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Focusing on the first chapter of the book of Acts. The church, the body of Christ was transferred from his physical body and the church was transferred to us and we become the church. In this teaching we will discuss the betrayal of Judas. Many of us have our own theory of Judas, maybe when we were younger we formed this opinion based on a lot of the artistic renderings of him with the scowl and so forth.

However, maybe Judas was the politician of the group, pretty savvy, pretty smart. Probably better educated than the rest of the group. After all, he was in charge of the money for the group. He was a fairly popular and charismatic member of the group.

There are several theories of why Judas did this.  As we grew up we basically thought he was just the bad apple of the bunch but at the same time we have probably realized he did not do anything worse than things we have done in our lives. Did Judas see all this coming and turn states evidence? Did he see all this coming and jump to the other side real quick and maybe they would take it easier on him.  Did he do it for the money? Probably not, 30 pieces of silver wouldn’t have gone very far, I am sure he had access to the whole treasury and that had a 100x more in it.

Did he feel like he had a hatred for Jesus and Jesus could read his mind and he was somehow an evil person? We like to point our finger at the other guy and say at least I dont do that.. But the thumb is pointing back to us as a reminder.

Maybe the betrayal of Jesus was done because it was Judas’ own way of bringing this whole thing to a head.  He honestly thought Jesus was the Messiah and he was going to an earthly ruler and he was going to help make it happen.  He was going to jump ahead of God and instead of getting involved in what God was doing, he was going to ask God to get involved in what he was doing.  He was going to go out first and get his blessing later.  This is our best guess as to what happened.

Don't  you think that at the last supper when Jesus says, go ahead and do what you must do Judas took that as confirmation that he knew what he needed to do. The fact is that he did indeed betray Jesus and he immediately felt a horrible sorrow when Jesus did not become the earthly king and therefore he hung himself.  

But now that leave 11, not 12 and they had to find a suitable replacement.  We know him to be Mathias.

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If the religious leaders of the church thought they had an issue with Jesus when he was alive, well boy they have a bigger issue now! It’s kind of like one of those sci-fi movies when you chop the little monster in half and it basically multiplies and creates two more little monsters. That is exactly what is happening.  All of the sudden, Jesus is no longer here physically, but he has multiplied in the believers.

Now there are 300, 600, 1000, 2000, 10000 and this thing is completely out of control.  And that is what the book of Acts explains, it explains how this all happened.  It was not by chance or circumstance it was absolutely planned.  This is what Jesus referred to when Jesus said to the disciples that it was necessary that I go, but you will not be alone. You are going to have me with you, in a slightly different form.

This is another personal sermon. Jesus was not just talking to the disciples, he was talking to us.  The reality of Christ living in us is exactly what Pastor Harris’s teachings are all about. He always teaches relationship, and the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, and how it manifests itself.  In this teaching Pastor Harris will teach on the events that happen on the Mount of Olives as Christ left after 40 days.  We call it the ascension, because that is exactly what he did, if you recall as soon as he ascended the disciples and believers are standing around and looking up and suddenly there are two more of them.  These two guys are all dressed in white and they are obviously angelic beings of some kind and they are saying men of Galilee, why are you looking up into heaven, the same Jesus you just saw go up will come again in the same manner.  That is obviously our hope and we know that to be true.

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At Easter we celebrate the resurrection of Christ, the week preceding that we typically focus on the events leading up to the cross. That was the culmination of the perfect life of Jesus which was sacrificed for all of us. Now in this series we will focus on the other side of the story.  If you can imagine, just for a moment, it is AD 31, 32, maybe and we are believers, maybe we are one of the 11 disciples that remain, perhaps we are one of the several hundred believers, or maybe we are one of the several thousand people that actually saw Jesus when he was living and he performed a miracle in front of our face and we believed he was something special, maybe we didn't know quite what it was but we experienced it.  We are in Galilee and we hear that he’s dead.  There is no instant communication, so maybe it's been a week or two. Maybe it's a rumor, we just aren’t quite sure, we are devastated and we don't know what to think.

The disciples were in disarray, we know they were at least until resurrection day.  The several hundred believers were probably despondent at the news. It seemed like to us, to the believers, that the vail that had fallen as Christ was dying was still there. The sun was up but the vale was still there. We didn't know what we were going to do.

Suddenly the Church emerges.  In this series, we are going to study how this happened. Our reference will be the first chapter in Acts which many of us are familiar with. However, as Pastor Harris always does, he will give us the details and insights that will make it come alive.

We know that Acts was written by Luke.  Luke, as Pastor Harris will point out, Luke wrote more of the New Testament than any other person.  We think of Paul as the primary author of the New Testament but Luke was very instrumental in the writing of our gospel. Luke was not one of our 12 disciples, sometimes you will ask people, “who are the 12 disciples?” and they will throw Luke in there, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John and you know… but nope, he was not a disciple.  

Luke was from the area above what is now known as Greece called Macedonia. He encountered Paul on one of his missionary journeys and became a believer through Paul and apparently Luke and Paul became very close.  From there Luke will take on the role of early church historian. By profession Luke was a physician, he was a learned man far more educated than most of the disciples.  Maybe not as educated as Paul, but close. So here you have these two deep thinkers together and they begin to share with us the history of the church.  We invite you to follow along as Pastor Harris tells us the details of the birth of our faith in this series titled, “The Birth of the Church”.  So let’s kick it off  with the first teaching in this series titled, “The Acts of the Holy Spirit”.

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It is truly hard to believe that we are approaching the 30th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. As many of you are well aware at this point, Pastor Harris, was the pastor of First United Methodist Church, which is situated directly east of the OKC bombing site.  Pastor Harris was at the church that day, and we have shared his story both in audio podcast as well as video on our YouTube channel.  However, in this episode we will hear from Kris Skinner, a cherished family friend and a former employee of First Church that was there meeting with Pastor Harris at the moment the bomb went off on that day that for many has been frozen in time.

As a reminder, we have published several OKC Bombing related episodes over the life of this podcast. Four that I will mention specifically. There is episode 50 which features the sermon Pastor Harris delivered April 16th 1995, just three days before the bombing, this would be the last sermon that would be delivered in that 100 year old sanctuary. In episode 51 we hear from Pastor Harris as he tells his story of the day of the bombing. In episode 52 we feature an interview we had with OKC Bombing Survivor, Arlene Blanchard who was in the Murrah Building when the bomb went off. Arlene had attended “Loves & Fishes”, a lunch Bible Study that First Church facilitated and Pastor Harris taught for many years. In this discussion with Arlene, she reveals one word that Pastor Harris taught on that gave her the strength to persevere. And finally, in episode #100 we feature the story of a surprise concert that Rich Mullins himself gifted the people of First United Methodist Church.

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In the first three episodes of this series, Pastor Harris touched on one key topic in each teaching. In episode one, “The Performance Snare”, Pastor Harris discussed the topic of Justification and that we are completely forgiven and have become fully pleasing to God.  We no longer have to fear failure.  In the second episode, “Approval Addiction”, Pastor Harris touched on the topic of Reconciliation and that we are totally accepted by God and we no longer have to fear rejection. In the third episode, “The Blame Game”, Pastor Harris delivered a message of Propitiation and that we know we are deeply loved by God and no longer have to fear punishment nor do we have to punish others.

Jericho was in the Roman province of Judea, the very wealthy lived here including King Herrod and he stayed there five months out of the year so it had to be pretty nice. In and around Jericho there were other palaces as well. The reason it was so popular had to do with the weather and its geographical location. It’s situated some 833 feet below sea level in what is now known as the Jordan River Valley. It’s the site of the world's largest oasis supported by the world's largest natural spring. 

In addition, its climate is ideal, it is virtually summer time all year round. Date palms can be found everywhere and citrus fruits of all varieties abound. The fences and the trellises are covered by flowers. The city was and is a tropical paradise. This is true even today, and was also true in the time of Jesus.  Even the great Egyptian Queen Cleopatra vacationed there in the winter. 

However, not only was Jericho very beautiful, it was also very prosperous. Some of this had to do with the tourism the city had attracted. Yet that was only a small part of it.  The vast majority of its wealth had to do with a great highway that passed through the city. The great trading caravans of antiquity made their journey there from India and Arabia. Crossing into the lands of Judea at the forge of the Jordan River located three miles east of Jericho.  

Here in this city, the great caravans would stop and resupply and remit their border tolls making it the tax center of Judea. The tax collectors and publicans of Jericho were very wealthy but paid a huge price for their wealth.. They were hated by everyone in their country and they should have been hated.  For the most part they were all dishonest and crooked, it is not hard to imagine that these tax collectors had a real image problem.  Many of them wanted to change but they had believed the fourth great lie that Pastor Harris will talk about in this episode, and that is this, “I am what I am and I cannot change.”

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In the first two episodes of this series, Pastor Harris touched on one key topic in each teaching. In episode one, “The Performance Snare”, Pastor Harris discussed the topic of Justification and that we are completely forgiven and have become fully pleasing to God.  We no longer have to fear failure.  In the second episode, “Approval Addiction”, Pastor Harris touched on the topic of Reconciliation and that we are totally accepted by God and we no longer have to fear rejection.

In this episode Pastor Harris will walk us through the third or four lies that Satan tells us. This third lie can even be seen as a game we play.  Pastor Harris refers to this as “The Blame Game”. When playing this Blame Game we may tell ourselves lies like this, “I am not responsible for what I do, someone else is.”  Has anyone out there listening ever played this game?  Hopefully Pastor Harris’s insights can shed some light on this game we play and how we might win, lose or simply choose not to play as we all work to move forward.

Now before we kick off this teaching, I wanted to give those listening a heads up that about 12 minutes into this original recording, something altered the recording speeds which in-turn altered Pastor Harris’ voice a touch.  Fear not, it's not your device, the issue has to do with the original recording from 10 years ago. It’s a small issue but we can’t let these small issues get in the way of publishing these important teachings.

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Last week Pastor Harris started a series of sermons in which he will examine four of the major lies that Satan uses to destroy the lives of far too many people.  We looked at the first of these lies in the last episode which is this, “I must meet certain standards of behavior so I can feel good about myself.”  

In this episode, Pastor Harris will deal with the next lie which is this, “I must be approved by certain others to feel good about myself.”  This leads to a condition Pastor Harris refers to as Approval Addiction.  This condition is totally linked to the fear of rejection that is one of our deepest human fears. We do not want to feel rejected.  We seek approval from others and we do this because we are biologically wired with a longing to belong.  We fear being cut off, demeaned or isolated. In other words we fear being alone and above all else we dread change.  

The greater this fear becomes the more we experience a need for acceptance and it really can become an addiction. Our problem relates to the fact that we often seek approval from the wrong source. Those sources are often those around us, they can often ignore or reject us. So rather than turn to them, we should really be turning to someone who can love us unconditionally and that someone, as we all know, is our God.  

Right now because of the condition of sin, a state in which we are born, we find ourselves alienated from God, the only one who really counts in our lives.  And that is why we have such an oppressive fear of not belonging. That problem is sin, we begin to overcome these fears when we realize that we need God more than we need other people. When we call upon him he will never reject us and he will never forsake us.  In theological terms we call this process reconciliation.  And that will be Pastor Harris's remedy to Approval Addition that he will be teaching today.

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To say 2025 hasn't kick off how I had hoped would be an understatement. No, I am not talking about politics or anything like that, who knows, maybe it is the tribulation Pastor Harris mentions in this teaching that is needed, time will tell. But spoiler alert… here shortly you will here Pastor Harris mention how tribulation produces perseverance, and perseverance produces character, and amazingly enough, character produces hope. All the sudden, I am starting to think that maybe a little tribulation is just what I needed to kick off 2025.  Who is going to turn down a little hope?  Better yet, a lot of hope!  

I feel like I say it all the time in these intros, I continue to be fascinated how these teachings remain so relevant. Once again, Pastor Harris's teaching in this episode really hit me right where and when it needed to.  As dad used to say, “He read my mail.”  Well my mail really got read here.  I sure hope this teaching hits those of you listening right when it needs to just like it did me, and it is my family's prayer that it continues to do so for years to come!

I am excited about this brief little series.  Although little and brief, I know it's going to pack quite a punch.  I believe it can be life changing for those that need it. In this episode we kick off a four part series where in each teaching Pastor Harris will share one of four lies that Satan sews in our lives. I can relate to all of these and I am sure many of you will as well.

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In II Corinth 2:14 there is a verse that speaks directly to our Pastor’s present series of sermons. It reads as follows:

“Thanks be to God who in Christ always leads us in triumph and through us spreads the fragrance of the knowledge of Him everywhere.”

These words sum up what the Christian life is all about. The apostle Paul wrote these words, after a terrible experience in which he had been abused so badly that he feared for his life. Yet, out of that, he writes that victory is the normal condition in the lives of believers.

In this series of sermons, our Pastor has attempted to show us that true Christians will experience trouble from time to time but God's will for us is this: that we walk in victory. And that is the great truth the book of Esther shares with us.

It is the marvelous story of how God delivers His people. We have seen how Haman plotted the destruction of the people of God by convincing Ahasuerus, the Emperor of Persia, to issue an edict to annihilate all Jews in the Empire. 

We have seen how Mordecai moved to prevent this by convincing Esther to inform Ahasuerus of what was happening. When this plot was exposed, the Emperor hanged Haman on the gallows he had prepared for Mordecai. 

Then, last episode we saw a new edict being issued, one that permitted the Jews to defend themselves when the enemy came against them. As our Pastor demonstrated, this provides a beautiful picture of Romans 7 in the New Testament, known as the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, which sets us free from the law of sin and death.

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As we saw last Sunday, the cry of Esther as she appeared before the Emperor for the second time was similar to the cry of the apostle Paul in Romans 7. "Oh, wretched man that I am…” She cried, “Oh wretched woman that I am.” Then she added something like this: “Who will deliver me and my people from this law of sin and death that has been uttered in the Emperor's name and cannot be revoked?"

But the king was helpless! He could only reply to her request by saying, "I can do nothing. The matter is in your hands and Mordecai's. What has been written by the king's hand and sealed by the king's seal cannot be revoked." 

We saw something similar last week in Galatians 6:8. It reads as follows:

"He that sows to the flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption…"  

This is an inevitable and irrevocable law. We saw that there is no way to escape the results of decisions made under the rule of self. They bear unavoidable consequences. Paul writes this in Galatians 6:7:

"Be not deceived, God is not mocked. Whatsoever a man soweth he shall also reap. If you sow to the flesh, you shall of the flesh reap corruption.” 

We all know the tragic harvest of it in terms of habits that cannot be broken and circumstances that cannot be avoided. So, what can be done? Our Pastor will provide the answer in today’s sermon. It requires a new law one that supersedes the old law.

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