Challenge and Appeal - Real Talk pt 3

Thank you for watching video from one Church of High Point. We hope that today's message encourages you to connect to God, to others and to your purpose. If you're looking for more information about one church or for more resources, visit one church and see. Sorry, I get stuck sometimes. We get to worship Hey, some of you guys I don't know. And some of you don't know me. So my name is Trey. I am a man here on the stage, and I have a beautiful wife, Megan. Almost five years. Love you, babe. And if you've been to any of our church meetings, you've seen our son run across the stage.

So there's a quick introduction. I love scripture. And so let's. Let's dove in Scripture. I'm a little old school so we can look at Jonah chapter one versus one through five. And I would love for us to stand up in reverence of the word. That's where I get my old school. You know, we stand up and read the scripture, and when you say, got it, say got it.

And if you don't have, you say, wait a minute. All right. Wait, wait, wait a minute. Here goes. So we need it I'll be reading from the Ivy. I think we got it. And so it just says the words on screen. If you don't have it, it says, but that's chapter four view of ourselves. Jonah one. Amen. The word of the Lord came to Jonah, son of Emmet. I go to the great city of Neva and preach against it because its wickedness has come up before me. But Jonah ran away from the Lord and headed to Tarshis. He went down to Joppa, where he found a ship bound for that port. After paying the fare, he went up aboard and killed for Tarshish to flee from the Lord. I mean, Lord, I listen to a third word. Hey, man. Got it. We're going to. We're going to. We're going to surf through this whole entire book today, but I don't want us to sit here and read it all. I'm pretty sure that you guys want to go home at some point. So we're going to we're going to move on Jonah. Right. We've all heard this story. We've all you know, a lot of us have heard the story. I won't say we all some of us grew up in one of the first Bible stories we learned and chose this church. You know, there's probably a song, I don't know it, but there's probably a song about Jonah and you know him in the will or the fish or depends on what church you went to.

And what you grew up in. But looking at this, I think it's super, super critical to understand what's happening. So I'm summarizing now. Jonah gets the word from Lord Turned your name, neighbor. Say that's a word. I'm just kidding. You don't have to do that. Oh, and then Jonah's like, Nah, I don't like this guy. I'm going to go the opposite direction. And I want to look at this map on a map up here. I want us to look so this little turquoise dot over here, that's where biblical scholars say that that that it was he was fleeing to. So he came all the way from this purple dot to the ends of the known world, OK, Spain. Nobody knew anything else besides Spain at that point.

And so Jonah went as far as he could to flee the presence of the Lord, a presence that he should know, you know, is ever present in, you know, in every place. But whatever, it's OK. So Jonah gets Jonah gets on this boat, right? And he sails with these people that he he he doesn't know. These people are Phoenician. They live north of Israel. They've taken over a giant part of the Mediterranean at this point. And so he is living there. And as we know, there's a storm that comes out on the ocean. There's a storm out on the ocean. Yes. The only four of us know that song. It's great, though. Don't get me started. She about to get started.

And so we get to this point and the sea is rock and Jonah is in the bottom of the boat asleep and he's knocked out. And so we have all these foundation people, all these other people who travel because they want to go to this place and they're all in this boat right and so the boat's rocking and they're like, oh, my God, what's going on?

That God, lowercase God, right? Because they all believe in different gods. It's a polytheistic world. That means there's many gods. People adore many gods. There's a God of the screams and the God of the drums and the God. So there's so many gods. And so what happens is you say this gets rocking the boat and they're like, Yeah, I'm afraid of my God, you pretty your God. Bob is gonna pray to his God. And Sal is going to play a hurt God, and we're going to figure out what God is causing this and try to ask Him to stop this whole time. Jonah asleep. And then the captain goes, Aha, there's a person who's not praying to their God. I'm going to go get him. And he goes, He knocks on the door Hey, Jonah, Jonah and Jonah's like, Hey, what's going on?

You know, you're the man that it's storming outside. We're going to cast lots. You want to figure out whose fault this is? And so they go in, they cast lots. And Jonah is the person who who pulls the biggest lot. And basically means they threw up some some rocks or picked up some some papers. And if you had the shortest straw, it's your fault, stuff like that. So they did that and they're like, Jonah, tell us about this God, because we've all prayed to our gods and none of our gods have done the thing. They've not fixed it. Oh, my God, the God that created the ocean. And so you can imagine, like, how all of these other people feel right now, right? They're like, so we may praying here about to our little gods, you know, the God of the boat, the God of this part of the sea.

But you said your God created the whole entire ocean. You need to get out of here. And so they end up throwing him overboard. He spends the night with a whale or a big fish or a massive source or sea monster spends a lot translation meat. Right. And so he spends the night with this world for three days and the whale ends up spinning him back on the coast of Israel. He gets there and he says, the Lord again says, you know, hey, Jonah, I have a word for you to go to Nineveh and do this again. So he goes back to where he started. Right. And so he gets off and he's like, OK, got I got you. I'm going to be obedient. I'm going to do what you said.

And that's when we get to Jonah. Chapter three. That was really quick for Jonah to, huh? And so we get to Jonah chapter three, and then we see Jonah finally arriving at Nineveh. And Jonah's probably walking the streets. He might be me like a petty prophet, right? Really petty about everything. And so he's walking. And I can imagine Jonah, like you know, God, from the story to the 40 the city in 40 days, it's all going to hell because all bad hell.

Help! Help, help, help. I can imagine Jonah going there. Right. And Jonah is just he's he's he's cool and he's he's like, yo, y'all, God's going to sort of see me for two days. And so the Syrians, they start with, you know, the people, Nineveh, they start to pray, and they're like, oh, no, we're going to pray to Jonah's God, because begin they leave, but then meaning God's right.

And so they go to this place and they are praying to God. And the king hears about this. Oh, the city is going to be destroyed in a few days. So he does what everybody does there. But there happens to be a trial or situation he calls a day of prayer. Right? Whenever we see something bad happens, we're all about praying. We want to fast when do the things, when to make supplication and all this stuff. And so that's what the king does in Jonah. It's like, yeah. And so Jonah goes outside of the city and sits on a hill and watches and waits for Nineveh. To be destroyed. That's a story. But I want to give us context. Sometimes as believers read the Bible and we we go, Oh, this is what this means today. Right? And the Bible wasn't written today. And so the things that that were written in the Bible, they have a culture of its own and an understanding of its own. And so we have to figure out we have to find out.

We have to do research. So our history is important, even though sometimes it may not be, you know. Right. It's important to know the culture and the history and the location and the map and the people and everything that's involved with this story. And so verse first first be the people right? The Israelites, they had this cycle, right?

It's going to pop up on the screen really quickly. But the cycle it goes from sin. Then they go to suffering and they go to supplication and then they go to salvation. And this is what happens throughout half of the Old Testament. Right? And judges, we see this a lot and there somebody sins or the Israelites are saying, you know, I'm going to worship that God because he looks cool and my neighbors are doing it.

So I'm going to worship them. And then something bad, some army comes and takes them up and tweets them up. And so then they're like, oh, God, something's wrong. Let us pray again. Prayer is what we do whenever we're suffering. And so then God raises up somebody, you know, whether it be Sampson, whether it be Debra was about to say Delilah. He didn't raise up Delilah. Whether it be Debra, whether it be, you know, any of these judges and those people that God calls to make a hero and save and deliver people. He makes a way God is God that makes a way. And so we get salvation and then we go back again. We send again and then suffer again and then supplication, salvation. So the Israelites had this really interesting relationship with relationship with God. They're like, you know, bad boyfriend or girlfriend situation shit. Like they keep messing up. You're like, it's OK. You know, it's all right. It's going to be OK. We're going to get better next time. Fortunately, God is not us, and he doesn't cut them off eventually. And so Israelites had this pattern and so they're right now in the depths of this suffering sin kind of area.

So they're in the sin and they're doing whatever they want to Israel has been split apart into two kingdoms. There's a northern kingdom, there's a southern kingdom. It's all one people, and they're split apart and they are in sin and there are these other prophets, right? Jonah is a prophet. If you didn't know he is a prophet. And so he has contemporaries, people who are prophets also. At the same time, they might be in the northern Kingdom. There might be, you know, on a hill somewhere, but they are all being prophetic and delivering God's word at this time. And so a lot of those contemporaries are Amos and Hozier, right? And they are people who are with them and who are also saying, you know, this is the word of the Lord. Lord says this. Lord says that it's a vile place and we're going to we're going to read Hosanna just to get a glimpse of what these prophecies look like. So Isaiah 11 one through 11 now off the screen to so when Israel was a child, I loved him. And out of Egypt I called my son and this is God speaking.

But the more they were called, the more they went away from me. The sacrifice to the, the bells and the burns and since to images. There were subtitles. It was I who taught Ephraim to walk, taking them by the arms, but they did not realize it was I who killed them. God save them. I led them with courts of human kindness, with tides of love.

To them I was like the one who lifts a little child to the cheek. I bent down to feed them. Will they not return to Egypt? And we'll not see or rule over them because they refuse to repent a sword clash in their cities and devour their fast prophets and put an end to their plans. My people are determined to turn from me, even though they call me most high God, I will by no means exalt them. How will I give you up, Ephraim? How can I hand you over Israel? How can I treat you like Adama? How can I make you like Zeb? William My heart is changed within me and all my compassion is aroused. He's angry. I will not carry out my fierce anger Nor will I devastate you from again for I am God and not a man the holy one among you. I will not come against their cities. They will follow the Lord. He will roar like a lion. When he roars, his children will come trembling from the west they will come from Egypt, trembling like sparrows from Assyria, floating like doves. I will settle them in their homes, declares the Lord. All right. And so we see this is the Lord talking through his prophet Hosseini, saying, You know what y'all are y'all messed up, you forgot who I am again. It happens frequently. The Wholesome Cycle. What happens? Happens frequently. And so, no, I'm going to allow you to be captured. You're going to you're going to undergo some suffering. And then I will save you as you return that to me. And so this this is another example of this this whole cycle that Israelites and a lot of us, all of us follow into, you know, we slip up oh, god, of this.

And that wasn't supposed to do. And then we suffer the consequences. And then we say, oh, God, you know, woe is me, God help me, free me God from this this consequence and the gods like, OK, I got you because I love you. And so we add a timeline just to show you, like, this is where this all kind of correlates. And so if you look at this timeline, you will see. So over here we have, you know, 800 BCE, we have seven BCE at the other end, and we have the three prophets who I just mentioned are all OK around the same, operating around the same time. And the eventually we see that the Northern Kingdom forces Assyrians and the southern Kingdom, possibly Assyrians. So this is something that's going to happen. Gods like this is what this is what it is and how it's going to happen. And so a lot of times we hear that Jonah was a scared of the Nineveh then invites the Assyrians because of the way that they behaved. But when we go in the reach context, it looks like there's a little bit more. If I came to you and I said, God's going to save you even though you're about to slap me in the face, do be like, what are you doing? And if I told my friends I had to go say that to you, they were like, No, Jonah, don't go do that. No, Trey, don't go talk to these people.

Don't be kind of these people. They're going to bite you. They're going to hurt you. And so we look at this thing. And so maybe Jonah is scared of how the device acts, but also the rest of his nation, the rest of his people are going to be at some point in time subjected to these people and they're going to be under rulership to these people that they don't like.

Right. And so this this changes things on a said this at the level of a depth or of nuance. I really like that word nuance and so we see that that changes and that this time where Jonah's prophesying and he's all these people are active, the Syrians are kind of just having battle skirmishes along the borders. So right there they're close. So say, you know, Syria is which state don't I like closest to us, South Carolina OK, I say Syria, South Carolina. Right. And South Koreans come in and they're always like, you know, we want Charlotte. And that's kind of the way this works. And of course, no, come on. It's like, no, Charlotte's our biggest city. It's very, you know, like a lot of money. We want to keep this one. And so this little battle about Charlotte, maybe they fight somewhere in Gastonia and Kelley doesn't like Gastonia. It's they fight somewhere in Gastonia. But this is what happens sometimes, like huge threat, but it's there. And so this is kind of the situation that we're in. And so it's does walking through this city, he you know, it's petty because of this.

Like, I don't want you to see you win. God's going to use you to punish my people. Why would I want you to be OK? Why would I want God to spare you God? Why would I want you to spare the people who are coming across the border the wrong way? Why would I want you to spare my my coworker who's who's living the alternative lifestyle? God, why would I want you to spare the liberals over there or the conservatives over there or the older people up there or the or the younger people who don't know what they're doing down here? God, why would I want you to spare them? They send they deserve punishment just the same way you to do it to us as good.

And so we look at this and we see all of this and Jonah and this is why I call him Penny. He goes outside of the city. He goes up on top of the hill and he sits down. I'm not going to sit down because I don't think he could see me if I did but he sits down and he's in. He's chillin and he's like, 40 days. Got him waiting for this to happen. But he hears the cries of the people who are repenting and who are saying, You know what, God, this is God, we're sorry. We don't want this. And knowing that this is not good for him or good for Israel, Jonah gets angry he goes, You not God. I didn't want to come here because I knew because I knew you were compassionate. I knew you cared about people. I know your quit for good. I know you don't like to punish people. I know you don't want them always to be cut underfoot. God, I knew you were going to do this. And this is why I didn't want to come to this place.

This is why I want to go to Spain instead of coming over here to Syria, over here to Nineveh. Because I knew that you were going to be merciful. And God says something that's really is. And this is the way the chapter four ends. He says something that's really he makes this makes this plant go up, and John is going to play. He's all excited about the plant. Oh, a little plant. So cute. There's some shade here. You know, I'm so glad this plant miraculously grows, guys. This one day in the plant is up and shading. Jonah, I don't know if you guys have house plates, but I do, and they don't grow that fast. And so that happens and then the next day, the plant is getting eaten by worm and it dies. And Jonah again, get angry, and God says, what right do you have to be angry? Jonah and Jonah goes, I'm so angry I could die. I don't think I've ever been that angry. But to who you are, you know, that's that's your business, OK? And so Jonah gets angry and God says, if I'm the person who put the plant there, you cannot be angry about the plant doing what it's supposed to do or whatever I do with the plant, because it's not your business.

Jonah. It's mine. I am sovereign. I'm the Lord. And whatever happens, this is my business. Right yeah. And so I'd like to propose today that we are like the Israelites and we are like Jonah. Sometimes we say things in our world today that we don't like and we don't we don't care for. Big most recent example that we all have probably seen something on our social media or something in the news. Abortion. We don't like it, right? We don't we're not fans of people having abortions.

And some of us get really outraged and upset. And we want to call people who have abortions names and we never, ever, ever want them to always see the grace that God wants to provide. And he's so eager to provide right we see the the person who identifies as something other than heterosexual. And we we are like, oh, no, grace for you. No grace for any of that. We see Black Lives Matters and we see critical race theory. We're thinking, no, I don't want that in my school. I don't want kids to learn about this because it's going to hurt me and to hurt my family. It's going to hurt my children. And I'm sorry to say it might be true. It might happen. Syrians did come and take over Israel. God save them eventually. But it does happen. Things happen. The word declares that the last and last days will be evil. Right? This is not something that should. Shaka says believers I think sometimes we forget that and we're like, Oh, no. And God's like, Oh, yes, I said it in my word. And so we see this and the question is, what? What do we do about this? Right? A lot of times you want to get up in arms and go vote and make the laws and that is fine. That's what you want to do. That's all right. But we have a greater calling.

We have a greater purpose. We have to live like Jesus. Would call us to live. And so when we look at our call, we look at a couple of different scriptures, right? We look at Jeremiah 29 and seven, and it says, also seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper. God can prosper in exile. And wow, come on. I can prosper when everything my city doesn't like the way that you would have it to like. I can still prosper. I can still flourish. Yes, if you pray to the Lord for it. And if you seek the peace and the prosperity, seek is an action verb, OK? It means more than just, you know, be on a safari it's more than that, right? Seek means I'm going to make peace with a person that I don't like. That's part of seeking, right? I'm going to go cut my neighbor's grass even though I don't like them, because that's part of seeking I'm going to volunteer at my kid's school with their teacher that I don't like because she lives in alternative lifestyle, because it's part of seeking.

Right. All right. The next scripture is the Shamar Prayer, and you may not have heard it call this, but Jesus calls it when well, the bad people are saying, you know, Hey, Jesus, what's the law? What's the most important law? The Fair Students Sciences. And it says to love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it love your neighbor as you love yourself. The second is like it. Love your neighbor as you love yourself. OK? And so we see this practically put out, right? We love God, we love God, we adore him. We worship and worship you live. Hallelujah, all the things we do, all that. And we also love our neighbor. God doesn't say your Christian neighbor, your neighbor that does all the right things. Your neighbor who is just like you, your neighbor who looks like you, who thinks like you. He doesn't say that. He says, love your neighbor as you love yourself. Right Nuance. We also have to learn ourselves, but that's a different Sunday. We see Jesus has this practical example right throughout his ministry. We see him having dinner with the people who none of the other religious people are saying that you should have dinner with. You have to deal with prostitutes. He has dinner with thieves. Tax collectors with other things. And tax collectors may seem just, you know, great and, you know, whatever taxes they're doing, they're supposed to do.

But if you look at the context of tax collectors in that day, you see that these people, Israelites, the whole it's all the sons and daughters of Abraham, right? All of them are under occupation. Which means they are under the rule or purview of the Roman Empire, which means the tax collectors don't work for the Israelites. They're not one of them per se. They're not viewed as one of them. They work for the enemy, the person who God is going to save us from that to attack lives or works for them. And so you have to see that this person also is not liked. Right. And so we see that. We see Jesus changing and flipping stories, right? He he goes to the woman caught in adultery and he says, you know, if you're without sin, throw the first stone, right? He goes, the woman that well. And he is another context thing. He sees this woman and she goes, No, where's your husband? You know, I don't have a husband. In fact, you had five. This isn't a dig at this lady at the one, the well, a woman. And that time could not survive on her own. Right. So she had to have some kind of man.

And so she remarried and she figured out what kind of man can I stay with that's going to keep me alive? Because if I'm by myself, I'm a woman, I will die. So this isn't the dig that, you know, oh, you're a your kids are in the room. You are a worker of other things. And so he he looks at that and he says, you know what, in fact, woman, I'm going to use you to save the entire town. Oh, there's a difference here what Jesus is doing. Jesus is flipping things on their head. He looks at Martha when Martha should be technically in the kitchen making sure all the meal is right. And Martha comes out, washes, wash the feet with the expense of everything. He says, No, this woman has done the best thing, and everybody will hear about it. He looks at these people who we would say I don't know about that, and he uses them many flips. I mean, he provides a safe space for them. He provides sanctuary I'm not sure if I set this definition, but a sanctuary is a place of refuge or safety. If we are being like Jesus, we're being Christlike, which we should all be doing.

We are called to provide sanctuary, to be a sanctuary to people. So the person who is your neighbor, who is struggling with an alternative lifestyle, or the old person who is angry, or the young person who is who might be naive or it might be just lost or whatever you want, whatever adjective you want to give them, you are we are called to provide them sanctuary, to put them in a place where they can be at peace, where they can be restored, where they can be loved.

Am I saying don't talk to them about the things that long? Now, I'm not saying that. I am saying listen to the Holy Spirit because let me tell you, try to talk to somebody without the Holy Spirit about what they're doing. It's not going to work well for you. All right? And until the Holy Spirit speaks kids, close your ears, shut up, shut up and love them. And to the Holy Spirit cause you do something else. I can guarantee you I work with 11 nights heroes, my day job, work with him all the times, ones who are not saved, ones who are who are we consider lost or who aren't super devoted Christians. Right? And there are so many cases where there are people who are our students, who are LGBT, who are smoking or who are drinking or who are living a provocative lifestyle or any of that. And the most challenging part is waiting until they open up this conversation that says, Hey, Trey, what about this? What about the way I'm living? What about, you know, how do you feel about this? Or This is why I do this? And then the whole spirit begins to move and to speak and say, you know what? This is what you can do about this, or this is what you can say about this.

But if I go in with guns blazing saying you are all sinning and God is, you know, not happy, but if you come to him, then I've lost him. I've lost their ear. I've lost their heart because I haven't provided the space for a sanctuary. All right, good. Good, good, good. I know that this is hard, OK? I know that this is something to wrestle with, and this is not easy. I'm going to tell you a story some of you might not the way might not like the way that it sounds. I implore you to just listen and hear me all the way out. About 2013. 20, 14. I think maybe that's a sign of getting the hooks out and when stuff happens anymore. But it hasn't started. 14. I was leaving church on a Sunday with friends. I was in a band. We, you know, the shows, you know, of course music videos, whatever, all the other things, albums, stuff like that. And we all tended to serve at the same church. We were church hopping, but we all say the same church and we serve the same church for about a year and some change, right?

Every time we went there and so we would serve there. We all came back from Winston one time we were hanging out. We had our, you know, Sunday, Sunday lunch, I think it was Chili's. OK, I think it was chili, fat, chili. It's like every Sunday that summer thing was Chili's. And so there were that six of us, right? It's one person, two meaning four vehicle to that one vehicle. And we decided, you know what, I'm going to get in the back. Where are you going to all ride out together? We're going to have fun. And so I sat in the back and this is wrong. I sat in the back with the person who was driving their son. Right. I think he was I'm not going to lie. And so he said, I don't remember the old part again, but he was he was he was he was young. Right. And so some places that doesn't matter. Right? You sit in the back of the the vehicle and you sit in the back of the Ford pickup truck does not matter to a group of individuals.

Call it the police. It does matter. Right And so we're driving along you and see this campus, my alma mater. And so we're driving along. You see this campus and here decides oh, whoa, whoa, whoa. I don't think it's what it sounded like. Some like that we hear those sirens and what happens is we all park this amazing building and the officer comes over and says, hey, I just we heard about somebody listening. We want to make sure, you know, that's not loud here, is it? You know, Officer the driver says we haven't done any of that. Our show looks back are you in the back with your son? Me no. I'm panicking. I'm not going to snitch. So I didn't deny that the kid was my no, wasn't my son and my head. I'm thinking, lady, I have not had the business. So I don't have a son. Don't give me a son without me having to, you know, doing the thing, OK? Because that's where babies come from. And I've done that yet. So you're not going to do this to me. And so she calls us out of the out of the out of the vehicle. And we're sitting there and she's she's going off. She's going and she's going ham. Maybe she's a mother. I don't know. I don't believe that you could do that to your son. What kind of parent are you? She's going off. Do you even go to the school? Why are you even here? And so I said, yes, ma'am. Medical school I tell her, you know, you want to look me up maybe in that petty, smart person I am. You know, here's my student I.D. number. Look me up. I want here and so she says, no, you do. And so she goes and she looks it up and she goes, and she she's she's not thrilled that she's wrong. And so then situation only escalates lots of back and forth. She's calling over, does this person run, run their license, run this. And I got the sense that she was trying to find something on me to take me because she wanted to take me to prison or to jail to whatever she wanted to put me in cuffs.

Person comes back to say no, he's clean, run it again. OK. And so I'm very upset. I'm very, you know, angry. I'm boiling hot. I'm recording with my phone you know, trying to figure out what's going on. So there's this one incident I was wrong, snowballed into this big things. There were other police officers pulled up. I end up spouting the you know, the phrase oh, is it because I'm black? And she's just like, don't answer that, don't answer that. And so we had this moment and this situation was we all go back home and wait for somebody to pull me up, pull up with my car so I can go back home. And we all drive separate. Evening just kind of dissipates because it's not a fun way to injure you. Sunday afternoon, probably take a nap the following Thursday. I'm on the way back from rehearsal and Winston again, who will although officer comes he runs me plates. You know, I pulled you over. No. Well, son, is that a camera?

And when this officer sees a camera, he pauses and he shakes his head, as I say. Yes. And I see his countenance drop completely countenance being his mood, his demeanor. I see his countenance drop to the floor. You know, I just wanted to tell you that your light was out your parking lot was out. And so I'm in this this weird place in 2013 2014 between I just really hurt this police officer's feelings. I hurt their heart now. So this other police officer, they weren't they didn't care to craps about me. It's I'm in this complex duality of like I want to protect myself. And also I want to continue being the light that I'm supposed to be, to be gracious and to be giving to provide sanctuary. And so I say that to say this I know it is not easy.

I know it is very difficult sometimes to live with people who don't think like you, who don't look at the same Jesus. You look at who, who, who think completely different from you, who do things that are completely different, what you would do. You know, sometimes you don't like to look out because their brains are kind of browny but I understand that that's a different place to be in, a different place to sit in that with someone who doesn't identify and doesn't do the same things that you do believe that God has called us to embrace those spaces. So evaluate and to consider other people to consider why they do this or why they do that. For me not to say you had an abortion, oh, no. But for me to hang out with the person who might be at risk for having an abortion and love them and after it comes, they have a baby or not still love them. A lot of times we get up and we say, you know what, you had it. We're so glad you had the baby and we banish we can't do that. All right.

So there's there's about four steps and really, they all can be happen at once. First thing that we have to do is repent I don't believe any good task, any good mission comes without first repenting because we are all fleshly people, because we are all not yet in our heavenly bodies. Heavenly bodies, there is a piece of us that is flesh and that piece of flesh is always going to be prone to wickedness and prone to sin. So we repent. We make our things ourselves, right with the Lord second step, we listen we listen to the mom, single mom who had the baby. This is the mom who bought the baby. We listen to the person who got here by crossing the border and we listen the person whose visa expired. Listen to the old person. The church says, I want it to be done this way. This way. We've always doing it. We listen to the kid that says, Can we try this? This is different, this is new. We listen not to listen to them. We also listen to the Lord because sometimes he may put you in a space to say something or to address something, but there is some work that he has to do before he gets you to get there.

There's some cleaning up. There's some things that he has to get you to learn before you can go and completely assignment. Right? The teacher doesn't come on the first day of class and hands us the test. There's work that's done before that. There's homework, they're smaller quizzes. That help you get to where you need to go. And so we listen and we learn. The next thing we do is obey. Oh, pray, sorry, we pray we pray. And these these kind of go hand in hand. That's what Prairie is a conversation between you and the father, between us and the father. We pray, Lord, that allow. And then we listen. Right, right. Sometimes we pray and we talk and we talk and we talk and we talk and we talk and we talk. We talk and we say, man, and we go away. And that's not a conversation. That's a monologue, right? That's almost preaching, right? Then we obey right? So it's better than sacrifice when you don't obey God can sweep in and say, You know what? I can't use you this way this time. You're missing out on this opportunity. I need to use someone else because you won't listen obedience is better than sacrifice.

If you would have obeyed the first time when I said, put the money aside this month, you want me for it? Obedience is better than sacrifice. We have to obey, man. I'm going to ask you to come back up we we have to move out of this space of it's us against the world, right? It's us in the world and out of it.But it's us in the world. Moving to the space of. You know what, God. Despite everyone, in spite of everyone because of who you are. And I want to be like you. I'm going to continue being a light in the middle of the dark not going to be light that stays on that one. That just flickers whenever I feel good. Not one that says, you know what?

I'm tired. I don't feel like putting up with you well, I don't have strength for this today. Ryan said earlier in his weekly sister. This made perfect. Well, my favorite scriptures we have a call to embrace the weakness and allow his strength to be made perfect in us and through us. There is no, no way that we are able to carry out this mission on our own, with our own proclivities and with our own nuances and our own thoughts.

Right. It doesn't doesn't last. It's not effective. And so today, I want to pray with us a prayer of repentance so that we can get started, right? We can get started living the way that Jesus would have lived the more we seek him, the more we have and the more we can communicate with him, and the more recommitting and abiding in him, the more space that we have to do these other things. And sin is something that keeps us from being able to do that efficiently and effectively. So I'm going to pray and the band is going to I'm going to sing a song, and I hope that you hear the words of it and the, the the plea and the yielding and the obedience in the song.