The OG Playlist: Songs of SORROW | 10/26/2025

All right, again, notes are available on the back table.

If you'd like to grab those even before I teach or grab them on

your way out, I invite you to do that and hopefully they will

assist you in kind of tracking with me today as I teach.

All right, if you're watching online, welcome to North Life.

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Would love to see you sometime soon.

And all the church said, Amen. All right, all right, If you

have your Bibles, please take and turn them, whether it's your

device or you have a Bible, turn to first Peter chapter 3 and

1 Peter 3 · chapter mention

it'll take you maybe a few moments to find a few seconds at

least. It's it's like man, almost to

the back of your Bible near Revelation, but it's after

James, before the letters of John, before Revelation, as I

said. So first, Peter, chapter 3,

Peter writes 2 letters that we get to glean from to these days.

And I'm going to read to you from chapter 3, verse 8, Peter

writes finally, I love him. You know, what's interesting is

he says finally, but he's in chapter 3, he's going to go for

like two or three more chapters. And then funny when pastors or

preachers say, hey, finally, it's like you feel like, oh,

they're going to end, they're going to close and then they

just keep going and going and going.

So that's kind of what he does here.

He says finally all of you have unity of mind, sympathy,

brotherly love, a tender heart and a humble mind, and do not

repay evil for evil, or reviling for reviling, but On the

contrary bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain

a blessing for whoever desires to love life and see good days.

Let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking

deceit, and let him turn away from evil and do good.

Let him seek peace and pursue it.

For the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are

open to their prayer. But the face of the Lord is

against those who do evil. This morning we're going to

continue our series in the Psalms.

We're calling it the OG, the original playlist.

And this morning I want to talk to you about songs in sorrow or

suffering, Songs in the midst of sorrow or suffering.

Let me pray for us. God, what a joy it is to be

together this morning worshipping you.

And we sense your presence, and we sense that you're near and

not far off. And now as an act of worship, we

open our our minds and our heart hearts to your truth and your

word. God show us from first Peter

here ways that we should live our lives.

And as we connect the dots between Peter and Psalms and

stories and for Samuel, let it grow our understanding of your

word and let it shape us. We pray in Jesus name and

everyone said Amen. Now we are as I mentioned in a

series and I I felt excited to get the idea for the series in

the summer months. So it was kind of building up to

the idea of the Psalms which are in the middle of your Bible.

The Psalms contain 5% of the entire Bible.

And I looked at the idea was that the Psalms are a playlist.

And nowadays you can go to Spotify or Apple Music or

YouTube and it's pretty easy now to find playlists.

But we used to have to work hard for them right when we would

make mixtapes or the likes. So we understand the idea of

like a, a list of songs that we enjoy.

I have favorites. I've been making playlists on

my, in my iTunes account since iTunes first came out and

they're valuable to me, right? Well, the Psalms are God's

playlist of songs and they're written over a period of 1500

years. Moses writes the earliest one

and then you have David and David's, you know, like those

that he mentored, they're writing songs.

And then you even have songs that are written in the post

exile period, meaning the time after Shadrach, Meshach,

Abednego, Daniel and the lion's den, Esther, the beauty queen.

If you remember those characters in the Bible and the Old

Testament, well, there are songs that are even written in that

era. So 1500 years of songs end up in

this collection of songs that we call Psalms.

And God is inspired these Psalms and they're so valuable in the

life of a believer. And my encouragement to you is

to read them often. And they're pretty short, many

of them, the Psalm 119, Islam, but most of them are fairly

short. You can read them in just

moments. But the idea of like reading

them often and using them as prayers and using them as

worship ideas is my encouragement to you.

So get the Psalms. However, if you read them or if

you listen to them, you can go to YouTube and you could just

Google Psalms of repentance. Last week I taught on that.

I taught there a group of psalms and I gave you notes to go look

at other ones. But we've mainly looked at Psalm

51 written by David where he says created me a clean heart, O

God, and renew a right spirit within me.

It's a great prayer when we are repenting.

So there are songs of repentance.

I looked at the essential Psalm several weeks back.

Those are like Psalm 23. The Lord is my shepherd.

I shall not once he makes me lie down.

The green pastures, the the famous psalms, we looked at

those, right? We looked at psalms that tell

about who God is. What is God like?

There are lots of psalms. If you want to find out what God

is like, the Psalms are a great place to go to get information

in these psalms, these songs about who God is.

So each week it's just happened. So I'm going to keep this trend

up each week. I've been starting in the New

Testament. The New Testament quotes the

Psalms 100 * 100 plus times. And I showed you the first week

that Jesus quoted the Psalms. Then I showed you that Peter

quotes the Psalms on the day of Pentecost.

Then I showed you even last week that the tax collector in Jesus

is parable, the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector.

We looked at that last week. Even the tax collector who's

like the lowest, you know that they were considered the scum of

the earth. Even the tax collector quotes

from the Psalms. When he says have mercy on me, O

God, a Sinner, Jesus quotes the psalms.

Peter does, the tax collector does this week.

Now I'm showing you on this occasion in first Peter chapter

1 Peter 3 · chapter mention

3, Peter again is going to quote a Psalm and he's going to quote

it just just right, exactly as it is translated through the

through the Old Testament from Hebrew into Greek.

But but it's the same, right? And Peter's going to take this

Psalm that's very important and relevant for those that he was

writing to, and it's relevant for us today.

There are lots of great things we could learn and how to

posture ourselves when we're in the midst of suffering or

sorrow. OK, so Peter is writing, and

he's writing to Christians that were early.

This is early church, maybe just a few decades after Jesus has

been crucified, resurrected and ascended to heaven.

Now there are those who are following Jesus outside of

Jerusalem, and he's writing to Christians that would have been

in what we call modern day Turkey.

OK. And the Christians in this

context were being persecuted. They were being reviled,

criticized, they were suffering and they were in sorrow about

it. And Peter's writing to encourage

them. And remember, Peter had had his

difficulties. He had his failures.

If you're new to the Bible and don't remember who Peter is,

well, Peter was a disciple of Jesus and he walked on water for

a little while, then he sunk, but he did walk on water for a

little while. He denied knowing Jesus The

night that Jesus was betrayed. Jesus even had said to him, you

will betray me before the rooster crows in the morning and

Peter does, but he's ashamed in that moment, but he experiences

the love and the grace of Jesus. And so he comes back to be this

great leader in the early church.

So he's writing now to these Christians that are in the midst

of difficulty and watch the greeting in his letter first

Peter 11, it says Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to those

who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontius Galatia,

Cappadocia, Asia and Bethenia. Now when he's saying you are the

elected exile, he's talking about these believers who are

still in the areas that they had been taken to in the era of the

Babylonians and the Assyrians. Remember, they're conquered in

the days of Shadrach, Meshach, Abednego and Daniel.

They they were put into exile for 70 years.

And some of the believers of God, they come back to

Jerusalem, they come back to Judah, and others stay dispersed

around that part of the world. So he's writing to these these

believers of God, followers of Jesus who'd been dispersed in

these areas that he mentions. And he says, according to the

foreknowledge of God the Father and the sanctification of the

Spirit for obedience to Jesus Christ and for sprinkling with

his blood. And then he says, may grace and

peace be multiplied to you. Peter is very aware when he's

writing to them that they are in the midst of sorrow being

they're being persecuted, they're suffering for their love

for Jesus. And this is his greeting to the

May grace and peace be multiplied to you and watch in

chapter 2, just to give you context and understanding of

what the posture of his letters like in verse 12 of chapter 2,

he says keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable so that

when they speak against you as evil doers, they may see your

good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation.

Watch Peter's aware that ironically they are they're

followers of Jesus. They're doing good, but the

world around them is calling them evil doers.

And this is what our culture is like today.

Christians who want to follow God's patterns and God's plans

and God's commands. Often we are criticized and and

called the evil doers. We're called the haters.

They have a whole bunch of names for Christians who disregard the

ways of the world. And we stand.

We stand outside of the culture. And the culture often will

criticize Christian beliefs, Christian morals, and we will be

called sometimes the evil doers. And that's what's happening to

the people that Peter is writing them now.

How is Peter going to encourage them in the midst of their

suffering? Is he going to say to them,

like, whoa, whoa, whoa, are you? How sad, How tragic does he sing

them? Just sad, sad, sad songs.

Now, there are occasions in the Bible where there are laments,

and I'm going to get to those in the weeks to come.

We'll talk about laments, which are sad songs that give voice to

grief. And sometimes we need that in

the midst of great sorrow and grief.

There are some Psalms that give you words in the midst of grief,

but in this occasion, in the midst of their persecution and

suffering, Peter is going to give them advice and wisdom, and

he's going to get this wisdom from Psalm chapter 34.

Psalms 34 · chapter mention

Now I read you his writing, but let me read you from the Old

Testament, Psalm 3412 through 16.

It is written this way. What man is there who desires

life and loves many days, that he may see good?

Keep your tongue from evil and your lips from speaking deceit,

and turn away from evil, and do good and seek peace and pursue

it. The eyes of the Lord are toward

the righteous, and his ears towards their cry.

The face of the Lord is against those who do evil to cut off

memory of them from the earth. This is David Psalm, but Peter

quotes that part of it instead of Peter saying, whoa, how sad

are you? This is so terrible.

No, he's giving them godly advice that he gets from David

Psalm. Now, if you look at David Psalm

and Peter quoting him, you'll see that there are a few subtle

differences, but it's really basically the same.

He is quoting him. But understand that sometimes

when the New Testament quotes the Old Testament, it's doing so

through what we call the Greek Septuagint.

The the, the Greek Old. I'm sorry.

The Hebrew Old Testament had been translated into Greek, and

it's likely that Jesus growing up was actually reading the

Greek translation of the Old Testament, if you didn't know

that. So sometimes there's just subtle

words that might be a little bit different because it had been

translated from Hebrew into Greek, and now Peter is writing

it in Greek and now it's been translated to English.

So that's the route in which the song took to get to us.

So the Old Testament that the early Christians used was again

this Greek translation that we call the Septuagint.

And it was written between or translated at least in 100 year

period between like 250 and 150 BC.

Now when we go back to Psalm 34 where Peter quotes, he takes the

passages from it. We'll see that the heading of

this Psalm 34 has some information about who wrote it

and when he wrote it. And it's very important to to

get the Psalm, you have to know this.

So in our Bibles in the ESV, at least it says this song is of

David when he changed his behavior before Abimelech so

that he drove him out and he went away.

Now what is the what is this referencing?

OK, so before you read the Psalm, what's good to know?

I love the connection. I love the way the Bible

connects. Here you got Peter connected to

Psalm 34 and Psalm 34 is connecting to a story with

David. David wrote the song when this

was happening. OK, now what was happening?

It's referencing first Samuel chapter 21.

1 Samuel 21 · chapter mention

And last year I did a series on for Samuel, you might remember.

And so in this occasion, this is the time in David's life when

he's not yet king. Maybe, you know, if you're if

you're new to the Bible, you'll remember David is the one who

slays Goliath with the the sling in the stone.

And eventually he is going to become a king.

He's going to fail greatly with his sin with Bathsheba.

We talked about that last week. But this is the season of his

life where he's not yet king. And Saul the king has become

very jealous of David and wants to kill him.

So David is hiding and it's the lowest part of his life.

He's being persecuted, he's suffering and he's in sorrow.

And watch the story in First Samuel 21.

I won't read the whole thing to you, I'll just paraphrase it,

but I'll tell you a bit of it. First Samuel 21, verse one.

Then David came to Nob, to Hahimlek the priest.

And Hahimlek came to meet David trembling, and he said to him,

Watch the priest says to David, why are you alone?

And no one is with you. David was at a such a blow point

in his life, hiding out from Saul, running for his life.

And he finds himself alone. Now, eventually he's going to

gather men to be with him. But at this series, this point

in his life, when he's going to write Psalm 34 that Peter's

going to quote, this is the posture and the season that

David is in. He's suffering, running for his

life, and he comes to the priest of Hemlec and he's hungry and

Hemlec actually gives him the the holy bread to eat.

He's so desperate for food that he eats the holy bread that

Hemlec gives to him. David's alone.

And the story continues in verses 10 through 14.

You'll find that David is going to pretend to be insane in order

to escape some who want to put him to death.

Verse 10 of chapter 21. And David rose and he fled that

day from Saul, and he went to Akifs, the king of gas.

And the servants of Akifs said to him, is not this David the

king of the land? Did they not sing to one another

of him in dances? Saul has struck down his

thousands and David his 10 thousands.

They're looking at him in this place of defeat.

He's washed up. And they're like, is this is the

guy that they had these songs about?

He's a loser. He's all washed up and verse 12

and David took these words to heart and was much afraid of

Akif, the king of Gath, So he changed his behavior before

them, and he pretended to be insane in their hands and made

marks on the doors of the gate and let his spittle run down on

his beard. Then Akif said to his servants,

Behold, you see, the man is mad. Why then have you brought him to

me? Now we're connecting the dots

again. First Peter quotes Psalm 34.

Psalm 34 is written when David is in this place in his life.

He's being persecuted, he's being wronged, it's unjust.

And what does David say in Psalm 34?

He doesn't just complain, he doesn't just get sad, but

instead he is going to have great wisdom for us.

Psalm 34 is kind of like David's survival guide for those who are

suffering and feel all alone. So now I'm going to read you the

Psalm. I'll read you all 22 verses, and

I'll just kind of just break it down for you a little bit.

But knowing that David writes it in that season of his life is

really important because you get to say it.

Wow. What is his thinking when he's

suffering and being persecuted? The Psalm starts here.

Psalm 34, verse one, David comes out of the gate and he says, I

will bless the Lord at all times.

His praise shall continually be in my mouth.

Now, maybe you're familiar with that song, maybe you've heard it

before. Wow, I will bless the Lord at

all times. But knowing that David says this

when he's in this very tragic place makes it more meaningful.

He's not a victorious season. He's defeated even in hardship.

David commits to worshiping God at all times, and then he says

this. My soul makes its boast in the

Lord. Let the humble hear and be glad

David in this tragic place is boasting about God.

When's the last time you boasted about the Lord, spoke of the

goodness of God, the love of God, the mercy of God that you

experience? It's not just to be expressed in

the times of great victory. Again, knowing that David is

expressing this in a time of great defeat makes it even more

valuable and meaningful. And then he says, oh, magnify

the Lord with me and let us exalt his name together.

In this occasion, David is acting like the worship leader

on Sunday mornings. I come and worship God with me,

not because he's in this great victorious place, but because he

is determined in his heart that even in the midst of his sorrow

he's going to continue to magnify the Lord.

Come and exalt the Lord with me. And then he says this I sought

the Lord and he answered me and he delivered me from all my

fears. Now David doesn't say God

delivered me from all my difficulties.

God delivered me from my enemies.

He says God delivered me from my fears.

So in the midst of this tragic season of his life, he is

delivered from fear, which is profound.

And this is where the this recent song that we sing here at

our church, I trust in God. There's a part of the song.

In fact, you can sing it with me.

Remember this, the modern song says, I saw the Lord and he

heard and he answered. I sought the Lord and he heard

and he answered. I sought the Lord, and he heard

and he answered. That's why I trust him.

That's why I trust in God. Songwriters are getting that

phrase from Psalm 34 where David is bragging on God and saying I

sought the Lord and he answered me and delivered me from fear.

In verse 5, it says those who looked at him are radiant and

their faces shall never be ashamed.

David had just come out of a place where he acted insane to

escape his enemy. He could be very ashamed, but

he's not. He's alone, but he's not

ashamed. God has delivered him out of it.

And instead he's saying those who look to God end up shining

in a radiant even in the midst of suffering.

So This is why it's so important that Peter is quoting from Psalm

34 to these believers in Jesus. They're going through difficult

times. Verse 6, this poor man cried and

the Lord heard him and saved him out of all of his troubles.

David in this song is the poor man and he by faith is saying

God is going to deliver me from his troubles and my troubles.

He initially said God delivered me from my fears in the midst of

my troubles and God will eventually save me out of all my

troubles. And then watch this in verse 7,

David says the Angel of the Lord encamps around those who fear

him and deliver them. He reminds himself of the

protection of God in this lonely place.

And then he's encouraging others to give God a try.

When he says in verse 80, taste and see that the Lord is good.

Blessed is the man who takes refuge in him.

David is telling others you should try God, give him a

taste, try and try and see the goodness and the greatness, the

holiness of God. He says blessed is the man who

takes refuge. In other words, safety and

protection in God. David needed that.

And then he starts preaching a bit.

He's just again this from this place of sorrow and suffering.

He says he'll fear the Lord, you his Saints for those who fear

him have no lack. And when he's talking about fear

in this occasion, it's not saying that we're afraid of God.

When you see fear talked about this way in the Bible, it's more

about a holy reverence. David's saying have a holy

reverence for God. And then in verse 10 it says the

Young Lions suffer want and hunger, but those who seek the

Lord lack no good thing. We're better than Young Lions.

He's saying he's testifying in this place about God's provision

and he keeps going. And verse 11 he says, come, O

children, listen to me, and I will teach you the fear of the

Lord. Even in this tragic place.

He's calling for children to come.

And I'll show you how great God is even in the midst of my

suffering and tragedy. And then we get to verse 12 and

this is where Peter quotes. So he takes the next verses 12

through 16 and he sends that to those in his letter.

He says what man is there who desires life and loves many days

that he may see good. You want to see good in the

midst of suffering. He has advice that he's going to

offer the Peter's going to quote in verse 13.

He doesn't He's not saying, hey, just be sad and suffer.

Just you know where ashes be pathetic.

No, he says keep your tongue from evil and your lips from

speaking deceit. Watch what you say in other

words, because honesty is important to God.

It matters and then he goes on. He says turn away from evil and

do good and seek peace and pursue it when he says turn

away. Last week we talked about

repentance, how repentance is a turning away from a sin.

The the not God's best. We turn away from that and we

turn towards God. He's saying turn away from evil

and do good. In verse 15, it says the eyes of

the Lord are towards the righteous and his ears towards

their cry and others. God is not distant.

He is attentive. David's alone, but he's not

really alone. God is with them.

He's testifying about it. And then the final part where

Peter quotes in the face of the Lord is against those who do

evil to cut off the memory of them from the earth.

He's talking about trusting in God and knowing that God is also

attentive to evil and injustice around us and God will bring

justice and that's good to know in the midst of persecution and

suffering. Verse 17, when the righteous cry

for help, the Lord hears and delivers them out of all their

troubles. He's right in this in the midst

of trouble. The Lord hears is what he's

saying. And in verse 18, he says the

Lord is near to the broken hearted and saves the crushed in

spirit. What a beautiful idea.

David was broken hearted. He was crushed in spirit, but

he's proclaiming that God is near to him.

And think of David who was broken hearted and crushed in

spirit, bringing encouragement to Peter, who's then bringing it

to those that he's writing his letter to.

In verse 19. He goes on and says many are the

afflictions of the righteous. Yeah, we follow Jesus, we still

have affliction, we still have difficulties, we still have

struggles. But then he says the Lord

delivers him out of the mall. Many afflictions, but the Lord

delivers us from the mall. And then watch here in verse 20,

it says he keeps all his bones. Not one of them is broken in

this occasion. John is going to quote from this

passage when he's talking about Jesus on the cross.

Watch this John 1936 grabs this truth from Psalm 34.

John writes for these things took place.

These things meaning Jesus being crucified and and beaten.

He says for these things took place that the scripture might

be fulfilled that not one of his bones will be broken.

It's nodding at the story of Jesus to come.

Verse 21 affliction will slay the wicked and those who hate

the righteous will be condemned. In other words, God will bring

justice in his timing. Peter was writing to righteous

people who were hated by the world around them, and he's

saying, hold on because God's wisdom and his judgment, it will

come. Verse 22, the Lord redeems the

life of his servants. None of those who take refuge in

him will be condemned. He finishes reminding them that

God redeems. And when we say God redeems, it

means like God buys us back again.

God creates us, we belong to Him, but we lose our

relationship with God due to sin.

So what does Jesus do? He goes and he buys us back.

He redeems us. And David is Speaking of it in

his Psalm. Now if we go back to first

Peter, we'll see the Peter's going again quote the Psalms.

And the reason why I want to show you this is because I want

you to understand that the fact that the New Testament quotes

the Psalm so often, it means they're important.

Some Christians, they, they just disregard the Old Testament or

some of the some of the letters or some of the books in the Old

Testament. They disregard them as being

unimportant. Peter is and these other New

Testament writers who quote from the Psalms are substantiating

the value and the anointing that is in these Old Testament

passages. So watch this first Peter

1 Peter 4:19

chapter 4 verse 19. Peter says therefore, let those

who suffer according to God's will.

Watch that to those who suffer according to God's will.

You mean sometimes it's in God's will that we suffer according to

Peter according to God's will entrust their souls to a

faithful creator while doing good.

If you're in the midst of suffering according to God's

will, then just continue to like entrust your heart and your soul

to God. And when he's mentioned this,

he's, he's grabbing this idea from Psalm 31, verse 5, where it

Psalms 31:5

says into your hand, I commit my spirit.

You have redeemed me. O Lord faithful God, he's

getting that idea. God, we entrust our hearts, our

lives, our journey to you in the midst of suffering.

Now, I would encourage you to take the notes home with you and

to like maybe look at them a couple times this week.

And my invitation to you is just to remember this connection

between first Peter quoting the Psalms.

We go back to Psalm 34. We've looked through it and we

know because of the heading that the story in which David writes

a Psalm is in First Samuel 21, when he's in this very tragic

place. So an application.

I want to ask you, what kind of suffering might you be in

because of your faith? There are occasions where in the

midst of your suffering, because of your faith, I'm not talking

about a tragedy in your life, but but suffering that is coming

along because you're living righteously, but the world

around you hates God's principles.

So sometimes you're going to be criticized because of it.

OK. So what kind of suffering might

you find yourself in? In the weeks to come, We'll talk

about some of the songs that are lamenting.

It wouldn't tragedy, OK? But for now, it's just suffering

that comes because we're following Jesus.

What kind of suffering are you experiencing for your faith?

People who think, again, they call you the evil doer even

sometimes when you're following God's principles.

And then I would say, what are these bits of wisdom that Peter

quotes and that David writes would be very helpful to you in

your life? My encouragement to you this

week is to go through Psalm 34 and read and go, wow.

In the midst of his suffering, he's offering really great

advice. He starts with, bless the Lord,

O my soul, all his days, he's going to be in that posture,

honoring God even in the midst of his suffering for doing good.

And then I would say it's valuable to know that David and

those that Peter was writing to endured and testified greatly

about the faithfulness of God in the midst of their suffering, in

the midst of you navigating through sorrow and suffering

again for your righteous stance, remembering that David endured,

Peter endured and those that Peter writes to, they endured

that mean didn't mean they didn't have any more challenges.

Peter eventually interesting enough is going to be martyred

for his faith, but yet he still is following these principles

from Psalm 34. He's able to keep in faith.

He endures in faith even in the midst of great, great suffering

and tragedy. And we can too, when we take

these principles from Psalm 34. Let me pray for us.

God, thank you for this day that you have made.

And we, God, we stand before you, and we want to be able to

grab these principles. And so our hope is that you will

make them very solid in our minds and help us to model

ourselves after Peter and the way he followed after you and

the way that David followed after you in the midst of

whatever persecution we might experience for standing up for

what's right. When we're called the evil

doers, let us not retaliate. Let us not revile those who are

reviling of us, but instead give us the heart and the posture

that David had. This is our prayer and our hope

as we continue to navigate through the Psalms.

God, I do pray that you would increase within us a love for

them and understanding for them and affection for the Psalms.

We pray this in Jesus name and everyone said Amen.

Now before we leave, I do want to give a moment in our service

where if you are a person who's never given your life to Christ,

you've never made the decision to become a Christian.

I want to give you a moment to do that.

And what does it look like? You reached a point in your life

where you understand that you're really not spiritually alive

until you give the lordship of your life over to Jesus.

We call that being born again. Jesus says that in John chapter

John 3 · chapter mention

3. It's like you're born the first

time from your mother's womb. Then you're born spiritually

when you invite the salvation and the love of Christ to come

into your life. And that means that you turn

away from sin and you turn towards God and His ways.

And maybe you've been investigating the the claims of

Christianity. You don't have to understand all

of the doctrine and all of the Scripture, but you do need to

understand that Jesus is God and that he sacrificed himself for

us so that we can have relationship with them.

And confessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord is the way to

come to salvation. And then we encourage you to

tell someone if you're making that decision.

We tell, say, tell someone. And then we encourage you to be

baptized, being baptized as an outward expression of being

washed clean and resurrected. And Jesus, and we'll have

baptisms again in the near future.

But I want to pray and I want to invite you to pray with me.

And if you've never made that decision, then you could pray

and receive Christ as your Lord this morning.

Let me pray and you can echo. You might pray.

Heavenly Father, come into my life.

Jesus, be the Lord of my life. I confess and proclaim Jesus

that you are God and that you have been drawing me and pulling

me towards you, and I want to have a relationship with you.

I want to experience your forgiveness and grace, and I

want you to put eternal life into me now.

I can receive it now, God, I receive it.

You being the Lord of my life leads me into your Kingdom and

puts eternity into me now. And I thank you for eternal life

to come, and I thank you for eternal life now.

So I give you my life. Come and reign and rule in me

Jesus be the Lord of my life and grow me in your ways.

I pray in Jesus name and everyone together said, hey man,

wonderful. It's all stand together before

we go. Thanks again for being here this

morning. I'll remember Wednesday night

7:00. We'll have the student LED night

of worship. Encourage you to be at that we

will have kids ministry that night.

So if if but you know, we want our kids in service with us

typically so as we will do like we did worship.

But if you do need to go be in the nursery, of course, you

could take advantage of that. Those of you with really young

children before you go, I do want to say a blessing over you

if you'll prepare your heart to receive this blessing.

And now may the Lord bless you and keep you, and may he make

his face to shine upon you. And may the joy of the Lord that

is unspeakable and full of glory made a bound to you.

And may the peace of God that passes all understanding made a

bound to you, also made the mercies of the Lord, in other

words, the forgiveness of God. That's new every morning.

May it be especially new to you now in your mornings to come.

And now may the Lord Jesus Christ guard your heart and your

mind. You are salt and you are light.

Go now and be salt and light unto the world.

You are blessed. We'll see you again soon.