Conversation - with Pastor Jared and Pastor Robby - Kingdom Relationship Summary

Welcome to the Church of the Lakes Kingdom Conversations Podcast.

At Church of the Lakes, our mission is connecting all to Christ to become healthy in God and courageous in love.

In 2026, we're emphasizing a kingdom mindset in all of our ministries and missions by being more like Jesus and countercultural in our living.

Today's podcast looks back on our latest sermon series, Kingdom Relationships.

Join Pastor Jared and Pastor Robbie as they conclude this series on what it means to relate to one another under the name and power of Jesus Christ.

Be blessed.

Welcome to another Kingdom Conversation.

I'm Pastor Robbie Strock, and today we are wrapping up our sermon series, Kingdom Relationships.

You know, over the past several weeks, we've been exploring what it means to live as kingdom people, which means that we don't just simply believe things differently that Jesus taught it, but we actually show it differently by relating to one another differently.

And that includes the way we treat our spouse, our children, our friends, our church family, our neighbors, and even the people, believe it or not, who we disagree with or hurt us in an opportunity to show what the kingdom of God really truly looked like.

And that's what the series kingdom relationship has been all about.

And to help us walk through all of these little circles of influences that we have is Pastor Jared.

Hey Jared, welcome back.

How are you?

Doing well.

Thank you.

Well, it's really great to have you back because you have been away just for a short period of time, uh, not by circumstance, because you were on mission in Africa.

Um, I wanted to uh certainly give you the opportunity to share just a little bit about your experience, uh, especially after we had Trisha Talbot on, sharing about the mission trip that she uh that you went on with together.

And I I just want to, you know, open today's podcast by giving you an opportunity to reflect on uh your personal experience.

Can you tell us about Sierra Leone?

Yeah, I appreciate the uh the offer.

Uh you know, and I don't want to be too redundant with what Trisha shared last week.

She did a, I think, a phenomenal job.

Yeah, she did just of really uh capturing the essence of the mission trip.

Uh, that was my fifth trip to Sierra Leone with our mission partners over there.

And uh for me, honestly, it's probably my favorite trip in terms of the work I was doing.

Uh, I did a lot of pastoral work.

And it was just uh I was in my wheelhouse from preaching on Sunday morning to uh taking the opportunity to uh uh anoint people and and pray over them for healing, uh, not only at the church service uh that Sunday, but the several hours after church going from house to house.

Wow, that's really cool.

And I just just connecting with a lot of really amazing people, uh, some of our brothers and sisters over in Africa.

Uh, you know, one trip I took, uh, one of the village chiefs from uh Manjama village uh that we're seeking maybe to do a village partnership with, uh his wife was very ill, and she was at a hospital out in a place called Kenema, which is about an hour, hour and a half east of where we were staying.

Okay.

And I rented a vehicle and I had one of the um mission partners drive me out there so I could just simply be with them, anoint her with oil, and pray over her and visit with them.

And and that was really uh a high mark for me.

And also just connecting with some of my uh my colleagues over there, yeah.

Uh Reverend Charlie, I think.

Reverend Charlie.

Uh there's a young man named Edward uh Lavelly.

He's a young pastor that I I've connected with on several trips.

I've been over there, and I was able to go to his house and visit with him and his uh his wife, his two children, and I was able to pray over them and and just speak life into those kids, and that was really, really cool for me to do.

Uh yeah.

So as Trish and others were at the schools, you know, doing their thing.

I was kind of doing my thing in in regards to just pastoral care and preaching and teaching.

You were doing the same thing you do here, just thousands of miles away, right?

And it was awesome.

It was awesome.

And definitely, you know, the Lord is is cooking.

He's he's doing a lot, a lot of awesome stuff over there in Africa.

And I always come back a little, you know, more humble, a little more grateful for what I have here, uh, but also uh definitely with a yearning in my soul uh to have the depth of faith that our African brothers and sisters have.

Amen.

Thank you for sharing a little bit, Jared.

I don't want to belabor the point, but it's such a unique opportunity to hear how even though we're thousands of miles apart, people are really the same and yearn for the same thing, and that's a connection with our Lord and Savior.

It is.

We're all part of the kingdom of God together.

And it's oftentimes, you know, we try and fill other things into that hole, but oftentimes it's uh when people are certainly not ri uh, you know, rich in in materialistic things, they often turn to the Lord a lot quicker.

Yeah.

And that's amazing.

Uh uh, but you know, Jared, because you were on mission, uh, I want to give you the opportunity to kind of reflect a little bit about this sermon series that we're concluding, because at the very beginning, um, you didn't get an opportunity per to prepare a message necessarily, but I'm sure you went over the text just as Brian, Pastors Brian, and I did when we were given the messages.

But uh we've said throughout this entire series, first and foremost, that kingdom people, which has been our focus all this year, is that we just don't believe differently, they relate differently.

What does that statement mean to you?

And why do you think our relationships, whether they're between our spouses, our kids, our coworkers, why are they such an important expression of our faith?

That's a great question.

Uh you know, I mean, certainly belief has its part to play in our faith in the Lord.

Uh, I think doctrine theology is of utmost importance that it that it that is sound.

Yeah, sound.

Uh that really drives uh our intentions in life and in the way we relate to one another.

So um, you know, believing in Jesus, however, is simply not a just about what we believe.

Uh when we say about relating differently with with other people, it's it's treating and taking care of the person who's right in front of you.

Uh maybe that's what I mean by that statement.

It's not just simply what you believe but how you relate to one another.

It's uh taking care of the people and treating them the way Christ would would have them be treated uh the people who are right in front of you.

You know, and uh regardless of the context you find yourself in, whether it's in a grocery store or in your home with your family or in church or at the office, um, you just treat the people right in front of you with with Christ's love.

Yeah.

Well, I'm excited to kind of go through these little uh mile markers that we went through in our sermon series, just you know, some of the type of relationships we certainly do have, can have, and should have, and what they should look like when we're kingdom people.

Um, and we started off our sermon series looking at a passage from Paul out of Romans 12.

It was really about peacemaking and, you know, to be honest, reconciliation.

Uh, because certainly we have people in our lives um who we relate with difficultly, messy, right?

Messy relationships.

You know, what does it look like for those who claim Jesus is our Lord and Savior?

Uh, how are we to approach conflict differently, especially in the culture around us that tells us so often an eye for an eye?

Um, why is reconciliation so much harder than simply keeping the peace then?

It's another great question.

Yeah, I I think our culture uh tends to kind of condition us with two options when it comes to conflict.

Oh, okay.

What what would that be?

Fight or flee.

Yeah.

Jesus offers us his third option, pursue reconciliation.

And so biblical peacemaking isn't pretending like nothing happened, uh, it isn't avoiding difficult conversations so everyone can quote unquote just get along.

Oh, so we're not supposed to be ostriches bearing our head exactly.

Jesus called us to move toward people with both grace and with truth.

Um, and so keeping keeping the peace it can simply mean just keeping distance, where reconciliation is going to require this component of vulnerability.

Admitting maybe that what when I'm wrong in seeking out forgiveness, or it's um maybe listening to somebody else uh rather than trying to you know have this insatiable need to defend yourself in an argument.

Uh, one of my favorite uh verses out of that Romans 12 passage, because that's the passage you're talking about.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Um, you know, I I think in my Bible we have the subheading of uh true marks of a Christian, right?

It's the subheadings for that section, but it's probably verse 18 where uh Paul says, under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with one another.

Yeah.

Uh unfortunately, it takes both parties involved to really create an in an atmosphere of peace.

He doesn't sugarcoat it, it's right there in the scripture, right?

But as far as it depends on you, like you have a responsibility, a part to play in in keeping the peace with another person.

Um, and so so Jesus is saying you need to try.

It's not fighting, it's not fleeing, it's pursuing reconciliation, and whatever that means.

And I I can't really give a prescription for that because I think it's contextual.

Well, I think you did hit the nail on the head by saying that there's a difference between peacemaking and peacekeeping.

Yeah, I liked it uh it's so much that I use it in my own sermon, but there's an old uh cliche illustration of a fire alarm, and there's a difference between those who are trying to silence the alarm and then stop the alarm.

So, for instance, when the alarm's going off, there's two types of people there's the people who go grab the smoke detector and rip the batteries out because they make it they make it peaceful, right?

Yeah, that's one way to get peace.

Another way is to actually resolve the problem that's causing it, right?

Yeah, um two approaches.

Uh, but you know, I think I we have a biblical mandate to pursue reconciliation relationship.

And the reason I say it is because that's what the living God did for us.

Yes.

You know, I I like your I like your your fire alarm illustration.

That's good.

Because um you think about Almighty God and what did he do to pursue rec he sent his son to die for us.

Yeah.

After we had destroyed the relationship, I mean stepped away, broken that.

He had no responsibility to do that because we're the one who fractured the relationship, but he chose to take a step forward and say, I'm going to, I'm going to reconcile.

You know, why I love it, you know, earlier on in Romans, you know, when Paul says, While we were yet sinners, God demonstrated his love for us in this manner.

While we were yet sinners, Christ Jesus died for us.

Yeah.

You know, he he shed his blood so we could be reconciled to God the Father, which now gives us the capacity and also the responsibility to seek reconciliation within our relationships on earth.

And the biblical truth comes all the way back from Genesis when we're made in the image of God and we stepped away and broke that stuff.

Um, because we have this amazing capacity as human beings to shoot ourselves in the foot, don't we?

We do always and that happens to manifest in our relationships too, right?

How many times, Jared, have you and I broken, been the brokenness part of that relationship with another and had to seek reconciliation, just as much as it is on us to reconcile with people who maybe broke the relationship with us?

So it's kind of like uh a both sides of the fence situation.

I'm sure everyone at home can think of ways that they've broken promises or broken relationships and have to mend the fence that way, and then vice versa, how they need to be willing to extend the grace for people to be able to mend those fences as well.

Now, this is a sticky wicket, perhaps, but does that mean when people break the relationships by doing something that is pretty, you know, awful, terrible?

Like, how do you handle a situation perhaps like that?

Yeah, I mean, there might there's certainly natural consequences um to just just like to poor decision making.

God lets us face our own consequences sometimes from the actions that we make and decisions we take, right?

Yeah, I I reconciliation doesn't necessarily mean the relationship's gonna be re-established to where it was.

Okay.

Right?

But but but I think um right there's a uh component of reconciliation where forgiveness when you extend forgiveness to the person who might have wronged you, even though it might you might not have the relationship re-established to where it was, you're no longer holding that over the person and you're no longer letting what they did to you uh embitter you.

And it there's a freedom in that.

Well, thank you for spending so much time on this topic, Jared.

I think people can understand why we started off talking about maybe the messiest relationships that we might have and how we're called to seek reconciliation.

Um but you know, then we turned our focus, is probably to the most intimate relationship that uh most people will experience in this life.

And it's really important, you know, once again, Brian and I emphasize this in our sermons that marriage is not the topic of marriage is not reserved to couples who are married or about to get married.

You know, at its core, marriage is the most perfect word picture that scripture gives us for God's relationship with the church.

And you echoed that brilliantly uh in our in the sermons leading at up to the end of this sermon series, but let's talk about specifically marriage because that's where we started in our second week of this series.

You know, we focused on this passage that is really controversial in today's culture.

Yeah, because people don't like the word submission to submit to one another.

Um, now, with that in mind, and our passage out of Ephesians, how does Jesus' example challenge the way our culture typically sees marriage and submission, especially when it comes to getting maybe our own way in a relationship, especially one that's as intimate as a spouse?

Yeah.

Well, I you know, you look at what Jesus who Jesus is, right?

You know, the second person of the Trinitarian nature God uh willingly subjugated himself, condescended, condescended, you know, left his throne in heaven, uh, came to earth and fleshed himself with our humanity.

When you say stuff like that, it is shocking, condescended.

Yeah, but you you mean it intentionally because I don't think so.

Because I don't think people oftentimes because it feels it feels derogatory.

It does, but it is.

It was I mean, like the the the God of the universe condescended, yeah, like he left his throne in heaven, came to earth, and enfleshed himself with with humanity, and didn't even walk around like an earthly king.

You know, Philippians 2 says that he he subjugated himself, he he be you know became the servant, the slave amongst us, yes, uh, to the point where he became even obedient to death, death on a cross.

Yeah, right.

And and um and so when you look at the word submission, it's like, well, if my God is willing to submit himself, subjugate himself for the benefit of the benefit of me, for reconciliation, for collective humanity and creation, yeah, then he wanting me to submit myself to another for that person's sake doesn't seem so big of a deal.

Right, right?

Like you're right, uh absolutely.

I mean, it's small potatoes compared to what the living God did for us.

But submission is this dirty word in our culture, and it shouldn't be.

Uh, you know, what when I sit with couples in marriage counseling, premarital counseling before they get married, uh, you know, we have a conversation around this.

And what I will tell both the uh husband and wife of uh of a partnership is is your job is to live like like husband, your job is to live in such a way to make your wife great.

Yeah, and wife, your job is to live in such a way to make your husband great.

Amen.

And when you guys are both living that selflessly, marriage not only works, it thrives.

Yeah.

And then I'll also throw in the caveat that you start living to make the other person great by making first a commitment to Jesus, Christ is your Lord and Savior, and then it really works well.

But but it's almost like uh, you know, going back to even Romans 12, Paul talks about outdoing one another the way you love.

I know we didn't focus on that part of Romans 12, but when we when we uh when we sat down originally to look at our first week on Romans 12, I laughed because I had totally ripped apart, you should see the side columns of my Bible there because I'm so used to using it in officiating marriages, you know.

It's a great text, and you know, can you imagine if if couples woke up every morning, it's like, okay, let's be competitive with who can serve the other best?

Like who's gonna win in the service category today?

Yeah, you know, outdo outdo one another and showing honor.

Something I like that you know, I talk about you know, Jesus, you know, God is we serve a God who stoops.

What do you mean by that?

Who goes low?

Like you think of the the John 13 when he was in the in the wash the feet, right?

Wash the feet, he stooped, he went low for our sake.

And I I I think that you know to me, that makes we have a mandate to do that for one another, yeah, even in the context of marriage, uh you know uh husband serve your wife, wife submit to your husband out of reverence, all all out of reverence for Christ.

Like Christ is the goal.

How how can we in in our respective roles in a marriage uh make make clear for the other person uh the image of Christ, the person of Christ?

And thank you for helping paint this picture for us with all the scriptural examples, because I think it's important to once again remind people that marriage, you know, regardless if you are married, have never been married, never plan on getting married, or divorced, widowed, so on and so forth, all the iterations of this intimate relationship there can be.

This is a word picture of how yeah Jesus' relationship is with the church, his bride.

Um, so I'm so so grateful for I like that stooped.

I I don't know if I've ever heard you use those words before.

I don't know, that's probably my lack of listening.

You know, the next natural movement in this concentric circles of our relationships in life.

If you think of Christ at the very center, and then you think of um spouses, whether that's husband or wife, you know, next, the next set circle centric, uh concentric outward from that has got to be the family unit.

Um, and we we really talked about how the family unit is to be on mission together.

Yes.

So, Jared, what does it look like for a family to move beyond simply just sharing a home, cohabitating with one another, uh, and actually share what we've talked about this whole entire year of 2026 of having a kingdom purpose and maybe being kingdom builders.

What does that look like?

Uh, maybe in your eyes and through the scriptures?

I think at least the way I look at my home, homes aren't simply places where we retreat from the world.

Uh I would love it if people started realizing that your home is actually an outpost of the kingdom of God.

Like God has set you up specifically in this neighborhood for the purpose of expanding the boundaries of his kingdom.

So does that mean does that mean our homes need to be places that oftentimes people relate to as the church?

For instance, should our homes be places of worship?

Yeah.

Should our homes be places of discipleship?

Yeah.

Should our homes be places of fellowship?

Yeah.

Places of hospitality.

Is that what you mean by outposts?

Uh yeah, I yeah, uh being a outpost of the kingdom of God.

You know, we are um salt and light in our world.

Uh we are bearers of good news.

You know, we're we're we're seeking to charge the gates of hell, push them back and expand the the kingdom of God, the kingdom of light in any context we find ourselves in.

And and your home needs to be that place within the community you that God has placed you in.

Um but does that home also need to be outward-facing?

Because certainly that's the big illustration for the church, is we need to hopefully not be belly button gazers, but yeah, uh it has to start with the people inside it.

Like, like you know, it is unfortunately possible to live under the same roof, share the same meals, attend the same activities, and still not have the same common purpose.

Yeah, yeah.

Right.

So it's so you know, mom and dad, you know, marriage is a Christian marriage, uh, are the the matriarch and patriarch of a family unit that's trying to develop and teach their kids the way of Jesus and and the per the true purpose of their existence.

I I said this week at at church, like you know, my goal as a dad is primarily not to raise my kids to where there are successful contributors to society.

That's not my primary goal.

That's important, sure.

But the primary purpose of my role in my children's lives is to help them grow into faithful disciples of Jesus Christ.

And to have their purpose being, uh I I I love our church purpose, you know, mission connecting all to Christ to become healthy and God and courageous in love.

And and that starts in the context of home.

Get everybody, mom, dad, children on the same uh wavelength when it comes to purpose and mission, and then from there face outward.

Be the outpost of the kingdom of God to the people you live around.

And like you said, you know, in the home, it's it's worship, it's discipleship, it then it's service, it's hospitality.

Yes.

Invite the neighborhood in.

Yes.

You know, or go out to the neighborhood and serve, right?

Whatever way you want to do it.

That's what I mean by outpost of the kingdom of God.

Well, thank you for helping us flesh that out because uh oftentimes when our homes start to be a true mirror of the scriptures that we're reading, um, and notice I didn't say church, I said the scriptures we're reading, because oftentimes uh, you know, we fall into the trap of thinking that the church is a building, right?

With programming that we attend to.

And that's where I want to go next.

Because certainly, um, you know, there's got to be something deeper to how we relate to one another in the church as a family, you know, because we certainly have looked at the uh intimate family that many of us know, which is our spouses and our kids, so on and so forth, uh, maybe some uh other specific close people.

We can even include some friends in that.

Yeah.

Um, but you know, you know, what makes the church something that we have to be different about, Jared?

Um, how we have to relate differently with one another within.

Yeah.

So, you know, all these uh relationship dynamics and concentric circles we've been talking about are all really important in terms of um, you know, husband and wife, children, friendships, all um having an element of pursuing Christ together.

Yeah, they're all relationships that God has created, but none of them were created to replace the greatest of all concentric circles, and that is the church.

Like God created the family of God, and so all of those other relational dynamics fit within the family of God, and uh, you know, we we are a diverse people, um, a microcosm in the local church to what the collective family of God is all about.

And uh I guess where where were you going with the question?

Well, you know, I I want to emphasize when we were studying specifically Acts chapter two, yes, yep.

You really honed in on the word devoted.

I did, yeah.

And specifically, you were trying to emphasize this beautiful idea in our scriptures from Dr.

Luke, who's writing to us in the Acts of the Apostles, about how they were devoted not to this building or to a certain program at a building, but rather they're devoted to one another, uh, being flexible enough to notice the needs of others and then to give um wholly and completely.

I just love the way that you honed in on devoted because I think it totally changes the way that we are to relate to one another if we are devoted to making sure you know we're living each one of us in the best capacities that we can in the in the beautiful image of Jesus Christ.

And so just to give the listener it what you're referencing in Acts 2 is verse 42, and they devoted themselves to the church, the early church, the Christians of the early church, uh devoted themselves, the apostles teaching the fellowship to breaking of bread and the prayers.

So, like uh something we talked about was like this is an amazing passage of scripture in light of the entire chapter.

Because Acts chapter two starts out with a conversation around Pentecost.

Now, Pentecost was a high holiday in Judaism that in this moment in history was redefined by God when the Spirit of God came to dwell within the people of God, and the church was born.

And uh what was neat about the context of the of Pentecost as a Jewish holiday is is it was a holiday where Jews from all over the world pilgrimed pilgrimed to the holy city to celebrate.

And so the church was born out of this diverse people that became after Peter got up and shared the gospel, and 3,000 people repented and came to faith in Jesus and received the Holy Spirit, became the united as the family of God, yeah, under the name of Jesus.

And so the fact that they were devoted in all these ways, just days before they were complete strangers of one another.

Wow.

And yet now they're calling each other brothers and sisters, because they are, because they are, yeah.

Because the Spirit of God made a radical transformation in into their identity.

Ah, that's a key word, you know, and so um their priorities shifted.

But who does the transforming, Jerry?

The Holy Spirit.

Isn't that amazing?

It's not you, it's not me, it's the Holy Spirit.

Yeah.

Um and it's cool because with the shift of priorities, like it became about you know, building your life on the authority of scripture, it became about communing with other believers, it became about celebrating the sacrifice of Christ and the empty tomb.

It became about um what was the last one?

Uh prayer, about seeking God's presence together.

And everything else became a secondary issue.

Where I feel like in a church in America today, so our secondary issues can become the primary issues.

We have constructed church no longer being a family of brothers and sisters in Christ, but rather a place we go every Sunday, yeah, or once during the week or occasionally, and so we we we've compartmentalized more than we probably should.

Well, I'm I uh loved your use of the word transformation, how God, whether it's through the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit, transforms the believer to become so much more in our relationships.

Um it's a beautiful illustration of how none of us, as you have said, are alone in this world.

We are the one another religion.

For those who claim Jesus as their Lord and Savior, we are brothers and sisters, and we have a responsibility to breathe life into that.

Um, and I'm so grateful for not only walking through the spouse and the family, certainly things people care very, very much about, but also expanding that to the church because and and to even to people we disagree with.

And these are the relationships that matter most.

Yeah, you know, um like when you think of the early church, like like people who came to faith in Jesus in the midst of a very pagan culture that persecuted the church.

They became outcasts, yeah, and they would be invited into the church and they would receive a new family.

Yeah, they would receive brothers and sisters, they would become brothers and sisters in Christ to other people, they would receive new spiritual mothers and fathers and grandparents.

And um yeah, it's just it's a it's it's just an incredible picture when you think about it.

Like the way God transforms the most important of relationships.

I tell people all the time, like in the church, we are bound together by something deeper and more precious than biology or by marriage or adoption, and it is the blood of Jesus.

And so I actually will tell people I have more in common and then close and am closer to let's say an Iranian Christian 6,000 miles away than maybe I do a cousin who doesn't believe in Jesus, but I grew up with.

Right?

Because what binds us more deeper than familiar liner biology is Jesus.

Um I don't know if we really look at that the way we we need to look at it in the American church today.

Well, I love the encouragement, Jared, for challenging us to see every relationship as an opportunity to share that gospel message and then to adopt them into the family as Jesus has first adopted us into the family.

Um thanks, Jared.

You know, relationships.

It was the next natural transition as we started to go through these kingdom things.

Now we're gonna spend a couple of weeks here prepping and preparing to go into our next kingdom series, and we'll have to wait and see on the next podcast uh what's coming up here.

I'm excited for our fall groups to kick off, and uh, and then we got a little bit of a teaser there for you to stay tuned.

Uh, but I wanna I want to end our um podcast today by uh heading back to our oldy but goody segment, real questions, real answers.

We had a submission from my good friend Angela, and she shared this question for us to chew on.

You ready for it?

Let's go.

All right.

Hey Jared and Robbie.

Uh Justin and I read a page from our son's prayer book each night.

We came across a prayer that says, The Lord will bless those who fear him.

How do we help explain fear of the Lord to our son?

What do you think, Jared?

That's a great question.

And it's not a question that I was actually prepped to answer.

So I like that.

It's it's coming in cold.

It's supposed to.

You're not, I'm not, you're not allowed to give away that.

Um fear it it's a it's a a depth of reverence for the Lord.

Uh, you know, it's it's great when you think about you know we sang a hymn recently in church called Jesus, friend of sinners.

And Jesus is a friend of sinners.

Uh Jesus is someone who wants to be approachable and somebody who we can we can laugh with and enjoy life with.

But Jesus is also God.

And there needs to be a level of reverence when we approach God.

Uh uh that this relationship matters, that it's serious, that I'm in submission to it.

Uh I I was, you know, with a friend today at Chick-fil-A, and we were talking about um you know Jesus as savior and Jesus as Lord and how much easier it is, at least it is for me to call Jesus my savior because I I don't want to go to hell.

But to call Jesus Lord means he gets to calls call the shots in your life.

Uh he gets to be the master over everything.

And so uh part of a healthy fear for the Lord is a willingness to submit to his authority, to his will.

And and the reality is when you do, it's the best place to be.

Yeah.

And you're gonna receive blessing upon blessing of the the the right blessings, the most important blessings, uh in in regard to that.

Okay, can you read me the the scripture again?

So so it's out of a prayer book.

And it says the Lord will bless those who fear him.

Yeah, and there it is.

It's a reverence, it's a seriousness in the relationship that you are willing to come under his lordship, his authority.

And when you do that and he calls the shots and you move in in step with his will, you will be blessed in the right ways that the Lord wants to bless you.

It may not mean a million dollars in your bank account, but you don't need too many examples to realize that that money doesn't actually make you happy.

Yeah, but you're gonna receive blessing from the Lord that actually will make you happy.

Well, you name chat uh traditional hymn that we sing, and I I can't help but think of when you talk another traditional hymn of I surrender all that we sing.

Actually, you know, uh in contemporary worship spaces as well.

Uh, because uh for those who fear, they surrender all, don't they?

Yeah, every little itty bit a part of their life, you know.

Which has been a major theme this year for us.

It has been, and it's what made me really hone in on um those who fear them are not necessarily covering their face afraid, but they're willing to surrender all and submit all, like you said.

Um, even the darkest steps that things that other people don't know.

You you you you say that it reminds me of C.S.

Lewis's um uh Chronicles of Narnia.

And the line which in the wardrobe, uh, I think it's Lucy.

When she goes to the wardrobe and she meets Aslan the Lion for the first time.

Aslan, for those of you who don't know, is a representation of God in the story of the Chronicles of Narnia.

An allegory, yeah.

Oh, I'm sorry, she meets Mrs.

Mr.

Beaver.

Oh, okay.

And Mr.

Beaver is talking to her about Aslan.

Okay, and as she's describing this line to her.

Oh, I think I know this.

She said she she she asks him the question, is he safe?

And Mr.

Beaver chuckles and goes, Safe, he's a lion.

He's a lion is not safe, right?

But he is good, he is good.

So, yeah, God is God.

That's some he is a presence to fear.

Yeah.

Oh, but he is so good.

He is so good, right?

So so much so that he sent his son Jesus to shed his blood.

Yeah, for us, yeah, for our sakes.

Yeah, praise be to the Lord.

Yeah, thank you, Angela, for submitting that question.

And you can be included in this section.

Please email us at podcast at church or lakes.org.

We'd love to be able to chew on your questions and uh maybe devote a whole episode to them if we get enough.

Uh and so, Jared, thank you for uh off the cuff helping us uh explain that a little bit, maybe, uh um, to those who probably wondered the same thing because fear is a is an interesting word to use, but uh uh uh we certainly uh know what that translation means oftentimes.

Uh but I'm so grateful for your time today, Jerry.

Thank you for breaking down our latest sermon series.

And if you're interested in learning more about this wonderful community of believers, hey, please reach out to me at Robert at churchalakes.org.

We'd love to be able to connect with you and tell you more uh how you can join alongside and get connected, whether that's online, in person, in mission, or in small groups.

But before we go, I want to say a big thank you to Betsy, our director of communication, to Len Brown, our chief editor and encourager in the My Voice Stephanie for helping us get this up off the ground in our social media platforms.

But please remember, it's our mission as followers and disciples of Jesus to connect all to Christ to become healthy in God and courageous in love.

Until next time.

God bless you.

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