Time to Choose | Pastor Chris Kouba

It is good to see you.

My name is Chris Kuba.

Let me add my word of greeting to past earliers.

Uh, it is so good to be here with you today.

What an incredible morning of worship that we've already had.

God is just moving in a big, big way.

Let me invite you to open up your Bibles to Joshua chapter 24.

Joshua 24 · chapter mention

Joshua chapter 24 is where we're gonna be.

Joshua 24 · chapter mention

And I want to invite you as well, if you would, if you brought your journals with you, to please grab them and open them up to page 25.

Page 25 is where we're gonna be hanging out and taking some notes.

If you did not bring your journal, or if you do not have a journal, I want to encourage you to grab something, grab your phone, grab something that you'll be able to take notes because I'm gonna be prompting you today to begin to reflect on some things and to write some things out.

And my experience has been, and statistically it is true, you're gonna learn a lot more if you write stuff down.

It's just as simple as that.

And I don't want this just to be something that is spoken over you.

Instead, I want this to be something that comes in you and God is able to use and to work in your life today.

So please encourage you to grab these.

Also, hopefully, you had a chance to see the leadership commitment cards that were in your seat as you came.

Just go ahead and take those, set it aside for just a minute, and we will deal with it at the end of services today.

Joshua chapter 24 is where we will be.

Joshua 24 · chapter mention

I do want to take this opportunity to welcome all of our men and all of our women at our correctional facilities.

Let's give them a hand and celebrate them.

They have been with us the whole time as we've walked through this journey series, which we are completing today.

This has been an incredible series.

I hope that you have uh enjoyed it and that you have been challenged not only in your personal leadership, uh, but most importantly that you would be a leader who's a godly leader, that you would follow after what God says, that you would do what he leads you to do, and that you would see that following Jesus is the best leadership decision that you will ever make.

Let me just kind of summarize where we've been so far on this journey so far.

The very first week we talked about how leaders fear God more.

More than the giants in the land, more than the challenges that they may face, more than the obstacles that they may come up against.

We talked about how Moses had 12 spies go into the land to scout it out.

Ten came back and they said, It's too big, we can't do it, there's no way.

Two came back, Joshua and Caleb, and said, Absolutely, if the Lord is with us, we can do this.

And we wanted to encourage you, listen to the voice of God more than you listen to the voice of everything else.

We talked about the following week about how even if you aren't ready for it, even if you weren't prepared for it, even if you didn't necessarily volunteer for it yourself, when God calls on you, when he presents a challenge or an opportunity in front of you, leaders step up.

Leaders take on that opportunity and they step up to what God has, and they do it with God's presence, and they do it grounded in God's word.

The next week we looked at Joshua chapter four, the story of the memorial stones, and what we saw is that God led the people across the Jordan River by splitting the Jordan River and allowing them to cross.

And he not only set up a memorial stone of rocks in the middle of the trial, but then he also had them set up a stone of remembrance on the other side so that when they would walk forward and walk through all of the leadership challenges and opportunities that God would have before them, they could always look back and see God was faithful.

We talked about the point being leaders tell the story.

They not only tell the story to themselves, but leaders tell the stories to the future generations.

We then looked at Joshua chapter 6, the story of the battle of Jericho.

Joshua 6 · chapter mention

It is an incredible story.

It is a story of great deliverance, but it also is a story that in no way is what you thought it would be.

It takes way longer, and it's totally different than how you would have thought that God would bring deliverance to the city of Jericho.

But what we learned in that is that leaders trust the process.

Let me tell you something.

If you follow after God and you do what he tells you to do, there's going to be many times you're going to be like, there's no way this is right.

There's no way this makes any sense.

There's no way this is what you're wanting to do, but we trust the process because ultimately we know that God does his stuff in his way, in his timing, and also with his results.

Last week, Dave did an incredible job, our executive pastor here at United City teaching us this principle that leaders pray big prayers.

I don't know about you.

My prayer life looked different this past week as a result of that message.

I prayed some pretty big prayers.

I began to ask God to do some pretty significant things.

And it doesn't just mean you just pray and do nothing.

What do we talk about?

God can do more than you can do.

It means that you still need to do some things.

And so for some of you, you're going to be challenged at the end of the message today to take your next step that you can do.

But what we also learn is that when you know who you're praying to, you change what you pray for.

And we talked about the fact that God, because he is somebody who is a more than God, allows us to pray big prayers to him, including, Lord, would you make the Son stand still?

And he can do it.

This morning we're gonna finish up this series looking at Joshua chapter 24.

Joshua 24 · chapter mention

It's the end of the story of Joshua.

It's the end of Joshua's life and it's decision time.

The title of the message today is Time to Choose.

Time to choose.

What you have is Joshua is now gathered with all of the military leaders.

He's gathered with all of the people.

He had all of these life experiences that he had done all the way from leading them from bondage there in Egypt along with Moses to then taking over the leadership, and now going to this place where they're in the promised land, and he tells them it's no longer time to discuss, it's no longer time for delay, it is time for you to make a choice.

And I want you to know the same thing that Joshua calls the people to do is the exact same thing God is gonna call you to do today.

I'm gonna be asking you to make a choice.

The choice is found in Joshua chapter 24, beginning in verse 14.

Joshua 24 · chapter mention

It says, Now therefore, fear the Lord and serve him in sincerity and in faithfulness.

Put away the gods that your father served beyond the river and in Egypt, and serve the Lord.

And if it is evil in your eyes to serve the Lord, choose this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your father served in the region beyond the river, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.

But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.

Principle I want you to walk away with.

You can write it there underneath the title in your journals there on page 25 is leaders choose God.

Leaders choose God.

This is the goal.

This is the point.

This is what I not only want from you, this is what I want for you.

Everyone is faced with a line in the sand moment, a time when you no longer can get more information, you can no longer debate, you can no longer ask for clarification, you have to make a choice.

And the question you have to ask is, what are you gonna choose?

You don't get a choice, you don't get to determine the consequences of your choice, but you do get to determine what choice you make.

The message found in the life of Joshua and reiterated right before his death is that leaders choose God.

This is what I want you to do today.

This is what I will ask of you today, to choose God.

There two ideas presented in verse 14 and verse 15 that I want to key in on related to this principle of leaders choosing God.

Number one, leaders choose God fully.

Leaders choose God fully.

Verse 14 says the choice is to be made to serve the Lord with sincerity and faithfulness.

This means that God is asking not for a half-hearted commitment.

He instead is asking for wholehearted devotion and commitment to Him.

I can say that I love my wife Hillary, I can tell her that I love her as well, but if I don't pursue her, if I don't date her, if I don't spend time with her, if I don't hang out with her, then all I am doing is saying what I wish to be true instead of what is actually true.

I cannot say that I love her with faithfulness and sincerity, yet my actions don't back up what I say.

Yet how often do we see that we may say one thing about our devotion to the Lord, but if you were to examine our lives, it would actually reveal something very different.

The problem that we see being presented here is one of idol worship.

I don't know about you, when I think of idols, I begin to think about little bitty statues that like people far away from here begin to worship.

I begin to think about the little shrines that people may bow down to.

And here I am in my American Metro or American suburban context, and I don't necessarily think uh anything this applies to me.

However, I want you to see today.

Idols can be very, very subtle in how they appear and how they show up in your life.

Hillary and I experienced this five years ago when I got the call to consider to be the pastor of United City Church.

We were living in North Dallas at the time.

It was a growing region, a region that was experiencing literally uh uh record growth.

And there was people moving in right and left.

Uh, there was large corporations that were also relocating there, and so as a result of that, the majority of the people that were moving in were young, professional, wealthy, growth-minded people.

It was an awesome place to live because, in light of that being a new emerging part of North Dallas, there was also all of these great amenities, some world-class restaurants, some high-end entertainment.

I mean, it was absolutely very, very close within 15 minutes of us.

Dallas Cowboys, this is gonna be our year, by the way, just a little side note, all right.

Dallas Cowboys had just opened their practice facility 15 minutes away from our house, which meant there was professional athletes all over the place.

With that, brought in some more world-class restaurants, and with that, in addition to that, brought in some high-end entertainment.

I mean, literally, it was absolutely awesome.

15 minutes from our house, we had all of these things that we could enjoy.

In addition to that, things were going really, really well at the church.

I was there in this church with all of the opportunity.

We'd experienced a ton of growth in our church and ministry.

Our staff team was incredible, our serve team was incredible.

Systems and things were operating at a high capacity.

We were seeing people come to know the Lord all the time.

We were seeing people disciple, we were seeing people come into a relationship with him.

It was absolutely amazing.

I was on staff there for almost 20 years.

As a result of that, you have a lot of history with people.

Not only do you have history, but I had situations to where I'd I'd I dedicated some people's children and I'd buried some of their family members.

I had trust in their lives.

I'd been around for a long time.

I had trust on the staff.

I was able to do some incredible things in leadership as a result of my position being there.

In addition to that, we loved our house.

I literally designed the house and we built our dream home, and every single thing in our house was absolutely perfect, except for a pool in our backyard, which we didn't have, but we had designs for one.

We were just trying to figure out when we were going to install it.

Everything literally was going so well.

We knew all of our kids' friends, and we knew their parents, and we knew their teams, and we knew their activities, and we loved the little bubble that we had created.

Our kids went to a Christian private school that met at the church that I was leading.

Hillary worked there on staff at the school.

Literally, you could not have had a more insulated, perfect bubble for our lives, and we loved it.

Then I get a phone call from David Carter, who's the chairman of the search team at this church, and says, Hey, would you consider being the pastor of this church?

I told him no initially, mainly because I had no desire to leave where I was.

I loved everything about our life and everything that we had had.

And so I told him no.

He kept calling back, we had a few conversations, and then eventually he said, Look, here's the deal.

Our team is unanimous.

We feel like you are God's man for our church, and we're going to wait you out.

I went and met with Hillary and I said, We gotta have a conversation.

There's this church in Houston, and these people that think that I'm supposed to be their pastor.

So let's talk this out.

And so we decided to do something we've done before, which is when we have a big decision, we wanted to make a pro-con list to kind of help us think it through.

But we weren't making a pro-con list about coming to Houston.

We were making a pro-con list about whether we would actually leave Dallas.

So we started to make the list.

And I said, okay, you go first.

She says, I really don't want to leave the kids, friends.

They're comfortable, they're good.

I don't want to have to leave that.

I'm like, okay, my turn.

I don't want to have to start over.

I've got almost 20 years with these people.

I love these people.

Like, I've got I don't want to have to go somewhere and build trust and relationships and have to do all these things over.

And I said, I don't want to leave all the amenities.

I don't want to leave the restaurants.

I don't want to leave the entertainment.

I don't want to do these things.

And as we began to say these things out loud, we both just looked at each other and we were embarrassed.

And we started off as embarrassment quickly turned to conviction.

Because we realized we would never in a million years want our kids to make a life decision the way we were making this one.

Never one time did you hear us say, God, I'll do whatever you want me to do.

Just tell me what it is.

Never prayed it.

Instead, it was, God, I really like my life, and I'll do what you want me to do as long as you check off these boxes and you don't touch this.

At the very same time, I was preaching through the book of Hebrews at our church, and I came to Hebrews chapter 12.

Hebrews 12 · chapter mention

I want to read you the passage.

Hebrews chapter 12, verses 1 and 2.

Hebrews 12:1

It says, Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight and sin which clings so closely.

And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us.

Looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

Now, I've preached on this before.

We all know what sin is.

Sin is something clearly that if you're doing something against what God says that you should do, then obviously it's going to keep you from being able to run the race that God has set out before you.

However, I did not know what weights were.

I remember that week in my study, it was around the exact same time they were having these conversations.

I asked the Lord, Lord, would you show me what does it mean?

What are the weights in my life that would keep me from running the race that you have set out before me?

And he hit me immediately and he said, This, your weights are your neighborhood, your house, your kids, friends, your job, your success, your amenities, all the things that I've blessed you with.

Here's the problem: nothing that I just told you and that I just said are bad things.

In fact, God actually tells us that He gives us those things as gifts for us to enjoy.

Yet somehow what God revealed to us in that moment was that along the way, the gifts that were originally given as blessings had suddenly turned into idols that we no longer could live without.

We suddenly had to have some very difficult conversations and some very challenging conversations because then I knew God was calling us to decide.

Am I gonna choose to follow God conditionally or am I gonna choose to follow God fully?

You see, here's the irony of it.

I would have told you in that moment that I was all in with the Lord.

I would have told you that I actually follow him with faithfulness and sincerity.

I would have told you that no matter what God says, I will do, no matter where God tells me to go, I will go.

But now all of a sudden, whenever he actually forces me to face the decision and time to choose and say, Are you actually willing to?

My actual answer was this: God, I will do whatever you want me to do, but don't touch my amenities.

God, I will go wherever you want me to go, just don't touch my friends.

God, I'm willing to give you whatever it is that you ask of me.

Just don't touch my house.

Just don't touch my comforts.

Just don't touch my finances, just don't touch all this stuff over here.

And the reality was, I was saying one thing, and I looked as though I was all in.

Actually, it was something else.

Church, whatever is at the end of your answer to this phrase.

God, I will serve you as long as you don't touch this.

Whatever this is, is actually what you serve.

It's uncomfortable in here.

I can feel it.

I want to ask you to do something for me.

Would you take out your journals or take out something that you can write on?

And I want to ask you to do something that could be very, very hard to do.

But I'm telling you, it will break free, and God will do some things in your life that will be very, very, very moving if you will let him.

Write down this phrase.

God, I will serve you as long as you don't touch.

I want you to write it down.

I want you to name it.

One of the most difficult things that God forced us to do in the midst of that season is that we had to not only just recognize that we had some things that were holding us back, God made us name them.

And when you name them, you have a greater ability to repent of them.

When you repent of them, then God can forgive you and cleanse you and move you to the place where you begin to recognize, okay, God, what do you want me to do about this now?

You see, for some of you, you need to put those things away.

You need to drop that job.

You need to get out of that relationship.

You need to remove that entertainment, you need to get off of that team.

Whatever it is that's distracting you from serving the Lord fully, you need to remove it.

For some things in your life, you can't just quit your job.

You can't just dump your school, you can't just leave all of your friends.

So the question then is okay, well, what do I need to do?

And I would tell you this the way that you can determine whether you are enjoying something as good gifts or whether you have turned those things into over time, idols which you can't live without is simply this.

Ask the question.

Can I be honest with you?

I had no desire to come to Houston and it had nothing to do with Houston.

The reason I didn't want to come to Houston is because I didn't want to walk away from all the things that I had.

And I was nervous that if I actually prayed and I asked God what he thought, then I would have to be okay with his answer.

Some of you have yet to ask the question.

You want to know why?

Because you're afraid what God may say.

All I'm asking you to do is be honest.

You're not following the Lord and choosing him fully.

Instead, you're choosing him conditionally.

And it is decision time.

He is asking you to say, Yes, I will follow you.

I will put my yes on the table and be willing to even lay down the very Which I have loved so much, so that Lord, even if you take away that team, you're still God.

Even if you mess with my kids, I'm still gonna follow you.

Even if you disrupt the perfect little bubble that you have worked so hard to create, he is still the Lord over all.

Let me tell you, I get it.

It's hard.

It was excruciatingly painful.

Not so much as to what God was leading us to do coming down here.

That actually happened very quickly, and God was gracious in that.

The biggest struggle for us was having to admit we'd walk away from all these things that we thought we couldn't live without.

Of course, I would tell you, we're now here.

God's been so good, he's been so gracious, and he always is.

He always is.

And what you will begin to discover, the very things you thought you couldn't live without, God has something more than waiting for you.

If you just follow him.

Choose to follow God fully.

Verse 15, I want you to see the second point of this, which is leaders choose God personally.

Leaders choose God personally.

Verse 15 says a very key phrase.

It says, For as for me, too many people live off of a proxy faith.

I've got a homeowners association in the neighborhood that we live in, and uh I get notices all the time about meetings that they may be having.

I've never been able to go to any of those meetings.

It always never works out timing-wise, but I've noticed that they are no one else must go to the meetings either because they're really big, not only on when the meeting is, but in but encouraging you to make sure that you fill out the form so that somebody else can proxy for you.

Because they need enough people to make a quota for the meeting to actually be able to happen.

And so a proxy means this that I am signing something saying I'm gonna let somebody else vote on my behalf.

When they ask a question, it's though they're asking my question.

When they're asking, when they're making a comment, it's though they're making my comment.

When they're placing a vote, that's basically placing my vote.

And as a result of that, it's not that I necessarily have any idea what's going on.

I'm just basically doing whatever it is that they say that we should do, the person who is proxying for me.

Can I tell you that many of you have a proxy faith?

I'm not sure who it is, but along the way, you decided whatever grandma thinks, that's what I'm gonna think.

Whatever my parents decide, that's what I'm gonna decide about the Lord.

Whatever my boyfriend or my girlfriend, whatever my youth pastor says, whatever my pre, whatever, whatever somebody else says, that's what I'm gonna choose about God.

Here's the problem: you can't have a proxy faith.

Joshua says here, as for me, he is owning the situation.

When you stand before God, God is not gonna look at you and say, Hey, what does your mom think about me?

When you stand before God, God's not gonna look at you and say, Hey, what does your boyfriend think about me?

When you stand before God, he's not gonna say, Hey, tell me what your youth pastor says about me.

Instead, when you stand before God, it's gonna be just like Matthew chapter 16.

Matthew 16 · chapter mention

When Peter was at Caesarea Philippi, and he asked him, What do the people say about me?

And Peter began to answer, and he looked Peter right in the eyes with an emphatic you in the Greek, and he says, Who do you say that I am?

What is your answer?

What are you gonna do with the calling that God has placed on your life?

What are you gonna do with what God has been leading you to do and to follow Him in your leadership?

Student, and I'm not asking what your friends think, your boyfriend or girlfriend thinks.

I'm not asking what your parents think, I'm asking what you think about God.

You're not gonna get into heaven on your parents' faith.

Adults, it's time for you to make a choice.

I am so grateful that so many of you are coming as a result of your student coming and being a part of our ministry.

But please hear me.

You're not gonna stand up before the Lord one day and say, Well, this is what my son said.

What do you say about God?

He wants you to make a personal decision where you are owning your faith in every single way.

Men.

So many men are like jellyfish.

They have no backbone whatsoever, they just basically go wherever the current takes them.

And I'm telling you, what God is calling us to do is for men in this room to be able to stand up and say, I don't care what everybody else does, as for me and my house, we are going to serve the Lord.

My first allegiance is not to the baseball coach.

My first allegiance is not to my boss, my first allegiance is not to the school, my first allegiance isn't to my friends.

I don't care what they watch in somebody else's house, we're not gonna wash that in our house.

I don't care what you do somewhere else and what they do on Friday nights over there.

Let me just tell you something.

That's not how we're gonna act here in our house.

I don't care how other people act at the office, I'm making the decision for my life.

I'm not gonna act that same way that everybody else does.

We're in desperate need with our culture growing more and more apart from what God says.

Of men, of leaders, of young adults, of moms, of teenagers.

Who will embrace this hard reality?

Leaders do hard reality.

This is so important for us to embrace because I love what he says here.

That's for me and my house.

He doesn't say that's for me and my neighborhood.

That's for me and my neighborhood.

That's for me and my grade.

Don't let the neighbors control what happens in your house.

Don't let what the culture says determine what you have decided is going to be convictionally true in your family.

But instead, you make the choice.

You be willing to say as parents, as dads, as moms, as kids, as whoever, if what my friends do disagrees with what God says, as for me and my house, we're not doing it.

Will you be a leader who is willing to make a decision personally?

Not one by proxy.

God has never called us to be private in our faith.

He has always called us to go public.

In fact, he tells us that he has given us the ministry of reconciliation.

He has saved us not so that we could sit, but he has saved us so that we could be on mission with him, actively seeking relationships with others for the purpose of them experiencing the ministry of reconciliation.

And what he's leading us to do is to make a bold declaration like Joshua that says, if it's disagreeable in your sight to serve the Lord, you choose what you want.

But as for me and my house, let me tell you what we're gonna do.

We're gonna serve the Lord.

Would you take out your journals and you open them up with me to page 31?

You can take out the card that is there as well in your seat.

You can use either one of these.

You can tear this off, or you can use the card in your seat.

I'm gonna ask you though to do something.

Just fill it out there.

It's a leadership commitment card.

I just believe that there is something powerful about a tangible response.

We don't want you to be inspired, we want you to live changed lives.

Understanding that my decision to lead advances the kingdom of God.

If you're willing to say this to be true of you today, I'm gonna execute this.

What is it that you need to do for your life?

Remove from your life.

What has the Lord been prompting you to do for whatever reason?

You've not just to do it.

I'm gonna answer what you will do is between where it says phone, and between where it says your the commitment there that you would actually write in this little space right here above it.

What is your next step today?

What changes do you need to make?

I'm gonna give you some time to do this, and in just a moment, I'm gonna pray.

And after I pray, I'm gonna ask you if you'd be so willing to do so.

To actually come forward and to place this commitment card with your information as well as what you're writing above and your signature below.

And just place it on top of the stage here.

I want this to serve as like a visual, symbolic reminder of what it is that you're committing to do.

I think there's something that is powerful when you don't just walk out thinking, yeah, this is what I should do.

But actually writing it down, placing it before the Lord and asking him to bless it.

Our team is gonna be up here as well.

For some of you, you need prayer today.

Maybe you've got something that you're working through, maybe you've got something that the Lord has revealed to you even today that you need to deal with him about.

We want to be available to pray with you today.

We want to pray with you about whatever God may be leading you to do to take your next step, that you would have boldness, that you would have courage, that you would have strength today.

And I just pray that this could be a time where we can consecrate ourselves before the Lord.

You can just come and place this on the stage and go right back to your seat.

Some of you may want to place this here, and you may want to just kneel right before this and just begin to cry out to the Lord today.

Whatever he leads you to do, I just want to ask if you would be so willing and able after I pray with your form filled out that you would come and place these up at the front.

Father in heaven, we come before you and we thank you.

We thank you for what you've done in and through us on this journey.

We thank you, Father, how you've led us, how you've walked with us.

Father, I thank you for the beauty of conviction.

I pray, God, that we would respond to it with repentance and we could experience freedom as we follow you.

Father, I pray you would help us to do what you've asked us to do, to respond the way you've asked us to respond.

Father, we wouldn't just be people that talk.

We'd be people that take next steps.

It's in the name of Jesus that I pray.

Amen.

Would you stand up and as you stand, our team is up front.

You can walk right by them if you don't want to pray.

You can just place it on the stage.

Otherwise, our team is here ready to help pray with you.

You are faithful, you are gracious.

I'm just grateful.

I think you don't need anything until you are.

So that you won't just be a leader for things that won't matter.

But instead, you can be a leader for the kingdom of God as you live to exist and follow and serve him.

The Bible tells us that the reason why we're separated from God is because of our sin.

The Bible tells us that God made a way for us.

He did so by providing his son Jesus to die on a cross for our sins.

He rose from the dead and he gives us the opportunity by placing our faith in him to receive his gift of eternal life.

You can do that today.

Let me just tell you, it's the greatest decision that you will ever make in your life is to give your life to follow Jesus.

I want to invite you in just a moment to come forward and let our team know we'd love nothing more than to pray with you today so that you can leave here knowing you've received Jesus.

Some of you, your decision today is to join United City Church.

God's leading you, you know it.

You know this is the place he wants you, and you need to come forward and make that public today.

You come.

Others need to be baptized.

What an unbelievable opportunity to see so many baptized today.

Maybe it's your story next, and God wants you to follow through in baptism.

Maybe some of you just need prayer.

I'm gonna ask you to sing and I'm gonna ask you to respond as God is leading.

Amos, would you lead us?

Come on.

I won't take care.

Let's pray together.

Father, we come before you and we thank you.

Father, we thank you how you're moving in this place.

We thank you, Father, for those that are making decisions today.

We thank you, Father, that you are calling us to something greater.

And Lord, we can trust you with it.

We can trust you with what we have to give up.

We can trust you with where you're calling us to go.

We can trust you, Lord, with whatever next step you're leading us to make.

God, we know, we pray by the power of the Holy Spirit that you will fill us, that you will allow us to leave this place today, knowing, Father, that you desire to help us, that you will never leave us, that you will never forsake us.

Lord, that we can stay grounded to your word, which you've given to us as a gift.

We can remember the stones of memorial that you have shown us over and over and over and over and over again, how good you are.

Lord, I pray that you would give us bigger faith.

I pray that you would let us pray bigger prayers.

I pray that you would give us the ability to believe in a God who is a more than God, who desires to see us not only follow after him in greater capacities than we could have ever thought, but God, for you to do something so special at United City Church, there is no other way to describe it other than the move of you.

God, I pray you'd use this church to reach Northeast Houston and beyond in ways we could never possibly think.

Father, I thank you for the way that you are continually each and every week leading people to yourself.

And Father, we pray for more.

Lord, we choose this day.

I don't care what other churches are gonna do, I don't care what other families are gonna do, I don't care what other people are gonna do.

As for me and my house, as for us at United City Church, we will serve the Lord.

It's in the name of Jesus that I pray all of these things.

Amen.

Pat, would you come closest?

I don't know about you, but I am thankful for a senior pastor who models God's word as much as he preaches it.

Can we just thank and honor our senior pastor for not just talking about wholehearted personal faith, but for modeling it for all of us?

Hey, I I got two quick action steps for you.

If you want to leave this room and be changed by this series, two quick things.

One, um, maybe for many of you, you need to join United City Church, or you're just interested in finding out more about who we are.

Grow Track happens every Sunday in the Growth Track room right out here to my right, your left, if you leave the glass wall behind that at 10 a.m., we would love for you to get plugged into Grow Track.

The second thing is this in a couple of weeks, um, our country is going to rally around a day of prayer for our schools.

September 27th is See You at the Pole.

If you don't know what See You at the Poll is, it's a day uh for the community.

Come and gather around the flagpole and pray for students, pray for our community, pray for our churches.

And we want to make a way for you to do that.

We've actually made a list of all the schools that are represented in and around United City and are gonna make an opportunity for you to register to go and claim your area and lock your area down and go and you yourself and your family, choose for your family to gather around the flagpole and to cover our schools and our community in prayer.

Man, I hope you've loved this series.

New series coming up next week.

Forgotten about the Holy Spirit.

We hope that you'll join us for that.

It's gonna be amazing.

We love you so much.

Y'all have a great Sunday, and we'll see you really soon.

Wow, what an amazing message we got to hear this morning.

I hope the Lord showed himself to you in a fresh, new way.

Hey, if you made a decision today to follow Jesus or a decision for Christ, we would love to process that with you.

And so text the word next to 55498, and someone from our team will be more than happy to reach out and process that with you.

If you missed the message or you missed a note or two and you want to go back, don't worry.

We've got the option for that as well.

It's gonna be available on Spotify as well as Apple Music.

This has been an amazing morning.

We love you guys so much, and we hope to see you next week.

Bye bye.