(Clip) How to Fix Your Eyes on Him

Hebrews 12.2 says this. Fixing our eyes on Jesus. Think about this.

Fixing our eyes on Jesus, who is the pioneer and perfecter of our faith. You know what fixing means? Of course you do. You can all thank Joanne and Chip for an illustration here on fixing.

When your brick wall is falling apart, fix those bricks. You're putting something back in place. So when our eyes get off, it says fix.

Fix your eyes on Jesus. Bring yourself back as you're drifting. I want to look at this.

No, fix your eyes back on Jesus. And I shared with the first service, I was listening to worship this morning. It was a great song.

I'm worshiping and it's a country singer, Vince Gill I think, and he was singing this wonderful worship song. And I came back in and it goes from him, now George Jones is singing. Singing this depressing song.

He stopped loving her today. And I'm like, what? What happened? They put a reef up on his something and now he's drunk. He's killed himself through alcohol.

And I went from worshiping to this. What happened? Fix your eyes. Get your eyes back on Christ.

It's okay you're in the balcony too. This is for you. Get your eyes fixed on Christ.

Turn back to Him. We drift off. And then he says fix your eyes.

Fix your eyes. It's a plea. Fix your eyes.

It's like slap. Get your face back on. What are you doing? Get back on.

Fix your eyes on Jesus. That's your only hope. That's the only way you're going to get through life.

It's not on Facebook. It's not on YouTube. It's not through your friends.

I might just preach a little bit now. If I just stay here for a minute. Because you've got to fix your eyes.

My goodness. 11am. You've got to wake up.

Something's wrong in this service. But I'm serious. Fixing.

It's like something is broken. I have to fix it. Something is broken in my mental state.

I have to fix it. I have to fix my eyes. Everything in the world is pulling you away from Christ.

Yes, everything that is not of God is pulling you away from Christ. Pulling me away from Christ. It says fix.

Get your eyes back on track. Before anybody ever walks away from Christ, guess what they started doing? Remove their eyes away from Him. Anytime a marriage falls apart, what happens? Their eyes fall away.

Anytime church is boring, and I don't want to hear God anymore, they're moving their eyes. Because there's no way you can keep your eyes fixed on the cross. Fixed on the bloodstained cross.

Fixed on the cross of Jesus who was beaten beyond recognition. His own mother couldn't even recognize Him. We heard firsthand.

Right? He couldn't recognize Him. Nothing about this is something that we should gloat in. But fixing, reminding ourselves of the cross.

Fixing our eyes. Bringing our eyes back to Jesus. Because I don't know about you, but we have the tendency to drift.

Drift away from the cross. Drift away from the things that are essential. You know, that's an interesting point.

Maybe God wants me to stay here for a minute. Fixing our eyes. So many people, I believe even maybe at this service, your eyes have gotten off of Christ.

That passion you once had maybe for Jesus is gone. You're going through rules and rituals. You're doing things out of obligation and duty.

You've lost your first love. You come to church when it's convenient. I just, at the first service, talked about baptism.

And it's sad, we normally do it when it's convenient. Can you imagine seeing the crucifixion or the resurrection, and then saying, I'll get to church when it's convenient. Jane back to Easter bunnies.

And, you know, the good things. And the chocolate. I want to eat chocolate.

No, no. This is truth. This is where some of you all never get to talk to again.

This is it. This is it. So if I could leave you with the encouraging word, it would be fix your eyes on Jesus.

Get your eyes for the love of God off of Facebook. Off of the media. Off friendships and destructive relationships that are pulling you back away from God.

Get your eyes fixed back on Jesus. No, the grass is not greener. I could shout that until the day I die.

The grass is never greener. That's the enticement. That's the enticement the enemy uses.

Same thing as fishing. Oh, look at that wonderful trout. See that wonderful big juicy worm.

Until it's being grilled later in the day. It looks so good. That's enticement.

That's why it's called lust. An enticement is you don't see the hook until you take the bait. And if you fix your eyes on Jesus, that is a sure foundation that will never fail.

He's a pioneer. He's a perfecter of our faith. For the joy set before Him, He endured the cross.

I don't even know why those two words are in the same sentence. For the joy set... If I knew that was coming... This one looks worse. If I knew this was coming, I would not have a lot of joy.

I would have... The joy set before Him. The joy set before... What joy? The sins of humanity. Listen, in all types of... I don't care what denomination you're really a part of, but you have to believe the essentials of the Gospel.

The essentials are that the blood of Christ covered every single sin. There's no work you have to do later. There's nothing else.

It's fully paid on the cross. It is finished. Every sin.

So He sees the joy set before Him of covering every one sin. And I heard a beautiful sound Friday night. Those of you who were here will remember that sound.

And I'm going to remind you. It sounded like this. For 25 minutes, people were nailing their sins to the cross.

Every sin. But Shane, you don't know. Lust.

Pornography. Abuse. Anger.

Greed. Everything was being nailed to the cross. Everything.

So He set His eyes on the joy that was before Him, and He endured the cross. And we think, well, endured, yeah. Woo! If we had time to go through what He went through, like Morgan illustrated, it's amazing.

It's amazing. And I'll probably tell this a lot, so if you're tired of hearing it, that's too bad. But, if I was Jesus, as soon as that guy spit in my face, and hit me? Innocent? Okay.

Peter, where is this? Okay, that's enough. I'm starting over. We tried with Noah.

We tried with Noah, you guys. The whole world's flooded. We tried with Noah.

Look what happened. I'm starting over. But He endured the cross.

The mocking. The same religious leaders who are going into the Holy of Holies to make atonement for the sins of the people. The high priest is mocking the very Passover lamb that they are acknowledging.

They're mocking Him. They're ridiculing Him. They're hitting Him.

The thorn's pressed on His skull. The blood is coming down. And He is sitting there.

The joy that's set before Him. He is enduring the shame of His clothes being ripped off, being scorched as the skin is pulled off the body. That's the point of being whipped with the cat of nine tails.

They have glass and sharp bones in there that actually grabs the skin and pulls it off. And He's sitting there, enduring the cross. And we're going to come in and worship as if we're in a hurry? My God.

Don't get me started on this one. But this is so dramatic. The joy set before Him.

He endured the pain. He endured the suffering, the scorning, and the shame. There was no other way to die that could have been that bad.

The Bible talks about a curse is the person who is hung on a tree. And I often wonder, God, why didn't You just take Him way up on Mount Moriah? Nobody was there. Just slay Him.

It's done. Thank God. But He's a public spectacle.

The shame. And theologians are divided. But there's so many.

If we could pull in Old Testament imagery. Passover lamb, scapegoat, the blood before the people, the shame, the guilt. In short, He took all of that.

He bore the shame. And I talk to a lot of people who are living with a lot of shame and guilt. Because of something somebody did to them.

Or what they did to somebody. And the price on the cross covers all of that. All of it.

All the shame. All the guilt. Every single sin.

It's hard. In our humanity. And in our depravity.

We have to fix our eyes back on Christ. Because we look at. I get sometimes upset at what my past was.

And what I did. And the years I wasted. And the lives I've ruined.

And it's good to learn from those. But you don't hang your hat there. You say, but because of Christ I'm here.

And the love of God, I'm here.