MYC ONE EVENT INVITATION

2 If, then, there is any encouragement in Christ, if any consolation of love, if any fellowship with the Spirit, if any affection and mercy, 2 make my joy complete by thinking the same way, having the same love, united in spirit, intent on one purpose.

COMPLETE

UNITED

Tonight is about unity in Christ… being one with Him and one another as a family… and being complete in love, fellowship, affection, and mercy.

If you’ll allow me a few minutes, I’d like to tell you about two things.

[1- BROKENNESS] If these are the things we are seeking, it means they are also what we are currently lacking.

Can I ask you a question, and can I ask you to be honest with yourself? You’re answering it internally, so you don’t need to put on a good face or pretend to have it all together.

Do you feel complete right now?

Do you wake up in the morning, look in the mirror, and tell yourself, “Wow, I am abundantly fulfilled in every way! My heart is literally overflowing with love, mercy, affection, and fellowship.”

Or, if you are like most of us, you ache in certain ways. You experience:

· Loneliness

· Anxiety

· The feeling that you don’t matter

· Depression

· Rejected

BELIEVE ME, I KNOW… I’VE EXPERIENCED MOST OF THEM.

Or, if I could put a category label on this, it's your experience of brokenness.

We all feel the world isn’t as it should be. We all have a sense that it should be one way, but it is something different. Can I share a little nugget of wisdom with you? There's a name for that gap between how things are and how we know they should be… It’scalled sin. Sin breaks everything. It divides, corrupts, and separates. It divides people, corrupts hearts, and separates us from God.

I could rattle off a list, but you don’t need me to, because you’ve already experienced a lot of it.

So what do we do about this? If sin divides, corrupts, and separates… if it only leads to more brokenness, then how on earth do you become whole again?

That’s the million-dollar question, isn’t it?

The first thing we typically go to is our own toolbox to find the right tool and get to work.

· We try to do better and become better people

· We go to church more often

· We look at the commands from scripture and craft them into a ladder of deeds that will get us out of the hole we dug.

Or… we blindly believe that belonging to a Christian family, attendance in a local church body, or having scriptural knowledge means that we are Christian and that those things are what repair our brokenness.

And all of these things are like globs of glue that we smear on a shattered piece of ourselves and slap it back on, hoping that this time, it will do the trick.

Does that sound like completeness or patchwork? It sounds silly, but isn’t that what we do?

The truth I want to present to you tonight is that YOU CANNOT FIX YOURSELF. You have no tools in your toolkit that will fix what’s broken. You have no glue strong enough to hold the shattered pieces of yourself together.

You need to be made new. And that only comes one way. Not by trying harder, going to church more often, or doing more ‘righteous’ things.

You need the Author of Life to give you new life.

IT IS ABOUT A RELATIONSHIP WITH A PERSON.

If you want to be made whole, you need to be in Christ.

· Jesus is the name above every name—the eternal Son of God who stepped out of heaven to seek and save the lost. He came to set captives free and restore what sin has broken.

· Our sin deserves judgment. But when Jesus died on the cross, He took that judgment on Himself. He bore the wrath we deserved so we could receive mercy instead.

· And it didn’t end there.

· He rose from the grave in power and victory. That’s why He is exalted above all—because He humbled Himself, died for our sins, and now reigns as King with all authority in heaven and on earth.

You can’t have a relationship with a dead person. Jesus is alive, and He will make you alive as well if you believe in Him and confess with your mouth that He is both Savior and Lord.

If you want to be complete, you must be in Christ.

So, before I get to the second thing that I want to tell you, I want to give you a chance to make that decision. We have people eagerly waiting to pray that prayer with you. Maybe this is your first time hearing this message, or if you’re like me, maybe you’ve realized you have been trying to put yourself back together… or that you have believed you are something you are not.

Whatever the case may be, right now is the perfect time to get right with God. Make that decision today to cry out to Jesus, confess Him as Lord, and let Him make you complete. Please raise your hand, and we’ll have someone come and pray with you right now.

[pause for decision]

[2- COMMUNITY] If you just made that decision — welcome. You are new. And here's what I want you to know right now: you were never meant to walk this out alone. Now that you are in Christ and are new creations… made whole by having a relationship with the one who created you… You MUST get connected with other believers. Please do not leave here without having that connection and unity with other Christians.

The MYC was created for this… for you to have a place where you can connect and belong with other believers your age. We want you to be a part of what we are doing, so please connect with us so we can get you plugged in to the new community we are building. MYC is your community and connection point, but it leads you to a local church. The MYC is a community of believers from churches across this area — and it's designed to connect you to a local body where real growth happens. So let me ask you one more question:

Do you have a church home?

If yes, praise God; if no, please come talk to us (me, Chris, Steve, Josh). We are all pastors who would love to connect you with one of our churches or with one of the churches represented here. You can’t belong on your own.. You need to be a part of a local body of believers. You cannot have fellowship by yourself. Please come see one of us for more information.

Complete in Christ. United Together. That's what tonight is about, and that's what we want for you.