The sacrifice that leads to great gain

Let's go to the Word of God brothers and we are going to continue with our sermon that we started last Sunday on the cost of following Jesus, the cost of discipleship and I want to continue emphasizing this dimension of sacrifice that leads to great gain and how essential it is that we understand exactly what the call of Christ consists of and what it is that we embrace when we surrender our lives to the Lord when we enter the path of the Gospel.

As a summary and also to reinforce what we have learned, we were talking about how many times in the society we live in, in this 21st century and in this culture, especially in the north of the United States and in Europe, like the Gospel it is undergoing an evolution and not necessarily for the better, where many times the true nature of the Christian life is not being emphasized, which is a life that includes sacrifices, includes the cross; not only for our champion, our prototype, which is Christ Jesus, but also for us. Hence what the Lord said, right? "If anyone wants to be my disciple, take up his cross every day and follow me."

We were talking about how the Lord, unlike perhaps many of us, was not totally happy with all the people who were following him. At the time of His greatest popularity, when large crowds followed Him, there is a passage that shows us that the Lord turned to that large crowd and implicitly made it clear to them that they needed to consider why they were following Him and that it was not for what He could do for them. It was not because of the loaves and fishes that He had multiplied, it was not to return Israel to its former political prominence, it was not because the Lord could heal their diseases or deliver them from the demons that oppressed them; heal them from poverty, all this was true and He had done it and would continue to do it and continues to do it.

But those are accessory things, they are additional things. They are additional benefits of the Christian life but it is not the center of the Christian life nor is it the one for which we should seek Jesus.

Brother Gonzalo during the devotional said that: what happens when we are diagnosed with a disease? what happens when we lose the house? what happens when we lose work? What happens when our marriage isn't going exactly the way we want it to be? What happens when we have a boss who doesn't treat us well? when we crash the car, when we don't have money to pay the rent. When we go to the supermarket and look to pay, we discover that we don't have all the money to pay for the purchase.

What happens in those moments? Can we then also adore the Lord, adore Him, glorify Him, feel that we are still in the center of His Will? Can we still experience joy in Christianity? because we have already become aware that this is not truly what the love of God guarantees us, that there are other things that are more important. That we can say as the writer of Habakkuk says that: "Even though the fig tree does not blossom, even though there are no vines in the fields, even though there are no cows in the folds" even though the bills are not all paid "we will still rejoice in the Lord. "

I remember my mother when I was very little there in the Dominican Republic, she used to say: "Look when there is nothing in the kitchen to cook, I feel happy in a sense because then I can dedicate myself to worshiping the Lord more and praising Him more." ." And by the way: when the Lord came to our family everything changed completely. The blessing came, the provision came; but first my mom had to understand that this was not the reason to serve the Lord, that there are other more important things.

And what is interesting is that when that surrender of our total being occurs in us, we know that we are going to serve the Lord, rain, shine or wind, there is a lot or there is little, the pantry is full or empty, we are in great health or not. , then the Lord says: you know what? Now I am going to bless you, now I am going to provide you, now I am going to give you.

Because ironically many times in the Christian life it is not until we get rid of things that things begin to come to us. Many times the Lord has to wean us, for using that word, right? from dependence, from material things and understanding why we serve Him and learning to see Him as the center, and that only comes when we have truly gone through a process of crucifixion. I don't know if you can help me, Javier up there? I'm hearing something up there that's not quite right, some hole up there. I don't know if you hear it over there but I do hear it completely fine.

So brothers, how can that happen, how does this process happen in our life to be able to reach that point where we become independent of material things? and that can only come when we have gone through a process, and God will often put us through that. It is a process in which God is going to put us in times of drought and sterility in which we are going to lack many things so that we can then learn that we do not die without those things.

When the Lord detaches us from those things and then we can understand that our life does not depend on that, as the Lord Jesus Christ says that man does not depend on food, bread and clothing; life does not consist of those things but in every Word that comes out of the mouth of God and God wants to put us through that process. Javier, he's still not well, please help me with this because it distracts me, sorry. I'm a little obsessive-compulsive, yes, it's on; I don't know if this will be the problem. No, I don't think so, that's fine.

Do you remember the passage from Deuteronomy where the Lord tells the Hebrews to remember the path they took in the desert? They spent forty years in the desert and God kept them practically only with manna, and He told them: I put you through that to discipline you, so that you would understand that man will not live on bread alone, so that you would detach yourself from the love of material things and now I am going to bring you into a land flowing with milk and honey, and now I am going to give you everything you need. But first God has to put us through that process.

And that is what he wants us to learn when we enter the paths of the Gospel, and that is why God has to crucify us, God has to break us to reach that point in our life. And that is why a lot of the Gospel talks about that, about leaving everything to find Jesus Christ.

We talked about all these passages right? where over and over again, when these great multitudes followed the Lord He said to them: Hey, if you don't hate your father and mother, wife and children and brothers and even your own life you can't be My disciples. When he called Peter and his companions, the Bible says that they left their boats ashore, which was the very essence of their survival. It says that: "Leaving everything they followed him." When the Lord healed blind Bartimaeus, it says that: "Bartimaeus left his cloak and followed the Lord." So that's the so-called radical.

When he called Levi, it says that Levi was attending to the collection table for taxes and internal revenue, and when he called Levi and told him: "Come and follow me" and Levi left, he says: "Leaving everything, he got up and followed him." And Levi then said that he gave him a great banquet in his house, and in that banquet he invited all his friends, what we have to be doing in our lives, he invited all his friends, all the sinful people of the city, and there was a great company of tax collectors and others who reclined with them. Levi left his profession, invited all his friends and then became an evangelist and a follower of Jesus Christ.

In Mark chapter 8 it says that: "Jesus called the crowd and his disciples and said to them: If anyone wants to come after Me, he must deny himself, take up his cross and follow me; for whoever wants to save his life will lose it." and everyone who loses his life because of Me and the Gospel will save it."

There is another passage from which we read where the Lord calls a person on the road and this man says: Lord, I am going to follow you wherever you go, but he did not understand something and that is, the Lord did not really have a single place where to go, His life was itinerant and the Lord warned him, He said: "Foxes have dens and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head."

Are we willing to follow the Lord wherever He leads us? Are we willing to accompany Jesus on His way through the Earth? Are we willing to follow Christ when He takes us to a dangerous neighborhood for example to proclaim His Word?

I have told you before that when God called us here to this part of the city, we had an old building that had been given to us in the city of Cambridge, in the Cambridge Port area, a very nice middle-class area of the city, High average. And the Lord gave us that building completely free of charge and we were there very calmly, the area was very beautiful, very decent. But the Lord gave me a call to come here to this part of the city and leave that place that was so comfortable for us, we didn't have to pay a penny, the building had been given to us.

And He called us to a tremendously dangerous part of the city because that's where He was going, that's where He wanted to be here in this area, the Holy Spirit wanted to establish a place here. And the question that we had to ask ourselves at that moment: Lord, what do we do if we stay here? as Pedro said: Let's make three stores, we are comfortable here; here is the Presence of the Lord, here is the vision, here is the joy of the Lord why don't we stay Lord here on top? and the Lord said: No, no, we have to go down. There are people who need Me.

And then the Lord brought us to this place. And so it is that many times we have to ask ourselves: Lord, where do you want me to go, where do you want me to follow you? Because the Holy Spirit moves where He wants and He needs people with a missionary heart who are willing to lose everything so that He can use them and each one of us has to be like a, I'm going to say: a terrorist but it's a good terrorist, not a bad one.

I remember one time when they invited me to preach at a high school graduation in a Christian Church and I think I was too heavy, I think that part of me and I talked to them about being terrorists and about Jesus as the greatest terrorist of all the centuries and it seems that some did not like it; Others did receive it very well, but I clarified, but it is that comparing the Church or Jesus Christ with a terrorist, many people grind their teeth when they hear that.

But in a sense, yes, because these terrorists, these suicide bombers are willing to lose their lives for their cause and immolate themselves for destruction and to be used by the devil. Well we are suicidal but we are for Christ and we lose our life but we gain it, we die but rise again in Christ Jesus.

Those terrorists are taught to despise their life, to despise it completely. And I understand that part of the training for a terrorist who is going to commit suicide in a bomb that is going to explode is that they put him in a coffin and close the coffin, and they lower him into a real grave, and they have him there. for a while so that he goes through the mental, cerebral process of seeing himself dead to help him prepare for the death that is to come.

And you know what brother? that we have to do something like that, not so gloomy or gloomy, but in a sense the Lord Jesus wants us to go through a process of dying ourselves to everything we love and consider valuable in order to then enter into what Christ wants us to do. we enter, to be able to experience the joy of the Lord, to be able to be used by God.

God cannot fill anyone who is first empty. God cannot use anyone who is not willing to go where the Lord leads even if they are the least pleasant places in the world. But you know what? The wonderful thing is that, the Bible says, that when you are willing to pay the price of discipleship, when you are willing to die as Christ died to all His privileges, prerogatives and rights, then is when you truly find your life. When you experience the joy of the Lord, when you experience the dignity to which God wants to lead you, and that is the process.

Jesus said, look in John chapter 12 verse 23, one of my favorite images: the grain of wheat. It says that: "Jesus answered them saying: The hour has come for the Son of Man to be glorified" what was Jesus Christ referring to when he said that the hour had come for Him to be glorified, hm? Was he referring to the fact that they were going to come looking for him with a royal carriage and that they were going to take him with bombs and cymbals to the city palace? No, he was referring to the fact that they were going to take him to the cross but he saw it as His glorification, the moment for Him to be glorified. On the cross He was to be glorified.

Paradoxically, the moment of greatest loss was when the Lord was truly going to find all His glory and was going to do there on the cross the greatest feat ever done by someone who was, he says: defeat principalities and powers, annul decrees that we had against us, the devil always accusing us, we had no one to defend us, publicly displaying and publicly shaming demonic powers, achieving salvation for all of us, all humanity that gave itself to Christ was going to be able to be saved through His cross and all that was made possible by the sacrifice that He assumed upon His Person.

That is why He said: The time has come for Me to be glorified and then He added, implicitly referring to that paradoxical and contradictory dynamic of glorification through humiliation, He said: "Truly, truly I tell you that if the grain of Wheat does not fall on the ground and die, it remains alone, but if it dies it bears much fruit." That is a verse that all of us must memorize.

Who is the grain of wheat? the grain of wheat is not, the grain of wheat is you and I am. I am the grain of wheat and you are the grain of wheat. What happens to a grain of wheat? you with a grain of wheat, we are going to use something more familiar to us, a large bean let's say, beans for the Caribbean.

If that grain does not go into the ground and is sown, if that seed, what happens to a seed when it enters the ground? the farmer puts it deep. That is why farmers open trails in the ground, because if the seed remains only on the surface, the process that has to occur does not take place. No, the seed has to be put deep into the earth, there is the first symbol of death. If the grain of wheat does not fall to the ground, it remains alone.

Now what happens when a seed is entered deep into the earth? A death process begins for that seed. That seed begins to interact with the moisture of the earth, with the acids that are in the earth and the bark begins to rot, that hard part of the seed begins to be softened by the elements of the earth and it gradually breaks down, because if That doesn't break, what's up? what is inside, the richness of that grain that is inside, right? the bark is to protect the life within.

It is like the skull that protects the precious brain that is inside you, the cortex is that. And we can say that this is our life too. Do you know, brother, that we fall so in love with the crust that we forget that this is not what matters, what matters is what is inside, the spirit?

The bark is your body, the bark is your youth, the bark is your beauty, the bark is your money, the bark is your house, the bark is your work, the bark is your profession; all these things are simply additional things, they are accessories to the life that is within you. And we often fall in love with the bark.

The young woman falls in love with her beauty, the young man falls in love with her false manhood, the professional falls in love with her salary of $250,000 a year and her BMW that changes every year and the good steaks she eats three, four times a year. the week and that the company charges it even because it has an expense account. And then he proclaims himself too busy to go to Church, to serve the Lord and in the corporation they tell him: look, we are paying you a lot of money, they don't tell him that, but what they are saying is: but you have to sell your soul to the company, you have to work eighty, a hundred hours if necessary, you have to neglect your family, you do not have time to go to Church and to serve the Lord; You cannot spend time praying, searching for the Word, going to a retreat because you have to return the money that we pay you by giving your life for the company. And if the company tells you to do something unethical and lie in the ads we give or the products we offer it doesn't matter.

Look, brothers, let me put myself here autobiographical for a moment. I bought a car this week, glory to God, a small car, it's the most beautiful there, and mine was embarrassing there with all the noise it made when the brothers received me there sometimes in the morning. But you know what? when you go, and incidentally if there is someone here who sells cars, I am not referring to you; I know that you are a serious Christian and that you do nothing like that, but listen to me, brothers, sometimes you get into the hands of a car salesman who knows what he is doing, so you commend your soul to the Lord, you know? 'Cause there's thirty or forty ways that they can always get you into something.

Oh yes we are going to give you the tinted windows but they take out the radio with six speakers and they give you another car and they don't tell you that it went with the other car. That is to say, the number of possibilities in which they can you is infinite. That's how much of the corporate world of this nation is, it's designed to trap the consumer, to sell them things that they don't want, that they don't need, products that aren't worth it, to deceive people in many ways, and who are the ones who have to do those things?

They are the employees and unfortunately many of them are Christians. Again, it is not that we are super, super spiritual either, but what I want to tell you is that the world is like that, the world asks you, and I believe that we have to walk lightly in the world. We cannot be so committed to the world that the world dictates what we are and what we do. There are certain commitments that have to be made, there are certain things, but we have to keep our eyes wide open because the world is going to ask for your soul and the world is going to offer you a series of shiny, attractive, addictive things so that you can sell your soul and the traps that the devil has are endless.

And we children of God can't fall in love with those things, that's part of the crust. What I am inside of me is my spirit, that is eternal. What is worth is my relationship with God, what is worth is what I can do in this world in the Gospel. What is worth it is what I can invest for eternal glory.

The eternal Bible says that we create wealth in heaven, not on Earth. How many of us have gone through the transformation process required to truly know where our priorities lie?

That does not mean young, adult that you are working for a corporation or that you are preparing in a business administration program or that you have healthy ambitions of achievement, that does not mean that you take a vow of poverty and walk down the street begging , No. But it means that you have to have your priorities well established, that the first thing is to serve the Lord, give the Lord the best of yourself.

The Bible says that the eyes of the Lord contemplate the whole Earth to discover those who have a perfect heart towards Him to show themselves in their favor. And many times to reach that point of conviction and to establish the correct priorities we have to say to the Lord: Lord, put me through a process so that I can detach myself from the attachment to the material things of this world. Crucify me, cut the connections between me and the world so that I can then walk correctly, so that I can understand what is bark and what is grain, what is shell and what is essence.

And again: that is what the Lord is saying here, going back to the metaphor that the Lord uses: If the grain of wheat does not fall to the ground, let us stay there in that image. When the grain falls, as I was saying, a process of putrefaction begins, of decay of the outer crust, so I am going to give it another spin because the Lord clarifies me again.

Do many of you know? because I speak to you from personal experience, the Lord has to weaken you many times and you have to go through sufferings and trials like the grain of wheat, when the earth is acting, when the earth is acting, the humidity is acting, the chemicals of the The earth, the salts, the acids of the earth are destroying the outside that is analogous to when we are going through different situations in our lives.

And we think wow, that house. If I lose this house I'm going to die, if I lose this boyfriend I'm going to break into pieces, I'm not going to be able to live and the Lord says: you know what? I'm going to take it off to see what happens. The grain of wheat, the crust is breaking, it's breaking.

And it is not that the Lord is cruel, it is that the Lord loves us so much that He is willing to put us through the discipline of a child of God and does he know that the glory of the Kingdom of God is reached through many struggles and sufferings? ? It's not that God is cruel. It is that one day when we are in heaven we will understand how unimportant were the things that we in this world consider essential.

The apostle Paul says that when we are in heaven we will know how we are known, we will see reality as it is. You know that? many people worry: well, my children when I die, what will become of them? Look when you die your children are not going to worry you anymore. You are going to see them from heaven possibly and you are going to understand that what they are going through is part of a glorious plan that God has, that they are going to have to go through their own struggles and their own tribulations as you went through them and just as you survived, they will also survive, and the prayers that you left here invested and the things that you invested in the Kingdom of God will bless them and persecute them, says the Word: "Until the third and fourth generation. "

I came up with a good title for a merengue, I'm going to suggest it to Juan Luis Guerra if one day: in heaven there are no depressed people. Because when people in heaven look at this world, they understand that everything that happens in this world, everything, everything; a child who dies prematurely in his mother's womb, a young man who is hit by a car in the street and dies, a volcano that belches and 100,000 people die, look brother: in the light of eternity everything makes sense. Everything ultimately reflects the love, the grace, the power, the control, the glory of God, everything, everything even that we cannot understand.

All of existence is a mysterious fabric of good and apparently bad things, but in the light of eternity everything has absolute coherence, in the light of God's control over everything that happens in this world, everything has meaning, everything reflects goodness and control of God.

The devil cannot win a single battle. Look: the devil believed that when he was climbing Christ to the cross he was going to win and he did not know that what he was doing was the biggest defeat he was going to receive. The devil is condemned to always do the Will of God. The devil is an instrument that God uses to be able to do what He wants in this world, you know? Ultimately Satan is God's dog so to speak, honestly.

I cover myself with the blood of Christ when I say that because in reality it is simply an instrument that He uses to perform. It's not like one day He got up and said: oh! I created something, Satan. No, He knew what was going to happen in this world but He uses this power for certain things.

But when we are in heaven, each one of us even if you leave, I say this if there is someone who is worried: when I leave, what will become of my children? Look, when you pass through the gates of heaven at that very moment there is no longer any concern for you. There are no fears, there is nothing, you are going to understand everything clearly, you are going to know the why of things, you are going to know that they are, even if your children go through tribulations, even if there is war in the world and all this, don't be depressed; celebrate, if you are in Christ for you there is no condemnation, for you there is no death, for you there is no sadness, for you there is only joy, celebration.

What you consider so important in this world, God takes away from you, but it is for your good and for your blessing. What God wants is to teach you that there is truly nothing you need from this world practically, that the only thing you need is Him. If you have Him, you have everything else with Him.

And I have learned that many of the things that we go through, the troubles, the crises, the struggles of life, if we are in Christ and we have asked the Lord to take control of our lives, all of this is simply designed for the training of a child of God. God puts you through these processes to break you, to weaken you, and that's what I was originally coming for; that many of us are going to have to be weakened.

There are many men who are going to have to lose that extra strength they have, that manliness, that extra testosterone that is giving them problems in their lives. There are many women who are perhaps going to have to lose that carnal beauty that is in them and become true servants of God. There are young people who are full of insecurities and other things and God is going to have to put them through tests so that they then reach a point of humility and truly surrender of their lives so that the Lord can make them great professionals, great servants of God, wise and understanding men, truly powerful people in the Lord.

But you have to go through the trapiche, you have to go through the process of crucifixion. The grain of wheat has to fall to the ground, the grain of wheat has to fall through a process of deterioration. There is no life if there is no deterioration first. What woman has given birth without her belly becoming deformed? and what woman after giving birth has totally returned to the same subtlety and agility that she had before? always someone for a price for life, there is always pain, there is always discomfort; there is always a degree of ugliness in all production of life.

And so it is with us. If we want to grow in the ways of the Lord, if we want to become a truly powerful and joyous people, and joyful in the Lord first God has to take a blade and start cutting things from us because this flesh is impure and the flesh is not pleases God, and cannot enter the Kingdom of heaven.

Until we reach this point of saying: well, Lord, you will know what you are doing, here I am giving you a signed letter, take what you want from me and leave only what pleases you in my life, until we go through that process. Because if you want to truly be a man, a woman of God, get ready because God doesn't create warriors if He doesn't put them through the field of war and training in their lives.

And that is why when you come to the Kingdom of God, when you enter the Gospel, you have to know that you do not come just to dance and have a party all the time, and that everything will be fine for you from that day on, it will not to be nothing; no, you are going to go through efforts and spiritual exercises because God is going to create a man, a powerful woman and it is in this way that you become everything that God wants you to be and you can appreciate the things of the Gospel.

So, going back to the image, the grain of wheat falls to the ground, the process of breaking, of weakening begins. There are things that God is going to take away from you, very loved things, things that you truly adore and that you believe that without those things you cannot live. They are precious things for you, part of your personality, you love those things, they give you pleasure, they give you pleasure and the Lord says: that is an impediment so I am going to put you through a series of exercises.

The whole Christian life if it is being lived authentically and truly is a process of gradual and gradual breaking, all of life. If you come to the Gospel, get used to it, do not come to a falsely easy Gospel because what they are going to do is sell you a hoax. Any Church that tells you that the Gospel is only profit and good things, and apparent blessing, and money, progress and, no. There is also a crucifixion, there are tests, there are spiritual exercises, there is the grain of wheat falling to the ground, dying.

Then God puts you through that process and the Bible says that if the grain of wheat does not go through that process of falling to the ground and dying, it cannot bear fruit. When the bark: everything that you love, everything that you consider important, beautiful, when the bark begins to break through the cracks that the shell opens when it opens, something begins to rise there, which is the life that is inside the bark.

That is why you see many times, the grain of wheat sinks into the ground and days go by and you believe that nothing is happening, you can't see anything. But one day you see a little green thing, almost transparent, delicate, it's the life that was inside the crust. And so it is with us.

And it all depends on how you react to the tests, to the struggles, to the sufferings, to the losses of life. You have two options when you go through a test, a difficulty. Either you get bitter or you get stronger and more beautiful. How does one become bitter? one becomes bitter rebelling against God when God takes away something you love. You grow bitter, you grow weak when you refuse to see what God is doing through it, when you refuse to mold yourself and kiss the hand of the one who slapped you, when you raise your head in rebellion and say to God: you sold me a falsehood, I do not like you. When you scream, you get depressed, you rebel, you kick against God, you get bitter, you question; then God's treatment becomes a sting for your life.

The Bible says: "It is hard to kick against a nail." How does one get stronger? when you meekly accept God's discipline and within your pain and your natural struggle you know: well now I'm going through this but at some point I'm going to have to go back to my Dad, bow before him and kiss his hand and tell him: make your will and not mine. You hit me and I'm still out of breath but I love you and I'm going to serve you somehow.

Know what? that there are moments like this when one receives a very big blow in their life and it is natural for one to feel sore and sometimes even feel angry with God, but within you there has to come the point where you say: yes but sooner or later I'm going to have to go back to my dad early and I'm going to have to kiss him. When the dog wears off I'm going to have to go back to him and bless him.

It's okay, there may be time, it's natural for meat to get sore. The grain of wheat, if it could scream and had consciousness like us, would scream when its crust is breaking, but sooner or later we have to understand: no, this is part of God's process. This life is nothing, this is a mirage. Money is gone, beauty is gone, the vigor of youth is gone. Sooner or later we end up in old age and in the grave, that is the fate of every human being.

Things in this world deteriorate, from the moment they leave the store the deterioration begins and all of us go through it. So I believe that the Christian has to reach that point where he understands that everything in this world is a contingency, it is simply an accessory. Do not fall in love with anything, do not become attached to anything because if God asks you, you are obliged to give it to him because it is for your good, it is for your blessing and that is part of your growth, that is part of the platform that you need to his future glorification.

That is part of the cross that you have to pass as your Master did too. You are not better than your Master. The Lord said: "If they do this with the green tree, what will they not do with the dry tree?" The Lord said: If I have to go through this, what will you not have to go through?

Brother: if you come to the Gospel, understand that this is the call of Jesus Christ. Then the Lord says: if the grain of earth does not fall to the ground and die, and goes through the process of losing the things it likes, of losing its beautiful crust, of losing that quality of being whole and beautiful and that one can take some tissue and shine that bean or wheat grain, yes how beautiful and shiny. If the grain of wheat is not willing to look ugly and deteriorate, and look ugly, what is inside, which is life, cannot come out.

And you know what brothers? that the most wonderful thing is when a man, a woman, while drinking their tears, begins to feel something different springing from within him or her. There is a different love, there is a different understanding of God. This person begins to read the Bible and then begins to understand things.

He reads David's Psalms and sees David suffering and being persecuted or repenting of a sin, of a fall and he says: wow, I've been there, I understand what he's saying. They see Christ say: Take My yoke upon you and he understands what he means, take up your cross every day and follow Me, so there is in you the same feeling that there was in Christ Jesus, he understands a number of things.

He thinks of Christ and since he or she has gone through his or her own crucifixion, understands that man experienced in brokenness that is Jesus, understands what the crucifixion is, what Friday is, three days under the earth like the grain of wheat and begins to see the Bible in a very different way. Begins to understand the values of humility, meekness, love, patience; That person who was tremendously impatient and intolerant of others is now willing to tolerate offenses and be more gentle with people.

That person who thought he was the big thing in the world now knows that: I am nothing, I need God's mercy like any other person. No one can reach what Christian maturity is, what the Bible calls: The fruit of the Holy Spirit unless it is through suffering, trials and difficulties. And if you are not willing and prepared to do it then you do not deserve to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, you are not going to be truly a child of God.

The Word says that: "How can a father love his son if he does not discipline him first?" The Bible says that God disciplines those he loves. If you don't discipline him it's because we are bastards says the Word. If you are not experiencing brokenness, difficulties, trials, effort in your life, look worry because perhaps that means that God may not be working in your life.

But if God is working in your life, he will be training you, strengthening you like an athlete who exposes himself to exercise, exposes himself to resistance so that his muscles get bigger, so that his lungs can take in more air. You have to go through the tests, the grain of wheat has to fall to the ground, it has to die. You have to understand that the Gospel is not just apparent triumphs and you have to know why you serve Christ, if you serve him for the loaves and fish or because Christ is the greatest treasure that a man, a woman can have and is willing to give everything to have that.

If the grain does not fall to the ground and die, it is left alone. If the only thing you do is come to the Church brother, sister and go through a superficial process, if you do not let yourself be treated by God, if you are not delivering things that you love, if you are not suffering some type of discipline and test, if you are not improving every day, if you are not crying tears before the Lord, if you are not praying, if you are not seeking the Word, if you are not leaving bad habits, if God is not transforming your mind, if there are no changes in your life, if you are not going through different training processes, if you are not giving the Lord something that you love.

If the Christian life is not effort, if you come to Church only when you feel like it and when everything is fine, if you only give to the Lord when you have excess, you are not truly a disciple, what has to happen in your life is not happening. life. The grain is not falling to the ground and is being left alone, which is why so many people come to Church and do not experience the joy of the Lord.

So many people come to Church and the Word remains closed, they open it and it is like lead, they listen to the sermons and it is as if they were being spoken to in Chinese. They hang around in the same situations year after year. Their life is the same, their marriage is the same, their character is the same, they don't change. Their life of service to the Lord is the same, their condition of depression and dissatisfaction is the same, they pray and God does not hear, they intercede and do not see an answer. No one has come to the knowledge of Christ through their intervention, they have not borne fruit.

Because? because there is no death, because they have not fallen to the ground, because they have not allowed the Lord to do the Work in their lives. If the grain of wheat does not fall to the ground and die, it remains alone, paradoxically when the grain of wheat dies, when we have gone through the process of crushing and crucifixion, discipline, trial, effort, we begin to bear fruit. The joy of the Lord comes, peace comes, answered prayers come, knowledge of the Word comes, love for the Lord comes; even prosperity comes, the miraculous provision comes, the multiplication of that life comes.

People look to you, start looking to you for advice. Mysteriously, the same Word that you said before did not make room for people, people listen to it and are touched. God begins to provide you with opportunities to serve him because the grain of wheat has fallen to the ground, it is dying, the bark has been breaking down, the life closed in the bark has been coming out and the Bible says: "But if it dies it bears much fruit. " If it dies it bears much fruit.

That is why I tell you, brothers, that the cost of the Gospel, I was telling the brothers this morning, is not a true cost, it is an investment because in reality the gain is after you go through the crucifixion process. Beauty and joy come after ugliness and sadness.

Easter Sunday comes after Crucifixion Friday. The singing of the angels standing on the stone that covered the tomb and the joy of the disciples to know that the Master is risen, and to know that everything He said was true comes after the exhausting night in Herod's palace being slapped, being questioned, having a sleepless night and then carrying that terrible heavy cross, and feeling the pain of the nails in his hands and feet, and going into the cave of the tomb for three days, and going to hell as the Word says, what happened there? we do not know.

But all this process of death is what gives rise to the Sunday of glorious resurrection where Mary and Martha go and the angel tells them: Why are you looking for the living among the dead? When you go through your own surrender process in your life, they will say: hey, why are you looking for so-and-so in such a place or in such a place? no, he is alive, he is doing the work of the Lord, he is growing, he is being blessed.

May the Lord, brothers, may the Lord make us understand this process. I am preaching these sermons because I feel that the Lord is calling us to realize that the Christian life is a life of trials, tribulations, struggles, but it is also the most glorious life you can imagine, but first you have to lose everything to gain it. everything, you first have to be willing to know what is important and what is not important. First you have to know what is bark and what is essence. First you have to know that whatever God wants to ask you, God will never take anything from you because God is cruel, otherwise He will take it away because it is for your good and your blessing.

"Take My yoke upon you for My yoke is light, My burden is light." The idea is that the Lord's yoke is lighter than the yoke that the devil can put on you, but you have to wear the Lord's yoke because it is training, it strengthens you, blesses you, makes you lighter.

We are going to ask the Lord to take possession of our hearts and our minds. I want to invite you, invite myself this morning, this afternoon to tell the Lord: Lord, I understand what the bark is, I understand what the shell is and what the essence is, and I give you the shell and I give you the essence. . Break my crust, break my flesh so that the life that is within me, the Holy Spirit that You have placed within me can come out through weakness, through my flesh that has become transparent and fragile, and as that my flesh is decaying, my spirit is strengthening, so that You can then do Your Work through my life.

And I renounce all attachment, all clinging to anything in this world, I give you what I love most with fear and trembling. I put my youthful illusions, the dreams of the future, the things that I love the most, the traits of my character and my personality and my temperament, all my appetites, the things that give me pleasure, I put everything in Your Hands Lord. Give right now to the Lord everything that is in you so that you can then experience what the true joy of the Christian life is, then the party can truly begin.