Core Values 2024 - Week 3: Connection

When we're continuing our series Core Values, and this our

twenty twenty four edition of Core Values, and we preach

this every October. We preach through the five values that

we kind of do everything here. We base everything we

do on these five values. If you're looking at me,

some of you're looking at me, I can tell your thinking.

Where is pastor Steve? Well, he is on vacation and

he's coming home soon. So he's out today with his family.

But they went out and we're on vacation this week,

so he'll be back.

No worries.

But I'm excited to preach you today on our core

value of connection.

You know, we started a few weeks ago.

Chief started us off with transparency, and I think transparency

is like the foundation. If you can't be genuine, you

can't be authentic, If you can't be yourself, really be yourself,

I don't think you can do I don't think you

can really operate and the rest of these values.

Last week we talked about generosity.

You know, it's talking about giving to the food bang,

but we talked about generosity and how we adopt that

value in our lives. And I think there are very

few things in the world the very few things you

can do that make you look more like Jesus.

There are very few things other than generosity.

I think that is if we really want to capture

the heart of God, it's being generous that's key to

kingdom living. But today I think I think that this

one really. They're all foundational, but I think this one really,

if we can get connection down, I think that we

can see the revival, and we can see the move God,

and we can see all the things we dream about

come to pass. If we can really get this one down,

let's read our definition. If you're ever wondering what the

definition of our core values are, you can always go

to Seystone dot Church. There's an about section. It has

all the core values listed. There are definition of connection

here at Cornerstone is this. We believe that authentic discipleship

is expressed through our connection with other believers. Connected living

offers the support, accountability and freedom that mankind is desperately

seeking but cannot otherwise attain. That's a lot of cool words.

We like to make it sound good, but here's what

it means. You can't do it by yourself. You can't

do it alone. And you can say, well, what is it. Well,

you could list like a million things to take the

place of the word it there.

But what I mean is life.

You can't do life alone. And when I'm talking about life,

I mean the Biblical definition of life, life where you

glorify God, free from the things that used to hold

you back, while using your gifts and your talents and

your time for the sake of those around you. I

don't know if that sounds familiar to anybody, but we

only do four things. We experience God, we walk in freedom,

we find a place, we live a purpose.

That's real life.

And those four things are completely undermined if we don't

have genuine connection. And why that might sound like a

sales pitch for Cornerstone, I'm not trying to sell you Cornerstone.

You're already here. If you're online, you're maybe trying to

make a decision. That's a pretty good sales pitch, and

we want you to come and connect, We want you

to be part of it. But I'm not trying to

sell you the church. In fact, none of this was

actually our idea. Turn with me to Genesis chapter one.

Genesis chapter one, we're gonna start in verse twenty six.

I'll show you that this wasn't our idea, it was

actually God's idea.

Genesis, Chapter one, verse twenty six.

Then God said, let us make man in our image,

after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the

fish of the sea, and over the birds of the heavens,

and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and

over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

I love how that's written in the ESV.

There we think creeping thing that creeps, Just in case

you were wondering what creeping things do they creep?

Verse twenty seven.

So God created man in his own image and the

image of God. He created him male and female. He

created them, and God blessed them. And God said to them,

be fruitful and multiply, and fill the earth and subdue it,

and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and

over the birds of the heavens, and over every living

thing that moves on the earth. Now this is a

familiar passage. I hope, I hope that we've talked about

this a lot of that you've read this in your

own time. But it's a familiar passage talking about the

creation of man, and God says there are a few

things in this past that I really want you to notice.

Number One, God says, let us make man in our

image after our likeness. Now, I don't know what that

was like. Maybe the first time you read that, you're

who's God talking about who is our We now understand

that to be God existing in the trinity, God, the Father,

and the Son, the Holy Spirit. God himself was and

remains in a constant state of connection. God created mankind

in his image, I meaning, he created us in his image.

Our desire and our need for connection is actually baked

into our design. It's just the way we're built. We're

built for it. God chose connection. God didn't need it.

God chose it. He chose to be that way. He

chose to create us that way because he wanted it. Now,

I think that's a really powerful thought. If you're wondering

if connection really matters, Well, the Almighty, the infinite, the

creator of all things, the one who is everlasting.

Wanted connection.

It's powerful that he chose it and he chose to

create mankind to experience it with us. And also, I

want you to notice from this passage that we're not

all the same. Now, it's not a sermon on gender identity,

but surprise, there are only two.

I didn't let that sink in.

I feel like I do a little, but uh, it's

not a sermon on that. But God intentionally created these

differences in us. And this is also not a marriage sermon.

But these unique pieces they fit together, and God created

us different so that we could fit together.

And if we were all the same, there would be

no need for connection.

Last thing I want you to notice from Genesis chapter

one here is that God commanded us to be fruitful

and multiply, and that reveals his intent for more and

more connection. He didn't just create Adam and Eve and

say well, that's good enough. It's us three. It's us

three in the Godhead and it's these two humans, and

that's enough connection.

He said, be fruitful, multiply.

I want you to experience more of this that I've

created with each other and with me, More people with

unique experiences. That leads to more interaction, That leads to

more relationships, That leads to more opportunities for his creation

to experience what he who had everything, desired.

So the bottom line is.

This that genuine connection and relationship is God's desire and

his design for us. If you need any more confirmation

on that, you can flip the Genesis chapter two, verse eighteen,

where God explicitly states that it's not good for man

to be alone.

Again.

We often use that scripture, and rightly so, we use

that in the context when we're talking about mariage, we're

doing marriage ceremonies, but it also applies in the broader

context of human relationship. It's not good for you to

be alone. Not only can you not do life alone,

it's just bad for you. I don't know why we

would choose anything that's outright bad for us. So connections

not just a core value for our church. It's not

just a core value for Cornerstone. I mean you might

say that it should be a core value for every church.

I would argue this that any church that doesn't intentionally

encourage and support genuine connection is not a church at all.

You can't just come do the vertical and never do

the horizontal. It's not designed that way. And listen, lots

of people want it to be that way. While I

got me and my Jesus I don't know about that

doesn't seem to match up with scripture. You got to

have you and the Jesus and his people. You have

to have all of that together. It's just the way

we're designed. It should be a core value that every

disciple fosters in their life.

And so it's that important.

It's that important to God, it should be that important

to us, so that we can remember. I've decided to

go a little bit old school in my preaching today

and give you a device to help you remember connection.

And what it's all about. Connection starts with.

The letter C, so we're gonna use alliteration this morning,

and I have three s's of connection. The first is

where we started today. The first sea is crucial. Connection

is crucial. From the beginning of time, God has shown

us that it's best for us to be connected with Him.

And to one another.

God himself exists in connection, and the Godhead, the Trinity,

he exists in that connection. He created man for that

vertical relationship that we might be in relationship with him.

God wanted to experience connection with his creation, and so

he created us special different from the rest of creation,

so that he might experience this connection. He created woman

to accompany the man. He gave them the command to multiply.

And if you continue on in Genesis. You see God

walked in the garden with them, which to me is

just another beautiful illustration of how much God wants to

connect that he would be there with them. In the

original sin, which we've talked about but gets talked about

a lot. With the original sin, its whole design was

to destroy connection connection to God and to each other.

The serpent put in mity between man and God and

man and wife. He caused problems in the relationship, in

the connection. His intent was to sever that genuine connection,

and he used doubt, and he used deceit, and he

used distrust to break the connection. And since that, since

Genesis chapter three, since the fall of Man, God has

been working on fixing this damaged connection with us and

among us. This is so important to God that he

sent his only son, Christ Jesus to bridge the gap

vertically and to be the example of how we ought

to live with one another.

Turn with me to first John chapter four.

I love the way John puts this, It just to

me is just It's extremely powerful. We might be familiar

with these scriptures, but if we really understand them, it

will change us forever. Chapter four, verse nine says in

this the love of God was made manifest among us.

That God sent his only son into the world so

that we might live through him. In this is love,

not that we have loved God, but that he loved

us and sent his son to be propreciation for our sins.

Verse eleven beloved.

If God so loved us, we also ought to love

one another.

No one has ever seen God.

If we love one another, God abides in us, and

his love is perfected in us. I think it's really

interesting in verse twelve. There the way that's written, no

one has ever seen God. And then immediately John says,

if we love another, God abides in us. You know

how people see God when they see you love each other.

There are there are million, millions and millions and millions

of people who will never step foot into a sanctuary,

who will never be under a sound system with a

preacher and with an incredible band.

They're just not gonna do that.

But they see you at work, they see you at school,

and they see you at the grocery store, and they

see you out and about with your family. And if

they see you love each other the way you're designed to,

then they can see God. But just like the serpent

in the garden. The evil in the world around us.

It wants to ruin that connection. You know, the enemy

has nothing better to offer you. He actually doesn't have

anything better. I mean that's kind of like a duh

pastor Clay. But yet the enemy actually doesn't have anything

better than God. He doesn't have anything that he can

he can offer you that would be better than what

God has for you. So he lies to you, but

he disguises those lies with the same verbiage, the same phrasing,

the same words that we use that God uses in

the truth. The enemy will use those same concepts and

cover up the lies, and it's we start to believe them.

Let me give you an example. Consider how phrases like

be true to yourself. You know that scripture says that

the heart of man is so wicked at its core

is just wicked.

Be true to yourself.

When see when you compare that to the scripture, that

seems like a ridiculous thing to say, and it is.

How about follow your heart? That sounds good? I mean

it does.

It sounds I want I wanna. I'm gonna follow my

heart and do what I'm supposed to do. No, actually,

I'm gonna follow Jesus and find out what I'm supposed

to do. My heart will lead me to hell, it will,

and yours will too. How about this one? This is

another one.

Love who you love.

We just love who we love, and everybody should just

be able to love who they love. Are you kidding

when you compare it to the heart of God? It

is just outright evil. The hyper promotion of individualism and

nationalism and sexual and gender identity and political affiliation. We

could go on and on forever right here, and I

really could. But all of that is presented to you

under the banner of unity while they cut you up

into pieces. All but we're coming together. Everybody come together.

Everybody's accepted. That's just not real. But the enemy has

convinced us using the same language that God uses unity

in the body of Christ, and they say something entirely

different with the same words. The underlying intent is to

ruin genuine connection. And listen, if connection wasn't important, that

deception would not be so clever. Because it is. It's

very clever, and lots of people believe it. Perhaps you

there's been times that I have been well, maybe and

maybe I'm wrong. May I should be a little more,

or maybe by accepting things that are wrong, we are

condemning people to a lesser existence and maybe even.

Hell itself. In the name of unity. The devil has

us really confused.

But God has given us so clear in his word,

and we just have to be in it a little

more often, and I think we could really get it.

This is.

To say that connection is not just something that we do.

It's not just something that it's just part of what

we do as a church. It's so crucial as a

core value. And it's especially true the later and later

we get into the end of time. Now. I don't

know how close we are. It could be tomorrow that

Jesus comes back. It could be a thousand years from now.

But I don't know. It feels pretty late. It feels

like the sun's getting pretty low. And the further we

get into the end times, look at what first, Peter

chapter four says. In verse seven, Peter writes, the end

this is first. This is a long time ago.

He wrote this. Okay, the end of all things is

at hand.

Therefore, be self controlled, and so reminded for the sake

of your prayers.

Verse eight.

Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers

a multitude of sins.

So connection is not just this will just make your

life better.

It actually leads to freedom from the sin that so

easily ensnares us. But it's unreasonable to expect everybody to

connect with everybody. You've only got so much time, you

only got so much energy, right, I think a lot

of times we take kingdom concepts and then we try

to just we go gung ho, we just go all

into it, like all right, if I need to connect

with people, I'm connecting with everybody, and then about fifteen

minutes into that where it's so exhausted that we can't

do it anymore.

So connection is crucial.

But when we talk about connection at cornerstone, we intend

for it to be our second see concentrated. You know,

there's scientific research that actually suggests that human beings can

only have one hundred and fifty or so sustainable relatelationships.

One hundred and fifty.

Now we we call that Dunbar's number. There's a British anthropologist,

Oxford professor, really smart guy, much smarter than me, I'm sure,

came up with this, and it's a lot of study

on the way our brains are put together the way

our brains look, and he compares it to other primates,

other animals that are similar to humans, and watch those

social structures. There's a lot of stuff that I don't

understand about it, but the bottom line is this. He

believes that the research says that about one hundred and

fifty sustainable relationships. He's gone on to suggest that we

really can only have five truly intimate friendships in our

life at a given time.

Then we can have it kind of scales out.

We can have about fifteen close friends, about thirty five

good friends, one hundred and fifty stable relationships. Beyond that,

we just those people are acquaintances. They're people we know,

we may know their name, but we don't have of

sustained relationship. Now, if you're like me, you take that

with a grain of salt, because there are a lot

of factors there that's evolutionary science. We're like, ooh, no,

so that's fine, take it with a grain of salt.

But I think it gives us a rough idea because

I think we can all agree that we have a

limit on our relationships. And if you don't believe that,

it's just you just just haven't looked and identified that.

But there are there is a there's a point where

you're like, I just can't spend any more time with

that person because I got to take care of these people.

I just I can't do.

And we as we go through phases of life, we

people that were really important to us kind of fall

away and we have those relationships change. Right, we have

new people that are more important to us depending on

our season of life. But take all that with a

grain of salt because of the science. Don't take this

with a grain of salt. Take this straight, no chaser.

Let's look at Christ and based on the accounts in

the Gospels say, based on what we see Jesus, we

can reasonably assume he knew a lot of people. Jesus

was very, very popular at one point, and even before

his ministry started. I mean, I don't know, Son of

God incarnate. I just feel like he was pretty pleasant

to be around. I'm sure he was well liked. I'm

sure a lot of people knew him. He had family

that he was close with. But when he started his ministry,

he ministered a thousands, but he chose twelve to spend

most of his time with should give us a clue,

because even within the twelve Disciples, there were three that

he spent even more time with and did certain things

with that he didn't do with the others. So even

Christ shows us that there's a limit we can only

reasonably sustain a certain amount of relationships. Let's take our

common experience into account too, that we're really confused because

in our modern world with social media, you know, I

don't know how many friends you got on Facebook, but

I got like a several thousand or something.

I don't know those people.

I knew them maybe, and maybe we were classmates, maybe

we were at the college together, maybe we worked together

at one point, but I don't have sustained relationship. Those

numbers are so inflated by our online presence that we think, oh, yeah,

I've got fifteen hundred friends.

No, you don't, I.

Mean, you might think so, I get it, I mean,

but our actual numbers are so much smaller. You know,

if you're like me, you know there's only a handful

of people you can really call on in the midnight hour,

even fewer still that you trust enough to tell them

your secrets and trust them with the parts of your life.

That we keep hidden from everybody else. That's a very

small number of people. My point is this, that's why

we define connection with the second see of concentrated.

It's why we have groups.

It's why we try to because in this room with

this many people, well, there's no way we can reasonably

know every person to the point where we would put

our dirty laundry out there in a sanctuary of people.

But in a group, which we try to limit to

twelve or.

Less, the ability for you to share deep parts of

your life and walk in freedom is the ability for that.

The probability for that is much higher.

That's why we try to keep it twelve or less

because it only takes one person that's untrustworthy to ruin

a group's potential, only one. If there's just one person

that everybody's kind of like, I don't know if I

want to tell them that because they got quick Twitter fingers,

or they're going to call and tell so and so,

and I can't have so and so knowing.

I'm just thankful they're not in this group, right.

That's why we try to keep it small, because that

layer of trust is so important. The point I'm making

is this, that real connection has to be concentrated. The

connection we have to our fifteen thousand friends online is

not deep shallow, but we're talking about real, genuine, deep connection.

It must be concentrated for your own protection and for

the benefit of those around you, because you can only

give so much, and guess what, you can only receive

so much. Eventually we get full. Trust me, I know,

I've been to Korean barbecue.

I get full.

It takes a little while, but we get there. You

can only receive so much. You can only allow certain

people in so far. And it's not just about your capacity,

about how much you can receive and how much you

can give, it's also about the quality of your company.

And when you're talking about thousands of people, the quality, well,

let's just say the cream rises to the top for

a reason, right, and that's just a small portion that

rises to the top. Who you choose to connect with matters.

That's why it has to be concentrated. And there are

many places in the scripture that confirm this. But I

want to look at Proverbs chapter thirteen, verse twenty. It

says it very plainly, whoever walks with the wise becomes wise,

But the companion of fools will suffer harm.

I know which one I'd rather have.

Paul in First Corinthians, he's just absolutely just blasting the

Corinthian Church because they're doing some crazy stuff. First Corinthians,

Chapter fifteen, Starting verse thirty three, he says, bad company

ruins good morals. It doesn't get much clearer than that.

It's so important to Paul Lock what he says. In

verse thirty four, he says, wake up from your drunken stupor,

as is right, and do not go on sinning, for

some have no knowledge of God.

I say this to your shame.

Paul was so dead serious about the quality of your company.

That he just insulted him to get his point across.

And look, that doesn't mean you have to reject interaction

with everybody that doesn't fit the right criteria. Right, We're

still called to love all and to reach all that

we can with the truth of the Gospel. You need

to keep telling your story, you need to keep living

on purpose. But spreading the truth of the Gospel is

different than connecting. You're still called to do that. But

in fact, I think that's what Paul's that's Paul's real

point here. In verse thirty four, some people don't know God,

and they can't see him when we're running with bad

company because we're all broken and we're all busted a

little bit. And when we get around more broken and busted,

we tend to become that.

Companion of fools suffer harm.

But if I get around wise people, if I connect

with people who are on the right track, I will

get on the right track. So when it comes to

the core value connection, we must be focused and intentional.

And since connection our first two s's, is crucial and concentrated,

surely you can guess what the last one is.

I'm just kidding. There's like a million c words. It

could be right.

The last one, though, is something I often say just

about every sermon.

I think. I say this.

Like most things that are in the Kingdom of God,

like most things that matter, it takes effort.

See Christ has done the hardest work.

For us by dying on the cross and taking on

the penalty of sin and paying bridging the gap back

to God. But we still have a responsibility. There's still

effort we have to put into kingdom living. See, connection

does not just happen, nor is it simply given. In fact,

we are commanded to create it, our last see is created,

and Clinton the band can get ready. I want to

close with what I think might be one of my

favorite passages of Scripture. Ever, that's hard to say because

there's a lot. There are lots of good ones, right,

But now, I just when I think about relationships, when

I think about connection, when I think about you guys,

I think about our family as a church, and I

think about what we're supposed to be who were called

to be. I just I always come back to this

passage Romans chapter fifteen. Starting in verse one, Paul writes this,

we who are strong have an obligation to bear with

the failings of the week, and not to please ourselves.

Let each of us please.

His neighbor for his good, to build him up. For

Christ did not please himself. But as it is written,

the reproaches of those who reproached you fell on.

Me verse four.

For whatever was written in former days was written for

our instruction, that through endurance and through the encouragement of

the scriptures, we might have hope. May the God of

endurance and encouragement grant you to live in such harmony

with one another, in accord with Christ Jesus, that together

you may with one voice, glorify the God and Father

of our Lord.

Jesus Christ.

Therefore, welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you.

For the glory of God.

Romans very very dense book of the Bible, and it's

often looked at as a kind of a one of

the more deep theological books that we get a lot

of a lot of ideas about God and how God works.

But you know, Paul spends a lot of time and.

It is that, but Paul spends a lot of time

in Romans talking about how we are supposed to treat

each other. Now, I think that's pretty indicative of how

important connection is. That one of the most theological books

in Scripture is also very keen on instructing us how

to treat each other to understand and live the life

God has called us to live. We have to get

this value of connection down. How you treat each other

is so so connected.

To what God is trying to.

Do in the world through you. Christ's example again is

the most compelling. You see, when we when we're feeling weak,

when we're feeling tired, our natural tendency is to isolate.

I mean to think of even in just the most

simple of situations. A nap almost makes everything better, right,

If I could just go take a nap, I could

just go be by myself for a few minutes recover right, right,

And that that does work. But we do it when

we shouldn't as well. We tend to week. I'm tired,

I just need to get away. We tend to isolate

when we're strong. Our natural tendency is to please ourselves.

Paul writes it right here. And when we please ourselves,

we're avoiding those who are weak, because if I'm feeling strong,

I want to keep that rolling. Baby, I can't get around.

If I get around the week that's gonna jump on

me or something which would make me question if you're

really strong.

But when we're strong, we tend to do that.

We try to find strength to strength to strength when

we avoid the week. But as Paul points out here,

Jesus did the opposite. He took on our failures that

we might be made strong.

And that's the goal of the core value of connection.

That's the whole reason that we put it in here

to be part of the core values. That cornerstone is

that when.

You're doing great, you can help those who are not

doing great. When you're doing and bad, you got others

around you who help you do.

Better and get through it.

And when we do this consistently and continually, Paul says,

we're able to glorify God with one voice in real unity.

That's unity when you're connected, when you're loving one another

and people can see God because they're looking at you

and how you love each other.

That's when we're in unity.

And that's when God is glorified with one voice. Peace

and harmony with each other that Paul says, right here,

that puts us in a chord with Christ.

Jesus. That means it puts us right in the same

line with Christ. That's where I want to be so powerful.

This connection is what we're called to create as we

follow Jesus. Example, we're about to worship, and we're doing

a particular song for this reason. But connection is intertwined

with worship. That's what this passage Romans fifteen is about.

That connection actually leads to you worshiping better. You actually

worship better when you're together. It's why we spend over

half the service doing it here together. Because you actually

worship better when you're connected. You can glorify God to

a greater extent when you're together, when you're in unity.

Connection allows us to maintain our strength as a whole

so that we might continue to bring God the glory

that he deserves. And through doing that, we share the

truth with the world around us because people see it.

This takes effort, but it takes aid from.

God himself too, And that's the other powerful thing about

this passage. Paul reminds us that we're obligated to do this.

You're supposed to do this.

You're supposed to be together, you're supposed to connect. And

then right there verse five, he says, may the God

of endurance and encouragement grant you, meaning you can't do

this by yourself either. You need God's endurance and strength.

Because connection is hard. It requires us to be vulnerable,

it requires us to invest time, It requires.

Us to be open in ways that we probably would

prefer not to.

It's very difficult, but I promise you it's worth it.

Creating and maintaining biblical connection is not easy. But I

don't want you to despair. If you will stand with

me all across the road, I don't want you to

check out now. Oh well, well, it's just too hard,

but rather not At a lot of time, we get jaded.

We get disillusioned because part of it is that we

we exist online so much and we think that, well,

that surface level is that's enough. I'm posting scripture on

my feed. I'm I'm not arguing as much on there.

I quit cussing in the comments back to those people

that don't agree with I mean, okay, I guess, but

we're called to so much more than that, so much

greater than those surface level things that we often find

ourselves spending so much time in. So I don't want

you to let disillusionment. Oh well, I'm connected enough or

I've done this before, Pastor Clay, I've gone to group.

I don't feel it, I don't get it. I don't

want us to be jaded. God's God's doing something new today.

I believe we can hop on right here. And I

also don't want you to be lazy, because this is

this is the temptation that, well, if it's hard, then, Pastor,

I have no more margin, I got no more energy,

I got nothing, I got nothing less in the tank.

I can't do this. I gotta.

Maybe maybe we need to trim the fat. Maybe We've

got some things going on, and things we're involved in

that are not actually leading us to where God's trying

to take us. They could be good things. Listen to me,

I love you. They could be good things. Fat is good.

You had a steak recently. I love a good I

love a good uh New York strip. I love that

fat cap on it. I just just flay you sear

that thing down. Fat is delicious. I'm not saying that

you have bad things in your life necessarily. Sometimes trimming

the fat is trimming off the good so that the

great can take its place. Sometimes we got to get

rid of some of the shallow things so that some

deep things can take rude. And then some of us

still here this morning are pushing back sayings, not because

we're lazy, not because we're jaded, but because we're afraid.

And look, I get that. Maybe you've been burned before.

Maybe you did this. Maybe I tried that. I opened

up and I thought I could trust that person. I

thought I could trust that group. I thought I could

trust that church.

And they let me down.

And they went behind my back and I was betrayed

and I was hurt, and I was and I'm so sorry,

but that's not a reason to give up. Now we

have an opportunity to step forward and leave that behind

and try again. Don't let fear hold you back from

what God's trying to do either. And I want to

encourage you to go back to our very first thought

this morning, this last c connection is created. It does

mean that you created, We created with effort. But I

will also want to remind you you were created for it.

This is what you were built to do, and to

ignore that would be to ignore the way we're designed.

That would be to ignore God. I don't want to

do that.

So, whether you're feeling jaded, you're feeling like AH, or

you're feeling tired, lazy, you're feeling fearful, whatever that is,

this morning, I want our alter team to come and

prepare themselves. Unless you're responding, if you need to pray

through those things this morning as we sing this last song,

I want you to do that. If you just need

some encouragement. Look, these people in this altar, these are

the most There are elite encouragers to the elite squad

of encouragers, and if nothing else, they're going to speak

life into you because God's speaking life into them and

they're letting that flow through them. So whatever you need

this morning, if you just need a jolt of energy

to get you back, I just don't believe in that connection.

Maybe you need inspiration, or I just don't have the time,

I'm too tired.

You need energy, or you're fearful and afraid to open

up again because you've been hurt before. I want you

to respond to this altar call, find somebody to pray

with you, and we're going to sing adoption song because

I believe that the overarching thing here is that God

has adopted us in who his family he is. He

did what he did from creation to the cross and

to the end of time. God did what he did

so he could be connected to you because he wanted

to be a relationship with his creation. He's been trying

to fix it, and we have the opportunity to step

into it at a new level today to whatever it

may be.

I want you to respond. We're going to sing together.

Father, have your way or move and work in these

next few moments, connect us deeper with you and with

one another.

In the mighty name of Jesus, we pray Amen.