Missing the Mark | August 3, 2025

Today's reading comes

from the book of Proverbs.

Mmm.

If I may digress for a moment from

my prepared message, I mean it.

When I say to you,

you guys, sometimes you're bad.

Don't be jerks.

You are supposed to be good.

I'm in my office every day and somebody

comes in and they're like, Hey, whoops.

I'm like, don't,

Dan, what is your deal?

If anybody doesn't know Dan is the worst.

I took a vow to not say who was the

worst, but it's Dan, you guys are

making me look bad in front of God.

What's that?

Oh look, it's Jesus.

And he said, stop it.

The word of the Lord.

All right.

I had foolish optimism that

this Mike would work on me.

Russell was, I saw him eyeing me when

I walked up with it, shaking his head.

He's shaking his head now.

So we're gonna go, we're

gonna go to the headset.

I told Debbie, I, I was the

first one to use that mic.

When we got that mic, Andy was made a

big deal 'cause he was outta town and

he was like, Hey, don't break that mic.

It worked perfectly for me.

I didn't have any issues with it.

And then it did not work for

anybody else who used it.

And I told Debbie, my theory

was Andy is tall and bald,

so he's basically an antenna.

And I thought maybe it works

for me because I'm not an

antenna, but I was wrong.

So,

so I, yeah, I did that video

because I referenced it a couple

weeks ago when I preached.

And I really liked that video.

Uh, and it's funny, if you look at that

video on YouTube, all of the comments

are pastors who are like, I'm a pastor.

I've watched this video five times.

This is how I feel so many times now.

I'm not saying that to come

down on you as the congregation.

Um, 'cause I think all of us really feel

that way, even if we're not pastors, um,

when we just look at the world, right?

So I wanna talk about how do

we deal with sin as Christians,

um, not just as pastors.

How do we deal with sin?

Well, let's break down

what even is sin like.

It, it's something we say all the time

to, we really stop and think about what

sin is because I think a lot of times

maybe if you just ask someone what sin

is, it's like, well, it's being bad.

I mean, that's what that video is.

You guys are being bad.

Just be good.

But what does that mean to be bad?

The word sin, there's three

words that are used in Hebrew

and in Greek to describe sin.

Um, but the primary one is the Greek

word or the, uh, Hebrew word kata.

And that means to fail or to miss.

So it's, it's used when talking

about someone throwing something

and they, and they miss the

target that they're aiming for.

Uh, it, or when you, when you

fail at doing something, that word

kata means to fail or to miss it.

It ironically is not necessarily tied

in with ethics or morals, but rather

the cons, missing a mark, not hitting

the point where you're supposed to.

So

maybe sometimes our problem is that

we're just trying to focus on being

good and doing the right thing when we

should be trying to aim at a target.

And that target is God's word.

What does God's word tell us to do?

And what's more interesting

is failing or miss.

What's more tied to is, is this

concept of like, well, what is

failing and missing in the Bible?

And we can talk about the

law, but it's more than that.

Let's, let's even go to when someone

approaches Jesus and they said, Hey,

what is the most important commandment?

What's the most important

thing for me to do?

And Jesus says, to love your Lord,

your God with all your heart,

mind, soul, and strength, and to

love your neighbor as yourself.

So by that definition.

What really is the heart of what God

wants for us to honor him and to honor

others, to love him and to love others,

which makes sense 'cause that's looking

at it from the New Testament perspective.

But even the Old Testament,

that same thing was at the

heart of the Old Testament.

To love your lord's, your God

with all your heart, mind, soul,

and strength, and to love others.

It was the golden rule

for For the old covenant.

And for the new covenant.

Everyone understood that.

So maybe we need to measure things

by recognizing, are we honoring God?

Are we honoring other people

and and why does that matter so much?

I mean, I think we can

probably understand.

Honoring God obviously is important.

Loving God is important.

He made us, I think we sometimes

mess up on the loving other people.

Why?

Well.

Based on that video.

'cause sometimes it's hard to love other

people, and especially when people are

bad, it makes it hard to love them.

But let's go back to the beginning.

God created man.

He created man in his image.

All of humankind is image bearers of God.

They're created in his image.

So if we're not honoring other people,

we're not honoring the image of God.

It's easy for us to look at sinning

as doing something against God, but

I don't think we always realize that

when we're dishonoring other people,

when we're not loving other people,

we're still dishonoring his image.

It's important that we

have reverence for God.

I asked Rusty this week if

he could do a song, but.

We had a lot of things going on this

week and I gave him late notice and

it wouldn't have worked in hindsight,

especially because we had all these

sound issues from our sound being

set up for having a giant castle in

here and that messed everything up.

So it was rough morning.

And so in hindsight, it definitely

would've worked, so would not have worked.

So Rusty made the right call.

Um, but the reason I picked the song that

I had talked to him about was, I love

how the song has this reverence for God.

Um, but then Rusty had the last song

The Holy Forever, which really had the

same, it evoked the same feelings that,

um, I was going for with the other song.

So I think it all worked out in the end.

Um, but it's really important

for us to have honor for God,

to have reverence for God.

And it's important that we have

reverence for other people.

And I don't mean we worship

other people like we worship God.

And I'm not saying other people, um,

I'm not saying other people are God.

But we have to recognize

their image bearers of him.

And he loves them just

as much as he loves us.

And if we're not loving them like

he loves them, then we kind of value

ourselves more important than God.

'cause we think this person's

not worthy of my love.

Well, they're worthy of God's love.

So why are you so much better that

they're not worthy of your love?

So maybe we all struggle

a little bit with sin.

Not maybe we all do.

That's biblical.

We all struggle with sin.

So how do we deal with our sin?

Okay, we've recognized maybe we aren't.

We all make mistakes.

We, we sin.

How do we deal with our sin?

Well, it's really a lot like how

you deal with anything in humanity,

how we deal with our emotions.

Okay,

you just.

Ignore them and you focus

on other people's problems.

Okay, so we'll move on to other people.

How do we deal with other people's sins?

Now, I'm not, I know there are some

people, like my wife, who are note

takers who are like, I just wrote

a section on dealing with our sin,

and then you just glaze past it.

How do we deal with their sins?

Well, let's open up our

Bibles to Matthew seven.

'cause really this whole chapter is kind

of Jesus' basic explanation for this

in Matthew seven, starting

right at the beginning.

Do not judge, or you two will be judged

for in the same way you judge others,

you will be judged in the same measure.

You use it, you will be measured.

Why do you look at the speck of sawdust

in your brother's eye and pay no

attention to the plank in your own eye?

How can you say to your brother, let

us take the speck out of your eye.

When you, all the time there's a plank

in your own eye, you hypocrite First.

Take out the plank out of your own eye

and then you will see clearly to remove

the speck from your brother's eye.

Do not give to dogs what is sacred.

Do not throw your pearls to pigs.

If you do, they may trample you.

They may trample them under their

feet and turn and tear you to pieces.

So going back to the beginning there,

do not judge for you will be judged

too, as you have judged others.

I used to throw this verse around

in college all the time and in

ministry, I've heard so many pastors

talk about how this is the most.

Taken out of context Bible verse,

and I agree and disagree with that.

Now, in college, I would say it

more in like a joking manner.

Like I'd be with my friends and they'd

be like, Dex, you just ate a whole bag

of peanut butter m and ms in one sitting.

What's wrong with you?

And I'd be like, Hey, Matthew

seven, one, don't judge me 'cause

you're gonna be judged too.

True story.

Um, but

I think the, a lot of pastors have

issues with this 'cause they think

it's kind of saying like, Hey,

don't hold anybody accountable.

Don't, don't call anybody out

for doing something wrong.

But that's not what Jesus

is talking about here.

Because later on in the New Testament,

there's plenty of times of the

Bible telling us to rebuke others.

But there's a difference

between rebuking and judging.

Rebuking is, is saying, Hey,

this thing is, is not right.

Here's biblical evidence

of why that's not right.

That's not something

that we should be doing.

Right.

Judging.

Is when you are casting judgment

on them, you are condemning them.

You are putting in a different place.

You're putting them in a different

place as you, it's God's God's job to

judge people, to hold them in a, whether

they're going to hell, where they're

going to heaven to hold their soul

and where it's supposed to be placed.

That's not for us to do.

We're not supposed to elevate

ourselves other over people.

So what I wanna talk about is, I think

one of the first things of dealing with

other people's sin is to not gatekeep.

Now maybe you might not know what

this phrase gatekeep comes from.

This is really like a, a cultural, um,

word where the concept of when we, when

we allow something to be allowed in.

So for instance, this is like, um.

One of the instances I can think of the

most of gatekeeping is seeing someone

like some, you know, young kid wearing

like a Led Zeppelin t-shirt, and some

older person goes up and is like,

led Zeppelin, you like Led Zeppelin.

They're like, yeah, like

name a Led Zeppelin song.

And they're like, um, I don't know.

And then like, you're

not a Led Zeppelin fan.

You can't wear that shirt.

Right?

It's that kind of thing of like, you

can't be allowed in here because you

don't care about this thing the way I do.

And sometimes we do that to other people.

We see people who maybe identify

as Christians, but we don't like

the things that they're doing.

And so we gate keep them.

We, we say they're not allowed

to be part of Christianity.

That's not really our place to say.

Now again, we can rebuke other people.

And let me think of another issue of,

like, another context of this is, I

remember years ago when Kanye West.

Started pushing out these gospel albums

and some people were really happy about

it and think it's so awesome and other

people like me were skeptical of it.

I had issues with Kanye West

and as time has gone on, I have

more issues with Kanye West.

But here's the thing, and it would've

been a lot different if I actually

like personally had interactions

with Kanye West, but I didn't.

So what my attitude towards him

was, didn't really change what

he was doing, but I was like,

no, this guy's not a Christian.

I know what you guys are saying.

He's not a Christian 'cause he's doing

blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

And what would the difference have

been if I did interact with him

and have that attitude towards him?

Again, I can call him out for

what he's doing, but it's another

thing for me to put value on

his soul and where it belongs.

Jesus talks about this later on.

He talks about when he, when he's

doing all the allegories of, of sowing

seeds and evangelizing to people.

And he talks about when you throw

out a bunch of seeds, but then

weeds start to grow in with them.

And he says, don't pull out all these

weeds that are ruining the crops.

'cause if you pull them out, you're

gonna pull out the good crops too.

Just let them all grow.

And when the harvester Jesus comes, he'll

pull out, he'll take care of it all.

So that's not our job.

And I think it's also worth recognizing

is there's a huge difference in how we

rebuke people who are Christians and

just people who have no interest in God

and, and we'll come back to that.

But the next thing Jesus talks

about is removing the plank.

A lot of the times, the reason why

we have problems with judging people

is casting where they deserve to go.

Because we also deserve to go there.

So it's really unfair for us to

be like, well, you're a sinner.

This guy's, he does this

thing and this thing.

He deserves to go to hell.

I can't claim his.

And as a Christian, yeah, all

of us deserve to go there.

And, and we don't approach

people with, I think the empathy

that they sometimes need.

Another example, I can think

of this, of calling myself out.

I did have a video calling congregation

out, so I'm gonna call myself

out here now a couple weeks ago.

I'm sure.

I, I feel like this was all over the

place, so everyone probably knows

this story, but on the off chance you

don't, there was this cold play concert

that happened a while back, right.

And Coldplay, the, the lead singer, he had

this whole thing where he had a camera,

uh, and it was showing couples and they

could kind of sing songs to the couples

or whatever while they were playing.

It panned to this one couple,

and immediately, as soon as the

camera panned to them, I mean,

it's like on the like mega, the,

the big jumbotron kind of thing.

Um, the, the husband was like, or the,

the guy with like crouched down and then

the girl just turned around and shamed.

I feel like this is everywhere, so if

you don't know what I'm talking about,

that's pretty much the main gist of it.

And the, the lead singer of Coldplay like

joke, like I either they're a really shy

couple or there's an affair going on.

It turned out it wasn't affair

and it was the CEO of a company.

And the girl he was with was the head of

HR of that company who was also married.

So it was a whole thing.

And now there's like a divorce underway.

Um, and he ended up issuing a public

statement that basically talked about

how he did bad things and he's sorry.

But then the end of that statement,

he then talked about how it was

unfair for Coldplay to take a private

moment and to publicize it and.

Allegedly, he's suing Coldplay now.

So, and when that all happened, I

remember I was on vacation at the time

when all this happened and I was like,

this bozo, like, and, and Jackie and

I even both talked and it was like,

yeah, the Bible talks about this.

When you sin, your sin

will be brought out.

Your sin will be revealed.

And that's what we said.

And he was like, yeah, you can't get mad.

This was not a private event.

You went to a public place, they

announced they were doing this.

You were sending in front of

thousands of people and then you're

just mad that you got caught.

And that was the attitude that I have.

And I was extremely judgmental of the guy.

And here's the thing, he sinned.

So I'm, what I'm about to say

is not saying that that's okay.

And, and I don't know whether

he's a Christian or what, uh, what

his religious background is, but

I didn't approach with empathy.

I approached with judgment because

honestly, it made me feel better

to call this guy out for his sin.

It made me feel better about myself.

If I'm being truly honest.

'cause here's the thing Jesus talks

about, if you even look at a woman

lustfully, you're committing adultery.

So when I bear that same ruling

on myself, yeah, I'm guilty.

And so how judgmental is it for me

to call this guy out for adultery

when by Jesus's law, by Jesus's

words, I'm committed adultery and I

can look back at any sin in my life.

And I get mad too when

I get called out on it.

I get more mad when it's publicized

in front of everybody, and I've

blamed those people for calling

me out, or I've made excuses for

why I did the things that I did.

So I didn't have personal

interaction with the CEO.

I think that that's what really

spoke to me is how judgmental I

was, and I wasn't even around him.

And maybe it's easier to be judgmental

because of that, but it doesn't make

the, it doesn't make it any different.

So if, if I had the opportunity to talk

to this guy, it'd be so easy to just be

like, Hey man, you're in the wrong you.

You were in public.

You chose that, you made that mistake.

But it might be better for me to say,

Hey, you know what, Hey, I've sinned.

Two, I've made mistakes.

I've done really dumb things

and I blamed other people.

But in the end, I had to just

take ownership of what I did.

And I learned to love my wife more and

to put her above every other, every

other person and you know, and I can

walk him through what my journey was.

And that's a whole lot different

than just casting judgment on him.

And that's really important for us.

The other thing that Jesus talks

about is to not waste pearls.

Don't throw your pearls before swine.

Don't give dogs what is sacred.

If you do, they may trample

under them under their feet

and turn to tear you to pieces.

Now, this is where it gets a little hard

because here we're now almost saying the

opposite of what I just talked about.

There are some people who have no interest

in what you're going to rebuke them with.

What is the pearls?

Pearls of wisdom?

If I talk to them about,

Hey, this is what God says.

There's gonna be people who have

absolutely no interest in that,

and it's just gonna turn them

off to Christianity even more.

It's gonna turn them off to

you, and they're never gonna be

interested in what you have to say.

So sometimes, as Jesus says here,

it's not always smart to impart

wisdom to people and their sin.

And that's a tricky game because it's

so easy for us to just be like, well,

they're not interested in what I have

to say, so I'm not gonna say anything.

And we just walk away from that.

And most of our failures

probably as Christians, is

finding when is the right time?

Who is the right person

to say something to?

And to not say something to which brings

me to what will help with that and what

the next important thing is, which is

that we gotta pray for those people.

'cause maybe you don't know

that person's heart very well.

God talks about how we look

at people from the outside and

not from the inside as he does.

So maybe you don't have the best judgment

of whether this person is ready to hear

wisdom, to have wisdom imparted on them.

So you need to spend time.

Praying for them and praying to

God for wisdom on how to handle

each situation with every person.

And I can say from my experience,

there have been times where I've

talked to someone and it was, it was a

conversation I was worried about and,

and I, I prayed about it and I talked

to them and afterwards I was like, huh,

I don't even know what I just said.

That was smarter things than I can

talk about because God does give

us wisdom and he will give us,

give us the right words to say.

And lastly, we are to love them.

Jesus goes on and he says, ask

and it will be given to you.

Seek and you will find Knock in

the door will be opened to you.

For everyone who asks receives the

one who seeks finds, and the one

who knocks the door will be opened.

Which one of you, if your son asks

for bread, will give him a stone?

Or if he asks for a fish

will give him a snake.

If you then through, though you are evil,

know to give good gifts to your children,

how much more will your father in heaven

give good gifts to those who ask him?

So in everything due to others, what

you would have them do to you for

this sums up the law of the prophets.

Now, here is a verse, or this

passage even is one that I would

say gets taken out of context.

I think a lot of people just use like,

Hey, you need something in your life.

You need a better job.

Uh, you need this thing.

Ask and it'll be given to you.

And, and I'm not saying our god's not a

provider and he doesn't do those things.

But this whole chapter is talking

about the context of salvation

of other people's salvation.

'cause even after that, he then

starts talking about how the

narrow and the wide gate, right?

He's talking about salvation, and

then he's talks about false prophets.

So he talks about the concept

of people delivering the word.

He's talking about evangelism.

So I think this whole thing of asking and

knocking, and it will be given to you.

And he's talking about praying for other

people, asking for other people to be

saved, evangelizing to other people.

Because here's the thing, there's

a lot of things that I've prayed

for that God's never given me, and

I don't give up on hope on that.

And I think sometimes we can focus

on that verse and take it for

other things and it can hurt us.

I think God Jesus is really trying

to emphasize to us this concept of

you have someone who you care about

who you want to be brought to the.

To the Lord.

You wanna say the right

words to those things?

Ask, and it will be given to you.

I will give you the right

words to say to this person.

I will soften their heart.

Because it's hard for us

to do that on our own.

It's impossible for us

to do that on our own.

And by doing that, you

are loving those people,

but you're not just loving them

by praying for them, but actually

going out and doing things for those

people, spending time with them.

I, I know a lot of people in this

church who have relationships with

people who are not Christian and

they don't mistreat those people.

They treat them just like they

would treat someone in this church.

They help them out when

they're in times of trouble.

They're someone that they can

talk to and they're not just out

preaching to them talking about

how they're sinners, but they're

loving those people where they are.

And that's what's important for us to do,

to love people where they are.

So those are the five things that you can

do when dealing with other people's sin.

All right.

How do we go back?

Uh, well, sorry.

Now what I'm gonna say with how,

going back to dealing with arson,

exact same things,

don't gate keep.

Sometimes we look at our own life

and we look at the sin that we have.

Now, maybe we're someone who

has some addiction that's hidden

that hasn't been revealed yet.

And I know I've been at places

where I'm like, I'm too far broken.

I'm not gonna get over this thing.

I don't think heaven's a place for me

'cause I can't get over this thing.

We sometimes gate keep ourselves.

We say that we're not

worthy of God's love.

I'm not gonna get past this thing.

I'm not good enough for God.

This whole Christianity

thing, I'm not good enough.

So we gate keep ourselves

out of Christianity, which is

completely wild because none of

us are good enough for heaven.

And the only reason that we all

are going to get to go to heaven is

because Jesus unlocked that door.

Right.

He has the keys, he unlocked

the shackles, he opened the

door so that we can all go in.

So it's kind of like crazy that there's

been times in my life where I'm like

standing and front of an open gate and

I'm like, yeah, no, I can't get in there.

And Jesus is like, dude, go.

I opened the door.

You're just standing there.

Oops.

Sorry.

We need to remove the

plank from our own eye.

And what that means is,

I mean, I kind of already covered it, but

we have sin in our life that blinds us.

We have inequities that blind

us from seeing and having

an honest look at ourselves.

One of the earliest uses of that word

qta is in the story of Cain Abel.

And when Cain gets angry that his brother

has a better blessing than him, right?

And he gets jealous, and

God says to him, be careful.

Ka tah sin is crouching at your doorstep.

He's almost giving this concept of, of

sin being a living creature that's waiting

to devour him because that's what sin is,

and we're lying to ourselves.

And I think it's, it's healthier if we

look at sin as an actual monster that's

alive and moving, it's not just, it's

not just like a choice that we make.

It's not just, um, a mistake that festers

in our brains, but it's something that's

actively trying to destroy us and we

need to put up our guard against it.

And because it is, it tricks us.

I mean, read the Bible, read any

story, and you see people who get

corrupted, who think they're doing

the right thing and they're doing the

wrong thing and how far they can fall.

And so it's important that we

are always taking a look at

ourselves and trying to be honest.

Is there a sin that you have in your life?

'cause none of us are perfect.

Don't waste pearls.

Now, how do we waste

pearls against ourselves?

Well, I think what this really is,

is that we give the best parts of us

to things that are not worthy of us.

I mean, what do we say is

the most precious commodity

time's?

The only thing that you can't get more of.

And so if time is the most

precious thing to you, are you

casting your time before swine?

Are you wasting your time with

things that are not good for you?

Every once in a while I'll kind

of try to take an account of

like, all right, what have I done

this week and 20 years from now?

How am I gonna look at

the time that I spent?

And especially as a father

now I've thought of like time

that I've spent with my kids.

How am I gonna feel about the time

where I spent, you know, playing

out in the yard with my kids?

How am I gonna feel about, you

know, the time where I was annoyed?

'cause I didn't want to go through

the hassle of the splash pad so

close to bedtime and then I have to

give them a bath and all this stuff.

And it's obnoxious.

And it's sometimes easier to be

like, Hey, you know what kids,

we're not gonna do that tonight.

We're just gonna chill at home.

I had an exhausting day.

But I look back at that and my kids

aren't gonna remember that time where

I just let them watch a TV show 'cause

it was way easier than dealing with

quality time that I spent with them.

And how does that relate

to our time with God?

And

I look back and how much quality

time did I have with God versus

how much time did I have working

overtime at my job, going to some fun

event, going to a Coldplay concert.

I don't know.

Are you wasting important things

with things that are not God?

And, and then praying for

them, praying for ourselves.

How much time are you spending in

prayer and, and maybe you're struggling

with the concept of being humble and

having an honest look at yourself.

If you are in the, in the congregation

thinking, yeah, I don't really know that I

have anything that is an issue in my life.

Probably do.

And maybe that's an indication.

God give me wisdom.

Let me see myself as you see me, because

we are constantly being bombarded by

hawk, how culture sees this, and that

corrupts the way we see ourselves.

So God, I'm praying that you will

help me see me the way you see me.

So that I can see my errors and I

can see the good things in me that

maybe I am not giving my pearls

to, that I am not recognizing.

And lastly, love them.

Now, this can be a dangerous thing to say

love yourself because honestly, we're in

a culture that's like, Hey, love yourself,

treat yourself, do all these things,

and maybe we have an issue with that.

So I wanna kind of

twist that a little bit.

So when I say love yourself, I

don't mean, hey, yeah, go buy that

car that maybe you don't need.

You deserve it.

You know, go take a guy's trip away

from everybody else and you know

that you don't really need, like,

I'm not saying all these things

of treat yourself in that way.

More so I'm saying love yourself in

the sense that the way God loves you.

As I talked about, there's been

things in my life where, like I

said, I was gatekeeping myself.

I was keeping myself locked out of.

What God's love was for me.

He broke me free of the shackles.

And how many of us bound ourselves to sin

when God has already freed us from that?

Love yourself enough to get rid of those

things in your life that are ruining

it or that are not hopeful for it.

You need to love yourself enough

to respect yourself, to see

yourself the way God sees you.

And once we can appropriately do

those things for ourselves, it

makes it all the easier to do all

those things for other people.

Because here are the things

we live in a broken world.

And I, when I first got called

into ministry, I, I remember being

mad at the church 'cause I saw how

hypocritical and judgmental the

church I thought the church was.

I thought, I don't think

I'm a judgmental person.

I think maybe that's why God's

calling me into ministry.

'cause I have a gift in this.

And the longer, the closer I've

grown to God, the longer I've

been in ministry, the more I've

realized, yeah, I'm judgmental too.

And I've ironically become less judgmental

the longer I've been in ministry.

But I just didn't see it before.

And so the biggest takeaway I want

to have for you is to every day

in the morning when you wake up,

I mean, Sarah talked about

memorizing Bible verses.

That's great, do that.

But also just a simple thing.

It's not a lot that I'm adding onto that.

Just pray.

God, help me see the

world the way you see it.

Help me see through your eyes.

And that means seeing other

people and also seeing yourself.

It will change your day.

It'll change your week and

it will change your life.

You bow your heads with me in prayer.

God, thank you so much for today.

Thank you for the beautiful weather that

is a break from, uh, blistering heat.

And just as we've kind of lived the

last couple months in blistering heat,

we live in a world with blistering sin.

Sin that is just killing

us and we're blind to it.

And we wanna look at the world and

say how broken it is and how it

needs fixed, but sometimes we're not

always interested in fixing it and

we're just interested in judging it.

So I just ask that you will help all of

us see the world the way you see it, so

that we can fix the world through you.

You are indeed holy forever.

And we need your power to break the sin

in our lives and in other people's lives.

Thank you that you will send people across

the ocean just to save one person, and

thank you that you can also just send

us across the street to save one person.

Be with us in all that we do.

Amen.

So while we're talking about ways

that we can go out and reach people,

if you're a guest with us,

thanks again for being here.

Uh, come find me.

I'd love to talk to you, uh,

and I'll try to come find you.

But, uh, we we're just happy that

you're here with us this morning.

So Men's fishing retreat,

it's already happened.

They're all gone at that.

That's why they're not here.

Um, but I just, I wanted to keep this

slide in here 'cause I wanna just

remind us, Hey, let's be praying for

them as they're coming back home.

It's like a 12 hour drive.

We just wanna pray that everyone makes

that drive safely and that they had a

great time and that whatever conversations

they had with Marty, with Andy, um, with

one another, that they will be ones that

stick with him for the rest of the week.

Uh, so continue to be praying for

those guys throughout the day.

Uh, we have the educator Comedy Night.

I know Ryan, he can really

answer all your questions if you

have any questions about that.

Um, he's raising his hand, uh,

and that's gonna be a fun thing.

And the cool thing about that is they're

gonna people who aren't part of our

church, who are gonna be at that event.

So if you're going to that event,

cool, that's a great time to

make connections with people.

Uh, there is not gonna

be any ba bam tonight.

Um, I don't know of any other

events going on tonight, so, 'cause

everyone's gone at the fishing trip.

Literally the shortest announcements

that we've had in forever.

Um, so I just wanna say

we love you White Rock.

Um, go out and show love to people.

Uh, you're dismissed