I've got a three hour sermon, and about an hour audience probably, right, if you worked at it from the beginning. Just talk a little bit about how great it is to be in here with you, and to stand in this place feels a little bit like home. It's a good feeling. It's territory that's been walked on and prayed over so many times. It becomes a holy place. And it becomes a holy place because we come to acknowledge it as a holy place. We expect that God will do marvelous things in the lives of people who need it. And we believe that God hears us when we pray and that he works in our situations even when we can't tell when it started and how it worked. We just know we needed help and cried out for it. And God faithfully blessed us. sends us back into the world marked by the gospel and marked by the work of Jesus and ready to be His, as we've been, some of us, for a long time. And some of you are gaining on it faster than you think as the years roll by. So we give Him praise today together. It's not gonna be a three-hour sermon nor a one-hour sermon. It may be a sermon. Looking at a text, anyway, Hebrews chapter 4, but I'll come to that in a minute. I'll get started up here on higher level and then we'll come to that step or two. A.T. Robertson is a Baptist. How many of you know that? You got to look him up somewhere before you find out. The man is a Greek scholar with a brilliant ability. to not only preach the gospel, but to train pastors in ways that they know what the coiny Greek has in it, as it is put in place study. And he had a lot of students in various places when he taught because he would travel to seminary to seminary, location to location. He's been gone since 1934, but he's still marking a lot of those who are studying Greek is his language and he continues to make an impact wherever he goes. One lecture stands out to people who know him and love him. It's their favorite. He once lectured on the sympathy of Jesus for us as people in our daily needs. Sympathy of Jesus for us as people in our daily needs. He'd given that lecture one day at the seminary, and he went straight from the room, the classroom, to his office. And in his office, he had a place where he always sat down when he first came in after doing some teaching, and he'd come and sit down on his chair surrounded by books. Or when we were in the Northwest, way up, you'd always hear, books, books, around the region. Always be books, those Englishmen carried it. But he sat among his books, and he was a homeboy. He was from our part of the world. And a beloved student followed him and found this prof in that class, surrounded by his books, sitting in the chair. His eyes, he said, swimming with tears, which overflowed to his cheeks and came down his face. Dr. Robertson broke out in words of adoration for Jesus, saying to his student, and to think, brother, he's the same Jesus now. He's the same Jesus now. Who do we need? I need him more than I ever needed him. I know that. And if I'm smart, I'll set at his feet a lot more. and listen to what he's saying through his word. We preachers can't do that well at anything we're trying to do and make the truth stick if we're going to just keep looking for things that paste together good so we can ignore the ones that are going to demand something of us and we have to get down on our face again and be prepared to get up and proclaim what people don't want to hear. I watched people in the last few days and weeks because they were out and they were in trouble. They were in trouble. They were hurting. They were afraid. Some of them were dying. Some of them still are. Numbers in our part of the world are still doing a little climb. Did it drop from yesterday? It was a signal. I wanted it to drop from yesterday just to show us that we could be free to come in for a few hours, a couple. But we can do what God calls us to do, and when we proclaim the gospel, we can be as effective as A.T. Robertson and his sympathy for people coming through his lecture and the thing that it did in the lives of those who received the word. And to think, brother, he's the same Jesus now, the same Jesus now. This is the point. at the writer of Hebrews would impress upon our hearts in this unforgettable passage of Scripture. I want to read now my brief text, and you can turn to it if you'd like or not. It's short, you can memorize it, it's easy, you may already have. But here's what I want to read to you. First I have to get to the text. Once I find it, we'll read it. 4, fourth chapter of Hebrews, beginning at verse 14. Listen. Since then, we have a great high priest who has passed through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God. The great high priest, put this together, is Jesus, the Son of God. He's the one that makes everything we get possible. We say, what about, do we need somebody else? No, we only need Jesus to do what he does best, and that's save a life, change a heart, make a person brand new. So here he is in this opening text for me, at least today. Passed from the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God, let us hold fast. Here's our doing right here. Let us hold fast our confession. We do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who in every respect has been tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace, or keep drawing near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in the time of need. Three verses, verses 14 through 16, right there at that intersection in the fourth chapter of Hebrews. Remember also, and this is something you don't get right away when you study this book by yourself, but it looks like a letter. It has the form of a letter. Many of the people who've studied Hebrews have decided that Hebrews was a letter, which it makes it a pretty long one when you're looking at all those chapters. But it has that kind of connection. And our great high priest is the same Jesus now. When that changes, he doesn't change. When other things change, he's right there. Remember, if he's with you, he doesn't change. If he's come along in your journey today and he's with you at the hard spot where life or death might be involved, he's with you there to make the change himself. He's with you there to give you the ability to stand and say, I believe in Jesus. I'm his. I don't care if I live or die. He is my Lord. The writer preaches to the Hebrew Christians in this section of scripture, as we read down, those who are tempted to go back. You ever read chapter 6? And this one? Oh, this one gets you spinning. This one, everybody likes to sit down with a study book and go after it. They want to be with some education, though, because you'll be gone as soon as they start using some of the words they use. But anyway, it's a marvelous thing to see the writer preaches to the Hebrew Christians who are tempted to defect. Where? Where are they going? Well, now let's say you've seen that God is glorious. You've seen his work in the spirit. You've seen this about him and that about him and what has already been revealed. And now you tell me, where will you go? You ask, where shall I go? Well, this is it. Read the sixth chapter and you'll find out that there ain't no place to go. You can go to the places open because in the place that's open in Jesus, there is life coming and what you need will be found. How many of you, when we first started, just decided we might do this? The elders were talking about it, praying about it, thinking about it. And you say in a meeting when you're sitting together, amen, amen, let's do it, hallelujah, praise the Lord, let's just do it. And then you go home that night and you realize, I agreed to put in people in harm's way if that's how everybody sees it. Did you start with that? I did start with that a little bit. Been doing this a long time, so I didn't stay with it too long. Been in Jesus' presence too many times. been too far down in the sludge where you're saying, I don't know how to get out of this. No, a lot of people don't know how to get out of their circumstances. But Jesus knows how to get out of that sin position. Jesus knows how to take you up where there is nothing but mud, set your feet on a rock and say, okay, you are stable, you are intelligent, you are marvelous, you're mine, shut up and do what I ask. I mean, he does say that. Will He say that to me? He probably doesn't have to say it to most of us in this room because we've been trying to please God even this week. Even in these six weeks, we've been trying to please God by walking with Him in such a way that we can encourage others who are coming along to know Jesus. I thought about it yesterday when my grandson was getting married yesterday. And they're down in a church building, you know, and they're down in, where are we? Pearland! Should have remembered my pears instead of my apples, it would have been a little easier to do. At that Pearland church, and they were all coming in in masks. We left ours in the car, but we had it with us just in case. And everybody just took them off, and they were around, milling around with that preparation thing and they locked the outside door. Nobody else is going to walk in and say I got in here and you guys had it open. I mean they were doing everything to the Pearland book. Everything they could to keep that Pearland people. There's a lot of people in trouble in that part of the world if you start looking at the numbers and what's been happening. Huge. They're in Rosaria County. They've already done a lot of action in Rosaria County. Oh, but it was a nice wedding. nice way. This kid who not very long ago was this tall is now this tall. Got me a couple inches. But he doesn't have me this way. I got him in a suave way. I got him. You know, it's just not me. He's the little guy. And his wife is about his size and shorter, quite a bit shorter. And they've been planning this for a while, moved it up because of all that's going on right now in order to kind of get settled in to some things before, you know, while the opportunities are there. So they talked, been talking it over. I'm not involved in those discussions, but it was, it was a joy to be there. Everybody was either laughing or crying. You sent your baby off to marriage. My son was sending his baby son, his only son, into the arms of a little girl from the East Coast. A little girl that we've already decided we liked when she came to visit us at our house a few months ago, and she went right out the back door barefooted and run all over the woods out there. I said, oh, this is good. If that kid can do it, I believe next time I'm around my house, I can run around out there again and not get any stickers. I didn't make one step and then those little flat stickers just stopped me. but they're a good match, and God is doing a good work, and all it's gonna take is a lot of family and a lot of love, and let the Holy Spirit do His work, because they wanna serve Him. And I thought about Him as we were driving down, and thought, you know, there's been so many reported from this part of the city with this problem, this disease, or at least the beginning stages of what looks like it, And they're in and out, Darrell, they haven't had a service longer than we have now. This is a day they don't have a regular service today yet. They're still just being themselves. They're waiting until they get a clear okay to it. There's just a lot of people coming in yet. So they're not sure. So they wait and pray and they're happy and everybody's happy. You know, that first kiss was pretty explosive, wasn't it? I don't know what happened. It looked like when he said kiss, they were already halfway there. I mean, seriously, I don't know why I would think about it that way, but here's how it sounded, boom. It was like they ran together. But they didn't fall, they stayed right in there. So that was a good sign. But there are people that just need Him. We can see them, we don't know them many times, but we can be ready for them if we start praying and plan ahead. The sermon, what they're calling a sermon, shows that the author is a pastor without peer, because they learn of its form and shape by the pastoral mind behind what's happening in the book. A man who studies the scriptures finds out what's happening under the leadership of the pastor, leading, leading. The priest stood in the place of the people in the judgment of the cross. He now stands as an advocate of sinners in the throne room of God. Here, Christ's righteousness, the perfect merit, effectually pleads for his people. Christ cries for his people, calls to his people, waits for his people often. The Old Testament priest was never designated a great high priest. They never had one like that. It's a different deal. Do you understand that you have a great high priest through whom, in whom you are acceptable right now to God? I just need this today, don't you? Acceptable to God. Praise God for that. No Old Testament priest, not a one designated. The son is no ordinary priest. You wanna look at the son of God, he's incomparable. Bear in mind also the eschatological setting of Hebrews, and that tells me to tell you this. We have to come back to believing that his coming is now. We gotta find it out again. We gotta quit putting it off by saying, I don't think it's gonna happen yet. Well, you're not gonna change it, but you're not gonna be ready. If you're careful, you will be, because you'll be attending to the one that's going to be here when it's over, and in charge of it when it's over, and ruling over it when it's over. So we need to kind of work that back into this fabric, the eschatological setting of Hebrews, the end time and its surety. We need more of the early church mentality that we are living into the last days. Without remembering this emphasis, we'll not understand Hebrews. We'll miss altogether what he's getting us ready for. How can this exaltation of Jesus coexist with the crisis in the testing for the church? You know enough about how it works with the church after its beginning and then the continuation. When the enemy charges in, when the enemy comes in in opposition to the church, There really is a recognition of warfare. There's opposition to the church in the world. Do we know that? We're not looking for a road back into heaven where we don't have to do anything, but just gotta catch the bus. We gotta be able to say, we wanna be waiting for him to come. We don't care how hard it gets on us, we got a job to take to get that gospel out. I remember so many times people feeling that so strongly. And I didn't. I would always have a good answer. I'd say, well, they'll get it done and I'll get to pray for them. And I'd forget to pray. So we, once again, have to look at our own lives always in this process. How can the exaltation of Jesus coexist with crisis and testing for the church? Well, the crisis of persecution, that's a big one. We in America are persecuted at times. We don't even know it. I mean, it's so simple. It's not the big thing yet. They're not taking your life away. They're not doing all that. So we miss it. What a day when that happens. But the crisis of persecution, along with those stresses that constrain their livelihoods, every time there is a strong wave of persecution in the Christian church, no matter what part of the world it is, there will be a lot of straining going on in their way of life. They will be losing much, giving up much, warring on the inside. So that the crisis of persecution and the stresses that are being constrained in their livelihoods are all due to their commitment to Jesus. I have to come back and make that clear, but it's amazing and it's true. Everything in the culture is saying, well, we're being persecuted and we got this. And then when you get to it, you look back and realize I'm being persecuted because he's being persecuted. He's my savior, he's my Lord. It's his kingdom that's here, not mine. And so this strengthens the temptation to long for and return to the old pattern because it's too hard here to change it. The writer brings perspective to the relationship between Christ's exalted priestly work and the crisis that in the time between the ascension and the return of Christ, work is going on while pressure is being built. Since then we have a great high priest who had passed through the heavens. Brings to mind Aaron's approach to God as the representative of God's people on the day of atonement. That's back in the 16th chapter of Leviticus. Here's a great preacher name for you. Gerardus Vos. You got it figured out which is the first name? Gerardus Vos, V-O-S. well-known in theological language and in the church and in the teachings of the church. And he said, where a comparison with Aaron is expressed or implied, Jesus Christ is called High Priest. I never got to dig it in this area at all. So I can't dig it up now, just ran into it fresh this last couple of weeks. But when you look at that, you think, here's old Voss saying, where a comparison with Aaron is expressed or implied, let's compare Aaron to Jesus. Jesus Christ is called high priest. Well, of course he would be. Here we are in the new covenant relationship. We're seeing priests that are born of Jesus' life and blood. And then Vos would say in continuum, when the comparison between Christ and the Levitical order is spoken of, Christ and the Levitical order, he's called priest. His power in the priesthood is where he is. He doesn't have to add to it because nobody else is going to be there. So that Christ is called High Priest when even Aaron is there. And Aaron the priest is recognized and honored, but he does not move Jesus out of the continuing journey of God's people toward home. There's a great presupposition that God must judge sin and that Christ has paid the penalty for the sins of His people. Believe that? Yes. And now presents the fruit of atonement in heaven's court as our advocate. Remember the word advocate? get a hold of that words a great word and it is where there is the advocate brings the fruit that is gathered places it in heaven's court someone would say we can't get to their i mean there could be people coming to that but they never get to where they can make a deposit like that big According to Hebrews, there are gifts and various kinds of things that are given as gifts by the high priest as he rules in his place. Gifts and sacrifices is the word in this book that we're reading. So that there are certain ones when they get in their place, they do what they do, but they are done when they're done. In other words, they got nothing else to offer and they can't do what the real priest, high priest will do. They present the fruit of atonement in heaven's court as an advocate. Now, can you go to the court without your high priest? Can you go to the court and be represented without Jesus? How can we approach that blazing glory of God apart from our high priest? Hey, you get pretty close to the fire when you get pretty close to where God lives. Presence, what do you run into when you get there? These other guys, when they're coming through, they come through the heavens, they go to the other side, you don't see them anymore. But now, you've got a man. who is able to come into the presence of the Father, into the presence of the Lord, and be there in that presence to receive what he needs to glorify that God and bless him. I like the fact that there is this, at the cross, there is this wonderful propitiation that just comes in and deals with the sin. What does it do with it? It gets it to the point to where the sin is recognizable without a problem as the evil and the wrong and needs to be extricated from there. Needs to be thrown out. The sin has to go and that is what's happening when you have someone with the power to propitiate what is revealed. Now, when you start reading some of these words, you'll get some different ideas when you get into the classroom and start listening to the lecture. Because some of these words indicate what a thing can do that's different from what another word might do. Atonement is a good word, but propitiation goes beyond atonement. Atonement is a fact that salvation has been provided Step in, be saved, come on. Propitiation means restoration. Satisfying all the wrath against God's goodness and greatness. Propitiation. Cleansing, making well, making whole of one who is in Christ Jesus. All the fury of heaven. Is that a way we can say it? All the fury of heaven was born by him in our place. Fury? Oh yeah. Put sin down in front of you called the priest. See it begin to take a part in your life as you cry out to Jesus. See what happens. Jesus wins. we do not lose when the enemy comes grasping for what he can get away from us how much he can destroy edges on our life we win finished propitiated alive in him we are here oh by the way I just noticed there he sits on the throne on high and the splendor of his finished work. That's a Texas Lutheran cry. Sounded like I was calling hogs, but I wasn't. I could do that, too. We did that. But it's celebrative when you begin to see, here comes our high priest into the heavenly, into the holy of holies, into the presence of God. He just kept coming in, he kept coming in, he kept coming in until you met him at a door he had created for you and you got out and stood up in his glorious redemption. and found you did not have an impossible situation. You only had the beautiful gift of life in Jesus Christ. God is just, no other could redeem than the Son. No other can represent us in heaven's court but the one who paid the price. It's all there. Next time I'm sitting under my tree, And a young black man, 21 years ago, stopped in our service here. And he left me a little note. I guess we were working with people a lot that time in a service, so we were caring for them. And he had to go. And so he found out what my address was, and went on down to where he was going at the lake, and then came by early the next morning and put it there in the mailbox we have outside. And it was to Pastor Sheil. And I don't have it with me to read it, but here's what it said to me. It was a poem that told me to find a tree and sit down under it, establish yourself in that place, and wait for God to come. Man. I mean, I've sat around these woods a lot, and I haven't had that kind of experience, you know? I mean, what do we do? And he used it to show that that tree was getting a little bigger over a little time. and that it would be ready for me. Whenever I'm ready to use it, just be there and leave nothing but the sin. Just stay in that church until it's finished. What church was that? This one. I still have it. I read it every once in a while, pretty often in fact. And I tried to find him, but I couldn't find him. So after running all over with the internet there one afternoon, I decided, you know what? Let's just call him Angel. Whatever he wants to deliver, I'm ready for another delivery. Probably be a little harder to deal with the first one, but it was amazing because it helped me. It put me in place. It reminded me of who I was. It set me down where God wanted me through this brother. And I'm thankful. And I receive it as a gift every time I look at it. The comparison between Aaron and Jesus, our great high priest, finds expression in the transcendent language that's in this text as well. Through the Son of God, he penetrates into the presence of God. Let me read this again. If I don't read it to you, I'll be messing up. So I'm going to do it. We know it. We just went through it. Here we go. Since then, this same text, you notice. Since then we have a great high priest. Since then we have a great high priest. who has passed through the heavens, passed through the heavens. How does he pass through the heavens? I'll give you the words for it. The Son of God. Let me read it to you. Who has passed through the heavens, through the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God. The Son of God. The Son of God is always connected pretty closely to Jesus, who he is, what he's doing, the work that's done. But I like that. Through the Son of God you get to the inner workings of the Father. Even pass through the heavens speaks to the contrast between Jesus and Aaron. Our high priest penetrates to the presence of God. Aaron is limited. entrance within the veil. He passed from the outer court through the holy place to the holy of holies beyond the veil, passing from view. Didn't stay there, didn't find a door he could open and sit down and be in. Had to keep going, his job not done, but had jobs to do. Passing from view. Out of his ascension, he passed from view. Jesus has ascended through the heavenly regions to the actual throne room of which the inner sanctuary of the earthly tabernacle was but a copy. Got a copy. Finishing his atoning work is what he did on the cross. He accomplished redemption, finished his atoning work, and now represents us in the heavenly court to which Aaron could only point. Did you see Aaron coming out? He said, it's there, it's there. See the glory way up there, way up there. He said, wait here for me maybe. I'll come back, see me tomorrow. Gone. To check on what had just been revealed to him. What had just been brought to him. Who did all this that we've been talking about for us? Who did it? This great high priest who has passed through the heavens did it. Jesus, the son of God did it. The name the Father gave him at his birth, Jesus, part of it, pointing to his true humanity. Same incarnate Lord Jesus, born in Bethlehem, endured the cross, rose from the dead, ascended on high, served his people as great high priest. The writer intends to stress the deity of Christ, his ultimate qualification for the office of high priest. He says he can accomplish as man what man needs in the strength of his deity because he perfectly unites in one person the natures that are two, two natures. Chalcedon Church Council. I don't remember the date. I didn't write it. Well, 451. 451, that's back there a ways, isn't it? They had this conversation about, two people becoming one, or this measure of two lives being tied together. This thing about God putting his life in one as identified with the other. Chalcedon said, so two natures coalesced. You like that word? I like that word. Every once in a while I see it enough to say it, and then I forget it until the next time I see it, which might be a while. Two natures coalesced in one person, prosopon, prosopon is the one person, and one substance, hypostasis. Now when I came back here to pastor, I had old hypostasis by the neck. He's not a person, it's a certain form of a word and how it's said. So I liked it so much and said it so much, I just kept putting in every outline I could find. It was, I guess it was good. Nobody said it was good. Nobody said it was bad. Nobody even said, I can't understand a thing you're saying. So I know that the Holy Spirit translates between the preacher and the people sometime, because we can't quite get it, but we can get it. When he says you can get it, here it is. So he does it. Chalcedon says, without confusion, Without change, without division, without separation, that is the two natures together. That's what they're like. That's what they decided. And so if you find it somewhere down the line, just say, thank you, Jesus, for two natures together and the beauty of your work in all their lives that makes it possible for them to know you and serve you. Now, finally, how late is it? Hebrews stresses that the humanity of Christ is a necessary qualification for the high priestly work. Do you believe that? Hebrews stresses that the humanity of Christ is a necessary qualification. You gotta be man. You gotta be man to qualify. Secondly, it also stresses that Christ's deity is a necessary qualification as well. So you've got man and you've got God. or you've got man who's looking for God. A lot of things going on in that kind of situation. But there it is, the language of the two together, two is one. And then there is the last part of this, the language of exhortation. The union of deity and humanity in one person who serves his people as high priests to bring them to God provides the context for the exhortation of verse 14, let us hold fast Our confession. We've got something to do before we leave this sermon alone. There's a simple stop along the way that's demanding something from us. If we're hearing from the Lord who's speaking to us as His church, then we can respond to Him, can't we? We don't have to know every detail about it or everything that's building up in here. But our confession is the truth as it is in Jesus. embraced by faith and acknowledged before the world. Our confession is the truth as it is in Jesus, the truth as it is in Jesus embraced by faith and acknowledged clearly before the world. That's our confession. Write it down. Think about it. There is Jesus, I've embraced the faith that comes in Jesus. And I worship him and thank him and give him praise. And I stand in my place and witness to him. And make sure that my calling is fulfilled in the proclamation of gospel. People have asked recently, When do we get a series of sermons on salvation, biblical salvation, true salvation, what's going on? Sometimes I guess we wander off and say things that are not as interesting to people, but it's always gonna be about salvation in some way. But you gotta know that that salvation has all kinds of marvelous pieces of truth tied to it and brings you out of that one sip type idea or that one person deal barely able to get across the line, what would it be like if we just came to him? Somebody ran to the front and said, Pastor, I want Jesus, I gotta have Jesus. And we laid hands on him and he jumped all over this building. What would you do? Well, I'm not gonna jump all over the building, I don't think, but I might. My son told me last night, he said, you and I are too weepy. Yeah, well, I said, you're standing here beside me crying, buddy, so I know what you're talking about. And he was, he was pouring it on down as he saw that little boy off with a girl on his arm. Have you professed faith in Christ? Who propitiated the wrath of God on the cross? Who rose from the dead and intercedes for his people? Are you sealed in that? Are you sure in that? Have you run to him already? Oh, what a blessed man or woman you are to be able to hear him call. I certainly am. Calling us to him. Are we under pressure and we're then saying, are you prone to wonder? Prone to wonder. Lord, I feel it. Prone to leave the one I love. The true believer will not go back. Can we say that out here? Yes, because our pursuit is to proclaim the gospel to the unbeliever and love him and care for him like you would anybody else. Beyond that, it's our purpose to preach to him a gospel that comes into his heart and life and absolutely makes him a new creation, holy and pure before God. It's clear enough? We have to make a way to answer that. and help people respond to it without getting in a hurry. How many people have been messed up because we went after them? Thought it was time for them. My dad, I don't know if my dad's in heaven or hell because of that exact event. By a woman who loved him and cared about him, not married to him, just a neighborhood friend. And that first time in her whole life, she saw my dad coming to that altar and she joined him. The worst thing she could have done was to join him and try to train him into where he was going. She didn't know. When he died, I had not had conversation with him about heaven except a little light ones we always had, but he had a door shut. And I buried him and we thank God for him. But it was hard. I didn't know. I don't have an assurity yet on that. Then I talked to my, after the funeral, I talked to my dad's friend, the best friend he had at the time. And he said, I want to tell you something, nubbin. That was my name with him. That was Decker Prairie name. A little ear of corn. My dad had it picked out. He said, you look like, he looks like a little ear of corn, chubby and short. Glad I fooled him. Got chubby and tall. Worked out better. He said, your dad was proud of you, son. He loved you. He heard you again and again and again on the radio. He heard it all long enough. He wouldn't go to church with us, but he never went to church. He left church when he was about 14. No excuses. Only God can make the difference, so we trust him. That's why at his funeral, myself and others in our family were really wounded by his loss. My brothers particularly, shocked, torn by it. We could only say we're not sure, but we're praying to a God who is. We're praying to a God who knows how to deal with this. So he did. Have you professed faith in Christ, the Christ who propitiated, or got rid of, or dealt with, or make sure we're paid the wrath of God on the cross as anger toward legitimate sins against God. Sin bearing. Are you prone to wonder? When the enemy comes, how do you respond? When pain comes, when loss comes, there are so many things that go. He has not forgotten you. He has not thrown you away. He is just collecting you. I look at it this way anymore. I said, I just believe God is collecting some of us and kind of stacking us in this room so we can wake up, see what he's got to do for us. And I pray that he'll use us the way he wants to. And I thank him today for his presence too. I can tell you most of you know my journey, but I'm thankful that his word is working in our lives. Let's pray. Father, I want to thank you for being Father to us, for looking in on this congregation and realizing there is in this body of people who love you, who just want to know you better, who want to be able to speak freely to you about what you're doing in the life and what you're doing in the future, what you're doing now. I ask you just to guide us each one. Give us gifts that we can use in the proclamation of the gospel and the building up of those things that have this kingdom in mind. We'll praise you for all you are and all you do. Thank you for today. It's been a good day. And in the long haul, it hasn't felt like a different day. It's felt like the body of Christ at worship. The body of Christ still the body of Christ hopeful, the body of Christ alive. Thank you, in Jesus' name, amen.