Be careful. Hi, I'm Tony. I'm Evan. I'm Lexi. Lexi, good to meet you both. Good to meet you too. I wanted to stop and talk. Okay, what would you like to talk about? Actually, would you like to pray over my son? How old is your son? Two months old. He's being a little cranky today. He's had a rough day. What's making it a rough day for him? Just being a baby? What's his name again? Mateo. Mateo. Hi, Mateo. Hi. Hi, Mateo. How old is he? Two months. Two months. Oh, my goodness. Father in heaven, I'm honored, blessed to be able to pray for this little boy. Father, my hope for him is that he would be numbered among your elect. that Father, the day would come when he would hear the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ, that he would repent and believe by faith, that he would be numbered among one of your own people. that Lord, that you would use him, Father, however you see fit for your own glory. Father, please be with this little one, Lord, as his parents seek to raise him. I pray, Father, that they would raise him in the instruction of the Lord. And I pray, Father, that you would bless this little lad in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. So, do the two of you have any particular spiritual beliefs? No. I grew up in a Catholic church with my grandma. Yeah, I grew up in a Catholic church too, at least the first 10 years. Yeah. So, I'm sorry, and your name again is? Lexi. Lexi and? Evan. Lexi and Evan. So, He's amazing. My youngest is 29, so it's hard to... I have two grandkids that are two. I can't even remember them that small. So let me ask the two of you this, since we've known each other now for two minutes and I got to pray for your baby. If the two of you were to die today, and obviously I don't want that, but if you were to die today and stand before God, And God asked, Evan, Lexi, why should I allow you into heaven? What would you say? Okay, honest answer. What do you think, Lexi? Bad people don't always do bad things. Just because you do something bad doesn't mean you're a bad person. As long as you ask for forgiveness and learn from your mistakes, I feel like you can get into heaven. Okay. So how good do you think a person has to be to get into heaven? Nobody's perfect. Yeah, nobody's perfect. I just think if your intentions are pure, then... So here's what Jesus said about some of this. He said, you are to be perfect as your heavenly father is perfect. Now, I just turned 60. I haven't lived a perfect day in my life, okay? But yet, if we're going to hope in purity, goodness, if we're gonna hope in our purity, our goodness, our best efforts to get into heaven, well then we have to be able to live up to God's standards of purity, goodness, for that to happen. The problem is, his standard is moral perfection, because he's God, right? And none of us are perfect. Have either of you been in a courtroom before? Oh, really? Okay. All right. Okay. So I want to paint a picture, try to explain what I'm saying. I want to paint a picture. And you two are going to be in this picture. I don't want you to think for a second I think that you would do what I'm about to suggest, okay? It's just to paint a picture. So instead of stopping to ask me to pray for this handsome little man, you two pull off to the side and you leave the baby in the car. You run over to the shell station and rob the shell station. Again, I don't think you would do that. And neither one of you are good at it. And you get caught. you get caught. It's not a case of mistaken identity. It's not a corrupt system. You actually did the crime. In fact, you feel remorse about it and you want to seek forgiveness and so you write out confessions. One thing I know about confessions is they never show a person's innocence. They only show a person's guilt. Even though you've admitted to the crime, you're still entitled to your day in court. And so you go to trial, and of course you're found guilty. Because, I mean, you've admitted to it. Now it's the day of sentencing. And the judge asks, Evan, Lexi, what do you have to say for yourself? And you say, well, your honor, we've admitted to it. We've confessed. We're sorry. We want to try to live pure and good lives. We think you ought to just forgive us and let us go. Is he going to let you go? No. No, not if he's a good judge. If he's a good judge, he has to follow the law, right? So all of us, every one of us, we've all broken God's law, right? In our mind, in our mind, with our words, with our actions, just about every day of our life. One of the first words this little guy is going to learn, and you're not going to teach it to him, One of the first words he's going to ever say is no. That's what babies do, because they're born with that sinful nature. Their propensity is to do that which is wrong. It's not toward purity. It's like, I'm going to disobey my parents. I'm going to whack my brother or sister over the head with a block just for the fun of it. And you're not going to teach him any of those things, right? So before God, we have a pretty long criminal history. lying, stealing, taking God's name in vain, harboring bitterness or hatred toward another person, being selfish, I mean the list goes on and on and on, right? Okay, so back to the courtroom. So, you've admitted, you've admitted the crime, you've confessed, you've said you want to live good, pure lives, you're hoping the judge is going to forgive you and just let you go, and as you expect, the judge can't let you go, because not only does he have the shell station robbery, but he has a life of criminal history in front of him, right? So the judge not only won't let you go, but he sentences you both to death. So they're going to take you both into the next room, separate you from your child, and they're going to put you to sleep. But before that happens, the judge who found you guilty, the judge who alone has the authority to sentence you to death, stands up from behind his bench, takes off those black robes of authority, He steps down, and he says to the two of you, look, I rightly found you guilty. Evan and Lexi, you are guilty. And I have the authority to sentence you to death, and that's a just punishment for your life of crime. But I'm going to take your place. The judge walks into the next room, allows himself to be strapped to a gurney with your name on it, allows a needle to be driven into his arm with your name on it. And he dies the death you're supposed to die, not because you're innocent. You broke the law, not because you confessed, not because you asked for forgiveness, not because you promised to try to live a pure and good life, because none of that helped you during trial. None of that helped you during sentencing. He did it for only one reason, because he wanted to extend love, grace, and mercy to you to the point that he would lay down his own life for you. What would you think of a judge who would do that? Yes, Lexi. God the Father sent his Son to earth in the person of Jesus Christ, truly God, truly man, without sin. He lived a life of perfection for some 33 years that the three of us and your son eventually won't be able to live for 33 seconds. Yet even though he never broke the law, even though he was perfect in every way, God in the flesh, He voluntarily submitted himself to the torturous, bloody death of a Roman cross to take upon himself the punishment we rightly deserve for our sins against God. And then he forever defeated sin and death when he rose from the grave. Now, what if after the judge did that for you, you walked out of the courtroom, you know, this isn't Chicago, this is Davenport, news travels fast, The whole town knows that this amazing thing happened in the courtroom. They give you your property. They release you. You step out of the courtroom. Cameras, reporters, pad and paper, microphones. They want to talk to Evan and Lexi. They have one question. What do you think about what the judge did? And you say, well, you know, we told him we were going to try to live pure lives. We told him we were sorry. We confessed. We asked for forgiveness, so it's really not that big a deal that he did that. Can you ever imagine yourself saying that? No. No, I can't. I can't imagine you saying that either. But unless you put your faith and your trust in Jesus Christ alone for your salvation, that's what you do every day of your life. You say, yeah, that's neat, but I'm gonna get there on my own. Yeah, that's pretty good, but That's not for me. That's what you do every day of your life, that you don't receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and your Savior. Salvation is by the grace of God alone, through faith alone in Jesus Christ alone. It's not by works. It's not by going to church on Sunday. It's not by sitting in a confession. It's not by trying to do penance or anything like that. The Bible says the wages, what we earn for our sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. I'm wearing a little bracelet, it's not worth anything. Let's say for stopping and letting me pray and let me talk to you, I'd say, you know what, Evan, I'm gonna give you my bracelet. You say, okay, and you put it on, I say that'll be $300. Is it still a gift? No, if you have to do anything to earn it, work for it, Anything to deserve it. It's no longer a gift, it's wages. But salvation isn't by wages. And most religions, including Catholicism, most religions say you have to earn your way into heaven. The Bible says there's nothing we can do to earn it. It's a free gift. You simply have to receive it. Do you have Bibles? No, I was actually going to ask for one. Can I give you a couple? Great. Yeah, you're welcome. Thank you so much. So let me ask you before you go, since I've already taken so much of your time. Oh, no, no. Do you believe what I'm telling you? I want you to be honest, okay? I don't want you to do anything for me. If you do anything for me, it's not going to be real. But do you believe what I'm telling you is true? Oh yes, I got chills. Yes, it makes a lot of sense. Is there any reason, is there any sin in your life? You don't have to tell me what it is. Is there any sin in your life that you love so much that you're willing to die and go to hell so that you could spend this life enjoying that sin that you love so much? No? Is there any reason why you wouldn't receive Jesus Christ as your Lord and your Savior? to receive forgiveness for your sins against him, to receive the free gift of eternal life? I mean, there probably is, but off the top of my head, no. Okay. Well, you're not going to be offered a more precious gift. Even more precious than that beautiful little boy is the gift of heaven that we can never earn or deserve. So I Look, I can't make you do anything. I wouldn't even try to make you do anything. All I could do is plead with you to love you as my neighbor and say, turn to Christ and live while God's given you time. He'll forgive your sin. You'll be reconciled to him and he will adopt you both as beloved children and will never let you go. Not because you're good, but because of the goodness of God that would allow his son to die for sinners like us. you're not going to be offered a more precious gift. Okay. Good to meet you Evan. Good to meet you. Lexi. Thank you. Thank you for letting me pray for your little boy. No salesman's going to come to your door, but there's information and there's information in there about our church. The door's always open and you're always welcome. All right. God bless you both. Have a good night.