Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Acts 2:1-13

Heading Toward Pentecost
A Good Heart These Days Is Hard To Find
Acts 2:1-13

What we need is transformation. We need less of the “have-to”, and more of the “want-to”.

The giving of the Law meant that the nation was ready to grow up and be productive.

That is, the Law, all the commandments given by God to Moses on Mt. Sinai really did nothing to set us free.

For the person who has truly met Christ, Pentecost means that our hearts are changed.

He gives us a new heart. And He lives there in that good heart.

It means freedom and joy and hope and peace and intimacy with God.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Acts 2:1-13

Heading Toward Pentecost
We Are Not Alone
Acts 2:1-13

What a difference! News of defeat turned to news of triumph.

I would like to spend the next few weeks looking at this passage of Scripture. There is much that can be said about Pentecost.

Pentecost was one of 3 pilgrim festivals–that is, when all Jewish men were required to travel to Jerusalem with sacrifices and offerings.

Christianity is really about God coming to us.

We know we don’t belong here, and we won’t be here long either. But we are meant to come faithfully to find God.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Matthew 28:1-10

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
The Promise of Easter
Matthew 28:1-10

I would like to take this opportunity to talk about the three promises of Easter. Each promise is marked by emptiness: the empty cross, the empty tomb, and the empty burial clothes.

Do not think for a moment that they did not have absolute knowledge that Jesus was very dead when they took Him from the cross.

In short, because the cross is empty, we have the full promise of eternal glory with God.

He had risen and the tomb was empty! Do we realize just how much promise that empty tomb gives us?

For, in the knowledge of the empty tomb we find the truth of the resurrection of Jesus Christ and the promise to every one of us that we too can be raised to eternal life.

And the promise of that empty tomb is that we can also live after we die.

Inside the tomb were the empty burial clothes, and it was in the emptiness of the burial clothes that they found they could still have the promise of personal fellowship with the Lord Jesus.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: John 11:45-12:37

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
Jesus Walks Toward Death So We Can Live
John 11:45-12:37

Reading around the Triumphal Entry Story in Scripture, we get a much bigger picture of what is really going on.

He was a threat to order and the established system, and the leaders in place at the time were not happy.

So, we have a wealthy family on the outskirts of Jerusalem throwing a huge party with an outlaw as the guest of honor, six days before Passover begins.

Jesus is not that kind of a king. He knows He has come to Jerusalem, at Passover time, to die.

In our lives and society today, are we the “comfortable people” or are we working and sacrificing for revolutionary change in our world?

The road to true, real, vibrant life runs through the death of Jesus and includes the requirement that we also put our old sinful nature to death with Jesus, so that we can then live.

Have mercy on us, O God, according to your steadfast love; according to your abundant mercy blot out our transgressions.
Wash us thoroughly from our iniquity, and cleanse us from our sin! For we know our transgressions, and our sin is ever before us.

Against you, you only, have we sinned and done what is evil in your sight, so that you may be justified in your words and blameless in your judgment.
Hide your face from our sins, and blot out all our iniquities.

Create in us a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within us.
Cast us not away from your presence, and take not your Holy Spirit from us.

Restore to us the joy of your salvation, and uphold us with a willing spirit.
For you will not delight in sacrifice, or we would give it.

You will not be pleased with a burnt offering.
Our sacrifice, O God, is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Psalm 51:13-19

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
The New Life
Psalm 51:13-19

That is a key point, because without it the rest of the Psalm, which we will look at today, is little more than some more nice words.

I hope that is encouraging to you, God can use us even through the things that we’ve done that were wrong.

The joy is there, God really can turn those hearts back to Himself, and there is a role for us to play in that process which includes and begins with our hearts at prayer.

God wants our broken and contrite heart because He knows that is the point when we let go and let God make it good.

And I wanted us to have words for our broken, contrite hearts, that affirm those as an offering in which God deeply delights.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Psalm 51:6-12

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
The Cleansing Shower
Psalm 51:6-12

I’ve been using very specific language this year, we remember the cross and celebrate the empty tomb.

The focus turns from the ugliness of sin to the incredible beauty of God’s forgiveness.

There was no denial or minimization of sin, the confession was complete, and now the next step–out of the death of sin, is just as complete.

Our part is to really look at our sin, be convicted of our sin, and then honestly confess it before God.

Now this “cleansing” is a spiritual cleansing, a declaration in the sight of God that we are now spiritually clean, that the defilement of sin has been dealt with by the blood of the innocent Lamb of God, and so now we are clean.

It’s a prayer for God to touch deeply, to reach into a heart that was darkened and stained by sin, and to replace it with something pure–a heart of love and full of goodness and purity.

That steadfast/willing spirit we pray for here keeps us going by growing our love for God and helps us to focus on the joy of walking with God, day in and day out.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Psalm 51:3-6

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
Looking Deeply; Letting Go Completely
Psalm 51:3-6

We are in the middle of the season of Lent, and a significant part of getting ready for Easter is examining ourselves so that we can deal with anything in our lives that causes guilt.

Last week we studied the first part, and I encouraged you to take some time this past week to really reflect and ask the Holy Spirit to bring conviction of any sin that is in your life.

The NRSV and NASB take that same original word and translate “inner being” and make the verse to mean that God wants us to know truth/faithfulness/wisdom in the depths of ourselves.

Let me just say really clearly: if there is some deep-rooted guilt/shame in your life today, some secret you’ve tried to bury, it is much, much healthier for you to deal with it.

Sin is, at its core, a rebellion, a rejection, of God and all His goodness.

It’s like David knows there is only one possible verdict, and so rather than fight, or get angry at God, or resent God, or turn away, David just says, “God, you are right.”

Here this clearly: your sin has been dealt with. Forgiveness is offered, freedom is available and it is here right now, this moment.

Speaker: Pastor Val Watkins
Scripture Text: Psalm 51:1-2

A Journey of Confession and Repentance
I Cannot Climb This Mountain Myself
Psalm 51:1-2

I believe that what broke David’s heart was not the sexual sin but rather the injustice sin.

Stop rationalizing and stop comparing to others. This is an instant short-circuit to the conviction process.

David begins in an interesting place–the plea for mercy rooted in the existing relationship of love.

Conviction of our sin is in no way a rejection of us by God. Our adoption is secure; our role as God’s children does not change in light of our sin or of God’s discipline in our lives.

It is like David knows, anticipates, how deeply the sin hurts God because of the depth of God’s love for David.

Once we recognize our sin, own it, and allow the reality of what sin does to us and to our relationship with God to sink in, then (and maybe only then?) we can begin to ask for the blotting, the washing, and the cleansing that we need from sin.