King Saul

Good morning, Springhouse.

Today we're gonna talk about

Saul. And we're going to read a passage of Scripture

that doesn't have anything seemingly to do with Saul until I

tell you what it has to do with Saul. Cause it's actually from the

New Testament and actually the first time that you stand to read

you're only going to have to read one verse. But as we get

further into the end of the sermon and you guys

get hungrier and sleepier, we'll stand again and we'll read

a much longer passage. But would you stand with me and

let's read from Hebrews

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

chapter 12 verse one. Therefore,

since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of

witnesses, let us throw off everything that

hinders and the sin that so easily entangles,

and let us run with perseverance the race

marked out for us. Father I thank you for your word, I

thank you for the presence of the Holy Spirit in this place because

without the Holy Spirit, nothing happens. I pray that the

Holy Spirit would quicken our hearts, our minds,

give us ears to hear in Jesus' name, amen. You may

be seated.

Saul and Saul, there are actually two prominent

Sauls in the Bible. Most of you know that but maybe some don't.

The Old Testament Saul was king of Israel, First King of

Israel. The New Testament Saul

was an apostle whose name was later changed to Paul.

It's not unusual for people when they come

to Jesus for their names to change because they

change. When before Peter came to Jesus,

his name was Simon. And that meant a reed blowing in the wind

and Jesus he came to Jesus and Jesus met him and he could

see that reed blowing in the wind cause that's what Peter was.

But he said, you're gonna have a new name and it's going

to be Peter, not Simon anymore. A

rock. And so Paul, used to be

known as Saul. He came to Jesus, his name changed.

We don't know who wrote the Book of Hebrews but

Paul is one of the names that's often mentioned. And the writer of

Hebrews mentions a phrase that I, that I hope you caught as we went

past. You'll, you'll catch it now but the phrase is this, the

sin that so easily entangles.

We all have such sin And you

may or may not be aware of what that sin is in your

life. Now if you're not aware of what that sin is in your life, you

may think, well, I don't, you know, I don't know what he's talking about.

But if you are aware of that sin

that's in your life, you're closer to God than the one who goes, I don't

know what they're talking about. Because the closer you get to

God, the more clearly you see your own

sin, your own inequity. As a matter of fact, you may think you know what

that sin that so easily entangles is in your

life, but you may get closer to God and find out oh no, that

that wasn't even it. There's even one, there's even one

more than that. When Isaiah saw the

Lord and this is Isaiah, he

said, I am undone. Woe is me. I'm a man

of unclean lips. I dwell among an unclean

people because I have seen the Lord. And

so just because you're not necessarily aware of sin doesn't

mean you're doing okay. In fact, it probably means you're not doing okay.

That was free. For some the sin

that so easily entangles is obvious. And for

others it's not so easily identified.

Now in in our in our culture, certainly in our

church culture because it's kinda been

passed down to us for a few hundred years. When we think of the sin

that so easily entangles, one of the first things that comes

to mind is immorality. Because immorality, I mean

that's sin for sure. And it's it's

talked about in the Bible. Paul certainly talks about it for

sure. And it's easily identified. I mean, you

know others may not may not necessarily see it in your

life, but you know

Crickets. But you know for

sure. On the other hand in our

particular culture we have a sin, just as deadly and

perhaps even more deadly that we celebrate

pride. That's right, and I'm not talking about

immorality and pride mixed, I'm talking about pride.

Drunkenness. Drunkenness is that's a

real sin. And you know what? Not only do you know it,

sometimes you don't know it. But everybody around you knows

it if that's, if that's what's going on. I mean they, they can,

they can see what's, what's happening. And

you know, but on the other hand there's this

sin because I, now drunkenness is wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I mean it's, it's definitely a sin and it

certainly entangles people.

But on the other side there, Jesus didn't say too much about

that. He did say a whole lot about being

judgmental. He did have a lot to say

about that. And it's pretty easy to look at the

drunkenness and kinda go,

And it's even easier to be judgmental when you're

driving.

I can't believe that they do that. You

know, what Michelle and I call it Sleepy

Smyrna.

And if you don't know why we call it Sleepy Smyrna then you're probably

part of the problem.

Because you know, sometimes people just and there's

Enon Springs Road, the new part where it's got

one lane going here and a big old median and then one lane going

this way. And and I'll admit the speed limit is ridiculous,

35 miles an hour.

But 28?

Yeah, you got the right, but I'm sitting back here thinking, you're just

doing

that. The first service didn't hear any of that.

Slothfulness, I mean yeah, people who are lazy and don't

work and blah blah blah blah blah. Yeah, that's a sin that easily

entangles people. Greed on the other hand is pretty good stuff. I mean

I'm a I'm just a go getter, you know. So

anyway, some of it is, some of it's pretty easy to see, some of

it's a little more difficult to recognize. Today we're gonna look at the

sin that easily entangled the Old Testament Saul.

And it's a sin that also entangles many

who may not think they have an obvious besetting

sin, because this sin is, is somewhat of a

chameleon and it masquerades as, as many things

and probably the most damning thing that it

masquerades as is wisdom.

I'm just being wise in what I do.

But it's sin nevertheless and it has a name and the name is

simply this, fear.

Fear. There's a reason why the

Bible tells us almost 70 times

to not fear. And there's a reason why over

in Revelation 20 one:eight when it lists, those

whose fate is damnation, the first on the

list is the fearful. Fearful, this is

this is serious stuff. This is pretty, pretty important stuff.

And fear, if I were to say okay, well what's the opposite of fear? Well

you'd, we'd probably jump into saying courage.

No, no, no. Because you see, well actually

courage doesn't exist without some element of fear. I mean fear's

actually got to be there for for courage to exist. And the

opposite of courage isn't fear, the opposite of courage is cowardice.

Now fear can produce cowardice, but it's not the same thing.

Now fear is an antonym for

another f word which is faith. It it

is the opposite of faith. You may say,

Well I thought the opposite of faith was unbelief. No, the opposite of

unbelief is belief.

Little English lesson here, right? And

and he got it.

You know, you can actually believe and not have faith.

There are people who believe that God exists, who believe

that Jesus Christ is His only begotten Son, but they don't have any

faith in Him. Because

belief is passive, faith is active.

See. Faith is

required to please God. And

it is also the means by which we are we are saved.

And and so no wonder the Bible keeps saying, don't

fear, don't fear, don't fear because fear

is the opposite of faith, is the antithesis

of faith. And Saul, King Saul

had three specific fears that the Bible brings out and

we're gonna look at those and we're gonna see, you know, how maybe that

might relate to us. And the first one, first one is this,

fear of the enemy. Over in

First Samuel 13, Saul and

his army were encamped and the Philistines were encamped

and they were gonna engage one another and the Philistines

more and more kept coming. I mean, they there just seemed to be an

endless supply of Philistines, but the Israelites on the other hand, when

they saw the Philistine army and how strong they were, how many

people they had, they started melting away. They started deserting. They

started going back home. They started hiding

and hiding out. And Saul

was kinda getting freaked out by this. Now he was supposed to wait for Samuel

to come and offer a sacrifice to the Lord before they could

start the battle. But as he saw the

Philistines increasing and the Israelites

decreasing sim seemingly,

excuse me, I live in Tennessee. As

he saw that happening,

Samuel's not here, we gotta do something. We gotta engage before

this thing gets totally out of hand. Bring the sacrifice, I'm gonna

offer the sacrifice. The thing that he knew he wasn't

supposed to do, he did and and as is often the

case virtually immediately after

he did it. Who shows up?

Yeah, you all were in the first service.

Samuel. Samuel shows up and

just as he finished the offering, Samuel arrived and

Saul went out to greet him. What have you done?' Ask

Samuel. And Saul replied, well when I saw that

the men were scattering and that you did not come at the

set time, it's really your fault that you did not come at the

set time and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash.

I thought, now the Philistines will come down against me at

Gilgal and I have not sought the Lord's favor. So I

felt compelled to offer the burnt offering. You

have done a foolish thing, Samuel

said. Now we all understand

fear of the enemy or, or think that we do.

But we seem unaware that this

fear of the enemy tempts us to act in our

own strength, tempts us to do

something instead of trusting in the Lord

and waiting on the Lord, waiting for him. You

have done a foolish thing, Samuel

said. Proverbs three:five through

six says this, trust in the Lord

with all your heart and and lean not on

your own understanding. In all your ways

acknowledge Him. Acknowledge that He's there and He'll make

your path straight. He'll straighten

that thing out. When you trust in

the Lord, you don't panic.

You don't go chasing after a solution.

You wait for it to come to you. I used to play racketball.

And I know that doesn't sound like it fits, but I'm just gonna

tell you something here. I was pretty good.

But when I first started out it was

such exercise, it was so exhausting,

and it was so frustrating to lose so much.

Because I was, I was going here, there, there's the ball,

there, you It all changed

when I learned to just stand in the right place and

wait and let it come to me. And

when you trust in the Lord, you can do that with life. You stand in

the right place, you wait, you let it come to you.

Psalm fifty six eleven says this, in

God I trust and I am not afraid.

What can man do to me? What can man do to you?

Oh, I don't know, you know, kill me? Maybe?

Well Jesus had something to say about that. I tell you my friends,

do not be afraid of those who kill the body

and after that can do no more. So what can what can

man do to you? I mean I'm asking that question.

Can man make fun of you? Take

money away from you? Take stuff away from you? What can man do

to you? Psalm

fourteen one says, the fool says in his heart there

is no God. Samuel said to Saul, you have

done a foolish thing. To give

in to fear of the enemy is to discount

God.

That was more profound than many of you think that it is. But

to give in to fear of the enemy is to discount God because it's

basically saying, Hey, I'm afraid of

them. You ain't enough.

Not all enemies we face are people. I mean, most of you are

familiar with Paul saying we don't wrestle against flesh and

blood but against powers and principalities and high

places. And and to be honest it's not

actually the the enemy that we fear anyway, it's the enemy's

weapons that we fear. An enemy who has no

weapons, no.

I've got a nine year old grandson who lives next door

and occasionally we fight.

We wrestle. He ain't

ever beat me and

I'm He probably isn't going to for another year or

two. I'm

not afraid of him. He doesn't have the weapons.

But our enemy has weapons. This is Memorial Day

weekend and, not many of us face the military

type of enemies that these

people face that we celebrate, that we honor. That's

really probably a better word for it. But we

all face dangerous enemies. We face their weapons.

I'm gonna mention three. There's there there are more but I'm I'm gonna mention

three and just throw it up against the wall and see if any of

it sticks. First one is

want. One of the enemies of

the weapon one of the weapons of the enemy is

that we come against is is want. I

can't do that. I I can't give that, I can't

because I may need it. I

I mean seriously if I if I if I if I

tithe, that that's a financial thing, but if I

tithe, what what am I gonna do if I need it?

You know? Or if God says, you know, we'll we'll

feed that person. Well, I I don't know if we got enough food,

you know? Clothe that person. Well, I, you know, I I might

need

I I I need some of these 17 shirts that I've got in

here. I need some of those 18 pair of

shoes that I've got.

Fear of want. The day You know I haven't worn no shoes

in two years but one of these days I'm planning on wearing

them.

So we don't obey God because

we're afraid we might not have what we need.

How about this one? Fear of failure.

I know nobody in here

is faced with that ever.

Well what's the worst that that can happen? I

mean, somebody gonna laugh at you?

I used to direct plays.

And we would have auditions, and people would come in and audition

for for a play. And you know, it was

it it it could get long sometimes, but for the most part it was

pretty good. But you know who the most fun people were

to see audition? It was the ones who didn't give a

rip if they did poorly,

you know? Yeah, I'm going to audition for

Scrooge.

Bahamba, you know, kind of thing. You sort of go, Well

that's interesting. This is this is fun. This has

kind of woken us up. I'm gonna find a place for that person

because they'll do anything.

And we don't even know what failure is.

We don't know. Have you ever

really wanted something and you didn't get it?

And then I don't know, a day later, month later, a few

years later you went, boy I

dodged a bullet on that one. You thought

you failed, but you actually ended up much better

off. And even worse, have you ever really wanted something and you

got it?

Only to find out a few months later, a few years

later, oh man, what am I gonna do now?

I didn't, I am the proud owner of a bass boat.

We we don't we don't we don't even know what failure is. The

most obvious looking failure of all time

was the Son of God hanging on the cross

as a common criminal. We considered Him

stricken by God, afflicted by Him,

but He was wounded for our transgressions. He was

bruised for our iniquity.

He was supposed to come and redeem Israel.

He was supposed to come and be their Messiah. Well you know what?

He came and he not only redeemed Israel, he redeemed us

all. And he is their Messiah and ours as

well. Yet to us it looked like a

failure.

One other thing that we tend to have fear of

is tomorrow. Tomorrow.

Man, I just don't know. I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow. I

got this meeting. I got this I got this interview. I got

this appointment with the doctor. I don't know what they're going to

say. You know, tomorrow, whoo.

Well Jesus said, don't worry about it.

You got enough to worry about today. Don't

add tomorrow's worries to today's worries.

And you know when you get and don't and for sure don't add next

week's worries to today's worries. Yeah, not not

He said, Don't worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow will worry about

itself. It's got some worry when you get there, you can do

that. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

We don't know what tomorrow holds.

I I One of my favorite artists is Paul Simon. And

I I really like his, sometimes his lyrics just

have so much truth in them. You know, all lies and jests, still a

man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest. True

that. Yeah. One man's ceiling is another man's

floor. True that. A couple weeks ago

I, I heard him in concert at the

Ryman. And he sang Slip Sliding Away.

And one of my favorite verses that he ever wrote was

through that song, God Only Knows. God

makes His plan. The information's unavailable

to the mortal man. We do our job,

we get our pay, we think we're

gliding down the highway, when in fact we're slip

sliding away. We don't know what's gonna

happen tomorrow. We we rarely know where

where we're headed.

In fact, you don't really wanna know about the future.

Because I promise you at some point it ain't gonna be

good. And if you knew

about it, you knew what was gonna happen and you knew when it was gonna

happen, that's all you'd think about.

It's enough to know who holds the future. When when

I was growing up there was there was a song that we'd hear in church

for pretty often. I know not

what the future holds, but I know who holds the future.

It's a secret known only to Him.

And I trust Him. And I'm not afraid of tomorrow.

Let's go to Saul's second fear. I mean fear of the enemy we get,

but this one is probably even more pervasive among us

and it is fear of his own people.

And Saul, over in

over in chapter 15 of first Samuel, Saul

was tossed a softball by by the

Lord to and he was supposed to hit it out of the park but he

whiffed. He was told to go and wipe out the

Amalekites. And the Amalekites apparently

weren't much of a challenge. And so he goes and

and he whiffs because of fear. And

after that happens, guess who arrives on the

scene? Samuel. And

now you get to stand up and do the real reading that we were gonna

do today. And I know, you know, you're getting hungry But

just just stay with me.

Samuel said, although you were once small

in your own eyes, do you not

So for Israel, The Lord anointed you king

over Israel and He sent you on a mission

saying, go and completely destroy

those wicked people, the Amalekites. Wage

war against them and wipe them out.

Why did you not obey the Lord? Why did you

pounce on the plunder and do evil in the eyes of the

Lord? But I did obey the Lord, Saul

said. I went on the mission the Lord assigned

me. I completely destroyed the Amalekites

and brought back Agag their king. The soldiers

took sheep and cattle from the plunder. The best of

what was devoted to God in order to sacrifice

to the Lord your God at Gilgal. But

Samuel replied, Does the Lord delight in

burnt offerings and sacrifices as much as in

obeying the Lord? To obey is better than

sacrifice, and to heed is better than the fat of

rams. For rebellion is like the sin of

divination and arrogance like the evil of

idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the

Lord, He has rejected you as king.

Then Saul said to Samuel, I have sinned,

I violated the Lord's command and your instructions.

I was afraid of the men and so I gave in

to them. Please be seated.

And read that last sentence again in silence

and pondering.

You can read it out loud, Connie. Yeah. It's okay.

I love Connie. She she doesn't think she's

brave, but she has become brave since I've known

her. And that's a fact. Yeah. I usually

do this, this teaching for pastors.

And while this is an all too common fear for

leaders, it applies to followers as well. So don't, you know, don't think,

Well, I'm not a leader so you're not talking to me now. Yeah, yeah, I

am actually. In terms of leaders, this is

the Achilles heel of leaders.

Being afraid of their own people.

It's the Achilles' heel of democracy. It's why stuff doesn't get done

right because they're afraid of us.

Afraid they're not going to get reelected, you know. So we gotta please

this group or please that group or do do do something right

now rather than something that's gonna be good for the future because

those people ain't voting for me. These people are.

It's also, the bane of the church.

When when I was growing up we we would come and worship the

Lord on on Sunday and then we'd have church business

meeting so that the Devil could get his due.

Because everybody had their own opinion that they had to bring and you know, and

they only caused divisions and all kinds of stuff.

And I hated those things, I really did.

What if Moses had given in to the people?

We wanna go back to Egypt. You know, why why did

you bring us out of here? We don't get enough manna.

We we like more than one day supply. You know, I There was just so

much stuff that if he had been the kind

who would give in in fear to the people, we wouldn't have

never We'd never heard about him, heard about them.

But okay, let's let's let's say we're let's say we're talking about

followers. What about your friends?

What do you mean my friends? I I don't hang out with bad people. I

mean bad bad company corrupts good character and I don't I don't

hang out with bad people. Okay. And I'm certainly not afraid of the

people that I hang out with. Oh, okay. I I hear you. Are you any

different with them than you are when you're here?

Are are you any different at work from what you

are on Sunday morning? Are are you any different,

at school than you are with your family? Are you

different with someone you're trying to impress, than you are

with somebody that you think is beneath you?

Fear of others causes us to lose our real

self. We don't know who we're

all who we are after a while.

I found it hard being a preacher's kid

for a number of reasons. The most obvious of which was,

everybody's looking at you. And you got, you

got you're held to a different standard from everybody and they're

all focusing on you. But

probably even even more difficult than that, though

at the time I didn't recognize it, was the fact that your parents or

your father or mother, whatever, is

up there in church and they're who they are and then they come home

and maybe they're somebody else.

And you and you kind of go, I don't like what I see behind the

curtain.

My parents were quite good at being the same as home

as they were elsewhere, as they were anywhere, actually. But you

but you know the thing is that when you're when you're 10, when

you're 13 and God help you when you're 16 and

17, you know. Just the tiniest little

crack gets magnified. You kind of go,

well you know, you you say this but

you you are that

and I'm not gonna be that way.

Really?

Well let's take this a little a little bit deeper. Let's get specific

with Saul's third fear. And Saul's third fear was fear of the

Lord's favor on another. And

that other was, was David. He was afraid of

David. First Samuel eighteen twelve

says, Saul was afraid of David because

the Lord was with David and had departed from

Saul. Well what what caused

this fear? Really?

Because you see, there are

There's a man I know who used to be

here at the church. He was actually on staff.

And he seemed extremely

confident. And, in fact,

he'd tell you right now, I'm not afraid of anything. Not afraid

of anything, anybody.

And he was good. He was good at his job.

And and I love this guy but we've reconnected

many years later and, you know, he's kind of admitted two

things. Number one, was actually I was afraid

of you. Oh, okay.

Afraid of me? I don't get it but you know,

he's not telling me what I've heard say that so, boo.

And but the second thing is I was

afraid that people were going to find out

that I'm just, that I'm not that good. I'm

afraid people will find out who I really am.

You afraid of anybody? You you

afraid of people finding out who you really are?

Afraid of people getting to know you?

Seeing behind the curtain?

The main issue is this, it's not jealousy, it's not envy,

it's not really even insecurity. The main issue is this,

it's misplaced identity.

You draw your identity from the wrong source.

Retirees suffer from this real often, especially pastors. You know,

they're used to being in charge and they're used to

people honoring them or or whatever, you know. And then, all

of a sudden they aren't that anymore and it's kind of like, well who am

I? Sometimes teachers,

businessmen, you know, whatever it

is, you know, if that become if your

position becomes your identity,

then you got some reason to be afraid.

One of the issues we had here for, for several years, and occasionally it

pops up again, is people unwilling to step aside from their

position for others.

In fact, there'd be times that they weren't even doing the job anymore,

and then we'd say, well, you know what? We're gonna,

we're gonna we're gonna let Wade start doing that job. Oh no, no, I'm

ready, I'm I'm ready to do it now, you know.

And they weren't ready to do it now, they just weren't ready to let it

go.

Saul feared for his kingdom.

He wasn't afraid that David was gonna kill him.

He he wasn't afraid that David would be bad for Israel, I

mean come on. David fought Israel's battles.

David protected Saul. David had Saul's back.

But he was afraid that he was gonna lose his

kingdom. David was gonna get

it.

And so he was unable to receive the greatest gift

that God gave to him, gave

to his kingdom. David,

couldn't receive it. When you know who you are

in Christ, it changes the calculus on everything. When

your identity is rooted and grounded in Christ, it changes the

calculus on on everything. When it shifts

from who am I to who am I in Christ.

Yeah I know I'm running a little late but,

just hang on.

I used to do a lot of my major in college was

theater, and I used to do a lot of acting and before I came to

the Lord I mean I was, I was doing that all the time. And you

know what, I was good.

I was good, and I knew it. And I

felt like I'm a really

good actor. And so I enjoyed acting.

I did not enjoy going to the theater, Because when I

went to the theater, one of two things would happen. I would see somebody doing

a role that I should have been doing.

And they weren't very good. And I would be sitting there the whole

time instead of into the play, I'd be sitting there the whole

time going, yeah. That's

not how I'd do it. And it was even worse if they were

great and much better than I could

do it. Because I would sit sit there,

something inside of me, kind of

falling apart I guess, crumbling.

And then I came to Jesus, came to Jesus in

in in my mid twenties and and I didn't know this was gonna happen

because I didn't know it was a problem. Because I

was stupid, and ignorant, and away from the Lord, and

couldn't see things. But I started enjoying

going to the theater. Because if I went and somebody

was really good, I would, wow, that blew me

away. I really enjoyed that. And if someone was

really bad, I just go, you know,

God love you. I mean look at what they're doing.

They don't even know their path. They're just up there, they're just up there

having fun and enjoying life and and living it

big. That's, I mean it changed everything.

It's not time for this, I'm gonna tell it anyway.

It's a play called Frost Nixon. And it's about David Frost

and Richard Nixon, and interviews and stuff. And, and

I I I've always

thought that I could play Richard Nixon very well.

And, and Studio ten over in

Franklin did that play, and I thought, oh wow, I'm gonna

audition for Well they already precast Nixon and I was going, oh

well. But then the guy had to drop out and

they asked me to come and audition. And

I did. And I feel like I

nailed it. And they didn't cast me.

They, they cast a friend of mine,

that I had known previous years, named Robert Kiefer.

And I went to see him, I went to see the play, and

Robert was fabulous. He

was fabulous. And and I

remember after after the show, I was in I was in the foyer,

I think they call it a lobby. I was in the lobby and one of

the guys who had been at my audition had decided not to cast me.

I went over to him and I said, you guys

absolutely made the right choice. And it was from the bottom of my heart and

it felt so good to be able to say it. Because my identity was

not in the fact that I I can do a Richard

Dixon or that I was an actor or anything. My identity is in

Jesus Christ and how well somebody else did had no impact

whatsoever on who I

was.

Back in the seventies, people used to say, what are my rights in Christ?

Kinda go, well, you

know, because of bad teaching they thought was

having stuff, and, and,

being never getting sick, or something like that. You

know, having stuff doesn't make you free from want.

In fact, the more stuff you have, the more stuff you want, usually.

Having stuff, having faith makes you free for

want.

Your rights are to die daily,

to forgive others,

to consider others ahead of yourself.

In other words, to take up your cross daily and follow him.

Those are your rights. And if you will exercise those

rights, the more you exercise those right,

the result is that you you find your true self, you

find freedom, you find freedom from

fear. No fear.

Colossians two ten says, in Christ you've been brought to fullness.

Think about what that means. Do you feel like your

life is full? Do you feel like it's it's

fullness? If you don't, it may be because

it's not grounded in Christ.

For you died and your life is hidden with Christ in

God. Stop looking for your life in the wrong

places. Your your life is

not about your politics, it's

not about your position, it's not about your possessions, your pride,

hidden in

Christ. And

then finally, it's hidden in Christ.

And then finally,

do not fear what they fear,

do not be intimidated by them but in your hearts

revere Christ as Lord.

Two options, you can

fear what they fear and be intimidated or you can revere Christ

as Lord in your hearts. Those are in inverse

proportion to one another, inverse ratio.

Many of you watch the news.

It may be your sin that so

easily entangles you. I'm just saying that,

not to be funny, but because it's

true. Because it promotes fear.

But if you will truly revere Christ in your

hearts, your fear doesn't stand a chance

when you stand in his love.

Would you stand with me? Will those who are

gonna pray with people come forward? And

if you need prayer for anything,

especially if there's anything out there that you're feeling fear or anxiety

about, it may be an interview, it may be a doctor's appointment, it may be

a bill that's coming bill that's

coming to I mean, but anything, it doesn't have to be

about fear specifically. We're going to worship for just a few

moments, give you an opportunity, to come and

be prayed for. His brothers and sisters would love to pray with you.