Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] God wants us to be spiritually alive. And as we looked at the last series, all right, when we started this series, right, we said from John 6, it says the flesh counts for nothing. Everyone say the flesh counts for nothing.
[00:00:19] The Spirit gives life. And, you know, we will. We won't get far in life, will we, in if we kind of continually use human reasoning.
[00:00:31] I'm not going to be political this morning. There's so many people who talk at a good talk from a human point of view, but we will not get very far in this life as believers if we put our trust in our human intellect, in our human reasoning, in our human strength, in our natural capabilities.
[00:00:50] Because the flesh is counts for nothing, but the Spirit is eternal. The Spirit of God, he gives life. And as a church, we want the Spirit of God to be upon us, to be in this church, to be at Deo Gloria. That's what carrying the glory means. That's part of our vision that we carry his glory, his nature, his spirit in us. Let me just do a really quick recap if we can put Ephesians 1:10 on there. We started unpacking this series and it looked at the primary importance of what God, what God's ultimate aim is on the earth.
[00:01:33] And his ultimate aim, we see it in Ephesians 1:10, is that God wants to bring unity in heaven and on earth, earth, under Christ.
[00:01:46] That's what he wants to do, is bring unity, unify heaven and earth, to come under the reign and rule and kingship of the Lord Jesus Christ. And how does he do it?
[00:02:00] Through you. Turn to your neighbor and go through me, through me, stuck in this lollipop, through you and through me.
[00:02:12] And as we carry. I think Caleb sung it out this morning. But as we carry the authority of Christ in our lives, as we know who we are in Christ, our identity in him. Remember, we looked at spiritual blessings, all right? As we do these things, we will make his kingdom known on the face of the earth.
[00:02:35] John, you're now a Christian.
[00:02:38] That means you have taken on a new identity, okay? You are new in Christ, still got your personality because God doesn't want to change your personality because he loves you and he made you as you are. But he's given you a new identity. You are now a son. You are now a son. You are royalty, all right? And it's not because of what you've done.
[00:03:03] It's because you have simply said yes to making Christ the Lord of your life.
[00:03:09] And he now says your royalty, you're mine.
[00:03:12] And that's what he does. And he's put a new authority, all right, in you because his Spirit, the fullness of God, lives in you. By his Spirit, your spirit, man has come alive. Do you feel that? Do you know that your spirit has come alive?
[00:03:29] And that's what it means. But the issue is there's a tension.
[00:03:34] There's a tension because living that out is messy. How many of us know that?
[00:03:41] We're spiritual people. All right? What did we say last time?
[00:03:46] The flesh were not under the rain and the dominance of the flesh anymore. Were under the Spirit. Were seated in high places with Christ. We're under the dominance of the Spirit.
[00:03:57] But the trouble is, is living it out every single day.
[00:04:02] And I believe God has got such a word for us as a church that's going to make us grow, not just spiritually, but numerically.
[00:04:10] All right?
[00:04:14] And the only way we start doing that before we. If you want to get Romans 12 in your. In the Word of God this morning, ready, we'll do that. And the only way we're going to do it is when we fully start by knowing that he's dealt with our sin.
[00:04:28] Do you really know he's dealt with your sin this morning?
[00:04:32] He's nailed it to the cross.
[00:04:36] He's put a new name in you, a new heart.
[00:04:41] All right? But we will never be the church he's called us to be unless we start from that position and say, this is who I am in Christ.
[00:04:52] We met with the Road Home team this week. I am so excited. Right. Some of you know that in December, we are going to be putting on the Road Home, which is a book by J. John the Evangelist, and it's based on the Prodigal Son. And we met as a production team and the cast team this week, and as we're reading through this script, it really comes to home again that the Son, the Prodigal Son.
[00:05:16] I won't tell you who's playing that role yet, but he's in this room anyway. The prodigal son, after he's gone away and he's made a mess of his life, when he comes back to the Father's house, this is really interesting. He says, make me like a slave.
[00:05:35] Make me like a servant. Do you know why he said that? Because he doesn't believe he should be anything else.
[00:05:43] And that's the trouble with us. Sometimes we don't believe we deserve anything else. So we live like paupers, we live like slaves, we act like it, but then that puts the onus on us.
[00:05:56] But there's nothing good about us, I hope you know that.
[00:06:00] Nothing at all.
[00:06:02] The only thing you see good in me is because his light has shined into my heart.
[00:06:08] Because he has changed me. There's nothing good in me other than what he's done in and through my life. And the father turns around and he says, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I'm having none of it.
[00:06:20] You're in my house now.
[00:06:23] You're in the Father's house.
[00:06:26] There's no paupers in my house. There's no servants in my house. There's no second class citizens.
[00:06:33] My house.
[00:06:35] That's just sons and daughters.
[00:06:38] If we understand that, let me tell you, we will treat each other differently. We'll have a lot more grace for one another.
[00:06:45] I think in the church today we do not have a lot of grace for each other. It's because we've not really fully understood that we have been accepted by. By a father who loves us. Not because of what we've done, not because we've earned it.
[00:07:03] Phil and I do not lead this church because we've earned is by God's grace we are here.
[00:07:10] I hope you understand that there's no illegitimate children in the kingdom.
[00:07:18] We're children of the living God. Incredible.
[00:07:22] Imagine a church in Newton Abbott who know who they are.
[00:07:28] Imagine as I love Phil, what you said. It's a takeover.
[00:07:32] We're going to take over this town. We're going to take over this region. I can't wait for some of you. You're going to come alive. We're looking at APIs towards the end of the year and God's going to just blow up in your hearts again for his kingdom. God's going to excite you to be used by Him. Some of you can discover the gifts that you know God placed in your life. The graces God placed in your life years ago. And they've stayed dormant because some of us have left our walking, our spiritual walking shoes here and we've carried on grow. Sorry, We've carried on going, but we've not carried on growing.
[00:08:07] We've left our spiritual walking boots. But I believe God is going to ignite things again in our hearts. And it doesn't matter how old you are. I believe there's going to be 80 year olds that 19 year olds who are going to be instrumental in seeing the kingdom come in Newton Abbot. If you've got breath in your lungs, you are not done.
[00:08:30] Okay, so imagine a church like that. It is a takeover.
[00:08:35] People to run businesses. Christian businesses in Newton Abbot. Teachers to be in schools in Newton. Abbot. Doctors to be in surgeries in Newton. Abbott.
[00:08:47] Young people in schools and colleges carrying the glory of God. Incredible.
[00:08:55] Incredible. Okay, I better get to the preacher this morning.
[00:08:58] Okay. Romans 12. We're going to read it. Here we go, Right? Here we go. Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice. Maybe just hold your hands out this morning just for like 10 seconds.
[00:09:20] Here I am.
[00:09:22] Here I am, Lord.
[00:09:25] Here I am.
[00:09:26] I'm a student. I'm a businessman. I'm a businesswoman. I'm a doctor. I'm a nurse.
[00:09:33] I'm a stay at home mum.
[00:09:37] I'm a shop worker.
[00:09:38] I'm a truck driver.
[00:09:40] Here I am, Lord. Here I am. Okay.
[00:09:45] Offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God. This is your true and proper worship. Do not conform, everyone say, conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God. God's will is his perfect, good and pleasing will.
[00:10:10] For by the grace given me, I say to every one of you, do not think of yourself more highly than you ought, but rather think of yourself with sober judgment in accordance with the faith God has distributed to each of you. For just as each of us has one body with many members, and these members do not have all the same function, so in Christ we, though many, form one body and each member belongs to all the others.
[00:10:41] We have different gifts according to the grace given to each of us. If your gift is prophesying, then prophesy in accordance with your faith. If it is serving, then serve. If it's teaching, then teach. If it is to encourage, then give encouragement. If. If it is given, then give generously. If it is to lead, do it diligently. If it is to show mercy, do it cheerfully. I mean, there's a sermon there, isn't there? Generously, diligently and cheerfully. You're welcome. Right? Love must be sincere. Hate what is evil, cling to what is good. Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.
[00:11:21] Never be lacking in zeal, but keep your spiritual faith. Server, serving the Lord, be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.
[00:11:32] Share with the Lord's people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
[00:11:38] What a great passage of Scripture this morning.
[00:11:42] So, having established who we are in Christ, all right, and we've looked at that in Ephesians and Paul's letters, as having established who we are in Christ and how as Christians, we now need to walk in the spirit and not the flesh.
[00:11:58] Paul now brings us down, and he says, we're going to talk about what that walk looks like.
[00:12:07] What that walk looks like. And I've come up with three stages or three pillars this morning that we're going to cling to in order to see our lives grow in Christ, our lives become alive and this church numerically grow. I am convinced it's love that makes a church grow.
[00:12:26] It's love. It's not the programs.
[00:12:29] I like programs. I'm creative. I love churning it all out. It's love, but it's sincere love.
[00:12:37] And it's messy, because where there's people, there is mess.
[00:12:42] Jill, I hope you don't mind me saying. Jill was just sharing with me this weekend how. And she'd worked with a colleague for over a decade, and she said they'd gone through so many issues together, but after almost 16 years, they were still close. They still carried things together that no one else knew about.
[00:13:02] But that is the testimony of people who are committed to loving and seeing things through in life together. And I loved that, Jill, because it was a picture of how we need to be the church. And so three stages. The first one this morning is consecration, if you're taking notes. Okay. Paul talked, first of all about being a living sacrifice. That is what consecration is. We often talk about seasons of consecration, seasons of prayer and fasting, seasons in our lives to sort our lives out. You there? Yeah.
[00:13:40] Start of the year, let's do prayer and fasting because we need to sort ourselves out and get back online and back on track spiritually.
[00:13:47] And I'm all for that.
[00:13:48] But I think what Paul's talking about is a daily consecration.
[00:13:56] And consecration simply, if it's a bit of a big word for you, is this act of dedicating your life to. For the purpose and glory of God.
[00:14:07] That's what it does.
[00:14:09] And Paul says, in other words, become like a living sacrifice.
[00:14:14] So we say every day, here I am, Lord.
[00:14:19] Use me for your glory. Here I am.
[00:14:23] Here I am. I lay my plans down.
[00:14:27] This is where it gets messy.
[00:14:31] I lay my agenda, my plans down for your glory and your kingdom. You know, in the Old Testament, before Jesus, altars were a big thing, right? And altars were a structure that people set up because many of them were nomads. They would walk around and, you know, travel around the area, but they would build these structures often out of stone, wood, whatever. And there would be a fire pit, if you like. Underneath these altars, all right? And these altars were raised off the ground. And it's where people who followed God would often put sacrifices on these altars, and it was seen as an act of worship. All right? And sometimes these altars were. Were put up to establish a new moment, a new kind of covenant with God.
[00:15:25] Sometimes these altars were put in place to offer thanksgiving and praise to God.
[00:15:30] And they would come with their best lamb, if you like, their best of their crops, and they would put it on the altar to thank God for all that he did in their lives. And that's what altars meant.
[00:15:44] But it was a place of slaughter, sacrifice. That's what the altars were. This place where there would be slaughter and sacrifice, I can imagine be quite bloody as well. All right? And it represented this place on the earth where the divine and the flesh, if you like, humanity would meet.
[00:16:08] Stunning picture where the divine, when the sacrifice was going on the altar, the divine and humanity would meet on the earth and the sacrifice would be acceptable. Thank God today that Jesus was the ultimate sacrifice who shared his blood for the sins of the world. Once and for all. Once and for all. But if you look through the scriptures, Noah, Abraham, Jacob, Moses, David, they all put up altars.
[00:16:45] We don't have to do that anymore. Thank goodness.
[00:16:48] Although I know the men are gonna have some fire pits going on over summer.
[00:16:53] All right, we don't have to do that anymore. But here's the point, all right?
[00:16:59] Paul says you are now living sacrifices.
[00:17:03] You are the ones on the altar before God.
[00:17:08] Are you gonna be pleasing or not? See, when the fire comes, the fire can either destroy or it can build in our lives and our hearts.
[00:17:24] And so Paul says the point is that we become this living sacrifice.
[00:17:31] Our flesh on the altar.
[00:17:35] That's what it is.
[00:17:37] Our flesh, our bodies go on the altar in submission to Christ.
[00:17:44] We will never be true worshippers.
[00:17:48] We will never be able to offer true and proper worship if we do not lay our lives down on the altar.
[00:18:01] The true and proper worship is when we present ourselves like we did before. Here I am.
[00:18:10] Here I am, Lord. I am presenting my life as this living savvy. That's what true worship is.
[00:18:17] That is what true worship is.
[00:18:21] The only problem is with being a living sacrifice and not a dead one, is that when you're living and you're trying to be on the altar every single day, life things have a tendency to do a runner.
[00:18:41] That's why every day, that's why we need the power of the Holy Spirit in Our lives every single day. We should say, lord, fill me by your spirit. Holy Spirit, I need you. I need you. I need you. Come and possess me. Do dominate my thought, life, my actions, everything. Because I cannot do this without your holy spirit.
[00:19:03] Can't do it in our flesh. It's useless trying.
[00:19:06] Trust me, I've been there.
[00:19:10] And so alive, things have a tendency to go and do their own thing. But you see, the altar is a place of surrender, humility. You seen a picture of the church here?
[00:19:22] What it could be?
[00:19:23] Sacrifice, selfless love, laying down.
[00:19:27] Paul says that's true worship.
[00:19:30] Let me tell you, wherever there is true worship, God cannot help but come near.
[00:19:37] And you will sense his holy presence weaving in and out our lives.
[00:19:43] We will be hearing more and more testimonies of the kingdom of God coming, of healings happening, Gordon, in our bodies, in people getting saved at Deo Gloria because they don't know they stepping over the threshold and encountering the presence of God. And I've got to hurry up and ah, Consecration as a church. Can this not just be a passing season?
[00:20:13] Can we be a church that continually offers up our lives as living sacrifices? Second thing, transformation. You know, to conform to something means that you change your behavior. It's like an outward thing. You change your behavior, your dress code, you talk.
[00:20:29] I'm not going to mention it, but when we went to. When we. Five years ago, we joined Rediscover Church in Exeter. Five years ago, Drew, we celebrate five years, three years of planting this church. Five years. And we met some amazing students. And they are incredible. We were talking about students earlier. Amazing students. But one student, right? And if I can say this right, he was white, but he taught like a black man.
[00:20:54] Right? And because all his friends were either Nigerian. All right, but he taught like a Nigerian.
[00:21:03] Right.
[00:21:04] And we found it so funny for our kids would come home in the car and they would laugh about this. But what happens is when you're in the presence of something or someone, you conform very quickly to them. I think Ruben's going to come back with an Australian accent.
[00:21:24] Hello.
[00:21:26] G', day, Sheila. Better not say Sheila. All right.
[00:21:30] But you transform and so we. Sorry, you conform to, I guess, whatever somebody sounds like or their behavior. And so this white guy, who's adorable, by the way, but he started like with the swag and he had. He was just.
[00:21:47] You could hear him on the phone, he'd be like, I thought he was Nigerian.
[00:21:52] All right.
[00:21:54] It was just really, really funny. Right? But what I'm saying is that transformation we. Sorry.
[00:22:01] Conforming to that is it happens when we feel pressure sometimes. I'm not saying this was. That was just a funny example. But we conform to things when we feel pressure.
[00:22:12] Think of students who leave school and go to college.
[00:22:15] Anyone do the Doc Martens thing because you thought you were cool when you went from school to college? I did. I became a rocker for a month. And then I realized looking in the mirror going, I'm just not a rocker.
[00:22:29] I'm just a boring English rose. I am not a rocker.
[00:22:33] And so we conform to these molds.
[00:22:37] And because of the pressure around us, what happens is we come off the altar and let me speak to some of you young people here.
[00:22:45] We come off the altar very quickly because of pressure.
[00:22:50] And Paul was saying. Paul was saying that if we're going to keep a vibrant Christian life, we're going to be alive. We need to reflect this new life.
[00:23:02] We need to reflect this new life in Christ. We don't need to be anybody else because God loves you and molded you and made you and created you to be exactly who you are. To have the shape of body, you've got to have the type hair. You've got to talk how you do, to have the mannerisms that you do. He loves you the way you are. Do not change other than change inwardly that reflects him. And so Paul says, and I think sometimes in the church, we've forgotten these basics. Don't we need to be authentic? You talk about this, Phil, about being authentic. It's about time we started being as the church, our normal selves, but carrying this new life in Christ. And Paul says, be transformed instead by the what?
[00:23:51] The internal?
[00:23:54] Yeah. All right. How many of us know that our thought life. Everyone say thought life controls our attitudes, our feelings that ultimately control our actions.
[00:24:05] It all starts in that. In there.
[00:24:09] Our thought life.
[00:24:11] If our thought life is worth wrong, our attitudes, our behavior and ultimately our actions will be wrong.
[00:24:22] We'll be absolutely wrong. And Paul says, we need to renew our mind. Renew our mind. Matthew 15. Jesus said, it's not what goes in your mouth that makes you unclean.
[00:24:32] It's what comes out.
[00:24:36] What comes out of us. See, it's internal, it's in and then it comes out. I want to suggest this morning, if some of you are in this room and you're like, esther, my actions are not good.
[00:24:47] My behavior isn't good. My attitude is not good towards my work colleague, towards the politics that I see on the telly. Right. Can I suggest, if that's you go back to your thought Life, start being intentional and thinking and saying, what am I thinking on? What am I meditating on? What is dominating my headspace?
[00:25:11] I tell you what, the Holy Spirit, he will change you.
[00:25:15] And he does. A quick change. He does. You will start to see these things dropping off your life. And then the third thing, we've got to go really, really quick here.
[00:25:23] If we do these things, we'll be able to attest and approve what is good and pleasing to God.
[00:25:29] In other words, when we consecrate our lives daily, when we seek this transformation of renewing the mind, we will be able to test and approve what is God's will over our lives. And this comes back to apest the graces and giftings on our lives. But I'm not going to go into that because that's for later on in the year. But, you know, when the Holy Spirit changes us, we will start understanding our place in the body of Christ.
[00:25:55] We will know exactly what God's called us to, and we will run with our lane. And the reason God wants to call that out in us is so the church gets people built up.
[00:26:09] We will understand our place in the body of Christ. We will be able to honestly evaluate our strengths and our weaknesses.
[00:26:20] See, we won't be in competition with one another.
[00:26:27] Phil and I are two very strong people.
[00:26:29] Not quite sure how we've lasted all these years.
[00:26:33] No, we do by God's grace. It's his grace. But honestly, we are two very strong people coming together, both of us, with apostolic leadership, gifting and graces on our lives.
[00:26:49] And we have to manage that.
[00:26:53] We do.
[00:26:55] And when people come along and they go to Phil, and they go, hello, Pastor, and they go, hello, pastor's wife.
[00:27:01] I kind of go, no, I don't really. I graciously just go, yes, I'm the wife, but we're going to start calling out gifting in one another.
[00:27:15] You're not just this, you're not just that.
[00:27:18] You are created in Christ Jesus to do great works for his glory and his kingdom. Somebody say amen this morning?
[00:27:26] All right. And then finally, I've got to run through this because I'm literally, what have I got, two minutes left? My goodness. Okay, I've got to run through these. Paul actually lists, right, eight things really quickly. Where does love start? Love starts on the altar. This all comes back to love.
[00:27:43] Love, he says love. What does it say? Here is the mind.
[00:27:48] Love in action. Here we go. Where does love start? Love starts on the altar. Lord, have me go from this place this morning. Say Lord, have me tell him he's got you. It's a powerful statement. Make sure you mean it. Say, God, you've got me. Whatever that looks like for my life, you've got me. It starts in worship.
[00:28:07] I'm putting my life on the altar. Have me, Lord, have all of me. This is my worship.
[00:28:14] How does love grow among us? Here we go. This is how our love grows amongst us. Love must be sincere.
[00:28:23] As a teenager, I was so two faced and God had to deal with that.
[00:28:30] As a teenage, I was just two faced.
[00:28:32] I remember being at school saying, yeah, yeah, I love you. But with another mate, I would talk about them.
[00:28:39] And at 17 I got incredibly convicted.
[00:28:44] We have got to make sure that our love is sincere.
[00:28:47] I say to my kids, mean what you say, say what you mean. That's been drilled into them from being such young age.
[00:28:55] Say what you mean, mean what you say. And I know we're an imperfect bunch, but love must be sincere. We cannot say to somebody, I really love you on a Sunday and I'm really for you, and then on the phone with somebody, gossip about them in the week.
[00:29:12] God can't bless a church family like that. And he won't, you know, if somebody rubs you up the wrong way.
[00:29:20] Why don't we celebrate them for the way God's made them?
[00:29:24] If somebody has a laugh next to you and it's just horrendous in the workplace, celebrate the way God's made them.
[00:29:35] Why can't we do that? Why can't we turn this around?
[00:29:40] Second thing really quick, a devoted life. You know, the word Philadelphia means literally brotherly love. Paul was saying, when you're devoted to one another, it's as if you are loving people in the church like you love your own family.
[00:29:56] Could I love you like I love Phil too, right? I can.
[00:30:02] That's what Paul's saying. We're to love one another as we would our own family on the face of the earth. Incredible brotherly love. See, we cannot claim to love God and hate a brother and sister.
[00:30:16] See what God's going to be doing. Drew, will you just jump back on? Do you mind? Verse 11.
[00:30:21] Third thing is being diligent, passionate, with zeal.
[00:30:26] Let's never be a church. Yeah. If band you want to come, don't ever be lacking in passion, in our love towards others. Will you stand with me this morning?
[00:30:36] Let me just say this really quickly.
[00:30:40] The way we treat and love people. Are you ready for this? And this really convicted me.
[00:30:45] The way we treat people, the way we love people.
[00:30:50] Is a reflection of the measure that we love Christ.
[00:30:58] I could weep over that.
[00:31:02] Sobering, isn't it?
[00:31:06] The way we treat, serve and love people is the measure, is a reflection of the measure of how much we love Christ.
[00:31:16] Because that's how he intended it to be.
[00:31:21] Love.
[00:31:23] Love wasn't meant to be easy.
[00:31:26] Wasn't easy for Jesus.
[00:31:28] He gave his life as a living sacrifice.
[00:31:32] The other one is joyful hope.
[00:31:35] I want to say to some of us here this morning, seasons are not going to be always on a mountaintop.
[00:31:43] There's going to be seasons of grief, seasons of trauma.
[00:31:46] There's going to be seasons of relational breakdowns, seasons of great pain in the church and outside the church.
[00:31:55] You know, if Paul can write from a prison, be joyful in hope.
[00:32:00] If Peter while in chains, can sing the melodies of heaven, if Stephen, while he has been stoned to death, can pray over his enemies, he's been stoned to death. And he says, lord, forgive them, Father, forgive them, for they don't know what they're doing.
[00:32:21] You know why they were able to do it? Because of the new life that was in them. Because they knew who they were in Christ.
[00:32:27] Because they realized that they're living in a higher place.
[00:32:32] We're not of the earth. We're not of the darkness.
[00:32:36] We're of the light.
[00:32:37] We're a new creation. We're under new authority. We're under a new kingdom. And this is a kingdom that's coming. This is a kingdom that's everlasting. This is a kingdom.
[00:32:50] Joyful in hope.
[00:32:53] Patience. Can we be patient with one another going forward?
[00:32:58] Can I suggest that when somebody upsets us, and I always think mostly it's unintentional because we're just silly people sometimes, Can I suggest that instead of picking up the phone to talk about them to somebody else because it makes you feel better, can I suggest that we pray for them on our knees?
[00:33:15] You know what it's going to do? It's going to revolutionize this church, this area, this region, because they will see and know that love lives here.
[00:33:26] Faithful in prayer. Imagine a church this week. You just say, lord, will you lay somebody on my heart this week in our church?
[00:33:32] I'm never going to tell them, but I'm going to pray for them. I'm going to be intentional about being faithful and praying for my sister, my brother in Christ this week.
[00:33:41] That's love in action.
[00:33:44] Sharing the needs of one another. I think this is an incredible, generous, caring, sharing church.
[00:33:51] It is.
[00:33:54] Can we open up our lives?
[00:33:56] Don't you love in acts when it says there was no needy person among them?
[00:34:01] No needy person.
[00:34:03] Finally, what happens when there is no love? We know what happens when there is no love. There's chaos, there's brokenness.
[00:34:12] It results in a dead church.
[00:34:15] Yeah, there might be people turning up and sitting on a chair, but it results in a dead church.
[00:34:22] And sometimes we come to church and we go and we've all done it. Probably. If you've been in church for decades, well, there's not really a program there to suit me.
[00:34:32] Well, this ministry isn't quite what I would like. Personally, I suggest we've totally got it wrong.
[00:34:42] Maybe we're not in a good place because we're failing to love one another.
[00:34:49] Maybe we just start to love one another. To extend our sharing, our caring, our hospitality, our faithfulness in prayer, we're going to pray this morning. Really quickly. First three things we're going to pray for. We're going to pray for an outpouring of God's love upon us as a church family.
