Anticipating Advent by Being on Mission - Mark 13:32-37

Message and we give this service to you in Jesus name Amen well

welcome my name is Mike. I'm one of the one of the

pastors here at Redemption North Ogden.

Welcome to our our sermon series anticipating Advent and

specifically our our lesson today that I've titled on

mission for the anticipated king.

Last week Eric walked us through the the first week of of Advent.

Advent meaning the the coming referring to the coming Messiah.

And we learned that we'll be looking at 2 advents in this

series. His arrival on earth as a baby,

his life and ministry as a man, and his death on the cross.

The Old Testament The Old Testament is is all about the

anticipation of that first advent.

The entire Old Testament points to Jesus first coming and then a

second coming, a second Advent. Throughout his ministry, Jesus

taught that he would come back again one day after his

crucifixion, after his resurrection, and and after his

ascension to heaven to fulfill the remaining prophecies about

him and to collect his followers.

We saw that we live now in a period where we are looking

backward and forward to Christ, where we are joyfully

anticipating the peace and safety of the coming Messiah.

And one passage that Eric walked through last week that that

specifically really connected with me was Isaiah 2 verse four

said he shall judge between the nations.

They shall decide disputes for many peoples and they shall beat

their swords into plowshares and their Spears into pruning hooks.

Nation shall not lift up sword against nation.

Neither shall they learn war anymore.

Now here's why that affected me. My background all of my adult

life. I was a police officer and, and

with all of the conflict that comes with, with that job, in my

role as a police officer, I was specifically, I was a use of

force instructor firearms, non lethal, you know, weapons, hands

on arrest control kinds of things.

And, and I, I, so I taught people that continuously

throughout my whole career. And during my career, I, I had

to physically fight for my life and to defend other people.

And, and although when you, when you train and prepare for stuff

like that for so long, training for, for gunfights and, and

violence and, and, and crime, you kind of just, you kind of

just incorporate that mindset into your normal life.

I always remember my wife over those years.

You know how often you had to pull bullets out of the washing

machine, right? Or she was rounding up holsters

around the house or my different, like the gear that I

had for that, for that life. It was just part of it was just

part of, of, of our life. And, you know, in your own life,

maybe you can relate to something like that, right?

Maybe you, you've seen examples of people that are like, you

know, we might, you might call doomsday preppers, people who

look at everything happening in the world through the lens of

disaster and, and calamity, where they see every

geopolitical thing that's happening.

Every geopolitical act is the verge of World War Three or

something. And there's this sort of sense

of continual worry and, and, and overwhelming fear.

But then here at Christmas time, in this Advent series, we're

reminded of that passage in Luke 2 in the story of the Nativity

and the multitude of angels proclaiming peace on earth,

goodwill towards men. That sounds wonderful.

We long for that, right? I think that's why I think

that's why we love things like like this, the song Silent Night

sung on a snowy, peaceful Christmas Eve, because it

reminds us of, of something better that we know in our souls

can exist. A world where we don't have to

train to fight for our lives, where our kids don't have to

practice lockdown drills, where as we learned last week, where

the the wolf lays down with the lamb and the leopard lays down

with the go. So looking forward to that kind

of peace sounds amazing to me. For, for, for many of us, this

concept of, of looking forward to, to real peace and safety is,

is too good not to dwell on, to let it dominate our thoughts and

our Christian life. We could easily find ourselves

so singularly focused on trying to figure out when Jesus will

return to, to so we can experience that, that we ignore

everything else that he taught us.

Or we could be tempted to see all the, the nonsense going on

in the world and just kind of throw our hands up and, and do

nothing while sitting in anticipation of his return.

You can, you can imagine, you know, sitting at, at work when

you've got reports to write or you've got thingamajigs to build

or, or whatever it is that your job is.

And you're just sitting there watching the clock tick, tick,

tick, tick. And you're anticipating the, the

end of your day, right? But that's not what you're there

for. You're there, you're there to,

to do work And, and you, you have something to do right?

That's kind of, you know, that's what a lot of Christians do.

They, they spend a lot of time looking forward to that time of

peace and a, and a ton of effort trying to figure out when the

second coming of Christ will happen.

There have been some famous examples of, of Christians doing

this, some even notorious examples.

One, one guy who was his name's Harold Camping, he Harold

Camping used to be the president of Family Radio, which back

before the Internet, you know, he had a huge impact, a huge

influence anyway. And and he kind of was famous

because he had predicted that the second coming would happen

in September of 1994. And then when it didn't happen,

he said it would be in May of 2011.

And then when that didn't happen, he tried to change the

date. But at that point, nobody wanted

to listen to him anymore. But he but he influenced so many

people in in looking at this and spending so much energy that

way. Hal Lindsay, another one for the

more experienced people in the in the room.

You might remember him. He was the author of a book

called The Late Great Planet Earth, and he wrote that Jesus

was coming back in 1988, forty years after Israel was recreated

as a nation state. And and that book sold

35,000,000 copies, 7 million of those sold in the 10 years after

his failed prediction. Because people wanted to know so

much that they were even willing to consume bad information to

try to get a better sense of this, because they were so, so

focused on wanting to know when Jesus was coming back.

There's even a significant number of Christians that

believe that the COVID-19 pandemic was indicative of a, of

an imminent second coming, and they tried in vain to link that

situation with cherry pick passages from Scripture.

So I, I guess that it's, it's somewhat natural for, to, to see

all of the bad things happening in the world and to longingly

look forward to something much better.

But today I want to look at why we need to avoid focusing simply

on the second coming and rather get motivated to grow the

Kingdom beforehand. And so our our main idea here

today is that although we can look forward to Jesus return

with hope and anticipation, we have work to do now that is

important and it's commanded by Jesus himself.

So here's the passage that we're going to focus on today in, in

Mark 13, verses 32 through 37, it says, But concerning that day

Mark 13:32–37

or that hour, no one knows, not even the angels in heaven, nor

the Son, but only the Father be on guard, keep awake.

For you do not know when the time will come.

It's like a man going on a journey when he leaves home and

puts his servants in charge, each with his work, and commands

the doorkeeper to stay awake. Therefore stay awake.

For you do not know when the master of the house will come in

the evening or at midnight, or when the rooster crows are in

the morning, lest he come suddenly and find you asleep.

And what I say to you, I say to all stay awake.

So the first point today, and one that I'll admit is, is a bit

difficult to understand, is that only the Father knows when this

will happen. So earlier in this chapter that,

that I just referenced up here, it says that Jesus was talking

privately with Peter and James and John and Andrew when they

asked him when these things would come about.

And, and, and, and earlier in the chapter, Jesus had just

mentioned that the temple would be destroyed.

So they are certainly curious about this, right?

They, they've asked multiple times before about the, the, the

future. I think it's natural.

It's a natural question for for any of us.

Obviously something this big is exciting and it deserves much of

our consideration. I think it's natural that people

would continue to look for signs and signals to to reaffirm what

they've come to believe because none of us wants to be taken for

a fool, right? But Jesus answer here is very

interesting says but concerning that day or that hour, no one

knows, not even the angels in heaven nor the Son, but only the

father. Now it might it makes sense that

the angels might not know, right?

But but Jesus is God and God is all knowing.

Jesus is God. That's called the the the

hypostatic union that he is both.

He's fully God and fully man simultaneous, simultaneously and

incomplete harmony. 2 distinct natures without confusion or or

division. So how then if God is all

knowing, how can the Son not know?

Well, he was still fully God in his life on earth, but Jesus

voluntarily chose to set aside the use of some of his

attributes. Here's how the apostle Paul put

it in Philippians 2 says Christ Jesus, who though he was in the

form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be

grasped, but emptied himself by taking the form of a servant

being born in the likeness of men.

Jesus lived his his life in full submission to the Father, and he

did this because it glorified the Father.

Jesus did this despite the fact that he is worthy of glory.

He chose to glorify the Father through His submission.

He set the example for us that that even though he didn't have

to empty himself of his claim to the rights and privileges of

God, He chose to do so. Regarding Jesus not knowing the

the day or or hour of his return, Iranius, who studied

under Polycarp, who was a disciple of John the Apostle,

says the Son was not ashamed to ascribe the knowledge of that

day to the Father only, but declared what was true regarding

the matter. Jesus simply spoke the truth.

See, it's, it's OK to believe something, even if you can't

fully comprehend how it, how it works, right?

Think about, you know, young children, you take them to an

amusement park and they, they see this, this great big tall

roller coaster or something. And, and, and they're scared

because they, they don't know that it's safe.

And you can try to explain, you know, I don't even know what

organization checks roller coasters and stuff like OSHA or

something like that. You can try to explain that to

them, but they're not going to understand it, right?

But, but you can, you can try to explain these kind of things to,

to a child. They, they won't understand it,

but they will get on that ride with you, right?

They will believe what even if they can't fully comprehend how

it's safe, they'll believe that it is safe.

So in, you know, in our humanity, the fact is with that

is that Jesus just simply spoke the truth.

And so we can we can believe it because he said it in our

humanity. Some of us, probably all of us

at at some point can, can feel slighted if the the praise and

and glory is is put on someone else in our hearts.

We probably wonder, yeah, but but like, what about me?

Like I did a lot too. I I worked really hard at that.

Why is he getting all of all of the attention?

But Jesus didn't do that, even though he was actually worthy of

of glory. None of us is owed A

comprehensive understanding of of this concept, but we can

believe it because Jesus said it.

But to try to help us to understand some of some of this

concept that Jesus, the Son of God wouldn't know the the day or

hour of his return. To understand that a bit better.

Let me explain the Galilean wedding ceremony briefly.

And I think maybe this will help us to add some some context to

it. So in Galilee, which is where

Jesus and his disciples were were all from, there was a

custom regarding the process of two people coming together in

marriage. So first, when, when, when this

young man has a, you know, his eyes on a particular, you know,

young lady that he thinks he might be interested in marrying

the the groom. He leaves his father's home and

he goes to the home of the potential bride.

And the groom is given wine to pour into a ceremonial cup of

joy. And the potential bride can

either accept it or refuse it. And when she accepts it

together, they drink to mark and and remember their betrothal.

But then the groom makes a statement to to everybody and he

says, I won't drink of this again until we are reunited in

marriage. For some of you, you're going to

see a whole lot of connections here with the Lord's Supper and

the things that we see when we when we participate in

communion. Then the groom leaves and he

goes to build a house, and he will work continuously on that

for for a long time. He'll go in and continuously

build. He'll start with one room and

then he'll add another room and then another.

And he'll just keep doing this. As long as he has time.

He will continue to build, and he'll do that until his father

tells him to go and collect his bride.

Only the father knows the day and the time.

Now, in the meantime, the bride is to remain pure and to ready

herself for her husband. She's she's, she's learning to

submit to her husband. She's no longer going to be

under the authority of her parents, but she will be under

the headship of her husband. And she and the wedding party

are to make preparations for the wedding celebration to gather,

you know, the, the clothes for her to wear, to keep their,

their lamps filled with oil, all of the different things that are

being collected and, and prepared for this wedding

ceremony. And then months later, as the

time draws nearer, still not knowing what day and what time

it's going to happen, the bride and the bridesmaids would sleep

in their wedding clothes so that they were ready at a moment's

notice. Because once the wedding began,

the doors would be shut for a week and no one would be allowed

in late. So the entire wedding party was

anticipating his arrival as they continued to prepare.

So I explained that because Jesus is speaking with these 4

disciples and he's telling them that only the Father would know

the day and the hour and this would make complete sense to

them because this was a custom that they were familiar with.

They had asked him multiple times previous to this.

They'd asked him about the future multiple times, but

Scripture doesn't record them ever asking about the timing

again after this. And we can also gain

understanding here when we are reminded that throughout the New

Testament, Paul, John, Matthew, they refer to the church as the

bride of Christ. So we are the bride awaiting our

groom coming to collect us and take us home.

And so from that same familiar custom, the disciples also

understand our next point, which is there is a right way to wait.

So in verse 34 of our, of our passage, he said it's like a man

going on a journey when he leaves home and puts his

servants in charge, each with his work and commands the

doorkeeper to stay awake. So remember, each with his work.

It's, it's, we're not watching the clock.

Like I said, we're not sitting there waiting for the, for the

end of of the, the shift, but we're focusing on the, the job

that we've been given. So what does that look like

though? Well, although there are lots of

things that Jesus calls his disciples to do, we can largely

categorize them under serving and disciple making.

And so in in Mark 9 verse 35, Jesus himself tells us this.

Mark 9:35

It says, and he sat down and called the 12 and he said to

them, if anyone would be first, he must be last of all and

servant of all. And then in Galatians 5 verse

Galatians 5:13

13, Paul says something similar. He says for you were called the

freedom brothers only do not use your freedom as an opportunity

for the flesh, but through love serve one another.

Paul writes this to remind believers that we are no longer

slaves to Mosaic law, an impossible works based

salvation. But he he, he warns us not to

allow this freedom to become an excuse for.

Sinful self indulgence and and self centeredness.

We are free from having to earn our heavenly reward, but not

free of responsibility to look out for others.

And in first Peter 4, verses 9 through 10, it says show

1 Peter 4:9–10

hospitality to one another without grumbling as each has

received a gift. Use it to serve one another as

good stewards of God's very grace.

Now maybe you've heard this call to serve before.

Maybe you've even grown a bit tired of it.

In our men's group yesterday, someone reminded us that a Good

Shepherd is a pushy shepherd. He carries that that staff

right? And it's his job is to poke the

sheep to to prod them to pull them to his job is to move the

sheep. So so maybe you have grown a bit

tired of being called to serve, but let me challenge you to

submit to the authority of Scripture and then make the case

that there is a way to ignore this command without being

disobedient to God. So in that verse there first

Peter 4/9 it says to use your gift.

That's your talents, your your skills, your finances, your

abilities. Use your gift to serve each

other. And guys, this is a letter to

the church. He's specifically saying to

prioritize serving your church family without grumbling.

And I'll be a transparent here for a second because transparent

lives is something that we believe in very much.

I have to admit that I occasionally get up here and I

try to recruit people to serve. And, and the reality is

sometimes I do it with grumbling in my heart.

You know, as as pastors, we've heard all the excuses.

We're too tired, we're too busy. I'm just not comfortable serving

in that position. And guys, I am not saying that

your reasons aren't valid. I know that you're tired.

I know that you're tired. But those kids back there in the

back, they need to hear the truth about Jesus Christ.

There are eternal consequences for them if they don't come to

know Jesus. And I know you're busy, but are

you busy about the work that Jesus told you to be busy with,

or did you prioritize something else?

Look, the bottom line is that you don't have to serve.

Jesus didn't have to empty himself of his divine right to

be glorified and serve, but he chose to serve other people

anyway. And those were some messy

people, right? People who actively and

aggressively mistreated him and attacked his character and his

message. But do you guys know, how do you

know how amazing it is to get to be part of serving God's church

in, in being a part of and in celebrating someone's coming to

Christ moments? It is a it's an amazing blessing

that we get to do this for people.

Everybody who everybody who who served last week got to be a

part of that baptism for Clint. What a great thing that we got

to be a part of that. So no, we don't have to serve.

We don't have to serve, but we do have to have the intellectual

integrity to admit that when Jesus tells us to serve, when he

tells us to pour ourselves out, when we choose not to do that,

we are refusing. We are rebelling.

Now, guys, if that has been your story of of finding excuses not

to step into those serving positions, please hear me.

It is not my intent to make you feel guilty.

So please don't, please don't sit and Stew in guilt.

Hey, guilt has a, a negative feeling that's often associated

with shame, right? And it, it, it can, it can lead

to despair and isolation. Meanwhile, conviction on the

other hand, is a is a good thing that's brought about by the Holy

Spirit to lead people towards repentance and restoration, to

lead us into changing our behavior.

Guilt is stagnant. We sit and we wallow in that

with no change and it feels horrible.

Conviction, though, is a movement to change, but that's

our choice. Which one we do in in Second

Timothy 4, Paul is warning believers to avoid preachers and

and teachers who who tickle their ears and who refuse to

preach the truth of the gospel. That that changes us, that that

convicts us and prompts us to to be different.

And then and then he says in verse 5, But As for you, always

be sober minded, endure suffering, endure suffering, do

the work of an evangelist, fulfill your ministry.

And this is a letter. This is a letter to Timothy

primarily, right? But the, but the, the universal

church is the secondary audience.

Guys, that's, that's a message for all of us.

Endure any suffering and do the work.

I as I was prepping this, I kept thinking back to when I was like

17 years old working as a bagger at Smith's.

And I was a funny guy. I did lots of funny, funny

things. My boss would, you know, I

remember all often him saying, stop screwing around and just do

your job. And I, and, and that's kind of

what we're, we're being told here, right?

Just do your job. The fact is, God's word is clear

about what is expected of us. Whether we dwell in guilt or

shame or are convicted to to change and to serve is dependent

on our obedience or our refusal. It's our choice guys.

But remember, we serve others to glorify God in our obedience and

because when we embody the traits and character

characteristics of Jesus to other people that serves as a

powerful witness to those who don't yet know him and helps us

as we strive to make disciples. That's the second part of of of

the right way to wait in our in our second point right and and

and it's also what Jesus is talking about when he says each

with his work in our original passage.

Now you might be very well familiar with with what we call

the the Great Commission. Matthew 28 verses 19 through 20.

Matthew 28:19–20

It says, go therefore and make disciples of all nations,

baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of

the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have

commanded you and behold, I am with you always to the end of

the age. Making disciples means going to

non believers and calling them to repent from their sinful

lives and and to follow Jesus. It means walking with them as

they come to understand God's word and as they learn to follow

him. And amazingly, many modern

churches have tried to redefine what disciple making is.

They often try to make it as unobtrusive as they can or as

easy as possible. We might try to get people

involved in serving or in discipleship through the

smallest of commitments. You know, you only have to do

this once a month or something. Or, or just send this link to

someone and get them to come check out the church where you

know, they, they, they might tickle their ears with

unintrusive and unoffensive messages.

What they need though, what they need, just like every human that

has ever walked the earth is to repent of their sins and put

their full faith in Jesus sacrifice on the cross to pay

for their sins. Now, of course, guys, I am not

telling you that you need to scream that at people.

And we've probably all seen examples of that right on social

media or or whatever. And sometimes it's people with

the best of intentions, but but their their delivery is, is may

may be described as unkind. See, the fact is, guys, that it

may take you some time to to build a relationship with, with

someone where you can effectively share that message.

But you must share the message. And let's be honest, you know,

if you are trying to share the gospel or if you are trying to

avoid it, I've been guilty of that many, many times and in my

life, modern society will tell us that doing this is, is hate

speech, but it's not. It's the most loving thing that

that we can do. Even then, even then maybe they

they do feel like learning about sin and wrath is is harsh, but

in in Jude, we were we looked at this yesterday in our men's

group in Jude verse 23, it says to save others by snatching them

out of the fire. There's there's an abruptness

about that. Think about this though, guys,

you just say that right now people are probably more open to

hearing and, and considering it that at any other time of the

year, just from a cultural, societal standpoint, we've seen

a shift in in recent months of people who have been a bit more

open to hearing something about the God of the universe.

But, but at this time of the year, right now, think about

this. You can walk into your local

hairdresser or mall or grocery store or whatever and hear some,

you know, traditional Christmas songs being played.

And outside of the dumb ones like, you know, last Christmas

or, or Jingle Bells or, or Santa baby or something.

Many of our traditional Christmas songs are, are written

around the facts of Jesus birth of, of the first advent.

And and so there is some familiarity with the story of

Jesus birth, even if they've never heard the fleshed out

gospel preached to them. Christmas movies often have a a

message about hope. And it's something that kind of

permeates our our culture at this at this time of year.

The closer we get to Christmas, the more we seek out that peace

on earth, goodwill towards men dynamic that I referenced from

from Luke. But sadly for the unbeliever

that that feeling often fades away right after Christmas when

when when people pack away their Christmas spirit with their

their tree and their decorations and guys, that's because they

only see it as as like a seasonal tradition rather than

as a way of life. But it doesn't need to be that

way. We need to be about the work

that Jesus gave us to do, telling others about what peace

on earth and goodwill toward men means.

Making disciples means walking toward God through life with

each other. We have to.

We have to get to know each other.

We have to spend time together. We have to stop lying about how

busy and tired we are. Or if we really are that busy

and tired, then we have to stop using that as an excuse to

disobey God. Making disciples means teaching

them all that Jesus commanded us to do and we can help them, We

can help each other to turn, you know, 6 or 8 weeks of Christmas

spirit into a lifestyle. 11 where we as as believers are

always looking back to Jesus first Advent that he would come

and, and live as a man and, and die as a sacrifice for those who

believe so that we can then look forward with hope and

anticipation to his second advent, the day he comes and

takes us home. And if we're going to be, if

we're going to lead people into being followers of Jesus, then

we, we better be studying and, and learning what that means

ourselves, making God a legitimate priority in our

lives, right? Because our Third Point here in

our passage today is that we need to make ourselves ready.

So six different times in that passage that we looked at at the

at the beginning six different times in that short passage here

he re emphasizes his command to us to to stay alert or to keep

awake, right. We we see here, be on guard,

keep awake, stay awake, stay awake lest he come suddenly and

find you asleep. Stay awake when just so you

know, when we when we study Scripture and we think we see

things that are repeated, we can, we can generally understand

that to be of significant importance, right?

Stay alert, keep awake is there when you see this, Is there any

doubt that Jesus thinks it's important for us to be ready?

Because that's what these warnings are all about, right?

He doesn't actually want us to go without sleep.

That's not what the stay awake is about, right?

He wants us prepared and ready for Him, returning for His

bride. In fact, He says exactly that in

Revelation 19 verses 7 through 9.

Revelation 19:7–9

It says, Let us rejoice and exalt, and give him the glory.

For the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his bride has made

herself ready. It was granted her to clothe

herself with fine linen, bright and pure, For the fine linen is

the righteous deeds of the Saints.

And the Angel said to me, Write this, Blessed are those who are

invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.

And he said to me, These are the true words of God.

So if in our second point, Jesus told us to be about the work

that that he set for us, the serving and and discipling of,

of other people, then what does he, what's he mean in here when

he says for us to be ready? Well, just like in this, in this

passage, the the bride again, that's us, makes herself ready

by clothing herself in fine linen.

And the fine linen, as it says, is the righteous deeds of the

Saints. Isaiah 6110 says, I will greatly

rejoice in the Lord. My soul shall exult in my God.

For he has he has clothed me with the garments of salvation.

He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a

bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a a beautiful

headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with jewels.

See, that's it's not something old, something new, something

borrowed, something blue, right? Or, or a sweet tuxedo with Air

Jordans. It's not about the tangible, you

know, physical decorations. It's about what Jesus sees

inside of us. For for some of you who are not

married yet, perhaps some of the weightiness of how beautifully

understandable this parable is might not fully connect with you

just yet. But husbands, you're going to

get this. It may have been our wife's

beauty that originally attracted us to them, but it is so much

more about their hearts and who they are that really defines

their beauty, right? And Jesus looks at us for what's

on the inside, not on the outside.

Galatians 3 verse 27 says, for as many of you as were baptized

Galatians 3:27

into Christ have put on Christ. So when we connect those last

couple of passages, right Revelation 19, Isaiah 61 and

then this one here in Galatians 3, we see that the bride of

Christ readies herself through salvation that comes about

through faith. That's how she readies herself.

So we see that that we are finally and and truly ready when

we have put our faith in Jesus Christ alone for the forgiveness

of our of our sins and committed to obediently following him,

putting on Christ, this intimate relationship with him that that

is our adornment, our our our fine linen dress, as it said,

and our jewels right. It's Jesus.

The more we conform our lives to him, to the will of God, the

more beautiful and covered in jewels that we are to Jesus.

As we close here today, as we as we contemplate living today with

anticipation of of Jesus return someday in the future, a day

that we cannot accurately predict nor should we try.

We must first ready ourselves as the bride of Christ by placing

our faith in Jesus alone. If you don't know fully what

that means or if you want to know more about that, we want to

have that conversation with you today.

All right, nobody knows the day or the hour that he's coming

back. We want to have that

conversation with you today. Don't put it off till tomorrow.

Don't put it off till next week. Don't put it off till till 2026.

That's a conversation that is worth you having today.

If you don't know what that means, find myself, find Eric,

find somebody here today and and get some clarification on that.

And then when we have done that, we have put our our our faith in

Jesus alone. When we've done that, although

we can joyfully look with excited anticipation to his

return, we cannot be singularly focused on that.

But we busy ourselves with the work that he left us to do.

We serve each other without grumbling, meaning we actively

seek opportunities to expend our energy in caring for each other

and we go make disciples. We don't shrug off that

responsibility and expect or assume that someone else will

will do it. We throw that life preserver of

the the gospel to people who are drowning, and then we throw it

out to them again. And then we throw that out to

them again until they grab a hold of it.

And then we continue to stay awake and to continue to do the

work, right? We just keep doing this.

Let's keep preparing and keep preparing.

When that bride, when that bridegroom goes to build that

house and he's waiting for his father to send him after his

bride, he just keeps building. He just keeps doing the work.

And the bride just keeps readying herself.

That's what we're going to do. We continue to do the work so

that when he comes back for us, Jesus will find us faithfully

obedient, fully awake and ready. And then we can look joyfully

and excitedly with so much anticipation for Jesus triumphal

return. Let's pray.

Lord God, I thank you that I get to live in this boxed in part

of, of, of history where I can look back at your first coming

and I could see the, the miracles and, and the, the

beauty, the love that it, that that was demonstrated and you

sending your son to be who he is, to live out the life that he

lived and to be the sacrifice that he that he was for me and

for other people in this room who have put their faith in you.

I thank you so much, Lord, for that.

And, and Lord, I, I know that that as we look forward, as we

know that you are coming back again, we can be, we can be

focused on that. We can we can look with joyful

anticipation at that, your Lord. And yet we we recognize that you

gave us responsibility to do here to prepare ourselves in a

way that glorifies you and honors you that prepares us to

be your your bride. And so, Lord, as a, as the body

of believers, as the bride of Christ here, Lord, help us to

help each other in, in preparing that to hold each other

accountable to, to serve each other, to give opportunities for

other people to serve, Lord. And, and as we do that, we know,

Lord, that you are faithful to, to help us to understand and

experience more of, of you and to understand your heart better.

And then, and then we, we repeat that cycle and we pour that back

out on, on people and they receive that and they know more

about you, Lord, what a beautiful system that you set up

for us. And we don't know how long that

will be, Lord, a part of my, a part of me is so anticipating

you in your return that I, I hope that it's today.

And yet, Lord, I know that there are people who have not

responded yet to the gospel. And so I asked for just a little

bit more time, Lord, so we can share that with them.

Don't let me have any excuses for not doing that.

Help me to, to, to have a fire in my chest that wants to go

share that with people, Lord, so that you can be glorified in

them coming to know you. Ultimately, Lord, though we

trust that the timing is perfect, it's, it's not up to us

when that is, how long it is, how short it is from now.

But Lord, we do know that you will be glorified in that.

And for that we are thankful. And we say this in Jesus name.