The Fruit of the Spirit: Kindness | Laura Macfarlen

So good morning and welcome again, everyone.

My name's Laura MacFarlane. I generally attend with my

husband Greg and son Uyazi, who are both at home today because

they're a bit sick, or at least Uyazi is.

And so I'm here alone. And today we're going to be

continuing through our series on Fruits of the Spirit.

Our topic today is going to be on kindness in Galatians.

And Nelly kindly has agreed she's going to be reading

Galatians 522 to 25 for us. There's a few different versions

floating around and slightly different words used.

We're going to be reading from the NIV.

But the fruit of the Spirit is Lovejoy, peace, forbearance,

kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and

self-control. Against such things there is no

law. Those who belong to Christ have

crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

Thank you. Great.

So I don't know about you, but often when I see a lot of words

that are similar grouped together, I generally think of

kind of the general vibe of things, especially if we're in a

hurry, we just kind of say, well, those are all nice things

that we're reading about, kindness, peace, goodness.

So when I read verse 22 particularly, and I'm hoping

it's staying on the screen, the fruits of the Spirit as a whole,

I'm often thinking, well, the fruits of the Spirit are really

just being a good person. And if we look at a few verses

just before that, in verse 19, those works of the flesh as they

described, I think, well, that's being, that's being a bad

person. And we really just get a feeling

for what we're reading and then we move on to the next.

But today what we're going to try do is to consider each word

in these verses as breathed out by God.

And we it's important to sometimes take that step to

meditate on this particular word.

Think how is it different from the one?

Why did God include this list? Why didn't he just say be a good

person? And when we adopt this approach,

we sometimes, at least sometimes, we find that our our

Bible reading can be so much more fruitful and we can really

learn quite a bit. So today we're going to pause

and we're going to consider the idea of kindness in quite a bit

of detail. We're going to do it three ways.

We first going to try see what we can glean from the word

kindness in verse 22. So we're going to look in the

actual verses around it. We're then also going to be

looking at Galatians in general. We know that books of the Bible

like this, which are written by Paul, there's often these

recurring themes that they're not saying contradictory things.

So it helps us as we trying to interpret what does God mean

here by kindness, to look at the context of the book as a whole.

And then we're also going to be looking at a more holistic

reading by bringing in some other texts and making sure our

view of kindness is aligned to a reading of the Bible as a whole.

And I know I'm not the only one who sometimes just groups these

together because a few weeks ago Ryan came and he mentioned that

he was preaching on kindness. And I was a bit taken aback

because I directly written my preach by then on kindness.

And then I can't remember what he's actually preaching on.

Could be gentleness, could be goodness.

But the point is that both me and Ryan just kind of group all

of those together. You're preaching on gentleness.

OK, there we go. All right, so as we go through

the sermon, I'm going to encourage you to think

constantly about two things. Firstly, how does this word, how

does God's word change the way or develop the way that we see

God and this considering this word of kindness?

And secondly, I want us to think also personally, as we go

through this word, what is God maybe saying to me or to us as a

church and not just to have this download of more information

like we've had in the week to be stored separately.

We know God's word is active and alive and we know he's speaking

to us. So let's really approach it with

those open hearts. All right?

Today we're going to be looking at 4 questions as we look

through kindness. The first is what?

What is kindness? We're then going to look at why.

Why would we desire kindness? Why would we even consider this?

We're going to look at who who we call to be kind to.

And then we're going to end off with the how, which is often the

the most tricky part. So starting with the what, what

is kindness and particularly how do we separate it from the other

fruits of the spirit as you're mentioning gentleness, Paul

doesn't give us, unfortunately. A footnote at verse 22 with a

definition of this is what I mean by kindness and Galatians

is a book as a whole. It mentions many things that we

might think is kind. It mentions praying for each

other in chapter 6. It mentions bearing each other's

burdens, but it doesn't necessarily always link these to

kindness. So we're going to have to go a

little bit further. And one of the ways I find quite

helpful when I'm reading something and I'm wondering what

does it really mean in this context is to look at some of

the commentary. Now we have commentators, the

commentary you're going to look at today is for the ESP study

Bible. Commentators who study the

Bible, who look at where's this word used, what are the specific

translations and the message that's overarching in the Bible

of as a whole. And they give us some guidance

as to what they think it means. So the ESP study Bible indicates

that kindness means showing goodness, generosity, and

sympathy towards others. And that's the the definition

that they give for this particular word that's used in

verse 22 of the passage we're looking at.

The second thing we can do is we can also look at where else is

the word mentioned in the Bible? Now we're going to be looking at

the English version. You can also go into the

specific other languages, but where else is kindness used and

what's the context there? What can we learn?

So kindness can also be understood in that way to mean

mercy or steadfast love. In Micah 6 verse eight, in the

context of God speaking to his people that he doesn't want

mindless routine sacrifice. He wants peoples whose hearts

are changed, transformed to look like him as those followers.

Those are his true followers. And in that context he says he

wants people to of kindness or pursue kindness.

Another clue for us of what this kindness means is found in One

Corinthians chapter 13 verse 4 to 6, where it sees kindness as

a part of what it means to love. The verse that we all know very

well, it says love is patient and love is kind.

So it's not the whole of love, but I believe kindness is a part

of what it means to love. Another way when we considering

a word in the Bible and how to know what it means is to look at

some examples. Sometimes we know what it is

when we see it, even if we can't describe it very well.

So sometimes what we can do is we can look at examples of what

we might see as kindness in the Bible, and then we can unpack

some of those characteristics. What is it that makes it kind?

So one example I'll give is from Ruth and Boaz.

We're not going to go to the story, but you can read it in

Route 2 to 4. And in the story, Boaz let's

Ruth, who's a poor foreign widow, collect food in his

fields. And what she was collecting was

what he wasn't really going to be using anywhere.

It was what would be left for the birds, essentially.

But he also instructs his workers to leave a bit extra for

her to make it a little bit easier.

And what's kind about that is, firstly, we know that he asked

around about her. So he knows that she needs the

food. I mean, those days, a woman

without a husband, it wasn't as common, wasn't as easy to work.

And she's a widow, so she really needed some extra assistance.

But he doesn't just go to her and say, well, here's a whole

lot of food in a bag. I've done it for you.

He gives her dignity, allows her to continue with what she's

doing, but he also doesn't tell her.

So he's not expecting anything returned because she doesn't

even know what he's done. He's simply taking steps behind

the scenes to make her life a little bit easier.

So that gives us a bit of an idea about what kindness might

look like in that story. Another one is from Two Samuel

9. It's David, and I meant to ask

someone how to say this nicely. Mephibosheth.

I'm going to call him Mr. M for now.

So David shows kindness to Jonathan's disabled son by

restoring his land and inviting him in this part of the Bible to

eat at his table every day. So what is kind about that?

Well, firstly, he gives him stability by giving him land.

He gives him this long term way to have sustainable income

again. He doesn't just throw a few gold

coins to make himself Betty. He's thinking, how can I really

set you up well? But more than that, and quite

importantly here is he gave him recognition and company, so he

was going to be able to eat at the King's table forever more.

And he doesn't have to eat alone.

So not only does he have that link and that ability to have

some status or on earth, which he might not have had before,

but he's also doesn't have to be alone.

He's going to be with people around him.

And we know that in those days, disabled people weren't treated

particularly well. So it wouldn't have been

elevating the King's status to have him at his table.

But he's really doing it because he wants to show him kindness.

And we know that he had very little to offer in return.

We know this also because how does he respond to the King's

offer? He says, what is your servant

that you should notice a dead dog like me.

So he's he's coming forward in the position that well, I know I

don't have anything to repay you with.

So thank you. This is this is unexpected and

it's really just coming from kind heart.

Then the third and last example I want us to look at in the

Bible is from John 81211 and it's about Jesus.

When a crowd brings for forth a woman who's caught in adultery

and they want to stone her because of the sin that she's

been caught in, and Jesus protects her from condemnation

and he, he restores her dignity. He was perfect.

He had the moral authority to say, yes, that was wrong.

I would never do it. He, he could have gone with the

crowd who is looking to punish her, but instead he doesn't take

the easy or popular choice without condemning, sorry,

without condoning her sin. He shows her compassion.

He doesn't join in with a crowd, but it's what, what's quite

important about this part of the story is he also says go and sin

no more. So he, he indicates that this is

wrong. I'm, I'm not accepting it.

I'm not being soft on this, but I'm showing kindness to you.

And that's an important part of our definition of kindness as

well, because kindness doesn't deny truth.

Kindness just delivers truth with grace and humility.

And I've got a personal example that I've shared with some of

you that I was grappling with recently.

I've someone at work who's not been performing very well.

They haven't even been working a full day and their work products

not great. And I've gently communicated the

truths over many months and tried to help them perform.

But I have a Co manager and we manage this person together.

He's not a Christian and he's taken the approach of I don't

really want to deal with this, so I'm not going to be doing

anything. That approach is a lot easier

because you don't get pushed back.

You don't have to deal with conflict and you're a lot more

liked by employees. And I was, I've been grappling.

I've also been considering, well, is that approach more kind

because it doesn't feel very kind.

I'm having to deal with this conflict.

I'm having to face something and pray about it and make sure it's

done in a nice way. But I I want his job.

I want to just just leave it and through lots of discussions with

mature Christians and lots of prayer, I've been coming more to

the peace that actually that's not a kind approach.

It's not a kind approach to leave it.

It's because it ignores the growth that you can see in

someone. It ignores their ability to take

opportunities to grow. It also ignores the impact that

someone's not performance or non attendance at work having on

others, the clients, the people that you're supposed to serve,

maybe on the Co workers who are picking up more slack.

So often we we avoid these kind of discussions or we avoid being

engaging with difficult topics because we see, well, as a

Christian, I need to be kind and kind just means avoid conflict

at all costs. But we see that that as Jesus

did that that's not really what kindness is.

Kindness involves honesty. We want to communicate with love

and humility. We want to pray about the right

timing and how much and how to do and if we're the right person

to do it. But we also need to be honest

and kindness doesn't ask us to leave that honesty behind.

So why don't you take a moment and consider something that some

examples that might be personal to you take, take a thought and

think about even this week, was there any opportunities where

other people showed kindness to you?

Did you see someone give kindness to someone else?

Was someone perhaps kind to you or did you miss an opportunity?

If anyone wants to share, you're welcome to pop your hand up and

and stand up. But start to start to think a

little bit about what does this mean for me?

Is it something I've even thought enough about to come up

with an example? I'll give you a second.

Some examples might be quite silly.

It might be doing someone's washing for them.

If you have a roommate or someone that you stay with.

It might be preparing a meal for someone.

It might be paying someone's train fare.

It might even just be praying with someone when you know they

really need that support and company.

It might be someone giving someone the better seat in

public transport, if you can see they just they just had a bad

day and they just might need a bit of extra comfort.

And what these examples that we're thinking of, what it

should lead the other person to think is why me?

That was unexpected because like Mr. M as we calling him, there

should be no specific reason that we do those things.

It's not because I think you're going to help me in the future.

It's not even because I feel guilty about it.

So I want to make myself feel better.

It's simply because I know that that would be pleasant for you.

I know it would make your life easier.

So we should be doing things constantly that have that

reaction of what? Why me?

Why would you do this for me? You didn't have to because if

you had to, it might not really be coming from from the heart of

kindness. So looking at these definitions

and these examples and this commentary is some of the

characteristics that we can draw into some bullet points of our

definition of kindness is this, it requires action.

So kindness mustn't be confused with just being nice.

Someone can be very nice, but do very little for other people.

I just, I have good feelings towards you, but kindness

requires you to do something. There's also no expectation of

reward or no other reason for being kind.

But what you're really looking to do when you're being kind is

just to make someones life a little bit more pleasant or a

little bit easier. It might be offering to do nice

things for them, helping them, listening to them, just

recognizing them and spending time with them.

Or it might be giving as well. And sometimes it might be, you

might be thinking, well, I mean, I don't really know all the

opportunities. When Laura gave me a minute, I

couldn't really think of that many.

But I'm not going to tell anyone.

So how do I, how do I think about when to be kind?

I mean, it's something that you learn in grade one, but it's not

something I've really had anyone speak to me about after after

that and learning values in primary school.

And what I found quite helpful is in Galatians itself.

Early on in Galatians 514, we reminded of the Golden Rule,

which says for the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one

command, love your neighbor as yourself.

And we already know from Corinthians that part of love is

to be kind. And where does Paul come up with

this in in Galatians? Where does he come up with this

golden rule? Because he didn't make it up.

Jesus himself taught this and said it twice, once in Matthew

7, once in Matthew 22. Both times he essentially

speaking about the greatest commandment, this golden rule,

and he speaks about loving God and loving your neighbor as

yourself. And if you're anything like me,

you're probably quite good at finding out what you want.

You're quite good at thinking about expectations of what would

be nice for someone else to do for you.

And that's probably the easiest way to think about how can I be

kind is to think about if I was in that person's shoes, what

would I want? What would make my life more

pleasant or easier? If it's a couple who've just had

a child, it might be going to pray with them about their

parenting and about the child. It might be taking them a meal.

If it's a single person and you know, they don't have much

family in town, maybe it's inviting them to some family

dinners, to some family events and just to like bringing them

as part of your community. If it's someone's society tends

to shun or only deal with in a certain way, maybe it's simply

taking the time to look them in the eye to have a conversation

that doesn't involve advice or giving but just recognizes them

as a person. Might even be something as

simple as letting your roommate have the better room but letting

someone have a shower when you both come home cold.

About giving someone the nicer meal.

If you have two options. Small things that you just know.

I would like it if someone did that for me so I'm going to do

it for them now anyway. And then moving on to our why is

what? Why do we need to be kind?

There's a famous movie, I don't know if anyone's watched it

cause called because I said so. And it's really this mocking on

this human idea of always wanting to ask why.

If you tell your kids don't do that, don't eat that you're not

allowed to do that. What is the general response you

get Why? And as adults we like to think

of it as more childish thing. If someone offered a promotion

and it's not you at work, why something bad happens.

Why? If someone else gets a benefit

and they're like, why not me? And I think the reason is we

often tend to accept things more and we often are able to act

more if we know the why. So it's, it's a lot of studies

and courage in the workplace is try get your employees on board

or try get your family on board. If it's parenting, if people

understand the why, they're more likely to get behind an idea and

to do it. So why would we be kind?

Why would we even try? The first reason we're going to

go back to our cortex today is in Galatians 5, verse 22 to 25.

Galatians 5:22–25

It tells us that those who belong to Christ have crucified

the flesh with its passions and desires.

Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

So part of the reason why is because it's our very nature.

It's God's design is when we belong to Christ.

Paul mentions later in Galatians 6 that we this new creation, we

we every day we dying to our desires because this

transformation is taking place. It's a reality for those who

call Christ their Lord. So we continue to make mistakes,

but we're empowered by the Spirit to be transformed.

And this leads to our our second point is as we being transformed

to be more like God's character. Part of the why is because God

is kind, because God has been kind to us.

From Romans 2 verse one to four, it says, Do you suppose a man,

you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them

yourself, that you will escape the judgement of God?

Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance

and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead

us, meant to lead you to repentance.

So how did God show us kindness? God showed us kindness by

sending His Son to die for us. This free offering of grace is

just the most beautiful picture of kindness we know.

So we want to imitate our Father's kindness to us.

We wanted to overflow because we know someone has been so kind to

us. And Luke 6:35 to 36 emphasizes

Luke 6:35–36

this idea as well. It says, But love your enemies

and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return, and your

reward will be great, and you'll be sons and daughters of the

Most High. For he is kind to the ungrateful

and the evil. Be merciful even as your Father

is merciful. So we are kind because our God

is kind to us, but our God is kind to everyone.

Our God is kind and we want to imitate that.

And then lastly, kindness is so critical and important to God

and often more than we often imagine.

One of my favourite verses in the Bible outlines 3 things that

God asks of us. Now just give you a second think

of three things. If you have to summarize, what

does God require of me? What does God need me to do?

And I will give you a hint that it's in the Old Testament.

What are the three things that you would come up with that God

requires of you? It's in Micah 6 verse 8, and it

Micah 6:8

simplifies God's instructions to his people.

And three, three tasks says he has told you a man, what is good

and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice, to

love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God.

And this is in the context we spoke about it earlier of God

saying he doesn't want this mindless sacrifice.

He wants this. He wants this of a Christ or a

follower of him and it sounds quite simple to love kindness or

other other versions use mercy, but it's not something we often

prioritize We it it doesn't sound glamorous.

We might even think it's a bit weak and unambitious in today's

day. We want to conquer, achieve,

lead, and we want to succeed, but I don't know how many of us

in our New Year's resolutions had be kind.

And yet it's three-part of three things that God says he requires

of us as a whole is to be kind. And I wonder if we give it the

same amount of priority as God does.

Then the third question is who? I'm not going to spend a lot of

time on this because I know everyone in this room.

We we know who who. It's more just that when you're

in those moments, it becomes a bit cloudy.

Is that academically we could write on a paper, we'd all get

100% in theory, but it's the practical that we probably

struggle with a little bit more on The Who, Well, let's look at

it anyway. It's in Galatians 69 to 10.

So the same book that our core text is from, and we're going to

read it again. It says let us not grow weary of

doing good for due season. We will reap if we do not give

up. So then, as we have opportunity,

let us do good to everyone. Let us do good to everyone and

especially to those who are in the household of faith.

The one thing I don't want us to do is just to catch on to that

end part. It's to everyone, but mainly,

mainly just to the Christians. You know, the other people are

the ones we don't really want. So, so we can have a look at

Luke 6 from 35 to 36. We read it earlier, it says, but

love your enemies, do good and lend expecting nothing in return

and your reward will be great. It will be sons of the most high

for he is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.

He is kind to the ungrateful and the evil.

So we have kindness to those who believe we have kindness to the

grateful and the evil. I think that means everyone the

the full spectrum. And then how we're going, how

can we be empowered to be kind? Kindness is a quality that's

gained a lot of popularity in the last decade.

I don't know if you've seen, but as I drive to from work, there's

a big sign on a bull ball that's just be kind and you see it

online on people's profiles. It's mainly non religious groups

actually that are putting it forward there.

It's almost like tolerance. It's this ideal, this value that

if we were all just kind, all our problems would go away.

But what these simple declarations sometimes miss is

that as humans, we're often not kind.

We find it quite hard. So how do we sustain this more

consistent kindness that the world needs?

And we know if we try in our own strength again and again, we

probably going to fail. And then we're going to feel

guilty. And then we're going to be

focused on ourselves because we're thinking about all our

guilt and then we're going to be less kind.

So it's it's probably not a recipe for success is to really

just dig deeper. But let's look at the fruits of

the Spirit again in the context of the whole of Galatians.

Galatians 5, five to six says for through the Spirit we

eagerly wait by faith, the righteousness for which we hope

for in Christ Jesus. Neither circumcision nor

uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is

faith expressing itself through love.

And I take from this that we're to work through the Spirit.

We're to be patient and wait as this process, this righteousness

to come, starts to take root. And we need faith as we express

it through love. And what is it in which we hope?

What is the hope referred to here?

We know that it's Jesus who transforms us, who gives us

supernatural ability and power to be kind, although it's not

always in our nature. And we see this coming, this

fruit. It's partly now and it's partly

something that we'll only see in the far future, but we know that

it's, it's something that is constantly at work.

And then if we go back to our, our text in Galatians 5 today,

where we started in the same section where Paul speaks about

kindness in the fruits of the spirit, he repeats the same idea

three times. The 1st is in Galatians 516.

He says, so I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify

the desires of the flesh. And he speaks about the desires

of the flesh being contrary to this idea of the Spirit, to the

fruits of the Spirit, including kindness that we speak of.

Then he goes on in verse 25, he says since we live by the

Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit.

And then finally Galatians 6-7 to 8 gives us further ideas.

It says do not be deceived. God cannot be mocked.

A man reaps what he sows. Whoever sows to please their

flesh will reap destruction. Whoever sows to please the

Spirit from the Spirit will reap eternal life.

So can we, can we be kind by Googling ideas and just trying

really hard to implement them from tomorrow is I think we're

going to run out of steam pretty quickly.

But how do we sow into the Spirit?

Galatians as a whole tells us quite clearly it's by being so

close to the Spirit, keeping in step with the Spirit, living in

the Spirit. And what does that mean

practically? I see it meaning just walking so

closely with God is spending time with God, is being

dependent on him and daily decisions and thoughts as we

keep going back to him and saying, God, I can't do this

alone, but I, I know that you can.

And I believe you are transforming me and will

continue to transform me. And as we move away from that,

we probably get back into our works and we start to fail

again. And when we feel like we're

frustrated and we feel like we're not doing a good job,

rather than walking into the guilt, we just need to run back

and say, let me walk by the Spirit.

Let me keep in step with the Spirit.

How do I get closer to God? Because because guilt's part of

the reason is to drive us further and further away from

God. But how do I keep in step and

live with the Spirit? So let's do a bit of a personal

check in and consider our last month.

Were we kind? Karine's nodding.

I think she was. Were we kind?

If we were, was it to our family or was it to strangers?

What about people in this community?

What about people that repel us, that we don't respect?

Perhaps they sin in ways we don't.

Perhaps they're people who've been mean or unfair to us

personally. If you like me, we'll probably

find it easier to be kind to children.

We can find it easier to be kind to old people.

They seem to deserve our kindness more.

It seems more appropriate. And as Christians, we call to go

far beyond that. We're called to be kind to the

able bodied man who who doesn't spend as much of his income on

his family as he should. We call to be kind to the man

who spends more of his money on alcohol than his wife and kids.

The man who doesn't want to work even though we think he should

be called to be kind to the woman who sells her body on the

side of the road. Be called to be kind to the boss

at work. That's selfish and doesn't treat

us as an equal human being. These are the people that

include those we are called to be kind.

And remember as we do this, it sometimes seems a bit counter

even Christian. But to be kind does not mean to

condone sin. It does not mean to just be

permissive, it means to to just share God's kindness with them.

And why don't we consider those in this community?

Have we been kind to them in the last week, in the last month?

You might have heard the saying that the opposite of love is not

always hate. It can also be indifference.

So if if you haven't thought about anyone in this community,

if you haven't prayed for them, if you haven't seen them, if you

haven't prioritized them, perhaps that's something that

God might be pointing out to you.

It's, it's not, it's not. If we avoid, then we avoid being

kind. If we avoid, then we we probably

failing unkindness. And if kindness doesn't extend

beyond our partners or our our close knit family, then we're

probably not being full ambassadors for Christ and we're

probably not offering the world the kindness that only

Christians can and that they so desperately need.

So looking at a quick summary of today, our four questions that

we're looking at is what kindness?

If we remember one thing on the what I want us just to remember,

the golden rule is afraid of loss of how to be kind.

If we're not sure what the kind thing to do in the situation is,

we consider what would we want if we're in that person's shoes.

And in doing this, we want to remember that we don't need to

condone sin. We don't need to be permissive.

We just call to be kind. And the why?

His kindness and Our Calling as we can be kind because God was

first kind to us. He's resulted in US having life

and eternity. So as we overflow with his

kindness, we can imitate Him and be kind to those around us.

We know that to be kind is to be kind to everyone, even those

that we we don't feel deserve it because we didn't deserve it

when God was kind to us. And we'd accept our limitations

and cling to Christ on the how, because Christ is our only hope.

Without walking closely with God, without depending on Him

daily, we can never hope to transform our character and

offer the kindness to the world that it so desperately needs.

I'd like to pray for us as we close the message, if you can

stand. Heavenly Father, we want to

thank you for the Word today from Galatians, we want to thank

You that when the world can be so confusing and there's so many

messages, God, your message can come so clearly through your

Word in the Bible. Lord, help us as individuals, as

a community to cling to your truth.

Lord, help us to experience your kindness.

For anyone here who who hasn't experienced that kindness, who

that sounds foreign to, Lord, won't you move towards them once

you show them your kindness? Show them the path that leads to

life, that you accept them, that you love them, and that you want

a close relationship with them, Lord, For some of us who might

have taken your kindness for granted, Lord, that we've gone

in our own path and thought we can do things ourselves, draw us

back, Lord. Help us to depend on you to

transform our character so that we can see these fruits of the

Spirit more and more in ourselves each day, Lord, not

because we are good, but because you are so good.

And the closer we are to you, Lord, the more we can reflect

that, the more we can taste and feel what it is to have Your

kindness. Lord, we pray against the

barriers that we have to some types of people, especially

people who do things differently to us.

We all are so fallen and sin, Lord, but sometimes we, we tend

to feel better than those who sin differently to us.

Once you point that out to us, Lord LED us in this room, in

this community, let us people be people who are kind to everyone,

who are kind to who we see as the undeserving because we know

we too are undeserving of your great and eternal kindness.

Lord. We thank you for this beautiful

day, Lord, and we pray that you'll just move among us, be

with us this week. Fill us with your Spirit and

help us to move forward in peace and confidence with our hope and

you, Jesus Christ. I'm in.