The Church We Dream About: Rest, Gospel, and Real Community - 8/9/26

A little while back, I was in our conversation with some pastors.

You know, we talk to each other, us pastors usually.

And we got talking about pastoring because you can't talk to anyone else about

that. No one else is interested.

We got talking about pastoring. And of course, when you talk about pastoring,

you talk about preaching.

And one of these guys, I was the youngest one in the group. And,

you know, there are some people who've been doing this a lot longer than I have.

One of them shared some advice about how to become a better communicator.

And, you know, it was fine advice. Not sure if I'm going to take it.

But it was good advice. It wasn't bad. there wasn't anything morally wrong with

it, but it really did strike me as I was talking to these pastors.

And as I think about most pastors I know, and as I think about my own self and

the way I think about pastoring, I was just struck because pastors tend to believe

that what their church needs from them the most,

is for us to be better communicators.

And now don't get me wrong.

It might be nice for all of us, myself included.

For me to be a better communicator, there's nothing wrong with trying to be good at what you do.

It certainly would feel good, and you all might appreciate it.

But as I was sitting there in that conversation...

I just wasn't convinced, and I had just this feeling in my heart,

that I'm not convinced that what downtown church needs from me is for me to

give better 35-minute talks every Sunday.

And you say, yes, they should be 25 minutes. No, I'm not sure if that is the most urgent need.

And of course, I think good Bible teaching matters. It's a really important

part. I think preaching is important. I think teaching the Bible is important.

I think it's one of the main areas where I can contribute. and one of my main

areas of responsibility,

but just because it's something that I care about and it is important and it

does matter doesn't mean that it is the most important thing or the only thing that matters.

Just because it's probably one of my main areas of concern and it is important

to me doesn't mean it's the only thing that matters for the whole church.

And I think in many ways in the church, collectively in all over the country,

at least, I can't speak for outside of it.

I think we've kind of lost sight of what really makes the church work,

of what really makes the church special, of what really we're called to.

We've traded, I think, what we're called to, and we'll talk about this as we

go along, is the beautiful and sometimes risky and awkward work of the Holy

Spirit at work in the congregation of people.

We've traded that for and put our sights upon instead like a well-run professional

organization. Thank you.

Where what we really need is just a better talk, a better sermon,

better programs, better buildings.

And I'm just increasingly convinced that in pursuing all that stuff,

which is not bad in and of itself.

I'm not saying any of that stuff is bad.

But I'm saying as lifting those things up as the most important,

I think we lose sight of what matters the most. What we're really called to.

I mean, that's kind of a lot of what we were talking about last week.

We were making our way through this vision statement that the

elders, staff, and some of our spouses have been working on,

and we've been talking about what we want to be as a church,

and just like as we're kind of new in this building, and as a lot of new people

are starting to come, welcome, by the way, so glad to have you here if you're new here.

If you're new-ish here, so glad that you're here.

We thought it would be a good idea to kind of just put out some of what we're

aiming at, what we're trying to do, and last week we talked about how we're

trying to be simple on purpose.

And if you missed that, I would encourage you to go back. But we want to be

a church that goes about our mission, which is important and urgent.

But to go about that mission with simplicity, because the gospel is really simple.

That was like my main thrust that we talked about.

We want to operate under the conviction that the best thing we can offer,

both to God in terms of worship and to the world in terms of what our community

is, The best thing that we can offer is to be a community,

and to paraphrase a quote that I had, a community of men and women who believe

the gospel and live by it.

Of all the things that we are urgently supposed to be pursuing,

I think what we are and who we're becoming and what we're like as a community,

that is being just individual people coming together for the goal of loving the Lord,

of living as if the gospel were true because we believe it, and organizing our

lives around that goal of just like becoming people of greater faith,

of greater living in the reality of the gospel more and more.

And this week is where we're going to keep going in this series,

and I'm calling it The Church We Dream About, just because that's what we wanted

to call it. I don't know. There's really not a lot more to it.

I just want us to keep exploring what that could look like. And I think the

following paragraph, it's three paragraphs, so this will be three weeks, I think.

The following paragraph goes like this, and it sort of expands on this simple

vision of the gospel. So continuing on, and then we'll get to the Bible, I promise.

So we envision a church where everybody has a purpose, where ministry does not

depend on the pastor's personality, and where the gospel is lived,

not hyped or marketed or forced.

We want to be a gospel community where prayer and humility and grace overflow into everyday life.

We want to be a trustworthy place for those who are weary, skeptical,

or wounded by the church, and a welcoming home for those who are seeking something real.

You notice just a couple of things here, just to point out some of the most

important things is that we want to see, and it's kind of what I've been alluding

to already, we want to see a shift.

And the shift is a little awkward for me personally, right? Because you'll see

that we're talking about the shift here is that we don't want to be a ministry

who's dependent on the personality of the pastor.

We want to be a church rather where the gospel is just lived out in the normal

everyday stuff of the life of the people where it's not hyped or marketed or forced.

And that's weird for me to put that out there. It's a challenge because I've

been told I do have a personality.

And it is my job. Me, I'm uniquely responsible, though everyone has this role,

the elders and other people as well.

But like one of my main areas of concern is to teach the Bible and to talk about

the gospel and to do that as me.

And we spend a long time on Sunday mornings. You know, probably the biggest

chunk of time that we have on Sunday mornings is doing this,

opening up the Bible. And that's my contribution and that's my responsibility

and that's just inevitability.

I don't resent that. I think that is a part of it.

You know, like each of us are called to use our personality,

to use our whole selves, to serve the gospel and to serve the church and to

serve Jesus in the way that we're called to. So what am I saying here?

What we're trying to say and what we're trying to focus on is that downtown

church could be about a lot of things, but the things that we want to be most about is about Jesus.

And we want to be a church that is about the gospel of Jesus Christ.

And we need to be aiming for, because that's true, we need to be aiming for

presenting the gospel and organizing the gospel around how Jesus presents it

in Matthew 11, 28. I'm going to read from the message.

It'll be okay. I'm putting the not message version down underneath it.

If you feel more comfortable, you can just look at the other one.

But I like the way Eugene Peterson puts this in the message.

He says this, Are you tired, worn out, burned out on religion? Come to me.

Get away with me and you'll recover your life. I'll show you how to take a real rest.

Walk with me and work with me.

Watch how I do it. Learn the unforced rhythms of grace. I won't lay anything

heavy or ill-fitting on you.

Keep company with me and you'll learn to live freely and lightly.

The gospel isn't something we need to hype up or market or force on people or guilt people into.

Because the nature of the gospel is that it's Jesus's invitation and good news

that we can have rest for our souls.

That instead of getting caught up in some tradition or system that engages our

emotion and tweaks our nervous system and,

causes us to act from a sense of our badness, we are called to actually just

lay our lives upon Jesus's mercy and grace.

And Jesus says, in doing that, in giving yourself away in this way,

you actually get your life back.

You actually get your hope back. You actually get your peace back.

Instead of just like trying to justify yourself and be a better person as we

just surrender ourselves upon the love of Jesus Christ, he brings that stuff

to us. He forgives us of our sin and he renews our inner lives.

And so the gospel doesn't have to be like, it's not something that I need to guilt anyone into.

I don't need to use the methods of shame at all, because Jesus didn't use the message of shame.

He provided forgiveness and mercy.

And then he just says, would you just come and find your life in me,

in surrender and in hope?

The gospel is an invitation to rest. The gospel is rest, and it's simple.

And so as a pastor and as leaders of the church, we want to be careful,

to be most excited about people coming and resting. and following Jesus and learning from him.

And that's more of like, just like, like an emphasis and a shift.

Like, like there are lots of types of churches out there and I'm like not trying

to compare myself or us to them because like, that's not the game we're trying to play.

But what I want to give us all is just clarity about how do we see like growing

in faith looking like, and I think it looks like stepping into the gospel and

stepping into a restful kind of love with Jesus.

I think that is, has to be our hope. It is my hope and my prayer as a pastor

that I would not do anything to like rile you up, trigger your guilt,

or pump you up on following Jesus.

Because I think the way that Jesus talks about the gospel is that it's something

so much better than that. You can be unburdened in following Jesus.

You can be unwearied in just trusting yourself to him.

And so my hope is that we would pursue Jesus in that way and understand that

he's already done everything that could be done that needed to be done so we

can just rest and have rest in him.

And I mean, you'll notice like rest is one. As a pastor, I'm also aware that

we need to do things and that people need to go to help out in these kids ministry

classrooms and all this stuff like that.

Like I realize the risk of what I'm saying acutely, acutely,

but I've weighed my options and I realized I could shame people into doing more,

but I would not be giving them the gospel.

And what's very stressful for me is the truth that Jesus says,

in order to come to me, people can start resting, stop performing,

stop feeling like they have to earn their keep.

And Jesus actually says, when people stop doing that, then they're actually

called into meaningful service and meaningful life.

It's like Jesus doesn't say, just rest, I'll take care of it.

He says, my yoke is easy and my burden is light.

Not Eugene Peterson, but Jesus says that, right? And it's this idea,

like a yoke is, it binds two farm animals together, There are two oxen in the case of this story.

And one oxen teaches an untrained oxen how to do things and bears most of the

weight of the pulling, of the work.

What Jesus is saying, you come and you attach yourself to me, and I'll give you rest.

It's not that you won't do anything, but I'll take the brunt,

and I'll do the knowing, and I'll do the leading, and you can just do the following,

and you can do the more restful work. and Jesus does the heavy stuff.

Like the gospel invitation is to come in to be unburdened and then to figure

out what are the things that I am called to and what are the things that I am

gifted for and what is my purpose and what,

are the doings that I am uniquely crafted to do because we talked about this in Titus last week.

You know, Jesus does all this stuff. He's forgiven us and he's doing it so that

we could do good works. He cares that we do things.

He just doesn't want us to do it in our own strength.

And so that is the great invitation that he's moving among us.

He's teaching us. He's growing us into maturity.

And I think there is a point where just better preaching, better programs,

more stuff actually gets in the way of that.

And so what I'm saying, what we're saying in this paragraph is that we want

to clear away all this stuff that we think is more exciting than the simple

invitation to rest and to grow in Jesus Christ.

We want to center that invitation.

I would happily be, I believe this in my heart, that probably my flesh doesn't

always believe this, but I think I would happily be an unimpressive communicator.

So long as I was able to pastor a church that is living out the gospel in this

restful kind of way and living in the manner that Paul describes in Ephesians

4, which is, I think, like the most beautiful picture of the church as it is called to be.

So Ephesians 4, we're just going to read it 11 through 13. I'm going to put it up there.

He, Jesus, gave some to be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists,

some pastors and teachers to equip the saints for the work of ministry,

to build up the body of Christ until we all reach unity in the faith and in

knowledge of God's Son, growing into maturity with a stature measured by Christ's fullness.

Then we'll no longer be little children tossed by the waves,

blown about by every wind of teaching, by human cunning, by cleverness in the techniques of deceit.

But speaking the truth in love, let us grow in every way into him who is the head, Christ.

From him, the whole body, fitted and knit together by every supporting ligament

promotes the growth of the body for building itself up in love by the proper

working of each individual part.

Man, I just see this as being so much more compelling than flashy,

bigger, you know, greater programmings.

Like this church that is simply doing the stuff that it's called to do.

It is the picture of a church that is absolutely killing it.

And how are they doing it? Well, they're taking on these, as Eugene Peterson

says, the unforced rhythms of grace.

They're leaning into the simple design of the church.

And the beauty and the vitality of that church is not coming from the stuff

that they have, the polish of the Sunday servants, the urgency of the work or

the charisma of the pastor.

The beauty of the church is in the community who's just taken on their identity

collectively as people who are just caught up in this gospel reality and called

into a vision of what maturity looks like.

I'm going to point out three things that I just want to highlight in here.

There's a lot more that we could say, but the first one is that this is a church

that has been supplied with gifted people.

Not just one gifted person, but many gifted people.

There are at least five functions that Paul lays out here, though I don't think

this is necessarily an exhaustive list, but he calls out these

giftedness, apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, teachers,

groups of people who are called to contribute to this important work.

And without going into detail about what each of these are, because that would

be a whole other set of messages in itself, I think it's really clear that what

Paul is saying, I mean, you can't avoid it, is that the vitality and like.

The power of the church is not dependent on a single human person.

It is dependent on Jesus, also a human person, we should say,

fully God, fully man. Don't want to know an unintentional heresy here,

right? But it's not invested in one of the members.

It is shared. The gifts, abilities, and functions that a healthy church require

in order to fulfill its mission are given to many types of people.

Everyone is sharing the load. It is dispersed. A healthy church spreads responsibility

around and recognizes that one person lives.

Not only isn't just supposed to be the one who does all the things, but couldn't.

It's not possible for one person to sustain and to do all these things.

A healthy church spreads around and recognizes that one person doesn't actually

have all that we need to grow, that many of us are called to the maturing,

to bring in about maturity.

And then the second thing to notice, I think it's clear is that God has organized

the church in this way, not because he doesn't like pastors,

but because this is the way to maturity. The goal is maturity.

He explains that when the church is operating according to this design,

the outcome is a congregation that is, as he says, building itself up in love

by the proper working together of each individual part.

Like the church is designed to be dependent upon one another.

So what's at stake, right, is that we would all share in the load and all be

contributing according to our gifting for the sake of love being developed in

the congregation, right?

We serve one another and care for one another from love, from love for God and

for love for one another.

The church is designed for love. It is designed to be a place where we are growing

in love and growing in our capacity to love, love God and to love one another.

And when Jesus invites us to take his yoke and learn from him,

he's inviting us to be people who love because he demonstrates love.

He is love. Everything about him and what he's doing is for the sake of love.

And so as we come our yoke together with Christ, as we come into that restful

work of gospel obedience, what we're doing is we're growing in love. Love is the way we grow.

You don't get smarter, more handsome, stronger in and of yourself.

Any strength that we have, any maturity we have comes as we grow in love.

And the third and final thing I think you'll notice is that like the many gifts

given to the church, they've been given, giving themselves for the sake of building up in love.

They are used across every level of the church and with every member of the

church, right? So it's not just like there's a class of people in these five

functions and those are the special people, we are called to love and to use

our gifts for the sake of love all the way down.

Anybody who's comes has this same shared calling. He says, speak the truth in

love and let us grow in every way into him who is the head Christ.

Each of us is called to do that, to speak the truth in love.

I'm called to speak the truth and to teach the Bible in love for the sake of

all of you, but I am no more called to that than you are called to that to one another.

It's the same shared calling, the same force, the same way that rests equally

on all of us, and it's an easy burden to bear.

The vision that Paul lays out is, to borrow a phrase from John Wimber,

which is always kicking around my head, is one where everyone gets to play.

So you as a Christian, as someone who is coming to Down Challenge Church, you get to play.

You're called to be a participant. You have a purpose. You have been given gifts.

You probably don't even know what they are yet.

And all of those gifts, though, are aimed in the same direction.

They're aimed at us all growing into maturity, which is greater love for God and for one another.

And they have been given. You have been given gifts for the sake of your contribution to this body.

It's not just going to be about me. It can't be about me. That is a recipe for

disaster and failure. I promise.

But we have been called in to be people of love.

And I will say, I love about this church that I think we do this.

It's hard to say. We are killing it on the love front.

We had a meeting not too long ago, and Sarah and Devin were there.

And we were asking people, like, why do you like this church?

And they made a comment that I really like.

And that's that you guys actually seem to like each other. And I'm like, yes!

That is great. I think it's true that as a church, we actually kind of like

each other, which is really close to loving each other.

Certainly it's on the road. I love that. I think it's true. As a church,

I think it's our strength.

We have a strength in the community that we have here. I've seen over and over

again when people get sick and we know about it, how quickly people just will

be there with a meal, with a call.

Like, like how I don't even have to, I'm not a great planner as anyone who knows me a little bit.

Like I'm thankful that I don't have to plan these things because you guys just do this for each other.

You, you, you reach out to one another. You care about each other.

We love each other, but I'm just going to say this. This is a strength.

But it is not a strength that we should move on from. This is a strength that

we have to keep growing in and fighting for because love is the goal.

Part of keeping things simple is so that we don't get enamored with something other than,

the call to love one another and to serve one another and speak the truth and

love so that we don't get into so many projects and so many distractions from this goal.

Like we want to keep things simple in church so that we can make room for us

caring for one another and serving one another and loving one another.

Because that's what we're called to do.

And I think in our age, I think we've, again, not looking at any particular

church, like just it's easy to forget that.

It's easy for that to get lost, that the church itself, a group of people who

are called to love and care for each other, that gets lost because we've equated

church and what churches do with the Sunday service, with the building,

with the leadership, with the impact.

But a church, it just is like the Greek word is ekklesia. It just means gathering.

And a gathered church doesn't really need to do anything but pursue that kind of love.

Like the church that is growing in love for one another and for God and collectively

being called into that and leaning into that identity, that's the church that's

killing it. Doesn't matter what else is happening.

John talks about that in 1 John 4. He says this.

I really just love the punchiness of this, okay?

He says, Dear friends, let us love one another because love is from God,

and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God.

The one who does not love does not know God because God is love. Very clear.

God's love was revealed among us in this way. God sent his one and only son

into the world so that we might live through him.

Love consists in this. Not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent

his son to be the atoning sacrifice for our sins.

Dear friends, if God loved us in this way, we must also love one another.

No one has ever seen God. if we love one another, God remains in us and his

love is made complete in us.

I can't think of a more clear way to center the importance of love.

So how do we grow in love? I do just want to get super practical here.

How do we, what is the next step for us as a church to grow in love?

How can we care for each other in this way?

Even though it's something I think we do well, how can we continue to go deeper in this?

One thing that I think we can work on is loving each other by,

as Ephesians 4.15 says, speaking the truth in love, which some of you guys are

triggered right now, because you know that's evangelical code for not minding your own business.

I've been here long enough. I know how that works sometimes,

right? No, no, no. But my favorite definition of love is from Dallas Willard,

which I think he stole from Thomas Aquinas.

Love is willing the good of others. So yeah, to the extent that I think love

is telling people what to do and trying to make them act like me, that's not love.

Love is genuinely looking at someone and saying, how can I serve and how can I do this person well?

We can speak the truth in love.

That's what love is. We can speak the truth to people and encourage one another,

to grow in that way so that we could genuinely serve them and see them grow.

And here's a simple way that I just kind of want to get in your brain about how to do that.

I'm on an airplane a couple weeks back, and because God is great,

I sat next to a lady who, Hannah, hi Hannah, I don't know, maybe,

She goes to Mosaic Church. She's involved in leadership downtown Seattle.

And we were just talking the way pastor people do, talking about what we do and things like that.

And she had this really, something I totally want to steal, right? Okay.

And I told her, I'm going to steal that. So when you tell, it's okay.

You can steal it if you say you're going to steal it.

They have this thing in terms of like how they do one-on-one discipleship.

It's a very simple format. They do this with their hands.

And this is meant to symbolize three important questions.

How are you doing with God? How is your heart?

And how are you doing to other people? So it's upward, inward, and outward.

And this is their framework for like one-on-one discipleship,

growing in love kind of stuff.

Upward, inward, outward. And I really liked that.

I thought that was really practical because like the thing is like I can get

in a conversation with someone and I could be like, how do I serve this person?

And the truth is, I don't know. But I do know this.

You have upward needs. you have things in your heart, like you need some clarity.

And sometimes I can serve you and love you well by telling you what God says

about you and how you're thinking about God and like how this inward upward

relationship is going and how it needs to be dependent upon what Jesus has done.

And he's calling you to rest. And it's not about your performance.

And it's not about some burden.

It's not about you measuring up more, man, he's measured up.

And so you can be right with him because of what Jesus has done.

I can remind you of that and serve you with that. And you can remind each other

of that, that, oh man, you don't have to bear the burden of guilt and shame

anymore because he's paid the price on the cross and nothing can come back into that.

There's no further price to be paid. The debt is paid, so let go of it.

That is usually the gospel thing that we need to know.

Then the next question is, how is my heart? What's going on in my heart?

Like, I don't know how to ask someone that. You know how you ask them that?

You ask them, what's going on in your heart.

Like, oh gosh, is that simple? Like you can be that direct with people and love them in that way.

And usually like the problem that's going on in my heart is that I know what

I'm supposed to do, but I don't want to do it.

And I'm into our heart. There's shame that comes into our heart.

There's it is. And then having someone come with me and encourage me along the

way and pray for me in that because there's a spiritual work that needs to be done in my heart.

But I think a lot of us, I think the reality is,

We're not collectively bold enough to ask these simple questions.

And then we're also just like not well-trained to understand that these are

things we need to be talking about.

So what's going on in your heart? And then what's going on in your relationship with others?

I mean, for Sean, I mean, it's super clear. Like the one who does not love does not know God.

If I have bitterness, anger, resentment towards other people,

this is something that needs to be dealt with.

Again, not performatively, but so that I can just like be back into this gospel

rest place where I can take on the easy yoke and it doesn't feel like something

I can't do where he's able to do the work alongside of me.

And so like, really, how can we grow? How can we take the next step as a church

is that we can put this in our brains and start to have these conversations with one another.

Even when we get into our small groups, which we're going to be starting up

small groups, we always do that at the end of September.

Like we are, some groups will do material. Some groups will go through Bible

studies and stuff like that.

There's content, but this is actually the content. Do you understand?

Like we're going to focus on some things. We'll do some things.

But in the end, ultimately what we're doing when we gather together in small

groups or when we gather together in one-on-one, we need to be concerned about these three questions.

And those three questions are always coming up no matter what content you're reading.

So that is the next step. We can be bold and understand that not only is this

something that we're called to, because this is how we grow in love when we

start to get right on these three levels.

This is how we step into the freedom that is afforded to us in the gospel.

But then we can understand, and this is the most important thing,

that you, as much as I am responsible for the preaching, we are all responsible

for carrying each other in these ways.

You know, not everybody all the time To the maximum degree But the people that

you know, who you love Who you care about If you want their good They need to

grow in these areas You can start having these conversations with people.

And I honestly think that what you guys need Is permission So,

granted Right?

I mean, because it's like Nobody wants to be the awkward religious guy I know,

I know I've been trying not to be that for a long time but I made a strange

career choice along the way, and here I am.

No, yeah, I am awkward, but not for religious reasons.

Oh, my wife said, don't make any self-deprecating jokes. One.

I had one in there. It was too good not to do.

So we can have that permission. Please take that upon yourself.

I know you might think, well, that's like someone else. That's a pastor's job.

No, we're all pastors in that respect.

We're all called to care for each other and love one another in those respects.

So we can care about what's going on in our souls.

Worship team is going to come up here as we wrap things up. but I just wanted

to cover the last little sentence of this vision statement.

This is really like, we want to be a trustworthy place for those who are weary

and skeptical, wounded by the church, and a welcoming home for those seeking something real.

Here's the thing. That stuff is not some additional program.

That stuff is love. That stuff is going to come along when we're a church who's growing in love.

Why is there a lack of trust? And why is there skepticism and weariness and

woundedness? Because the church fails in love.

We make things about other stuff, unimportant stuff.

We want something real. Well, Jesus says, here's what reality is.

In John 13, 34, Jesus says this, I give you a new commandment, love one another.

Just as I have loved you, you're also to love one another.

And here's the reality, by this, everyone will know that you're my disciples if you love one another.

I can't make someone believe the facts about the gospel.

You know, I can present them and offer them up to a person, but ultimately I

have not found that what people have are, where most people don't have purely

intellectual questions, what they want to see is,

what is the fruit of this thing?

What is the fruit of this thing called being a Christian, called going to church,

even if I don't believe? What is the fruit of this community called downtown church?

And what Jesus says is that people are going to know that you're at least about

me if you love one another.

They're going to know if you're really about this work of the gospel invites

us into if you love one another.

I just think this is my one point message is that we need to love one another

because when we do that, we will be a place where weary and skeptical,

wounded people and people who are seeking something real will find something real.

Because we're sent into the world with the gospel, being witnesses to the gospel.

And what we're witnessing to is the love of God.

The fact that God would come down and take on flesh, dwell among us,

die for our sake, forgive us of our sins, and invite us into a life with him.

We are proclaiming that. And it means that we're loved by him.

We love him. And we're called to love one another.

People are going to know that we're his disciples and that it's real because we love one another.

So man, that is my commissioning this morning. I just want us to pray that over

us this morning. And so if we could just stop and pause, if you just like,

you know, pray how you want.

But if you want to open your hands up, because sometimes in the end,

like we're asking God to do something in us that we just can't do within ourselves.

And so I think being in this posture of like open-handedness and asking,

Lord, would you give us something that we need? Would you give us love?

Is a good reminder of how we receive from him.

So Jesus, we come to you.

And we remind ourselves of what you've done, whether the gospel is your work,

and that it is restful and easy.

And we want to not just walk away from that, but step into it,

Lord, and receive from you our calling and commissioning to be people who are

on mission for the sake of love.

Lord, we want to receive love that we don't have. Holy Spirit,

we know, you say in Romans 5, you poured out your love in our hearts by the

Holy Spirit. So Holy Spirit, that is what you do. You pour out love into our hearts.

We don't have enough in ourselves, Lord, but we want that love.

So, Lord, as a church, would you make us people of love?

Would you train us into what it looks like to care for one another.

To want good for one another, and to be the sorts of people who step out and

ask the questions and encourage one another.

Lord God, would you keep our eyes focused on how good you are and how gracious

you are and how we're called to grow in maturity into the fullness of Christ and into love.

Lord, would you make us a people who just love each other well,

who lift that up and hold that on as the most important thing.

We ask you all that in Jesus' name. Amen.