As Unto the Lord (Ephesians 6:1-9)

Ephesians chapter 6, verses 1 through 9.

Ephesians 6:1–9

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, because this is right.

Honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise, so that it may go well with you, and you have a long life in the land.

Fathers, don't stir up anger in your children, but bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Slaves obey your servant master your human masters with fear and trembling, in the sincerity of your heart, as you would Christ.

Don't work only while being watched as people pleasers, but as slaves of Christ.

Do God's will from your heart.

Serve with a good attitude as to the Lord and not to people, knowing that whatever good each one does, slave or free, he will receive this back from the Lord.

Masters, treat your slaves the same way without threatening them, because you know that both their master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with them.

Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you so much for your word, and I just ask that as we study your word, that you would fill me with your spirit to rightly teach, that you would fill the hearers with your spirit to rightly divide and at certain ways of you.

I ask, Lord, that we would grow in you, we would grow closer to you, we would continue to follow you in all things and grow more and more into your image and be glorified in your name.

Amen.

Go ahead and have a seat.

So we're working our way through the book of Ephesians.

We teach verse by verse, chapter by chapter here.

Nothing controversial here at all.

So it should be about five minutes and we're out the door.

So there's no issues with that.

Okay.

Obey.

Does anybody like that word?

Does that stir up like, yes, this is my jam moments of like it's like, oh yes, obedience, compliance.

That is in my nature.

This goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden.

This goes all the way back to the very beginning when God says, you can't eat of any tree, any fruit in the garden, except that tree.

And we're like, that tree?

That one over this one over here?

We can eat this tree?

And that's where it all starts, where obedience becomes a big issue.

And there is a theme running through this passage.

So the beginning is talking to children, and then it talks to fathers, and then it talks to slaves, and then it talks to masters.

So with children, I just gotta know how many of you here are between the ages of six and eighteen?

Six and eighteen?

Okay.

Cool.

I have a question.

Who is brave in that group who's willing to answer a question?

Alright.

And I gave her like carte blanche to say whatever she wants.

So this could come back to Hump.

When is it hard for you to obey your parents?

Like when they uh like when you think that their command is like dumb or like uh wrong.

When you think that their command is dumb or wrong, absolutely.

That is that is the perfect answer.

That's at the stage.

Anyone else?

What did you think of this?

Oh yes.

I kind of follow up with what my generation says and everything, and it's kind of like when I listen to my parents, I know that it's mature and everything, but I'm like, but this sounds a lot better.

Yes.

Absolutely.

Is it am I summarizing this well?

Because when you're comparing what your parents say versus what your peers say, what your peers say make more sense at times?

Does that summarize that one?

Yeah.

Very well said.

Okay, any other brave people?

Huh?

Yes.

Absolutely.

I should have started this with I didn't want to ask for absolute immunity for the brave souls who actually.

So, yes, this is all getting to the core of the matter.

It's hard to obey when what parents say seem dumb, when she's my kid, so sometimes what I do say is dumb.

But uh when what our peers think and say makes a whole lot more sense when we're being pestered, is it makes it difficult to obey.

And yes, here in scripture we see children, obey your parents in the Lord.

Why?

Because this is right.

God just played the because I said so card, which doubles down on what makes this infuriating.

It's hard to obey, but then nobody, nobody, nobody likes the because I said so.

And I tell you, as parents, if you can get past the third why without saying because I said so, you're a better person than me.

Once it's like, do this.

Why?

Because this.

Why?

Because of this, why?

CURSHETO! We're moving on.

So, with that in mind, taking a look at this, he's saying, obey your parents in the Lord because this is right.

This passage has a sibling passage, it has a brother passage in Colossians.

Colossians says, obey in the Lord because this pleases the Lord.

So, not only is it right to obey your parents, but it pleases the Lord to obey.

So, why?

The big question, why should we?

Why should we obey?

Ultimately, because fundamentally, that's how God designed things.

Fundamentally, that is hard because we live in a broken, fallen, sin-tainted world where shocker, parents don't always get it right.

My batting average ain't so great, honestly, like half the time.

But with that, that doesn't change here.

God saying, hey, obey your parents because it's the right thing to do.

It is how God designed things.

And we're going to see a little bit more of that right here.

He says in verse 2, honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise, so that it may go well with you, and you may have a long life in the land.

I want to be clear that what this doesn't mean is obey your parents or else they'll murder you.

That's not what this says.

It says, obey, honor your father and mother, the first commandment with a prompt, so they may go well with you and you have a long life in the land.

What does that mean?

Why does he say that?

Why does he bring that in here, into the new covenant, in the midst of this, when he's telling children to obey their parents?

This, think about when this command was given.

Israel in the wilderness at Mount Sinai.

They are being led through a desert by a pillar of cloud during the day and a pillar of fire during the night, and they go when the pillar goes, they stop when the pillar stops, back and forth, back and forth, a 40-year game of red light, green light.

Why?

So that they can ultimately get to the land of promise that God is leading them to.

Every step along the way looks crazy.

How do I know that?

Because the Israelites were the biggest group of doubting whiners until we came along.

And we equal them about constantly.

Stop here.

We don't have this.

I don't like this food from heaven.

I want different food from heaven.

Hey, there's not water.

Hey, I don't like you.

I think he should be in charge.

Hey, we're going back to Egypt.

It was better when we were slaves.

Hey, let's do this.

And all the whole way, they are being led and led and led in a place that they don't know where they are going.

Now, I know something about people, but especially about people under the age of 18.

There is a combination of a lack of life experience and an absolute certainty that we know what we're talking about.

Doesn't mean you're wrong.

It just means that those two things tend to combine.

And I think a lot of that comes with context and peers and such with that.

And so, why does God tell us to obey our parents, our imperfect parents, which I'm going to pick on in a moment?

That why does he say that?

It is a part of the process of learning to follow where you don't see when you think otherwise to get to a place of health.

Parents, if they are following the Lord, or if they're just doing their best, want their kids to thrive.

They want their kids to be healthy, they want their kids to succeed, they want their kids to do well.

And the goal is to try to lead them that way in a place that they haven't been and don't know.

Is that easy?

Absolutely not.

He does not say children obey your parents because it's easy.

It is real hard.

But what he is saying here is that number one, following our parents is willing to listen to a person in authority that we might be side-eyeing, but willing to put aside what we think is true to follow what they say is true.

It also is a willingness to put aside what we want to do in order to do so.

Both of those are very, very, very hard.

But both of those, the whole big point of this, he says, in the Lord.

Obey your parents in the Lord.

This is ultimately a picture of shaping parents, shaping your children to follow the voice of the Lord as adults.

When we're first-time parents, all we want is compliance.

Just basically like, can you just do the one thing I asked you to do without all the different things?

But ultimately, parents who want what's best for their kids, ultimately want them to be able to follow the Lord on their own, independently, and trust that voice.

And so that's why.

That's the goal.

It's not easy, and parents don't get it right all the time, which makes it even harder.

But that's his calling for children because it's how God designed it, because it pleases the Lord, and because it sets up a life of following the Lord's voice, who we can't see and also can't audibly hear, and seems weird when compared to what everybody everybody else around us is having us.

So that's the important things in that.

Okay, children, you're off the hook.

Fathers! We have spent a little bit of time here.

Fathers, don't stir up anger in your children, but bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Short passage, check, got that done.

We're all good at this.

We can move on.

No.

What are parents not to do, or what are fathers not to do?

I'm talking to fathers.

Because as we talked about last week, there's there's an authority, there is an expectation, and a responsibility is the real big word there, to be the ultimate responsibility for your family.

But that doesn't work that way in all families.

Sometimes there's just a mom who's doing the best she can and is probably sometimes doing better, all those different things.

But so in saying fathers, insert your own parental figure in that situation.

But ultimately, fathers here we see as responsible for the family if he is present.

Don't stir up anger in your children.

To in Colossians 3.21, the brother passage, to exasperate.

It's a fun word.

Don't exasperate your children so that they don't lose heart in Colossians 3.21.

What causes the stirring up of anger?

We know one.

I'd say there's three.

Number one, injustice.

Causes the stirring up of anger.

But that's not fair.

That is the uh statement that we say more than anything else often.

Injustice.

When dads get wrong, or when they're being unfair when parents are that way.

Number two.

This is the one that people are surprised by in this day and age.

Passiveness.

When the dad's kind of on the sideline, he goes from work to the recliner and is not involved at all.

And just, this isn't my problem, you you figure it out, I'm not dealing with you.

Believe it or not, that causes a great deal of damage that we don't see.

If there is no parenting involved in that, if there is no father action in that, does a lot, that can actually stir up of wrath as well.

And finally, flexing.

That's the one we think of often.

What stirs up anger when the dad wants to become the silverback gorilla in the family, and you know, to meet questions or uh disobedience with force.

So, three things: injustice, passiveness, and flexion can stir up anger in our children.

Well, what do fathers too do?

Bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord.

Bring them up is to nourish, to nurture, to cultivate.

It's not just get them from birth to out of the house in one piece.

It's actually to cultivate and nourish and cause to flourish.

According to this passage, what are the things that cause bringing up nourishment, flourishing?

Training and instruction.

And we go, cool, those are good words, I like it, check.

Let's dig into it, and then we'll hate those words.

Training.

Chastising.

You take the noun word of that word.

That's colloquially used for the term whipping.

We don't do that.

But training is not simply logging time for a sprint.

It is discipline.

Rebuke.

Chastising.

Which we'll flesh out here.

Second word, instruction.

Neuthesia is a combination of knowledge and set forth.

The set forth knowledge.

Warning, admonition, instruction, teaching.

Two things here.

Discipline, instruction.

Stuck together.

Cause nourishing.

Where do we see this word for training pop up the most in Scripture?

There's a chunk in Hebrews 12, 5 through 11.

I gotta warn you ahead of time.

This is a two-slide passage, but it's worth reading because these are the passages we don't want to see are there, and so we tend to kind of skip past real quick.

So, looking at Hebrews 12, 5 through 11, and you have forgotten the exhortation that addresses you as sons.

My son, don't take the Lord's discipline lightly, or lose heart when you are reproved by him.

For the Lord disciplines the one he loves and punishes every son he receives.

Endure suffering as discipline.

God is dealing with you as sons.

For what son is there that a father does not discipline?

But if you are without discipline, which all receive, then you are illegitimate children and not sons.

Furthermore, we had human fathers discipline us and we respected them.

Shouldn't we submit even more to the Father of Spirits and live?

For they disciplined us for a short time based on what seemed good to them, but he does it for our benefit, so that we share his holiness.

No discipline seems enjoyable at the time, but painful.

Later on, however, it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.

So context matters, and the context here is suffering in this world.

Endurance, struggling, suffering.

And the Lord using these things as disciplining children, he loves.

There are times where suffering, struggling, trials teach me things I'm not willing to hear otherwise.

I don't like that at all.

In my mind, I listen all the time, and I am perfectly uh compliant in those things, but sometimes the Lord has to take those moments to use discipline to create health, nourishment.

And then also, Revelation 3.19, talking to the Church of Laodicea, we always read the lukewarm, move on.

Interesting thing.

He says here in Revelation 3.19, as many as I love, I rebuke and discipline, so be zealous and repent.

How many times do we read the the about like the Church of Laodicea that's lukewarm, they're neither hot nor cold, and we go, man, they're the worst.

Don't be like them, move on.

But then he caps it off with I discipline the people and I rebuke the people that I love.

Otherwise, I wouldn't spend time on that.

I don't tend, maybe I shouldn't admit this, I don't tend to discipline other people's children.

Number one, liability.

Number two, because I don't ultimately bear the burden for that.

But if it's my kid, I will discipline them.

And so we see here that God, in the context here of sin and the need to repent, He rebukes.

He disciplines.

How many of us like these?

Are we feeling good right now?

Is this like cozy, going like, man, this is really good.

So I want to be very, very clear in these two passages that contextually we're looking at suffering as a form of the Lord disciplining towards health and growth.

And here we look at his rebuke and discipline as a foot as a purpose of bringing about repentance.

Nowhere in scripture that I am aware of do we see God just taking swings at his kids because he can't.

So when we read these words, we can go that direction, but that's not the character of God.

We don't see that anywhere.

So, discipline, training, instruction, teaching of the Lord.

As the Lord trains us and disciplines us and instructs us, so we do the same with our children for the purpose of bringing about health, for the purpose of bringing about growth, for the purpose of their well-being.

And that tends to be the problem because we don't think that his well-being is our well-being.

I don't like his version of my well-being because it involves going through the discipline and change and struggle and difficulty, growing pains in that way.

Here's why this is hard.

I am going to put up in a second three true statements about God.

It is possible that one of these statements will utterly repulse you.

Hopefully not.

But based on what we're dealing with and going through, it is possible that that is the case.

Joshua, go ahead.

Number one, the Lord is always perfect and completely righteous.

All the time, forever ever.

Amen.

Because he loves us, the Lord forgives us, encourages us, and shows us abundant mercy and grace.

Because he loves us, the Lord disciplines us, rebukes us, and instructs us.

And you're like, well, how could these be hard depending on who you are with that?

Because some people have a hard time trusting that the Lord is right.

We all do.

That's called sin.

That's called the sin nature, but we have a hard time truly believing that.

And so receiving the Lord's love in that way is very difficult because the very first thing is like, that doesn't feel right.

The second one, believe it or not, there is a whole category of people who have a very hard time accepting that God unconditionally loves them, is not mad at them, and wants to be with them and have relationship with them without constantly keeping score.

And then the third one, this is more of a modern, recent thing, that there is a category that has a hard time believing that once we are saved, God will still discipline us, correct us, rebuke us.

Which is a form of deism, by the way.

It's basically God saved us and then split until he's going to come back again.

He's still involved in our lives.

Why is this and why is this hard?

Why is this so challenging?

Those three things correspond with the three things we said earlier of how fathers can provoke their kids to anger.

Injustice, the Lord is always perfect and completely righteous.

Passiveness, because he loves us, the Lord forgives us, encourages us, and shows us abundant mercy and grace.

What I am getting at here is that there is a very real possibility that how we view God is directly informed through the lens of how we experience our earthly fathers.

Or mothers, but largely fathers.

That's heavy.

And we go, that's not true.

No, I'm a grown-up.

We passed it by.

That's fine.

We see our earthly parents.

We hear them.

We experience them in real time.

We do not see God.

He's very real, but not visible to our earthly eyes.

He speaks, but we don't hear him with our earthly ears.

And so it is very easy to see God through the lens of how we experienced discipline and instruction and have a really hard time having a healthy relationship with God as a result.

Two things for that.

And this is why I'm spending so much time on this.

Number one, God wants you to be healed from that.

That's not like, hey, this is how it is.

Sorry you were dealt a bad hand, but that's as good as it's gonna get.

We would love to pray with you.

Please, if if that is you, if you have a hard time receiving God's love, if you have a hard time accepting his discipline, if you have a hard time seeing him even as judge, please talk to one of us elders, and we would love to pray with you and follow up.

There's short of miracles, there's no easy fix with that, but we would at least love to know you in that way and pray for you and counsel you in that way.

Number two, it shows the stakes for fathers.

How much difficulty can be caused through carelessness.

So we have a responsibility as fathers, or as mothers who are parenting in that way, that uh is very, very sobering.

And whether we choose to take that mental responsibility or completely abdicate it, both can cause harm.

And so, what do we do?

That's like great, thank you for that daunting thing on this Labor Day weekend when I decided to come to church rather than get out of bed.

What do we do as fathers?

Okay.

Number one, just be wary of your tendencies and watch your pace.

If you're someone who gets really excited about discipline, maybe take five.

Slow things down.

Slow it all down.

If you're someone who's like, oh, that is repulsive, and I don't believe in that, and I uh think the Bible is an outdated book that is no longer a temple to our society, maybe get off the bench.

Get involved in that.

But know your know your tendencies.

Number two, just walk in your calling.

Do not shrink back from your responsibility to raise your kids if you are parents.

Do not uh abdicate that because it does it potentially does harm in that way, just as it would by being overbearing.

Number three, reaffirm love always.

Always, always, always.

There's no point where your kids don't need you to remind them that you love them.

They may say that that's true.

They may go, oh gosh, dad.

But my kids are laughing, uh, but they uh they need to hear it constantly.

Number four, this is really, really important.

Ask forgiveness when you get it wrong.

Not if.

I did not say if.

When you get it wrong.

We are imperfect parents.

We will get it wrong.

The times that I am confident that I have nothing to apologize for are the ones where I'm just about to get blindsided by gentle conviction and have to go apologize to my children for how I handle things or if I got it wrong.

If you get it wrong, admit it.

That does not subvert your authority, it actually strengthens it.

And then finally, ask for help.

This is why we do church in a body.

This is why we interface with fellow believers so that you can ask for help.

Now, there's one thing that I found that is interesting is when we ask for help, we look at the parents and go, I want to be like those people.

Those are the coolest parents ever.

Look at the kids.

Look at the fruit of the of the parenting.

To see who who to be asking help for.

This is near and dear to my heart.

I don't like to talk about myself, but I'm gonna hear for this purpose.

Um, it was my mom and me from the time I was 12.

She had a hard time.

So when I was a first-time parent, I was terrified.

Because I had blank slate, not the slightest clue how to be a father.

No idea whatsoever.

By the grace of God, we had friends that we could meet with and go, how do you do this?

What I don't have the slightest idea.

And then you try it, and then you do it wrong, and then you apologize, and then you ask for more help.

Live in a community in that way.

But you are not supposed to have all the answers off camp.

The answers you think you have from what you learned may actually be the problem.

Be willing to receive help from wise counsel and the fruit of children who uh you want your children to be like in that way.

But just know that that is not an admission of failure.

That is the start of a future success.

Hopefully, prayerfully.

And understand too that kids have a will of their own, and you could do everything, everything right.

You didn't, but you could, and did not go like you expect it to.

That is the very, very first thing I learned as a parent was wow, they have a will of their own and do not automatically comply.

And that was uh that was very shocking to me in that way.

So, anyway, okay.

So, dads, parents, fathers, don't stir up wrath in your children.

Nourish them in the training, the discipline, and the instruction, the coaching of the Lord.

Okay, moving on to slaves and masters, uh, nothing controversial here, so it should take about two minutes out.

No.

Okay.

Roman Empire is when this is being written.

Imagine the complicated world of being in the Roman Empire, where slavery is a reality, and then slave masters give their life to Jesus, and slaves give their life to Jesus, whether that's a bond servant who has fallen under this uh agreement to work off a debt, or somebody who is a slave, and then they're in the same church together.

Awkward.

Really, really awkward.

Then the questions come up.

Well, if I'm a new creation, aren't we equals?

If I'm a new creation and you're a new creation, aren't we equal?

I don't think I really have to listen to you anymore.

And then there's the, no, I need to show you that you need to listen to me.

And then they say, he's not treating me right, he's not listening, all this thing, and then the Ephesian elders are like, I just want to nap.

Okay, so Paul does not ever condone slavery.

He is giving them here a blueprint of how to navigate if you have uh lords, slave owners, masters, and slaves in the same church.

It is controversial.

I have a slide here to give us a rundown of all the things he says.

Why do I have that?

Because this is very applicable to all of us.

I don't want that to be true.

It is true.

Jesus says.

So, how are they to obey?

Number one, I'm gonna read the passage real quick.

Slaves obey your servant masters with fear and trembling.

Would you hear that and you're like, oh, that's pretty dicey or whatever.

It means take it seriously, give it the seriousness and the reverence it deserves.

Paul says that he functions this way in 1 Corinthians 2.3.

The Corinthians functioned with Titus this way in 2 Corinthians 7.15.

And then Paul called to Philippian believers in Philippians 2.12 to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling.

That it is to take it seriously.

Number two, insincerity, singleness, free from pretense.

Don't fake it.

Serve and obey genuinely.

That's a little harder.

Number three, here's the key.

As you would Christ.

Do this as you would to Jesus.

You serve Jesus.

You serve your lords, your masters.

You do that through that to serve Jesus.

Not while being, not only while being watched.

Your passage may say, not with eye service.

I have a long history of retail management.

I'm still doing that.

And uh that's my day job.

And there's a it's a sad saying, but it's true that everybody's a model employee when you're looking right at them.

So, with that in mind, he's calling them to do well when you're not being watched.

Also, not as people pleasers.

A lot of this involves a lack of hypocrisy.

And then do so as slaves of Christ, and doing God's will from your heart, serving with a good attitude as to the Lord and not to people, which we saw the same thing in Colossians 3, 22 through 23.

I can summarize all of that with remember who your master truly is, which is Jesus.

Now, we're not slaves.

I get this.

Uh we surely have people in authority over us that we can apply something to in this way.

Do we function this way in our daily life with our parents, with our leaders, with our direct supervisors at work, all the different ways.

There is a theme that runs through that is remembering that you serve Jesus and therefore function in sincerity as a result.

So, here's the thing, the key, the key to remember, the why.

Whatever good you do, slave or free, it don't matter, you will receive this back from the Lord.

The one who rewards you for your good service is God.

What you do matters.

What you do carries eternal significance.

When you are serving the Lord, when He is seeing that and you do so, well, He rewards you in that way, eternally, from Him.

You're not serving that way.

It's a strange.

Here's the fun thing to say.

Because at this point in time, the cut the conflict is you have masters, you have slaves in the same church, and they're basically like, I don't serve you, I serve God.

And Paul is saying, exactly so.

Do so well, be an example that way.

Not using your freedom as an opportunity for vice, as we see it believes in 1 Peter, I think.

So, and then finally here.

First of all, real quick, also remember how often Paul calls himself the bondservant of Christ.

May we all operate in that way.

Finally, looking at here, masters treat your slaves the same way without threatening them because you know that both their master and yours is in heaven, and there is no favoritism with him.

So, treat your slaves the same way.

The same way as what?

As what we just saw.

That is absolutely revolutionary.

For it's Paul to call masters to serve their servants is crazy.

Countercultural completely to the core.

But it shouldn't surprise us because that's what Jesus did.

And then he's telling them without threatening them.

Best way I can summarize this, just don't be a bully.

When you come up against resistance, don't be a bully.

The issue is not discipline.

We saw that earlier in the passage in verse 4 with parents and children.

The issue is how are you doing it?

Are you being a bully, overly aggressive, flexing your authority, or are you not?

Are you serving in that way?

Why?

Because you both, because you know that both their master and your master is in heaven.

You both have the same master, and then the chilling statement, there is no favoritism with him.

The advantage you think you have on earth has no weight in God's eyes.

How do you think God would react?

How do you think a righteous Lord would react if one of his servants is mistreating another one of his servants?

Do you think that's gonna go well?

That's where we get correction.

Discipline, rebuke in that way.

And that's the thing I would say is the Lord sees.

That should comfort us if we are in difficult circumstances.

The Lord sees.

Now I want to also, I'm just saying this very, very, very clearly, if you are in a harmful situation, do not be in that harmful situation.

Get help.

Get help.

We're not being called to perpetually endure unrepentant abuse.

It's not what this is saying.

However, if it's just a hard thing, just know that God sees the labor and the work, he sees the injustice, and he cares and he knows.

So here's what I would say wrapping this up.

What we do matters.

As children, as parents, as servants, as masters, what we do actually matters.

Do we live that way?

Do we live that way?

Like what we do actually carries weight beyond my comfort for today.

Our life also reflects our worship of God.

So for servants, as we seek to serve that way, it's a reflection of how we serve the Lord, because He is truly our master.

Do we function in that way?

As children, do we function in that way?

As fathers, do we do so in a way that knows that that kid belongs to God?

So you better treat them well.

As masters, same way.

And do we truly take believe that God will take care of us?

That seems to be the core of the obedience question.

Is God good?

Will he take care of us?

Will he see?

Will he know?

And then do we also just bring this around again?

Do we view God through an imperfect lens?

I would say we all probably do to a degree.

But is it to a large degree to where that really informs how we view God?

And if so, how do we take care of that?

That's not a hospice situation, that's a physical therapy situation where we seek to provide growth and health as a result over time.

But just know, again, God is always good.

And I just I pray that we would function in a way that stirs up our trust in that, whether he is comforting the good, whether he is disciplining and taking care of things so that we would be nurtured and growing, he is always good.

And may we always see it that way, and may that be outpoured into how we treat one another.

Let's pray.

Lord, I thank you so much that you are good in all things.

That when we don't see how good you are, it's still true.

That as children, when we don't know and don't are not certain that what you what you're saying is our best, it's still true.

That as servants, when we wonder if you don't see, you do.

That in people of authority, if we don't take seriously that and think, we can do what we want because nobody sees, you do.

I ask, Lord, first and foremost, that we would have our hearts set aright with you, that we would see you truly and see you in your glory and goodness, that we would receive encouragement and training and instruction, that we would receive correction in a way that brings about nourishment and life, that we would take care of one another as a body of Christ, encourage one another, exhort one another, bless one another, and that you would be glorified in all of these complex relationships.

Lord, I ask that you would provide healing for those who have such a challenge with these topics.

Bring about supernatural healing and growth, whether that's instantaneous or over time.

Ultimately for the goal of knowing you more and trusting you more.

Be glorified in your name.

Amen.