THINKING BIBLICALLY ABOUT GOD - Exodus 34:5-8

All right, if you have your Bible, go

ahead and meet me in Exodus chapter 34.

Exodus 34 · chapter mention

Exodus chapter 34.

Exodus 34 · chapter mention

We're kicking off a brand new series

over the next couple of weeks called

Thinking Biblically. And the reason we

are beginning the new year with this

series is because many of us, we

approach 2026 with goals and dreams and

resolutions that that we hope to

maintain discipline in order to

accomplish throughout the remainder of

the year. But let's just be honest. I

think brother Scott mentioned it uh this

morning during our welcome time.

Resolutions, goals, dreams, ambitions,

everything that we have, not just around

the new year. Often times when life

confronts us, when we face the reality

of pressure, of life, of schedule, of

routine, oftentimes our goals fall by

the wayside.

And if one of our goals this year is to

attend church more, read the Bible more,

pursue greater intentionality with

Jesus, then what we need to do is to

start thinking biblically.

Really, it's not just with goals, but we

need to frame everything in our life

from the filter of biblical truth. We've

talked about this many times before. The

reason that's important is because if we

don't frame our lives according to

biblical truth, then the enemy, his

agenda, and his lies will frame our life

for us.

We are constantly being fed. We are

constantly consuming. We are constantly

being influenced whether we acknowledge

it or not. We live in a culture where

voices are speaking specifically into

our situations. Technology has risen to

the likes by which we have never seen

before. Some of it is good. Some of it

can be utilized for the glory of God and

for the advancement of his kingdom. But

you know this just as well as I do that

if we are not careful and we are not

intentional then those things can be

used to create a wider gap and a deeper

void between us and the truth of the

gospel. So what do we do? Well, we need

to be intentional and disciplined about

thinking biblically. And let me just

challenge us with this because I don't

want us to leave here confused or leave

here with our heads just filled with

information. Because thinking biblically

isn't just about truth. It isn't just

about godly information, which is great.

But the goal of godly truth and godly

information is what? Is transformation.

So that what God does in here would

overflow in our life.

And so we would love our families

biblically. We would work biblically. We

would interact with our neighbors, our

brothers and sisters, and the people God

brings into our lives biblically. We

would look at the world around us

biblically. That everything would be

viewed, experienced, and lived through

the lens of the Bible. And so what we're

going to do this morning is we're going

to dive into what it means to think

biblically about God.

Most people have an idea of who God is,

of what God is like. And that idea of

God begins to form how God moves, works,

and acts in and throughout the world.

And guess what? If you have a false idea

of who God is, then you're going to look

at the things of this world through a

lens that is false, through a viewfinder

that is nothing more than a lie. And

what we need to do, because we're

constantly surrounded by every voice in

the culture, by pain, by preference, by

experience, we need to understand who

God is

so that we can begin to see God move.

and God work. Exodus chapter 34

Exodus 34 · chapter mention

beginning in verse 5. We'll read through

verse 9. Let me just kind of set it up

for you.

Israel has just come out of one of the

most grievous sins.

They have crafted an idol out of the

very gold

gave them as provision on their journey

towards the promised land. If you don't

remember the story, let me give you the

cliffnotes version. Moses goes high up

into the mountain to commune with God.

Remember, Moses is a type. He is a

shadow of the great deliverer of the

lamb of God who would come away uh come

to the world and take away the sins of

the world. And Moses as he's communing

with God receives ten commandments.

And you remember as he is descending the

mountain, as he enters back into the

valley, what does he hear? He hears the

roars of his people.

And it's roars of worship.

It's roars of praise.

And I wonder if Moses begins to think,

I'm about to enter into a worship

service where my people are glorifying

God. How awesome and how amazing that

now I can show them. Look, I've spoken

with the Lord and look what he's given

me. Laws written by his own finger for

us to live by as we enter into all that

he has given us. But that's not what he

encounters.

He comes to a people who indeed are

worshiping and there is a worship

service taking place, but it's not unto

the God of creation. It's not unto the

God who has set them free. It's to an

idol that they've crafted with their own

hands.

a golden calf.

And do you remember what they tell the

golden calf as if the golden calf can

listen and hear them? They tell the

golden calf, "Oh, golden calf, you have

brought us out of Egypt.

You have protected us from all the

plagues. You are the one leading us to

the promised land." It's a grave sin of

idolatry. Now, let me hit the pause

button here for just a moment. It's very

easy for us to look to that sin, how

heinous it is and how insulting it is

before the God of creation. But did you

know your sin and my sin does the same?

It insults God. It's heinous. It's evil.

And it shakes our fists at his holiness.

At some point in our lives, if not now,

the past, or in the future, we will

create an idol for ourselves.

And most often that idols control. It's

pride. It's I want to do life my way.

And it keeps us from giving in

submission and in full faith to the

Lord. So, so this is what has just

happened.

And if you're God, how would you

respond?

Well, he meets with Moses again. And we

pick up here in verse five.

The Lord came down in a cloud,

stood with him there, and proclaimed his

name, the

Lord.

God isn't just proclaiming any name, but

he's proclaiming a covenant

name. Why is that important? Because

who's just broken the covenant?

God surely hasn't.

The people of Israel have broken the

covenant.

And it's amazing how Moses writes that

the Lord came down.

Isn't this a beautiful picture of the

gospel? The Lord enters in.

That's what we learned and celebrated

this entire Christmas season. That our

God comes near. That he doesn't remain

far and distant. Even when you and I

rebel against him, he comes down. He

enters in. He pursues. He beckons. He

calls. And this is what he's doing here.

Even when his people have rebelled,

they've broken the covenants. But God

proclaims his covenant name.

It's God's way of saying, "I'm not a

covenant breaker.

I'm faithful." We'll see this here in

the passage in just a moment. I'm true.

I remain. I'm steadfast. I'm sure. And

I'm steady.

And nothing that this world brings, no

matter what you do, I'm unchanging. My

character, my attributes, my plan, my

purpose, my will, it remains. It cannot

be thwarted by human power or will. The

Lord came down, stood with him, and

proclaimed his name. Verse six, the Lord

passed in front of him and proclaimed,

"The Lord, the Lord is a compassionate

and gracious, gracious God,

[snorts] slow to anger." Thank you,

Jesus.

That he is patient with us,

that he is slow to anger. Some of us

parents can learn a thing or two about

that, myself included.

what it means to be slow to anger and

abounding in faithful love and truth,

maintaining faithful love to a thousand

generations, forgiving iniquity,

rebellion, and sin. But

he will not leave the guilty unpunished,

bringing the consequences of the

father's iniquity on the children and

grandchildren to the third and fourth

generation.

Now, there's some there's some clarity

that needs to be made there. We'll dive

into that here in just a moment. Verse

eight, what is Moses's response?

What should our response be to a God who

reveals himself?

Who says, "I'm faithful.

I'm patient with you.

I'll bless you." When you establish a

pattern of godly living,

but I'm also just.

And when you have established a pattern

of sinful living, it doesn't just affect

you. It affects generations to come

after you. What does Moses do? Moses

immediately knelt low on the ground and

worshiped.

In contrast to the false worship that

took place when the Israelites knelt

down to the golden calf.

Verse 9. Then he said, "My Lord, if I

have indeed found favor with you, my

Lord, please go with us." And I love the

parenthesis here. Even though this is a

stiff- necked people,

forgive

our iniquity and our sin. Moses

recognizes that this sin is ours.

That all that has taken place is because

of our rebellion against the Lord. All

that is taking place in your life is

your rebellion,

your sin.

that even in the midst of God comes down

and speaks into and enters in. And I

love this. Watch what Moses says. And

accept us as your own possession. And

all God's people said,

Lord, would you bless your word? Holy

Spirit, would you stir our hearts today?

It is so so beautiful when we see God

as he reveals himself to us. And I want

I want us to know this morning that this

is not unique

to the Old Testament. It's not unique

just to the Bible. God God is revealing

himself to us. Not in new revelation.

Not that God is telling us something

that he hasn't told us already in his

word and through the gospel ministry of

his son Jesus Christ, but God is

revealing himself to us in ways that we

are called to recognize his work, his

movement, his wonders, his miracles so

that we can not just be observers, but

so that we into what he's doing in and

through the kingdom. And this is what's

amazing. And we'll unpack this further

throughout this series over the next

couple of weeks. God chooses to expand

his kingdom through his people.

We know that God is sovereign and God is

all powerful and God doesn't need you or

I to accomplish his will and purpose.

God can use other means

but in accordance with his character and

who he is and the plan and the covenants

that he has established with you and I

mainly through his son Jesus Christ.

He invites us in to be active

participants

in how he is moving and working which

brings about a very challenging

question. How are you actively

participating in the kingdom of God?

And maybe you say, "Well, I read my

Bible." Yes and amen. I attend church

regularly. Yes and amen. I listen to

worship music. Yes and amen. I pray. Yes

and amen. Well, Roland, what are you

getting at? That sounds pretty good to

me.

How are you actively engaged

in the commission of God to the people

of God to proclaim the word of God so

that people would place faith in God?

How are you actively participating in

that? And one of the ways that the

church empowers people is the church

provides avenues by which you can do

that. Did you know the church is the

training ground for God's people?

The church is the place where we grow

and how we think biblically about God.

Well, for what reason? For what purpose?

One, to glorify the name of our Lord and

Savior, to proclaim his majesty and his

fame, not just in this room, but to a

dying world in need. When you begin to

think biblically about God,

understanding who he is and how he has

revealed himself, it changes who we are.

It changes how we move, act, and operate

outside these four walls. I am so

grateful, glad for what God does in and

through this place. I am grateful for

stories of life change, for addictions

being made clean, for marriages being

restored, for people dead in sin being

resurrected to new life with new found

purpose and new found perspective. I am

grateful for how God does that because

of the gospel.

But God doesn't do that so that it would

remain here.

The entire Bible is about God sending

his son to draw sinners in the world to

rescue redemption and salvation.

But we can't do that. We can't

participate in that if we have no clue

who God is.

So there's two extremes on the spectrum

here. On one side, there are people who

have no clue who God is because they've

never placed faith in God. You have an

idea of who God is, but it's an idea

from the world. The world has painted a

picture of a false God because it's not

one that's rooted in biblical truth. And

so because of that, you can't step into

God's plan, purpose, and will for your

life because you don't know the God of

your life. I I pray today that you would

leave here knowing

as you place your hope, faith, and trust

in him.

But on the other side, there are many of

us who know God and we can quote the

Bible backwards and forwards. [snorts]

We can point to historical concepts and

theological doctrines and this and that

and all the nuances and we can get into

the weeds and the mud that is makes for

great conversation biblically.

But what does it do for the co-worker

down the hallway? What does it do for

the client on the sales call? What does

it do as you interact with the T-ball

coach or at the teacher parent

conference?

What does that do to think biblically

about God means that we also think

biblically about the mission?

And I love how you may have picked up on

this that our passage, it doesn't stand

alone.

This is a prevailing theme throughout

the scriptures, Genesis to Revelation,

everything in between. It's a prevailing

theme today.

How am I growing in the grace and

knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus

Christ? How am I growing in the

understanding of who God is?

Ask yourself, have I ever taken a moment

to consider the depth of knowledge there

is to know about God?

So that information

transformation.

And I love how God does something

amazing.

He reminds his people that he's not

going to abandon them.

He doesn't dissolve the covenant. What

does he do? He presses in. So here's

what I want to do. We're going to go

back through our passage. We're going to

draw out some truths that will help us

think more biblically

about who God is

so that as we gaze into the holiness and

beauty and the covenant faithfulness of

our God, I've always said it this way.

We view ourselves, we see ourselves

in relation to who God is.

And that's a two-sided coin. We see

ourselves as sinners in need of a

savior.

And once we are [clears throat] saved,

we see ourselves as those who have been

rescued

by the blood of Jesus Christ. So, three

things we want to pull out from our

passage. If you like taking notes,

here's the first one. God defines

himself,

not us. You probably picked up on that

already. When God proclaims his name,

he's not just identifying himself.

Right? He's pointing to his

faithfulness. He's revealing his

character. It's not just a name that God

has called. It's a name that reveals who

he is.

It's a covenant name. It's a declaration

of who he is. And I love that God

doesn't ask Mo, "Hey, who do the people

need me to be?" or who do you want me to

be? He he doesn't adjust himself to the

failure of his people.

But he steps in, declares truth, stands

on that foundation, and expects his

people to adjust themselves to the

revelation of who he is. You see, God

defines who he is, not us. And so many

of us, especially in this culture today,

we get caught up in the trap of defining

the God that we want to worship.

And when you define the God you want to

worship, what you do is you adjust God

to your likings and your preferences.

God doesn't step into the world and

says, "What would you like? What would

you prefer? I'll be that for you." No,

he flexes his glory and his majesty and

he says, "I am that I am. I'm the alpha,

the omega. The beginning and the end.

You adjust to me.

>> The clay doesn't tell the potter what to

mold. The potter molds the clay.

[snorts]

This is why Moses later on will say,

"Would you be with us? Would you accept

us as your own possession? Even though

we are a stiff necked people,

stubborn,

no desire to change, a prideful people,

standing with a posture,

with chest strutting out as if we know

it all.

And God enters in and reveals himself to

us. Go back with me to verse five.

The Lord came down in a cloud. We've

discussed the significance of that. God

enters in. He remains. He guides. God

never leaves nor forsakes us.

And as he steps in, as he stands with

us, he doesn't approve of your sin. He

doesn't say, "Oh, I understand. Yes, it

was a hard week.

Yes, I I know the pressure from work or

the pressure from family really weigh

down on you. I understand that you rebel

against my holiness. No, he presses in

and he reveals something that we all

need to be confronted with that he is a

covenant God.

And his covenant has standards.

His covenant is law. It has rules. It

calls us and elevates us to greater

obedience.

He declares this about himself.

He proclaims his name, the Lord, and the

Lord passed in front of

him.

I want you to know that the Lord is

passing in front of you.

Are you following after him?

When someone passes in front of you, do

do you know what they leave in their

wake?

They leave a trail [snorts]

for you to follow.

And so many of us are are so blinded by

pride.

Are so blinded by by a God that we have

defined ourselves that we miss out on

the trail before us, the true trail at

least.

And we start to walk a path that Jesus

will bring clarity to in the gospel

ministry. He'll say there's a narrow

path and there's a wide path.

And there are many on that wide path

because they've defined God themselves.

They've not thought biblically about

God.

Think about it this way. What what would

be the reaction if I got up here earlier

this morning and said, "I'm going to

preach a message to you today about the

importance of thinking worldly about

God."

I'll tell you what the servant leaders

would do.

They'd make sure I wasn't out of my

mind. They would tell me, "I need to

think twice if I wanted to return and

preach here."

But so many of us, we may not sit in on

a church service that says how to think

worldly about God, [clears throat]

but we're being influenced like that all

the time.

And the more that the world speaks to us

about who God is,

and the less we're engaging with the

truth of who God is, the more we open up

ourselves

to the consequences of that. We'll get

into this as Moses makes his case about

how that follows into the generations

after us. But let me just say this

before moving on. False worship, wrong

worship, sinful worship always begins

when we redefine God. This is what

happened prior to this dialogue that

Moses has with the Lord. The Israelites

attempted to redefine God in the form of

a golden calf and they went into a

worship service

lifting up the golden calf that was

nothing more but false and sinful

worship. True worship, I want us to hear

this. True worship begins when we

receive God as who he is,

not as we make him out to be. And so

here's the question for us.

Do we allow God to define himself

or have we defined who God is? Does our

understanding of God come from the truth

of scripture? Does or does our

understanding of God

come from the world, come from social

media,

come from things that we read, that we

hear, or does it come from the truth of

God? Here's the second thing that we

see. You've picked up on this as well.

God confirms his covenant

by his faithfulness.

You've heard it said said this way

before. You can talk the talk, but can

you walk the walk? Words are great.

Words are absolutely powerful. We're not

dismissing the importance of words, but

words [snorts] become more powerful.

Words are emphasized and you experience

the essence of the truth of your words

when they are lived out.

And God confirms this by his

faithfulness. Let's start at the end of

verse six.

The Lord is compassionate.

The Lord is a compassionate and gracious

God. He's slow to anger, abounding in

faithful [clears throat]

love and truth,

maintaining

faithful love to a thousand generations.

I love this because who's maintaining

the faithful love?

God's maintaining it, not us. If it were

up to us, we wouldn't maintain it. I

mean, this is clear from the context of

the passage.

God maintains the faithful love. And if

God maintains a faithful love, this is

the trap. I'm going off scripture. This

is the trap that we that we fall into.

Paul picks this up uh in his letters in

in the New Testament. If God maintains

his faithful love,

then that frees us up

to enjoy his faithful love the way it

was meant to be enjoyed.

Ain't there something about riding in

the passenger seat? Now, I'm not talking

about you sightsee drivers like, "Slow

down. Don't go too fast. That car's in

front of you. But I'm talking about when

you have a trusted driver, they're just

some about enjoying the journey cuz you

don't have to worry about navigation.

You don't have to worry about where to

go, what exit to take, when we need to

stop and fill up, when we need to stop

for snacks.

You enjoy the journey because you're not

the one who has to maintain it. The

driver does. Listen, Christ is in the

driver's seat. That's so cliche, but

it's so true.

We get to enjoy the journey. It frees us

up to enjoy the journey. Now, let me go

back to how we can get caught in the

trap. And Paul addresses this in the New

Testament.

He says, "In our sin, grace abounds."

In other words, Paul is painting this

picture that no matter how heinous,

evil, and deep your sin is, God's grace

is bigger and greater and more powerful.

And then Paul anticipates this rebuttal.

Well, if his grace is bigger and

powerful, then I can just go and sin

more because his grace covers me. And do

you remember what Paul says? Shall I

shall I continue to go on so that grace

may abound? And Paul says, absolutely

not.

You're looking at it the wrong way. And

so I want to caution us from from being

for being careful about what we read

here about God maintaining his

faithfulness, God maintaining the love,

about God maintaining the truth in our

lives. That that doesn't absolve us from

responsibility.

It frees us up to enjoy [clears throat]

the responsibility. So he continues,

"Forgiving iniquity, rebellion, and sin,

but he will not leave the guilty

unpunished, bringing the consequences of

the father's iniquity on the children

and grandchildren to the third and

fourth generation."

So God proclaims his name

and he's not just attaching this label

to himself. He's demonstrating how his

character moves into action.

compassionate, gracious, slow to anger,

abounding in faithful love. Those aren't

abstract or random traits.

They're part of God defining himself,

defining who he is.

And so, for example, when God says that

he's compassionate,

it means that he's not indifferent to

your weakness.

He's not indifferent to the things that

we struggle with, but it's the reason he

intervenes.

Time and time again, as Christ moves on

behalf of people to heal and to forgive,

it's rooted in his love and comp.

It tells us that God again doesn't

remain distant. And isn't this

incredible

that God reminds Moses of this despite

their rebellion

against him

that he who knew no sin became sin for

us so that in him that's what Paul tells

us in the New Testament. We might become

the righteousness of God in Jesus

Christ.

He presses into us.

And I also love, I mentioned this

earlier, that God is slow to anger.

He doesn't respond irrationally. He

doesn't respond impulsively.

Our God has a plan and a purpose.

And if you're anything like me, you can

look at the evil around the world and

you might say or think things like this.

Well, why doesn't God just come now?

Because he's patient and slow to anger.

not wishing that that people would die

in their sin, but that all would come to

repentance in him. God is slow to anger

to create space

for people to have a window to repent.

Which is why in the scriptures there is

always this urgency.

There's always this this stirring within

us that Christ can come at any moment

because he can. And because we don't

know the time or the date, it should

stir us to urgency to place faith in

Christ if you've never placed faith in

Christ. To tell your neighbor Jesus

loves them. If you've neglected or

refused to do that,

to be the man God has called us to be,

the parent God has called you to be. God

stirs that within us. He is slow to

anger. He is patient with us. His delay

is not weakness. It's kindness that is

meant to draw people back to him. Now,

there's one thing I want to focus on

before we continue.

God begins to instruct Moses

about the blessings, benefits, or the

consequences of patterns that are

established. Did you pick up on that?

So, God shares his covenant name. He

defines who he is. We don't define who

God is. God establishes that his

covenant is true. It's firm because he's

the faithful one. God's not unfaithful.

We are unfaithful before God. But then

God opens up this window into this

beautiful picture of what faithfulness

on our part, this response of continued

faith looks like not just for me, but

for my kids, my grandkids, my great

grandkids should the Lord ty generations

to come. And what does he say?

maintaining faithful love to a thousand

generations,

forgiving iniquity, rebellion, and sin.

The patterns that I establish today with

my children, with my family have ripple

effects.

And those ripples extend far and wide.

And I've shared this before, ripples

extending far and wide is all dependent

on what? The heaviness and the size of

the stone.

This is all the weight that we will ever

need

for the ripples of the gospel to extend

into the people after us.

But then he goes

and he says, "But

he will not leave guilty the guilty

unpunished, bringing the consequences of

the father's iniquities on the children

and grandchildren to the fourth, the

third and fourth generation." And so

maybe you read this and you think, "Wait

a minute. Do I suffer because my parents

made sinful decisions?"

Not necessarily.

What God is saying is the patterns you

were exposed to or the patterns that you

were establishing with your kids have

ripple effects just as well. And so if

church is not important, if prayer is

not important, if bible reading is not

important, if repentance of sin is not

important, of understanding biblical

concepts is not important to you, it

won't be important to your kids. It's

been said this way that what one

generation tolerates,

the next generation will embrace.

And so often we may tolerate attending

church here and there. We may tolerate

opening up the Bible here and there. The

generation to follow is going to embrace

the absence of that faith, that trust,

and that devotion.

I've been in ministry for 20 plus years

and so many parents

struggle and and I sympathize. I I

really do. So many parents struggle with

wayward children.

And I sit in these sessions and I ask

the parents, "What does your spiritual

disciplines look like?

What have you modeled before your kids?"

Now, their choice is their choice,

but their choice is based off of a

foundation that was laid for them.

What foundation did you lay out for

them? Was it one where biblical truth

was just seen as optional?

Or is it one where biblical truth is

seen as everything? This is important

because what's going to happen here in

the rest of the story, the Israelites

are going to wander in the wilderness

for 40 years

on a journey that should have taken

anywhere from two weeks to 3 weeks. They

wander in the wilderness for 40 years.

Why? Because a pattern of rebellion

continues. A pattern of rebellion

continues. Some of us in here, we are

living

examples of what it means to have good

godly patterns set before us.

And maybe some of us in here, we're

first generation believers. Praise God.

So, we've broken the curse of that

ungodly pattern and now we have chosen

and committed to establish good godly

patterns in our life. Or maybe some of

us here, maybe up until now, we've not

recognized that we are continuing in

this ungodly pattern. And the goal of

the scriptures is to draw us closer to

Jesus. Here's the last one.

A right view of God leads to right

worship.

Verses 8 and N. Moses immediately knelt

down low on the ground and worshiped.

[clears throat]

His response to the revelation of God

was worship.

It wasn't indifference. It wasn't, "I'll

make a choice later on." It was worship.

Then he said, "My Lord, if I have indeed

found favor with you, my Lord, please go

with us. Even though this is a stiff

necked people, forgive our iniquity." He

takes responsibility for his sin. We

must take responsibility for our sin.

Our sin is not.

Our sin is not just some

bump up against the holiness of God. No,

our sin declares war against the

holiness of God. It's a war that we will

not win, which is why we need Jesus. And

and what does Moses his prayer? How does

it end? accept us as your own

possession. The truth about God is

always meant to lead us to worship God.

And church, if we're going to think

biblically about God in a world that

thinks unbiblically about God, we need

to understand who he is. And the way

that we understand who he is is by

reading the words that he's declared to

his people. By understanding his

faithfulness.

And at the end of it all, asking

yourself, how have you responded?

How have you responded to the truth of

who God is and how ultimately he has

revealed himself in his son Jesus Christ

who died on the cross for the iniquities

of the world, who rose from the grave to

declare victory over sin and death, who

ascended into heaven and seats and is

seated at the right hand of the father,

pleading our case, beckoning us, and

calling us. has given us his spirit to

fill us and to dwell within us. God

doesn't live far and away, church. He

lives in here.

And if he lives in here,

how is that transforming us out there?

Would you pray with me?

Lord, thank you for how you move and

how you work.

We thank you that the Bible reveals who

you are.

And Lord, I pray today that

you would be begin to stir hearts and

lives

to understand what it means to live a

life set apart for you. And the only way

that we can do that is by

looking into the truth of who you are.

And we thank you that that you are a

covenant God. That

your covenant is unbreakable, not

because of anything we do or don't do,

but because of everything you have done

through Jesus.

And so Lord, I pray that as we sing

songs here in just [music] a moment, as

we worship your name, that if anyone who

does not know you,

wants to know you, that we would

celebrate that together. All this we ask

in [music] Jesus Christ's name. All

God's people said, "Amen." Hey, would

you stand to your feet with me? We're

going to close our service. We're going

to sing together. These aren't just

words on a screen. They're a prayer from

the heart. Let it be your prayer. This

[music] we're going to have a time of

response. That means our altar is open.

This space up here is available for you

to come have a moment with the Lord.

Pastor Eric and myself will be available

as well. If you need someone to pray

with, we'd love to to pray a blessing

over you to thank God for a victory uh

or a blessing or answered prayer or

maybe want to come and receive prayer

for an appointment or intercede on

[music] behalf of a friend or family

member. This this time is available for

you to respond [music] to God. Amen. If

you'd like to bring your family up here,

dedicate your goals and resolutions to

the new year with God at the center,

this is what this space is available

for. I love you, church.