Top Ten // Love God

Welcome to the Refinery Church Sermon Podcast.

We're so glad you joined us today.

Our prayer is that this message will help you grow in your pursuit to love and follow Jesus in your life.

If you'd like to learn more about the refinery, find ways to get connected, share a prayer request, or explore resources to help you grow deeper in your walk with Christ, visit us online at refineryohio.com.

Now let's dive into today's message.

Well, good morning, y'all.

Hey, so this uh past Friday was the 25th remembrance of the 9-11 attacks.

Um, if you are close to my age, a little bit younger, a little bit older, you probably remember exactly where you were uh when that happened.

I'd been in class, I was a college student, and I'd gone back to my dorm and uh noticed something going on on the TV, and some people kind of gathered around and uh so went and sat in there, and like everybody else, just kind of stunned disbelief like this isn't something uh we understand or uh know what's going on.

And um just trying to process that like everybody else, and that day felt very different and strange.

And I remembered um, you know, you want to do something, and so a number of us they were asking for like they were doing a blood drive at the hospital, and so we went and we waited in line, and it was hours and uh long, literally, and they actually sent some of us away because there was such a a turnout just to support and to do something, to do something meaningful, tangible.

I know we have a number of first responders uh here at the church, and uh oftentimes they will mark that occasion each year uh with some kind of special remembrance or thing that they do.

And uh one of our members uh actually was there at 9-11 after um helping to do with cleanup and things of that nature, and so it just matters to remember these things in in life.

And I was listening to it was either a song or a book, I I can't remember, the other day, and it talked about this idea that wounds become scars, and scars become stories.

And so that was definitely a wound in our nation that had left a scar, and that scar has um resulted in stories.

But scars don't have to hurt anymore.

In stories, we can uh remember the good and man how how people can come together and work together and all those things.

And so this morning I'd like to just take uh just a brief moment of silence, and then I'm gonna pray uh for us, and then we'll move forward with the message.

But if you would just bow your head and close your eyes and quiet your heart for just a moment.

God, it's important that we remember difficult chapters, the difficult situations, difficult events in our lives, as individuals, as families, and even as a nation.

And so, Lord, I I pray for families today that are particularly impacted by this weekend and all that it means and how it changed the trajectory of their life.

I thank you for the many stories of heroism that came out, of service and of sacrifice, how it unified the nation in a unique way.

And so, God, I we just want to quiet our hearts, we quiet our minds today in recognition, as many people do around the world with different events and different tragedies that unfold, to remember the pain that took place, to learn from those things, but then also to be reminded that pain, injustice, brokenness, and attack don't have the final say, that in the end you work all things to the good, and that your justice will prevail.

And so we're grateful for that today.

May we honor you in our lives and how we live well.

We'll give you all the praise.

And all of God's people said, Amen.

Couple things before we jump into the message.

Uh, to this evening is starting points, 5 30 to 6 30, just an hour.

If you've been coming to the church for a few weeks, a couple months, but we've not got a chance to meet, or you've really not introduced yourself, this would be a great starting point for you.

Uh, you could even be here today for the first time.

You're like, hey, I'm kind of curious.

Um, if everything goes well the rest of the service, and you're like, Yeah, I think I'd like to come.

We'd love to have you.

We'll have a meal.

Kids are welcome.

Uh, it's very informal, just kind of like a family getting together for dinner, and we'll be out at 6 30.

You're like, Landon, it's kickoff Sunday.

That's why we're gonna be out at 6 30.

Um, so we'd love to have you.

It's just a chance to get to know you, share a little bit about what's going on in the church, and hear a little bit about your story.

So, nothing too intense.

Uh have a local restaurant that caters that.

And then our monthly outreach, you've noticed hopefully the Christmas tree in the lobby.

I was driving with my uh mom she was visiting this past week, and uh we were driving around and she goes, You have a Christmas tree in your lobby.

And I was telling her what it was.

And uh we have Guatemala that we work with um each year, and so we have a sponsorship program of 72 children there, many of your sponsors.

Um, but you may not be a sponsor because our sponsorships are filled up.

But if you're a sponsor, once you grab your bag, fill it for your child.

If you're not a sponsor, we still want you to be a part of this as well.

And we're partnering with Hearts for Heaven.

That's an organization that does great ministry in Guatemala, and so they're gonna help us get those bags to our children in La Planada, but then for everybody else, you can just bless a child in need in uh that community at large.

And so if you'd like to be a part of that, all the information's in there.

It's due back next Sunday, if I understand right.

From uh I said two Sundays, and half the first service corrected me.

So that's I think it's next Sunday.

So we'd love to have you be a part of that, please.

Um any uh sport people in the room?

You like sports?

Yeah, yeah.

Uh my son was playing this last week, um, football, and uh rules matter, right?

We know this when we're playing a game, like when we're playing a sport, like rules matter.

Any any parents ever find that the striped shirts struggling with the rules, and so you graciously offer to help them?

Yeah, yeah.

I mean it's just it's what I do as a Christian, right?

I'm just like, hey, you missed something, let me help you, right?

Because I would want that to be pointed out in my life as well.

And so, because you need to have the rules.

That way there's clarity about what you're doing, like the objectives of like, hey, this works, this doesn't work, that's legal, that's illegal, like all that kind of stuff.

Like, you need to have these rules.

Because you've all played games like with kids or you've had friends, like you remember growing up and like they didn't play by the rules?

You know, like they just kind of willy-nilly change the rules.

It's like, no, no, I can do this or I can do that.

I mean, imagine something like so so silly, like you know, game's over, and somebody's no no, it's my rule, so I get I get to put one more second, I get one more shot.

You know, like it's just like nobody would nobody would do that as we get older, but like when we're kids, right, we we do that kind of stuff.

And so maybe you're not a sport person, you're saying that doesn't matter to me.

But if you play cards or you play a board game, like rules matter.

Like you want people to play by the rules.

But rules matter in other spaces in life.

If you're in school, like there's rules about how the school works.

When you can be there, when you can't be there, like if you can have your device out, can't have your device out, when assignments are like all those, and if you don't know the rules or you don't follow the rules, like school's a little bit harder.

Same thing with work.

Work has rules set up.

Might call them guidelines or whatever it might be, like, but this is how things work here.

And if you don't know how things work at your work, you're gonna have problems.

Relationships have rules.

Doesn't matter if it's a friendship, a dating relationship, a marriage, like there's rules about how this thing works.

And so, like, who can say what and when and how, and like, what's the idea of how this stuff plays out?

Like, how do we engage?

There's rules of engagement when it comes to conflict.

Have you heard of this?

And it's true, like in small spaces, like if you have a boss and your boss says, Hey, I want to hear what you think.

Like, I want you to just be candid and open.

And then you hear about a colleague who did that and they're no longer burdened with employment at that locale, you know the stated rule is different than the unstated rule.

And so those things matter in our lives.

Uh, when you have conflict in marriage, there's some basic things you need to know.

Like my wife and I know if we're tired, hungry, or cold, especially all three, do not have this intense fellowship in this moment because it will not go well.

Right?

There's different things like we need to understand.

Even when nations go to war, there's rules of engagement.

And when you break those rules, it makes the conflict that much messier, that much more challenging, that much more difficult.

Rules just matter in life.

And in our series, over the next five weeks, we're gonna look at the Ten Commandments found in Exodus chapter 20.

Exodus 20 · chapter mention

Exodus is the second book of the Bible, Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, part of the Torah, the Pentateuch.

Those first five books are this rule for how to live.

And in this, we kind of almost see a little bit of like rules of life.

So the Israelite nation had been in captivity because of the sin and brokenness of their nation.

Uh, sin always leads to brokenness in our lives, and there's always consequences to sin.

And because of the brokenness in their lives as a people, they end up enslaved for over 400 years.

Well, if you live in a certain way, generation after generation, like you become to expect like this is normal, that this is what's accepted, this is what's unaccepted.

And God rescues the people out of their captivity, out of their slavery, and says, Listen, I want to afford you a new way to live.

I want to offer you a different way to be.

Instead of the broken patterns you've embraced, I want to offer you patterns or rules of life that bring about life to the fullest.

And so that's what we'll look at when we consider these commandments.

Today we're gonna look at the first three commandments.

Next week we'll look at just the fourth.

We'll look at um six through nine, then later, and then just the or just the fourth, just the fifth, sixth through nine, and then finally tenth.

But Exodus chapter twenty, verses one through seven, it reads like this.

If you have your Bible, I invite you to look with me.

If not, it's also there on the screen.

It says, And God spoke all these words.

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

You shall have no other gods before me.

You shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything in heaven above, or on the earth beneath, or in the waters below.

You shall not bow down to them or worship them, for I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God.

And if that phrase is off-putting to you, we'll contextualize it in a minute.

It really shouldn't be, but I could understand why it might be.

And this next phrase might even be more difficult, but we'll deal with it too later.

Punishing the children for the sin of their parents to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who keep my commandments, or love me and keep my commandments.

Verse 7.

You shall not misuse the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

So here we see the setup for the Ten Commandments and detailing out the first three.

The Ten Commandments are kind of known in culture, like back in the day, Charlton Heston, right, and the movie.

If you didn't see that one, uh 20 years ago, 30 years ago, 15 years ago, we had a lot of debate on where they could be placed and where they couldn't be placed in society, and people clashed over that.

And depending on what you understand, the thought with the Ten Commandments a lot of times is it's it's almost like they're the original rules to the game, or they're the guidelines for how we're meant to live, who we're meant to be as a people.

I think a better way rather than rules of the game almost is kind of the framework for what it means to be fully alive.

And some see them kind of as this lofty ideal.

It's like, well, I mean, I try and do my best.

Like, I try and live by the commandments, you know.

I'm I'm I'm trying, like I'm trying to climb that ladder up to God, but that's really not what the Ten Commandments are.

And I love the way Erwin McManus kind of rephrases this.

It's a book I read over 20 years ago, and this um these couple of paragraphs from the chapter of just or from the book have just lingered with me these past couple of decades.

He writes this in an unstoppable force.

He says, The Ten Commandments are not heaven's standards, they are not the standards by which the angels live.

They are not God's attempt to pull us up beyond the human into the spiritual.

The Ten Commandments are the lowest possible standard of humane living.

Stop and consider what they demand of us.

The rest of the quote won't be on the screen, you'll just have to attend with your ears.

Maybe it would help if we just rephrase them in everyday language.

So here goes, hey, could you stop killing each other?

Oh, yeah, by the way, could you not steal each other's stuff?

And it would be really helpful if you wouldn't lie to each other either.

And here's a thought.

Could you not take other people's husbands and wives and just sort of like keep your own?

Upon reflection, these are unreasonable, right?

How could anyone be expected to live up to these?

Only God could do that, right?

The Ten Commandments don't call us to the extraordinary spiritual life.

They call us to stop dehumanizing one another.

When I first read that explanation over 20 years ago, I just loved what McManus was trying to do.

This isn't some like impossible ladder to climb.

It's a basic framework for how to live.

And McManus isn't disparaging the Ten Commandments as if they're no big deal.

It's just, hey, listen, this isn't some crazy, lofty ideal.

What we see is that the Ten Commandments are not some difficult ladder that we climb to get to God, but instead they're more like this framework for living in relationship with a God who draws near to us.

And that's a very different way to consider them.

So remember the context in which these were first given to God's people.

God has rescued the Israelites out of captivity.

They had chosen broken ways of living, so they resulted in broken lives.

That always happens.

It's just it's it's true then, it's true now.

You live in broken ways, you end up broken.

So God sets them free, and it's in their freedom that God makes them this offer.

God says, You're free, you can do what you want, you can go your way.

Here's the offer though I afford you.

I am the Lord your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

And in the midst of this context, here's all I want to know.

If you want to be my people, you can be.

And I will be your God.

I have chosen you, but you have a choice in this as well.

You're not compelled, you're not forced, I've chosen you, but will you choose me?

And so the people do.

They choose God, and he begins to lay the ground rules for how living and loving relationship with Him and with one another looks.

And it's the same with us today.

We've not been rescued out of slavery to a nation, but we are rescued out of slavery to sin.

The things I wanted to do, I never did, but the things I didn't want to do, I found myself doing those over and over again.

Like, God, who will rescue me from this body of death?

Thanks be to God.

It's through Jesus Christ.

And Romans 7 and 8 Paul illustrates this.

And it's through the life, the death, and the teachings of Jesus that we see we can be set free from sin, from broken ways of living, those things that lead to death.

And so God lays that framework with us as well.

And if we would choose to follow after Jesus, if you don't follow after Jesus, they don't apply to you.

But if you would choose to follow after Jesus, or if you're like, I'm I'm open to the concept of following after Jesus, then these are kind of the framework for what that might look like.

And so God says, let's define the relationship, so to speak.

So the first commandment God gives is this you shall have no other gods before me.

Now this one is incredibly straightforward, really.

It's this idea of, hey, first, before we do anything else, let's make this exclusive.

And the concept isn't complicated, it's how marriage works.

It's how marriage has always worked.

A man and a woman say, hey, I'm committed to you.

And in some way, shape, or form they say, yeah, I choose you, I forsake all others.

And that's to be expected.

There's the exclusivity that's been willingly entered into.

And so if my wife comes to me and says, Hey, I kind of want to go on a date, I'm like, Yeah, where are we going?

She's like, No, not with you.

That's awkward.

Remember, we kind of made an agreement.

Your parents were there.

God's saying, hey, this is the same thing.

Like, I'm inviting you into this type of relationship.

It's not casual, like it's intentional, it's purposeful, like there's huge implications for what this means.

This relationship is to be like any, unlike any other relationship, just like your marriage is unlike any other relationship you have.

You have friends, you may have incredibly deep friends, but your marriage is still different.

Hobbies come and go, work comes and go.

But you made a promise, you made a commitment, a covenant to one person till death do us part.

It's different.

That primary relationship, there's this security, there's this beauty, there's this strength when we live into it the way it was meant to be.

And God is inviting us into that type of relationship.

God is making an intentional move toward the Israelites.

He's their rescuer and deliverer, he's the one who brings them life.

Like, this is profound.

The Israelites, in other words, like, they don't have to chase after all the other gods and masters.

There's a lot of gods and masters to keep them busy, to keep them on the hamster wheel, like to chase to chase to chase.

And God says, You don't need to, I've got you.

It's me and you.

And we're afforded the same offer.

God's our rescuer and deliverer, not from a nation, but from the brokenness of sin and from the inevitability of death.

This is all revealed in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.

We don't need to chase after a number of different gods and masters in this life.

There's plenty of them to keep us running, but we can bow out of the race because we're no longer in the dating pool like we found our one.

And so somebody says, Well, you have to, and this, and like this, and this is just the way this works, the way culture works, this is the way economy works, this is the way business works.

You're like, Yeah, I'm doing something different.

I found my one.

And he set the guidelines, he's set the rules on what it means to live well and to live fully.

God, the sovereign creator of heaven and earth, can be our one God.

That's the invitation, that's the beginning of the framework.

The second commandment is this you shall not make for yourself an image in the form of anything above or in heaven, sorry, of the form of anything in heaven above, or on the earth beneath, or in the waters below.

You shall not bow down to them or worship them.

Uh, I mentioned before, like I'm a big fan of the NFL.

I love football, it's a lot of fun.

Um, and literally, there's people going to be in animal costumes, like in stadiums all over the country today, and people will lose their minds, and their day will be good or bad.

Their week will start off well or poorly based on how a bunch of people playing a game that they have no bearing on turned it out.

It's almost like they set their agenda, they set their life based on that.

It's it's almost like they worship it.

That's foolish.

Sports are good, they're games, they're fun.

But in the bright context.

We still make images.

But at least we don't make giant golden people, right?

Oscars and Grammys.

Or whatever awards your business gives out.

Now, there's nothing wrong with awards and trophies and things of the like.

There is a problem with making that your ultimate aim.

God says, don't do that.

For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of their parents to the first third and fourth generation, which sounds harsh, and just hang with me.

Of those who hate me, but showing love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commands.

The idea is pretty basic here, parents, we have a responsibility.

If I go into debt, deep debt, because I won't control my spending, because I'm chasing after some God that's driving me in another way, my kids will suffer for that.

And there's consequences.

It can lead to generational like pain and hardship and trauma.

Because I've not attended to the needs I needed to attend to, or I didn't make preparations for myself in the way that I should have.

If I'm a workaholic, and the reason I would do that is because I'm chasing the approval of some God, because I'm not exclusive with God as king.

There is a consequence that my kids will pay for that.

If I have some brokenness in my life that I just can't let go of, I can't give up, there is a consequence that my children and my grandchildren could potentially pay.

But here's the beauty of what God does.

He says, listen, sin, it's going to have a lingering effect.

But I'm telling you, my love, where sin will kind of hang on for the third to fourth generation, my love is thousands of generations.

God wants to be clear in this command that we're not to try and control or manipulate him in this exclusive relationship that we have.

No image is going to do him justice.

God can't be contained in such a way.

Another way we might consider this is we can't like reduce God to some good luck charm that we carry around with us.

As long as I got my cross necklace, say a few prayers, read a Bible verse a day, give a few bucks, then we're in agreement, right?

You gotta do what I say.

And God says, no, we're not in agreement.

Like it's not this ritualistic symbol-based idea, it's a relationship.

All right, babe, I got my wedding ring on.

I can come and go as I please and talk to you however I care.

That's not the way this works.

The symbol points to something, but it points to something deeper.

And in the Christian faith, it's the same idea.

God cannot be reduced to some image, something that we stamp on our various things, and like now, like everything is going to be okay.

It's a marker of something.

The wedding ring's important.

The marriage, though, is relation the marriage is relationship is primary over the symbol.

In the covenant relationship we have with God, the symbols of that relationship must always come secondary to the relationship itself.

It's too easy to often try and reduce walking with God to making sure I'm doing these couple of things right and I have my cross necklace on.

God says it doesn't work that way.

In the ancient world, this was something they contended with.

It's still something we contend with today.

Hardship comes our way or difficulty comes our way or brokenness comes our way.

And we're like, well, what happened?

I did all the right things.

It's supposed to go my and God says that's not the way it works.

We submit to God, God does not submit to us.

It's a powerful reminder that God desires to conform his people to look more and more like him.

God will not be conformed to look more and more like us.

And while we never may never carve a statue, we may never draw a picture to kind of make it look, sometimes in our hearts and minds, we create a version of God who conveniently shares our priorities, our politics, our preferences, and our prejudices.

And God says that's not going to work.

You cannot make me into your image.

But I will make you into mine.

If you're interested in this exclusive relation, I will form you more and more into my image.

To where all of a sudden, like your values, your priorities, they look more and more like the kingdom.

I'll take you from a greedy, selfish person to a generous servant.

I'll take you from somebody who's scared to somebody who has confidence and courage.

I'll take you from somebody who's chasing and feels like they never have enough to somebody who's just deeply content, just where you are.

God says, I can form you into my image, but I will not be formed into yours.

We build our lives on the character and commands of God.

We don't build God on our own character and commands.

This thing's exclusive.

And understand, you don't have the control in the relationship.

I will not be shaped to be like you, but I would long to shape you like me if you want.

It's your decision.

You're free.

You can do what you want.

And the third command God gives is this you shall not misuse the name of the name of the Lord your God, for the Lord will not hold anyone guiltless who misuses his name.

Now, oftentimes when we come to this command, we kind of get hung up on like foul speech or how we say, like, oh my, or whatever.

And that definitely is appropriate to consider.

If that's an expression you used, you should change it.

It's not helpful.

And we'll I'll mention more about that in a second.

And if you have a trouble with uh expanding your vocabulary, you should change it.

There's different ways in which we should and should not speak, that's true.

But the commandment is going after more than that.

We're to honor the name of God.

So, in other words, we're to think of the command as saying something like this.

Again, if you're a Christian, if you've chosen to follow after God, God says, listen, if this is what you want, if you want to be my people, if you want to follow after me, this is what the guideline kind of looks like.

Don't speak or act in ways that misrepresent the heart, desires, or intent of me.

And don't use God's name to give authority to something that comes from you rather than him.

I always tell people, be very careful if you say to me, hey, Pastor, listen, God told me to tell you.

I'm like, can I double check with him?

I just want to check.

It's like, well, he told me he wasn't going to tell you.

He wanted me to tell you personally.

Like, that's weird.

I've had a few people tell me that before.

It's not a difficult idea to grasp.

If you misrepresent someone intentionally, if you put words into their mouth or attach their name to something that they never said or something they don't actually value, there's no love in that.

And so when people say, well, God is this and God is that and God is the other, God's saying, hey, make sure that it actually lines up with who I am and what I'm about.

Don't be careless with my name.

Don't be careless with what I hold to.

I mean, your speech should matter.

Love has been the consistent thread throughout the commands.

God acted on behalf of Israel because he loved them.

He sees them enslavement, trapped below who they could be, because of their own actions, because of their own choices, and he says, Man, I want to make a way for you to know life.

God wants them to see them in an exclusive relationship just like we see marriage.

The Israelites don't have to bother figuring out which gods, and there's plenty of gods of the land, there's plenty of gods to chase after, there's plenty of gods to appease in all these different ways.

They don't have to live into that.

It's a different thing.

And while our gods look different today, they're still there.

Materialism, success, ever-changing culture, broken systems, and more.

And God says you don't have to chase after all the gods.

Because God loves us.

He provides shape for what a life rooted in healthy love looks like.

Just because you call something love doesn't mean it is love.

We're not busy chasing the ever-changing values of our world, rather, like our value has been established in who Christ is.

And we aren't leading this relationship, God is.

We're not able to remake him as an image, but he is able to remake you and remake me.

No matter how broken, no matter how messed it up, God can do his work.

So we honor God and how we speak to him and how we speak about him.

It just makes sense when love is at the forefront.

So the first three commands aren't arbitrary restrictions placed upon people.

They're describing what it looks like for people to love God as God has loved them.

You've heard someone talk about somebody they love before.

There's a warmth, there's a care, there's a character to their language.

It's just how it is.

There's just this nature, there's this exclusive relationship God is inviting into us.

Not like, okay, if you're gonna do it, here's the rules.

God says, all right, here's the framework.

Listen, first, it's just us.

I'll be your God, you be my people, don't worry about all the chasing.

It's like, okay, that actually sounds like a pretty good deal.

Like sovereign creator of the universe, like, okay, well, what's the second guideline?

Don't don't try and feel like you can control me.

Like you can't manipulate me.

Like, I'm not, you can't move me, but listen, I can do a work in your life.

I can I can reshape things that you think are broken and I can make them beautiful.

It's like, okay, so far your your rules just really sound to my benefit, your framework really.

Well, what's the third thing?

Just make sure you speak in a way that's consistent with who I am.

Don't try and take authority you don't have.

It's all rooted in love.

Our primary call in this life is to love God.

And so at the outset of the Ten Commandments, what it practically looks like, love God first.

How do I go about all this?

How do I love me first as I've loved you?

So what do I do?

So when it comes to your priorities, love me first.

When it comes to your profession, love me first.

When it comes to your resources, love me first.

When it comes to your dreams and your ambitions and your desires and your goals, love me first.

Just first say, man, is this consistent with who God has created me to be, who God is inviting me to be?

Love me first.

And when you love someone, I mean, like how marriage is supposed to look?

I mean, you always put that person first anyway.

Ben's gonna come and he's gonna lead us in a song here in just a moment.

And I'd like you to think in one of two ways specifically.

The first thing is maybe you don't have that exclusive relationship with God.

You're like, I've kind of dabbled in it, I've kind of considered it, like I've thought about it, I'm listening to the claims.

And yeah, I want that.

It's your choice, just like it was their choice, just like it's been everybody's choice.

And God's beginning to lay out the framework to say, hey, I love you like crazy.

Would you like to know what that looks like to live into?

Maybe you'd say, yeah, today's that day.

Then I'm gonna pray in a moment and I'd invite you to pray with me and love to have a conversation with you after and point you in the right direction as we take next steps.

Because it's a life we live, not just a decision we made.

But the second thing would be this maybe you've been following after Jesus for five years or five, five weeks, five years, fifty years.

Are you keeping him first?

You know the nature of relationships are dynamic, right?

They're never static.

It's like Well, remember that time I loved you by doing the dishes?

It was 20 years ago.

But I mean, I felt like that was a pretty compelling statement.

Ah, we continue to grow in love.

To love, to serve, to care for, the way we speak, the things we do.

God's saying, Do you love me?

God's continued to move on your behalf.

How have we responded?

So I'd like you to sing with me.

We're gonna sing this song kind of a time of response.

And then I'm gonna come back up and I'll dismiss us.

But do you know God?

Secondly, if you do, is He first?

Let's pray.

Father, we thank you for this day.

Your love and your grace and your kindness, for who you are, for who you invite us to be.

I thank you for the exclusivity of this relationship.

To be our God, let us be your people.

You offer it to every nation, tribe, and tongue.

What a gift it is.

And Lord, I pray we would be wise to recognize we we can't try and form you to our image, but you long to form us into the good and the beautiful image.

Help us be willing to receive that.

Help us be wise in how we speak, how we represent you.

Lord, for anybody who doesn't know you today, I pray that they would just say, God, I need your rescue, I need your love.

I want to root myself in your love.

They would begin in that way.

They'd let us know so we can begin to point them in ways of how to walk with you.

And for everyone else, Lord, for those who would profess you as Lord and Savior, to just answer the simple question, is God my first priority?

And my work is he my first priority?

In my marriage, is he my first priority?

In my family, is he my first priority?

When I just have opportunity abound, is he my first priority?

Saying, God, what do you want to do?

Because the people we love most, we ask when the greatest things come, and when the greatest challenges come, and do we say, God, I don't know what to do without you.

God, what do I do in the midst of this hardship?

Because you're my first priority.

And over the next several weeks, as we consider this framework, this ancient framework of what it means to be your people.

Maybe we receptive into the images of the God.

Thank you so much for listening to today's podcast.

If you're ready to take a next step in your faith, please reach out to us through our website refineryowhighway.com, or you can email us at refineryohard.com.

We hope you have a little day.