail me, Peter.

And I need you to know that when you have failed me, when you have denied me, that God Almighty has washed your feet. I need you to know, Peter, that not only did I make you and did I form you, but I have washed your feet. You're going to fail me, Peter. But and then what? You're going to you're going to mess up, Peter. And then what? You're going to deny me three times, Peter. You're you're going to do all the wrong things at all the wrong times. And then what?

Because Peter, you've got the key. I have a very simple message to you today. We we do we've done we we we're comfortable with the with the taking of communion. We're we're maybe not always as comfortable with the washing of the feet, but but Jesus did it, I believe, for his disciples because he knew the shame, the pain, the failure, the abject poverty, the all the issues they were going to face.

And he needed them to know to get it through their to know in their heart of hearts that the God of all eternity had taken time to wash their feet. They were worthy of it. Can I talk to Peter today for just a moment? You have failed God. You have messed up. But it's okay. You're worthy of redemption. You're worthy of forgiveness. I have one message for you today. I have one message. You are not too far from God. You have God values you. You are made in his image and in his likeness.

You are made after God. You have the breath of God. You have the DNA of God. He values you. He has bankrupted heaven for you. He has emptied all of heaven for you. The blood, the most precious blood has ran dry for you. You are worthy of it. That's it. That's all I've got for you today, church. If you would stand with me, I need someone to know in their heart of hearts and their soul deep down within God has orchestrated this service for you. I have no other way to say it than that.

God has orchestrated this today for you. You matter. Your soul matters. You are not too far gone from God. You have not failed enough. You are not messed up enough. God is here for you today. He is calling to redeem you today. You may feel like you can never touch the throne of God. You may feel like you can never touch the grace of God. But God has come for you today. He has given you a chance of repentance and the most precious gift of redemption. He did it for you. That's it.

I don't know where you are. I don't know what you're questioning. I don't know what you feel like you're unworthy of today. But can I tell you, God deems you worthy. I don't I can't blow enough smoke. I can't give you enough words of encouragement, but God deems you worthy. God deems you worthy. God deems you I wish someone would have grabbed a hold of that for just a moment. God deems you worthy. You hold the key in your hands to a future that this world has no idea to.

But I I want to ask you this. If Peter had allowed the failure of the denial to get in the way of the day of Pentecost, where would we be? Got your key? You got your key. Do not allow. Do not allow your pro, your issue, yourself to get in the way of what that key will unlock. I don't know. Each of those keys go to something different. I don't know what it goes to. And I'll say that about you. You hold the keys.

God, I I kept telling Lauren about this and and I want you to know this is not one of those sermons that's easy to ride out. It's not. I kept I was like, I think I think I think I can FL God's put this so strongly on me. There's a lot of words that I could probably use, a lot of ways that I could probably go about this, a lot of different, but the only thing I can get out today is God is waiting on you. You're not too far. You're not worthless. You you've not failed him too much.

Oh, but I know better. I I I know. Yeah, you do. And that's okay. Peter knew better. And that's okay. Would you lift your hands with me real quick? Jesus, God. From the very start to the very end of this of today, I know that you've orchestrated this. Good. I know the spirit of redemption is is so heavy in this place and and has been so heavy. I know the spirit of of redemption has been saturating us.

But God, I ask today that you would help us to fight past our own the own voice in our heads, the own self-doubt, the own the our own critique. and we would find a place of mercy and grace. That we would find a place of repentance. We would find a place of redemption. We're not too far gone. We're not too far messed up. But a place of repentance. A place of redemption. Can I ask you find a place to pray? I'm afraid if I keep going, I'm going to mess it up.

And when I ask that we would just find a place to pray, God, quieten the voices that we that that are that are the the the voices of the devil in our ears, God. The accuser of the brethren that is speaking to us. That's you're not You're you're just going to go again. You're just going to fail again. I'm telling you, you're worth it. You're worth it. You've you you knew better. I'm telling you, you're worth it. You you you you know you can't beat that. I'm telling you, you're worth it.

I'm telling you today, you're worth it. God has orchestrated today for you, for us to know that we're worth it.