# Sunday Setup – Matthew 8:28-34

Sermon transcript from Cross Church Surprise.
Series: Sunday Setup
Date: April 16, 2026
Watch: https://crosschurchcares.com/surprise/episodes/sunday-setup-matthew-828-34

## Summary

What does it mean to truly meet Jesus in our everyday lives? Are we willing to confront the darkness within and around us, or do we settle for comfort instead of His presence? Discover the transformative power of Jesus as we explore Matthew 8:28-34. Let's dive in together!

## Transcript

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 >> Hey CrossRidge family, and welcome to 
 the Sunday setup. This is our time each 
 week where we gather together to prepare 
 our hearts for this weekend, where we 
 will be gathering together as a church 
 to [music] preach through, to pray 
 through, to praise through a piece of 
 scripture so we can practice it next 
 week. 
 But today we continue on in our series 
 we started last week looking at miracles 
 of Jesus. We're looking at this through 
 the book of Matthew, and these miracles 
 are all the synoptic gospel miracles 
 that we're going to look at eight of 
 them that we see in Matthew, Mark, and 
 Luke. 
 And today we read from Matthew's 
 account. We're going to be in Matthew 
 chapter 8 starting in verse 28. 
 Last week we saw how Jesus calmed a 
 storm. And today as we continue on, we 
 pick up in verse 28 right after this 
 other story we saw last Sunday. When he 
 had come to the other side, to the 
 region of Gadarenes, two demon-possessed 
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 men met him as they came out of the 
 tombs. They were so violent that no one 
 could pass that way. 
 Suddenly, they, being the 
 demon-possessed men, shouted, "What do 
 you have to do with us, son of God? 
 Have you come here to torment us before 
 the time?" 
 A long way off from them a large herd of 
 pigs was feeding. "If you drive us out," 
 the demon begged him, "send us into the 
 herd of pigs." "Go," he told them. So 
 when they had come out, they entered the 
 pigs, and the whole herd rushed down the 
 steep bank into the sea and perished in 
 the water. 
 Then the men who tended them fled. They 
 went into the city and reported 
 everything, especially what had happened 
 to those who were demon-possessed. At 
 that, the whole town went out to meet 
 Jesus. When they saw him, they begged 
 him to leave their region. 
 Man, there's a great amount of 
 information in this story, and you I 
 encourage you can read the gospel 
 accounts in Mark and Luke, which are 
 even a little longer that shed more 
 details into the situation. 
 But as we begin to pray for through it, 
 I first want to call our attention to 
 verse 29. And the demons identify who 
 Jesus is, and they identify him with a 
 title. They say, "Son of God." 
 And and in [music] this there's a lot of 
 acknowledgement here that we'll be 
 breaking down this weekend. 
 But as we talk about this in our prayer 
 prompt, they acknowledge who Jesus is. 
 And in here they acknowledge some of the 
 power that [music] Jesus has. 
 But as our first prompt, and just think 
 of this as a prompt of acknowledgement 
 and a prompt of worship of who is 
 Christ. 
 And I just want this simple and and this 
 easy prayer prompt here 
 is you are the son of God in 
 and and think about it this way that you 
 are the son of God in 
 all power and and holiness, [music] that 
 you are the son of God in the fact that 
 you can command waves and oceans as we 
 saw last Sunday, that you are the son of 
 God in that you choose to love us and 
 pursue us, that you are the son of God 
 and and name the ways that Jesus shows 
 how he is God, how he is all powerful, 
 how he is worthy of our worship. 
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 >> Jesus, you were the son son of God in 
 eternity past [music] 
 and eternity future, that you always 
 have been 
 the son of God. He has always been with 
 God, that he have created our entire 
 universe. But Lord, as we see this week 
 that you have the power 
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 >> over all spiritual forces. 
 And no matter how dark things get, no 
 matter how chaotic things feel, no 
 matter how hard pressure and forces come 
 against us, that you are the son of God. 
 And it displays your power, 
 your might, your holiness, your 
 goodness, and your glory. 
 But Lord, you don't stop here. And not 
 only do we see the authority you have, 
 see the name that you have, see that you 
 are the son of God, but then as the 
 story continues, 
 we see this miracle performed where 
 Jesus cast out demons, where we see how 
 it disrupts the world around them. But 
 in this last verse, it says, "At that, 
 the whole town went out to meet Jesus." 
 Now we're going to see how not all of 
 them had the proper response. 
 There's a different responses when the 
 demons met Jesus, 
 when the townspeople met Jesus, and when 
 the oppressed and the demon-possessed 
 met Jesus. 
 And for us, here's our prayer prompt is 
 just as we think of this personally, how 
 we begin to prepare our hearts, how we 
 begin to pray through this is Jesus, let 
 me meet you in. 
 Jesus, let me meet you in. 
 Do we go out to meet Jesus? Do we meet 
 him in our quiet time in the morning? Do 
 we meet him in our stress in the middle 
 of the day? Do we meet him in our 
 families when we're busy and running 
 from thing to thing? Is Jesus, let me 
 meet you in. 
 Where do we need to meet Jesus? In in 
 what way do we need to meet Jesus? Pray 
 those prayers [music] to our God. 
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 >> Jesus, let me meet you 
 in the anxiety and the stress and the 
 frustration of the daily rhythms in our 
 week. 
 God, as we talk about our church, let us 
 meet you 
 God, in the regular rhythms of our life. 
 That not in just the miraculous where 
 all of the sudden we're confronted with 
 you, but in the ordinary, in the 
 everyday. And Lord, when we do meet with 
 you, let us not be like the townspeople 
 and be inconvenienced. Let us not 
 substitute pigs for your presence. 
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 But God, let us meet you 
 God, wherever we're at in our 
 brokenness. [music] 
 Let us accept the fact that we need you 
 to take us next to the next place. Let's 
 depend on you. 
 Let's meet you, and Lord, just allow us 
 to follow you. God, as we absorb this 
 miracle this weekend, as we just see how 
 you have the authority over demons and 
 over the darknesses and over all 
 spiritual forces, Lord, that it can 
 align our lives to ask the hard 
 questions of maybe where are we falling 
 victim to, where we falling off the 
 wrong path, where we letting bad 
 influences seep into our life. But Lord, 
 ultimately how we can meet you in the 
 right places and we can let you guide 
 [music] our life. God, we thank you for 
 this time. We ask that you prepare our 
 hearts for Sunday. We ask that we can 
 pray for those around us, invite the 
 lost that are far from you, and invite 
 those to expose the demons in our world, 
 and instead see you as the truth. 
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 And Lord, we just thank you and lift all 
 this up in Jesus' name. Amen. 
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 >> Thank you for joining us this week. 
 We'll see you Sunday. 
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 >> Oh.