The Confidence to Do What's Right

All right, guys.

Um well, hey, so jump into the the message real quick.

If you if you haven't been here or haven't been here in a few weeks, we're in a series right now called Getting to Know God.

Getting to Know God.

We are studying the life of a man in the Old Testament named Abram.

He later gets his name changed to Abraham.

And we're going through his life in a very detailed manner because going through Abraham's life allows you to get to know not just Abraham, you get to know God.

Because over the course of his life, bit by bit, God reveals himself to this man.

At the beginning of Abram's story, God is someone he knows about and he believes in, so much so that when he hears God speak, he obeys and he follows, but he doesn't know God.

He doesn't really know what God is like.

In fact, we're going to see throughout his story, he has a lot of misconceptions.

But at the same time, we see God be so good and so personal, revealing himself to Abram and just layer by layer, showing him, this is who I am, this is what I value.

You can trust me.

You can live your life in a very different way because of who I am.

Abram is able to live his life like very few people live it.

He's able to take risks, he's able to go places he would never go, he's able to be generous, he's able to do all kinds of things because he knows who his God is.

We talked about the fact that Abram is often known by his faith.

That's kind of what he is connected to.

If you know his reputation in the Bible, Abram is kind of the father of faith.

Faith is described in Scripture in the book of Hebrews as confidence.

It is the confidence and what we do not see.

We can have confidence in God, and the better we know him, the stronger that confidence becomes, and the more confident we can live our lives.

You can live a very confident, bold, powerful life when you know who your God is, when you know who's with you and who's got your back.

And we see that with Abram.

And so as we get to know God better through Abram's story, we get to live with more confidence in who he is and the ability to do what he calls us to do.

And so a few weeks ago we talked about the confidence we can have to go first.

We can take initiative in life.

We don't have to wait for everything to get to a crisis point.

We talked last week about the confidence to be generous.

Abram is a very generous man, and his generosity is in large part connected to his faith because he knows that God will take care of him.

He doesn't have to live his life hoarding everything that he has, being stingy, being fearful, having a scarcity mindset.

He knows that God is his provider and he can live generously, and so can we, and that's something that God very much blesses.

Today we're going to talk about having the confidence to do what is right.

The confidence to do what is right, even when it's hard.

I don't know how much you naturally care about what's right.

Some of us have a little bit more of this than others.

This is not annock.

Like, obviously, we all care about what's right, but there are some people that have uh perhaps even an overactive sense of justice where things bother you that don't even bother most people.

Like those of you who, if that's you, oh, like when someone cuts you off in traffic.

Oh my, I'm so sorry.

Like the the the injustice that has been done, right?

Like the anger that can boil up in you when you're like, that was wrong.

That was that was wrong.

Man, I I have some of that sometimes, especially when it comes to church stuff.

Like years ago, uh when the the live stream stuff was really new, it would really bother me when churches would would post the word live on a pre-recorded service.

It was like really bothered me.

I'm like, it's not live.

There's a little thing in the corner and it says live, but it's it's pre-recorded.

That's a lie.

You know what I mean?

Like I would just be like, oh, like, who cares?

Um it's just there's things in life that bother us because they're not right.

I actually think that rightness is the right filter most of the time.

Most of the time.

Sometimes we can be so focused on that that we can sort of minimize love, but those two are supposed together, love and truth, right?

It's important for us to care deeply about what's right.

In fact, in my home, I care more about what's right than I care about a lot of other things.

For example, my children care about what is fair, and I don't care about fairness.

And I don't think you should either.

Fairness is underrated, it's it's fairness is overrated.

Like fairness does not trump rightness.

I'll give you an example.

My my son Judah, who just turned 10 yesterday, 10 years old, he uh, yeah, he made it a decade.

He made it a decade in our home.

That is incredible.

Um, yeah, so he he it's really bothers him.

It's not fair that his older brother has his own room.

Judah shares a room with his little brother, and he will, for a really long time.

And he's done the math.

He was like, it's not fair.

Liam got his own room when he was 10, and I won't get my own room until I'm 14.

And I was like, what makes you think you're getting your own room at 14?

You know?

He's like, well, Liam's gonna move out.

I was like, yeah, I get an office.

Right?

No, no, I wouldn't do that.

I don't want to be up there upstairs.

No, I don't want to be, it's a it's nasty up there.

Um but but I was like, yeah, that's that's true.

It's not fair.

It's not fair.

Now, it's right that Liam gets his own room because he's the oldest.

And just by default, we've done the worst job parenting him as the other kids.

Because he's our guinea pig.

We don't know what we're doing.

And so at the very least, it's right that he gets his own room because we've messed him up.

Right?

There, you have to have some type of consolation.

The other kids get parented so much better because we learned with him, and then we go, ooh, let's do that differently.

So it's right.

It really bothers Liam that his sister has her own bathroom.

He has to share a bathroom with his brothers, and I'm constantly asking him to clean his bathroom, and he's like, I didn't do that, I didn't make that mess, that's them, and I'm like, I don't care, clean it.

Uh and so, you know, it would be more fair if maybe he and Lily switched, and a few months of the year he had his own bathroom, and then she shared it with the boys, and then, you know, but that would not be right.

That just wouldn't be right.

In fact, we moved houses a few years ago.

That was about that's what motivated our last move, and hopefully our final move was like Lily needs her own bathroom.

She cannot share a bathroom with with the boys.

There's just no way.

And so we searched for a house that would fit that.

That's kind of what led us to our house was her having her own bathroom.

It just wouldn't be right to make Lily have both like older or younger brother shared bathrooms.

It's just, uh, we're not doing that.

Not doing it to her.

Maybe you figured out how to make that work in your family.

We have not.

So it's just it's fair, but it wouldn't be right.

Eli, my youngest, he doesn't think it's fair that he doesn't have braces and all my other kids have braces.

And really, he's mad about it.

He doesn't need braces.

He actually may not need braces.

The dentist was like, actually, his teeth look like and he's mad.

It's not fair that I don't have braces.

And I'm like, it's not right to ask me to pay for braces when you don't need them.

Like, that's not right.

No.

Fairness is overrated.

And I really, honestly, as a parent, when the when the I'm not, it's not fair comes out, I'm like, I don't care.

I don't, you don't really want fair, right?

Like, honestly, it would think with God.

If if we wanted fairness, like you want fairness with God?

No.

No, you do not.

No, when my kids go on the fairness thing, I'm like, oh, you want to talk about fairness?

You know, it's not fair that your mom and I work and we contribute everything.

And for most of human history, child labor was really normal.

Okay?

And half of you are old enough to have a job by most of the world's standards.

That's not fair.

It's time for you to contribute around.

You know, rightness is better than fairness.

And we should value, we should value rightness and doing what is right.

Scripture teaches us this time and time again.

Galatians 6 9 says, let's not get tired of doing what is good, of doing the right thing.

Never grow tired of doing what's good, doing what's right.

At just the right time, we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don't give up.

Doing the right thing is hard, especially if you do it consistently.

But God sees it.

Proverbs 21:3, the Lord is more pleased when we do what is right and just than when we offer him sacrifices.

Proverbs 21:3

The Lord is more pleased when we do what is right than when we offer him sacrifices.

It's important to do what is right.

Now, in Abram's story today, we're in Genesis chapter 14.

Genesis 14 · chapter mention

We're gonna see a situation where Abram has a choice to make, and it's a choice, to be honest, not many people would make, given the context.

But he is going to do what he believes is right, and he's gonna trust God with the rest.

And I think that is a that is a philosophy you can use for all of life.

Do what is right, trust God with the rest.

Let's go ahead and jump into it.

Genesis 14.

It says, about this time, war broke out in the region.

Uh, a bunch of kings whose names I'm gonna mispronounce from a bunch of places who I'm also gonna mispronounce, they all had a big war.

They had a big fight.

We don't have to go through all of this, okay?

Let's just save me the embarrassment of trying to read these names.

Uh, the important thing is that there's a war, okay?

There's a big fight between a bunch of city-states.

Because at this time, this is ancient, ancient time, there's not really nations yet.

Egypt kind of becomes the first nation in that area, but really at this point it's just city-states.

And so it'd be like if Atlanta had a king and Savannah had a king, and the king of Savannah and the king of Atlanta got into it, and Savannah came and attacked us, and then Atlanta came.

It's like that's the way the world sort of worked.

It was all these different city-states acted as independent places.

And so there's this huge war, and it really starts to manifest in the valley of the Dead Sea.

And we get there in verse 10.

It says, As it happened, the valley of the Dead Sea was filled up with tar pits.

And as the army of the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some fell into the tar pits, while the rest escaped into the mountains.

The victorious invaders then plundered Sodom and Gomorrah and headed for home, taking with them all the spoils of war and the food supplies.

They also captured Lot, Abram's nephew, who lived in Sodom, and carried off everything he owned.

But one of Lot's men escaped and reported everything to Abram the Hebrew, who was living near the oak grove belonging to Mamre the Amorite.

Mamre and his relatives, Eskel and Anair, were Abram's allies.

When Abram heard that his nephew Lot had been captured, he mobilized the three hundred and eighteen trained men who had been born into his household.

And then he pursued that guy's army until he caught up with them at Dan.

That's a good name.

There he divided his men and attacked during the night.

And that guy's army fled.

But Abram chased them as far as Hoba, north of Damascus.

Abram recovered all the goods that had been taken, and he brought back his nephew Lot with his possessions and all the women and the other captives.

I actually tried to say that guy's name many times and gave up this morning.

So Abram finds out that Lot is in trouble, his nephew.

He's been captured, and Abram has a choice to make.

Now, the problem is that Lot is the worst.

Lot's terrible.

He's not a good guy.

There's really nothing admirable about him.

Remember, last week we learned the story that Lot, because he's related to Abram, because he's blessed by Abram, because God is blessing Abram so much, and Lot's just standing close by.

Lot is also being blessed.

Lot and Abram have this tension because both of their flocks, their wealth, their households have grown to the point where the land is having a hard time sustaining it.

And so Abram takes the initiative and he goes to Lot and he says, Hey, look, this isn't working.

There's conflict that's brewing.

Let's not let this get out of hand.

I'll tell you what, you take whatever land you want, I'll take what you don't pick.

He's generous in that way.

And Lot could have been kind.

He could have said, Man, let's figure out how to make sure that however we divide the land, it's equally good.

And he went, Great idea.

He took the nicest part of the land.

He left Abram with the part of land that was by far the worst.

And he thinks that he's made off and he's got it made.

And he goes and lives next to this place called Sodom.

And that's not going to end well.

But Lot's in trouble.

And it's his fault.

It's his fault.

He left his uncle.

He left the blessing of being near him.

He could have actually come to Abram and said, Abram, I will never leave you.

Like I want to be near you.

I want to serve you.

I'm your nephew.

Let's figure out a way to make this work.

I'll tell my men to cool it.

Whatever it is.

No, no.

He he left his uncle and he went and he partnered with some really evil people in a place called Sodom.

And now he's paid the price.

And if I mean in my flesh, if I'm Abram, I'm like, sweet, now that land is mine again.

But that's not what Abram does.

He believes it's the right thing to go and rescue Lot.

He believes it's the right thing to do.

And so he does it.

He does it.

And he's successful.

But doing the right thing requires risk.

It requires risk.

And in life it often does.

In life, doing what is right is often risky.

The question is: will we be people who are willing to take the risk to do what is right?

Like that's a question we should really ask ourselves.

Am I willing to risk doing the right thing?

And what might you be risking?

Well, let's talk about a few options.

To do the right thing, you often have to risk offense.

To do the right thing, you have to risk offense, because often standing for what's right, doing what's right, saying what's right means offending people, sometimes very deeply, who don't agree with you.

Jesus did this all the time.

We could look at a classic story in Luke chapter 6.

Luke 6 · chapter mention

It's the Sabbath, and Jesus is in the synagogue.

We read this in verse 6 through 11.

It says, On the Sabbath day, a man with a deformed hand was in the synagogue while Jesus was teaching.

The teachers of religious law and the Pharisees watched Jesus closely.

If he healed the man's hand, they planned to accuse him of working on the Sabbath, which was against their laws.

But Jesus knew their thoughts.

He said to the man with a deformed hand, Come and stand in front of everyone.

So the man came forward.

And then Jesus said to his critics, I have a question for you.

Does the law permit good deeds on the Sabbath, or is it a day for doing evil?

Is this a day to save life or destroy it?

He looked around at them one by one and said to the man, Hold out your hand.

So the man held out his hand, and it was restored.

And at this the enemies of Jesus were wild with rage and began to discuss what to do with him.

So Jesus understands that to do the right thing to heal this man's hand, which is clearly the right thing to do, is going to offend the hyper-religious leaders around him.

And this offense makes Jesus' life very difficult.

There's actually a few moments in Scripture, this one of the last moments, maybe the last moment, that Jesus actually teaches in synagogues.

Because these these moments where he offends the Pharisees, he offends the Jewish ruling class, they make it kind of impossible for him to ever go to a synagogue and teach.

Now he has to go and teach in the wilderness and out in open fields, and people have to come to him because he's not welcome anymore, his life becomes much more complicated.

Jesus was willing to risk offense, and even the offense of powerful people who had the ability to make his life hard, and they did.

But Jesus refused to say no to the right thing because it might offend some people.

Are we willing to risk offense?

It's tough.

But we have to be.

Why?

Because God honors what is right.

God cares deeply about what is right.

It is more pleasing to God for us to do what is right than it is for us to be celebrated by people.

And sometimes standing for what's right means you will be unpopular with people.

It does.

But if you care more about rightness than popularity or than comfort or ease of life, you'll risk offense.

Sometimes doing what's right means risking your resources.

Doing the right thing, it can mean risking what you have.

It's a great story with Jesus and a man named Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus is a tax collector, he's a scoundrel, he's gotten rich by extorting money from people, stealing from people.

What tax collectors would do if you're not familiar is they were uh commissioned by the Roman government to collect taxes, but they were free to collect extra on top of that and then use that to line their own pockets, and so they could go to you and say, Here's what you owe in taxes, and it was way more than what you actually owed, and they just got that money for themselves.

That's what they did.

And so Jesus comes to the town that Zacchaeus lives in, and Zacchaeus sees him, and Jesus invites him to spend time with him.

He says, Hey, I want to come have dinner with you.

And we see this in in verses 5 through 10.

It says, When Jesus came by, he looked up at Zacchaeus and called him by name.

Zacchaeus, he said, Quick, come down.

I must be a guest in your home today.

Zacchaeus quickly climbed down and took Jesus to his house in great excitement and joy.

But the people were displeased.

He's gone to be the guest of a notorious sinner, they grumbled.

Meanwhile, Zacchaeus stood before the Lord and said, I will give half my wealth to the poor, Lord, if I have cheated people on their taxes.

I'll give them back four times as much.

And Jesus responded, Salvation has come to this home today.

For this man has shown himself to be a true son of Abraham.

For the Son of Man came to seek and save those who are lost.

Now, what's interesting about this story is that Zacchaeus doesn't have to give this money back.

In fact, there was a law in Jewish culture from Leviticus that actually addressed what someone like Zacchaeus should do in a situation where he had wronged people and taken more money.

We see it in Leviticus chapter 6.

Leviticus 6 · chapter mention

It says, The Lord said to Moses, suppose one of you sins against your associate and is unfaithful to the Lord.

Suppose you cheat in a deal involving a security deposit, or you steal or commit fraud, or you find lost property and lie about it, or you lie while swearing to tell the truth, or you commit any other such sin.

If you have sinned in any of these ways, you are guilty.

You must give back whatever you stole, or the money you took by extortion, or the security deposit, or the lost property you found, or anything obtained by swearing falsely.

You must make restitution by paying the full price plus an additional 20% to the person you've harmed.

And on the same day you must present a guilt offering.

Zacchaeus is like, I'll give it back plus 400%.

Yeah.

It's probably what Zacchaeus' wife said, you know, like, no.

But man, it was what was right.

It wasn't about fairness, it wasn't about just following the letter of the law.

Zacchaeus in his heart had a change, and he went from being a selfish person who's willing to steal from others to recognizing his sin and saying, I have to make this right.

And to make it right, what came to his mind was, I'll give four times back as much.

I will impoverish myself to make it right.

Sometimes to do what's right, it means risking resources.

You know, it's being honest on your taxes.

It's it's being honest in all of your business dealings.

There's a lot of Proverbs actually about how much the Lord detests dishonest business dealings.

If people like lie and cheat and inflate, and oh man, it bothers them a lot.

To do what's right means you might risk offense.

It also means you might risk resources.

To do what's right means you might risk relationships, whole relationships.

You could risk them to do what's right.

Jesus did.

Mark chapter 3, early in his ministry, it says that when his family heard what was happening, when his family heard about all the things Jesus was doing and how famous Jesus was becoming, he's causing this huge stir, they tried to take him away.

Mark 3 · chapter mention

He's out of his mind, they said.

So a little later in the same chapter, it says Jesus' mother and brothers came to see him, and we know why they're there, like to take him home.

They stood outside and sent word for him to come out and talk with him.

There was a crowd sitting around Jesus, and someone said, Your mother and your brothers are outside asking for you.

And Jesus replied, Who is my mother?

Who are my brothers?

And then he looked at those around him and said, Look, these are my mother and brothers.

Anyone who does God's will is my brother and sister and mother.

Ooh.

I don't know how that was received.

Now Jesus loved his mother and his brothers and sisters very, very much.

Very much.

And we see, you know, by the end of his story, on the cross, he's taking care of his mother.

And his own brother James becomes one of the leaders in the early church, even though he wasn't a follower of Jesus prior to the crucifixion.

Like there's a restoration there for sure.

But Jesus was willing to risk relationships to do the right thing.

Very few people are.

In fact, I gotta give a huge shout out to my wife because I saw her do this one time in a way that really blew me away.

It was great.

Um, one of my kids had a family member that was a really good, sweet person, but kind of a distant family member.

And at family gatherings, this person just sort of made one of our kids feel really uncomfortable.

And they they were kind of a touchy feely person, and they really wanted to always like, hey, come here.

And and there was a lot of of that kind of stuff.

And one of our Kids who was younger shared with us, shared with with Megan, I feel really uncomfortable.

And they were young, they were probably five.

And like I they, however, they said it, they weren't in the back seat, like, Mom, Dad, can we have a discussion?

I feel a little uncomfortable.

My personal space, they didn't have those words, but they described it, I feel uncomfortable.

And in many families, it would be like, well, just don't I don't want to create drama.

But Megan thought about it and prayed about it.

And so when we were there, and that person was like, come over here and sit on my lap.

And Megan said, actually, we're not going to do that.

And she did it in a really sweet way.

And she had a great conversation.

And it ended beautifully.

There was no blow-up or anything like that, but there could have been.

But she was willing to risk a relationship to do what was right by our child.

That's that's a wonderful thing.

And she made a judgment call, and maybe other people in the same situation would have made a different judgment call, but it worked out really well.

And my point is that sometimes when you do what's right, you you may offend someone to the point that that relationship is broken.

And if that's the case, that's heartbreaking and there can be reconciliation.

But if we neglect to do what's right because we want to protect a relationship, if we neglect to stand for what's right because we want to protect a relationship, eventually that corrupts us.

I know lots of people who have hard convictions, but then someone they're close to has a different view and they don't want that person to be upset with them, and so they'll drop their convictions because they want to please that relationship.

That is not the right way to do it.

You hold true to what's right and you act lovingly.

You don't want to become a person that's like, ooh, I get excited about offending people.

That's not Jesus.

But you stand for what's right, even if it risks relationships.

I got one more.

And then worship team, you guys can come out and we'll we'll wrap up.

Uh sometimes you have to risk everything to do what's right.

Like everything.

There's a man named Stephen in the book of Acts.

He's one of the early followers of Jesus, kind of an early leader in the church.

He's not one of the top leaders, but he's someone that's very well known.

And he ends up getting an audience with the Sanhedrin, essentially, the high priest and all the most important religious leaders.

And he makes an accusation that really bothers them.

He basically says, You guys crucified your own Messiah.

And they don't like that.

And so they they bring him in front and they give him a chance to defend himself, to renounce what he said, to make it right.

And here's part of what he says.

And it's actually Acts chapter 7.

Acts 7 · chapter mention

It's really long, it's really incredible.

He says this, you stubborn people, you are heathen at heart and deaf to the truth.

Must you forever resist the Holy Spirit?

That's what your ancestors did, and so do you.

Name one prophet your ancestors didn't persecute.

They even killed the ones who predicted the coming of the righteous one.

The Messiah, whom you betrayed and murdered.

You deliberately disobeyed God's law, even though you received it from the hands of angels.

These Jewish leaders were infuriated by Stephen's accusation, and they shook their fists at him in rage.

But Stephen, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed steadily into heaven and saw the glory of God, and he saw Jesus standing in the place of honor at God's right hand, and he told them, Look, I see the heavens open, and the Son of Man standing in the place of honor at God's right hand.

Then they put their hands on him.

They put their hands over their ears and began shouting.

They rushed at him, they dragged him out of the city and began to stone him.

His accusers took off their coats and they laid them at the feet of a young man named Saul.

And they stoned him.

Stephen prayed, Lord Jesus, receive my spirit.

And he fell to his knees, shouting, Lord, don't charge them with this sin, and with that he died.

And that man, Saul, is going to become Paul, the man who would write the majority of the New Testament.

Stephen was willing to risk everything to do what was right.

He gave up his life.

And you might say, well, that did not work out for him.

It depends on how you look at it.

Matthew chapter 5, Jesus said, God blesses those who are persecuted for doing right, for the kingdom of heaven is theirs.

Matthew 5 · chapter mention

It just matters where your values are, here on earth or something greater.

In fact, we're told in 1 Peter 3, even if you suffer for doing what is right, God will reward you for it.

I promise you, Stephen is doing great.

In fact, scripture actually talks about the fact that martyrs, those who are martyred, who are killed for their faith, are honored in a very special way in heaven.

There's like an extra blessing.

Will we be people who do what is right no matter what?

It's hard to do that.

It is hard.

These are challenging messages.

I know that.

They're not fun.

But you only get to live one life.

You get one.

And we all have to ask ourselves, what is going to be the standard that I use to determine what success looks like?

Is it is it wealth?

Is it wealth?

Is it how much you have in an account?

Is it achievement?

Like, oh man, I accomplished this, I accomplished that.

You got an amazing resume.

Is it popularity?

All the people that might come to your funeral when your life is over.

Wow, this was a really amazing person.

And those things are all well and good.

There's nothing wrong with those.

In fact, you can be a person who does what is right.

I know a lot of people who live their life to do what is right, and they are very blessed financially.

They have a lot of achievements, and there will be a lot of people at their funeral because they've made a huge impact in so many people's lives.

It's not always a trade-off, but it is a question of what do I value most?

And if what you value most is doing what's right and what is good in the eyes of God, if what you value most is integrity and righteousness, Jesus said, if you hunger and thirst for righteousness, you'll be blessed.

We have to ask ourselves, am I willing to do what's right, even if it's risky?

And I've I've taken some of those risks, and maybe I was wrong.

There might have been times in life where I did what I thought was right and it was risky, and I paid a price for it.

And maybe I got it wrong.

Maybe I messed up, maybe I didn't have the right filters, but I will tell you that had I made a different decision at that time, I would have been betraying my own conscience.

And I don't want to live with that.

I would rather be wrong, but be able to say, I truly believe that was the right thing to do.

I'm okay looking God in the eye if it turns out I messed that up.

Be like, my bad, I thought that was the right thing.

I can own that.

What I don't want to do is look God in the eye and say, Yeah, I thought that was the right thing to do, but then I got nervous.

Or I was worried what that person would think, or I thought it might cost me too much.

Do what is right, no matter what the risk, and trust God with the rest.

That is the right way to live.

And as we wrap up and take Lord's Supper, that is how Jesus lived.

I mean, this little meal that we take together every week, and as you made your way in, guys, there's there's bread and juice on the tables.

Hopefully you grab that.

If not, grab it next week or get up and grab it now.

It's totally okay if you want to do that.

I mean, could we have a better example of what this really looks like?

To risk everything?

Jesus risked his life to tell the truth, to teach the truth, to live it out, to rescue us, to save us from our sin.

And he knew the risks.

In fact, risk may not even be the right word because it was a certainty of what would happen to him.

But he did it anyway.

How many people would do what is right if they were certain that it would cost them their life?

Jesus did.

And he did that for all of us.

Because of what he did on the cross, because of what this meal represents, this bread being his body and the juice being his blood, we are saved through faith in Jesus.

We do not have to live life worrying about the price of our sin because it's been accomplished.

We don't have to wonder where we stand with God.

We don't have to earn it.

We don't have to hope that this week we were good enough for God to be pleased with us, but next week maybe we'll have a rough one.

No, it doesn't work like that.

We have grace, we have mercy, we are fully accepted, we become adopted into the family of God.

Scripture says we're his own sons and daughters, all because of this, because Jesus did what was right and what was good in the eyes of God the Father, and he risked everything for it.

Let's be like our Jesus.

Let's just be like him.

Let's do what's right, and let's trust God with the rest, however the chips may fall.

That's how I want to live.

I hope you do too.

Let's pray.

Lord, we thank you so much for this piece of bread.

This represents your body that was broken for us.

You died on the cross.

You love us.

You care deeply for us.

And you knew that it was right.

It was the right thing to save us and rescue us from a plight that we could not rescue ourselves from.

Thank you, Jesus, for being our example, for being our role model, for being our leader, for being our king and God.

Help us be like you, Jesus.

Help us care that much about what is right in your eyes.

Let's take the bread.

Now, the juice, Lord, we thank you for this juice and what it represents.

This is your blood.

Poured out as an offering and a covering for our sin.

And now it's been washed clean.

We've been made right in your eyes.

We are righteous in your eyes because of what you've done.

Help us live life like you did, Lord.

Being willing to risk whatever we have to to do what God calls us to do.

Let's take this juice.