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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Cory Reeves Weekend

Cory Reeves

The Gift

I know you're small, but you're mighty, right?

I have 2, I say young, but they're not as young as they used to be.

My older son is 17 and my younger son is 15, and my wife, and I pastor at Mills River, Seventh-day Adventist Church, if you know Hendersonville, Fletcher area, it's in that area.

And we have a small school at our church as well.

And my wife teaches part-time there And I think I have the wrong remote.

I think this is your remote and this is my remote And that would have been a problem here in a minute when I wasn't yelling at it.

We're gonna talk about the beautiful gift that we were given at the cross tonight.

And it's a blessing to me personally, and I hope it's a blessing to you.

I'm going to read a couple of quotes as we go throughout.

And the first 1 is from Desire of Ages, page 761.

In the opening of the great controversy, Satan had declared that the law of God could not be obeyed, that justice was inconsistent with mercy, and that should the law be broken, it would be impossible for the sinner to be pardoned.

Every sin must meet its punishment, urged Satan, and if God should remit the punishment of sin, he would not be the God of truth and justice.

When men broke the law of God and defied his will, Satan exalted.

It was provided, he declared, that the, I'm sorry, it was proved, he declared, that the law could not be obeyed.

Man could not be forgiven because he, after his rebellion had been banished from heaven, Satan claimed that the human race must be forever shut out from God's favor.

God could not be just, he urged, and yet show mercy to the sinner.

You know, Satan doesn't believe God's word.

And tonight and through this weekend, the question is, do you believe God's word?

He can and will save you while upholding justice.

You see, friends, Satan is who wants you to believe the lie that you have to be punished.

And in that plan, in this plan to do what Satan said was impossible, Jesus gave himself completely for you.

The great controversy says God in giving Jesus poured out all of heaven in 1 gift.

This is 1 of my favorite quotes and kind of the theme for tonight.

It would be well for us to spend a thoughtful hour each day contemplating the life of Christ.

We should take it point by point and let the imagination grasp each scene, especially the closing ones.

As we thus dwell upon His great sacrifice for us, our confidence in Him will be more constant.

Our love will be quickened, and we shall be more deeply imbued with His Spirit.

If we would be saved at last, we must learn the lesson of penance and humiliation at the foot of the cross.

You know, I think we're often afraid of meditation, and yes, we should be of emptying our minds, but we should Run to be able to meditate and let our minds grasp each scene of the last moments of Christ's life.

All that he has done for us, all that he is doing for us.

We need to see the cost of our sin, seeing God's love and forgiving our sin, and begin to see his character more.

Tonight, I'm going to tell this story of Jesus, the last hours.

There are some quotes like this I'm going to read, but I'm going to try to tell it in story format.

I would encourage you to try to grasp each scene.

That great sacrifice, that great love of Christ.

I believe this is a story that we will get to reflect on and be marveled by for all of eternity.

Jesus, the Son of God, took on humanity not to rule here on earth, but to pave for each of us, all of us, a path to put us back into atonement with him and his father.

How did we treat the son of man who should have been our king?

After the Passover supper, Jesus had neither food nor drink.

You see, he was mentally worn out from the conflict with Satan in the garden.

He had been betrayed, not just by Judas, but sadly, none of his friends, none of his disciples stood by him.

Alone, Jesus was passed from leader to leader, a farce of a trial at night where he had been sentenced to death.

Jesus had been insulted, mocked twice, tortured by whip, laying his skin open.

And yet, he never spoke in a way that didn't glorify God.

Jesus was entering the worst, most brutal death man can devise.

Tired, hungry, mentally exhausted, emotionally beaten, physically beaten, and covered with not his sins, but friends, he was covered with your sins.

A sin that separates him from his father.

And now in jest, they clothed him in royal clothing of purple, jammed a crown of thorns upon his head?

Jesus, the King of the universe, God became man, deserving of all earthly crowns, is here on earth to save us.

In return, Jesus is standing here with open wounds as they shove a painful crown of thorns upon his head.

With this, they mockingly salute him, hail the king of the Jews.

They hit him in the head, spitting on him and mockingly bowing before him.

Next, he is stripped of his mock royal clothing and instructed to carry his own instrument of torture.

This understandably became more than his human nature could bear.

Jesus, our Savior, fell under this burden.

Even though a crowd gathered to watch, no 1 seemed to care.

Sadly, no Jew was willing because they wanted to keep the Passover.

And ironically, the Passover they were so worried about keeping was to reflect the very 1 they were watching bear this burden, the true Lamb of God.

The ceremony you see became more important than the true.

A man named Simon happened to be passing by.

His sons were believers in Jesus, but he was not at this time.

He became, the spirit of prophecy tells us, forever grateful for this opportunity.

Carrying this cross became a gift that he was ever cheerful that he got to stand beneath.

As Jesus marched forward, the character of Christ could not help to come through.

You see, when we carry Christ's nature on ourselves, when we carry his character upon ourselves, it bubbles out.

We're gonna talk more about that bubbling forth this weekend.

But though Jesus was suffering under physical and emotional strain, he spotted the women in the crowd mourning for him.

You see, even while bearing their sins, friends, even while bearing your sins, his heart burned for others.

He knew they were not sad because he was the 1 from God, but they were pitying his pain.

And Jesus, we're told, saw forward to the destruction of Jerusalem at that very moment.

Jesus finally arrives at Golgotha, the place where his execution was to be performed.

Jesus' mother and at least a few of the disciples are there.

The Value

He took your sins, even though he felt separation and felt alone.

He wondered if the sin he took on was so great that God would never accept him back.

But we were, I was blessed in discovering that regardless of what Christ saw, regardless of what Christ felt, he put his faith in his God.

He put his faith in his Father that regardless of how he felt, regardless of what he saw, he knew God would work.

We are to trust in our Father's goodness.

And With this great gift, what is the great value it places on each of us?

You know, there's a story of a little boy, and this little boy, he carved, he worked, month after month, and he created this cool little sailboat.

He got it just perfect, and he ran to the lake the first day it was finished.

He sets the little sailboat down and he watches it.

He kind of follows along closely and then a gust comes along.

It takes the boat, he wades out as far as he could, but it was too late.

And he said, no mom, the sailboat worked too good.

And Johnny, after all that work, he was devastated.

And later that next week, he's walking through town and there's a secondhand store.

And guess what was in the window of the secondhand store?

He was so excited he could hardly stand himself.

He runs in, He grabs the sailboat and begins to run out the door.

The store owner says, stop, what are you doing?

He turns it over and said, here's my initials.

But I purchased it from another little boy who found it last week.

Johnny, devastated, runs home, grabs his piggy bank, runs back to the store, bashes it on the ground, and says, this is everything I have.

You can see him hugging the sailboat, saying you are mine twice.

Once I was your creator, now I have purchased you with everything I have.

Friends, we are that purchase possession.

We have infinite value because of our infinite costs.

And that's what we're gonna discuss today.

The book, A Call to Stand Apart, page 50, puts it beautifully.

Your life is too precious a thing to be treated as of little worth.

Calvary testifies to you of the value of your soul.

Has there ever been a point in your life when you felt down?

Someone has said something to you or you don't feel like you have the connections you need.

Your value is at an infinite cost that he paid.

Consult the word of God in order that you may know how you should use the life that has been purchased for you at infinite cost.

Now I hope you were able to join us last night and by the size of this audience, I know most of you did not.

But I am blessed by reflecting 1 thoughtful hour on Jesus's life.

I would encourage you, if you don't go listen to last night's sermon, Mike, I won't have hurt feelings, but I would encourage you to read through Jesus' life.

Just reflect on that beautiful gift you have received, this infinite cost.

So with that value being so high, why in Ecclesiastes 7 verse 6 would the wisest man in all of history tell us, better to go in the house of mourning than to go to the house of feasting, for that is the end of all men, and the living will take it to heart.

Why would he rather be at a funeral than be at potluck, feasting?

I believe he had read what his father wrote in Psalms 39 5.

Lord, make me to know my end, and what is the measure of my days that I may know how frail I am.

We see the value in the gift of Jesus, but why is it important to know how frail we are?

Why is it important to look at this in our lives.

Psalms 103 verse 15 and 16, David continues this theme, for as for man, his days are like grass, as a flower of the field, so he flourishes for the wind passes over it and it is gone and its place remembers it no more." Even in the New Testament, James continues this thought.

Whereas, you do not know what will happen tomorrow, for what is your life?

It is even a vapor that appears for a little time, and then it vanishes away.

You know, there's something in the Bible that is telling us that we need to understand the fragility of life.

It was in 2018, January, we had a late family Christmas.

And this is in 2018, so they're all a lot bigger.

That's my sister and her husband, who is a graduate here at Loma Linda.

He's a joint orthopedic surgeon in Chattanooga.

So when you have a CRNA and a surgeon, Christmas is hard to have at Christmastime.

This was our last day of that long weekend together.

My sister hired a photographer to come, and we got this picture.

My parents next door to us, we each had 10 acres and there was a well-worn trail between the 2.

It was 2 weekends later on Sunday, January 21, 2018, Dad and I decided to cut firewood.

I got up and made pancakes for my family.

And I come out of the house really late on a Sunday morning.

He's like, it's about time you get out of bed, you lazy bum.

He had just turned 66 in August and he was telling me how tired he felt that day.

So I said, well let's put up the tractor and we'll just call it a day.

And he had hauled more firewood than I had.

And as we're putting the tractor up, I decided to go work on the trails for a little while.

And he said, you know, I'll just tag along.

I won't work too hard, but I'll tag along and help.

Our Response

Dearly Father, Lord, we come before you tonight just so thankful for your love, your grace, and Father, your desire to pursue us, to want into our lives in a special way.

Father, give us the strength to let go of the things of this world.

We love you and praise you in Jesus' name, amen.

So, last night and this morning, we've discussed the great gift of Jesus.

I'm gonna get these remotes confused if I don't remove it.

So last night and this morning, we've discussed the great gift of Jesus.

I'm gonna get these remotes confused if I don't remove it, because they are the exact same.

So last night and this morning, we discussed the great gift of Jesus.

We reflected on his amazing love and we reflected on the value that that love, that great gift has put on your life.

We also have reflected a little bit on what value that is put on your neighbor's life, your friend's life, your co-worker's life.

And as we see this gift and its value, the question is, how do you respond?

And I'm not saying this is something we respond to verbally and just move on.

This is a cool picture, but there's more to this picture than meets the eye.

The warfare against God's law, which was begun in heaven, will be continued until the end of time.

Obedience or disobedience is the question to be decided by the whole world.

All will be called to choose between the law of God and the laws of men.

Every character will be fully developed and all will show whether they have chosen the side of loyalty or rebellion.

And I think I should have clicked because you could have read that with me.

Is there any way we can put it on this screen up here?

So sometimes I think there are too many people that think if I wait back and sit back, I can see how this plays out a little bit.

Or in my life, maybe I'm not ready to fully commit and I'm scared of what full commitment looks like and we can wait.

But I really believe it's this picture in life.

And friends, if I had a stage and I could stand on it, I'm looking all over for something to stand on, and I can't find it, so pretend I'm on a precipice right here.

A cliff is falling over, and this is Jesus standing here, and you are holding on below me.

Just reach up and I will protect you, I will do everything, and I will save you.

And some of us are like, you know, I think I can hold on for a little while.

We just talked this morning about how short the brevity of life.

Holding on to that cliff is the same as letting go and giving your life to Satan.

We have to commit, we have to grab on to the hand, reaching, begging for us to take it.

Christ Object Lessons 302 would suggest many of us are unaware of the time we are in.

Yet the world is asleep, the people know not the time of their visitation.

You see, there is 1 of the, let me rephrase, there is the most important decision you'll ever make.

And yet the world is asleep, not aware of their condition.

So far in this point in the war, the Confederate Army had been unstoppable.

Many felt they were within weeks of winning the Civil War.

And this was mainly due to General Robert E.

1 of the qualities that made him so effective was the mysteriousness in which he operated.

His troops would appear, attack, fight, and then melt away into the woods.

His secret, though, was very detailed, well-executed, well-drawn-out battle plans.

And imagine for a minute if the Union generals, what they could have done if they just had a copy of those plans.

Well, in September of 1862, General Lee had detailed his bold plan of Special Orders 191.

He had the copies distributed to his commanders and the plan involved a risky decision.

If the Union army found out, they could destroy these smaller divided forces 1 at a time.

After reading these top secret orders, 1 recipient sewed his copy into his jacket so it could not be lost.

General Longstreet decided to wad his up and chew it like tobacco.

It was when Union General George McClellan's 90, 000 man army was moving in to intercept Lee that he occupied a campsite where the Confederates had just vacated.

While setting up their tent, 2 Union soldiers discovered, wrapped around cigars, a copy of Special Order 191.

It was 1 of the colossal blunder of the war by a Confederate officer.

McClellan made 1 of the biggest mistakes of the war.

He waited over 18 hours before deciding to take advantage of this intelligence.

He finally did move 50 miles and put the 75, 000 Union troops attacking the 38, 000 Confederate troops on September 7, 1862 at the Battle of Antietam.

If you know any war history, that was the single bloodiest day of combat in American history.

All that saved Lee from complete destruction was McClellan's indecision.

McClellan seemed to freeze in the heat of the war.

This information still sapped a number of the soldiers, But what was probably the most impactful for the war is that England, wanting to support the cotton producing South, when this battle happened, they ended up pulling out, deciding not to help the South.

But also, because of this, McClellan failed to make a better use of the game plan.

President Lincoln ended up removing him shortly thereafter.

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Series

Cory Reeves Weekend

The Gift

Transcript

Parent Series

Sponsor

Recorded

Parts

The Gift

39m

The Value

34m

Our Response

55m

Sound Doctrine