I want to welcome you to the Soul of Music series.
We're in week two and asking ourselves the question, basically, what does our world need now?
And we need to, we have a lot of different answers to that. Your neighbor, your spouse, your friends might have an answer to that.
But first and foremost, we need to go to God so that we can hear what He might need.
And we need to go to God so that might have to say about what our world needs now, and that's what we're doing.
We're looking at Galatians chapter 5, where it has the nine fruits of the Spirit, and we are called to live by the Spirit and then produce these fruits by the power of the Spirit, and that's what our world truly does need now.
And we looked at love, joy, and peace last week, and we're going to look at patience and kindness and goodness this week.
Our special song for the Soul of Music is "Humble and Kind" by Tim McGraw. Beautiful song, has a lot of wonderful truths in it. Look forward to you enjoying that as well as us talking about that.
A couple of important things: Vision Night is this Wednesday, and it's really going to help us sort of prepare and prepare you for our capital campaign in February.
But that Vision Night is at 6 p.m. on Wednesday night, and for those who have been invited to that and haven't RSVP'd, we serve room for you. Please let us know you're coming.
We are a little worried, or we need to worry a little bit about the weather that is going to be moving into the area.
We understand that maybe Tuesday will be one of those times we will have the campus closed, and you might not be getting out, but Wednesday, they say it's going to warm up, and just because we have cool weather doesn't mean that we need to cancel an opportunity to gather as a church and have a meal together, and I have a feeling we'll be able to come together on Wednesday night still, but just please be looking for email and communication, social media communication when it comes to church closures.
I know some of the ministries said that they're not going to be meeting even Wednesday morning. We need to be really careful about meeting depending on the weather, and so be looking for that.
Also, if you have any huge emergency that pops up because of the weather, please let us know. Call the church office if you have that ability. Let us know. We'll be monitoring our voicemail, and we'll help if we possibly can help. We would love to know that you are in need.
Also, like we always do, let's get up. Let's greet those around us. Shake a hand. Somebody around you, introduce yourself. Have a conversation.
I want to thank Lewis and our modern team for singing that again. Let's thank him, and always a great voice. Thanks, Bill, for doing that video for us, and that was an amazing, magnificent anthem. Thank you, Steven, Judith, and our chancel choir. Great music for a great day.
So we're going to start out with some music trivia. I've got two gifts right here. They're, oh, you could say they have to do with "Humble and Kind," a song by Tim McGraw.
They're both titled "Humble and Kind," and so one is by the actual author of the lyrics, and then this one has more to do with Tim McGraw, but they have a couple of cool stories. They're coffee table worthy; they're probably more children-friendly than anything else, and they probably are, or you could say, grandkid friendly.
I'm going to put them both here. We have two questions, and this is not a systematic way of like really being able to do trivia. I'm just going to listen to your voice, and if I award you one gift, you can fight over it in the narthex afterwards after we talk about patience, kindness, and goodness.
Okay, so pop music trivia.
Okay, wrong one. No, that ain't it. Hold up. There it is. Pharrell Williams' hit song "Happy" was featured in which animated movie?
Despicable Me! Who said that over here?
Okay, we got one. We got a winner. After the service, you can come up and grab one of these.
Okay, all right, and I know who it is, so don't say that you want it. I'll fight you for it too, so she gets it.
Okay, uh-huh, that's right.
Okay, inspirational music.
Okay, I changed these up. Like if you're at the nine o'clock, that's why I had to change them up.
So which famous singer-songwriter released the song "Man in the Mirror"?
A lot of people said that one. I heard, I heard, yeah. Was it Connor or Casey? I don't want somebody over there. Patrick's scared to death; it's like his family screaming.
Anyway, so why don't we, uh, somebody come up and grab it from your family afterwards. There you go.
So great stuff, a lot of fun.
We've been talking about, again, Galatians chapter 5, verse 22 through 23. The Spirit said this: the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things.
So the Holy Spirit produces these things in us. Last week we talked about love, joy, peace, and I want to just reiterate something or make it more succinct.
Love, joy, peace—those are foundational fruits of the Spirit, love being the truly foundational one.
But love, joy, peace are foundational fruits of the Spirit that are centered around our relationship with God in a way that this is how we reflect His nature: His love, joy, peace.
Now this week we're talking about patience, kindness, and goodness, and those center around our relationship with God, and we're talking about how we reflect His nature, His love, joy, peace with others.
It's not that we don't have love and joy and peace in a relationship with others, but they center around relationship with others and the grace that we offer, the compassion, the virtue in which we act with.
And just as God has demonstrated with us, patience, kindness, and goodness—these are action-oriented fruits.
Okay, action-oriented fruits.
And the soul of the song "Humble and Kind," I think, is a reminder as you listen to this song that we're talking about how we should treat others, how we should sort of exist with others in our community, our family, friends.
And it's not just good advice; you could say the soul of the song really reflects the biblical truth of God's call to live a lifestyle that aligns with the fruits of the Spirit.
And there's some amazing lyrics in that song, and the one that we heard repeated a couple of times, some lines, is: "Hold the door, say please, say thank you, don't steal, don't cheat, don't lie. I know you got mountains to climb, but always stay humble and kind."
And that sort of is where we're headed. You know, it talks about these actions that we can do and how we interact with people around us.
Now the background of this song: this song was written by Lori McKenna, and Lori is a renowned singer-songwriter, and she had penned this song in sort of a prayer for her five kids.
And I'll get into a quote she has here in just a moment, but could you imagine writing a prayer for your kids, writing a note to your children, and then Tim McGraw sings it back to him, right?
I mean, that's a really cool legacy, I would say.
But in one of these books, it says this: she says, "Often on school days when the house is quiet, I sit at my dining room table with my guitar in my lap and stare out the front window. Usually, I mess with the guitar and see if a melody will pop out. I was thinking of my kids, as parents often do, and taking a mental inventory of the lessons my husband and I have tried to teach them. We have five children; at the time they were ages 10 to 25, each born with a different compass, a different set of sails, and a different anchor. I decided to write a list—a list of things I want them to know, a list of things I sometimes forget and want to remember—the basics, the simple rules that our grandparents told us, our parents remind us of, and we all want for one another."
I love that. Well said.
McKenna sent this song to McGraw, and he heard it and he thought, "That's exactly what our world needs now, and more people need to hear that message."
And of course, he recorded it, and it went on to win a Grammy for the best country song, went on to be the CMA song of the year, and hit the top, you know, song in the country music charts, and it's a very memorable song for all of us, and we can sing along and it has some great stuff in it.
So the Apostle Paul is speaking into the church in Colossians, and he says in chapter three, "Since God chose you to be the holy people He loves, you must clothe yourself with tender-hearted mercy, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Make allowance for each other's faults and forgive anyone who offends you. Remember, the Lord forgave you, so you must forgive others. Above all, clothe yourself with love and mercy and be kind to each other, and be kind to each other, and be kind to each other—love, which binds us all together in perfect harmony."
Again, the soul of the song to me mirrors these biblical truths—these deep biblical truths of how to live a holy life, how to live a life that through interaction with others we live a godly life.
And in verse 12, I love how Paul reminds us, "He chose you to be the holy people."
And when we hear that, we often think, "Oh my goodness, I'm supposed to be holy." Yes, you are. He has chosen you to be a holy people.
But a lot of times we take holiness and we put it with perfection, and we know we are not perfect. We are only perfect in Christ.
Holy means to be set apart. Holy means to be of another agenda, of another will, that you humbly are under somebody's particular orders, and you are God's.
You are doing God's will. It's evident by the production of spiritual fruit in your life, of course, and it flows from our connection to God through Christ.
Now, that means when we do that, that we are living in the Spirit.
We've heard that said before. That phrase is probably a common phrase that we have heard: "Live in the Spirit."
What exactly does it mean? How do we do that?
Well, that's a military phrase. "Live in the Spirit." It means to be drawn up in line.
Okay? It means to stand in a row at orders, you know, to show it by your lives that the Spirit dwells in us, and we're constantly willing to step up and participate.
Participate and actually put ourselves in alignment with God while we are abiding and connecting with Christ.
In doing so, then God utilizes that, and we progressively move through sanctification with this sort of Spirit guiding us, the Spirit directing us, the Spirit governing us.
Now, that requires vigilance, doesn't it? That requires obedience. That requires some humility.
Because we've got to take orders from the Heavenly Father, not just from us.
But again, sometimes it even takes a lot of repentance.
We have to like ask God, "You know, I'm sorry," and we repent of where we've missed the mark.
But resulting ultimately in producing some sort of spiritual fruit in our life.
And if you're like me, that doesn't always just happen naturally—the spiritual fruit.
Well, that's why it's called spiritual fruit, not natural fruit.
It's spiritual fruit because it's of the Spirit. It's not something that naturally just happens in our lives.
So patience, kindness, and goodness. Let's talk about those things.
And there's a great quote by J.I. Packer, an author and pastor. And he has some great quotes about fruits of the Spirit.
But listen to this about the ones today: "Kindness is the Christ-like reaction to all that is maddening."
Okay? "Kindness is the Christ-like reaction to all that are unkind."
"Goodness is the Christ-like reaction to bad people and bad behavior."
So let's talk about the patience.
Patience is this action-oriented fruit. Patience from the Greek word is "mo-kro."
It's "mo-kro-themia."
Mo-kro-themia means long-suffering. It means long-endurance.
Forbearance. It's the ability to tolerate delay and hardship without getting angry and upset.
That's where patience finds its foundation.
And it's not passively waiting.
It's active endurance by trusting God. By trusting another source.
By being so humble that we have put our faith in that.
That it's about His timing and it's about His purposes, not just ours.
This fruit reflects, like all the fruits, reflects God's character and who God is.
God is patient towards humanity, isn't He?
In 2 Peter chapter 3, it says, "The Lord isn't really being slow about His promise. He is being patient for your sake. For my sake."
See, Jesus was patient with the disciples. He was, man, they doubted Him. They misunderstood who He was. Gosh, they abandoned Him.
In the end, the patience is the Christ-like reaction to all that is bad.
I want to tell you about something that's maddening in my life that happened to me in the last couple of weeks.
We have this Whirlpool washing machine. It's 20 years old.
Okay. Very sentimental to the Dunbar family. It washed all our baby's clothes. So how could we ever get rid of it? Correct?
No. But actually, with little fixes, a home warranty, we always, you know, $75, somebody come out and fix something for us.
And occasionally we'd have something.
Well, there was this new issue that arose a couple of weeks ago. It violently was shaking.
I mean, I was looking at it, you know, and it was like the back of that thing was about to blow out the back of the wall or something.
It was leaking some water. And so we had towels under there.
The boys were home, and they have clothes. They have a lot of clothes.
And so we do need to do laundry around our house.
And we used it, whether it was broken or not.
And it was just shaking and leaking and all sorts of crazy stuff.
And it was just shaking and leaking and all sorts of crazy stuff.
And it was just shaking and leaking and all sorts of crazy stuff.
And it was just shaking and leaking and all sorts of crazy stuff.
Called the service person in; the home warranty lady came out.
She looked at it. She's like, "It's either out of balance because the springs are rusted inside. It's a 20-year-old springs. I can replace those, or possibly it's just a drum or the, you know, something's bent the transmission, whatever it is."
Okay.
And so a few days went by, and they had this little cold spell in DFW.
And I guess their distributor was sending down some springs.
That's the only issue was those home warranty companies. It takes a while for them to get back to you.
And so she had already told us the problem.
So the next step is I figure I'm going to help it along the way.
I'm going to place my own order on Amazon.
I know the springs I got; that's the problem.
So DIY Marty went into action.
I got on there, and I ordered.
Now, let me tell you the other maddening thing about trying to repair an appliance in a laundry room.
When you're a large person like me, there is no room left to do anything else.
Once you take the cover off, and then the dogs are looking at you like this, and there's dog bowls there, and there's laundry, this, all this stuff.
And it's like, oh my gosh.
So I'm going to outsmart that because I had done that before.
I'm going to put it in the garage.
So I put it in the garage with Noah's help and took the cover off, replaced the springs.
And then I noticed, man, there's some 20-year-old dust in here.
Why don't I clean this up?
And so I cleaned it up and sprayed it down, all that stuff.
And anyway, two hours, three hours later, I got it back inside, kicked it off, got it all fixed.
I want to see how it's going to rumble.
Do you know what happened?
Water just starts pouring out the bottom.
This is a whole new problem together, right?
And so I discovered that there's this huge leak in the hose that transfers water somewhere.
And I must have broke it or, or whatever.
I'm not, I didn't break it; it must've just been there, and I just sort of helped it along.
That's what I'm thinking.
Anyway, so we're moving stuff, we're cleaning stuff up, we're running out of towels, we're trying to, you know, but the big problem is you run out of towels and you don't have a washing machine to wash these things.
So I jump in the car. I got to fix this.
I go to Ace Hardware. I'm like, I'm going to upgrade this hose.
This is a terrible hose.
I get this other hose, and I'm like, well, maybe that's not going to fit.
So just in case, I'm going to go to Home Depot, see if they got a hose.
And I picked up a hose there as well.
Get back to the house, put both of them on.
Neither of them worked.
Wasted my time.
I'm like, I'm going to go to Home Depot.
I'm like, I'm going to go to Home Depot.
Wasted all that time.
So this was testing my patience by now.
Brought it out to the garage.
I shot it with my shotgun.
No, I didn't.
I really wanted to do that.
That was yesterday's thought.
But anyway, more to that story in a minute.
And then I called the appliance place in Tomball, like I should have.
And basically, they had the hose, got that hose, finally got it back and put it in place.
All this stuff.
Okay.
More to that in a minute.
But the question arises when we think about patience.
Do you find yourself becoming easily frustrated when things don't go your way?
You know, sometimes people have uncontrollable anger and tempers when things don't go their way.
This tends to originate a lot of times in the modern world from being impatient.
And impatience typically comes from a hurried life.
And hurry kills patience altogether.
And if we want to find that patience, we need to find victory over being impatient or eliminating.
We need to eliminate hurry from our life a lot of times.
And that's hard to do in a fast-paced world.
John Mark Comer writes a great book, though, if you want to read that.
It's called "The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry," if you haven't read it.
But I would recommend it.
But there's a spiritual recipe for all of these types of fruits, and maybe to help produce and actually foster them in our life.
And so, we must sometimes with patience just wait on prayers to be answered.
You know, that's genius, right?
But we got to trust God's timing sometimes rather than just focusing on the plans we have for God.
That doesn't mean we're just sitting around, but we just have to discern those things.
Now, a key fruit is patience for relationships.
Think about how important that is.
Patience is required in healthy life.
Patience is required in healthy life.
Patience is required in healthy life.
Healthy relationships with your friend or your spouse or family, co-workers.
People challenge our patience all the time, don't they?
People disappoint us.
People offend us.
You know the people; it's like their special little evil gift, right?
You know those people, and we run across them a lot.
And so if we want to just challenge ourselves with this whole idea of patience, I just want to challenge us and challenge me and you, but it's like when we face frustration in the coming days, why don't we just pause and why don't we just pray?
Don't react.
That's hard not to do.
Don't react.
Just pause and pray and ask God for some special patience.
And maybe we say a prayer, something like, "Lord, help me to trust your timing and show patience to others as you have shown with me. Teach me to slow down, wait on you, with peace in my heart."
Amen.
I mean, we just need something like that.
Well, back to the washer.
Got that hose in there.
Everything was great, firmly fixed.
Ran a load of towels, and it's violently shaking and a slow leak.
And we're back to where we were before.
I spent hours and hours and hours.
So we're back to square one, but it was washing again.
And so that was important.
So we washed everything, even though it was violently shaking.
But if you're competitive at all, you understand where I'm going with this.
You cannot let a washing machine beat you.
Yes, it was violently shaking.
I don't know if I could do anything about that.
But I could do something about that little leak in there.
So Tuesday after work, I went home, and I took off that cover, and I looked for the little leak, and I found it at the bottom of a pump.
I found it at the bottom of a pump.
And I took a little spray, Flex Seal, and I sprayed a little on there.
It was easy.
It was simple.
I was going to let the service person come in, worry about the rest of that stuff.
And let me tell you something.
What doesn't work is 245-pound Marty on top of the washer trying to keep it from shaking.
That doesn't even work.
I don't know if I need some help, some other of y'all out there, but it didn't work either.
But the back cover, it had been, you know, it's rusted, and there's stuff that's out.
It's out of alignment.
I was like, I've been so patient with this thing.
I'm going to make this perfect.
Why not get this on perfect, this back cover?
And so one area of the back cover just wasn't going in.
And let me tell you something.
Marty's answer for issues like this then turns to brute force.
That is something that God has given me, is the ability to have brute force.
So I look over, and there's my tool drawer right there in our laundry room, and I pull it open.
There's a hammer.
I'm thinking, this is it.
I'm going to hammer it.
And I hammered it a couple of times.
Boom, it popped right into place.
I was so proud of myself.
But the last hit hit the little inlet where the hoses go in, and the back, and it sprayed all over the laundry room and made a complete mess.
Absolute disaster.
More towels, more time.
I lost my patience.
I was so done with it.
I moved it back into the garage.
We looked for a new machine.
It arrived yesterday.
Praise God, Jesus Christ.
Amen.
And I just want to thank you all for allowing me to have a therapy session with you.
As the guy was pulling it off yesterday, I said, "I really want to shoot that with my shotgun. I really want to use that as target practice before you bring it off."
But, you know, that's against the law in our neighborhood.
It's what they've, for some people it is anyway.
So kindness, let's go to kindness.
Four times in the New Testament, kindness is used, and it's action-oriented fruit.
The Greek word for that is "krestotes."
"Krestotes" refers to active compassion, active benevolence.
It's a goodness that is in action.
It's like love expressed in a practical, helpful way.
Okay, so we got that kindness.
It's not just being nice, because we can say, "Well, I've been nice to people."
But this is intentional, selfish action that is rooted in love and compassion for people.
It's a God characteristic.
In Titus chapter 3, it says, "When God our Savior revealed His kindness and love, He saved us, not because of the righteous things that we had done, but because of His mercy."
Jesus was constantly modeling this—healing the sick, feeding the hungry, forgiving people.
In Luke chapter 10, He tells the story of the Good Samaritan.
He talks about how that Good Samaritan had pity that was accompanied by compassion on the man that was beat up.
He also, it was risky behavior.
It was risky action, because that person could try to have mugged him, and something worse could have happened to him.
But it was undergirded with this act of love as he set the Good Samaritan, set this person that got hurt and, you know, whatever, jumped and set him up at an inn and took care of him until he came back and paid even more for him.
So it was this sort of selfless act of compassion and mercy.
And the question that rises to me is, do you naturally show kindness?
Do I naturally show kindness?
Do we only extend it when it's convenient to us?
And living by the Spirit, we will notice that we will have our hearts softened for people that really don't deserve kindness.
They, towards people who are difficult to love, and our hearts soften when we're living by the Spirit.
And it's just really, it's a beautiful thing.
And I've seen it in people.
I see it all the time.
It's displayed.
And some people do this better than others.
Now, there's a spiritual recipe for this as well.
Help produce this.
I think we need to practice this in our everyday simple moments.
Start trying to see people.
Start slowing down enough to see people through God's eyes.
Maybe you offer a listening ear.
Maybe you write a note of encouragement.
Maybe you help someone who, without asking, you know, they don't ask, but you just want to go help them.
Maybe you show kindness to somebody who does not deserve any kindness.
Or maybe they've been overlooked or they've been mistreated.
But you show kindness.
But you're just moved to an act of compassion.
And I want to challenge us then to go today and every day after to look for one intentional way that we can actually show kindness to someone who doesn't expect it.
Not deserve it, but doesn't expect it.
Let's look for somebody, and let's try to practice that.
Maybe we need to offer ourselves a prayer: "Lord, fill me with your kindness so that I can reflect your love to others. Help me to slow down enough so I see the needs around me so I can act compassionately even if it's inconvenient to me. Teach me to be kind as you are kind."
Amen.
Amen.
Another way that we can do this and show some kindness, I think, is we can give people a little Jesus.
Do you have a little Jesus on you?
So I got some little Jesuses, and I actually have purchased little Jesuses for everybody in the room.
You can come get a couple of them.
There's some baskets up here.
You can come grab a couple.
There's one out in the narthex as well.
I'd love for you to have that.
More on that here in just a moment.
But a good friend of mine, Janet, in our church is talking about these little Jesuses.
And I thought that was a great idea.
So we bought them, Jamie and I, we bought them for the kids for Christmas, stuck them in their stocking, and we have them around the house.
And I keep them in my house.
I keep them in my pocket.
And just give them a little Jesus.
Some people need Jesus.
I love that.
And that kind of, I was, the other day I was at the coffee shop, and some of the baristas that take care of me, and they just, they know me and I know them.
And I was saying goodbye, and they were like, "Yeah, have a great day."
You know, and I said, "Hope you guys have a great day."
And they're like, "Yeah, it's been busy. It's been good."
You know, I said, "Well, maybe you need a little Jesus."
And I gave them a little Jesus.
And they thought that was the coolest thing in the world.
You got these 20-something old girls, and they're just like thinking this is the greatest thing.
And they're like taking pictures, a bit on social media about their little Jesus I gave them.
And it just brought such joy to them.
And I think that's a kind act.
But let's talk about goodness.
Action-oriented fruit.
The Greek word is "agathosune."
And it means moral integrity.
That's what goodness means.
It means virtue.
It means dignity.
Doing what is right for others, even when it costs us.
And you could say this has relation to standing firm in Christ, standing firm in the Lord.
We got to do things even though it costs us.
This is one of God's characteristics.
God's very nature is goodness.
My favorite scripture is Psalm 34:8 that says, "Taste and see that the Lord is good."
The Lord is good.
Jesus embodied goodness.
He was touching people.
They weren't supposed to be touched.
And he would like confront injustice, and he was dealing with religiosity, but he was loving the unlovable.
And he began to do this throughout his entire ministry.
And ultimately what it cost him, it put him on a cross.
So the question for all of us: are my actions aligned with God's standards of goodness?
Are our actions aligned and decisions aligned with God's goodness?
Do I make honest decisions?
Do I stand up for what's right?
Do I do the right thing because it's right?
Not, you know, not being right all the time.
That's not what we're talking about.
It's doing the right thing because it's right.
But actively living righteously.
It takes knowing the truth.
And where do we believe truth comes from?
All truth comes from God.
It originates.
But we can know the truth.
As we believe in the written word, God's Bible, the Bible, and through God's living word, Jesus Christ.
Truth can be revealed.
In Micah chapter 6, verse 8, a very familiar scripture, it says, "Know, O people, the Lord has told you what is good. And this is what He requires of you: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God."
So the challenge for us today and days ahead would be, let's look for one opportunity to make a decision that prioritizes goodness, prioritizes integrity over our personal gain.
Let's look for that opportunity.
Maybe we need to say a prayer because we struggle with this: "God, fill my heart with your goodness so that my actions will reflect your love and reflect your truth and help me to pursue what is right, even when it is difficult for me to do so. Let me be a light. Let me be a light in dark places."
Amen.
So just to close, staying humble and kind is so vitally important, but it's not passive.
It's intentional.
It's actively choosing to reflect God.
And when we are patient, when we are kind, when we are good, you know what happens?
We become.
We become something.
Actually, we become someone.
We become a little Jesus.
Little Jesuses when we do that.
We become holy because we're set apart.
You know, that's what Christian means, right?
Little Christs.
So we become what God wants us to become.
We become something.
We become someone.
But we also gift something.
We gift something to people when we are patient, and we are kind, and we are good.
We gift something and someone.
We gift Christ.
We gift a little Jesus.
We gift a little God into somebody's life.
So just keep little Jesus right there for us to remember.
But don't take for granted the love this life gives you.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Amen.
Always stay humble and kind.
Let's go to God in prayer.
Lord, thank you for this opportunity, Lord, to talk about your goodness, your kindness, your patience with us.
And we want to reflect those things.
We want to live by the Spirit.
Lord, I pray in our connection to you, in us trying to put you first in obedience, in our own plans, I pray that through that, the Spirit continues to produce the fruit that is needed in each one of our lives.
Lord, most of all, when we deal with patience, Lord, in a very hurried world, I pray that for each and every one of us as we are challenged by it, even before we get out of the parking lot today, Lord, dealing with our kids or spouse or friend or church member, I pray that we will be patient with people.
Again, you have been patient with humanity for centuries and millennia.
And Lord, you are truly kind and good because you have offered yourself for each and every one of us.
And Lord, we respond to you in faith and praise for that.
In Jesus' name we pray, amen and amen.
I'd like to open the doors of the church and the church of the Lord.
If you want to join this portion, Body of Christ, you want to know more about our vision and mission of our church, we have a way of doing that.
It's a pathway; reach out to the pastor's church staff or call the church office, and we'll get you plugged into that pathway.
Also, if you want to make reconnection to Jesus Christ, if you've been walked away from the faith for a while, or if you want to make a new commitment in Christ, please let us know, grab one of the pastors.
We'd love to have a conversation with you about that.
If you need prayer for any reason, but you also have a faith, and you have joys in your life, and you want to celebrate that and praise God for that, we have prayer partners, our prayer angels in the prayer chapel after the service.
Go by and get personal prayer with them.
It's such a beautiful opportunity and act of worship together with your community of faith.
Well, let's stand, let's join together in our closing hymn.
Thank you.
We're the service, but also there are some tiny Jesuses up here.
So grab some of those and a little basket of that in the back as well.
But take your time getting out of here and grab a little Jesus if you'd like to do that.
So as you go from this place, may you love God, may you embrace beauty, and may you live life to the fullest.
Go in peace.
Amen and amen.
on Jan 19, 2025
