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Well, good morning. Let me start by saying, uh, welcome to everybody who's joining us across Iowa. Here's where I need to start this morning. Okay. I'm sorry. I take personal full responsibility for how horrible it is outside.

Okay. It is a hundred percent my fault. I got a little confused talking with God. I'm like, let's make sure this cold day is Monday instead of Sunday. I think he heard it's probably his fault. He probably heard me say, it's gonna be better tomorrow, is what I'm trying to say.

Welcome to Prairie Lakes today on this cold day, we're really, really glad that you're here. About half of our campuses are on spring break and, and then half of us don't do Spring Break. Um, but wherever you're joining us from this morning, whether it's at a Prairie Lakes Church campus or in the warmth of your home or somewhere across the country, we're really, really glad that you are here.

Hey, it's week two of, um, a series that's just, we're just calling Lent because that's where we're at in this time of year, and we talked a lot about what Lent is and how we do it last week. So I, I would, I just, I would ask you to go back there.

Is there some, there's some, I don't know, just some interesting kind of perspectives about where we fit in this whole story, but, uh, I want to be clear on what Lent is. Okay. There's, here's the phrase I think kind of describes it for us.

And this is what we're doing every single week. And for these six weeks, lent invites us, lent invites us to, uh, shift our focus. Okay? It's, it's a chance for us to focus on something different for six weeks. And, and, and here's the shift we want to shift from, uh, being the savior, which I think we all feel that, you know, there's, there's so many problems in our lives, in our world that we just, we worry about and we wish were different and we, we engage in, but Lynn invites us to shift our focus from being the savior to just needing one, to just needing one.

And then it invites us also to lay down our lives like our savior laid down his. And, uh, so, so what we're doing, um, starting last week and really this week, and the next four after this, is just looking at different stories from the Passion Week, which is the last week of Jesus's life before he goes to the cross every single week.

Another snapshot from, 'cause it's, it's kind of a packed week in his life. And, uh, and it just, it's gonna help us maybe shift our focus a little bit to who he is and what he's doing and why that matters for us today. Okay? So passion week, during this week of Jesus' life, this last week before he goes to the cross, there's a lot of pressure that's starting to build up.

And, and, and, and, and it had been building up around him for about three years as he started his public ministry. But this last week, this pressure just skyrockets. It just skyrockets. He's, he's got pressure from, um, his Israeli countrymen. Okay? That's, that's part of it.

And, and, and this pressure is, is the pressure to pursue. They want him to pursue political power. He has just raised a guy from the dead. He's demonstrated that he's got divine power, he's got divine authority. They look at that and they go, you know what?

You should be king. And let's go to war. Let's go to war. Let's fight the culture war. Let's fight a real war. Let's take back our nation and our world for God. He's got that pressure mounting. Um, he's got some pressure mounting from his political and religious enemies.

There are people that don't want him anywhere near a kingship. You know, they, they feel like he's a threat. They feel like he's a threat to God. They feel like he's a threat to the truth of scripture. They feel like he's a threat to their tradition, and they feel ultimately like he's a threat to their authority and their influence.

And they're starting in this last week to really conspire to get rid of him, to kill him. Okay? But the real pressure Jesus is feeling in this last week of his life, the real pressure isn't the pressure of this be king or this pressure of don't be king. It's the pressure of his future of what he knows is coming his way.

And that starts to weigh on him because it's a cross and it's a crucifixion. And he knows, he knows. And that's, that's actually one of the things that I love the most about as we read some of these stories in the new test about Jesus.

It doesn't paint him as this like caricature of a human being. It's, it freely, openly talks about the, the, what it was like for him to feel the weight of the world on his shoulders. He's a real person. He, he, he knows what's coming his way.

It's looming large in his mind, and it's weighing on his heart. His death is, is, is nearer and near. It's becoming real to him. And, and, and we can see it. And that, and that's, I don't know, that's almost kind of an interesting thing to think about as well.

I mean, if, if what the gospels say is true, okay? And, and I believe that they are. Um, here's, here's the thing. Jesus knew, uh, How, And he knew when he was gonna die. He knew how and when, Right?

Um, and, and, and he's starting to just kinda work his way through that mentally, emotionally, spiritually, relationally. I, I, I don't know. I don't know how I would do with that kind of knowledge, that kind of foreknowledge. Um, I, I think if, if it were an option for me to know, I would not want to know.

I wouldn't, um, I, I'm not sure how, how you feel, but, because, you know, would you wanna know how and when you're gonna die? What if you, what if you knew that, uh, it was gonna be really painful, like horribly painful, cruel at the hands of others?

What would it be like to mentally and just emotionally just anticipate that coming your way? Well, we, we actually know kind of what it's like for Jesus, because in John 12, and this is where we're gonna be, we're gonna be in John 12. We were there last week.

We're gonna be there again this week. In fact, most of the, most of the series is gonna be from the Book of John. And, uh, we, we'll have the verses on the screen for you as well. But we really do encourage you to, to kind of look John 12.

Um, we're gonna be in verse 27. And so what was it like for Jesus to kind of feel the weight of this on his shoulders? Here's what he says. He says, my soul is troubled, my soul is troubled. And what shall I say? Okay. What was it like for Jesus?

Well, you know, Jesus is, he's honest with himself and his friends about what's going on, what's, what's going on inside of him. He says, I'm, I'm troubled. I'm troubled. Like he doesn't sugarcoat it. Um, he doesn't gloss over it, you know, he, he, he doesn't do the, the, the I.

I'm fine. I'm fine. You know, I'm, oh, yeah, it, it, it's a tough day. No. Like I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm troubled. You know, he doesn't try to trick his mind into thinking something else. He doesn't deceive himself.

He doesn't try to deceive or misdirect those around. He doesn't put like a, a, a, a, a, a strong foot forward or, or a happy face. No, he's just honest. He's just honest. He sees reality. He calls it what it is. He's open about what it's doing to him.

That's a good lesson for us in 2025, I think it is okay to call reality. What reality is, we are under no obligation to deceive ourselves or others into some sort of silver lining perspective. That's, that's not our job.

You know, I'm troubled. Now, he doesn't only say that, okay? Because what comes right after I'm troubled is this question. Jesus goes, and what shall I say? And what shall I say?

And, and there's a good lesson for us in this part too. It's not, it's not as feel good of a, as a lesson. It's not. Um, but it's a good one nonetheless. Because so often, okay, so often that first lesson we've learned that one, we, we, we love to give ourselves permission more and more to be, to to be real, to be authentic, you know, to, to be open about how hard our, our lives are sometimes, or how, how, how broken this world is, and how hard it is to, to live in it at, at, at times.

We, we, we, we love that part actually. And, and we kind of wear that like a little bit like a badge. Like especially my generation and below, we, you know, we, we don't bottle things up like our parents or our grandparents did.

We're a lot more, you know, in tune, you know, this, that, and the other, right? And, and, and, and I, honestly, I think that's good. I think it's good. Nothing wrong with that. But this next part, what Jesus models here in this question is something we're, we're maybe not as quick to embrace.

Because after Jesus is honest with himself and his friends, he asks this seemingly rhetorical question, and what shall I say? In other words, he, this is my reality. This is what's going on. This is what's doing inside of me. But how am I gonna respond?

Where am I gonna go from here? Who am I gonna be in light of all of this? Which, which direction will I choose to go? Okay, so here's, here's the lesson, okay? And that it's a good, it's a good one for us. Um, Jesus never let himself be dishonest about his circumstances.

He didn't, he didn't try to be deceptive, self deceptive, self-deprecating, diminishing, dah da da, you know? Nope. He was honest. He never let himself be dishonest about his circumstances, but he never let his circumstances dictate his response, either.

He didn't get to a spot where he just allowed that to shape his direction and his identity and his choice is something else drove him in that. And it wasn't his circumstances. Now, this is something I fall short of all the time, all the time, okay?

Yet another way I look at the life and the person of Jesus and go, wow, you are him. I am not okay. Because what do we do? Okay, we'll, we'll, we'll be honest about our circumstances, you know, and we'll say things like, uh, work sucks. My boss is a moron. You know, we'll say that.

Um, we'll say, I'm so stressed out. Uh, I, I, I'm pulled in so many different directions. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm out five nights a week with whatever, you know, I, I can't even read the news anymore. You know, we'll, we'll be, we'll be honest about how we're feeling and how we're doing, as long as we all kind of agree that we're allowed to respond to those circumstances however we want, you know, like, like, don't tell me how to feel.

You know? And, and, and, and that's, there's some, again, there's some good stuff in that. But are we allowed or maybe encouraged to challenge one another? Not on how we feel about it, but how we respond to it.

Here. Here's how Jesus responded, asked this question. Here's how he responded. Here's the rest of the verse. Okay, one more time. Says, my soul is troubled. What shall I say, father, save me from this hour? Is that, is that what I should do? Or should I, should I cry out to God?

God make things better for me, make things different for me than what's coming? He says, no, it was for this very reason I came to this hour. And we're gonna camp out in, in the, in the truth behind these verses and the point that Jesus is trying to make.

We're gonna camp out in that for the rest of our time this weekend, especially as we unpack it in the next few verses. But this verse, okay? And the truth that's behind it reminds me of one of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite books, and it's the book called The Screw Tape Letters.

Um, some of you have read that book, and, and, but if you haven't, this book can take just a little bit of a setup before I share the quote with you. 'cause the premise of the book is a little odd. Um, CS Lewis is the author, CS Lewis. CS Lewis was a prolific author.

He wrote a bunch of stuff, including like The Chronicles of Narnia. That's what he's probably most famous for now. But he writes this book called Screw Tape Letters. And, and here's the premise of the book, okay? In this book, he is imagining it's fiction, but he's imagining two demons corresponding to one another, writing letters back and forth, okay?

You're like, this is a weird book. Yes, it is super insightful though. And, uh, one, uh, boss Demon is named Screw Tape. And, and his apprentice is named Wormwood. And they're going back and forth, okay? And in one correspondence, here's what Screw tape writes to wormwood, that I think perfectly captures what Jesus is saying here.

Okay? Here's, here's the quote. Here's what screw tape is saying. He says, be not deceived wormwood our cause. He's talking about the demon's cause evil's cause, Satan's cause our cause. He says, it's never more in jeopardy than when a human no longer desiring, but still intending to do our enemy's will.

So now he's talking about Christians who don't wanna obey God, but they're gonna do it anyways. He's saying, our cause is never more in jeopardy than when they look upon, look round upon a universe, in which every trace of God and every trace of him seems to have vanished.

They look around themselves and they go like, where's God in this? They ask why they've been forsaken, and then they still obey. That's the worst news for the enemy, for our enemy. As we look all around this world, all around our circumstances, everything that it's doing in us, everything that's doing to us.

And we go, I'm gonna still obey. How is it that Jesus, when, when looking all around him, when taking in his reality and being honest with himself, honest with his closest friends about how troubling it all was, how is it that Jesus can look at all of it and not say, God save me, but instead say, God, use me.

How can Jesus do that? How He never let his circumstances dictate his response, something else did. What was that? He here, here, here's why I think Jesus was able to, to say that, okay? I think it had everything to do.

I think it had everything to do with what he expected. Something shaped his expectations that caused him to still walk down this path that he was going down. It had everything to do with what he expected. Now, we, we we're gonna unpack this a little bit, but we've already, we've already talked a little bit about Jesus's foreknowledge, right?

Like he was closely connected to God. He was God in the flesh. God had revealed certain things about his future to him. You know, he, he knew, he, he expected a cross coming from him. He knew that. And he apparently also knew the purpose.

He knows why. We just heard him say as much in verse 27 and 28. It was for this very hour that I, that I, that I came, right? Like he knew it was coming, and he knew why. And so he knew what to expect, right? Jesus knew.

Jesus knew what to expect, he knew what tomorrow was gonna bring. And so it's tempting to think that when you know the future, right? When, when, when the future isn't uncertain like it is for the rest of us, but it's known when you know the future and, and not only you know what's gonna happen, but you know why it's gonna happen.

Well then wouldn't it be, wouldn't it be a lot easier just to respond appropriately? Like if I knew what was coming, I wasn't surprised by it, it would be a lot easier for me to just kind of rise above it and, and respond appropriately. Jesus was coming and it was why he came to the world to die for the sins of the world.

And so what he expected to happen was just, it was gonna be just that a crossing crucifixion. There was no surprises there. So yeah, grateful Jesus, I'm glad that I wasn't have to, I didn't have to walk that path. And I, and, and I'm, I'm so grateful for the cross.

But what does that have to do with the rest of us who don't know? Like, I don't know what tomorrow's, if you wanna be technical about it, I don't know that I'm gonna get up tomorrow morning. I don't, I, there's no way to know.

Wouldn't it be great to know, right? Wouldn't it be great to know? Wouldn't it be great to know if you were gonna get through this horrible season of work that you might be in? Like, how's this all gonna work out? Is it gonna work out? Is it ever gonna be different? What's on the other side?

There's a ton of uncertainty for a lot of us right now in our nine to five. Wouldn't it be great to know? Would it be great to know not just what those test results mean, but what they're gonna mean for my life six months from now for my marriage, six months from now for my kids?

Would it be great to know? Wouldn't it be great to know if I'm ever gonna feel good again? Some of us are right there living through that uncertainty, not knowing what to expect. Wouldn't it be great to know if, if you and your spouse were ever gonna feel close again, or if your kids are gonna come back to Jesus again, or, or if they're gonna grow up and follow him like they are right now?

Or wouldn't it be great to know? Wouldn't it be great to know what you're gonna do when you grow up? Wouldn't it be great to know if you're gonna meet someone ever? It just would be, I don't know.

It would be, it would be nice to know. Like, here's the question, okay? If, if, if Jesus could respond, if Jesus could respond how God wanted him to respond because he knew he knew what to expect, if that's true for Jesus, then what about the rest of us?

What about the rest of us who just never know? Like we never know. You never know. I'm sure you've said that before. You never know. Usually just in passing, maybe to yourself, maybe to someone else in, in a conversation where they're dealing with the uncertainty, but it's true of all of us all the time.

You just, you just never know. What about the rest of us who literally never know? There's gonna be some things I think, in this passage here that, that, that are gonna help us. 'cause Jesus is gonna have an interaction with crowds. He's saying this in front of people, people who never know.

So let's start in verse 27 again, and we're, let's just kind of work our way through these verses here, because there's some things in here for us. Those of us who who never know, we'll just pause along the way and, and unpack 'em.

So one more time. Okay, my soul is trouble. What shall I say, father, save me from this hour. Now it's for this very reason I came to this hour. I know, I know what to expect. Father glorify your name. Then a voice came from heaven. I have glorified it and I'll glorify it again.

And the crowd that was there heard it, heard that voice and said that it had thundered. Others said that an angel had spoken to them. So, so file that part away. 'cause that's important. There's crowds that hear Jesus say what he's about to what he says.

And heaven thunders its approval in front of everybody audibly, okay? But there is something, and this is the first thing that we can do when we, when, when you never know. Here's, here's one thing that you can't expect.

When you never know what to expect, okay? Here's what you can't expect. Number one, you can expect a bigger purpose regardless of what you're walking through. You can always expect with Jesus that there is a larger purpose at play.

You can expect that you can. That's a real thing. It's not a mind trick, okay? That's a real thing. And what you can expect, the bigger purpose is for God to glorify himself in you. And you can expect that God will glorify himself through you.

You can expect that you can. Quick story. I was talking to one of our chaplains this past week, Monday night. It was here at our Cedar Falls campus when they, when they did their summit, when we did our summit here. And she is a chaplain. Her husband's also a chaplain.

And one of the, um, people they have been caring for, for, for a long time now is, uh, is one of our guys here at Cedar Falls, a guy named Tim Wolf. Okay? And Tim has been fighting, um, a losing battle with a LS officially for a year, unofficially for a couple years now, uh, Tim's my age, uh, he's in his early forties.

He's husband and father of two girls. And a LS is a horrible disease. But I was talking to our, our, our chaplain who, uh, was caring for them. And, and here's what she said. Here's what she said. She said, it doesn't seem to matter how bad of an, of news Tim and Edden get.

Um, and, and, and now it's almost only bad news. That's the stage. But she goes, it doesn't seem to matter. He, he, he just accepts it. And he, he keeps a somewhat positive perspective, and he keeps going forward. And then she said this, there's only one way a person can respond like that.

There's only one reason. And the reason is God. That's the only reason. You know? And, and, and she was careful. Like I'm sure he doesn't always respond that way. There's, and you, you, you, you can, you can track their caring bridge story.

Um, plenty of long dark days for, for, for, for him and their family. It's not this Christian movie or children's book, sanitized story here. But right there in the middle of all the pain, God showed himself and Tim's attitude to this chaplain, even in the midst of really dark, painful stuff, these chaplains could see God's glory even in that.

Which is why, 'cause that's number one. 'cause this is why Jesus goes on. He goes on to say this in verse 30, okay? Jesus said, this voice was for your benefit, not mine. 'cause Jesus knew what to expect. We don't. He goes, now's the time for judgment on this world.

Now the prince of this world will be driven out. He's talking about our enemy, Satan. And he says, and I, when I'm lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself. And he said this to show the kind of death he was gonna die.

So that phrase, I am lifted up. Let's talk about that. It's actually one word in the language that John, the author originally wrote in, and it's this word, hoopa. It's fun to say. And uh, this word hoopa is used in a lot of different ways. It's translated, I'm lifted up. It's one word.

And sometimes it's used to talk about getting a raise, like receiving a promotion or a status or a position of honor. It's used that way. Sometimes it's used to be, to describe being exalted, like lifted up or praised, you know, sometimes it's used to describe, um, in, in the New Testament, Jesus ascending into heaven and sitting at the right hand of the Father, meaning he's God's right hand man.

He's got all the divine power and authority. This is the same word that Jesus uses here to describe being lifted up on a cross. He's describing something literally like him being nailed to a cross. And these guys are raising the cross up and then sitting it down to the ground.

And Jesus is elevated in front of everybody dying. He uses it literally. And he uses it metaphorically as well to describe the deeper meaning of what this would mean. His death would mean for everybody that his death on the cross would make a way for literally anyone and everyone to be a part of the family.

So when you never know to expect, what can you expect? Number two, you can expect this. You'd expect God to bring something good, even when you're walking through something that is bad. You can expect God to bring something good even when you are walking through something that is bad.

And let's talk about this for a little bit, because we have a tendency to screw this one up unintentionally most of the time. But, but sometimes to, to ourselves, to our and everybody else's detriment. Okay? Um, we do not have to call things that are bad.

Good. Please don't do that. Sometimes we feel like what we have to do because God's gonna bring good things for you, bad things. And so we kind of talk about the bad things as though they're good. They're not, they're not good, okay?

A LS not good all bad, a hundred percent bad crosses a hundred percent painful. We do not have to call bad things good If we're walking through tough circumstances, we don't have to call those circumstances good. They're not good. Nor do we have to say that the, that the reason for bad things happening is, is so that good things can happen as though, as though good can only happen if there is bad.

That's not biblical either. You wanna know how I know that? It's because someday this is what we believe, this is our hope that someday no more bad things, no more death, no more sin, no more uncertainty, no more darkness, only light, only good, right? In those days, we don't need bad things to know that there are good things.

That's not a biblical way to approach it either. Today, there are just really bad things in the world and in our lives that we are gonna deal with. It's okay to expect that. It's good to expect that, but it's also okay to expect that even in those bad things or despite those bad things, God can and will bring something good 'cause who he is.

And it's what he is capable of doing, and he's able to do that for you, or even in you and through you for someone else. Number two. Now, stay with me here as we continue to move through this story, because Jesus says all of this, but he's saying all of this to crowds around him, and there's, there's a way that these crowds are gonna interact with them and respond that we need to kind of unpack.

Okay? So here's what he says, 1234, verse 34, the crowd for listening to all of this spoke up. Well, we've heard from the law, from the Bible, okay, we read the Bible, Jesus. And here's what we know, okay? From, from the word that the Messiah will remain forever.

So how can you say the son of man's gonna be lifted up? How can you say that you're gonna die? How can you say that? Because we, we read the Bible, and the Bible says that he, that he's gonna remain forever. And so who is this son of man? Who's this messiah? Who's this person that you're talking about?

Let's get to right to number three. Okay? When, when you never know what to expect, unfortunately, you can expect this, you can expect that others are gonna act like they know better. And some of 'em are gonna act like they know better than God himself.

It happens all the time when you're dealing with uncertainty. Someone in your world will say, well, here's, here's what's going on. I, I know what's going on. I mean, back in Jesus' day, these people literally looked at God himself in the eyes and said, I don't think that's how it works.

They looked at the author of scripture and said, let me teach you about scripture. It's amazing, but happens all the time. There are some people who just, they're unwilling to admit that you never know.

They just are unwilling, and they lean instead into knowing better. They always, and they do it with chapter and verse sometimes too, like, God's on their side in this, right? But anyone can quote scripture. Anybody can quote scripture.

Knowing a verse and knowing God are two different things. They are, which is why Jesus finishes this conversation by saying this in verse 35, okay? Here's what he says. Jesus told them, you're gonna have the light just a little while longer. Walk while you have the light before darkness overtake you, whoever walks in the dark does not know where they're going.

So believe in the light while you have the light so that you may become children of the light. And when he had finished speaking, Jesus left and he hid himself from them. Even after Jesus performed so many sides in their presence, they would still not believe him.

Okay? So here's the last one. This is really the, the one that kind of summarizes all of it. What can you expect when you never know what to expect? Okay, what can you expect? You have to expect to let Jesus set your expectations.

Let Jesus let Jesus, let Jesus set your expectations. 'cause he says two things here in this last verse. He says, you're gonna walk through darkness. It's gonna happen. I want you to know, okay? Expect that. And I want you to expect Jesus says that I will light your path.

See, the crowds couldn't tolerate a savior who came to die, didn't fit their expectations. Too dark, too weak for them. They wanted a victorious life. They wanted a powerful savior. They wanted a smooth path. They wanted a God who vanquished all of their enemies, who hated all the people that they hated, you know?

But it was in Jesus' death that he would ultimately secure their life. And Jesus couldn't be more clear. He just couldn't. Darkness is coming. It is on this side of heaven. Darkness is coming. He's cast this prince of the world, our enemy down.

But our our enemy is not out yet. We'll walk through darkness. You gotta expect it. But you can expect that Jesus will meet you there, he'll meet you there, and he's the light and he'll light your path. Um, we're gonna camp out on this just a little bit before we, before we leave the room in a few different ways.

But before we do that, okay, lemme, lemme just pray for us. Pray over us, okay? Father in heaven, um, we're grateful. Um, we're grateful for this truth. Uh, God, so many of us are, are walking through uncertainty and dealing with it. And, and God, not just uncertainty, but we're walking through things that are, that are difficult, that are, that are, that are difficult because they're uncertain and, and it's just difficult to carry.

And God, sometimes, uh, uh, people around us even add to our burden because they think they know better. But we, we don't know. We don't know what tomorrow brings. And, and God, we, we, we do know that we can expect you'll show up with us and that you'll get us through. And so we're grateful for, uh, God, we're grateful for your son Jesus, who is the light.

And, and God, I just, I do pray that, that, that those of us who are walking through just, just some unimaginably, uncertain and painful things, I, I, I pray, I pray that you would light their path. Jesus. I, uh, I pray this in your name, in the name of the light of the world.

Amen.