Baptize you in the name of the Father and in the Holy Spirit.
I'm just so glad we're not one of those weird churches. Wow, am I on? Can you hear me out there? I think I'm on. Okay, all right. Good to see you this morning. I am Pastor Craig. If I haven't had a chance to meet you, I don't know why I feel compelled to tell this really weird story, but I had to do some caulking in my bathroom yesterday.
If you're not really careful with those caulking guns, they just start oozing out, and I freaked out. I didn't know what to do, so I just wiped it on my kneecap, and then I let it dry. My jeans keep getting caught in the caulking that is on my leg, so if I'm preaching and I'm like... well, I'll leave that one alone. You don't know what's going on.
All right, I'm Pastor Craig. Hey, if I haven't met you yet, I would love that opportunity. Those that are online, thank you for being with us as well. We've got two weeks left in the book of James, and so thank you, Ben, for the reminder. If you want to go back and get caught up, you can do that.
But I'm kind of sad that we've only got two weeks left in this amazing book. You know, it's kind of bittersweet. It's bitter because James has kind of become like an old friend, right? Old friends are the best kind of friends because old friends can tell you the hard things. They can just kind of shoot you straight, and it kind of feels like that's how James has been with us over these last several weeks.
It's sweet, though, because we've only got a few more weeks before Easter. We even had the Easter flags flying today! Who's excited about Easter? Come on! Yeah! So we got two more weeks in James, and then we'll be right into the Easter season, which is always a great time.
The next two weeks, though, we're going to be talking about two P words: the Parousia today, I guess is how you could say it, and prayer. So today we're going to talk about the Parousia, right? That's when you're walking in the woods and you get a little critter that latches onto you. That's the part... no, that's parasite. Sorry about that.
Parousia is kind of a general term, this general idea of the Lord's return, and the Lord's return is imminent. That should get us again very, very excited to know that there's nothing that the Lord is waiting on. I mean, it's in His timing, but the Lord's return is imminent.
I like how James presents kind of his end times ideas, his end times thoughts. Unlike John or Peter or Paul, which praise God for all three of those guys, James doesn't really break down for us his thoughts on how all the end times are going to work out. So that's not what we're going to do today either.
But what James does do, I like it because James is just a simple, straightforward kind of guy, and he's going to give us a perspective on the end times that's really more focused on, "Okay, the Lord's return is imminent, the Parousia. There's nothing that the Lord is waiting on to return and lay claim to His kingdom." Right? There's nothing that is preventing that.
So if that is the case, how should we live our life in light of this reality that the Lord is coming back? When the Lord comes back, He's not coming back as a baby. He's not coming back as a lamb. He's coming back, James will say, as judge, and He's going to come back and He's going to right all those things that have been made wrong.
I love how Tolkien, the old author, says it, right? He's going to come back and all these sad things will become untrue. All the sad things. We will have a fresh perspective, and we will finally get to see and to understand that the Lord has not tarried. The Lord has not been absent. That actually all things do work together for the good.
I don't say that flippantly, but all things work together for the good, and we just won't have the full perspective on how that works out in the here and the now. But there is coming a day when the Lord will return, and He will restore all that has been broken, and He will lay claim to His earth, and His kingdom will be established.
That should change the way that we view our life. That should change the way that we view the world around us, right? The end game is not just for us to be in heaven, as great as that is. That's not the end game. Jesus is actually coming back, and He's going to restore, and He's going to bring about justice on the earth, and He will fully consummate His kingdom on the earth.
Not a square inch of the globe that the Lord will not exercise His full authority. And He's a God that is for us. It will be a kingdom of justice, and we need to look forward to that day, and we need to live our life today. What James is going to tell us, we need to live our life today in light of that day.
Someday is coming. I've been on it, you know, you probably could tell from the last week. I've just been on like a classic rock kick. You know, I go kind of through different phases, and I've been listening to a lot of Creedence Clearwater Revival over the last couple of weeks. I don't know what it is, but I was listening to this song. It's kind of one of their not-so-popular songs, but it's this song that's called "Someday Never Comes."
And it's this story about this guy. He's kind of writing the song, right? And it's from the perspective of his earthly father that constantly tells his son when his son is approaching him with all these things that he can't understand. The father says, "Hey, someday will come. Someday, someday you'll understand."
Right? The son grows up, and he comes to this conclusion that someday never comes. He's disillusioned his whole life. And I'm here to tell you, to take the song kind of out of the equation, but the father was not wrong in his advice. Someday will come. Someday will come when we will understand, when we will be able to see more clearly.
But it's not going to come from human enlightenment. It's not going to come because we have acquired knowledge or somehow we reach a level on this earth. But someday will come when we will understand, and it will be in conjunction with the Lord's return when He comes and He makes right all that has been broken.
So go ahead and let's jump into James. We're going to look at these verses today on the Parousia, Parousia, Parousia, however you want to say it. Not parasite, though, for sure.
The Lord's return, the Lord's coming in James 5:7-8. And here's what we got: "Therefore, brothers and sisters, be patient until the Lord's coming." Again, James is writing this letter to refugee Christ followers that are scattered across the Roman Empire. Life is not easy for them. There's this constant battle that's taking place that James is speaking into.
The people who are receiving this letter, they're on the side of oppression, right? They are being oppressed. Their life is not easy, and they constantly go back and forth between taking matters into their own hands. "Hey, let's just play by the world's game. I mean, if we're going to be abused, if people are going to take advantage of us, then let's just take matters into our own hands and do what we have to do."
And James writes, and he's saying, "No, don't do that. Don't do it. We do serve a sovereign God. He's in control. He sees." Right? We talked about that last week, that God, His ears and His eyes are actually attuned to those who are in need. And James says, "Don't do that. Trust the Lord's timing."
And that is the challenge, right? That's still the challenge for us. It's not an easy path, but that is the call. As Christ followers, we're called to, no matter what the circumstances of our life might look like, we're called to honor God, to follow Jesus, even in the difficult, even in the hard.
And I think sometimes we just get so consumed on earthly things that we forget the eternal perspective. Jesus's life wasn't an easy life. Jesus's life of what it looks like to honor God was a hard life, and His life is the one that we are following after.
So in many ways, yes, when we conform our lives, when we bend our life to the book, we are swimming upstream. We are going against the flow of this world, and there will be challenges with that.
So James says, "Therefore, brothers and sisters, be patient until the Lord's coming. See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth and is patient with it until it receives the early and late rains. You also must be patient. Strengthen your hearts because the Lord's coming is near." James 5:7-8.
So three times in these two short little verses, James commands those whose life is hard and difficult and so many things are going against them. James says, "I got a tough request for you, but it is the right path." And three times he uses this word "patient," which is personally not my favorite word. I've expressed that before. I'm just not a patient person.
Some people, if you have the gift of patience, you should praise God for that because that's a... you talk about just on a next level spiritually. Like people who have... you know you're in the presence of somebody who just has like a very calm spirit about them, and they're just very soft-spoken, and the things that are encircling around them just don't frazzle them as much as others. Like that's a real gift.
But James doesn't give any of us a free pass, and he says that we all must be patient. Yeah, and then he uses this example of a farmer. I went down this long path because I have some farmers in my family. I've never personally farmed very much, but I'm going to try to get this word right: agro-hydrological expert. Did you know there are people in this world that are agro-hydrological experts? Who knew?
So when you're at Cracker Barrel with your friends after church and they ask you what you talked about, you can say, "We talked about agro-hydrological experts at church today." What did you talk about? And they're going to look at you like, "Wow, amazing." Probably not. They'll probably glaze over. Don't do that. Just enjoy the biscuits, okay?
But these people actually study water cycles and stuff, right? And how it impacts farmers. Rain is very important in farming, obviously. You need water supply to make plants grow. But did you also know you need some seasons of dry? You can't have too much rain. It's like this really crazy thing.
When you think about how many examples in Scripture, like God uses agriculture as an example of the Christian life, it's because I think if we were to sit down and have a conversation with any farmer out there, I think that farmer would be the first one to tell you farmers get up really early. Farmers go to bed really late. Farmers can't really take... they can't go like pastors to Key West and just fiddle... but not fiddle-fart, I'm not going to say that, but fiddle around, right?
Like farmers have to be there, and it's this idea that in the Christian life, there are things that are in God's control just like a farmer would tell you there are things that are beyond their control. I can imagine that that's just such a humbling occupation, but yet at the same time, it doesn't negate the work that goes into it.
So James is using this example. He's using the example of a farmer, and he's reminding them, "Hey, all of you in the first-century world, they would have had a pretty good idea of what farming would have looked like because that's the vocation that most people were involved in."
And he's using this example of, "You got to be patient just like a farmer waiting on those early and those late rains." But then there's going to be seasons in between that it might look like there's not a whole lot of things that are happening.
You know, I don't want to press this too far, but it's like perhaps James is saying, "You know, it's like when Jesus inaugurated His kingdom 2,000 years ago. Now He came to the earth. He established..." Like in John, it's like Jesus comes to this realization. I was just reading it this week, and it's like Jesus comes to this realization right before He's headed to the cross. He's actually in the upper room with His disciples, and John lets us know that Jesus said He realized that all authority had been given to Him.
All authority had been placed under His care. All authority! Isn't that wild to think about? All authority handed to Jesus. And what did He do in that moment? He took off His robe and He got down and He washed the disciples' feet. Wow! He served.
But it doesn't deny the fact that God the Father had placed all authority in Him. We've had 2,000 years to see the kingdom of God expanding, right? And there are times where, yes, it's discouraging, and there are times when we look at things that are happening in the world, and it's like, "Wow! Is there anything happening? What in the world?" It doesn't make sense.
It's kind of like maybe we're in this season of being in between the early and the late rains. But as the Lord prepares to return, which James will again remind us, His return is imminent, that there are things that are happening that we need to pay attention to. We need to be aware of the signs of the times, and we need to be encouraged because James doesn't say just to be patient. What does he also say? "Strengthen your hearts because the Lord's coming is near."
Now that word "near" is a specific word in the New Testament, and it's a word "engizo." And here's what it refers to: it is a sign of proximity, but it's also a sign of awareness and a sign of an effect.
Let me read a verse to you, and maybe it'll help to provide some context for it. But Luke 10:8-9, here's what Jesus commands His disciples: "When you enter any town and they welcome you, eat the things set before you. Heal the sick who are there and tell them the kingdom of God has come near you."
And what James is saying by this is that the Parousia, the coming of the Lord, is near. What he's referring to in that is not just on a chronological timeline, not just in simple matters of proximity, but he's actually saying that if you pay attention, if you will open up your eyes, if you will look to see the things that are happening in the world, you will begin to see that the Lord's coming is near and that there is already an impact and an effect that is being experienced.
It's like an encroaching storm, right? It's like when a storm comes, and before the eye of the storm comes, you can begin to feel the temperature changes. You can begin to feel the wind picking up. You can begin to see the storm as it comes into the rise.
And I'm just using a... I'm not trying to make a correlation between Jesus's coming and a storm, even though maybe there is some correlation there. I'm just saying what James is referring to is that the nearness of the Lord, we can begin to experience the impact and the effects of that even now.
And you might say, "Well, Pastor Craig, it just looks like the world is just really messed up right now, and I just don't understand." And I would say, "Get outside of the box a little bit and actually look at the things that are happening around the world." That's what I would encourage you with, right?
We live in an increasingly post-Christian society, and we start to believe that Norfolk and Virginia and the USA is the world. And I'm here to tell you it's not. There is a big massive world out there, and God is doing amazing things. Lots of difficulties, lots of hard things that are happening. Satan is not going to release control of his world easy, right? If we think that, we're mistaken.
But I'm so... two weeks, I get to go back to Chad, and it's right before Easter. And I probably shouldn't, but I'm going because God has opened up a door, and there are things that are happening around the world that are just... man, it's amazing just to go and to see.
And I hope that this time... I'm really excited because Jared, you know, our frenemy church at VBCC, is sending me a buddy to go to Chad, so we're going with a buddy. So we're really not enemies, right? Y'all get that? We love each other. We're just competition. That's the word I was looking for.
But I can't wait to come back and just to share some of the things that God is doing there. So please don't... strengthen your heart. Strengthen your heart. That's what James is saying.
You know, we strengthen our heart by bending our lives to the book. We strengthen our heart by spending time with the Lord. We strengthen our heart by gaining a right perspective on what God is doing in the world.
And I just challenge us with this because, you know, our brains are like... they mold and they take form around the things that we fill our minds with. That's why the Apostle Paul, in Romans, says, "Don't be conformed to this world. Don't be conformed to this world. Be transformed through the renewing of your mind."
So the things that we put into our minds... when we just sit... and I mean, I'm guilty there too. One of the first things I do in the morning, I pick up my phone and I look at all the news updates that happened overnight, right? And it's just like, "Why?" Because that is conforming my mind to think in a certain way.
So I just say all that to say, like, let's just be wise. We strengthen our heart by having a right perspective, and we gain perspective by the unchanging word of God. That's why we need to receive the instructions from the Lord in such a clear way, and He's provided it so graciously for us.
And I know there are things in here that it's like, "Oh man, I don't like this as much as I like that." It's this kind of... it's like a cookie cutter, you know, coming down and kind of like cutting off some of the corners of my heart. But that is the point. This word didn't originate from the things of this world. This word is from above. His Spirit has spoken and has given us this amazing gift, and it is going to cut.
There are things that are going to make us uncomfortable because this is the unchanging word of God. It's how we gain perspective, and it's how we strengthen our hearts. What a gift God has given us!
Well, James continues down this path, and he says, "All right, the Lord's coming is near. Be patient. Be patient as you wait. Be patient. Things might not look that great right now."
Again, James is writing to people who are literally being oppressed. Like last week, we looked at those who were doing the oppressing, and James had a harsh word to them. But do you see how he's changed his language in these last couple of verses? Now it's brothers and sisters. Brothers, sisters, family, family.
"Hey, I know things aren't easy. I know things are difficult, and I'm going to give you a word that none of us like to hear, but it is the path forward: be patient. Strengthen your heart because the Lord's coming is imminent. The Lord's coming is near, and there are things that we can already experience."
He doesn't break it down, but he does say, "Here's how we need to live in light of the reality that someday is coming." And here's this... he's loving, but goodness gracious, he's like an old friend, right? He tells you the hard things.
And here's what he says: "Brothers and sisters, because someday is coming, because we know we have hope, because we know things are going to work out, we know we are victorious already in Christ because He rose from the grave already, we live in the power of the resurrection."
Do we really realize how blessed we are to be New Testament believers? We get to live our entire lives in the power of the same power that rose Jesus from the grave. The Spirit of God indwells us. The Spirit of God indwells us and empowers us.
We don't have to see how far we can make it and get exhausted and get frustrated and get mad and then say, "Oh God, please help me." We have the Spirit of God in us from the moment we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. His Spirit indwells us. His empowerment is in us, and our strength is found as we yield our life to the Spirit.
And here's what he... I feel like I've said that seven times. And here's what he says: "Brothers and sisters, do not complain about one another."
Oh, James, come on! You had to go there. I got a bone to pick with James when I see him one day. "Do not complain." I would love this verse a whole lot better if it said, "Try not to complain." It's these little words in the Scripture that just drive me nuts. You know, like stop complaining.
I know I'm complaining about James saying not to complain. Oh my goodness, Father, right now I just repent in this moment. I am so sorry. "Do not complain about one another so that you will not be judged." Yikes! "Look, the judge stands at the door." James 5:9.
So James gives us this reality that the Lord's coming is near. He doesn't break it down for us. He doesn't play his cards. He doesn't tell us how... what his... here's another fun word. He doesn't lay out his eschatological development for us, right? His whole... like he... the guy might not have even been to seminary. Oh my goodness!
But he does tell us how we are to live our life in light of someday coming, and it's a command about harmony as the body of Christ. It's really what it boils down to: harmony, unity as the body of Christ. And we've been getting it wrong ever since James wrote the letter. It's a shame, but it's true.
We are so quick to justify why we are right about this or why, you know, "Well, this just isn't really working out anymore. I don't like this person anymore. This person said something to me. I don't like the shoes that this person wears."
How does that feel, big guy? Oh yeah, I've been... I wasn't in my manuscript, but the Lord brought that to my mind, and I said, "I'm about to zing this guy over there." He's jealous. That's right. I forgive you.
Unity as a church is not... we can laugh, and we should laugh, and we should have fun in church, but unity in a church is no laughing matter. And again, it's just a really... it's a struggle because we... we, me, you, we are all, at our core, very, very selfish people.
It's a hard command, but isn't that interesting that James, he gives this grand picture: the Lord is drawing near. The day is coming. And not only does he say it's drawing near, he gives this amazing picture. He gives this picture: the Lord is not literally... you know, there's nothing that the Lord is constrained by, right?
So it's not like this door is constraining the Lord, but the idea is that James is reminding us Jesus is coming home. He's on the porch. He's at the door. Jesus is standing at the door, and He's coming home. Dad is coming home, and the kids in the house need to act a certain kind of way because Jesus is at the door getting ready to come back to His world that He created with His very own hands and breath.
It's His world. We just are living in it, and there's a way that we are to act with one another in light of Jesus being on the door getting ready to come home. And I don't want to be caught complaining about my brother or sister in Christ because the judge is... this is how James portrays it: the judge is coming home.
That means the judge is going to render a verdict. He has the authority to actually render a verdict, and His word is the final word. So we might say, like, you know, I have one kid in the auditorium, so I'll just say I have two. I'll save my other two kids, right?
There's always something that happens, and there's always like 18 sides to every story. I don't know how it works out, but it's just one of those things, right? "Well, this person did that." "Well, this... but you don't know what this person did. They started it. They started it. It wasn't my fault. I didn't do it."
Right? Jesus is coming back as judge, and He sees everything. That's the kicker, right? I'm a human dad. I don't see everything. I don't see how everything unfolds. Not the case with Jesus. There's not going to be any making our pitch when Jesus comes back because He sees.
And so all that to say, James is saying, in light of someday coming, and it's coming soon, we need to treat each other like that. There needs to be harmony. There needs to be unity. And what we do not mean by harmony and unity is that that doesn't mean to become a doormat. That doesn't mean to just suck it up and just let everybody run roughshod. That is not what harmony and unity is.
Harmony and unity is actually pursuing relationship in an authentic, in a real way with one another. But it's actually leaning in and actually doing the hard and sitting down and having the conversation. "Okay, I see this this way, and I perceive that you see this this way. Can we actually sit down in a room, not texting each other, not shooting fireballs on Facebook and all that? Can we actually sit down in a room, and I want to hear and understand your perspective?"
I might not agree with it. It doesn't mean that we have to agree on everything, but we have to be willing to sit down face to face and have the conversation. Say, "This is how I see it." And at the end of the day, we can disagree on some really, really big things as long as we both can come to that same conclusion that we are both in love with Jesus and we are pursuing Jesus, and that is our goal.
That is what binds us together. And if we have Jesus in common, there shouldn't be anything else that sways us out of that relationship. Does that make sense? That's what unity is. It's not conformity. It's not faking it till we make it, but it is a resolve to say that Jesus is number one in my life. If Jesus is number one in your life and we're both pursuing the same Lord, it's why Jesus, His very last prayer that He prayed over those that would come, He said, "Lord, make them one as You and I are one."
Make them one, Lord. Our oneness is not found in our political affiliation. Our oneness is not found in our skin color. Our oneness is not found in the way that we choose to educate our kids. Our oneness is not found in the fact that we're Americans. Our oneness is not found in any of those things. Our oneness is found in our commitment to Jesus. That's where our oneness is found.
And James says that we have to live our life in light of someday coming, and we live our life in light of that by being in unity with one another. He takes it the negative direction, but he says, "Don't complain about one another. Don't murmur about one another. Don't be at odds with one another."
Life is hard. It's tough. These people that he was writing to are just having a go of it, and he realizes that their strength, one of the ways they're going to strengthen their hearts is that they're going to be bonded to one another because of their mutual relationship with Christ in such a strong, powerful way that on the hard days and on the tough days, they got each other.
We need one another. We need one another. It's a great reminder from James. He's going to conclude this section by then saying, "Brothers," in verse 10, "Brothers and sisters, take the prophets who spoke in the Lord's name as an example of suffering and patience. See, we count as blessed those who have endured. You have heard of Job's endurance and have seen the outcome that the Lord brought about. The Lord is compassionate and merciful." James 5:10-11.
There's a whole lot to unpack there, and I'll just say it briefly, but James is basically reminding us of this truth that we all need to be reminded of from time to time, and it's this truth: trust in God's character even when the circumstances don't make sense. Trust in God's character even when the circumstances of life don't make sense.
And James uses this example of Job, and we're probably all familiar with Job. He suffered a lot. The guy lost his family. The guy lost his friends. The guy had boils all up and down his skin. Man, Job had a tough go of it. But in the end, Job did a lot of bending, right? Job even did some... you know, there were things that he didn't understand, but in Job's bending, he never broke.
And what did he not break? He never broke his fundamental belief that God is a God of character. He's worthy of our trust because He is a compassionate and merciful God. God, if we ever get off on that, if we ever start to believe and buy into the lies of Satan that we don't serve a God who, at His fundamental core, is compassionate and merciful, man, it just begins to skew our perspective on a lot of things, even in the way that we treat other people.
Like even sometimes we can forget that God is merciful. This is the core of our God: a merciful and compassionate God. And we, as believers, actually get to a spot where we stop having mercy and compassion on people.
How do we not flow out the mercy and compassion of God knowing that we serve a God that has been so merciful and compassionate to us? So perhaps if we find ourselves in a place where we're short with our spouse or we're short with our roommate or we're at odds with someone, maybe the place to begin is not just diving right back into that interpersonal relationship.
Maybe we just need to take a day or two to step back and say, "Man, I don't feel a lot of mercy and compassion towards this person. Perhaps, God, it is me who has gotten off or skewed on my fundamental belief that You are a merciful and compassionate God to me."
And that helps us to rethink and reframe the way that we approach those that are around us. I love how James has kind of taken us through, and I will end here, but I love how James has taken us through this really quickly, some really key things, right?
James has reminded us that the Parousia is coming. The Lord's coming is near. We can actually begin to, if we're aware, if we look at the signs of the time, we can actually see the results and some of the impact that is happening as the Lord's drawing near, as the Lord's coming is near.
Then he tells us, because of that reality, there's a way that we need to act as the children of God. We need to be in unity with one another. Stop the complaining about one another because the judge is coming.
And then he reminds us of this fundamental aspect that we serve a God of mercy and compassion, and he uses the testimony of this guy named Job and the other prophets. And I look, and I love... not love, but that's who he uses because he reminds us of Job, this guy who did not have an easy life.
But at the end... and hey, for Job, it didn't even have to wait till he died and was in the presence of God. Like the end of Job's life, God chose to bless this guy exponentially more than even what he started out. God chose to act in Job's life that way, and it's these testimonies that we can look at as we have the difficulties in our life.
It's these testimonies that we can go back and we can look at these pillars of the faith who have modeled a life of Christ-likeness for us, and that is yet another way it helps us to gain patience and strengthen our hearts.
As I was going through this, I just took a few minutes. I just sat down, and I was like, "Lord, who are some people in my life? What are some testimonies of some people whose lives are just lives that I have so much respect for that have demonstrated just a life of quiet faithfulness?"
And I was just sitting, and I was just kind of thinking, and they don't like the limelight, so don't tell them I used them as an example in a sermon, please, whatever you do. But Dr. Luke and Nancy Kuthril just came to my mind. They're two missionaries that served in Pakistan. I had a chance to go visit them a couple of years ago to see how they did their ministry.
It's a ministry of mercy and compassion in the face of... I mean, nothing comes back to them by way of real benefit or appreciation a lot of times, and that's not why they're there. They were there. They retired, and that's why I bring them up because they had this amazing... from the '80s, right? Just these decades of serving the Lord with compassion and mercy to people who had a totally different worldview than them, and yet they just quietly went about serving the Lord.
And it's people like that that help remind me and just show I can strengthen my heart, Lord. I can strengthen my heart not because I'm putting too much faith or anything in another person, but I can strengthen my heart, Lord, because of You and Your character.
And I've actually seen You have blessed me with the opportunity to see testimonies of lives that are incredibly blessed, incredibly blessed, blessed because they oriented their lives in this way. It's amazing.
I also brought the... as I was just kind of processing through, we think about individuals a lot of times, but then there are these times where God does these amazing testimonies through a body of believers, through a church.
And this, if you're here and you're new, I wasn't here during this time, but we're here in some ways... well, we're here because of God's faithfulness, but we're also here because God's faithfulness was used as an instrument through the lives of real people that sacrificed immensely.
And Ben talked about this building and how much of a blessing it is. You know, 25 years ago, I think like this week or last week was the dedication of this building, the 25th anniversary of this thing we call Miracle 2000. 25 years, here we are.
I don't know if we had time to put them in there, but Ben had some... man, those are some cute pictures. Look at this! Can you... I don't know, they're kind of small, but look, there's Ben and his siblings. This guy right here! Look at that! Isn't that just so cool?
I didn't think you were 25. Oh, I'm kidding! Isn't that amazing, though? We are so blessed because we are a part of a community of faith that the whole mode of operation for us as a church from the beginning of the church in 1925... 1935, I was like, "Oh my goodness, is it the 100-year anniversary?" No, it's not.
1935, we've been a people who have been fueled by faith. That's it! At the end of the day, we have been a people defined by being fueled by faith. And collectively, as a church, we've experienced the extravagance of the generosity of God in our lives, and we can strengthen our hearts because of the goodness of God, of what He's already done.
We are such a blessed, blessed people. So I just want to challenge us. Here we are, we're 2025. We still serve the same God. And I love how Pastor Gene Garrick, as I've read through the history of one of the... he's just a masterful guy at quotes and stuff, but he would always say, "Where God's finger points, His hand provides."
I've experienced that to be true, and I'm so thankful for the things, the testimonies that have gotten me to this point. But God, help me! I don't want to stop now. I don't want to just rest on my laurels for the things that have happened in the past.
I want to use the things from the past to fuel us with faith as we pursue what God has in store for us right now in our future as Tab Church as we anticipate the return of the Lord.
And I don't know about you, but I'm excited about what God is doing at Tab. I'm thankful, and I truly believe we've got amazing things in store. But at the end of the day, God is going to operate through our willingness to submit and be fueled by faith.
And I'll look forward to what He has in store.
Father, we come before You, Lord. We love You. We thank You. Thank You for being a compassionate and merciful God. Thank You that You are returning, and You're returning as judge. So we can chill. We can relax.
Not taking our foot off the faith that You call us to, but we can relax on knowing that all things, Lord, You see them. You're working things out. So we want to be a people that is living fully into Your mission that You've given us to share God's story from Norfolk to the nations.
Thank You for using us, Lord. Thank You for Your Spirit that empowers us. If anybody's here today and they're like, "I just... I don't know if I know Jesus like that." Jesus, You want to know them more than they even want to know You.
So I pray that doesn't have to be certain words. All it is, it's a posture, and it's saying, "Jesus, I accept You. I accept You as my Savior and as my Lord. Forgive me of my sins. I invite You, Lord. I want You to take up residence in my heart."
It's a posture by which we come before You. And Lord, when we come before You and we open up our lives to You, Your Spirit fills us right now. No pre-reqs, Lord. No fine print. You fill us with Your Spirit.
So Lord, we thank You. We love You. It's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
on Mar 23, 2025
