How did Paul Maintain a Godly Attitude and Perspective?

0 (0s): Well, glad to have you here at Harvest this morning. I'm a pastor Dave. And if this is your first time with us, we're glad you're here. You'll hear more about that in a little bit. But this morning we're entering into God's presence. We've come here to worship often think of that, that som come and let us go into the mountain, into the house of our God. And this morning, as we start out, we're saying a lot about Jesus today. And I found something here a couple of months ago that I liked the quote so much that I, I printed it off and stuck it on the wall in my office. But I want to share it with you this morning. It says the name of Jesus is not only light, but also food. 0 (45s): It is also oil without which all food of the soul is dry. It is salt without whose seasoning, whatever is set before us is insipid. Finally, it is honey and the mouth melody in the ear, rejoicing in the heart. And at the same time medicine, every discourse in which his name is not spoken is without savor the name of Jesus. It transforms us, it shapes us. It is power. So let's get our hearts ready. We're going to pray now. 0 (1m 25s): And then we're going to get started worshiping the Lord, our Lord Jesus. Let's pray, Lord our God. I thank you. And I praise you this day that you are Lord of all that you are Holy, that you are a completely other, and yet at the same time, you love us. You know what it is to be a man. You know what it is, Lord Jesus, because you came and were tempted in every way, such as we are yet without sin, that you might pay the price that we owe and that we might bring glory and honor to you and power our hearts by your spirit this morning, Lord empower your hearts that we might worship you in spirit. 0 (2m 18s): And in truth that we might lift up that name of Jesus, that at your name, every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God. Our father. Thank you, Lord Jesus. In your name, we pray. Amen. Amen. Let's worship. 1 (2m 39s): We're going to sing a song about God's peace this morning. I teach you the chorus. Some of you might know this might be new to some of you. Jesus, Jesus, Jesus. Jeez, silence. Jesus. Geez. Geez, geez storms. 1 (3m 23s): cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese, cheese. 1 (4m 13s): Jesus. 1 (6m 14s): . 1 (8m 10s): We do call upon your names, the name above every other name that every knee will bow. Every tongue confess to you. You're the only one worthy of our praise. There's a whole lot of stuff in the world. Vies for our attention or affection or worthy. thoughts on you this morning, your faith in generations. 1 (9m 7s): where they have all the praise we do. 1 (15m 27s): You want to be more like you got your love BR from foundation that we build our life upon. We pray that people would see you in us, that we would reflect your love, your heart. To those that we can contact with thinking of that Christmas, Carol, that says let every heart prepare him room and how I just keep thinking how there's just so much in the world that tries to crowd out. 1 (16m 9s): Jesus. There's so much in our lives is constantly just crowding out space for him. Plus, let's be intentional this morning to make room for God in our lives to make room for Jesus in our hearts to make room for the spirit at work. In our midst, you prepare remarried hearts. As we head into this holiday season, even Lord that we wouldn't get so caught in all the busy-ness and all the plans that we forget why we're celebrating. So we surrender our will to yours and we say, come your . 1 (17m 4s): This is my Subaru. This is my it's your kingdom come and your will be done. 1 (22m 39s): We make room for you. We open our hearts to receive all that. You give us ears to hear, give us eyes to see Jesus name. Awesome. Church let's share some of that love of Jesus with each other this morning, by saying hello to someone around you. We'll be back and just a few moments this morning. 2 (23m 13s): All right. Good morning. Harvest Church good morning. Glad to see you all. Hey, my name is Jeremy. I'm the youth CA youth and family pastor here at Harvest and Hey, welcome. Glad to see you all. If you're joining us online, want to say welcome as well. Thanks for, thanks for tuning in Hey, today is family Sunday, and that means that we have donuts. The maple bars I'm told are all taken. I'm sorry. I'll have to change the order for that one, but a what family center is, is kids. First grade and up are here in, in the service with us. So if you are standing or sitting next to a student, tell them welcome because they're not just an instructor 3 (23m 55s): Part of the Church. They are a part of the Church. All right. Okay. 2 (23m 59s): So we're glad to have him in service with us. Hey, if you're you're new here with us, feel free to stop by the info center to get the find out ways to get plugged in, find out more about us. We also have a free gift for you, and you can also do that on the Harvest website, as well as on our app as well, man, exciting news. We are, the registration is open for our men's retreat in January, January 8th and ninth. And we're calling it throttling back, which is a interesting you normally I think men's retreats are like full bore or something, but throttling back this year is, is the theme. And I was thinking about this week and a few years ago, as some friends and I went from Apple Valley to Las Vegas on dirt bikes. 2 (24m 44s): And we took all dirt trails. We weave in our way through the desert. We came to this dry Lake bed, huge Lake bed. And I gave my friend my camera. I said, Hey, Jay, wait here and take a picture of me as I go by. So I went out about a mile or so, and CA came back and just ran to the gears, throw a full open throttle, flew by him at 93 miles an hour. And what am I, my vision do my vision went tunnel vision. I was just concentrating on right where I needed to go to buzz him, but not hit him. And as I pulled off the throttle, all of a sudden everything kind of comes into focus and every, you know, every everything comes alive and it's, and it's like that. I think with this retreat, I'm really excited about is our, our focus sometimes in life becomes so narrow that as we kind of throttle back, we get to see the big picture and the, and the big vision vision comes into paint. 2 (25m 33s): It gives us more Perspective so men you to sign up for that January 8th and ninth, and the signups are due by December 15th. Great job this year with Thanksgiving meal donations. Really? We did an, 3 (25m 48s): Oh, I'm sorry. Yes. Breakfast in a while. So we are scheduling. 2 (25m 59s): We haven't had a men's breakfast in a while, so we're scheduling that for December 12th. Okay. So that keep, keep a look on your Bolton's for that email. So a Thanksgiving meal donations were awesome this year. We re we, we, the generosity this this year was above and beyond we've ever had. So thank you so much for, for showing up and giving to those families in need. Not surprisingly, it's been a different year. I think we all know that. So because of that, our Christmas ceremonies are going to look a little different. Our Christmas tree lighting ceremony is going to be Sunday, December 6th. Okay. Sunday, December six. 2 (26m 39s): And if you didn't know that the pine tree in front of our church is actually a donut or a designated the village Christmas tree. So we'll be lightened that, that guy up, seeing it some Christmas carols, Ron, we pulled the trigger and pulling the lights and doing the lights on. So join us for that. There'll be more information as a, as, as the time gets closer. And then one of the thing I forgot to mention before I show this a video clip is obviously we have the sanctuary open. We have a loft open, we have the patio, but we've made a new venue and that's in the parsonage and that's a mass only as designated zone. So if you only feel comfortable wearing a mask, the parsonage is for that in the lastly talks about the men's throttle back retreat. 2 (27m 24s): The sisterhood night of worship was incredible. My wife came back and my two older daughters came back was super-stoked. It was an amazing night. So we have a video to show that, and then pastor CA will come up. 1 (27m 37s): 2 (28m 60s): I never remember that. Here we go. Good joke. Here we go. You guys ready for a good solid joke? Yes. All right. Sweet. All right. So God told John come forth and receive eternal life. John came fifth, got a toaster. I tried, I knew it wasn't a good joke. I knew it was a bad joke in fact, but I tried to preface it with positiveness and it still fell flat. So whoever gave that joke to me, no five bucks for you. I did pay off a $5 debt that I have this morning. So I made this deal that if you give me a joke and I should actually qualify 4 (29m 43s): If I, if you give me a joke that I use and that people laugh at, not like a pathetic laugh, but like a real laugh, then you'll make five bucks. So there you go. Welcome. We're in first Thessalonians today. So we're starting a brand new series. And so as has been our kind of our has been typical for us with the last couple of studies that we've done. We've started out with the Bible project video, the Bible project videos kind of illustrate for us what the whole study is going to be about, kind of from start to finish. It kind of gives us the, the, the mile high view of the book that we are studying. So with that, let's take a few minutes and watch the Bible project video on first Thessalonians 5 (30m 28s): Paul's first letter to the festival. Ionians this is most likely the earliest letter that we have from Paul and the backstory for it is found in the book of acts. It's where Paul and his coworker, Silas went to the ancient Greek city of Thessaloniki. And after just one month of telling people the good news about Jesus, a large number of Jewish and Greek people gave their allegiance to Jesus. And they formed the first Church community there, but trouble was brewing Paul's announcement of the risen Jesus as the true Lord of the world, it led to a suspicion. So the Christians in Thessaloniki were eventually accused of defying Caesar, the Roman emperor, when they said that there is a, another King Jesus, and this led to a persecution that got so intense. 5 (31m 11s): Paul and Silas actually had to flee from the city, and this was painful for them because they love the people there so much. And so this letter is Paul's attempt to reconnect with the Christians in Thessaloniki. After he got a report from Timothy, that they were doing more than, okay, they were flourishing despite this intense persecution, he designed the letter to have two main movements. First is a celebration of their faithfulness to Jesus. And then he challenges them to keep growing as followers of Jesus. And then these two movements are surrounded by three prayers. The letter opens with the Thanksgiving prayer. The two movements are linked together by a transitional prayer. And then the whole thing is concluded with a final prayer. 5 (31m 51s): It's a beautiful design Paul opens by giving thanks and celebrating the Thessalonians, faith, their love for others and their hope in Jesus. Despite persecution, he goes on to retell the story of their conversion, how they used to be idolatrous polytheists. And they were living in a culture where all of life was permeated by institutions and practices that honored the Greek and Roman gods. And Paul talks about how they turned away from those idols to serve the living and true God. And that they're now waiting for the coming of God's son from heaven. So in a city like Thessalonica, transferring your allegiance to the creator, God of Israel, and to King Jesus. This came at a cost isolation from your neighbors, hostility from your family, but for the Thessaloniki ones, the overwhelming love of Jesus who died for, and the hope of his return, it made it all worth it. 5 (32m 43s): Paul then retells the story of his mission in Thessaloniki and of the dear friendships. He formed with the people he uses really intimate metaphors here. They treated him like their child, and he became like their mother and like their father. He says, we were happy to share with you not only the good news from God, but our very selves, because we came to dearly. Love you. Paul reminds us here that the essence of Christian leadership is not about power and having influence it's about healthy relationships and humble, loving service. He reminds them that he never asked for money. He simply came to love and serve them in the name of Jesus. And so Paul moves on to reflect on their common persecution, just like Jesus was rejected and killed by his own people. 5 (33m 29s): So now Paul is persecuted by his fellow Jews and the Thessalonians are facing hostility from their Greek neighbors. And Paul draws a strange comfort from knowing that together, their sufferings are a way of participating in the story of Jesus's own life and death. Paul then shares about the anguish he experienced when he heard of the hardships the Thessalonians had after he and Silas fled. So he sent Timothy to support them and see how they were doing. And to his joy, Timothy discovered that they were going strong. They were faithful to Jesus. They were full of love for God and their neighbors. And they long to see Paul as much as he longed to see them. And so Paul concludes with a prayer for endurance. 5 (34m 9s): And what's cool is that he introduces here the topics he's going to address in the letter. Second half, he prays that God will grow their capacity to love that he'll strengthen their commitment to holiness as they fix their hope on the return of King Jesus. So he opens the letter second movement by challenging them to a life that's consistent with the teachings of Jesus. So this means, first of all, a serious commitment to holiness and sexual purity in contrast to the promiscuous sexually destructive culture around with them, they are to follow. Jesus is teaching about experiencing the beauty and the power of sex within the Haven of a committed marriage, covenant relationship, God takes sexual misbehavior. 5 (34m 49s): Seriously. Paul says it dishonors and destroys people and their dignity following Jesus also means a commitment to loving and serving others. So Paul instructs them that Christian should be known in the city as a reliable people who work really hard, not just to make a money, but so that they can have resources to provide for themselves and to generously share with people who are in need after this Paul addresses a number of questions that Thessalonians had raised about the future hope of Jesus's return. So some Christians in the church had recently died, most likely killed as martyrs and their friends and family are wondering about their fate when Jesus returns. And so Paul makes it clear that despite their grief and loss, not even death can separate Christians from the love of Jesus. 5 (35m 36s): When he returns as King, he will call both the living and the dead to himself. And Paul uses a really cool image here. He uses language that would normally describe how a city subject to the Roman Caesar would send out a delegation to welcome or meet his arrival. Paul then applies this imagery to the arrival of King Jesus. He too will be greeted by a delegation of his people who will go to meet the Lord in the air as they welcome and escort him back to this world where he'll establish his kingdom of justice and peace. Paul then wants a testimonial to see how this hope should motivate faithfulness to Jesus. So he pokes fun at the famous Roman propaganda that it Cesar, who brings peace and security. 5 (36m 20s): Of course, Rome's peace came through violence through enslaving their enemies and military occupation. And Paul warns that Jesus will return as King one day and confront this kind of injustice followers of King Jesus should live in the present as if that future day is already here. Despite the nighttime of human evil around them, they should stay sober and awake as the light of God's kingdom dawns here on earth, as it is in heaven. Paul closes all of these exhortations. Like he began with a hopeful prayer that God would permeate their lives with his holiness, that he would set them apart to be completely devoted and blameless until the return of King. 5 (37m 1s): Jesus. First Thessalonians reminds us that from the very beginning, following Jesus, as King has produced a truly counter-cultural or Holy way of life, and this will sometimes generate suspicion and conflict among our neighbors. But the response of jesus' followers to such hostility should always be love meeting opposition with grace and generosity and this way of life. It's motivated by hope and the coming kingdom of Jesus that has already begun in his resurrection from the dead. And so holiness love and future hope. That's what first Thessalonians is all about 4 (37m 42s): Review for us. And if you're studying any book of the Bible, I'm pretty sure the Bible project people have videos for every book of the Bible. Most of them, if they don't have all of them by now, so you can always type in Bible project and then they a book of acts or Matthew or Galatians or whatever it is that you're studying, and you will get that type of an overview. And it just helpful for context, when you start reading the Bible, you kind of know what it's doing and what it's saying and where it's going. So, so this is one of Paul's earlier epistles. He wrote it pretty early on, but he had already experienced quite a bit of persecution in acts chapter 17. 4 (38m 25s): We read, we read about Paul's preaching to this church and planting a R P preaching to these people in the, in the town of festival. And I, I call it a festival and Annika, you can call it. I'm not sure the correct pronunciation. I've heard it both ways, but a Paul was there in a vessel Anika. And he was preaching there. And many people came to faith. And so they planted a church. But if you go back a chapter in acts chapter 16, we see that Paul and Silas were both imprisoned for their faith, for what were they doing? They were preaching the gospel. And so it tells us in acts chapter 16, that they were beaten with rods and that they were in prison. So it wasn't like a light duty persecution. It was heavy duty persecution. 4 (39m 6s): So we're not supposed to be having Church right now. I don't know if you knew that or purple. And so we humbly decided as an elder team to go ahead and have Church met with the team this week and went around each of the elders and asked, what do you guys want to do in light of this new closure for the church? And we all agreed one at a time that we would go ahead and have Church and continue to do what we've been doing since this whole thing started. Well, we, we kind of closed Church a little bit for a few, a couple of months during the beginning, then we realized we don't want to do that. So we're continuing on. So we might, you know, we're, we're kind of experiencing maybe a little bit a persecution when they say that retail stores can stay open, but churches have to close. 4 (39m 51s): There's something spiritual going on. So there might be some kind of persecution going on, but this is just a light persecution with more to come. It's a slippery slope when they start closing churches down and more persecution is likely to be coming down the road. So we we've yet to be beaten with rods, at least in this country and in prison. But in other countries that's commonplace for Christians. There's persecution, there's martyrdom, all kinds of stuff going on. So back to acts chapter 16, Paul had experienced some significant persecution while he's in prison. God does amazing things. We'll get to that. But, but I wondered as I was reading this and I've been, as I've been teaching through the epistles, I, I wondered how did Paul, Maintain a Godly Attitude and Perspective with all of the junk that he was going through. 4 (40m 42s): Th w that's the title of our message to you and the form of a question. How did Paul Maintain Godly Attitude and Perspective. And we see from this chapter, that's the first Thessalonians that he did about five different things really well, that kept him focused. That kept him maintaining his Godly Attitude and Perspective. And so we'll just get into first Thessalonians chapter one, and just kind of unpack it a little bit at a time. But before we do that, it's good. And stand up and pray. We're going to stand and ask the Lord's blessing as we open up the word. So Lord, we stand in honor of you, you and honor of your you Lord in a and an honor of your word, and we say, God, your will be done. I pray God that you would speak today to each of us. We need you to speak to us, Lord, and God, we're grateful that we can be here to have Church all over this campus and online, as well as people tune in and listen, I pray that wherever people are tuned in God, that you would speak God, that you'd move 6 (41m 34s): God that you would do what only you can do. God, thank you for this time. Thank you for your grace in Jesus name. Amen. You can be seated all over the place. You can be seated. 4 (41m 46s): First Thessalonians chapter one, greetings from Paul. This letter is from Paul, Silas, and Timothy. If you, if you read acts in the epistles, you see that guys like Paul and Timothy traveled with and ministered with Paul. These guys were active partners in his ministry. And so this letter is from Paul, Silas and Timothy. He said, we are writing to the church and festival and Nika to you who belong to God, the father and the Lord Jesus Christ. So he's identifying who his audience is. He speaking to those who belong to God, the father and the Lord, Jesus Christ. If you're here today and you belong to God and the Lord Jesus Christ, then God is speaking to you through Paul's letter as well. 4 (42m 26s): He said, may God give you grace and peace. Interesting. Paul says this in most of his letters, he says that this is kind of his typical greeting. May God give you grace and peace? This is Paul's Godly Perspective and Attitude. He wanted to extend grace and peace. This unmerited favor of God, which is grace and the Shalom of God, which is his peace. I find that those two carry the grace and the peace of God are actually able to extend that grace and peace to others. There's something that they carry, especially a guy like Paul, he'd been persecuted, he'd been in prison. He had been in all kinds of trouble as a diss, as an apostle of the Lord, Jesus Christ, as a preacher of the gospel, he had been in all kinds of trouble. 4 (43m 14s): And yet he's able to experience grace and peace in his own life. The unmerited, 6 (43m 20s): The favor of God and the Shalom, the peace of God, just saying that word Shalom. It has a calming effect. As I say it, it's like, Oh, praise the Lord. 4 (43m 31s): There's the peace of God that just kind of settles into your soul. So he's he had it. He experienced it supernaturally. So, and we're going to find out How but he had it, but he was also able to extend it. I thought this is a, this is a great heart check for me. Number one, do I have it? Do I have grace and peace? And if I do have it, am I able to extend it to others? It's easy to extend it to people who love me. It's more difficult to extend it to people who have, who are at odds with me. So I have this difficult conversation this week and I just been studying first Thessalonians. And so this whole idea of grace and peace was fresh in my heart and in my mind. 4 (44m 11s): And so, as I was having this difficult conversation, I remembered grace and peace. And so I, I actually communicated that to this person on the phone. I said, Hey, grace and peace to you. And then I prayed with them. And it was just, it was like a, it was like a bomb, a healing on my heart as I had this difficult conversation. And I didn't carry that difficult conversation with me after that conversation, I, we hung up the phone. I just felt that peace. I had what I extended. I had the grace and the peace of God, but it took some intentionality on my part. I had to say, I'm not sure I want to say this because I'm not sure that I want this for this person, but that's my flesh. 4 (44m 55s): I know that much, my spirit wants this for this person, my spirit, this thing that has been born again in Christ, this thing that has been filled with the Holy spirit, I, my spirit wants this for this person that I was talking to you and my spirit. I think like Paul wants this for every person that he comes in contact with. So it was a great, great challenge for me, a kind of a heart check. I love it. When I'm reading the scripture, maybe you do this too, but do you come across something? And you're like, Oh, that kinda like sticks in my, in my soul a little bit. It kind of grabs my heart. I'm like, Lord, what are you? What are you saying when that happens? What are you trying to communicate to me when that happens? And usually the Lord is trying to do a work, a heart work in me or some sort of work. 4 (45m 40s): And so I was able to say grace and peace and hang up the phone smile and had grace and peace. So I challenge you to be able to think about that too, to do that. I think sometimes we, we kind of gloss over statements in the scripture, especially opening statements. Paul says grace and peace, grace, mercy, and peace. He says these things a lot in his epistles. And so we can tend to gloss over them and miss what God wants to say. But I believe that every word of God is inspired and it's powerful and it's meant to communicate life and truth and grace to us. So it will slow down. I said, this last week, sometimes we just need to stop and just read one verse and just really allow the spirit of God to use that verse, to speak to us, to minister to us. 4 (46m 26s): So maybe this week, it's a, the grace and peace verse is yours, where you're just holding onto that and thinking about that and seeing what God will do. I think this communicates clearly where Paul's heart was as a minister of the gospel, as one who had been through very difficult, very difficult circumstances in his life in ministry. He was able throughout all of his epistles. Mostly I actually haven't checked all of them, but every one that I checked and said in some format in Timothy, he said, may grace, mercy and peace to Timothy my true child in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from God, the father and Christ Jesus, our Lord first Timothy one, two, two Timothy, my true child in the faith, grace, mercy, and peace from who? 7 (47m 17s): Where does it come from? God, 4 (47m 20s): It comes from God, the father and the Lord Jesus Christ. So if you're struggling this morning with grace, mercy and peace, go to the source of that, go the Lord, go to God and say, God, I, I need it for myself. And I need to extend it to others. And watch what will happen is you supernaturally receive that gift because this is the kind of thing that you, if you asked for the Lord, the Lord's gonna give it to you. And if, if you're struggling to receive it, he'll show you why you're struggling to receive it. Maybe there's a hardness of heart. Maybe there's unforgiveness. Maybe there's anger in your soul. And God wants to address that. But if we ask the giver of this good gift, we know in the Bible that it says every good gift comes down from the father of lights from God. 4 (48m 3s): And so this is a good gift that he wants to give 6 (48m 6s): Grace mercy and peace again. What a great filter is. I read that Lord, how's my soul or how's my heart. Is there anybody in my life that I don't want to extend that to? Is there anybody in my life that I don't want to say that too? And just do 4 (48m 27s): There's some personal inventory. And, and then if there is somebody that comes to mind and sometimes it'll just come, right? It's just come. And then other times it'll take some time and maybe you'll come across somebody. And you're like, Oh, that's the person, no way do I want grace and mercy a piece on that person? And then you get a chance to do some heart investigation and allow the Lord to do some heart 6 (48m 47s): Surgery. Can you say that to everyone? May God give you a grace and peace. How did Paul Maintain 4 (48m 54s): Godly Attitude and Perspective when people are picking at him, persecuting him, complaining about him, having a hard time with his ministry, misjudging him. 6 (49m 5s): Paul did five things. Number one, he remained thankful. 4 (49m 12s): First to first Thessalonians chapter one says, we all 6 (49m 15s): Thank God for all of you and pray for you constantly Paul remained thankful. He was 4 (49m 24s): Thankful. Not because his circumstances were awesome 6 (49m 27s): Because his hope was solid. He had a solid hope 4 (49m 33s): In the person of the Lord, Jesus Christ. And he believes solidly that the work that he was doing was kingdom work that had eternal value. And so he was willing to suffer as it were for a season. So that the message, the eternal message of the gospel might have an opportunity to go out. His hope was Christ and the eternal kingdom of God. There's a few things that hinder gratitude. There's a few things that hinder thankfulness, a critical spirit will hinder thankfulness. You ever experienced that like a critical spirit, like just critical spirit, is this you just kind of, you're critical of everybody and the critical of everything that will hinder a gratitude that will hinder thankfulness. 4 (50m 16s): But on the other hand, thankfulness and gratitude will cure a critical spirit. If we just determined, I'm going to have a good day, I'm going to be thankful for what I have in my life and for what is doing in my life. It over shadows, that critical spirit and all of a sudden we're able to enjoy life. We're able to have grace and peace and mercy in our own lives. And then all of a sudden, because we, we have it in us, we're able to extend grace and mercy and peace. So there's just something powerful that happens when we decide in jesus' name. I'm not saying we decided in our own strength, I'm saying in jesus' name, in the power of the Holy spirit, where determining to be thankful to have gratitude last week, I said, I, I said, we, we need to make a list of things that we can be grateful for a gratitude list. 4 (51m 5s): How many made their list? You don't have to write it down, but I just encourage you to think about it, right? What am I thankful for? And then just kinda make a mental note, or maybe you write it down. This is what I encourage you to do. Think about 12 things, because that really forces us to think about all the things that we're grateful for. Right? So we can come up with a few off the top of our heads, but when we really have to stop and think about 12 and come up with a list of 12, that really causes us to do some personal inventory and come up with some things that are really important to us, but maybe we have 6 (51m 37s): Taken for granted. We can take things for granted pretty easily, right? 4 (51m 41s): Like things that have always been kind of good. 6 (51m 43s): We kind of take it for granted, but if we can just stop, just say, thank you, Lord, for whatever it is. Like, I've never missed a meal in my life, right? But every meal we say, thanks, right? Thankfully I've never had to miss a meal, but every meal we say, thank you because we are genuinely thankful, Lord, thanks a few that we've not missed a meal that we don't have to miss a meal that we have provision. Thank you, Lord. We were praying on the way into church this morning. Thank you that we have a church to go to you and that we have a roof over our head that we've got cars to drive. You know, you could think about all kinds of things. W when you, when you're forced to come up with 12, you get past all of those kinds of easy things that come to mind and you really get down to the nitty gritty. 6 (52m 24s): And then, and then something beautiful begins to happen. And your soul, you become grateful in that critical spirit just begins to make its exits. So a critical spirits hinders gratitude, unforgiveness, jealousy, disappointments 4 (52m 42s): It's Thanksgiving week. Let's determine this week to be, 6 (52m 45s): Be grateful to have a thankful heart. We talked about gratitude last week. We're talking about it this week, make a list, make a list and see what the Lord will do in your hearts. Paul did five things to maintain a Godly Attitude and Perspective number one a year. 4 (53m 3s): Thankful. Number two, he prayed 6 (53m 6s): Constantly. We see that in verse two. Also, we all 4 (53m 9s): Thank God for all of you and pray for you. How often constantly, right? Prayer is the lifeblood. It's like I said, last week. And a lack of breath will cause us to die. Physically. A lack of prayer will cause us to die spiritually. We absolutely to pray. It's the lifeblood in everything that we do. And when we are praying, we have the capacity to go through any season of life, the good, the bad, and the ugly. And we maintain a level of trust. Sometimes we go through hard stuff and it shipwrecks our faith hard stuff is not meant to shipwreck our faith. Hard stuff has meant to solidify our faith. We're saying, Lord, I see your faithfulness in the midst of hard stuff. 4 (53m 52s): I believe you even more. I determined to trust you even more. So hard stuff is not meant to shipwreck us hard stuff is meant to solidify, to help us to find a way 6 (54m 3s): Feet on solid ground. Spiritually life is full of heart stuff. If we will pray constantly 4 (54m 12s): Without ceasing, like never stop praying. If we will pray, God will meet us. So we just pray. And I 6 (54m 22s): Said, I said this all the time, when I'm up here 4 (54m 24s): Preaching, I'm sometimes praying as I'm preaching. As I was praying a few minutes ago for the service, I was praying out loud and then praying to myself, kind of Lord, help me get this message out the way it needs to get out. Like I'm praying what you can hear. And I'm praying things that God can hear that, and God hears it all. So there's just something about that humble desperation where you're saying, God, I need you. I need you to show up in this relationship and this decision at work, I need you to show up in my personal life. I just need you to show up. When we do that, 6 (54m 59s): God will do wonderful and supernatural things. Giving us the ability to cope in the most devastating of circumstances. I have this book it's titled what happened this day in Christian history. So today's November 20 seconds. And in November, 1873, something happened. And I'd like to read that story. Just take a moment. 4 (55m 21s): In November, 1873, Chicago, lawyer Horatio. 6 (55m 25s): She Spafford took his wife and four daughters, Maggie to Netta Annie and Bessie to New York and boarded them on the luxurious French liner. SS Vila do a whore brain. I think that's how you say that 4 (55m 42s): The great Chicago fire had destroyed everything 6 (55m 45s): They owned and Spafford was sending his girls to an English Academy until the Chicago schools and his own life could be rebuilt. As he saw his family settled into their cabin and unease filled his mind and he moved them to a room closer to the bow of the ship. Then he said goodbye, promising to join them later in France, during the small hours of November 22nd, 1873, as the ship Godly glided over smooth seize, the passengers were suddenly thrown from their bunks in a jolt. The ship had collided with an iron sailing vessel. The low Shern water poured in like Niagara and the ship tilted, dangerously, screams, and prayers and Oh, submerged into a nightmare of unmeasured terror passengers losing their footing, clung to posts, rumbled through darkness and were drenched by powerful currents of IC in rushing. 6 (56m 44s): See loved ones fell from each other's grasps and vanished into foaming blackness. Within two hours, the mighty ship disappeared beneath the nocturnal waters. The 226 fatalities included Maggie to Netta, Annie and Bessie. Ms. Spafford was found nearly unconscious cleaning to a piece of the wreckage. Nine days later, when the survivors landed in Cardiff Wales, she cabled, her husband saved alone. He immediately booked passage to join his wife on the way over on the way over on a cold December night, the captain called him aside and said, I, I believe we are now passing over the place where the ship went down. 6 (57m 34s): Spafford went to his cabin, but found it hard to sleep. He said to himself, it is well, the will of God be done in later. He wrote this famous him based on his words when sorrows like sea billows roll, whatever my lot that was taught me to say it as well. It as well with my soul, Her ratio survived that experience because he knew God. We don't know for sure, but I would imagine that he was a man of prayer who developed trust in the face of the most difficult of life, circumstances and situations. 6 (58m 26s): He prayed constantly. We assume. And we know that he was faithful. When the worst of circumstances hit his life. I don't know how you can survive the worst of his circumstances that hit your life apart from a constant prayer life. Have you learned to pray and trust and with confidence in God, through all the seasons, it's easy to pray with trust and confidence in God and when the seasons are good. But what about the rest of the seasons? Paul prayed constantly in good times and in bad. And I wonder if we decided to do the same, have we decided to trust God in the same way? 6 (59m 12s): Praying constantly, no matter what we're up against. How did Paul? Maintain a Godly Attitude and Perspective number three. He focused on the good, 4 (59m 23s): We live in a culture that mostly focuses on the bad shit on the news. It's mostly bad news, mostly bad news. The news agencies would be out of business. If it weren't for a mad news, they report it constantly. Paul focused on the good. He loved the church. She loved the people of God. He called the Church, this this'll Thessalonians Church he called it his pride and joy chapter two verse 20. In fact, he wanted to visit again after he got rushed out of there and acts chapter 17, but it says in acts chapter two, or excuse me, in Thessaloniki and chapter, chapter two, verse 18, he wanted to return, but Satan prevented him. 4 (1h 0m 4s): Isn't that interesting. We have an adversary. The devil walks about like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. You would think that with Paul's credentials, his work with the Lord, that nothing could keep him from doing that, what that, what he wanted to do and felt called to do. But certainly Satan was able to keep him. And so Paul did the next best thing and he wrote a letter. And thankfully he did, because we study that letter that epistle to this day Paul did what he could do. He wrote a letter focusing on their good works Paul needed to, we had to hold onto his optimism, his hopefulness for his own good. And for the good of those, he served, it wouldn't have done anybody, any good of Paul lost his, his optimism and his hopefulness, but he held onto it so that he might continue to minister most effectively. 4 (1h 0m 55s): God's God wants you to hold onto your hopefulness as well, because it's out of that place of hopefulness optimism, trusting God that you're able to minister most effectively. If you've lost all hope and lost all faith as a follower of the Lord, Jesus Christ, you're not able to be salt and light in the earth. Paul decided to focus on the good, he focused on the good and he focused on the good things that they were doing. And this is what it says in verse three, as we pray to our God and father about you, we think about your faithful work. I wonder what faithful work he's talking about. Well, Paul, Paul's faithful work in acts. Chapter 17 is he went to the city in Thessalonica festival and ICA and he preached and people got saved and they planted a church. 4 (1h 1m 39s): So I would imagine that the faithful work that Paul is talking about is that this is a continuation of the good work that Paul started, that we read about knack or that we read about in acts chapter 17. They continued the very good work and that's really what God has called us to do. He said, go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the father, the son, and the Holy spirit. We've got a responsibility to do what this Church did. As a church. We get to do faithful work that God has called us to do. So Paul focused on the faithful work and their loving deeds. Now this is a church that suffered persecution, and yet they were known for their loving deeds. This is not a supernatural, I think a supernatural. I don't think we can do that. 4 (1h 2m 20s): Apart from the supernatural power of God at work within us. Like, I can't love people that are mean to me unless the Holy spirit gives me grace to do so. Like I want to be mean to people who are mean to me, that's my natural human inclination, right? But that's not what God wants me to do. You asked me to have loving deeds, loving action, loving heart toward people who don't like me. We can't do that apart from God, right? We need to be empowered. We're going to talk about that next. We need to be empowered by the Holy spirit. As we're empowered by the Holy spirit, we can do those supernatural things that God asks us to do. And listen to everything that God asks us to do is supernatural. 4 (1h 3m 1s): It requires his power. We don't want to do it in our own strength. We do not want to do it in our own strength. Verse four says, we know dear your brothers and sisters, that God loves you and has chosen you to be his own people. So now through the difficulties that they're having, let me go back to a verse three. As we pray to our God and father about you, we think of your faithful work, your loving deeds and your enduring hope in the enduring hope you have because of our Lord Jesus Christ. We know dear brothers and sisters, that God loves you and has chosen you to be his own people. That is true about you. God absolutely loves you. And he's called you and has chosen you to be his own people. 3 (1h 3m 46s): Commercial break. There's no need to ignore the obvious. Got 4 (1h 3m 56s): It. Sweet. All right, let's continue. 3 (1h 4m 3s): Oh, thank God for technology. 4 (1h 4m 7s): Train of thought. Here we go. Trying to find it. Here we go. Yes. Yes. Yes. So Paul focused on the good things that this church was doing and he encouraged them with truth. Listen, when we have a Godly Perspective and Attitude, we can do the same thing. We can focus on the good that others are doing. And then we can speak life and encouragement to them. Jesus loves you. Jesus. He loves you. Jesus loves you. And you are his chosen people. He loves you and he's chosen you to be his own people. It's rather easy to focus on the good with people in circumstances that we like. 4 (1h 4m 48s): It's really difficult to focus on the good in circumstances that we don't like. And with people that we don't like, but maybe, maybe this is what God wants us to do. Paul had difficult circumstances, difficult people around him, but he was filled with the Holy spirits were in chains, but we can pray and sing. Like they can't take that away from us, 3 (1h 5m 16s): Right? We're up against 6 (1h 5m 18s): Difficulty. Paul 4 (1h 5m 20s): Silas in a prison, but we can pray and sing songs and hymns, 6 (1h 5m 28s): The jailer is maybe unfair as they're in prison. 4 (1h 5m 33s): But the truth is God loves that guy. 6 (1h 5m 37s): And 4 (1h 5m 37s): Paul had a vision possibly for this guy because the jailer ends up getting saved. So the story is Paul and Silas are in jail. It's a late night, there's singing and praying. And this major earthquake hits the jail and it rattles that the chains on them. So they come off and the doors swing open and the jailer, the Philippian jailer, he thinks that surely it's, everybody's gone, the doors are open. And so he's going to kill himself because all of his prisoners have escaped. But Paul cried out to him. Stop. Don't take your own life. We're all still here. And that opened the door for Paul to be able to preach the gospel. 4 (1h 6m 20s): He and his whole family got saved and baptized that night powerful stuff, right? Because Paul's, Perspective kind of Godly Perspective and Attitude. And so we had a expectation. He believed that God was going to do something. When we're filled with the Holy spirit, we have a God-sized expectation like this isn't a possible scenario, but I'm believing for impossible answers from God. God comes through in the impossible, because he's the God of the impossible. And we see this over and over again in the scripture, this situation seems unjust, but God is on the throne. I mean, Paul, he could have gone all kinds of different places. Lord, you know, we're doing all this good stuff for you. Why, why are we in jail? 4 (1h 7m 1s): Why are we being persecuted? Why, why, why? But he didn't knew that he said, you know what? I'm going to pray and I'm going to sing and just leave the rest to the Lord and watch. And God did that. God opened up the doors and there was a great Harvest of, of, of souls added to the kingdom that night. How did Paul Maintain Godly Attitude Attitude and Perspective number four. He was empowered by God. Hallelujah. Right? I mean like, this is the best part of being a Christian besides salvation. We've got the Holy spirit in us. We're empowered by the living. God who gives us wisdom and compassion and grace and clarity when we need it. 4 (1h 7m 43s): He is forever with us for when we brought you the good news. Paul wrote in verse five, he was not only with words, but also with power Paul didn't minister out of his own steam. Often we're trying to do stuff out of our own steam. We're trying to minister out of our own steam. We're trying to do life out of our own steam. Paul didn't preach at him, his own steam. He didn't write letters in his own steam. He didn't live his life out of his own steam. He lives as a man who was filled with the Holy spirit. The Bible says, if you're saved, if you're in Christ, you've got the gift of Holy spirit. The paraklete the helper, the one who is forever with you in your life, Paul was filled up. 4 (1h 8m 25s): Some of us need to get refilled up, right? Apparently we leak. I say that all the time, but it's true. We somehow leak and we need to be continually filled with the Holy spirit. Paul understood that he did it and get filled up with God and get the grace that you need for your life and for your circumstance, get the love that you need. It's it's a holiday season. So you're going to be seeing family that maybe you haven't seen since last holiday season, and it could be good or it can be very difficult, right? So get the grace that you need for the people that you will be seeing so that you are salt and light to them so that your grace and mercy and peace to them, you're experiencing it. 4 (1h 9m 10s): And you're able to give it by God's grace. If we brought you the good news, it was not only with words, but also with power for the Holy spirit gave you a full assurance. Listen, when the Holy spirit is in you, he's going to empower what he's doing and then he's going to give a shore. And so if you're sharing the gospel with somebody through the power of the Holy spirit, then God will cause the person that you're speaking to to be, to be ministered to, they will resonate. And they will begin to understand that truth. That may take a lot of conversations and a lot of prayer, but God will do the work with you. He is leading in the process for the Holy spirit gave you full assurance. That's what he did in this Church that what we said was true. And you know of our concern for you from the way we lived when we were with you. 4 (1h 9m 52s): So their lives reflected the gospel. There was consistency in the way that they lived among the believers are the believers and the non-believers there. And they did an amazing work. Again, Paul didn't speak in his own steam. He didn't live that way. He didn't write that way. The spirit of God filled him and affirmed his work. We can't do anything God asks us to do unless he's filled us with his spirit 9 (1h 10m 17s): And listen, we don't even want to try. Even when we 4 (1h 10m 20s): Figure something out, like sometimes we we've been doing something for a long time. We've like, figured it out. Look, okay. I know how to do this Lord. Aye. And we kind of lose sight of our desperate need for him. Like our desperate need for his power to speak through us because we need him. We need him, whether we're teaching Sunday school or whatever it is that we're teaching or whether we're praying with somebody, we don't even want to pray without the power of the Holy spirit, because we don't know how to pray without the power of the Holy spirit. We just pray out of our hand. We can, we don't pray out of our spirit when we're not filled with the Holy spirit. We're just praying Lord help this person. We're not, we're not getting a hold necessarily of what God wants to say. Maybe the Lord wants to speak something powerfully through you in your prayer time with a person. 4 (1h 11m 3s): And so you're saying, Lord, would you pray through me? Would you show me how to pray? Would you teach me? Would you show me something that I can, that will touch this person's life? So that it's just not words Paul, didn't come with empty words. He came with empowered words and that's why they've stood the test of time. It's it's the, it's the Bible. It's God's word for us. We, we can speak with a four T and Jesus, when we're filled with the Holy spirit, there's just something about it. So don't do anything. Even if you did think, you know how to do it, just say, Lord, I think I know how to do this, but I don't want to do it without you, whatever it is that you're doing. Like I've been married for 40 years, Lori, and I think I know how to do this, but I don't want to do it without you, Lord. 4 (1h 11m 44s): I I've been whatever I've been doing this job for 50 years. I, I think I don't want to do it without you Lord, whatever it may be. Just continue to get humbled before the Lord and get desperate before him and watch what he will do. It'll be wonderful and supernatural stuff that only he can do ask God for it. Ask God for it. Ask again and again and again, how to Paul Maintain a Godly Attitude and Perspective number five. As we get ready to wrap up, he celebrated the success of others. Paul wasn't all about himself. He was celebrating the success of others. There's something wonderful about that. There's something powerful about that. When we can celebrate the success of others, this is what he wrote in verse six. 4 (1h 12m 29s): So you received the message with joy from the Holy spirit, in spite of severe suffering, it brought you wow. They received it with joy. In spite of the severe suffering, they received it with joy in spite of the severe suffering. I'm not sure that we have in the Western church. We have the capacity for that yet, but we may have to develop the capacity for that to receive the message, to do what God has called us to do with great joy. In spite of the severe suffering in this way, you would limit you imitated both us and the Lord, listen to suffering and sacrifice as a part of the call, suffering and sacrifice as part of the call, suffering and sacrifice is part of the gall. 4 (1h 13m 15s): It's it's it's not so much in this nation yet, but it's common. It's common. And if we're not ready, we're not going to be ready, but we can get it ready and say, Lord, We need to declare before it even happens, Lord, I don't know what's going to happen. I don't know what's coming down the pike, but I'm going to stand for you no matter what, no matter what the persecution, whatever that looks like I was, I was a bit nervous coming into this weekend. And I'll be honest with you. I was nervous. I, I dunno why I was more nervous this time than the last time we made the decision. I just, I just was feeling anxious about it. I was like, Lord, even though we had full support of the elder team, everybody was in unanimous agreement to go ahead and open up. 4 (1h 13m 56s): I just felt nervous. I talked to my brother last night and he said, Hey, I talked to a, we've got a mutual friend who is a local politician. And he said, I talked to, I talked to so-and-so, I'm going to leave this person anonymous. But he said, I, I talked to so-and-so and I asked, are you going to shut our Church 6 (1h 14m 12s): Down? And this person said, Nope, we're not going to follow the, the guidelines the governor set out. And when I heard that, I thought that's, I needed to hear that know, we were talking about this, this Shalom of God earlier, man. That was like the peace, the Shalom that I needed. I was like, ah, 4 (1h 14m 29s): I mean, I like, I'm not afraid of people, but I'm afraid of people, you know, that sort of thing. It's like, I am a humanist. I want to stand strong. But there's times when I'm afraid. Right? And I don't know how to stand strong sometimes. But when the Lord 6 (1h 14m 43s): Gave me that, I was like, okay, I can let this go. We're going to have Church and we're not alone there. Other churches in the community who are doing the same thing that we're doing, I've heard of a couple of others. 4 (1h 14m 53s): Church is. And there's probably more just people doing the same thing 6 (1h 14m 57s): That we're doing. Having Church a triangle 4 (1h 14m 60s): Trusted the Lord in the midst of it. Not in any way, are we trying to be arrogant about it? Got it. 6 (1h 15m 6s): But God's not impressed with that. We're just trying to be humbly doing what God has called us to do. We're not boasting about it to anybody. We're not being critical of others who aren't doing it. We're just saying, you know what, for us, for Harvest Church, we're going to have Church inside, outside, online, everywhere we can. We're going to have Church. They received the message. In spite of the severe suffering, they received it with joy. As a result, you have become an example to all the believers in Greece, throughout both Macedonia and a K. Yeah. This 4 (1h 15m 40s): Church exemplified true discipleship. 6 (1h 15m 43s): And the result was 4 (1h 15m 44s): First eight. And now the whole, the word of the Lord is, is ringing out from you to people everywhere. Even beyond 6 (1h 15m 52s): Macedonia in a yeah, for wherever 4 (1h 15m 55s): We go, we find people telling us about your faith in God. Like the faith of this church was, was resounding all over the region. We don't need to tell them about it for, they keep talking about the wonderful welcome you gave us and how you turned away from idols to serve the living and true God. So that's a lot. I go, this is a big city, probably a couple, a hundred thousand people bigger than our area, a couple, a hundred thousand people. And so there was, there was a diversity, there all kinds of different idolatrous things, things that were were temptations to this church and they were sick of it. They were like over it. They knew that all of the things that the world had to offer was leaving that empty. 4 (1h 16m 37s): And so when Paul came and preached the gospel and told them about the Messiah, they were like, this is real. This is genuine. The person who preaches it is real and genuine. And this message is real and genuine. They keep talking about the wonderful welcome you gave us and how you turned away from idols to serve the living and true God. But they understood something about turning away from their idols to the living. God, they turned away from something so that they might turn to the living. We have to do the same thing. We have to decide to turn away from our idols in this culture. We've got all kinds of idols as well, all kinds of things that get our attention and keep our attention. 4 (1h 17m 20s): And I wonder if we're willing to turn away from things that are getting our attention, maybe it's money. Maybe it's just stuff that you've accumulated and liked to collect. Maybe it's a relationship or a hobby or a sport. 6 (1h 17m 35s): What is it? 4 (1h 17m 36s): If anything that the Lord is saying, Hey, you you're, you're spending way too much time and attention that you can't, you can't serve God. And anything else you can't serve God in any thing else, verse 10 says, and they speak of how you are looking forward to the coming of God's son from heaven. Jesus whom God raised from the dead. He is the one who has rescued us from the terrors of the coming judgment. Jesus is coming again and there's a coming judgment. Are you, are you ready for that? Are you ready for that? There's going to be a judgment that leads to a, a, a, you know, a, a Jew for those who aren't saved, there's going to be the great white throne judgment where those who are judged there will go into eternal fire hell. 4 (1h 18m 22s): And then there's a judgment upon believers as well. That will determine the rewards that we receive in heaven. We're going to be, our lives will be judged. Did we live our lives according to God's plans and purposes? Or did we live them for ourselves? We might. Some of us might have fire insurance. Well, I'm not totally sure that that's a biblical thing because the requirements for salvation is that we trust Jesus as Lord, Lord, and savior. So he wants not 30% of our life, like, okay, what's what's one seventh of the week. He doesn't like what one seventh, right? He's not like wanting your Sunday. 4 (1h 19m 3s): He wants your Sunday, your Monday, your Tuesday or Wednesday, your Thursday or Friday. And yes, your Saturday, he wants your Saturday. He wants 24, seven Sunday through Saturday. Pretty sure he wants it all. He wants it all. He wants a 24 seven. He wants it all because that's what Lordship is. When some, when you're owned by somebody, they own you all, they own all of you. Right? Right. We are bond servants, servants by choice to God. So he owns us. We've been bought with a price Calvary. We're going to be taking communion here shortly. We, we need to live in such a way that we are owned by God, that we've been bought with a price that we've been adopted into his family, that he loves us. 4 (1h 19m 48s): And that he's wants to lead our every area and arena of our 6 (1h 19m 52s): Lives. Does that make sense? It's hard stuff though, right? Like not really though. Let's just be honest. It's not really that hard. 4 (1h 20m 3s): If you do these five things, it's not really a hard remain. Thankful, pray, constantly 6 (1h 20m 10s): Focus on the good, be empowered by God. Celebrate the success of others. It's just when, when we just get up and decide by God's grace and then repent quickly when we fall short, it's not that difficult. I don't mean to oversimplify it, but it's just not that what's makes it difficult is when we don't want to give up the things of the world, when I don't want to give up that thing, then it's difficult. Then it becomes this big wrestling match. But when I say, God, I give it to you and I want to continue to give it to you. And I know we've got addictions in our lives. We've got things. People have addiction and people have difficult things that are, that are nagging at them and lifelong stuff. 6 (1h 20m 50s): All of that stuff is navigate. Navigate. We can navigate it when we've got the power of the Holy spirit at work in our lives. I don't mean to make light of it. I know people go through hard stuff. I've been through hard stuff, but, but when we decide that we're all in, God gives us the grace to do what he's called us to do anyway, enough of that heaviness there and a half of that let's invite the worship team forward. And we're going to take communion. Can I get an element? Can I who's passing out elements today? Can I get one of those? Thanks very much. Thank you, pastor Ron. Okay. One, one. It is. So we get a chance to take communion on the fourth, Sunday of every month on family Sunday. 6 (1h 21m 34s): And it's just an opportunity to reflect on 0 (1h 21m 37s): What Jesus has done for us. And 6 (1h 21m 39s): So through COVID we've got these fancy little individual servings. So go ahead and get started by peeling off the very top layer of clear plastic. And that will give you 0 (1h 21m 50s): The wafer first Corinthians 1123 says for, I pass on to you. What I received from the Lord himself 6 (1h 22m 5s): On the night, when he was betrayed the Lord, Jesus took some bread 0 (1h 22m 8s): Ed and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke 6 (1h 22m 12s): Pieces and said, this is my body, which has given me 0 (1h 22m 15s): For you. Do this to remember me. It's take the for, thank you for the wafer that represents your body, your body, that was crucified, nailed to a cross and Pierce. Thank you that you did that for me. I did that for us. The wages of sin is death. Thank you that you died in my place in our place. The free gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ. 0 (1h 22m 56s): Our Lord. Thank you for that learning in the same way, he took the cup of wine after supper saying this cup is the new covenant between God and his people and agreement confirmed with my blood. Do this to remember me. As often as you drink it for every time you eat this bread and drink this cup, you are announcing the Lord's death until he comes again. Squinting the juice. Thank you so much, Lord, thank you for the juice that represents the blood that was spilled so that our sins might be forgiven. 0 (1h 23m 48s): I don't know how to understand it. Other than theologically that's God's design that his blood was spilled and it's got cleansing properties, cleansing power. The blood of Christ makes us as white, as snow clean, cleansing us from every sin. Every failure, every mistake. If you're here today and you've never received the grace and the mercy of the Lord, Jesus Christ. You can, you, whether you're watching online or on campus somewhere, you simply acknowledge your need for Jesus. And when you do, you say something like this Lord, I need you. 0 (1h 24m 31s): I, I need you. I need you to forgive me. I need you to cleanse me. There's some here that just feel dirty. And God wants to cleanse you from that experience. And you need to believe that when God covers your sin, he cleanses your sin. He forgives your sin. He races your sin. He eliminates your sin and he no longer holds it against you. He loves you. He loves you. He loves you Lord. 0 (1h 25m 12s): For those who are receiving your grace gift for the first time, bless them, Lord, God bless them with new life. Fill them with your Holy spirits. God, for those who need to renew their faith commitment to you, Lord, I pray that that would be happening now as well. And some people who are renewing, they feel dirty Lord. And I pray God that that would be eliminated in Jesus name. The enemy is a liar. He's always trying to deceive us, making us feel bad about ourselves, lying to us all the time. If we confess our sin, he is faithful. And just to forgive us and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness, that's what the Bible says. 0 (1h 25m 54s): That's the truth. Thank you for that truth. So confess your sin and watch what God will do. Lord. We love you. We thank you for your mercy, your grace. We thank you that you've saved us. That you've sanctified us. Lord. You're in the process of sanctifying us and making us more and more like you. We love you and we need it. Lord, thank you for this time. Bless us as we continue to worship, we pray in Jesus name. Amen. Let's go ahead and stand and worship. 1 (1h 26m 39s): I see , your presence here with a brand that you would go with this all to where we just fill our hearts and we can reflect your love. 1 (1h 30m 50s): Everyone. It's a safe and healthy until we meet together again. And Jesus, thanks so much for joining us today. If anyone has needed a prayer this morning, please don't leave without getting some come on forward and we'll have some folks love to pray with you today. Otherwise I have a wonderful day to worship together. Again, next time. Take care.