The Good Portion

So at this point, I'm going to call it Chuck Spears.

And as he's gathering this stuff, I'll begin telling you a little bit.

For those of you who don't know, Chuck Spears is the director of Cooperstown Bible Camp.

Since the time I moved here, I've had a chance to collaborate with him in multiple ways, and I've gotten to know his heart, not only as someone who we've teamed up in a work capacity, but as a friend.

And I've seen uh just a dear heart in this man for God's truth, applying it in his own heart, and making it come alive in the lives of children and people that he meets, not only in the context of Cooper's Down, but in his daily walk with Christ.

And it's an inspiration.

And I am honored to call him friend, and we're glad to have him here this morning.

I told the the first service that I think he's a little bit of a long-haired hippie, but um he makes up for it with a good beard.

So we're gonna accept him in our ranks.

Um but I will turn it over into his capable hands.

Um we're glad to have you.

I'm really glad that I got a haircut last week, then.

If I'm already if I'm a long-haired hippie with this, I it was um it was much longer, unfortunately.

Well, it's very good to be here with you guys, and um it's good to just take time to open the Word of God together.

Um so if you want to turn with me, we'll get started today.

We're gonna go to Luke chapter 10 for our scripture reading, and this is what where we'll spend a good bit of our time.

Luke 10 · chapter mention

But Luke chapter 10, verses 38 to 42.

Luke 10:38–42

I'm sure this is a familiar passage for a lot of you.

Uh the story of Mary and Martha.

And so Luke chapter 10, verses 38 to 42.

Luke 10:38–42

Now, as they went on their way, Jesus entered a village, and a woman named Martha welcomed him into her house.

And she had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord's feet and listened to his teaching.

But Martha was distracted with much serving, and she went up to him and said, Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to serve alone?

Tell her then to help me.

But the Lord answered her, Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary.

Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her.

We're going to get into that passage here in just a little bit, but maybe you're like me, maybe you're coming off of a uh a Christmas season, and for me this was my first Christmas season as a married man, and so I'd had a lot of practice of getting into my own probably selfish routine, uh visiting who I wanted to visit, when I wanted to visit, kind of self-absorbed, right?

Because it's easy to do that when you're single.

Uh and now, this year, as many of you have experienced, once you're married, you have double the friends, double, triple, quadruple the family possibly to go and visit.

We stayed with four different family members, uh, family groups, lots of driving.

We drove, uh broke it up, but we went all the way down to Charlotte, North Carolina to have Christmas with my brother, and then we were there, and it was his girlfriend and all of her family, and all of her family.

It's just family, family, family, all over, tons of people.

And when our time came to uh head back to North Dakota, I was exhausted.

We'd been all half covered half the United States, and then in and out of, I felt like I just lived out of a suitcase, in and out of the car, and I was exhausted.

I was thrilled to come back to camp, to unload everything, to get back to my routine, my schedule, kind of the way that we do things.

And I'm certain that Christmas isn't supposed to be about all the busyness, and I think a lot of us we have good intentions of this year is going to be different.

This year at Christmas, we're gonna slow down.

We're gonna spend time really thinking about what Christmas means and what God has done and why we celebrate Christmas to begin with.

But I know for Amber and I, our routine was thrown off.

Our routine is normally uh coffee, prayer, and the word of God.

And yes, it is that order.

It is coffee first, uh, prayer, and then the word of God.

I'm not saying that's the right way to do it by any means.

That's just the way that we do it.

Um so yeah, it was a great time away.

It was a great time with family and friends and a lot of fellowship and great food and uh time together, which was a lot of fun.

But it was also a lot of busyness.

It was a lot of uh preparing meals.

When you have a lot of family, it's a lot of food and a lot of dishes and a lot of garbage.

You know what that's all about.

My brother is a chef, and so he put on a Christmas Eve party for uh all of his girlfriend's family and friends and our family, and so it was really elaborate and uh lots going on.

And so I was up until 1 a.m.

that night doing dishes.

Lots of fun, just what you want to be doing on Christmas Eve, right?

And so maybe you've had a Christmas season like this once or twice in your life.

Maybe you've had a season of busyness, and maybe you find yourself getting to the new year and just excited that there's a little less to do, possibly, with the additional chores and entertaining and food preparations.

But if you're really honest with yourself, maybe you're like me, maybe Christmas isn't the only time of the year that you're busy.

Maybe you're really busy all the time.

Maybe you're distracted all of the time.

With a lot of good things, even.

As Amber and I came back to camp, and um, from time to time I like to pick up the Valley of Vision, a collection of Puritan prayers, and I just like to read through those because it causes me to slow down, to think differently, to read words that I don't use in day-to-day life.

And so the Valley of Vision, it's called the New Year, makes it really easy for you.

Pick the one called the New Year when you get back.

I just want to share that prayer with you, and it says, O Lord, length of days does not profit me except the days passed in thy presence, in thy service, to thy glory.

Give me a grace that precedes, follows, guides, sustains, sanctifies, aids every hour, that I may not be one moment apart from thee, but may rely on thy spirit to supply every thought, speak in every word, direct every step, prosper every work, build up every moat of faith, and give me a desire to show forth thy praise, testify to thy love, advance thy kingdom.

I launch my bark on the unknown waters of this year, with thee, O Father, as my harbor, thee, O Son at my helm, thee, O Holy Spirit, filling my sails.

Guide me to heaven with my loins girt, my lamp burning, my ear open to thy calls, my heart full of love, my soul free.

Give me the grace to sanctify me, thy comforts to cheer, thy wisdom to teach, thy right hand to guide, thy counsel to instruct, thy law to judge, thy presence to stabilize.

May thy fear be my awe, and thy triumphs my joy.

So I love some of those phrases in there, that the length of my days does not profit me except the days passed in thy presence.

Grace that I may not be one moment apart from me, thy presence to stabilize me.

And so after a busy Christmas season, I found myself needing to slow down, needing to have time with the Lord.

I say routine, and sometimes we bash routine, and routines can be a bad thing, but I needed to get back to my routine of having a daily, quiet, devotional time in prayer, to hear from the Lord, to be in his word, to go to him in prayer, to wait patiently.

Maybe you're at a point like that right now.

Maybe you have had a season of busyness and you just need to slow down.

Maybe you're in the midst of a season of busyness.

I've been reading through the Gospel of Luke lately and the Psalms, and so that's how we ended up here in Luke 10 with the story of Mary and Martha, and one of the words, one of the things that's been jumping off the pages of Scripture to me lately has been the idea of the presence of the Lord and being in his presence.

I see Mary at the Lord's feet, and I hear Jesus' words when he says, If you then who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask?

And then in the parable of the two prodigal sons, when the father says to the older son, Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours, it was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this is your for this your brother was dead and is alive.

He was lost and is now found.

And so that image of the old man pulling up his robe, running down, embarrassing himself even to his son that was lost and is now found.

The Heavenly Father giving us the Holy Spirit, Mary sitting at the feet of Jesus and experiencing the presence of the Lord.

And so that's why I want to focus on Luke 10, 38 to 42 today.

As we kind of start off looking at this passage, just a little bit of a disclaimer, uh, I've heard a lot of messages and talks and devotionals and different things shared on this passage, and we set up this false dichotomy.

We say that work and worship are mutually exclusive.

And so we're not going there today because I don't believe that.

I don't think the scriptures teach that.

Because a lot of times I think we hear that message, and for those of us that actually worship through the way that we work, whether that's in a full-time ministry position, whether that's you know on the job site, you know, whether that's in your family, whatever the work is that God has given you, we're not saying they're mutually exclusive.

We can honor God, we can worship through the way that we work.

I think a lot of times we maybe think that we can't, and so if you come and hear a message saying that you have to choose work or worship, and all this time you've been trying to worship God through the way that you work, then you probably are going to leave defeated, discouraged, and with a wrong understanding of what the scriptures say.

So we're not going there because we see in Colossians 3.23 and 24 that whatever you do, work heartily as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward.

You are serving the Lord Christ.

And I love Ephesians 2.10.

A lot of us are very familiar with 2.8 and 9, for by grace you have been saved.

But then you get down to 2.10, and it says, For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared before him beforehand that we should walk in them.

And so God's created us to work, and he's prepared works in advance for us to do, and we're to do all things for his glory.

And this includes any of our work and any of our Christian service.

And so that's just a little disclaimer.

I'm not here to say that pick, work, or worship.

They're not mutually exclusive by any means.

They shouldn't be as believers.

We're going to take some time just to look at each of the characters in this little passage.

And so we're going to start off with Martha, because Martha, sometimes Martha gets a bad rap.

You know, Martha's busy, she's distracted, she's all of these things, and so we read this passage, and then maybe we even find ourselves or other people saying, boy, I pray that I'm not like Martha.

Martha gets a bad rap.

If you look in John 11 and 12, we see some really good things about Martha.

She believes and confesses that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that he possesses power over death and disease, talking about the resurrection or being able to keep Lazarus alive or bring him back to life.

And then we see her serving a large party of the disciples and Lazarus and Mary again in John 12.

No complaining, no grumbling, no tell her to help me with this.

Just that she's carrying it out.

And so even in this passage, we see some really good things about Martha.

First of all, she's opened her home.

I don't know about you, but maybe there are times that you just don't really feel like having people over.

But Martha is opening her home.

And so our homes are opportunities to invite people in and then to carry out one another commands like show hospitality to one another, serve one another, serve the Lord, that we see in Romans 12.

And so we see some really good things there.

And so Martha doesn't deserve the bad rap that sometimes she gets for being busy and distracted.

But in this passage, there are some things there that we see about Martha.

She's anxious, she's troubled, she's distracted, she's worried about the details of this elaborate meal.

And so my brother, like I said, on Christmas Eve, he put together this huge meal, and it was fantastic, far more elaborate than anything I would ever make in a week.

But at the end, what did my brother do?

My brother put all the food out and went and kind of closed himself off in a quiet room and watched some football reruns.

It wasn't even a live game.

He just wanted to be away and take a break and have quiet and didn't want to engage with all these people that he had worked so hard and put so much love and effort into.

He didn't want to be with the people.

So, sure, we enjoyed the food, but more than the food, we wanted to be with him.

In this case, Martha's a little more concerned with the food as well.

She's a little more concerned about serving the Lord, and she's even frustrated that Mary isn't helping.

And then she judges Jesus and says, Don't you care?

And then this part here just is just so interesting when she says, Tell her then to help me.

So Martha gives Jesus, think about that.

That's really bold.

Martha gives Jesus the imperative to make Mary help.

Here, telling the Son of God to make my sister help.

But we can all really relate to Martha, right?

We can relate to expecting her to help, expecting the younger siblings to jump in and prepare the meal and serve and show hospitality.

It's pretty normal, it's pretty culturally accepted, natural, maybe a little self-focused.

But let's think about this for just a second.

We we really can relate to this.

I mean, ladies and gentlemen, whoever is the cook in your family, maybe you've been preparing a Thanksgiving or a Christmas meal, and there's expectations of the kids or your younger siblings jumping in, helping out, doing dishes, taking out the trash, all those different things.

And if you find some of them all of a sudden just lounging over in the other room, you might get a little frustrated.

That's kind of normal if you've agreed to kind of prepare the meal together, and then all of a sudden, one person's off doing their own thing.

I had a buddy one time that we helped, I helped um skin and cut all the meat off of a deer, and we might as well have been using butter knives.

They were the dullest things in the world.

We were doing it all night.

It was cold, my hands were numb when we finished, and it was just his deer.

And so I kind of think about it like this, guys, if you go, if you go deer hunting, you you and your buddy both get a deer, you field dress the deer, you hang and skin and cut the meat out, you work and you get your buddies done, and then uh it's time for you to do yours, and you expect your buddy to jump in, and instead, once again, he's off in the other room.

It's kind of understandable to think that when we're doing these things together, preparing a meal, that we might do them together, that people would pitch in.

So we can kind of relate to Martha's frustration a little bit, I think.

But I think when we do that, we realize that we're possibly serving out of a wrong motivation or for a wrong purpose.

We can hear Martha saying, it sounds like things that we've probably said in the midst of our daily lives.

Lord, don't you care about my work?

Don't you care about how I'm serving you?

Lord, don't you care that Mary isn't helping?

Don't you care about my ministry?

And ultimately, I think sometimes when we find ourselves like this place that Martha is in is, Lord, don't you care about me?

We've probably felt this way at some time in some type of ministry.

And I'm not just talking about vocational ministry.

You have a ministry as a as a husband, as a wife, whatever your ministry is as a student.

And we kind of hear the same thing in Matthew 8.

You hear the disciples that are about to drown and say, Lord, save us, we're going to drown.

And it's kind of that same idea of Lord, don't you care?

We are here with you.

We're here to do your work, the ministry you've called us to.

Don't you care about us and our safety?

I think we have to be really careful there because when we get to that place of asking those type of questions, we need to make sure that we're not questioning God's ability or that we're not questioning God's goodness.

And maybe see that there's a little bit of a lack of faith, or maybe that we're serving with a wrong motivation or for the wrong purpose.

And so I don't want to be harder on Martha than the Lord is by any means.

And I think sometimes, like I said, we kind of beat up on Martha in this story.

She gets a bad rap.

But I think there's some good takeaways, some things to look at that we see that Martha, it's not that she's choosing uh good and evil.

She's carrying out some commands that are in Scripture, but her priorities are a little misaligned.

She knows Jesus well and knows that he is the Christ, the Son of God.

But she's more concerned with serving him than being with him.

And it's easy for us to read through this scripture and think, I would never do that.

If Jesus were in my house, sitting at my table, he can bring the food, right?

Okay, I'm not gonna worry about it.

I just want to be there with him.

So sometimes I think maybe we look at Martha and we're like, how could you do this?

How could you be more focused on serving the Lord instead of being with him and listening to him?

But she has some misaligned priorities.

And we see that it's really easy to allow much serving for the Lord to become a distraction to worshiping and listening to the Lord.

And like I said earlier, we talked about acknowledging that God has created us to work, to serve him and others for his glory.

We need to be reminded that our service flows out of, is enabled by, being with Jesus.

It's not in our own strength.

What we do, quote unquote, for Christ, flows out of our relationship with him.

I love the passage in Acts chapter 4.

Acts 4 · chapter mention

You see Peter and John before the Sanhedrin, and they're called, this isn't like a compliment to be called this, ordinary unschooled men.

I don't think too many of us want to say, that's what I would like to be called, an ordinary unschooled man or woman.

But I bet most of us, hopefully all of us as followers of Christ, would want it to be said of us that it was evident that we had been with Jesus.

And that's what we see said of Peter and John in Acts.

And so we need to come back to that and be reminded that we, as John Piper says, we must have a personal, vital fellowship with him.

Otherwise, Christianity becomes a joyless burden.

What we do flows out of who we are.

And so if we're a disciple, if we're a follower of Christ, that means we need to be spending time prioritizing, worship, listening, sitting at his feet.

It's so easy to get so caught up in thinking God needs us to do all of these things.

The different ministries that he's called us to, the different passions that he's given us, the different ways that we're used by him to expand his kingdom, to make much of him, to give him glory.

But once again in Acts, we come back to what's really true about our service.

Acts 17, 24 and 25.

The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.

And so that's a verse I share with our summer staff every single year.

Because we can start to get really worked up thinking that this ministry is about me and what I'm doing and what I'm doing for the Lord, and I'm so important.

We like that idea of feeling needed, of feeling important, like God needs us, but God doesn't need us.

He we are his workmanship, Ephesians 2.10.

He's created the good works in advance.

He's the one that gives us the skills, gifts, and abilities to carry them out, and they're for his glory.

Matthew Henry in his commentary says, God cannot be a gainer by our services, and therefore cannot be made a debtor by them.

And once again, I appreciate John Piper's insight when he says, we do not glorify God by providing for his needs, but by praying he would provide for ours and trusting him to answer.

We need to be aware of the likelihood that when we find ourselves serving not from the overflow of our relationship with Christ, that frustration, disappointment, distractedness, worry, and anxiety are pretty common.

I'm sure many of you have experienced that in some type of ministry or another.

With your family, with your friends, at work.

And so we have to come back and think what am I serving out of?

Our service to others has to flow out of a deep, intimate.

Relationship with our creator, Savior, and Redeemer, who's prepared those works for us in advance.

As we move on to the next character, we're going to move on to Mary.

And Mary gets a lot of the praise, of course, in this passage, and there's for good reason in a lot of cases.

You know, Mary is at the Lord's feet.

She's listening.

She's continually engaged.

She's intently focusing on the words of God and being in his presence.

So to be said of you, can you imagine that being said of you?

Mary has chosen the good portion which will not be taken away from her.

It's another one of those passages that'd be really nice to have said of us as followers of Christ, right?

That we've chosen what is better, as some translations say.

Another thing that's really interesting about Mary is that this idea of worshiping at Jesus' feet, it's kind of common with her.

You see where she takes the expensive ointment and she's putting it on to Jesus' feet and anointing his feet.

When Lazarus passes away and she comes and declares that, you know, Lord, if you would have been here, my brother would not have passed away.

And so she believes that Christ has the power over illness and death, and she's once again at the feet of Jesus.

So Mary is pretty aware of what's going on, of her environment and her circumstances.

She's not missing out on the fact that the Son of God is sitting in her living room, that the Savior and Creator of the world is there.

She's not consumed with the work that she feels like has to be done, maybe like Martha's a little distracted with right now.

So she's prioritized.

And she's giving her talents and attention and abilities fully to Christ and in his presence.

John MacArthur shares a really good thought on this.

He says, this establishes worship as the highest of all priorities for every Christian.

Nothing, including service rendered to Christ, is more important than listening to Him and honoring Him with our hearts.

Sometimes we want to be recognized and given our own attention and honor.

But first and foremost, we are created to worship God.

We see that we're commanded to worship.

Psalm 29, 1 and 2.

We could have picked a ton of different passages here, but I love Psalm 29.2 especially.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory to his name, worship the Lord in the splendor of his holiness.

Psalm 37 is another one of my favorites, and there are phrases in there like, trust in the Lord, delight yourself in the Lord.

Be still before the Lord, wait patiently for the Lord.

In Psalm 46.10, we know that we're supposed to be still and know that he is God.

God alone is worthy of our worship.

We're created to worship him alone.

Our primary priority and responsibility as a follower of Christ is to honor him and to worship him by being with him, by delighting in him, and by ascribing the glory that is due his name.

Eugene Peterson summarizes this well when he says, the main thing is not work for the Lord.

It is not suffering for the Lord, it is not witnessing for the Lord, it is not teaching Sunday school for the Lord, it is not being responsible for the sake of the Lord in the community, and it's not keeping the Ten Commandments, not loving your neighbor, not observing the golden rule.

The chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy him forever, which he takes from the Westminster Catechism.

And even a twist on that by John Piper is the chief end of man is to glorify God by enjoying him forever, being in his presence, experiencing him, abiding in him.

That's our first and primary, as MacArthur says, the highest of all priorities.

There's a book called The One True Thing, What is Worthy of Your Lifelong Devotion by Howard Baker.

And commenting, he gives this compare and contrast to looking at Mary and Martha and the differences between them.

And he says, Martha was fuming about dinner.

Mary was feasting on every word from the mouth of God.

Martha was troubled by many things.

Mary chose the one thing.

Martha was distracted.

Mary was focused.

Martha responded to Jesus in light of the circumstances.

Mary responded to the circumstances in light of Jesus.

Martha told Jesus what to do.

Mary listened for what Jesus wanted her to do.

Martha left Jesus to go to work.

Mary left the work to go to Jesus.

Martha initiated for Jesus.

Mary responded to Jesus.

Martha spoke to Jesus.

Mary heard from Jesus.

Martha was dutiful.

Mary was devoted.

And so we spend a lot of time on this passage and we can look and see and compare and contrast and see the good things and the things that are a little out of whack between Mary and Martha.

But once again, the key figure in this story is Jesus.

And so we're going to look at just a few things here as we see Jesus' response when Martha comes up and says, Don't you care about my work?

Tell her to help me.

But the Lord answered her in verse 41 Martha, Martha, you are anxious and troubled about many things, but one thing is necessary.

Mary has chosen the good portion, which will not be taken away from her.

And so Jesus gently, calmly, lovingly reminds her, reminds Martha to check her priorities.

And I think we need to be mindful of and thankful for the fact that God doesn't vilify us or condemn us when our priorities are out of whack.

We don't want to be harder on Martha than the Lord is, and we certainly don't want the Lord to be harder on us than he is with Martha.

Jesus reminds Martha that the better choice, the good portion, is being with him.

And I can kind of imagine Jesus saying, Martha, don't you see that I care more about you than what you do for me?

That I don't need you to do anything for me.

He's gentle and he's patient and he's loving and he's kind.

And he gives this invitation, this calling back to Martha.

And it's the same invitation to us to worship and experience his presence and to abide in his goodness.

To trust in him, to delight ourselves in him.

Psalm 73, 25 and 26, whom have I in heaven but you?

And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.

My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.

Psalm 34, 8, taste and see that the Lord is good.

Blessed are those who take refuge in him.

Psalm 46, 10, be still and know that I am God.

I will be exalted among the nations.

I will be exalted in the earth.

And so he's calling to us to be still.

To not be distracted, to spend time with him.

And I don't know about you, but once again, for me, it's really hard to do that.

It's hard enough just to slow down and be still.

It's even harder to clear away all the distractions.

First of all, I need to take my phone and I should probably just throw it in the other room when it's time to spend time with the Lord and be in prayer, because when it lights up or dings or whatever, it's really easy to want to pick that up and.

Oh, sorry, Jesus.

Just a minute.

Hold on.

It's hard.

It's hard to be completely dependent upon God, to sit at his feet and to have a deep, intimate knowledge of who he is and what he's done for us.

But this is so important because John 15, we know in John 15, Jesus says, Apart from me, you can bear no fruit, you can do nothing apart from me.

And so we need that time.

We need that time to be with Jesus, to worship and abide, to listen and to experience, and then from there, out of that, go serve, whoever God has called us.

Go with a glad heart, a joy-filled heart, overflowing with the love and mercy and kindness that we've experienced in Christ.

After being near to the king, that's what we take and that's what we go and serve out of.

We serve in a way that 1 Peter 3.15, we serve in a way then that causes other people to ask us to give a reason for the hope that we have because of the way that we're serving, because we've spent time with Christ.

And so, yeah, I don't want to just say pick work over worship, not at all.

Worship, draw near to Christ, and then go out and serve, knowing, serving out of the truth that you know about Him.

Highly recommend all the time the Jesus Storybook Bible.

If you have young children or grandchildren, I want you to go out serving, knowing that God's love is a wonderful, never-stopping, never-ending, never giving up, unbreaking, always and forever love.

A couple more quotes from Brennan Manning as we think about serving in the love of Christ, knowing what he's done for us.

His love is never, never, never based on our performance, never conditioned by our moods of elation or depression.

The furious love of God knows no shadow of alteration or change.

It is reliable and always tender.

I have received from the Lord Jesus, namely his unconditional acceptance of me as I am, not as I should be.

He loves me whether in a state of grace or disgrace, whether I live up to the lofty expectations of his gospel or I don't.

He comes to me where I live and loves me as I am.

So know that God's love for you, that invitation to be with him, to abide in him, to be in his presence, isn't based upon your performance.

It's based on his love.

Cling to your identity in Christ's love and completed work and then go serve as he's equipped you to go serve.

Maybe you find yourself here today and you've been in a season of busyness, or you're in the midst of a season of busyness, or you just came out of one, or you're just going into one.

Whether it's at church or in the community or with your family or at work, take time to slow down.

Hear Jesus' tender, gracious invitation to come commune with him, to be in his presence, and to sit at his feet today.

Take time to choose the good portion.

Let's pray.

Lord God, you are so amazingly good.

You are gracious and patient and loving and kind.

May that never be lost on us.

May we never take that for granted.

May we draw near to you and experience you and experience your presence and be reminded and deeply affected by what you have done for us through Christ.

As we evaluate our lives and look at the different distractions and good things, even that are taking up our time and attention, God, I pray that each and every one of us here today would take time to be with you, to come before you, to delight in you.

That out of that, God, you would equip us and prepare us, encourage us and enable us to go and serve and make an impact for your kingdom, for your glory, and for your honor.

In Jesus' name we pray.

Amen.