1 Corinthians Week 10 • 1 Corinthians 12-14

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Good morning.

Glad that you guys are here.

If you've got your Bibles, go ahead and open them up to 1 Corinthians chapter 13.

1 Corinthians 13 · chapter mention

That's where we're going to be.

We're in week 11.

That struck me this morning.

Some of you are like, yep, no, we're realizing it, right?

But week 11 of working through 1 Corinthians, and we still got some ways to go, but we will

be getting there.

I'm glad to be journeying through this with you guys.

This weekend, we had our marriage conference.

I want to talk about that real briefly.

It was a wonderful time.

We had about 25 couples that came through this.

We had some phenomenal conversations during it, and I'll be honest with you, we've gotten

some phenomenal feedback after as well.

One of the things that we did was we took an assessment that helps us understand some things

about ourselves.

And one of the big topics was how you view and manage time and how you do that.

And so it kind of worked through you either live in the present, so you're present-minded, or

you're future-minded.

And then within that, you are either a person who, and the assessment does a way better job

explaining this than I do, but basically you're the person who lives and die by a plan and

a schedule, or you're just a person who's like, nah, whatever.

We're just going to figure it out as we go.

And so Aaron and I, we took that assessment, and we found out, or not found out, but I think

it affirmed what we already knew, that we are both future planners, and that's who we

are.

We have a hard time living in the moment, and we panic if our phones shut down, and we don't

know what happens the next day.

Right?

So everything's on the schedule, everything's on the plan, it's what we do.

And that was embodied in us on Saturday morning.

We were driving up to the church to go through day two as we led through this together.

And on the entire drive here, we were not talking about anything we had to do today on that Saturday,

but we were talking about the next marriage conference in the future.

And so I've already had a couple people say, you know, we hope we're going to do another

one, we loved it, or even others that said, we know we didn't, we didn't have an opportunity

to be a part of this one, is there going to be another one?

Short answer, I tell all that to say, yes, we will have another.

And then I just want to kind of have a moment to be able to say this, all right?

A lot of times, you guys know Erin, and you know my wife, and she's the one that comes alongside

me and supports me and encourages me, and she sits there, and we work through that with

our children, with parenting them and what she is and all that to me.

I tell you guys often that I use this illustration, that it just helps me, that the Holy Spirit

uses her in a powerful way in my life as she speaks truth.

To me in so many ways, shapes, and forms.

But this weekend was just fantastic, because while we've led small groups together, while

we usually do couples counseling together, when we've got to work through some stuff with a

couple, we'll go through that together.

But this weekend, we had the opportunity to just lead and walk through this together in

this marriage conference and to do this as a couple.

And it was just such a blessing, and she crushed it.

And every time that I got in the way, she overcame that.

And so just a wonderful time.

And so, baby, it was just a blessing to be able to do that with you.

And thank you for all that you do, all that you mean to me, and all that you do for our

church as well.

We love you.

I love you.

And thank you for that.

All right?

Also, I want to point you guys to these cards on your rows there for our Easter.

Easter is coming up, coming up quickly, right?

That's what the pollen says.

So Easter will be here.

And we're doing some things a little bit differently than we had.

One of the things that we've learned over the last couple years that COVID kind of brought

in was thinking through doing some things differently as churches.

It's why we're able to live stream in the way that we do.

And a lot of things have changed within that.

But also, last year, we got such a positive response from how we did our Easter service

with having an early morning outdoor.

Now, it was painfully cold, right, Joanne?

It was painfully cold out there.

And so we're hoping this year won't be as cold.

But we will have a morning service at 8 a.m. outdoors out in the parking lot.

And so you can come to that.

And we're going to have a 10 o'clock service here like we always do gathered in our auditorium.

For the most part, they're going to be identical.

The message will be the same.

We'll do the Lord's Supper same.

Music will look differently because of having to be outside.

But for the most part, so choose which service you want to come to.

But also, we're doing something a little different.

We're going to have a full hot breakfast for Willow Ridge Church in between.

So at 9 o'clock after the 8 o'clock service is over with and before the 10 o'clock service starts,

you can come here that morning, get breakfast, spend some time in fellowship with our church family,

and just really looking forward to the fact of celebrating all that Christ has done

and the fact that the tomb is empty.

And so we'll have a beautiful time to do that together.

So in your group tonight, right, those of you that are in small group,

in your groups tonight, you're going to work through 1 Corinthians 12 through 14 together.

This morning, we're largely going to focus on chapter 13.

But as we largely focus on 13, because we'd be here till 3 if we had to go through all of this, right?

But I want to kind of give you guys some understanding of what chapter 12 deals with

and then some understanding of what chapter 14 deals with

so that we can understand what is sandwiched in between both of these chapters

because all of God's Word is inspired.

All of God's Word is good for us.

And so we want to make sure that we can have this.

So in chapter 12, there's kind of three sections that we see in chapter 12.

Chapter 12, verses 1 through 11, what Paul's talking about is that the Holy Spirit is the source

of all spiritual gifts.

So spiritual gifts are going to be an overwhelming concept

that Paul's going to focus in on these three chapters.

And what God does is in His sovereignty, He gives us our spiritual gifts to be used for His glory.

So your spiritual gifts were not passed down to you from your parents.

Your spiritual gifts were not worked toward in your life.

You haven't achieved these.

You haven't earned these.

God, in His sovereignty, as He chooses, gives individuals spiritual gifts.

And there are different spiritual gifts.

So you and I are different oftentimes in the spiritual gifting that we have,

but it comes from the Lord so we can trust that it's good.

Then in verses 12 through 26, Paul talks about the diversity of these gifts.

And what it does is it brings unity to the body.

So because we are different, right, the world tells us different is bad,

but because we are different in what we see, because we're different in what we have,

that actually doesn't bring the division into the body.

What it should bring into the leading of the Holy Spirit is unity in the body.

And so for me, you guys know I love sports.

I think in sports illustrations.

So imagine we're a baseball team, right?

We're not a very good baseball team if all of us want to be pitchers,

and all of us are gifted to be pitchers, right?

We need someone to be a catcher.

We need someone to be infielders.

We need someone to be outfielders.

We need someone to be able to hit the ball.

And typically, that's not where pitchers thrive, right?

And so think about this with the body.

There's a diversity in the body.

We all can't be the same.

And if we were, then the body wouldn't be what the body needs to be, all right?

And then the last part of chapter 12, verses 27 through 31,

Paul talks about certain gifts, all right,

will be used in certain leadership positions within the church.

So certain gifting will require these people to step forward into leadership positions,

and they're to be viewed as leaders, and we're to follow them in this.

But here's the big part of this.

It's still Jesus' church, all right?

And so this is not my church.

It's not Pastor Dave's church.

This is not the elder's church.

This is not the trustee's church.

This is Jesus' church, and he is our ultimate leader, all right?

So that's a really quick version of what we're going through in chapter 12.

And then chapter 14 is kind of broken into two sections, all right?

In the first part of chapter 14, Paul talks about the use of tongues and prophecy in the church,

and he goes over the rules with them, all right?

Now, I'm not going to go a lot into this,

but I am going to jump into this a little bit later in some questions about these as we look at chapter 13.

And then in chapter 14, 26 through 40, he talks about the importance of order in worship in the church.

And so there's this big piece of spiritual gifts.

How are they used?

What is the body like?

And what we can see happening in Corinth, and what we can see happening in churches here,

is that when it comes to spiritual gifts, they're meant to unify us.

But oftentimes, because we handle so many things sinfully, right?

We handle them in the negative context, and they can be used to divide.

And oftentimes, spiritual gifts, this comes in arrogance.

And here's kind of how it manifests itself, right?

We are gifted by God to do things to serve the body and to glorify him.

But yet, through our pride and ego, right, it builds in us a sense of arrogance to where we say,

look at me, look how talented I am.

I'm more talented than you.

I'm better than you, right?

And so it causes within someone who has been given this gift by God an inflated sense of self

that makes them feel like they have a self-righteousness that's better than others,

that I'm more spiritual than you, that I'm more blessed than you, that I'm more favored than you, right?

And that's an abuse of the gifts, right?

Or flip turn, an arrogance toward God.

An arrogance toward God.

God, I'm so good.

I'm so blessed.

I'm so fortunate, right?

You couldn't do this without me, right?

That's the other side of that.

We see oftentimes the arrogance within the church, but oftentimes within our own hearts.

It's, Lord, this would all fall apart if I wasn't here.

And the truth is, all of this would fall apart if Jesus wasn't here, right?

And that's it.

And so we're reversed, and I do see this that happens,

and it's created oftentimes an idolatry of leadership.

We tend to, as churches, elevate others and then devalue others

off of their gifts, right?

So we deem that a certain gift is more important than others.

And so those that have that gift, we raise them up.

And oftentimes what it can create within us is a sense of jealousy,

of wishing we were like them and not living in the reality of who we are,

of who God's called us to be.

Now, with spiritual gifts, because we're not going to see all of them,

but it's going to be an overlying theme that we see.

In Scripture, I think there are basically two lists of these that I just want to kind of mention

to you if you want to jot them down.

In Romans 12, there's a list that Paul gives where he talks about there's prophesying,

serving, teaching, encouraging, giving, leadership, and mercy.

So that's one list that's there.

And then in 1 Corinthians 12, Paul gives another list of them that's there at the front of the chapter

and at the end of the chapter where he talks about word of wisdom,

the word of knowledge, faith, healing, miraculous powers, prophecy,

distinguishing between spirits, speaking in tongues, and interpretation of tongues.

And so what this kind of draws us from is that so oftentimes we look at the gifts of the Spirit

and we say, well, they fall into these absolute columns.

But what we see is Paul leaves some grace and some margin to say, no, no,

like maybe the Spirit can gift us in different ways and in different capacities

and that these giftings of the Spirit may not be the end all in this list,

but it could even be beyond that, all right?

And so sandwiched in between these is chapter 13,

Isaiah 13 · chapter mention

and that's what we're largely going to focus on is we're going to do all of chapter 13.

So let's jump in and start reading verse 1.

Paul says,

If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love,

I'm a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.

And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge,

and if I have all faith as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.

If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned,

but have not love, I gain nothing.

And what we see here, what we're going to draw from is just this concept of nothing without love.

Like the root message of the gospel of what's going to penetrate through all Scripture

is the concept of love.

Love in the gift, love in the message, love in the song, love in who we are, love in what we do.

That we are nothing without love.

We can do nothing without love.

Love is the way in which Christians, right, are called to use their gifts.

And when gifts are used, and however God's gifted you,

when your gift is used,

when that piece of your personality that you thrive in,

when those talents that you have are used in love,

in the context of who we are as Christians,

God works in such a powerful way

that it draws people into a deeper relationship with the Lord

and a deeper relationship with others, right?

Like that's what it does.

Like if you were here this morning and you're like me and I'm not musical,

it was funny when the countdown got like below 45 seconds,

I went and stood behind the keyboard here

and I really messed with the Couragers.

They were like, you play?

I didn't think that.

I'm like, yeah, I'm going to play this morning, right?

And then I walked off like because I can't play at all, right?

But music, like what happened here

was this group of individuals used a talent or a gift

that the Lord blessed them with

and not out of pride of who they are

but in love and what it did was

standing there in that moment,

like it drew me in into a deeper relationship with the Lord

and then for a moment, like I stopped singing

and I heard others singing

and I looked around the auditorium

and I'm seeing different people engaged

and man, it just made me love all of you more, right?

Because they're using their gifts

in the way that draws people into the Lord

that challenges them in a deeper relationship.

Now, as Isaac's playing the guitar and singing,

he's not focusing that out of me

but because the heart of which is being done

and how God uses it

is what took place in the heart of a pastor

standing there ready to preach.

I now love Jesus more, I love you more

because the gift that's being used there in this moment.

But then Paul said, but if we don't have love,

we become something.

We're like a clanging symbol that's there.

Now, now the beauty of what our symbols can bring

to our worship is not what he's talking about, right?

How many of you remember the gong show?

Y'all remember that?

I never watched it, all right, before my time,

but it's the only reference I could think of, all right?

And I know they'd hit that gong

and I know that gong was not associated with good.

It was a lot, if you ever heard a gong ring,

no one sits there and thinks,

man, that's delightful, right?

That's beauty all in its own, right?

And so Paul says, like, if this is who you are

and this is what you're doing,

like, you're just a loud, distractive noise

that serves no purpose, right?

If you're as talented as all you want,

you got talent oozing out of you.

The gifts are just overflowing on you.

But if it's not with love,

then, man, you're not even pointing people to Jesus.

You're just loud and distracting from the mission

and you serve no purpose.

Paul goes on and says,

if you have prophetic powers,

if you understand mysteries,

if you understand the depth of knowledge

and have faith that can remove mountains,

but no love,

you're nothing.

You're nothing.

You don't matter.

And the purpose and the journey of what God's doing

when it's done in pride and what's there.

And he says,

if you're the person who says,

you know what?

I'm going to give it all.

And I'm even willing to be martyred.

But you have not love?

Then you gain nothing,

is what Paul says.

Now, that's hard to hear.

And it should cause us in a moment

to check our hearts

and begin to understand,

like, what is the motivation?

Who is the God that I serve?

What is my life being lived toward?

What is the pursuit that I have?

What is this all about?

What am I doing this for?

Is it out of love?

Now, verse four,

Paul's going to define love.

He says this,

love is patient and kind.

Love does not envy or boast.

It is not arrogant or rude.

It does not insist on its own way.

It is not irritable or resentful.

It does not rejoice at wrongdoing,

but rejoices with the truth.

Love bears all things,

believes all things,

hopes all things,

endures all things.

And so what Paul does

as he defines love for this congregation.

Now, remember,

this church is not a group

of seasoned, matured believers.

They're young,

they're immature at the most.

The oldest believer

is probably five years old

in their faith.

So it's a group of people

who are working through

some shallow things

and who probably

are taking a shallow approach to love.

And so Paul hits him

right in the middle

of the forehead, right,

with the truth of love.

And he defines love

by saying,

like, this is what love does.

Like, you can see love.

You can experience love.

You can look at something.

You can look at someone.

You can look at the action.

And you can say,

that is love.

So I'm going to reread

these verses,

but I want to do it

with making sure

that love is said

with each and every one of them, okay?

And I just want you

to just listen to this

for a moment

as we read through.

Love is patient.

Love is kind.

Love does not envy.

Love does not boast.

Love is not arrogant.

Love is not rude.

Love does not insist

on its own way.

Love is not irritable.

Love is not resentful.

Love does not rejoice

in wrongdoing.

Love rejoices with truth.

Love bears all things.

Love believes all things.

Love hopes all things.

Love endures all things.

Now, you've heard this passage.

If this is your first time

ever in a church,

I would be willing to bet

you've even heard

this passage before, right?

Every time I get ready

to officiate a marriage,

I ask a couple,

what passage of Scripture

or what multiple passages

of Scripture

would you like for me to use?

And oftentimes,

this is one that they ask for,

and this is a wonderful

passage of Scripture

to use in a wedding,

in a marriage.

But can I say this?

This passage,

while it has a grand application

in marriage, right,

is about more than

a romantic love.

And it's agape love.

The word love that is used here

is this word agape love.

Now, Paul writing in the Greek,

communicating in a Greek context,

uses this word agape, all right?

And when they hear the word agape,

there'll be certain things

that register within them.

You see, Paul didn't use the term

for brotherly love.

Paul didn't use the term

for romantic love.

Paul used his agape love.

And in that,

that would have drawn them

to a certain set

of understanding,

even within their

pagan Greek culture,

about love.

And I want to share these

with y'all.

In the Greek context

of agape love,

love means this,

that love is unconcerned

with self

and concerned

with the greatest good

of another.

That in the context

in which Paul write this,

agape love

was not a love

that was based

in feelings

or attraction,

but love was a choice.

That agape love,

that it demanded things

from someone.

That agape love

demanded faithfulness,

commitment,

and sacrifice

without the expectation

of anything being returned.

And so when this church

reads this,

even if there was

a great sense

of immaturity

of faith,

they hear agape.

They hear that love

is patient

and kind,

does not envy

or boast,

is not arrogant.

And they're like,

wow,

love means that I'm not

the center of my world.

But love means

that I'm working

for the greatest good

of another.

When they hear love,

they begin to understand

that,

whoa, whoa, whoa,

whoa,

love is not a feeling.

Can you feel loved?

Yes.

Can you experience

the feeling

of loving another person?

Yes.

But agape love

is more than that.

And that love

also isn't

based out of attraction.

Right?

But instead,

love

happens when it's difficult.

Love happens

when you're in conflict.

Love happens

when someone's

done you wrong.

Why?

You don't feel it,

but you choose it.

I choose

today

in spite of this

to love you.

That's agape love.

And that in that,

that agape love

says no matter

what you do to me,

I will be faithful

to you.

Agape love

says that you

do not determine

my commitment

to you,

but I am

committed

to you.

And agape love

says,

and I'll sacrifice

for you.

I'll sacrifice

for you.

And here's the thing,

I'm not keeping

a record

because you don't

need to do anything

in return.

No,

I just described

love to you,

but also

just described

Jesus to you.

Right?

Jesus unconcerned

with his self

to step out

of heaven

to take on

the flesh

of a man,

to grieve

when his friend

died,

to be rejected,

to be beaten,

and does it all

for the good

of others.

Jesus,

who didn't

come down here

and say,

oh,

well,

I feel like

I love you today,

you better hope

I do tomorrow,

right?

Jesus that doesn't

look at the crowd

and pick out

the pretty ones,

the athletic ones,

the gifted ones,

but Jesus saying

that I choose

to love you,

not in who you are,

but in who I am.

Jesus,

who embodies

faithfulness,

commitment,

and sacrifice,

right?

and gives

that sacrifice

to us

to the point

of dying

on a cross

without expecting

anything in return.

This is Jesus.

So when we,

when we read

these,

when we read

these verses,

it's describing

to us

what love is,

but when we read

the whole context

of scripture

in every moment

of what we see,

if we want to know

what love is,

if we want to know

what love does,

if we want to know

what love looks like

in the context

of your marriage,

in the context

of your family,

in the context

of your neighbors,

in the context

of work,

in the context

of your church,

look at Jesus

because this is

who he is

and the full

embodiment of it.

And then Paul

continues on,

look at verse 8.

He says,

love never ends.

As for prophecies,

they will pass away.

As for tongues,

they will cease.

As for knowledge,

it will pass away.

For we know in part

and we prophesy in part,

but when the perfect comes,

the partial will pass away.

When I was a child,

I spoke like a child,

I thought like a child,

I reasoned like a child.

When I became a man,

I gave up childish ways.

For now we see

in a mirror dimly,

but then face to face,

now I know in part,

then I shall know fully,

even as I have been

fully known.

And what we're going

to see here

is this permanent

nature of love.

Paul says very simply,

first three words,

right?

Love never ends.

Seasons end.

Time will end.

Your life,

my life will end.

This world as we know it

will end.

But love,

love,

agape love,

will never end

is what Paul says.

And Paul looks at the church

and he says,

I'm going to give you

some insight

in the concept

of these spiritual gifts.

And he gives a list

of apostolic gifts,

all right?

Which God gave

to the early church

to use them

and to grow them.

And he says,

they will come to an end.

All right?

Here's what I want to talk about.

He says,

prophecy,

right?

It will pass away.

Tongues,

speaking in tongues,

will cease.

Knowledge,

now you think this is weird

because we still have knowledge,

right?

So what does that mean?

Well,

this knowledge here

is to know what God

is going to do

before God is going to do it,

right?

That there are certain people

that would have that gift.

It will cease.

Now,

I'm going to say this

and we can be friends,

all right?

I believe that in the context

of these apostolic gifts,

as Paul writes,

that they will come to an end

and that they have.

I believe the prophecy

of Scripture

has been given to us

in fullness and sufficiency.

I believe that God

equipped the church,

the early church,

with these

and that God equipped

those before us

so that we can have

what we have before us.

I believe what God gave

and the issue

of speaking in tongues

was used in a powerful way,

but I'm just going to tell you

what we see happening

in Pentecost,

we probably don't see happening

in Lexington,

South Carolina,

right?

But that God used it,

right?

And it ceased.

The knowledge

to know what God

is going to do

will cease.

Why?

Because we can see

and know

what God is going to do

in Scripture

and we can continue on

in different ones

like the gift of healing,

right?

Like while God heals

and while we pray for healing,

God gave the apostles

this gift of healing

where they could go in

and touch someone

and that person

who was dead

would come alive,

right?

We don't see that.

Now here's why I say

we can still be friends.

Because if you believe differently

and you want to have coffee

and lunch

and we can talk about it

and we can hug

when we see each other

and we can hug

when we leave.

What I've seen happen

and exist

and take place

in churches

is men and women

who get into things

that can be open-handed

for the church

and they decided

they're closed-fisted

and they decided

that you're against me

if you don't believe

what I believe

and I do not believe

this is what Paul's

talking about.

Because here's what Paul says.

He says,

when I was a child,

I spoke like a child,

I thought like a child,

I reasoned like a child.

When I became a man,

I gave up childish ways.

You know what children do?

You've got to be like me.

You've got to think like me.

Paul says,

look,

I gave this up.

I walked away

for now

we see dimly

but then face to face.

Now I know in part

then I shall know fully

even as I've been fully known.

Right?

And so,

so what Paul is saying to us

is that

as I walk through these,

here's the understanding

of what I have.

Here's the understanding

of what I'm placing for you

but I see dimly.

I know that.

I see through the limitations

of my earthly body,

of my earthly mind

and where I am

but one day

I will know fully.

And one day

I will be able

to fully comprehend.

And what I don't want us

to do tonight,

what I don't want us

to do here right now

is get caught up

in tongues

and prophecy

and miss the love of Jesus.

Too many churches

divide themselves

over the things

that we can agree

are open handed

and not agree

on the things

that close fisted

of who Jesus is

and the grace

that comes from him

and him alone

and what he did

on the cross

and what he provides

to us

and what it means

to love him.

Right?

So Paul says

this isn't going to be.

And then he says

in verse 13,

so now

faith,

hope,

and love

abide

these three

but the greatest

of these

is love.

And love

is the greatest.

Love is the greatest.

How can I say that?

Faith's a big deal.

Right?

We place our faith

in Jesus Christ

as our Lord and Savior.

Hope is a big deal.

We hope

for the things

that we have not seen.

We hope

for the beauty

of eternity.

We hope

for what God

has promised us

and what God

tells us

he's going to do.

And we place

our faith

and our hope

in him

and these are big.

But Paul says

but the greatest

of these

is love.

Now I read a lot

this week

about this.

And there was

a lot of people

who wrote

well Paul didn't

really mean that

but I read

that Paul wrote that

so I've got to really

think he meant that.

Right?

So what does that mean?

And in my simple mind

here's what I believe

the Lord

bringing me to.

One day

I said it earlier

one day

you and I

we're going to die.

Right?

We're going to have

our faith.

The funeral

of a person

with faith

is a joyous

occasion for me.

Because their faith

in that

will be made sight.

So when you die

your faith

of who Jesus is

guess what?

You're going to see him.

And now the difference

of what I've heard

of what I've placed

my faith in

is right here

and it's Jesus.

And so my faith

is not different.

My faith is sight.

Like I said

you're going to die

one day.

I'm going to die

one day.

And as we

are anticipating

for that

we have hope

for eternity.

we have hope

that all

of the brokenness

and the evil

of this world

will pass away.

We have hope

that there will be

no more death

because that's what

God's word tells us.

We have hope

that there will be

no more pain

because that's what

God tells us.

We have hope

that there will be

no more suffering

that there will be

no more tears

because that's what

God tells us.

And then one day

we will experience

eternity

and eternity

will be reality.

Can you imagine

living like that?

No more hurt

no more sorrow

no more pain

no more suffering.

And so now

it's not hope

of what it will be

it's the reality

of what it is.

But love

will still be there.

And the beauty

of that

is in that moment

as much

as I think

I love Jesus

as much

as I think

about

how much

Jesus

loves

me

in my death

and in my

experience

in eternity

right

that love

will not

go away

but that love

will deepen

to a point

that I've never

experienced before.

And so Paul says

the greatest

of these

the greatest

of these

is love.

Would you pray

with me?

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Amen.

Lord we thank you

for your word

this morning.

Lord we thank you

that when we

think about love

in the context

of all that's

going on

in this world

and in our life

where there's a lot

of defining pieces

for that for us.

the world

tries to tell us

what love does

and what love

doesn't do.

The world

tries to take

broken standards

of love

and give them

to us

to set as our

standard.

Lord no standard

that we can

think of

other than you

fits.

They're all

square pegs

trying to go

into round holes.

But Lord

you

are the perfect

embodiment

of love

for us.

So Jesus

thank you

for being patient

with us

as we run

and as we rebel.

Lord thank you

for your kindness

that's given

toward us.

Lord thank you

thank you

that while you

are jealous

for us

Lord that you

are not

envious

because there

is no one

for you

to envy.

Jesus thank you

that you came

not boasting

in who you

are

but boasting

in the Father

and came

to serve.

Lord thank you

that you came

not in arrogance

not in arrogance

but in humility

that you came

not in rudeness

but the embodiment

of grace

and truth.

Lord thank you

that you did not

come insisting

on your own way

Lord

but you

surrendered

to the will

to the will

of the Father

Lord thank you

for not being

irritable

but being

compassionate

of not being

resentful

and being

joyous

of not rejoicing

in the wrong

but rejoicing

in the truth

and the repentance

of lost.

Lord thank you

for bearing

our sins

on the cross

for showing

us belief

in action

Lord thank you

for showing

the hope

we can have

and what

the plan

of the Lord

is going to be

and Lord

enduring all

Lord may we

take our

gifts

and our

talents

in our

positioning

in our

resources

in our

personalities

in everything

Lord that you've

given us

and use

them out of

love

out of you

to draw

people to

you

to speak

reconciliation

and hope

and love

and relationships

to have a

love for the

brother and

sister

who's

wronged me

who's

offended me

who's not

like me

and Lord

may this

be who we

are

Lord would we

not let

gifts

our

understanding

of gifts

divide us

but instead

to unify

us

in who

we are

in you

and in you

alone

Jesus I

thank you

for the

work you

did

in the

marriages

of the

individuals

that were

here this

weekend

and I

thank you

for the

work that

you're doing

in the

hearts of

the men

and women

and children

and people

who are

here today

Lord may

we respond

to your

gracious

calling

thanks again

for listening

to the

Willow Ridge

Church weekly

podcast we

hope that you

enjoyed listening

to this week's

message if

you'd like to

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we are or

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