Discombobulated by Divine Bias

Welcome to Gateway Churches Podcast.

Wherever you're tuning in from, we hope you're encouraged by today's message.

Summer reminds me of a lot of things.

Last night I live out in the boonies, about 30 minutes south of Nashville, Tennessee, and I sat in a chair and I watched Fireflies for about 30 minutes, and I thought, oh, this feels like summer to me.

And then I was in a friend's neighborhood last weekend and they still have ice cream trucks.

And I was like, oh, this just makes me so excited.

I want to put on stretchy pants when I hear the ice cream truck sound.

It makes me so happy.

I love the smell of people grilling hamburgers.

You said, you know, you gotta love summer.

Summer also reminds me of school because six years ago I started a doctorate, and the only way I could do it in residency was to go spend part of the summer in Denver, where I went to seminary at Denver Seminary.

And so school is part of my summers.

I'm trying to finish a doctorate, so pray for me.

You may want to lay hands on me.

I think I'm the dumbest person in my doctoral program, having a hard time with my thesis, but I loved classes in the summer.

As an older woman of faith, I love to learn more about Jesus.

And I just love going to school in Denver in the summers because if I had a bad day, I could go out and look at the mountains and I would be so encouraged.

And there was one moment I had at the end of my academic time, class time, uh, two summers ago.

I was in my second to the last class of my doctorate.

I was sitting in my class, I always got there early.

And my professor, Dr.

Brad Strait, came walking in.

There were just 10 of us in this class, and all of us are older because usually it takes being older to be willing to go back to school because the pain from earlier school has dissipated.

But we're all older, we're in this class, I'm there early, and Dr.

Strait comes walking in.

He gets the podium just like this.

He kind of shuffles his papers, and then he comes down from where he's standing, and he walks right down to where I'm sitting, and it made me nervous because I got in trouble a few times when I was in high school for talking too much and skipping, and then one of the seniors turned me in, and that was back when principals could hit you with a paddle and didn't have to worry about litigation.

So, you know, my rear end started to tingle when he came away and came walking down by me.

And then he came straight up to me, Professor Strait, and I was like, oh, shoot, this doesn't bode well.

I'm probably in trouble.

And then he stopped, and I know Sandy, and so don't try this at home.

We've practiced this.

Sandy Job is a dear friend, and I told her I was gonna do this, so don't worry.

I might spit on you though a little bit.

You know, I'm gonna spitter.

He came right down to me, like I'm doing to Sandy, and Dr.

Strait put his hands on the side of my face, and then he said, Lisa, do you know that you're God's favorite?

And I was like, So I was like, This is just awkward, this is super, super awkward, and there's nine other students, and I feel weird, and he's singling me out, and I don't think I wrote a very good paper, and I've always struggled a little bit with an orphan spirit.

My dad left when I was a kid, and there was some abuse and my backstory, and so I just kind of want things to be like everybody to be at peace, but I don't want to be singled out, and so I was like, Because I didn't really know what to say, and he would not look away, he went Lisa, kept his hands on the side of my face.

Do you know that you're God's favorite?

And y'all, you could have cut the tension in the room with a knife.

It's like we're in a classroom, and and you're a PhD.

Like, aren't you crossing some kind of propriety lines, or isn't there like a law about this nowadays?

This just feels we he did it like five times.

And by then I was just like, people can probably see, you know, when you know there's a balloon above your head saying, I feel really awkward, this is odd, I feel so awkward, everybody's staring at me, this is so awkward.

And finally I realized if I don't say yes, even if I'm telling a little white lie, if I don't say yes, he's not going to leave.

It's why they used to sing just as I am 47 times.

At the end of services when we were growing up, they're like, if we sing it enough, you'll eventually somebody will come forward so we can go to lunch.

I thought I'm gonna have to say yes, I know I'm God's favorite.

So after the fifth time, I was like, Yes, sir.

And he goes, Claire.

Goes to the next student.

Do you know you're God's favorite?

He does it to all nine of us, and we're all kind of like, well, ten of us, I was the tenth.

And then he goes, walks back up to the podium and goes, Today we're gonna talk about the immutable favor of God, that God loves us unconditionally, all of us, and we are all his favorites.

And because you receive the absolute favoritism of God does not mean you get a smaller piece of the pie.

And I thought, dang, that was a good prop.

That was really good.

We're God's favorites.

We're comfortable with favor.

Missy and I were at the mall yesterday with a friend, and she told me there's this great cupcake place at the mall that I hadn't tried.

I don't know if y'all have it here.

I think it's called Sally's Cupcakes.

And they're good, but they're like$45 a piece.

So we go in Sally's or whatever the cupcake place is, and she gets a cupcake, and then I just felt guilty because you're standing there, and I thought, okay, okay, I'll get a cupcake.

And then I asked Missy.

My daughter's 14, she's here.

She is, I brought her home from Haiti the year I turned 50.

I asked her.

Hard to tell she's adopted.

That is the biggest chunk of my heart right there.

Um, and by the way, I adopted her as a single woman.

So if you're over 60 and employed, um I'm looking for a baby daddy.

But anyway, um Missy, Missy said she didn't want a cupcake.

And I was like, score, because I didn't bring, you know, my gold card.

And then as we're checking out, this really sweet girl who was working behind the counter came walking up and she smiled at Missy and she said, Baby, just in case you want a cupcake later.

And she handed her a cupcake in this pretty little bag.

And as we're walking out the door, my friend Michelle said, Now that's favor.

Favor.

We're comfortable with favor.

Favor is an extra cupcake.

Favor is a good parking spot at the galleria.

Favor is good weather when you rented a place in Galveston because you're not bougie enough to go to 30A.

That's favor.

We're comfortable with favor as church people, but I bet you a nickel.

If Holy Spirit was personified tonight and he put his hands on the side of your face and said, Do you know that you're God's favorite?

I know your wife, so I can pick on you too.

Most of us would get a little uncomfortable.

That means the God of the universe sees us without spanks.

Gentlemen, if you don't know what that is, don't Google it.

You won't be able to unsee it.

Nothing in our lives is hidden from him.

He sees everything and he still says, You're my favorite.

Our human condition says that we can only be somebody's favorite if we deserve it.

Deservedness is part of the human condition.

Y'all, deservedness, earning God's favor, it's not biblically defensible.

It's not in there.

What Dr.

Strait was trying to model for us is true.

Every single one of us, we're his favorites.

Every single one of us, it doesn't matter if you're in a good season or a bad season.

It doesn't matter if you're in your stretchy pants or your zippered pants.

It doesn't matter if you just fussed at your child or you've been blessing them.

It doesn't matter if there's no divorce on your record or there is divorce on your record.

If you're walking with Jesus, stumbling toward Jesus, you're not only in the family of God, you're his favorite.

I'm 60 years old.

I've been walking with Jesus since I was five.

I still have a hard time hanging on to that.

It's kind of wet soap for me.

It's just it's slippery.

It's the foundational wall of our Christian orthodoxy.

But emotionally, as human beings, it's hard for us to hang on to the fact that God says you are so beautiful today.

I want to spend every moment of every day with you.

What's your favorite color?

We see him as divine.

But to see him as the one who calls us his favorite, is that is that even okay as a Christian?

Is that reverent?

I believe it is.

If you brought your Bible, return to the beginning, to Genesis.

He started telling us the story in the very beginning, Genesis chapter 48, verse 8.

Genesis 48:8

When Israel, and sometimes uh some of the names in scripture can be confusing.

Israel in Genesis chapter 48 is also Jacob.

Genesis 48 · chapter mention

Jacob, one of the great saints in the Old Testament, um, made some mistakes along the way.

But Jacob, and so he's also called Israel.

This is Joseph's daddy.

Don't you worry about the baby.

Uh, I told y'all when I was here in January, I love the sound of babies in church.

And when people don't and give mamas or dads dirty looks, I always pray they'll get hives because babies should be celebrated in church.

Part of it is becoming a mom late in life, but don't worry one bit about the baby.

I have a little bit of ADD anyway.

When Israel slash Jacob saw Joe's sons, he said, Who are these?

Joseph said to his dad, These are my sons, Dad, whom God has given me here.

And he said, Bring them to me, please, that I may bless them.

Now the eyes of Israel, slash Jacob, you still with me?

Remember his son Joseph that has the coat from Bidenton, all the many colors coat.

Jacob's one of the patriarchs.

Joseph, his brothers got jealous, and they threw him in a pit, and then he was sold into slavery.

And then remember Pharaoh's wife tatted on him about something that wasn't true because she made a pass at him and he didn't text her back, and so she lied, and then he got thrown in prison.

Y'all remember the story?

So Joseph, who because of his integrity, winded up becoming the number two guy in all of Egypt.

God reconciled him to his family.

Joseph is now coming back home from Egypt.

He's a grown man, he has two sons of his own.

His daddy, Jacob, his eyes are dim with age, said, Who are these kids you're bringing into my house?

I can tell they're boys because I can smell them from here.

My nephew lived with us for a while, and he moved in when he was 19.

And I was like, My goodness, he smells different than Missy.

It's just a beautiful, beautiful smell you boys have after you play basketball.

Now the eyes of Israel were dim with age, so that he could not see.

So Joseph brought them near him and he kissed him and embraced him.

And is and Israel, Jacob, said to Joseph, I never expected to see your face.

And behold, God has let me see your offspring also.

Then Joseph removed them from his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth.

And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh in his left hand toward Israel's right hand, and brought them near him.

And Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on the head of Ephraim, who is the younger, and his left hand on the head of Manasseh, crossing his hands, for Manasseh was the firstborn, and he blessed them and said, The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who has been my shepherd all my life to this day, the angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless these boys.

And in them let my name be carried on in the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.

When Joe saw this dad laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him, and he took his father's hand to move it from Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head.

And Joseph said to his father, Not this way, dad, since this one is the firstborn, put your right hand on his head.

But his father Jacob refused and said, I know.

I know.

I know exactly what I'm doing, Joe.

He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great.

Nevertheless, his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his offspring shall become a multitude of nations.

So he blessed them that day.

So here's the deal: during this ancient period of whole culture, they existed under this traditional cultural law of primogeniture.

And that just means the firstborn son is the one who gets all the blessing.

So if you're secondborn, too bad, so sad.

You do not get the inheritance.

The firstborn son is the son of favor.

He's the dad's favorite.

So in their culture, and this is still the case in many Semitic cultures, in their culture, that the patriarchs, that'd be a grandfather or a dad, or in the case of their deaths, an uncle, would pray blessing on the firstborn son, and he would lay his right hand on the firstborn son, because the right hand in biblical narrative is the hand of blessing.

The right hand is the hand of favor.

That's why you'll never read in scripture that Jesus sits at the left hand of God the Father.

It's always the right hand.

Even today, I was in Israel right before the fighting broke out.

When I'm with my Jewish friends, it would be unthinkable for them to greet me with their left hand.

That's dishonorable.

The right hand is the hand of honor.

So Job comes home from Egypt.

He comes to his aging dad who says, I can't believe I get to be reconciled with you and my grandsons.

I would like to pray a prayer of blessing.

He crosses his arms.

And y'all, those of y'all, how many Enneagram eights do we have in here?

I think the Enneagram is a bit of a cult, but it's still a good tool.

If you're an Enneagram eight, if you're a type A, if you're a firstborn, I brought a word for you.

It's actually a double word.

It comes from the Greek.

It's called a hapax ligamenon.

I paid a lot of money for my doctoral classes, so I want to show off and give you two words that I remember.

Haypax legomanon.

It comes from the Greek.

It means this was said once.

What that means is this, when Abraham crosses his arms, it only happens one time in all of Scripture.

This is the only time a blessing was given, and the blesser purposely, intentionally crossed his arms so as to put the right hand on the second son.

It's so unthinkable that Joseph himself says, Dad, I knew you had cataracts.

I didn't know they were that bad.

You're blessing the wrong boy.

And Jacob says, Boy, I know exactly what I'm doing.

I know exactly what I'm doing.

I'm blessing your second son.

The point God is making in this story is there's no firstborn and secondborns in the family of God.

There's no firstborns and secondborns.

We are all his favorites in your family of origin.

Maybe you are made to feel less than.

Maybe you have an orphan spirit because of the love you are desperate for that you didn't receive.

From the very beginning of this love story, we call the Bible, God is rewriting our history.

He's saying, You're a firstborn, you're a firstborn, your firstborn.

You are all my favorites.

I will never lay my hand of blessing on one and not give it to another.

If you're in Christ, you're not only in the family, you're my favorite.

I love that he crossed his arms.

I love that the secondborn was probably so discombobulated, he didn't know what to do.

I'm not less than.

It's not about my gender, it's not about my place in the family, it's not about my personality.

I'm your favorite too.

Yes, you're my favorite.

One of my mentors, former pastor, Scotty Smith, he said, Lisa, so many Christians are like Cinderella with amnesia.

We hear the story and we forget we're the one he wants.

We're the chosen one.

We're the favorites.

And because God knows we're a little slow on the pickup, this theme is, it's just gone over and over and over again in scripture.

You'll see this theme of us being his favorites.

That God is leveling that human understanding of deservedness and hierarchy.

And over and over again, he says, no, no, no, no, no, you're not, you're not the last, you're the first.

You're firstborn, your favorites.

Head over to 2 Samuel.

Similar story, similar theme.

I love this story in David's story.

This is toward the end of David's reign.

You know, he became the second king of Israel.

They had Saul, the people's choice for a king, and then there was David.

He was God's choice for a king.

He was anointed by Samuel when he was just a kid, still had clear cell dots on his face out tending sheep.

They forgot him, didn't even bring him into the lineup of potential kings.

And you remember Samuel said, Is there not one more?

And they said, Oh yeah, we've got a seventh grader tended sheep.

Bring him, bring him to me.

I'm taking the tiniest bit of liberty with the Hebrew here, but Doc can clear it up for you if you'll go to school.

Bring him, bring him to me.

And he sees David and he says, This is the one.

This is the one.

God has chosen to become the king of Israel.

And then there's over 30 years between his anointing and his appointing.

What made David a great king was he spent a whole lot of time in dark caves.

So many people these days want platforms.

And I'm like, the platform will kill you if you don't have time in the dark with God.

That's a whole nother sermon.

But anyway, David, David was a great king.

He stumbled a little bit, but this is later in his reign.

David says, chapter 9, verse 1, is there still anyone left in the house of Saul that I may show him kindness for Jonathan's sake?

You remember Jonathan and David were BFFs.

They started out playing t-ball together, ended up being on the Jerusalem football team together, double-dated at prom.

They were besties.

But remember, Jonathan's dad was the first king, and he was a narcissistic nutter, and he hated David because David was a folk hero, and people used to sing the song Saul has killed his thousands, but David has killed his tens of thousands.

Y'all grew up half Baptist like me too, and have heard these stories, right?

Seen them flannel graphed.

And so Saul hated David, and Saul tried to kill David, and Jonathan said, David, because you are like a brother to me, and I know my dad's kind of two sandwiches short of a picnic, I'll text you if I find out he's trying to kill you again.

I don't believe it's Yahweh's will that my dad murders you.

And that's exactly what happened.

Later on, after they made that vow, they're both very, very young men.

Most Old Testament scholars think they were still teenagers.

After they make that vow, Jonathan finds out his dad indeed does have another murder plot, and he lets David know.

And that's when David escapes with his life, kind of by the skin of his teeth, and begins the sojourn, this time away from the city that he loved, the place where he'd eventually be king, because Saul was trying to kill him.

So fast forward many decades, he's now the king, and he gets nostalgic and goes, Is there anybody left I can bless?

Jonathan died with his nutter of a father, Saul, in battle many, many, many years before.

And so he's been dead a long time.

And David just goes, Is there anybody left whom I can bless in light of that vow Jonathan and I made that we'd always have each other's backs?

Now there was a servant of the house of Saul whose name was Zeba, and they called him to David.

And the king said to him, Are you Zeba?

And he said, I am your servant.

And the king said, Is there not still someone of the house of Saul that I may show the kindness of God to him?

Zeba said to the king, There is still a son of Jonathan.

He is crippled in his feet.

So what happened was when Jonathan and Saul were Were killed.

Tradition in that ancient era is that whoever the next king was coming into power, he would kill anybody related to the previous king so as to ward off any potential coups.

It was considered political wisdom.

It's also genocide.

And so the people who were related to Saul assumed that when David was coming in to take over as the king of Israel, the second king of Israel, then they didn't make themselves real scarce because it wasn't going to go well for them.

Of course, that wasn't the case, but they were afraid David would try to kill him.

And there was a nanny carrying Jonathan's baby boy, Mephibosheth, it's hard to pronounce, so I always call him Bo, carrying Bo.

Bo is a toddler.

She's trying to hightail it out of the palace before David's entourage comes in.

And she was nervous and probably slipped on the tile, and she dropped the baby.

And it broke both of his ankles.

And so Ziba, the servant, says to David, Yes.

Jonathan actually had a little boy.

And years ago, when they were fleeing Jerusalem, the nanny dropped him, broke his ankles.

I heard he's still a cripple.

He lives in a place called Low Dabar.

Do y'all remember what Low Dabar means?

Barren place.

So just imagine this man now in his 30s.

As a child, he was the grandson of the king.

Probably, you know, had a nanny with a degree from some fancy school in London.

Had all of his little onesies hand smocked.

Mama shopped at the galleria, probably at Neiman's.

And now he's ostracized, middle of nowhere, Oklahoma.

You know.

Sorry, I think y'all have a church there.

He's in the Dust Bowl.

He's in a government subsidized apartment.

He's sitting in the lazy boy with duct tape on the arms, watching QVC him, and his life is barren.

David says, go get him.

So this emissary of the king goes to load a bar to the barren place, knocks on the door.

Can you imagine Bo's reaction when he opens the door and goes, oh, snap.

Somebody from the king is showing up, bringing a message that the king wants an audience with me.

Jig is up.

They've found me.

They're gonna bring me back to Jerusalem, and they are gonna kill me.

Because my granddaddy was a nutter who tried to kill the king.

So my backstory is so broken and so Jerry Springer.

I mean, this is it for me.

This is the end.

I can imagine him trudging back to Jerusalem thinking it's over for me.

They bring him in front of King David, and David says, Mephibosheth.

Now this is my imagination.

Scripture doesn't clarify this, but I like to think he looked like Jonathan, don't you?

I like to think that David went, oh my god.

He looks like his dad.

My best friend.

And Mephibosheth sees the king, and you know what he does?

He doesn't go, I'm your favorite.

He does what I did.

He gets nervous.

And then he actually gets down on his knees and says to David, What would a king like you do with a dog like me?

And David says, He says, I made a vow with your dad.

Which means you're now my son.

Which means you will always sit at my table.

That doesn't mean he's coming over for burgers and to play dictionary and then they flick the lights and he has to leave after three hours.

The table in biblical narrative is you're part of the family.

You're in.

You're not leaving.

You can bring a you-halt.

You are in.

And the end of that chapter, I love the very last verse that says, and Mephibosheth always ate at the king's table, and he was crippled in both feet.

In other words, he wasn't fixed.

He was still a mess.

He still didn't deserve to be the favorite, but he was always right there at the king's table.

God says over and over and over again this love story: you're not just mine because I sent Jesus to deliver you.

You're mine because I delight in you.

From the very beginning, you've always been my favorite.

That's a theme we see in Romans chapter 8.

Romans 8 · chapter mention

When Paul says we're co-heirs with Christ.

We have Holy Spirit who reminds us we have the right to call God what?

Creator of the universe?

Divine, sovereign, king, all that's true.

But that's not what Holy Spirit says.

You have the right to call him dad.

And just like Bo, you get the best seat at the table, co-heirs with Christ.

In other words, you're firstborn.

You get all the inheritance.

You're the favorites.

You're not the ones who have to duck your head because you know you don't really fit and you're just happy to still still sit at the kitty table at Thanksgiving, even though you're 38.

He says, No, your favorites, your firstborns.

Summer also reminds me of camp.

I grew up going to camp, Christian camp, started going when I was in the eighth grade, didn't want to go, but my mom just kind of gently manipulated me.

And um, and I mean I ran smack into the grace of God, um, singing kumbaya, having fires, saying I would never ever again put an alcoholic beverage in my Slurpee at Burger King after a football game.

I mean, I just fell hard for Jesus.

I repented, even though I was a kid, I'd already started to make some bad choices because I never felt like I fit.

And so, whatever people were doing, I would just do what they did so that they would like me.

And uh I fell in love with Jesus hard when I was a young woman at Summer Camp.

And I loved everything about Christian summer camp.

I grew up in Central Florida, so this was at a camp in Florida, not here, not Pine Creek, although I've heard amazing things about that and Gateway.

There was only one thing at camp that I didn't love that has scarred me for life, and it was called the Sadie Hawkins Dance.

Um, those of y'all under 40 don't know who Sadie Hawkins was because of litigation.

But Sadie Hawkins is what we used to celebrate when those of us who have the potential of discounts at McDonald's were younger, and that was when they would switch traditional gender roles, and the girls would invite the boys to a dance.

And so at this Christian camp on the very last afternoon of camp, we had a Sadie Hawkins Day race.

So they would line up all the girls in camp on one side of the soccer field, and then all the boys would be on the other side of the soccer field.

So there'd be like 250 teenage girls all lined up, and 140 or 50 scared, skinny teenage boys who'd been forced there by their mothers.

And when some sadistic Christian college kid blew a whistle, all the girls would chase the boys.

And then whoever you caught, you took with you to the dance, which is why we struggled being submissive, gentlemen.

Um, you give us mixed messages, um, but we would take them, and it wasn't a dance either.

We weren't allowed to dance, it was like super serious Christian camp.

We just stood around in the camp cafeteria, but they called it a dance.

And said, this one summer camp, I was 13.

And I mean the the it boy of camp, Jeff McGarvey.

Um, he's married to a beautiful, lovely woman and lives in Florida now.

But Jeff McGarvey, when I was 13, ooh, ooh, he I got a little non-church there for a while, Pastor.

I'm sorry.

I'm old, but I still have a drop of estrogen left in me.

Just he was just it.

So he was like the Brad Pitt or the Denzel Washington or the Bono.

I mean, he was just it.

And so we're all lined up, the boys are on that side, and I mean all the girls, like probably half of them are talking about they're gonna chase Jeff McGarvey.

They're gonna try to catch Jeff McGarvey.

Now, normally I'm a win bag, so normally I'd be talking too.

But this one Sadie Hawkins race, I'm just standing there grinning, because I have a secret.

Because Jeff McGarvey had come by my cabin about an hour earlier, and I knew him.

His mom was my piano teacher.

And he asked for me, and my camp counselor was like, Lisa, Jeff McGarvey is waiting.

He was wearing these LeCogue sportif tennis shorts, and still remember, and he had hairy legs, which was cool because a lot of them hadn't come through puberty yet.

So he was just so cute, and he had kind of an afro, and he's outside the cabin, and he's kind of doing his Chuck Taylors in the dirt.

His neck was all splotchy when I walked out.

He was like, hey, uh, I was just wondering if uh when we have the race, if I mean, you know, if if you want to chase me, I just wanted to tell you I'd let you tag me.

And I was like, okay.

So the camp counselor blows the whistle, and y'all like probably a hundred girls start taking chasing Jeff, but he was really athletic.

And he gets away from the girls, and he had told me, if you'll stand over by the laundromat by where we would wash our clothes at camp in the snack store, I'll let you tag me.

So I just walk over by the laundromat and the snack shop, which I loved anyway, and here comes Jeff flying up through the woods.

And he was like, and I was like, and that night, y'all, it was like a wedding.

Jeff Cassina was it?

I was wearing a peach Kiana knit dress.

And Jeff wore an ice blue polyester suit with a vest.

And uh we stood in the cafeteria, and he was such a big deal that everybody filed in and greeted us like we were like the couple.

And I grinned so big standing next to Jeff that my cheeks started to cramp.

I just, I couldn't believe it.

I still love the memory because it was the last really good date I've had.

But like my cheeks were just like little hard balls.

I was just like, he picked me.

He picked me.

Jeff could have had anybody.

There's girls who are so much prettier and sweeter and come from better families and don't have all the mess I have.

But he picked me.

That's the gospel.

That's the story over and over and over and over again.

He picked us.

He picked us.

You're his favorite.

You may not be anybody else's favorite, which is why it's hard for you to believe that the God of the universe says, that's us the son.

That's my son.

That's my girl.

Isn't she beautiful?

That's my girl.

Pastor Mark is gonna come up and wrap up this family meeting.

But um, pastors of the other campuses, if I could ask for one more favor, um don't switch yet to your campus.

Stay live for just a second more.

Uh, pastors get ready.

Um, and Pastor Mark, you can come up, sir.

Um, I know I haven't earned this right.

I know I'm a guest in this house and so thankful to be one.

Um, I ask you to just bow your heads and close your eyes, not to be religious, but to be respectful for the other saints in this place and the saints on your campuses who maybe it was a stretch for them to come to church.

Uh maybe they've been wounded in church or by Christians.

And I'm gonna ask everybody to raise their right hands so you won't hear hands go up around you, so it won't be threatening.

And and open your right hand, like just spread your hand out.

If you have never felt like a firstborn, if it's hard for you to imagine the God in the universe putting his hands on the side of your face and saying, You're my favorite.

Would you just close your hand into a fist so pastors can see who they have the privilege of praying with and for tonight?

Because we're gonna pray that there's no orphan spirit left in this house when we dissipate.

We're gonna pray that this is the beginning of you leaning more fully into the embrace of God.

You believing that Jesus says, Oh man, I'd go back to the cross all over again for this one.

This one is worth it to me.

Just keep your hands raised.

And those of y'all who would just honestly say, Pastor, we pray for me that I'd begin to believe bigger that I'm God's favorite.

Keep those hands in a fist so they can see the saints they have the privilege of praying for.

Thanks for joining us today.

If you'd like to connect with us, text Connect to 71010 or visit gatewaypeople.com.

We hope you have a great week.