Transformed Life: James, Brother of Jesus

Hello and welcome to the Kalamazoo Church of Christ podcast.

Thank you so much for listening.

We're Startup Church.

We just planted in September, 2020 and at the Kalamazoo church, we believe that Christianity is done best when it is done together.

And so if you live in the Kalamazoo area, we would love to connect, be it coming to a Sunday service, one of our small groups, or even just grabbing coffee with a member to learn more.

You can visit kalamazoo.church in order to do that.

We pray that you are inspired by what you hear today.

Great.

Well, it's good to see you all.

It's been for at least for since I've been with you guys, it's been at least, oh, I guess this is like going on three weeks now.

So it's really good.

It's great to see you guys in person and not just through group me or through text.

I wanted to share where me and Bianca were this last weekend.

So we went to a small church leaders conference.

And so this is the fourth iteration of it.

It's happened in Irving, Texas, basically it's like Dallas area.

And there's about 200 church leaders or lay leaders really that came from just a bunch of different churches.

It was specifically a conference intended to be for those who are leading small churches.

And we define that as basically over there, there was anywhere from eight to 150 congregants.

And so a lot of them were in different contexts.

Some had full staffs where there was a campus minister or a youth minister and others were, they were just basically a small house church meeting, getting together and trying to grow.

It was just, it was really encouraging.

It was a great time to, it's probably the most relevant teaching that I've received at being on staff or off staff, because you're speaking to a group of people and it's just a very focused, it's a very focused conference.

Yeah, I think the content was extremely relevant.

The spirit of the group was high.

There's times where I've been to different conferences and you feel like I've got a posture, I've got to show how good we're doing or how awesome our church is.

And even at times when I feel like it's, you know, there's stuff going on or it's not all awesome.

And that's not how you, the spirit of that group is we all want to, we want to grow that.

And so how, what's the best way to do that?

How can we do that?

How can we lead our churches in order to do that?

So it was, it was a great time.

I guess there's this little video, I took the audio off because I don't, I mean, you don't even really need to see the audio, but this just gives a little bit of an image of who was all there.

And it was a great time.

And then, and then as far as our lesson went, I just want to thank you guys so much.

So we had the opportunity to share a lesson at that, at the conference.

And I really want to thank you for your prayers, the class, it was received really well.

Most of it was just giving us the opportunity to brag about you guys, essentially.

And I think as I was, as I was thinking about, you know, I was just thinking about you guys.

I just, I'm just so grateful for your, your love for God, your hope in what He's doing, your unity with one another.

And I really do feel, maybe it's just the Christmas season, or maybe I'm a father of two daughters, but I do feel a little bit sappy about this, but I just, I really feel grateful for your trust in me and Bianca.

It's just, it's not lost on us, the amount of grace that you've shown to us over these last three years and change, you know, the scripture, it's 1 Peter 4, 8, it just says above all, love each other deeply because love covers over a multitude of sins.

And I just, I've seen that in the way that you guys have really loved, really loved me and Bianca.

This isn't, I was just sharing it and we're not going anywhere, but I just mean to say like, thank you guys so much, is really what I mean.

So right now, what's going to happen is there's going to be over this Advent holiday season, there's a few churches in the Midwest that put together some devotionals, basically.

It's like 12 days of Christmas, but devotionals.

And so I'm asking the, there's the teen boys are just going to pass one out to every family.

And I, and I believe inside of this devotional booklet, there's also, there might also be a QR code or a link for the mobile app as well.

So there's a mobile, like it runs right, like you don't got to download anything and you can scroll.

And so if you're like, man, my wife has it, I wanted the devotional, she took it to work or whatever, no big deal.

You can just go on the mobile and navigate it that way.

You know, we know the holidays are just a difficult time to stay focused on the most important thing.

And I think this is going to be one, one way that we can do it.

If somehow we're short, just let me know.

We'll order some more.

You know, we, yeah, we can order some more, but I think we might be good or no.

So we'll see.

Today, today we're going to look at James, the brother of Jesus.

All right.

So you guys can go over to Mark three.

There's not an awful lot written about James.

We're going to extract as much as we possibly can.

I believe there's, I believe there's something in here for all of us.

I also believe that there's something in here that we're going to be able to take to our holiday dinners.

We're going to be able to take with our coworkers.

We're going to be able to take with our family members.

I think there's something here.

This is kind of the image that I had as I was writing it.

Just to be really clear, though, so there's, there's, there's a thought.

This guy, this guy, James, he was likely that Jesus's closest in age to Jesus.

He, this is where there's, there's old denominations that will teach that Mary was perpetually a virgin and that she never gave birth.

Although the Bible is quite clear.

She never, she never had more children.

The Bible is quite clear.

It says that Jesus actually had sisters and he had brothers.

It actually names his brothers.

You know, and so I, you can, you can look up for yourself.

I found it really surprising.

I grew up in a fellowship of churches that never taught that Mary was perpetually a virgin and that Mary was a sinful person.

She did have sin.

But, and so the idea that the Mary is a perpetual virgin, this is going to make sense to us in a moment.

That's it's, it's just not a biblical concept.

You're only going to see her virginity affirmed prior to Jesus being born.

One of the early teachings that the, the, the, the people in this day were fighting against was not basically from Gnostics Gnosticism taught that one of the teachings was that everything physical is bad and so Mary in that way, I think this filtered into even how some of Christians practice their belief.

And so Mary then had to be a virgin her whole life because she's so holy and so amazing and anything physical is evil and it's bad.

And so it should be looked down upon.

That's, that's not Bible though is what I would say.

And this is important because then Jesus, James is mentioned.

He's the first brother mentioned whenever it mentions Jesus's brothers.

And so work with me here.

That means that, that Jesus and James were, were the closest in age from all of his other brothers.

You imagine the amount of time and energy that they just spent together.

If you have siblings, you wouldn't know that.

If I asked you to do it, to share your favorite memory with your sibling, you could share it, but then that, that memory might lead you to think of another memory and another memory and another memory and things that are just mundane in our day-to-day lives, you would probably think, oh man, it was just more fun when I had somebody by my side to do it.

My, my sibling, right?

This, this then was probably the, this interaction or this, the way that James and Jesus grew up.

Um, so we're going to, we're going to meet James here.

Uh, he went from someone who believed Jesus was crazy to being one of his most devoted followers.

He wrote a book in the Bible and he was, was identified as the voice, the leader of the, of the main church in the early time, uh, in Jerusalem.

How could this happen?

Well, we'll, we'll figure out a little bit and, uh, yeah, we'll figure out a little bit of it.

Let's, let's just read.

It says in Mark three, it says that Jesus entered a house and again, a crowd gathered so that he and his disciples were not even able to eat.

When his family heard about this, they went to take charge of him for they said he is out of his mind and the teachers of the law who came down from Jerusalem said he's possessed by Beelzebul by the prince of demons.

He's driving out demons.

Jesus talks a little bit and then they go.

So they say, we got to go get it.

We're part of, we got to go get it.

This is Mark three.

Now it's Mark three, right?

Towards the end.

It says, Jesus says, mother and brothers arrived standing outside.

They sent someone into this house to call him.

A crowd was sitting around him and they told him your mother and brother are outside looking for you.

Jesus says this, who are my mother and my brothers?

He asked, and he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, here are my mother and my brothers.

Whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother.

And so we, we, we, we see that they're trying to take charge of Jesus.

They say he's out of our mind.

He's, he's lost it in order.

It's going to help him.

If we just remove him, he's going through a phase.

He's going through a tough time.

He's lost it.

Let's go get him.

And when we read this passage, we said, amen.

Right.

That's so powerful.

Think about being James and hearing this said from a distance about, about you.

You're trying to, this is your, this is, this is your, your brother.

This is your older brother.

The guy that you looked up to this was maybe on this earth, the one who spent the most amount of time with you.

So on one hand, you have his family.

It's like, he's a danger to all those who are close to him.

He's lost his mind.

He's out of it.

He's going through a phase.

We've got to get him.

But then I'd have to imagine being, being James, the guy who spent the most time with Jesus than anybody else.

You guys were the older brothers.

You, you played together, you talked together, you dreamed together.

Think about how many nights were spent just looking at the stars together.

Uh, he had your back when a kid was trying to pick on you and you stood up for him in front of your family members.

When they said, where's Jesus?

He's, he's just going off to do his thing to pray.

You probably knew where Jesus prayed before anybody else knew where Jesus prayed.

If you're James work with me here, Jesus was probably your hero.

The older brother, you know, Joseph, uh, their, their father, he's not mentioned in the Bible at all, really after Jesus was about 12 years old.

And so we could say that either, uh, perhaps there's a chance that if she's just is not mentioned and he's present, uh, more likely and more scholars will believe that either he deserted the family or he passed away.

So you got Jesus and you got James and your older brother, he was the guy who looked up to.

And now he's lost his mind.

And then he just said, you know what?

Anybody who just does what I say, that's actually who I'm going to follow, or that's actually who's a follower of me.

Excuse me.

Think about the sadness.

Think about the frustration.

Think about the betrayal.

You would have felt hearing those words and maybe not even hearing him from Jesus's mouth, just hearing them communicated from somebody else.

He doesn't have the decency to look me in the eye and tell me this.

There's a truth here that that's true for all of us sitting here.

Now, it was true for them back then is that you can't have a close experience with Jesus and leave indifferent.

There's, there's no record.

There's no record in the Bible.

Anybody having a close experience with Jesus and leaving like, man, right.

It's good.

He's all right.

You know, nothing bad, nothing good.

I feel neutral about Jesus.

You can't find that.

If you ask James in this moment, how do you feel about Jesus?

Indifference is not the word you would say, right?

I love him.

But I, you know, and, and in today's culture, though, you, you see me, this is, I might be dating myself a little bit, but there was this, this whole big movement, uh, years ago.

And I don't think it's still popular.

I don't know.

I was almost going to show stuff on the screen, but it was that Jesus is my homeboy.

They had like trucker caps.

Do you guys remember that?

Or is that just me?

Ashton really?

Any, uh, any Gen Zers don't know what I'm talking about.

Actually the older people don't either.

It's just the millennials guys.

We got to stay strong.

I think Ashton Kutcher would wear this, you know, this, this trucker cap.

Jesus is my homeboy.

You got celebrities putting on that.

Jesus is my homeboy.

What does it communicate?

Well, I'm good with Jesus.

We're all right.

I'm doing okay with him.

And that's, that's ridiculous.

You don't, you don't see that in the Bible.

Um, you, you'd interact with people.

If you went on the street and you asked her, Hey, what do you think of Jesus?

They might, a lot of people would say I'm a follower of him, but even the ones who said, no, I'm not a follower of him and we're going to, we're going to break down how, how ludicrous this is, those who say I'm not a follower, you would ask, well, do you agree with his teachings and what they would say is, yeah, I think he's, he's a pretty good teacher.

Uh, it's been said that I, I love Christ, but I don't like his, his followers or his disciples that don't like the Christians and so people can say, or people would say, you know, I'm pretty good with Jesus's teachings, but Jesus himself, or rather I'm good with Jesus's teachings.

Jesus himself, I'm good with his followers.

Not at all.

That doesn't, that doesn't make any sense though.

Uh, there, there's a, this C.S. Lewis is a Christian theologian and he popularized a belief that we're actually going to read in the Bible, how, how it fits.

Uh, but basically he says that Jesus is either a lunatic, a liar, or Lord.

I'm going to read this quote and then we're going to break down some of the bold claims that Jesus made that if he wasn't Lord, you should not follow him.

You wouldn't want to follow him.

And his teachings are, are, are ridiculous.

This is, this is what C.S. Lewis says.

He says, I'm trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about him.

I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept his claim to be God.

That is the one thing we must not say.

A man who is merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.

He would either be a lunatic on the level with a man who said he's a poached egg or else he would be the devil of hell or the devil of hell.

You must make your choice.

He goes on.

This is, uh, this was written in the, it was actually communicated in the forties.

Uh, it was a radio broadcast during world war two.

Uh, the, the, some of the British or UK, they asked him, Hey, go ahead and explain what Christianity is.

Um, but then it's written in a book.

You can read it as well.

Uh, C.S. Lewis is communicating.

You can't be on the fence with Jesus.

You can't be 50, 50 with Jesus.

Uh, these, these, these people understood him.

Uh, you would read this first part about his family.

Well, what did they say?

He said, they said he's a lunatic essentially.

Right.

And, and then the teachers of the law, we just read the scripture.

I'm not going to read it again.

The teachers of the law said, no, he's a liar.

He's actually from the devil.

Wow.

Think about, think about for yourself and who, who do you say Jesus is?

Where, how do you identify it?

Do you say, well, he's a great teacher and there's somebody that some, some of it, I can't get behind.

Uh, or are you believing like he's the guy that you can't leave 50 50.

Some of the crazy claims that Jesus makes that if anybody else were to make these claims, you should run and run far away, Jesus says, I am the way, the truth.

The life, no one comes to the father, except through me.

No one, you can't read about any moral teacher who will say, I'm the only way to get to where you're going.

Any moral teachers that I, I know the way I can teach you the way they will not say I am the way.

And yet this is what Jesus says.

Jesus says, your sins are forgiven.

And he doesn't say it just once consider that your sins are forgiven.

Who's going to tell me my sins are forgiven, but God himself.

I am the Lord of the Sabbath claims to grew up in a Jewish culture and Jewish understanding.

He says, you know what the guy who organized this, I'm, I'm, I'm Lord.

I don't have to listen to him putting himself the level of the father.

Jesus says, whatever I say, these words, that's what's going to condemn you at the last day.

Wow.

Then he says, I am the light of the world, not a light.

I am the light of the world.

That's right.

Wow.

Anybody saying Jesus teaches good moral things.

They haven't read the Bible.

They haven't had a deep experience with him.

If he's not Lord, this is a new word for me.

A new word defined for me.

He's a, he's a megalomaniac, someone who has an unnaturally strong wish for power and control, or thinks they are more important and powerful than they really are.

Megalomaniac.

Don't call your spouse that this week.

That's not that that's free.

I didn't put that in here.

You can't be neutral about Jesus.

James wasn't neutral.

And this is, this is, we're going to bring it.

We're going to, we're going to bring it around.

James wasn't neutral about Jesus.

I'm sure there was a love and then there was a, there's this, this thing, man.

Bailed on us first, my dad, then him, what's going on now?

It's just me.

And I got to care for my brothers and my mom.

How do you feel about Jesus this morning?

You know, it's an incredible concept.

I think you're closer to being a devoted follower of him.

If you despise him, then if you just consider him decent, you're closer to being a devoted follower, if you despise Jesus, then if you just consider him decent, we don't, we don't hear or see much about James until after the resurrection.

And so we're going to read just a, just a bit first Corinthians 15.

This is Paul talking and he's explaining to the Corinthians, what basically is interaction.

It says, but what I received, I passed on to you as a first importance.

That Christ died for your, for our sins, according to the scriptures that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day, according to the scriptures, then it dropped down to verse 70 shares, he appeared to different people that he says, then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles.

And last of all, he appeared to me also as to what I've normally born.

Think about this interaction that, that Jesus and his brother had when, when Jesus was actually resurrected.

I, I don't, I obviously I can't, I can't share about that.

That's one of the cool questions in heaven.

I'm looking forward to asking how, what was that like to be able to, and I want to ask from James's perspective, like to see your brother, you heard about him.

Maybe you started it and you actually got to see him and you realized everything he said was true.

He wasn't lying.

He wasn't crazy.

He was actually the Lord of this whole world.

And, and you would, there has to be tears coming down.

You're probably laughing.

You're probably going back and thinking of all those times that you call him, whatever name you call them.

And you're probably, you're like, I'm sorry about, yeah, I don't care.

So it's no big deal.

It's no big deal, James.

I'm here for you, man.

And consider the hug that would have, would have happened and the embrace that Jesus would have, would have been able to just grab his younger brother and imagine him hugging him so tight, maybe even giving him, maybe even giving him a kiss.

And just, and we're, we're united again.

Wow.

This, this interaction, we're not told how long it is.

It's just mentioned.

Then he appeared to James.

We understand that this, this interaction motivated James to, to live an entirely different life.

And James goes on to be one of the main leaders of the church in Jerusalem.

In fact, we're going to read a passage.

He, it seems that he has the final say over, over what to do in this specific interaction.

They're wondering, uh, it's an act 15 and you can read the whole context, but they're wondering, should we allow Gentiles in, although, you know, and Peter's explained, this is what happened, right?

Gentiles should be allowed in.

And I don't know.

I just dreamt it.

This is, you know, this is what occurred.

And they look to James, Jesus's brother for, for guidance.

Uh, it says, this is what he says.

It's my judgment therefore, that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God.

Instead, we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood for the law of Moses has been preached in every city from the earliest times.

And it's read in the synagogues on every Sabbath, they look for James.

Everyone weighed in.

And then James is the one that said, no, this is, this is what I really believe ought to happen.

And what he says is he says things that are not, uh, some of it's outright sin, obviously sexual immorality, uh, some he's saying, Hey, I'm going to make an edict and I'm going to make this, this, these regulations, these rules, uh, just for our church culture.

Just so that the Jews who have a weaker consciences regarding, uh, strangled animals and this kind of thing, or the food from idols, those, I'm just going to, let's make this rule so that we can remain united, basically.

And I think about the power in, in James's words, and you'd wonder what else does he say?

Well, we have a lot, uh, we have a lot that shares about what else he says.

Uh, he, he writes a book in the Bible.

And if you, uh, again, there are whole denominations that will say that this is the most problematic book in the entire Bible.

And I, I don't necessarily, uh, I don't necessarily disagree because it talks about the tension, basically all in the book of James, there's a tension between Jesus being the one who's the perfecter, he does everything.

He's doing all of the work.

He's so powerful.

He's working way more than we can ever imagine.

He makes us clean.

He makes us pure.

He makes us holy.

And yet there's still something on our end that we ought to do as well.

And there's this, this tension that if you'll sit with it for any length of time, it's really uncomfortable.

And maybe you felt like somebody, I remember being a kid and, uh, and I was just kind of talking about some of my convictions, um, to my basketball team.

I remember being 15, 16 years old and somebody just said, well, Jesus, he's going to forgive you.

So who cares if you sin?

And as a 16 year old, that was actually really like, I don't know.

I don't know.

I mean, you just shouldn't do it.

Well, based on what, based on like, if he just, he's going to forgive you.

Isn't that like, doesn't he love you?

And, and this tension, now somebody was able to share in Romans six.

Uh, it just said, what shall we do?

Shall we go on sending so that grace may increase by no means.

And, and so that's awesome.

But there's this tension that maybe you feel, maybe you, you've seen interaction, maybe that's been the excuse given when you brought things up and you said, Hey, what happens?

I got, you gotta forgive me.

It'll work itself out.

There's, there's this, there's this tension that James is able to, to write so eloquently.

Uh, I'd imagine I, I want to, there's, there's a small challenge.

If you find time to read through the book of James this week, but actually read it through the frame of, of this resurrection, that Jesus is, is the guy's brother and he's writing and when, what, what is going through his mind?

What experience with Jesus is he thinking about as he's writing it?

Here's, here's one little one.

It says, do not merely listen to the word.

And so deceive yourself.

Instead, do what it says.

Anyone who listens to the word, but does not do what it says.

It's like someone who looks at his face in the mirror.

And after looking at himself goes away and immediately forgets what he looks like.

But whoever looks intently into the perfect law, that gives freedom and continues in it, not forgetting what they have heard, but doing it, they will be blessed in what they do.

So you're, you see it just in this passage, right?

Don't, don't just listen to the word.

Uh, it's deceitful if you just listen to the word.

Um, but you're going to be, you're going to be blessed in what you do if you actually act on it.

And, and there's a tension that that's all over, uh, all over the book of James.

I bet you there was a tension that was probably in James's heart as he, as he was writing it as well.

And so what, what does this mean then?

Uh, we're going to wrap it in, wrap it up, bring it, like, make sense of what, what does this mean, what does it mean for you?

What does it mean for the people you interact with?

And what does it mean for us as a church?

Well, I think what this means for you is this is a chance to reflect.

We've got not a month, maybe we got two, three weeks between now and the 31st, this new year, I don't know where you've been with Jesus over this last year, I don't know where you've been with Jesus over this last month, but I want to challenge you to really identify, are you passionate about your relationship with Jesus or are you just neutral?

Now we'd all say you're here because you love him.

You hear, if I were to ask any of us, do you love Jesus answers?

Yes, I, I know it.

And I've seen it in your guys' lives.

Are you, are you, are you passionate about your relationship with Jesus?

There, there ought to be an emotion.

It's not, it's, it's both.

It's not just this devotion that I'm going to be there regardless.

There ought to be an emotion as well.

Is that how you feel about Jesus this morning?

You think about the people that you interact with?

Well, when I read this, actually, I feel a bunch of hope for my family, uh, who are not Christians because they are, they're, they're far from God.

They're, they're not, they're not close to them.

They don't, if you ask, they despise them.

I don't know, but they're, they're, they're not far from it.

I know that they look down on those who follow and all of that.

It gives me hope though, right?

Because if that means that if our family members despise Jesus, they're actually, they're closer to being devout followers than if they just feel like he's pretty good, I can go to church and feel okay about that.

It gives me, it gives me great hope.

What I think about this for my family members, something else it does is I think it ought to give us urgency to those who are neutral about it.

And we'll define neutral as somebody who kind of goes to church.

Sometimes someone who shows up to church, they're in and out, maybe, maybe, but there's a depth that they're lacking that we should feel an urgency.

We were not the only, we, you guys know it.

I don't even got to say we're not the only church.

That's that's we got it right.

We're doing not the only church, not even close, but we're one of them or we're trying to be.

And if we're not bring it up and let's, let's get there.

And, and so it should, it's not just, do you go to church?

I can feel, I can feel stonewalled too.

Maybe you guys haven't.

I know I have like talking to somebody.

Oh yeah.

I'm a Christian.

Oh yeah.

Church.

Oh yeah.

I go to church already.

Okay.

Well, what's next?

You know, like, is there another conversation?

Is there another question that I asked?

Or am I like, well, oftentimes shame on me.

I'd be like, well, they're, they're actually, they don't need, they don't need this.

And they're not looking for this.

And so let me, let me find somebody else.

So let me, that like next time I go to the store, that, that's some, that person will, will maybe be on the last leg and really need God and those who are neutral about Jesus need him just as much as anybody else, right.

And then, and then what does this mean for us as a church in the year, finishing off 2023 and then going into 2024?

Uh, well, I think if I'm going to say anything, it's just, we just can't be lukewarm.

Uh, there's a, there's a church in the Bible that's, that's lukewarm.

Uh, there's probably more than a few.

This is one in Laodicea.

Uh, it says in revelation three, this is after Jesus rose from the dead.

John is, uh, is sharing this revelation.

He says, I know your deeds to this whole church.

I know your deeds.

You're neither cold nor hot.

I wish you were either one or the other.

So because you are lukewarm, neither hot nor cold.

I don't want to spit you out of my mouth.

Let that not be said about us, right?

What, whatever that means.

And you say, well, as a church, we're not, okay, great.

I don't know.

I we've, we've got to, we've got a ways to go to be, to be hot, right?

I bet you, if you looked at your life, you would identify, well, there's some, there's some areas that I need to grow in.

There's some, there's some things I need to be more passionate about.

Or when I was, when I first became a Christian, I was super passionate right now.

I'm not this way.

There's probably room for you to grow.

If there's room for you to grow and there's room for me to grow.

And there's probably room for us to go.

Right.

So as, as a church, whatever this looks like, whatever it means, we want to be those who are not cold and are not lukewarm.

We want to be those who are on fire for Jesus.

One of the, one of the big areas, and we're going to talk more about this.

This is not the last time we're going to talk about it, but one of the big areas that I I've, I've heard it actually from more than a few people that I really believe in 2024, we're going to grow a bunch in one of the characteristics of this church is just in the way that we interact with each other, one on a weekly basis, but even at church on Sunday, specifically in, in what our, what our speech is about.

It's not bad.

Nobody's I'm not, you know, I love football as much as anybody else.

I love sports as much as anybody.

I love talking about what's going on.

And, and, but there's going to be, I already know in the year 2024, there's going to be a depth in our conversation that that's extremely rich.

There's going to be people that you, man, I got to talk to this person.

You know, they said something that didn't sit quite right.

I got to open the scripture.

And I, I don't, I'm not going to wait until all that set up a time, two weeks later, and now we get this time and I share it, it's already two weeks later.

So I don't really care that much about it.

And they, they probably don't, they don't, don't even remember.

No, when they say it, let's, we're going to share it in our, our spiritual conversation as a church is going to grow in 2024.

I already know it.

This is just, just one small area.

And I mentioned it.

If you thought of, if you just spent a couple of minutes, you'd probably think of many more.

Um, as those come up, as you think about them, I'll say that I'm, I'm an open, uh, I'm a Dropbox, you can share it.

Uh, we're not going to, we can't do everything tomorrow, but I'm a Dropbox.

You feel free.

Like you can contact me.

You can tell me, this is what I feel like.

This is what I've seen.

You can share with Bianca.

If you don't feel, if you don't feel like you can share that with us, then share that with somebody who you feel like let's bring it to him.

He's not going to hear it.

Well, bring it with a few people and let's, let's, let's grow together.

Amen.

Uh, we're going to, we're going to bring it in for communion right now.

And as we take communion, I want to challenge us.

We're going to take the bread that represents his body and the juice that represents the blood that Jesus shed.

And I want you to go back to a time that you had the strongest connection with Jesus.

Now, maybe that time is this morning or maybe it's weeks, months, years ago.

Go back to that time.

Think about how you felt about it.

Not, not the stuff that he did for you, but how you felt his interactions, closeness, and then, and then make a point.

Share that with somebody.

Share it this week.

Share with somebody the closeness of your relationship with God, what it was, what happened and all of the stuff around it.

Amen.

Right now we're going to pray and then we'll, we'll take that communion.

Dear God, Lord, we, we come before you, Jesus.

And we're, we're impressed.

We're in awe.

I, nobody can, nobody can look at you, interact with you, go, go deep with you and leave neutral, but we can't leave feeling like you're decent.

Uh, we can leave feeling like you're a liar.

You're a lunatic or we can leave, uh, knowing that you're Lord father.

And that is Jesus.

That's why we are, are at your feet, Lord.

We're, we, we realize that we've fallen short.

We know that we don't measure up.

We know that there's nothing that we can do to, uh, to be good.

We know that you make us good.

And yet we know there's a tension that, that will necessitate action on our end as we truly embrace your love for us.

Jesus, we know that there, there's no greater expression of your love than, than you giving your, your life for us, physically giving your life for us.

Thank you so much for your sacrifice on the cross.

I pray that, that it will move us Lord.

I pray that it will continue to move us as we, as we enter this holiday season.

Jesus, this is in your name that we pray.

Amen.

Thank you so much for listening to the Kalamazoo church of Christ podcast.

If you're in the Kalamazoo area, we'd love to get connected.

Please go to kalamazoo.church and fill in your information to come to a Sunday service or any other event that we have going on in any case, you'll be hearing from us next week.