Why Jesus Came to Die

The reading tonight is from colossians chapter 1 verses 15 to 23.

That's colossians chapter 1 verses 15 to 23 and that can be found on page 1182. That's 1 1 8 2 of the church bibles. And Grace is going to come and read for us this evening. The sun is the image of the invisible god, the firstborn over all creation. For in him, all things were created, things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible.

Whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities. All things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things and in him, all things hold together. And he is ahead of the body, the church. He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead so that in everything, he might have the supremacy.

For god was pleased to have all his fullness dwell with dwell in him and through him to reconcile himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. Once, you are alienated from god and were enemies in your minds because of your evil behavior, but now he has reconciled you by Christ's physical body through death to present you wholly in his sight without blemish and free from accusation. If you continue in your faith, establish and firm and do not move from the hope held on the gospel. This is the gospel that you heard and that has been proclaimed to every creature under heaven and of which I, Paul, have become a servant. Thanks, Grace.

My name is Pete Woodcock. I'm 1 of the ministers of the church here. We're doing this series. We've we've started a few weeks ago. Based on on a on a book by an American pastor called John Piper.

Called I I I I can't quite exactly know that I don't remember the whole name of it, but it's why Jesus died 50 reasons, isn't it? 50 reasons why she's saying. The other way around. 50 reasons why Jesus came to die. And and, that that it's a it's a lovely little book.

It's very a very, very, very short chapters. And we thought we'd have a go at that. We're not doing all 50 reasons, so don't worry. But Jesus dying on the cross. It it's like it is very much like a diamond.

It's 1 thing, but there's many different facets. They all sort of join up really. You can't help overlapping, but they're just these different facets that shine out about what the cross is about. It's not just a it's not just a bland flat 2 d thing. So we're we're, thinking about that.

I'm just gonna pray again and then, we'll look at this 1. Father again help us, some of us are new to church. We never heard anything like this stuff before, and we pray, please, you would be kind to us and help us to hear and hear what you've got to say to us. And, lord, those of us that are used to church, we pray, please, that you would help us again to listen, that we may rejoice in your kindness to us, and we pray in Jesus' name, amen. Now I I don't know whether you like or dislike, the TV series and the film series star trekker.

You know, you may like it or not. I I don't really care. But, I actually think that, in Star Trek, it has 1 of the best science fiction enemies of the universe. And that's the borg Do any of you know the borg about the borg? If you don't, the borg is a sort of cybernetic hive mind sort of species, and that they aim to take over the universe as all the bad is due.

By by forcibly assimilating humans and any other sort of being, any other sentient being and technology into their collective. That they're they're converting individuals into these cybernetic drones. And they go around in this big square thing, if you know it, and there's firing through the from the Delta section, if you really wanna know. And they're coming and sort of sucking in everybody. They they have they're led by a a a a borg queen.

They're powerful. They're very persistent, and they are quite frightening within the context of Star Trek. They're they're a frightening enemy. They're strapline of faith, if you can give them 1. Is very simple whenever they meet anyone, they'll say resistance is few they're they're obviously Americans as well, because resistance is futile is futile is futile.

They mean. You will be assimilated. That's what they say. Now when Star Trek crew crew first met the borg, they were confronted with this, and I'm gonna read it. We are the borg.

Lower your shields and surrender your ships We will add your biological and technological distinctives to our own. Your culture will adapt to serve us. Resistence is futile. Resistance is futile. Resistance is futile.

You will be assimilated. It's a scary line, isn't it when you first meet someone? I mean, imagine that as a chat chat chat line, resistance is futile. You will be assimilated. You wanna get out there straight away.

They're they're an enemy of the universe. Now I just want us to think about futility, you know, f being futile, futility. Futility means, in his dictionary definition, the fact of having no effect So resistance is futile. You you'll have you'll have no effect, so it's no point. Achieving nothing, being useless, pointless, or ineffective representing a total lack of purpose or success.

That's an amazing word, isn't it? But here's the really scary thing I think about futility. Futility comes to us, and it will come to us in the end. Futility comes to us. And like the borg, it says resistance is futile.

You will be assimilated. In other words, it's futile to resist futility. That's what I'm proposing here. And I think that's right. Well, if you think our life is like a sand castle, you know, you build it up with a lot of optimism, but the wave of hue futility of achieving nothing, the wave comes and just smashes down, and you will be assimilated into futility.

Resistance to futility is futile. Scientists have an another word, of course. They say that the entire universe is is steadily running down. Their word is entropy. It's the same thing, really.

It's running down. It's fading. It's dying. It's decaying. It's degrading.

Many years ago, Mark Twain, who's a an American writer wrote in his, autobiography this. Now just listen to this. This is something. This is what he wrote in his autobiography. A myriad of men are born.

They labor and sweat and struggle for bread. They squabble and scald and fight. They scramble for little mean advantages over each other. Age creeps upon them. Infirmities follow.

Shame and humiliations bring down their prides. Resistance is futile. Turn that off. Shame humility, and humiliation bring down their pride and their vanities. Let's listen to this.

Right? Those they love are taken from them, and the joy of life is turned to aching grief. The burden of pain, care, misery grows heavier year by year. At length ambition is dead, Pride is dead. Vanity is dead.

Longing for release is in their place. It comes at last. Is that is that Star Trek? It's the soundtrack. Is that the Star Trek soundtrack?

No? Travis, don't know. Okay. Good. I'm gonna read that again because it's it's really it's it's really, it's it's really, like, painting a a a bleak picture.

It comes at last the only unpause and gift, ever had for them. And they vanish from a world where they were of no consequence, where they achieve nothing, where they were a mistake and a failure and a foolishness where they have left no sign that they have existed, a world which will lament them for a day and forget them forever. That's an extraordinary sentence if you heard that. He he there's a myriad of men. We squabble.

We fight. We go to war. We grab. We plan. We have ambitions.

They start to fade. And the older you get aches take over. You don't know that yet, maybe, but you will aching, pain, grief, friends dying around you, empty this. Resistance to futility is futile. If you want a more modern thing, the, the music group manic Street Preachers have a song called from despair to wear.

And they cry out in that soul many times from despair to wear, from despair to wear. So all that talk that we have about progress in our world and AI progress and achievement. It doesn't really seem to be getting us anywhere, and no 1 seems to know where we're progressing to and where we're supposed to be advancing to. And it feels very much like sometimes being on an exercise bike. You're putting a load of energy in, but you're not moving anywhere.

And sad to say that many people say I want off before they get to a destination. So this sense of hue futility and lostness and hopelessness is is really a major force, today, particularly amongst men, believe it or not, particularly amongst men. And it it seems that it's just irresistible. Futility is just irresistible. So here's my question then.

Does Christianity speak to this? Does it have an answer? Has has it got anything of real substance to offer to someone that woke up today feeling the world is futile and resistance to futility is futile? Does Christianity find lost people and point them in a direction where there's home, where there's warmth, where there's joy, where there's freedom, where there's life, where there's energy, where there's deep satisfying relationships with people that are loyal and trustworthy. Does it have a a future vision to give to us?

Does it have something bright enough to shine in a world that's full of emptiness, full of futility? And I wanna say, of course, yes. Absolutely, it does. And it is the message that does that. And not only does it, it give us a hope.

It actually gives us a taster of the reality to come. So it keeps us even though we're in a world that sees seems so meaningless around us and so full of futility that there's a taster of this bright future to come. It's not just fake, It's not pretend. It's not working ourselves up into a land of make belief. It's not hype.

The Bible really does show us that we live in a world that's full of futility. There's a whole book actually in the Bible called the book of Ecclesiastes in the Old Testament part of the Bible, and the whole book is given over to meaningless meaningless says the preacher. Everything is meaningless. It's like chasing the wind, and it deals with all of our sense of grief and meaningless and all of the things that Mark Twain was saying about, that we have these ambitions, and they look so good, but they then fade and die. So the Bible takes futility seriously.

It doesn't you know, paper over the cracks. It doesn't pretend. It doesn't bring us into a land of sort of pretend and, you know, make belief. In fact, Paul writing to the Ephesians in the New Testament part of the Bible, He's writing to these Ephesian Christians, and he says, now, I say this and testify to the lord that you must no longer walk as the gentiles do in the futility of their minds. So he's saying to them there's a message that will enable you not to walk in the futility of the thinking of this world.

So there's hope there. So I wanna just look at this then and open this out a bit and look at a number of, things that we feel is, futile. First of all, the futility of the planet, the futility of the world that we live in. Recently, of course, we've we've, heard and seen perhaps those 4 crew members that went round the moon. Autonomous 2 took them around the moon.

And they could view the moon from 202 hundred and 50 they they could view the earth, rather, from 250000 miles away. They went over 250000 miles, and they've they viewed viewed the earth from a little window in their little pod, little space pod. And from that distance, You can put your hand as you're looking at your little window. And because the earth is only like the size of a tennis ball, unless you can put your hand over it, and you can block out the whole earth, just like that. Like I can do with the microphone here.

The amazing thing. I read a book of the 12 people that have walked on the moon, and doing that had a massive, massive effect on the whole rest of their lives. There's only 2 of them alive now that have walked on on the moon, but it they were affected by it. They said that just putting your hand over and blocking out the earth, even though the earth was absolutely beautiful from that like a jewel in the sky that you could block out all the achievements, all the history, everything man's ever done, any everything that people have ever achieved. All of that can just be blocked out just like that.

And it really had an effect on them. It it's it's it's this planet just gonna go like that. Here's a here's another writer who's a rather miserable, but listen to it. This is Bert from Russell. It's an atheist.

He said this, that all the labors of the age, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all of the noonday brightness of human genius are destined to extinction. In the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of man's achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins. Just put your hand over. It's gone. Environmentalists are very, very gloomy, aren't they?

About the future of this planet, warning us that we're absolutely heading for disaster. The funny thing is a lot of people are saying, well, what we need to do is to leave this planet and try and sort of go and populate another planet that is a lot worse than this planet, but we try to get to Mars. And Artopus too is sort of part of that sort of desire to be able to get to Mars. But artemis 2, to get artemis out of our 2 out of our atmosphere, it was the equivalent of 8000000 cars driving 1000 miles each. That's how much it was polluting the planet that they were, you know, and we're going to go to Mars and think we would do better.

No. Environmentalists are very gloomy. I mean, there there's there's a a group, wasn't they called extinction rebellion? They're rebelling against extinction. I'm I'm not sure if they're still going away.

They might be extinct now, but but they might be. I don't know. But do you see what it's all saying? Resistance is futile. Every achievement is coming to an end, and it makes everything futile.

Now this is the great thing. You step into the Bible you step into the new testament part of the bible, and there is another way of thinking, completely different. It recognizes the futility, but it clearly shows there's 1 who resists. Here's some bible verses. You need to listen carefully.

I'm not putting them up because I want you to hear them. Romans 8 verse 20 is a book in the bible. It says this. For the creation was subjected to frustration, Do you hear it? This creation is frustrated, but it's subjected to frustration, not by its own choice, but by the will of the 1 who subjected it.

In hope, that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the freedom and glory of the children of god. Now whether you understand all that or not, you or not. You see something. You see that there's this creation that feels futile and is in bondage and in bondage to decay, but there's a plan underneath all this. That brings hope and then liberty.

Suddenly, when you read the new testament, it's realistic about the futility and the frustration and the decay, but there's a birth of hope. There's something that's gonna change it all. Here's another verse from that same chapter, Romans. We know that the whole of creation has been groaning. So it it it puts creation, the world, the universe, the planet, groaning, groaning.

But then listen as in pains of childbirth right up to the present time. So it shows the futility. It shows the groaning. It shows the pain of a world that has no hope. But then suddenly it turns that pain into the pain of childbirth.

It's painful, but there's gonna be life after it. Here's another 1. This room is 8 verse 3, and it and it shows how personally and and physically this whole thing is going to be. Listen to this. Not only so, but we ourselves, talking about people now, who have the first fruits of the spirit grown.

So here are people themselves groan inwardly. We're groaning. We're part of a frustration. We're part of the futility, but grown inwardly as we wait eagerly for the adoption of sonship, the redemption of our bodies. Our bodies are going to be brought back.

And in that hope, it says we're saved. Do you see that? The Bible was very realistic about decay and frustration and, groaning inwardly, but then there's hope. And then when you read the rest of the Bible, it talks about this planet. The mountains will learn to sing for joy.

It talks about the the trees clapping their hands. It talks about the deserts bursting into life and flowers, animals and birds and rocks and sea creatures. They all begin to be set free from the futilities and the frustrations, and they're made into something altogether more beautiful. Now how can that happen? That's the question.

What power can take this groaning futility and frustration and turn it into fruitful freedom and resistance to futility? What what what is the power that can do that? Well, we saw it in colossians chapter 1. Are you ready to hear it again? Close in chapter 1 verses 9 19 and 20.

For god was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him. That's Jesus. All the fullness of god is in Jesus. And through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. Peace.

The word is completeness to make people complete again. By his blood shed on the cross. There's hope, it's saying. There's hope for this planet. There's hope for a renewed universe because of the blood of Jesus.

There's something about what Jesus did on the cross that is cosmic. Listen to a paraphrase of that verse. It's from the message. It's a paraphrase version of the Bible. It says this.

All the broken and dislocated pieces of the universe, people and things and animals and atoms get properly fixed and fit together in vibrant harmonies all because of his death, his blood that was poured down from the cross. What a staggering statement is making? See, it's claiming It's claiming that the death of Jesus on the cross had a massive ability to absorb all the futility in the planet. The wages of sin is death we're told in the Bible. We see that from other other things.

We'll see that in our series. And because, and and death is the ultimate futility because death puts an end to everything. So, you know, that's it brings futility. But here, look, if you're putting it in science, sort of, well, it's sort of semi science and science fiction terms, isn't it? You you would you would say that Jesus' death, was was was taking futility into the black hole.

And crushing death, and then coming out of the other end of the black hole as a new creation as a new creation reconciled with god. It's like a new birth he's talking about, and he uses that term, doesn't it? This childbirth. There's a new birth. It's dying to the old and resurrection in the new.

The decaying frustrated, broken. Futile world is being taken through the black hole, taken down to death itself, taken to the very place it deserves to go. And Jesus is taking it there and battling with that futility, and then rising again. And an understanding that Jesus has done this on the cross is to experience birth in your in your soul. It's to understand that there's fruitfulness and joy even in this futile world.

From despair and futility to hope in Christ. That's what the cross does. See, the cross is not just a religious symbol. It's actually the turning point in the world. It's the turning point in history.

It's the death of the old and the resurrection of the new. Futility of the planet. Because of the death of Christ, there is hope for a new world. But let me just deal with the second futility. The futility of life With futility of life, it's late, perhaps you're in bed.

Your phone is in your hand. You've been scrolling and looking at things for an hour, 2 hours. Who knows? It's TikTok and it's Instagram and it's Snapchat and whatever it is you're looking at, and it's on repeat, isn't it? And you're hooked in, aren't you?

You laugh at a few things, and you send a few friends, a few things, and a couple of messages. And then you finally stop And there's a moment of quiet, isn't it? And then this thought goes through your mind. Why do I feel so empty? Or if not that?

What have I achieved? What have I actually achieved in? I don't even know how many hours. What I've achieved? It's so empty, isn't it?

I can't even remember the things I've been looking at. I sent a few things to people, but I can't even remember what I sent. When they see me, they say, well, that was a funny thing. He's like, oh, I can't remember what I sent. What have I achieved?

No 1 sees those moments, do they? But every 1 of us has them in some degree. And we're told to chase, aren't we? Chase chase your dreams. Go in to self and find yourself.

Find your identity. Discover your own meaning. But all of that advice and all of that thinking is stuck in this world, which is a world of death and futility. Here's some quotes from young people that got off social media. Here it is.

Life just feels like a cycle. Wake up study, work, sleep, repeat. What's the point? Everyone says, live your best life, but no 1 explains what that actually means. Here's another 1.

I've got more freedom than ever, but I feel more lost than ever. It's heartbreaking stuff, isn't it? And there's a lot stronger stuff than that. Resistance is futile. Resistence to futility is futile, and everything will be assimilated into emptiness.

What is the point? Now here's where Christianity is so completely different because Christianity doesn't come and say try harder to find meaning. Christianity doesn't say look within It's the opposite. You look within, you're gonna find some horrible stuff in there. Empty, dark meaningless stuff.

Christianity says, no. No. No. There's someone from outside the world of decay and futility. Someone bigger, someone grander, someone who made the whole thing in the first place, has now come in.

He's above. He's bigger. That's what we read in colossians 1, and he's now broken into this futile world. The lord Jesus Christ, the creator of all things, and everything's made for him and by him, has come into this world, into this futile world, And if you just surface, look at his life, it seems quite futile his life. He's betrayed by friends, if you know the story.

Friends turn against him. He's mocked publicly. People laugh at him. He suffers unjustly on the cross. He dies in what looks weakness, and it looks Like, it's all pointless, and here's another profit that doesn't do any help at all, but just dies in a violent way.

But what you've got in the bible is that that isn't futility, that god has come on a mission, that god is working through Christ, that god is coming to bring meaning into what seems a meaningless world. The message of the cross is actually the power of god. Have a listen to this. You can turn to it if you want. It's 1 Corinthians.

It's in the Bible. It's 1 Corinthians chapter 1, but if you don't quite know where it is, then just listen. 1 Corinthians chapter 1. And Paul is writing. This is Bible.

Paul is writing to a church in Corinth. And it says for the message of the cross, is foolishness is futility. Is foolishness to those who are perishing. But to us who are being saved, it is the power of god. For it is written, I will destroy the wisdom of the wise and the intellect intelligence of the intellect.

I will frustrate. Where is the wise person? He asks? Where is the teacher of the law? Where is the philosopher of this of of this age?

Has not god made foolish, the wisdom of the world. For since in the wisdom of god, the world through its wisdom did not know him, god was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believed. He then goes on and says Jews demand signs. Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to to the gentiles, But to those whom god has called, both Jew and Greek, Christ the power of god, the wisdom of god. Do you see what he's saying there?

When you understand the cross, it changes everything. The Jew is looking for signs for prophets. Those sort of people. It's not just Jews. That sort of world of people is looking for prophets for signs for power.

For religion. And the Greeks, those sort of people. They're looking for thinking and wisdom, but the signs never bring you to god. They all look good. They all look powerful.

And the and the the wisdom, all the philosophers and Plato and all of those people. They've got such wisdom, but they never bring you to god. All those things do is to keep you in this locked world, this system of a world, and they're futile. They only bring futility. They never bring release, but here is 1 who's come outside of the world.

It looks foolish. Here's the 1 who has died on a cross. And in doing that, he's brought us to god. His death has brought us life to god, and that's the power of god. So resistance comes to futility, not through signs, and not through human wisdom, but through what Jesus has done for us.

There's a third 1 I want us to look at. The futility of loneliness. Listen to how 1 lady summed up her own life on a tombstone. This is in Wales, this tombstone. Says this.

She's speaking about her life, and she's had it written on her tombstone. Sleeps, but rests not, loved, but was love not. Try to please but please not. Died as she lived alone. Grace, Lewellen Smith, died as she lived alone.

That's extraordinary, isn't it? The futility of that life. She even writes it on a tombstone. People are so lonely now. They're getting AI girlfriends and boyfriends.

Isn't that amazing? And not only that. I saw a program recently where there was a couple of blokes. Their mothers had died, and they put all their mother's emails and pictures in, and they have an AI mother. There are mother rings up every day.

It's not real. It's so futile. And when he was asked, but this isn't real. This 1 bloke, this isn't real, is it? You know, she's died.

And he says, oh, that's too much. I can't handle that. I don't want to think about death. I don't want to think about grief. She rings me every day, and she rang while this interview was, and there's his mom on the how hello, love.

How is your day? It's not real. It's futile. It's pathetic and sad. But even worse than that, listen to this.

Listen to what 1 bloke wrote. When I was younger, I used to worry so much about being alone of being unlovable or incapable of love. As the years went on, my worries changed. I worried that I had become incapable of having a relationship. Of offering intimacy.

I felt as though the world lived inside a warm house at night, and I was outside, and I couldn't be seen because I was out there in the night. But now I'm inside that house, and I and it feels just the same. This is what he says. Lonliness had of late become an emotion, I'd stop feeling so intensely. But I realized a capacity for not feeling lonely carried a very real price, which was the threat of feeling nothing at all.

That's futility. That's a definition of futility, but come to the Bible again. And when you come to the Bible, you see that the cause, the real ultimate cause of loneliness is that we've broken off friendship with god. Broken off friendship with god. But what is Jesus Christ?

Well, he's called in the Bible. He's he's a friend that will be closer than a brother. He's he's he's someone that's come into this world, and he suffered the loneliness. I mean, there are plenty of verses to show you how lonely he was when he was on that cross. Here's 1.

I am a worm and not a man scorned by everyone, despised by the people. See how lonely he was? Now why did Jesus go through this utter loneliness? Well, we're told in another passage in the Bible, but he was pierced on the cross For our transgressions, he was crushed for our own iniquities. The punishment that brought us peace, complete completion with god, coming to peace with god, was on him, and by his wounds, we are healed.

There's something so wonderful about the lonely man on a cross. He was actually introducing god as father and sinful people like us and bringing them together. That's what he was doing. The answer to loneliness is this 1 who's come who was alone on the cross. There's a fourth 1.

This is my last futility. You'll be thankful to know. The futility of religion and idolatry, you know, worshiping things that aren't god. Here's a verse from Jeremiah 51. Everyone is senseless and without knowledge.

Every goldsmith is shamed by his idol. So it's giving the picture of a a goldsmith that's making these little gold idols that people will worship and put in their pockets and and touch all the time and keep looking at them and seeing how they can guide them and help them in life. And, bringing them out, and they shine, and then they touch them, and they go up and down, and just wipe their foreheads, and all of that things shift that way, that way down here up there. These little gold trinkets, these things that they made in those days that we don't have, of course, and there they are in their hands, and then he says the images he makes are a fraud. They're futile.

They're a fraud. They have no breath in them. Imagine giving to your yourself to something that has no breath in it. That means they're dead. Imagine that.

Now we have many idols today. Whether there are mobile phones, whether they're rich and famous, whether they're the stars, whether they're the national lottery. I don't know whether you've seen this. It's extraordinary. The national lottery is giving a prize of 1000000000 pounds.

Imagine imagine someone willing 1000000000 pounds We all think, oh, I know what I would do. It would kill. It's gonna kill most people. If you had 1000000000 pounds, here I am living in Chester, and suddenly I am a billionaire, you know? I'm a billionaire.

I'm up there with the other billionaires. I'm a billionaire living in Chestington. Yeah? Who's gonna be knocking on my door? The girl that does the dog poo outside our house every morning, she wouldn't do that anymore.

Would she? When she knows I'm a billionaire, she would say, oh, I'll clear it up. You're a billionaire. I'll clear it up. Where do you want me to put it?

Yeah? People will be certain with anyway, don't don't get me on that. I know you're not, but I'm getting myself a the whole idea that you have a but even if you win 1000000000 pounds, even if you use it wisely, you only use it wisely for a few years. And then you have to leave it to the dog home or the cat home or a load of people that are gonna fight for it and get little mean advantages over each other and then die themselves. All the claims these things make, the horror of an idol is that not so much it gives us nothing, but it actually takes away everything.

It just drains us. It sucks us. The person who gives themselves to the job, the executive is swallowed up by ulcers and heart attacks. This is just what happens, isn't it? Listen to a verse from the new testament.

This is Peter writing. He was the apostle of Jesus, and he writes this. He says, for you know that it was not with perishable things, futile things, things that are here and gone. It is not with perishable things such as silver and gold that you were redeemed from the empty way of life, futile way of life. You were redeemed not by silver and gold, redeem being bought back from an empty way of life handed down to you from your ancestors, but with the precious blood of Christ, a lamb without blemish and defect.

That's an extraordinary sentence that god has come into this world to bring you to life to redeem you to buy you back and there is nothing in this world, not even 1000000000 pounds that can rescue you. You have 1000000000 pounds and you'll go to your grave. You may have bought lots of trinkets. You leave them all behind. Everything is futile.

We need the blood of the savior to come in, to bias, to bias back. Religion can't do it. Idles can't do it. It's futile, resistance to futility through religion and idols is futile. Be prepared to be assimilated into darkness and death.

So here's my last point back to colossians 1. Versus, 19 and 20. Let me read them again or 18 rather. Let's go to 18. And he is the head of the body.

This is Jesus. He's the head of a new group of people called the church. He's the head. And there's a group of people are like his body. He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead.

See that? He's the beginning of something new. He's the firstborn amongst the dead. He's born from death. So that in everything he might have the supremacy, he's the most beautiful 1.

He's the most supreme 1. He's the only 1 that's done it. For god was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him. And through him to reconcile, to bring together to himself all things where the things on earth or things in heaven by making peace through his blood shed on the cross. What Jesus did on the cross is cosmic.

We've gotta get that into our heads. The whole universe was affected by sin and break being broken off from god. Futility, you see, is not just a psychological thing. It was a cosmic thing. The world is completely out of alignment with god.

It's like broken songs. You know, they're out of tune songs. It's like missing the end of a story this world. It's like disconnected in all kinds of ways this world. But Christ on the cross somehow with his arms outstretched has pulled together and pulled together.

These futile things have brought them together because he's brought people to god. On the cross, it's not just a sad man dying on the cross. This is cosmic. And because the whole problem with this universe and you and me, is sin and brokenness and a cosmic problem. We need none other than a divine solution, none other than god to become a man.

We don't need self improvement. You can't, can you? To improve yourself? It just doesn't work. I've been improving myself for years.

Look at me. Yeah? It's not achievements. It's not positive thinking. It's Christ on the cross.

If everything, as we're told, was made through him and for him and by him, then to cut ourselves off from him, is to go down the futile line, but here is the 1 who's come back the architect of the universe and of a new universe. Everything now we can look at and say, ah, even my pain and suffering that I don't fully understand, Even the things you feel are meaningless. No. No. This cosmic 1, through his death on the cross, his reconciling and stitching together and pulling together, and I have hope and meaning.

So why did Jesus stay on a cross? To deal with futility, and why should you come to him? Because your life is a waste of time without him. Isn't it? Oh, at the moment, you think it's alright, but in 10 years after your death, no 1 will even remember your name.

You might have left a thing, or please put flowers on my grave, but that'll soon give up. When was the last time you put flowers in your mom's grave? I never have. But I told her that before she died. And even if you do, Do you even know your great granddad's name?

Who remembers them? No 1 remembers them. Everything you ever done brought it out. But with Christ, takes that hand away. He has a nail through his hand and says I will make your life so significant you'll be called a son of god.

Through what I've done on the cross. Let's pray. If there's anyone here that hasn't come to Christ, hasn't asked Jesus to be their savior. If you haven't done that, why not tonight? It's a good night to do it.

Perhaps he's brought you here for that very reason so you would hear this word. But he, your creator, has come to die for you. He rose again to be your lord and savior. What an amazing thing to know him is to know life and to resist futility. Father god, please hear our prayers.

Help us to rejoice in what Christ has done on the cross. And we pray in his name, amen.