Together | Ps. Keith Pittman | Celebration at the Park

Welcome to the Celebration Church Orlando podcast.

Thank you so much for listening today.

We hope it encourages you and inspires you.

Here's today's message.

You guys can go ahead and take your seats if you haven't um done so as of yet.

We do have some blankets over here at this table.

Um so if you didn't come and if there's not enough space, um please grab one of the blankets and and get yourself comfortable.

Um I know for those that are joining us online, you you may think that it's just literally me, the worship team, and that's it.

But we are surrounded by a great cloud of witnesses.

Can people let them hear you guys so they know that online I'm not talking to myself?

Okay, y'all are y'all are here, y'all aren't.

Let's try again.

Like, can you guys give a shout of praise for God um and so that online folks will know that we're here amongst a great community of people?

There we go.

There we go, man.

We're we're so glad that you're here and we're excited for what we believe that the God is doing.

And and and I also want to remind you guys that um not only just about our Easter services and all the activity that we have going on, but we're also gonna have a raffle that's gonna take place at 1230 uh today.

So if you came in and if you didn't get a chance to stop at the the Connect booth out there, make sure you leave your name there because at 12.30 we're gonna do a raffle and give some giveaways that I think you guys are absolutely not gonna want to miss.

Now we're we're out here in this beautiful environment, and I want to give us some space to get out and enjoy.

We have food trucks that are pulling up.

We we have some ice cream that's gonna be here in just a moment.

That's all on us.

It's gonna be a great time um for all of us together.

But before we do that, I I do want to encourage us um around uh the word of God.

We're we're in week six um of our series, Greater Than.

And over the past several weeks, we've been unpacking this idea about Jesus uh being greater.

And I write.

So he gets it.

Um that Jesus, that Jesus is greater.

And really the idea behind it has been for us to really just answer that question and really come to that resolve of saying that no matter what we're going through, no matter what we're walking through, to come to the conclusion that Jesus is greater in a culture where we're filled with so much comparison and and so much option to resolve in ourselves of that Jesus is indeed greater.

So over the past couple of weeks, we've been unpacking this idea um and hopefully it's been an encouragement for you.

If you've missed any of the previous weeks, uh go back and check it out, because I do think that there's a a great deal of continuity um that has been taking place.

And today we're going to be concluding um the service or or the series rather.

And and I've been looking at uh the book of Hebrews, and and what I'm intimately aware of is that even in spite of the varying things that we've talked about on Sundays, even in spite um of our um our After the Message podcast that's up um on our YouTube channel as well as on our our podcast link, that even as much as we've tried to talk uh about what God is speaking to us in the book of Hebrews, we we haven't even scratched the surface.

So my challenge and my encouragement for you is this go back, read it, check it out.

There's so many powerful theological truths that are found in it, and we've only just scratched the surface.

Um, but I believe that my assignment today, as we conclude the series, is found in Hebrews chapter 10.

Hebrews 10 · chapter mention

Hebrews uh chapter number 10.

It fits perfectly for where we are, um, even today, being outside in community.

Starting at verse number 22, I I want to read this for us.

And and if you have your Bibles, it's fine.

I know that typically we have the Bible in the sky.

We don't have that today, um, but you can certainly uh read along.

And if you don't have that with you, it's perfectly fine.

I'll I'll read it for us.

But but but I want you guys to hear these powerful words.

It says this let us draw near with a true heart and full assurance of our faith, with our heart sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and from our bodies and washed with pure water.

Let us hold on to the confession of our hope without wavering, since he who promised is faithful.

And let us consider one another and provoke love and good works, not neglecting to gather together as some are in the habit of doing, but encourage each other all the more as you see the day approaching.

Let us not neglect these things.

Let us not let us not get into a place where we're isolated from one another, but let us be people that are connected in community.

Today I really do want to take this opportunity to talk to us a little bit about the importance of being connected to community.

And if you're taking notes, of course, at Celebration Orlando, we do that.

I want you to write this message title down.

Together.

It's really that simple.

Let's pray and let's get into it.

Lord, we thank you so much for your word.

We thank you for every opportunity that we have to come and to gather um in your name.

Father, I just pray over the next few moments for for this brief moment that we have together, um, that you give us open eyes, that we can see you, open ears to hear you, and open hearts to receive everything that you want to speak to us today.

We give you this space in Jesus' name.

Amen and amen.

Um, I I would not consider myself to be um a very, very competitive person, at least not blindly um competitive.

I I think we all have a measure of competition on the inside of us, but but just the way that my mind works, I tend to be competitive on things that that matter.

Like I'm not gonna be mad if if if my team doesn't win, unless it's the Philadelphia Eagles, and then which case I need to grieve and get over it.

But but in general, um I I tend to not be a person who is overly competitive when it comes to things.

Um, I'm more of a big picture person.

I I tend to kind of invest in things that I view um as a big deal, but there is an area where I can be a little bit competitive.

My outlet for me is is personally is video games.

I know that you guys may be surprised to hear that I'm a full-grown man with gray hair in my beard, and it's true that I absolutely raise and love video games.

Here, here's the reason why.

I was raised on video games.

I was raised with uh Nintendo, I was raised with ColecoVision, I was I was raised with all of those things, and I was a good father, and I raised my children with those things.

And so it's a great, it's a great outlet.

If you are parents here and you don't know what to do with your kids, maybe they're super rambunctious, they're running all around, buy them a video game system.

It's like built-in babysitting, it gets no better than that.

I I absolutely love it.

But for me, um, as I've gone through the years and I've gotten every game system that's known to man, still do and still love it, I've I've really grown to appreciate it.

But but here's a tension that I began to see emerge several years back.

That tension was is there became this expectation that you're gonna start playing with a larger community.

Now, I played video games my entire life and I've never had to play online with anybody.

I tried playing online once and I got completely destroyed by a 13-year-old with no job.

So I'm like, why do I need to put myself in that position?

Like, I my self-esteem is already dealing with enough.

So I tend to prefer to play by myself no matter what it is.

For the most part, it's gonna be basketball or football.

I can make my own character, in which case I make myself to be about 6'5 and I can dunk.

So that's that's always fun.

Fantasy is always fun.

Um, I love to play football.

I'm the running back or the quarterback, and I'm always breaking every record because I put the game on easy, because again, I'm I'm not here to try to make any waves.

Um, or the other thing is sometimes I'll occasionally play a game where I get a chance to be the hero.

Because who doesn't want to save the world on their own terms?

So those are the outlets for me.

Well, a couple years ago, there was this one game that I was playing, and they were nudging you to say that you have to play it with other people.

And so for me, I'm like, I refuse to do it, I'm not gonna do it, I want to play on my own terms.

And so I'm playing this game, I make it to a certain point, but I finally get to a spot where I just can't get past it.

I'm I'm absolutely stuck.

So I'm playing this.

I'm talking about days, guys.

Like, I'm I'm I'm playing an hour, and then the next day I'll play another hour, and then the next day I'll play another hour, and I just can't get past this level.

As I mentioned, my my son and my my daughter, I've raised them playing video games.

So my son walks by, he's like, Oh, I I know this level, man.

You can't get by this by yourself.

That's when my competition rose up.

I'm like, who do you mean?

Who do you think you're talking to?

I could do all things through Christ Jesus that strengthens me.

I can absolutely get past this level.

You don't know the God that I serve.

You start proclaiming scriptures that make no sense out of context, but nonetheless, it made sense for me in that moment.

I went on another two days, still stuck at the exact same level, before I finally got to a point where when my son walked by again and he didn't want to say anything, um, but he just looked at me, shook his head, and went upstairs.

It's like, are you sure you don't want me to help?

I'm like, okay, fine.

So he hops on upstairs, and and and literally, what had taken me four days of frustration, almost through and destroyed three remote controls, what took me all those emotions, and one minute, my son hopped on, helped me get past that level, and it completely blew my mind.

I was blown away.

It's something that I was so frustrated with, trying to deal with it on my own because my pride got in the way, and I didn't recognize that what I actually needed was somebody to come alongside and help me.

I hope that you guys can recognize where we're going with this.

I think that very often we find ourselves functioning like lone rangers, functioning like heroes.

We're we're living life on our own terms, and we want to be the hero on our own terms, and we're doing things in our own strength, and we don't recognize that we are actually better together.

I began to recognize that my preference was going to be a barrier for my breakthrough.

That if I didn't find a way to step outside of my comfort zone and begin to invite other people into this journey with me, that I would never make it to the finish line.

I think the same can be said of every single one of us that God had intended and wired us to be in community with one another.

From the very beginning, his desire was for us to be connected to other people.

And what happens is we want to have, we don't want to live lives where we're codependent on each other.

We don't want to live lives where we big things become unhealthy.

But from a biblical perspective, it's not about us having codependency, it's about having healthy interdependency.

What that means is that I'm bringing my healthy self and you bringing your healthy self, and together we can make every single goal take place.

That is what God's mind is when he talks about this idea of us being connected in community.

The writer of Hebrews is talking to a group of people that are that are struggling in their faith.

There's temptation all around them, and that temptation is for them to forsake their faith and go back to living life on their own terms.

And so every single word that he is writing, he's trying to encourage them, he he's trying to remind them, he's trying to nudge them, to make them feel that they're connected to something much bigger to them.

But then when we get to Hebrews chapter 10, he begins to show them that you're connected to a much larger community.

Hebrews 10 · chapter mention

He uses the phrase, let us, let us.

Somebody say let us.

Say it with your chest, say let us.

He says, let us.

He's saying, make sure that in community, this is not something for you to apply as an individual.

This is something that we're supposed to put into practice together in community.

In fact, he literally uses the phrase let us over 10 times in the book of Hebrews.

He insinuates the idea of community over 50 different times.

This idea of making sure that we stay connected to other people.

Here are some of the things that he followed up: the phrase, let us.

He says, Let us be accountable to one another, let us hold on to our faith, let us experience grace, let us grow spiritually, let us be transformed together, let us be considerate of one another, let us lay aside every burden and wait.

Let us run our race together, let us be thankful, let us be people that worship God together.

These are just an example of the very moments where he's challenging and nudging the community there to do it together.

And then he shifts into this idea of saying that we don't want to neglect this.

He says, Let us not neglect this idea of us gathering as others are in the habit of doing.

I don't know about you, but when I hear that word neglect, that carries a lot of weight.

Because when I when I think about church, when I think about the idea of what it means to be connected to a kingdom community, I never think of me not showing up as an expression of neglect.

That's a very weighty word because when we look at the definition of neglect, it means to sever ties.

It means to desert or it means to abandon.

That's weighty when you're thinking about kingdom community, and he's saying, don't neglect it.

Don't, don't let it, don't let it go unattended.

My my wife and I, we we live in a neighborhood that has uh uh an HOA, a homeowners association.

I got any homeowners association folks out there with me today.

You guys know it's the gift and the curse at the same time.

You got you got a lot of opinions and you got a lot of retired folks that ain't got nothing else to do.

Um, but I love them, I love them.

And and so in our neighborhood, we have a guy and he just walks around the neighborhood and he's just making sure everything is perfectly in alignment.

But he has a role to play, and what he's trying to do is he's trying to make sure that the community stays healthy.

Well, where there's several people um that live in our neighborhood that they that this is just their second home.

They're not here every single day, they're here maybe a quarter of the time.

So because of their traveling, there are moments when they're not home.

And the challenge with that is the the yard goes completely unattended.

And what happens is you can clearly see the people who are there and the people who aren't, because you can start seeing the weeds and the and the grass overgrow.

And it's a hot mess.

It's not on my street, so it doesn't bother me, but for the people on the other side, I can see why they're they're frustrated with it.

And so what he's began to do is he began to send letters to the people and saying that even if you're not here, you still have a responsibility.

You can't neglect the yard because it's gonna affect all of us.

And the person began to push back and say, I don't see how this affects you in any way.

They said, Well, when you have the weeds that begin to overgrow, it begins to invite invasive species into the neighborhood, and now they begin to affect other people, and now we're all dealing with this.

See, your your lack of care is more than just about you, it's gonna infect the entire community.

These are the exact same words that the writer says as it relates to being connected to kingdom community.

This idea of saying that when we're not connected, when we're when we begin to neglect the importance of being connected to other believers, that it can cause things to overgrow in our life that can then begin to affect other people.

And you may not see it that way, but when people say and see that you're a follower of Christ and you're not connected to community, and you got weeds and other things that begin to invade your life, and you're in a workplace, that could begin to affect your witness, and then people don't want to have anything to do with Jesus because you're not connected to a community that can challenge you and that can make you a little bit better.

The idea of not neglecting these things is ensuring that we stay connected to one another.

He says, Let us make sure that we meet and that we prioritize this and that we stay connected to community.

Don't withdraw from it.

Don't don't fall back from it.

In other words, he says, don't minimize the importance of us being connected together.

He he mentions this idea about habits.

He says, Don't don't begin to neglect the gatherings as other people have the habit of doing.

Habits is another strong word that we see here because what we know is that that habits are essentially it's the culture, it's the it's the rhythms that we begin to create in our in our lives.

And we begin to understand that as we have healthy habits, it it creates patterns, and then patterns create healthy results.

And so what he's saying is that people had gotten into the habit that they didn't prioritize the household of faith anymore.

It just became a habit.

At one point it was important, but at another point it began to become this thing that, man, I'll I'll go if I feel like it.

And and and we began to see some things adjust.

Quite honestly, being being uh in the body of Christ in this day and age, we we've seen this all too well.

Like we all know how how I believe that time now for us will be determined on pre-pandemic and post-pandemic, because we began to recognize how how that split time.

And so for us as a church community, I remember when we got that faithful call of, okay, we're no longer gonna be able to gather.

The effect that it had on us as we began to scatter and we began to adjust into what does worship look like online and be create beginning to create new rhythms and habits so that we can continue to stay engaged in community remotely.

Contrary to popular belief, we were a church that actually stopped gathering.

I know we're in Florida and the assumption is every church continued to gather non-stop, but we stopped for about six months.

And in that six months' time, man, people were scattered.

It was such a challenge, and we didn't know where people were, and some people moved away, and some people went to churches that continued to gather.

So our last service before the pandemic hit, we had about 1,100 people.

Our first service, when we began to gather again, we had under 100.

People had gotten to the habit of not gathering anymore.

And literally since then, it's been an uphill climb.

And I find myself having conversations with people.

And when I see them, I'm like, man, you don't have to go to our church.

It's not even about that, but you need to be connected to community because it was important enough to Jesus, it should be important enough to you.

Where are you going?

What are you connected to?

And and I began to see they've been developed a habit that it's just not important.

They began to distance themselves from the importance of being connected to community.

What I believe God wants us to do is that no matter how busy we are, no matter how many things that's going on in our lives, that we don't get so busy that we no longer prioritize the things of God.

As I've had conversations with people, I firmly believe it's not because people don't love God anymore.

I don't believe it's because people love people less.

I believe that it became less of a priority.

That what was once sacred became something that was a suggestion.

That was once a commitment became complacency, and what was once a conviction turned into a matter of convenience.

I don't believe that that's what God's will is for every single one of us.

The idea of us being distracted is not hard upon us.

Think about it.

We have we have podcasts, we have the ability to stream information online, we have everything at our fingertips.

So for many of us, it's not an issue of development, but it is absolutely an issue of discipleship.

We can watch content, we can read books, we can listen to podcasts, we can get all these things, but but even what Paul says, man, you have you have many teachers, but you don't have any fathers.

You need to be connected to a community that's going to help you to grow together.

That the writer of Hebrews then says this phrase, he says, So let us consider one another.

Let us be considerate of one another.

Now, now think about the phrasing of that.

He he's not throwing this word out there as a as a as a as a lazy phrase that says, hey man, just consider this as one of the options.

No, he's actually using a phrase of saying, I want you to be considerate, be mindful.

I want you to focus on the importance of this.

I remember when I got my first big boy job after I graduated from high school.

I know that some people uh take what they call a gap year.

I took like a gap decade before I went back to college, but there's no judgment.

I did finish.

Um, but I remember when I got my first big boy job and it was working in a mailroom at a large bank.

And and working in a mail room, it was a well-oiled machine that we have people that came in early that sorted the mail.

We had other people that came in that delivered the mail, we had drivers, and so everything worked like a well-oiled machine.

And I remember my supervisor walking me through all the varying stations and all the parts that people played.

And what he said to me is like, hey, I get it.

Life happens.

You're gonna get sick, things are gonna happen in your life that's gonna sometimes challenge your ability to be here.

He said, But this is what I want you to do.

Be considerate of your co-workers because when you're not here, somebody else has to do what you're supposed to be doing.

I don't know what that did inside of me.

That made me understand that that my presence mattered in everything that I was called to do.

That when I go to work, my presence matters.

And if I'm not there to do what I'm supposed to do, that somebody else has to do it.

Well, how much more important is that in the context of the kingdom of God?

That when we're talking about being connected to community, having that mentality of saying that God has given me some unique gifts.

And when I show up in connection with my community, I'm bringing something to the table that is unique to me, that's going to help to shape the culture.

Maybe you're a person that you are just profound at worshiping.

Maybe you sing with the most angelic, melodious voice, whether you're on platform or not.

But what you're doing is you're helping to shape the atmosphere.

And when you're not there, we're missing your voice.

When you're not there, we're missing what you can contribute that actually helps to shape the culture.

It's so much bigger than wanting to stay removed or functioning at your own convenience.

It's understanding that I bring something to the table.

That's what I love about us being an all-hands church.

We're all connected, that we all play a part and have a responsibility.

And if we could begin to truly recognize the unique anointing that's on every single one of our lives, and when you show up and I show up, that we're able to shape and cultivate an atmosphere that can accidentally produce freedom.

Let me remind you about what happens with Paul and Silas.

I can't imagine while they were in prison and the other prisoners were there, if that was the day that they decided to stay silent, if that was the day that they chose not to lift their hands and declare the goodness of God.

But what scripture describes is that there was a moment while they were in prison near midnight, they began to sing songs themselves and it shifted the atmosphere and everybody got free as a result of what they brought to the table.

I believe that same thing happens every single week when we come together in community, that you're coming with your worship, you're coming with your generosity, you're coming with your servant's heart.

And there are people who may not be able to worship in their own strength, but you've cultivated an environment where freedom can take place, you've cultivated an environment where breakthroughs can take place.

All because you sang from the back row, all because you lifted up your hands, all because you chose to give, all because you chose to serve, all because you just chose to show up and smile and say hello to somebody, you'd be amazed at the difference that your presence can make in the context of community.

Jesus shows us the importance of community.

And in fact, what we see in the life in the ministry of Jesus of this man who was capable of doing anything in his own strength, but yet he chose to do his most powerful acts in the context of community.

He did it while he was surrounded by people.

And when I look at the life in the ministry of Jesus, there are some things that were connected to him that I believe are incredibly beneficial to us.

Jesus had community all around him.

Community simply means people that are all together, that are like-minded, making an effort to achieve a common goal.

Jesus had these people around him.

And I believe that every community has a couple of things that are connected to it, these viable things that are there.

One, every community needs to have supporters.

We need somebody that's just gonna cheer for us, people that's gonna support.

Jesus was surrounded by people that were supporters.

They they amen him, they traveled with him when he was preaching, they were there, they were shouting him down, and all the things like that was his supporters.

But then Jesus also had the people around him that served as his fellowship.

See, fellowship is a little bit deeper.

You can be amongst a bunch of people that are there and they have a collective identity, but fellowship are the people that you break bread with.

These are the people that you spend time with, these are the people that you invest in and they invest in you.

When you're part of a kingdom community, yes, you absolutely need to be surrounded by the great cloud of witnesses that we can encourage one another, we can shout down one another, we can greet and talk to each other outside in the courtyard, but then you have those that you're in fellowship with, the ones that you're sharpening each other with, the ones that you're having deeper conversations with, the ones that you spend more time with.

But then that third layer that Jesus had was his inner circle.

And that inner circle was just three men.

And those three men are the ones that Jesus was able to be the most vulnerable with.

Those are the ones that he revealed his glory to.

Those are the ones that he actually revealed his tears to when he was carrying the weight and the burden.

Of what he was going through.

That ultimately what we see in Jesus in the context of community, he had supporters, the great group, he had the fellowship, which were the ones that sharpened him and he sharpened, but he also had his inner circle, the ones that he was able to be vulnerable with.

I like to look at it this way: if this is what Jesus did, then that's what I need to do.

If this is what Jesus was around, then that's what I need to surround myself around.

I'm not under any illusion that I am any better or any stronger than Jesus.

If this is what Jesus did in order for him to thrive, then this is absolutely what I know that I need to do to thrive.

We are better together.

I believe that that relationships are the currency of the kingdom, and that when we're connected to one another in healthy interdependence, it allows us to be strengthened and it helps us to move forward.

But one of the things that I know above all is that our most important relationship is our individual relationship with God.

It starts there and everything flows from that.

Hebrews chapter 13 is growing to be one of my favorite chapters in the entirety of the Bible because it's there that the writer he consolidates everything he's been sharing up to this point, and he's really trying to drill it down and saying, listen guys, everything we're talking about, I want to I want to summarize it for you.

Hebrews 13 · chapter mention

I want you to go back and read Hebrews 13 in your own time.

But one of the things that he emphasizes is, man, let me tell you how you're supposed to interact with leadership.

Let me tell you how you're supposed to interact with each other, let me tell you about generosity.

He begins to break down these robust ideas in the context of community, and then he ends it on this premise of saying, and it's all built on Jesus.

He actually says that Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever.

That's found in Hebrews chapter 13.

Hebrews 13 · chapter mention

And what he's saying is everything you've heard me say up to this point, it's built on Jesus.

That's our firm foundation.

So my question for some of us right now, as we're talking about the importance of community and the importance of us being connected to other people and having healthy codependency or interdependence, rather, have we began to place our dependency on Christ?

Or let me pose it this way: how's your relationship with Jesus?

I I know that that for me that there are moments where I have to do uh in some inward inventory to ins to ask myself, man, how's my relationship with God?

Am I am I communing with him?

Am I spending time with him?

Because everything flows from that.

I've also have been able to find that when I'm struggling relationally with other people, it's because I haven't been as engaged as I need to be with God.

That when I'm connected with God, everything flows from that.

And that maybe instead of trying to figure out three steps on how to fix your relationships here, maybe the first thing you need to do is is restore your relationship there.

That as I get strengthened in the presence of God, then it's gonna flow and everything is gonna be better as a result of that.

I I want to close and pray for us.

Um, with every head bowed and with every eye closed, I want to pose this question to us.

As we're going into this season of Easter, the season of harvest, the season of us really considering the power and the influence that comes from us being connected together.

What is your relationship with Jesus looking like right now?

We're not going to ask you to raise any hands, but I just want us to have a moment of self-reflection, a moment of of personal inventory.

And this is not a transaction.

This isn't uh, I made a mistake yesterday, so I'm not in good fellowship with God.

I'm talking about am I communing with God?

Am I in relationship with him?

And I am, am I in prayer, am I connected to him in a way, or do I feel that maybe there's been a little bit of distance that's began to grow and I'm feeling it in other areas of my life?

I simply want to pray for us that God strengthens our relationship with him.

And then with that, we know the overflow is going to be our relationships with one another being strengthened as a result.

That we're gonna be able to identify the people that are around us that are meant to be our support group.

We're gonna be able to identify the people around us that are we're gonna spend time with in discipleship and grow and strengthen one another, our fellowship community, but then also beginning to identify our inner circle, the ones that we can be the most vulnerable with, the ones we can share everything with.

Lord, you know the heart condition of every single one of your precious people.

That as we're out here and the the beauty of the nature that you've created, Lord, we're we're reminded of the life and the ministry of Jesus and how you're constantly nudging us to be connected together.

That yes, we need to be healthy as individuals, but we come together and we link arms and we partner together in an effort and in a hope that together we are better, that together we can be strengthened, that together all hands we can move and do what you've called us to do.

That this powerful but yet challenging concept in in Hebrews chapter 10, it reminds us of the importance of us not forsaking, for us not to minimize the priority of us coming together in community, that we're better together, we're we're strengthened together, there's accountability together, that this is the place where we can hold each other accountable, that we can grow, we can celebrate, we can grieve, we can do these things all together.

Hebrews 10 · chapter mention

Father, I pray for our individual relationships, that as we know that that life gets busy and there's a lot of distractions and a lot of things pulling for our attention.

And it's in these moments, Father, that we can begin to minimize the importance of prioritizing you, whether that's as a person or or whether that's in community, we can just begin to slowly drift away from something that we once were committed to, something that we had convictions about, that we've grown complacent in.

But your word reminds us not to forsake these moments, not to neglect it, for us to make a habit of gathering with you.

So, Father, I pray that you stir our hearts, that we reprioritize the importance of us being connected in community with each other, that this is a cautionary reminder that we are better together, that all hands, that we pray together, we encourage together, we celebrate together, that we're better together.

So, Father, I pray a blessing over your people in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Amen and amen.

Well, well, well, God bless you guys.

Thank y'all so much.

Um, and and I think it's very fitting that we're talking about the importance of community.

I I cannot, like, first and foremost, man, I want to introduce a couple of people.

Nine o'clock service.

Here's a 10:30 service.

We got two services that some of y'all have never met each other, and we're actually all out here together.

I love having us all together in one spot at one moment.

I also want to remind us that this that this whole entire park is open to us.

We have some food trucks that are out there.

We have Kelly's ice cream out there, and the church has already paid for it.

So Kelly's ice cream is on us.

You guys are more than welcome to go and get some Kelly's ice cream.

Um, we also have there's the applause.

There now they're happy, Vinny.

Now they're now they're applauding a little bit.

Give them some free ice cream.

I need to just start it that way.

So we have free ice cream out there.

Also, I want to remind you guys um that we're gonna have our raffle at 12 30.

Our raffle is gonna take place at 1230.

So if you didn't get a chance to put your name down, go and put your name down at 12.30.

We're gonna meet back here.

We're gonna pull the names.

We have three powerful prizes that I think you guys are absolutely um going to love.

Also, out at our connect tent, there's a great spot that if you wanna um, if you wanna give, if you want to learn more about the church, you want to connect, even set up a care appointment.

All that can take place at our connect tent.

But we want you guys to run around, have fun.

This is a massive uh venue, and I'm hoping that you guys will enjoy it.

But meet me back here um at 1230.

I I want to pray over us, but we're gonna come back at 1230, and we're just actually gonna go back into one more worship song to celebrate as we wrap up.

We're gonna come back here at 12 30.

We're gonna continue to have fun.

So let me pray for us.

In fact, let us all stand to our feet.

Let us stand to our feet as we as we prepare to wrap up and run around and have a good time.

Um, may the Lord bless you and keep you.

May He make his face to shine upon you and give you everlasting supernatural peace.

In Jesus' name, amen.

Amen.

Amen.

God bless you.

We love you guys.

We'll see you back here at 12 30.

All right.

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