The Reset Button

This past Friday night, I took my wife on a date.

Uh, we love to go on dates.

I love to go on dates, and when we go on dates, I've got sort of two jobs.

The first is uh I pick up the check.

Okay, that that's uh I've been given that responsibility, and so I do that.

But then the set the second thing is uh I try to come up with a thought-provoking question that we can discuss.

Otherwise, if we go by default, we end up talking about work and kids.

You know what I mean?

That's not a very hot date.

You know what I'm talking about?

You ever been out on one of those?

You're like, why do we keep talking about this?

And if we're not careful, that's where we go.

So I try to come up with a good conversation starter.

And this last time, uh Friday night, um, I brought up the question what causes you to either gain or lose respect for a person?

We started with the under the assumption that every human being has at least one or two respectable qualities, but in their totality, a person may not have been able to gain your respect, right?

Honor is given, respect is earned, and it can be lost.

And so we we we had that conversation.

I'm not gonna tell you what she said because she didn't give me permission to do that, and so if she wants to share that with you, she can.

Uh I'm gonna I'll talk about, you know, I hadn't really thought about it until we started discussing it, and as I started processing it, I kept coming back to um actually 2 Peter 3, where Peter says, always be growing in grace and knowledge.

Always be growing in grace and knowledge.

And I think the combination of knowledge, growing in knowledge, and growing simultaneously in grace is really the recipe for maturity.

Think about it.

If you only grow in knowledge, which I think, by the way, I love people that are always learning and growing in knowledge, learning new things.

Um, I think embedded in always learning, being a learner all your life, embedded in there is humility.

Because you have to be willing to listen to people.

You know, they say leaders are readers, right?

Well, what's a reader?

A reader's a listener.

You're sitting down there for eight hours of a book or however long it takes you to read, and you're listening to another person's thoughts.

And so for you to be able to sit and actually think that other people saying things have something to offer you, or that even if you don't agree fully with what they say, you're looking for a nugget in there that you can learn from.

I just love people like that.

I don't like hanging out with know-it-alls.

I like hanging out with curious people that are just always in a state of learning.

But if you grow in knowledge, but you don't grow in becoming gracious, okay, uh, you become smarter, but not necessarily mature.

A smart person can win an argument, but it takes a mature person to resolve a conflict.

A smart person has all the answers, but it takes a mature person to be willing to think of all the perspectives, to have empathy, to be able to look at life through someone else's lens, to be able to put yourself there.

And so, you know, I think growing in grace and knowledge is a gift Peter gave to us in 2 Peter 3 of how we grow in maturity.

And this is the spirit of this whole series of teachings on theology.

I didn't come to just be academic, give you fill in the blanks and multiple choice, and now you have the right answers.

That's why we spent the whole first message just talking about your approach mentally.

Like, how are you approaching this?

Because otherwise you could just inform yourself and you could have all the right answers and all the right arguments.

And in so doing, what is your personal spiritual formation actually?

Uh, what's happening there?

Are you be who are you becoming?

And is this really transforming you as a person?

Is this maturing you and deepening you as a person?

Or if all you've done is just educate yourself?

It it's a combination of the two.

Um, what I want to do today is I I told you last week that that this week I was going to give you a theological hack or a default, some sort of true North that, like, in all the complexity of theology.

So let's say that you're using the Bible for your source of theology, you believe the Bible is God's word.

There's a lot of places you can sort of get lost and confused and overwhelmed in the Bible.

It's 66 books, it's many, many authors, it's written in three languages.

The books are literate literature, they're written in different genres.

So you have some that are poetic and some that are historical narrative, and each, according to the culture that they were written in, use hyperbole at certain points and use metaphor at certain points, and and so what's literal and what's not, and that's why like sincere people don't always agree.

And so, if you are finding yourself sort of going cross-eyed on theology, how can I make the complex simple in a way that's not irresponsible?

Today I'm gonna give you that, all right?

Okay, so I'm gonna give you my point, my main point right now, and then I'm gonna go and work on it.

Alright?

So here we go.

Here's the this is it.

This is your true north, this is your default, this is your reset button.

Jesus is perfect theology.

Jesus is Jesus is perfect theology.

What are you talking about, dude?

And how are you gonna prove that?

And and where'd you even come up?

How can you make a statement like that?

Okay, let's go, let's go academic for a minute.

Go into the Old Testament, you will see the Old Testament is written in two languages, primarily in Hebrew, but also in Aramaic.

Um, in Hebrew, the name for God is the name Yahweh.

That's the Hebrew word Yahweh.

It shows up as early as Genesis 2.

So think about it like this: Genesis 1, God creates the heavens and the earth, right?

He makes all of this, all this.

And in Genesis 2, the guy or the being that made all of this is identified as Yahweh.

That's him.

In Exodus 3, God Himself connects the dot by referring to himself as Yahweh to Moses at the burning bush.

So Yahweh is the one that made all this stuff.

The heavens and the earth.

The earth, the ecosystem, the microscopic, the macroscopic, and then you look out the things millions of light years away.

That's Yahweh.

6,828 times God is called Yahweh in the Old Testament.

Okay.

You follow the nation of Israel, the nation of Israel eventually, they've been taken over by other nations, eventually you get to 250 BC, and they are operating under essentially the system that Alexander the Great created when he was creating an empire.

So the Greco-Roman culture has proliferated all the way to the Jewish people.

So now the Jewish people, although they are their background or their ancestry goes back to being Hebrew, they are very, very Greco-Roman.

They're very, very Greek.

They've been Hellenized.

And so now what you have are a lot of people that really don't speak that good of Hebrew.

And so many, when they're trying to read the Old Testament, they can't even really understand it.

And so the Old Testament is translated into Greek.

The New Testament's written into Greek, but the Old Testament's translated into Greek in what's called the Septuagint.

Okay.

So you see the timeline here, 250 BC, the Septuagint.

All of the translations of Yahweh in Hebrew into the Greek is the word kurios.

So what does curios mean?

Curios means Yahweh.

Curios means God.

If you read it in English, you'll see either God or Lord.

Every single reference to Yahweh in the Old Testament, in Hebrew, is translated into curios in the Septuagint.

You tracking with me?

Hang with me.

I'm just going to teach it a little bit more, and then we'll get into preaching.

Alright?

Alright.

So now you have it in Greek curios.

In the New Testament, all of the, we see, you know, Jesus shows up at the AC, AD, BC, right, about 5 AD.

When Jesus shows up, all of the New Testament writers, the gospel writers, everybody that wrote the New Testament, very intentionally, 422 times in almost all the books of the New Testament, refer to Jesus as curios.

Why?

What's the point?

Because the New Testament writers were making a very clear point that Jesus wasn't just a disruptive revolutionary, he wasn't just a dynamic teacher, that Jesus was Yahweh.

Fully God.

This is a theological principle that he's fully God, fully man.

So they're tracking Jesus back to the Septuagint, curios, back to Yahweh, Genesis 1 and 2.

Okay?

Alright, so let me show you how this shows up.

700 BC, right?

Isaiah writes this in Isaiah 40, verse 3.

Isaiah 40:3

Speaks of uh it's a prophecy that one day there will be a voice calling of one calling in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make straight the desert and highway of our God.

Okay, that's Isaiah 40, that's 700 BC.

Alright, well, Matthew, in 600 AD, so nearly 800 years later, he writes this, connecting the dot.

In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea and saying, Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near.

And then he connects the dot from Yahweh to Kyrios to Jesus.

He said, This is the one who spoke who was spoken of through the prophet Isaiah 700 BC, a voice of one calling in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord and make paths straight for him.

In John 1.18, it says, No one has ever seen God, but the one and only Son, who is himself God, is also in closest relationship with the Father and has made him known.

John 1.29 says the next day John saw Jesus coming toward him and said, Look, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world.

What point are you making, Greg?

The point I'm making is Jesus is perfect theology.

If Jesus is curios, track back to Yahweh, the one that created the heavens and the earth, right?

In Colossians, Paul says, Yeah, he's the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.

For by him all things are created, things in heaven and he's the one holding all this together.

Okay?

And so if that is true, and that's what the Bible's teaching us, then when we look at Jesus, what we see in him being fully God is that he is perfect theology.

So if I'm getting lost in the wilderness, or I'm getting lost in the tabernacle, or I'm getting lost in the old test.

Okay, at some point I've got to come through.

This is why uh if you're brand new starting out, probably a wise Bible teacher would tell you if you're just opening your Bible for the first time, probably don't start in Genesis 1-1.

You'd start in the book of John.

Because if I start in the book of John, now I can understand perfect theology, and now the pieces I can start having them fit into place.

Okay.

If Jesus is perfect theology, how do we wring every bit of theology out of Jesus that we can?

How do we learn everything so that we can not only know but live perfect theology?

To live growing in knowledge and grace.

How can we live this?

Okay, I'm gonna give you three things.

The the first thing is this we look at what he taught.

You start there, you look at what he taught.

Now, if you have um if you have a hard copy of the Bible, there's red letter editions of the Bible, right?

What are the red letters?

The red letters are the words and the teachings of Jesus.

And so if you read the teachings of Jesus, you're gonna get a lot of good stuff.

What you'll notice is that Jesus teaches things that are profound, but they're really, really often very simple.

He'll talk about the kingdom of God, but he will also uh he talks a lot about relationship with God and how that affects our relationship to ourself and our relationship to other people.

Jesus really talked a lot.

Like you you you can't miss the relationship Jesus brings from theology to actually relationship.

So I'll give an example.

I'll give you three quick teachings of Jesus.

One is the great commandment love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, strength, and love your neighbor as yourself.

Okay.

Love your neighbor as yourself.

That'd be nice.

What what what if what if you don't love yourself?

That's a that could be a problem.

That's actually bad news for both you and your neighbor.

So, how would I go about loving myself?

Because there are some of us in here who would be honest enough to say, I haven't learned how to do that yet.

Well, the way you learn how to do that is actually in the first part of the Great Commandment.

Love the Lord your God with all your heart.

Well, how would I love God?

Well, we love him because he loved us first.

So I receive the love of God, I give the love of God.

When I'm in a loving relationship with Yahweh, Curios, the one who sent Jesus to die for our sin.

When I'm in a loving relationship, then I'm completely and totally in my heart, my soul, my mind and my strength, my body, my emotions, all of it, my all of it, I'm loved in that way.

Then now I can love myself.

And now that I love myself, I can love my neighbor as myself.

Imagine a world where that was happening.

My goodness, what would that happen to your neighborhood?

Like what would happen to your family?

What would happen to the toxic work?

There'd be no more toxic work environments.

I mean, it would it would be revolutionary.

So this is red letter stuff, Jesus taught.

He taught, you know, Matthew 7, 12, which is the the the golden rule.

Whatsoever you would have them do, you know, people do unto you, do that to them.

Do unto others as you would have them do unto you, right?

You like people stabbing you in the back?

No, then don't do it to them.

Do you like when people are talking about you behind your back?

No.

Then don't talk about them.

You like people talking about your wife, then keep my wife's name out your mouth.

Okay, if you I know I had to let it settle for a few months and then I have my jokes ready.

Um you like people cutting you off in traffic?

No, then don't cut them off in traffic, right?

Like if you sat down and just thought of all the things you didn't want people to do to you and then you just didn't do it to them, the world would be a better place.

So so Jesus teaches some of this red letter stuff right on the nose, it's good stuff.

Oh yeah, here's one.

Peter, his friend, comes to him and he's like, you know, Jesus, I want to be a good forgiver, but I don't want to get taken advantage of.

So, you know, fool me once, shame on you.

Fool me twice, shame on me.

But you know, I want to go above and beyond.

Should I forgive like three times?

Maybe four?

What about seven?

And Jesus goes, no.

Seventy times seven.

Okay.

Well, what's he doing?

Well, he's doing a few things there.

One, he's helping to orient Peter to reality.

Peter, you're a human and you're surrounded by humans, so you better get good at forgiving.

You're gonna have to forgive a lot.

Now, that doesn't mean that you don't put up boundaries, that doesn't mean you remain in harm's way.

Because you love yourself, because you know how loved you are by God.

You love yourself and your neighbor enough to create protection and safety and make good choices.

But that does not preclude you from forgiving.

So he said, just get ready.

It's not seven, it's like 490, probably north of that.

Okay?

So what's he doing?

Now he's giving not only practical advice because you can't really separate theology from relationship completely.

But the second thing he's doing is helping you understand God because if you've if you're like me and you've ever made repeat mistakes with God, like God, I swear I'll never do that again, and then I did it again.

And actually, I did it a bunch of times, like seven or more.

Or it's like, God, I promise I'll always do that, and then I quit doing it by February.

Many years in a row, at some point you start wondering, is God fed up with me?

Is God running out of grace?

Is God like, you know, I'm gonna have to create some distance here?

So as Jesus is teaching red letter stuff, he's teaching us about God and how that would then spill over into our relationships.

So if you want to wring all the theology out of curiosity, you you would start with what he taught, but that's not it.

That's not all.

There's more.

The second is you gotta look at how he taught, how he taught.

Uh it says in the book of uh Mark, chapter four, that Jesus never taught publicly without using parables.

So he he told stories, he didn't teach in fill in the blanks, he didn't teach in multiple choice, he didn't say hurry up and memorize this.

He taught in narrative form.

Why?

Because those stories and those lessons will keep working over time, and actually they'll they'll keep teaching over time.

So think of it like this, okay?

What is your favorite Christmas movie?

Okay.

Uh Home Alone?

Anybody out there?

Okay, elf.

It's a wonderful life.

Die Hard?

No, I know that's a controversy.

It's a can of worms, that was last week.

Think about a great movie.

Think about a movie that maybe you started watching as a child and you've watched many, many times.

And maybe, maybe there's a movie, it might be a Christmas movie or some other kind of great movie, that you started watching as a kid and you've now watched as you've gotten older.

And what you know about those stories is they every time you watch them in a different season of life, you get something new.

When you if you watch Home Alone as a kid, you saw one thing.

You you identified with little McAllister, right?

You you identified with all that.

And but if you watch it as a parent, you see something totally different in that story.

Okay, you watch It's a Wonderful Life as a kid, it doesn't mean much to you.

You watch it at retirement age, you you you watch it in a season where you think you've been working real hard and you're not sure what it all means, and am I really making any difference at all?

And I put out a lot of effort, but man, is this you watch It's a Wonderful Life at the end when everybody's showing up to help him pay his bills, you're like, oh man, okay, okay, why?

It means something different in a different season.

And so this is why Jesus never taught publicly without using parables.

You know, I did a uh a message this last year where I was in Luke 15 and I was talking about the trifecta of parables of Jesus when he taught about the lost coin, the lost sheep, and the lost son.

I've heard that story all my life.

I grew up in church, I've been hearing about the lost sheep, I've been hearing about the lost coin.

I've been preaching almost 20 years.

I've taught that story so many times.

After 41 years of hearing and teaching the story, this last year, I decided to look at it again and watch it again.

And I'm looking at it real close and I start seeing things I'd never seen before in that story.

I was I was looking at it through my life experience now and what I've been, and I and I noticed, I knew what was the same about the three stories, but I started noticing what was different.

And that in the story of the lost coin, Jesus uses the metaphor of an inanimate object to actually symbolize a human being.

And so he says the the coin was misplaced.

That the coin didn't make a choice, you know, I'm gonna get myself lost.

It was placed somewhere.

And I said, Well, how does that apply to human beings?

And now the Holy Spirit's working on my heart, and now I'm starting to get revelation as I'm looking at it for after 41 years of having watched the movie, and I come back to it and I'm looking at it and I realize how many people have been misplaced.

Your first 10 years of your life, you don't get to pick anything.

First 10 years of your life, they didn't ask you who you wanted your babysitter to be.

They didn't, you didn't get to pick what family you were born into, you didn't get to pick what neighborhood you were born into.

They told you, go there, do that, shut up, go there, eat this, do that.

Okay, and so you ended up with rooms with people you didn't choose, and you ended up with family with people you didn't choose, and you ended up in an environment.

And so now the first 10 years of your life, there's a decade of stuff happening to you at nine years old.

You don't even have the faculties emotionally or mentally to be able to sort out.

So now here you are in your next decades trying to figure out what happened to you when you were nine because you got placed somewhere, and so the story of the lost coin is about people who were placed somewhere that they didn't have any choice, and God's ability to find them wherever they had been placed.

I didn't see that for 41 years.

Maybe that's why Jesus taught him parables because he wants you to go watch the movie again and see what you missed.

Look at it real close, sit with it.

What's different here?

What am I not seeing here?

That's theology.

And listen, I want I want you to hear me.

If all you do is focus on the red letters of what Jesus said, you'll miss the black letters of what Jesus did.

And there's as much theology in the black letters as there is in the red letters.

So if you want to wring all the theology out of curiosity you're gonna have to look at not just what he taught but how he taught when Jesus taught the Sermon on the Mount he taught about unlearning you've heard it said this but I say this.

You've heard it said this but I say this.

When we put up the Wesleyan quadrilateral we talked about tradition.

You grow up in a tradition you grow up in a way of doing things and certain things to believe and with that tradition if you grew up in a strong tradition you know that there's social pressure to that there's there's essentially what feels like uh an existential threat if I was to not follow that tradition if I was to go make my own path and some of you tried to sort of deviate from the tradition you were in and you I mean they rained it down on you okay your family and your friends and people they let you step outside of what you've been taught and in some way you're in this emotional struggle.

Jesus is talking to people he's getting ready to flip the whole thing he's getting ready to change all kinds of stuff so he's talking to them you've heard it said this but I say this you've heard it said this was their tradition and Jesus is teaching them how to unlearn certain things so you can see it.

You can power wash it and get it as pure as you can get okay you got to look at what not just what he taught but how we taught the third thing is we look at who he was not just what he taught and how he taught but who he was as a person.

Jesus talks about I'm the bread of life he talks about I'm the living water he talks about I am I am the way the truth and the life but when you watch Jesus' life and you watch the narrative and you read it you'll notice there's theology embedded all in there.

We did a series this last year called Interrupted where we were in Mark chapter six and we we we we noted we looked at how Jesus he chose a method of traveling where he went across across the Sea of Galilee in a boat which was efficient but Jesus didn't use all of the efficiencies he had at his disposal he could have run across the Sea of Galilee he could have taken a horse across the Sea of Galilee he could have teleported himself he didn't use all that what he do he sat in a boat and patiently waited on the wind to push them across most of the time and he sat there with people and invested in the disciples then he hits the shore and gyrus who has a massive sense of urgency because his little daughter's on her deathbed Jesus could have phoned in a miracle which he did in other parts of scripture but he slow walks with gyrus and then the woman with the issue of blood interrupts him and instead of going oh you just had you're just hemorrhaging I gotta go help this little girl he stops and he and and he he invests in that relationship and and he ministers to her and so what is he doing?

He's teaching us theology man we're seeing priorities.

We're seeing that to him this woman who was ceremonially unclean was just as important to him as a girl who's on her deathbed and and so you there's theology all in the like who Jesus was and you know this because if you look at your life and you look at the people who have made the biggest impact on you who have really trained you the people you've learned from the most you probably have to rack your brain to get a bunch of notable quotables off of these people it wasn't that it was who they actually were I've been thinking about this actually my mom and dad I I look at like they're the two most profound influences in my life and I look back I can't I'd have to really think to come up with 10 like sound bites 10 like red letter things it was really their lives.

My mom I remember when I was little I I I was watching the news and and I saw um a tornado hit a city and flattened the the city and they're showing video of these houses that were splintered and it's like this many people died X number of people died.

And so I realized man tornadoes can kill you.

And so a few whatever sometime later the news comes on hey there's a tornado watch in our county I go to bed man I cannot sleep I'm laying there eyes wide open I go wake my mom up mom I can't sleep what's wrong I said there's a tornado watch man I'm afraid I'm gonna go to sleep I'm gonna die in my sleep and my mom goes okay where do you think is the safest place in the house I said basement she said all right come on we go down the basement she flips on the light she's like what do you think is the most safest place in the basement what's the most safe place in the basement that table looks pretty sturdy maybe under that table she said okay where's the sleeping bag she gets a sleeping bag she sets me up a little sleep she goes would you feel better sleeping under this table in this basement frankly it was a bad plan because if everything went down that table was going to crush me but whatever she's like would you feel better sleeping under there?

I said I would feel really good and she goes okay so I go lay down and she goes listen if if a tornado hits this place in the middle of the night okay you'll probably be the only safe one but you're probably gonna be stuck down here for a few days so I'm gonna go pack a suitcase and I'm gonna get you a change of clothes and some snacks because you might have to wait it out until they come rescue you was like okay so my mom true story literally went and packed the bag with clothes and snacks and tucked it up under the feeble little table and I snuggled up to it and slept like a baby and every time a tornado came through town I went right back to my post what was my mom teaching me some deep stuff dude my mom was teaching me how to enter with someone into their fear she didn't go Greg you're gonna be fine go back to bed shut up quit being a baby there's no way a tornado's gonna do that she did none of that she helped me come up with a plan we collaborated on a plan she validated my concern and entered with me dude some deep learning there deep learning there when I was a little bit older um we were hanging out with some people who had way more than we had nicer house nicer cars nicer stuff I got in a car and I started loathing our standard of living wish we had more why can't we have what they have my mom did not say a single word she just took our a right turn and drove into the poorest parts of our community and drove and I saw folk who were homeless I saw houses that were breaking down I saw what my mom taught me was perspective.

What my mom taught me by the way my mom might have had the same feelings I was having frankly maybe in her own way she was feeling some of that type of stuff my mom taught me how to ground yourself when you're feeling some kind of way you know you need to come over here and you need to count your blessings.

You need to stop thinking about what you don't have start thinking about what you do have she gave me no red letters none she didn't say any of that she just drove me through by who she was and what she did.

My dad when I was a kid we had friends that they lost their job and so my dad came and my my bedroom at that point was in the basement because I moved the basement because you know tornadoes and uh that's true that's a true story.

I'm not proud of it I'm just telling you what happened and so my dad said hey this family's moving in with us for a while I don't know how long they're gonna be here but they're gonna move in our basement they lost their job they need help then we can't do everything for everybody we can do something for somebody who he was my dad at 60 years old decided to run a marathon he'd never run a marathon you know knees not all that great joints not all that great decided to run a marathon so he went to the University of Akron and took a college class on how to run a marathon taught me about preparation.

Then he went out and he's running the marathon mile marker 18 I go to every mile marker I'm cheering him on come on dad you can do it build four tough baby he gets a he gets a mile marker 18 and he's shuffling like it was it looked like cross country skiing.

Okay he's doing this and he looks over I'm like you're gonna make it and he and he goes like this he's like my dad taught me how to ask for prayer my dad taught me how to put one foot in front of the other and sometimes you gotta plod.

Dude sometimes it's not high knee and pretty dude sometimes you gotta plod.

You gotta just put one foot in front I'm not a good plotter.

I learned how to plod from my pops putting one foot in front of the other we get to the finish line the finish line's at home plate of like the minor league ball stadium in Akron is at home plate and dude they're starting to tear the thing down because it's been a long time and they they put it I'm just telling you the truth and we weren't sure like is is he gonna make it right so we're sitting there man all of a sudden like right at the end my dad comes busting through you know the the the wall at the back you know you come through the outfield wall and he comes through and his both feet were almost off the ground at the same time you know he's coming through like this okay stronger than he was at my marker 18 he comes through that thing man we dogpile him yeah and I'm like dad how'd you do that man?

How'd you come through so strong?

He said man listen I decided I'm gonna finish in the time I want to finish it he said he goes so here's what I did he goes I stopped outside the stadium because I didn't want y'all to see me come you know limping through the finish line so he goes I stopped I caught my breath I got a big drink of water I stretched out my legs he said I can want to come through as strong as I can my dad taught me how to finish strong how do you finish strong I don't care if you you can tear it down if you want I'm coming through when I'm ready I'm gonna finish strong tell me how to finish strong but speaking of finish strong my dad's in his late 60s went back to school and got his doctrine not necessarily not necessarily an academic guy but he just wrote a dissertation I was on school watching my dad defend his dissertation in his late 60s okay he didn't sit down and give me red letters dude it was his life you want to wring all the theology out of Jesus you can yeah read the red letters it's real good stuff in fact sometimes it's painfully simple and you're gonna have to just decide you want to do it or not but if you really want to get all the theology out of it look at the black letters too what he did.

Pay attention to not just what he taught how he taught and who he was I got one more thing for you but I'm gonna I'm I'm gonna do it in a moment I'm gonna do it at the very end what I want to do now is we're gonna take a moment and uh we're gonna celebrate we're gonna celebrate changed lives we're gonna we're gonna celebrate the work that not just Jesus did but the work Jesus still does.

And so today we have a number of people we have actually 25 people in all of our services this weekend being baptized so we got a handful here in this service I'm gonna invite you to stand up on your feet go ahead and bring the tank out you guys go ahead and bring it out and I know some of you came specifically to support a friend or a family member and and you can feel free to step out from where you are come down here get close if you want you can take some video and uh encourage them along the way and yet some of you maybe you don't know anybody but today as we as we do this together I want you to be encouraged and reminded again of not just who Jesus was and what he did in a historical book but who he is now and that he's still an ever present help in time of need and that he's still active and doing work in people's lives.

So let's take a moment let's let's go to the Lord God we thank you for this moment Lord we celebrate Lord God we celebrate your power we celebrate your presence and your goodness in Jesus' name all God's people said amen amen