Last week we introduced a series, I'm not sure exactly how long it's going to go, called Subjects Christians Avoid. This was right on the heels of when we talked through the ten major things that people were concerned about when it came to voting, when it came to politics today. So we've already broached the topic of politics, we figure we'll just keep on going. But I want us to understand this doesn't mean that we're going to be covering every necessarily controversial issue. That's not the idea, but it's just things that we avoid. And this morning's topic is something that we might avoid, but not necessarily for the same reasons. Last week, we talked about talking about sin. That's just uncomfortable, whether it be our own and confronting that, or whether it be sometimes calling sin what it is, even out in the world. And again, one of the things I mentioned was we don't strap a little blue light on our heads and run around and point out everybody's sin, but at the same time, when it's needed, we need to call it for what it is and not back off from that. That is part of being salt and light. Again, there's a lot that we talked about last week, I can't unpack that all, but sin, worldliness, and God's judgment are realities. And when we miss the mark, we need to call it for what it is. Today's topic is individual soul liberty. Individual soul liberty. I'm going to refer to this topic as possibly soul liberty, liberty, freedom, whatever it is, however I do it, and purposefully so that we can kind of use these terms interchangeably to have it be more of a practical application. When we talk about terms like individual soul liberty, like that kind of has a bookish idea to it. And I want to kind of make sure that we keep it at a level of, OK, I know what that is. I know what I need to do with it. And so that's kind of where we're at. And what we're going to do is we're going to read through Romans chapter 14 first. We're not going to go through this necessarily verse by verse as we do so often with certain passages, but it's going to be our backdrop. And so we're going to look at this topically. We're going to be checking out some different passages and talking through this. But first, I want us to get this backdrop. Our scripture reading today kind of tied in with not only, you know, not sinning and doing the right thing and being led by the Spirit, but also the idea of freedom was in there as well. So we're going to begin. Romans chapter 14 beginning in verse 1. It'll be a little bit of a lengthy passage but follow along as we can just see how Paul works through this. Receive one who is weak in the faith, but not to disputes over doubtful things. For one believes he may eat all things, but he who is weak only eats vegetables. Let not him who eats despise him who does not eat, and let him, not him who does eat, judge him, does not eat, I'm sorry, judge him who eats, for God has received him. Who are you to judge another servant? For his own master, he stands or falls. Indeed, he will be made to stand for God is able to make him stand. One person esteems one day above another. Another esteems every day alike. Let each be fully convinced in his own mind. He who observes the day observes it to the Lord. He who does not observe the day to the Lord, he does not observe it. He who eats, eats to the Lord, for he gives God thanks. And he who does not eat to the Lord, he does not eat and gives God thanks." Are you seeing a pattern here, folks? Okay, good. For none of us lives to himself, and no one dies to himself. For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's. For to this end Christ died and rose and lived again, that he might be Lord of both the dead and the living. But why do you judge your brother? Or why do you show contempt for your brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us shall give account of himself to God. Therefore, let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or a cost of fault in our brother's way. I know and am convinced by the Lord Jesus that there is nothing unclean of itself, but to him who considers anything to be unclean, to him it is unclean. Yet if your brother is grieved because of your food, you are no longer walking in love. Do not destroy with your food the one for whom Christ died. Therefore, do not let your good be spoken of as evil, for the kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. For he who serves Christ in these things is acceptable to God and approved by men. Therefore, let us pursue the things which make for peace and the things by which one may edify or build up one another. Do not destroy the work of God for the sake of food. All things indeed are pure, but it is evil for the man who eats with offense. It is good neither to eat meat nor to drink wine nor to do anything by which your brother stumbles or is offended or is made weak. Do you have faith? Have it to yourself before God. Happy is he who does not condemn himself in what he approves. But he who doubts is condemned if he eats, because he does not eat from faith. For whatever is not from faith is sin. So there's a lot there, folks, like I say, a lot to unpack. But we're talking about the freedom that each person has in Christ. And that's really what we're going to be defining right now is what does individual soul liberty mean? And this is going to be kind of the basics right now. And then as we discuss some other things, it's going to put some meat on the bones, so to speak. What is soul liberty? It is the freedom afforded every believer through the word of God. There's different freedoms, but there's this general idea of freedom. But each one of us is responsible to the Lord. We just read that in Romans 14, where it says, who are you to judge another's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. Indeed, he will be made to stand for God is able to make him stand. So we are answerable to the Lord. Although we are to serve one another, we're to serve brothers and sisters in Christ, only the Lord is actually the master of each believer. Each person will also give an account of the life that they have lived in Christ. And we're going to take a look at 2 Corinthians 5, verse 10, and it says, For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. Now in this context, Paul is concluding the topic of persecution, of afflictions and sufferings he experienced that is carried over from chapter 4 in 2 Corinthians. He compared the fragility and temporary nature of life with the promise of eternal life in Christ. And he concluded with the warning that we will all stand before the Lord and be judged for what we do. Now, in this context, it's critical for us to understand that the term bad here does not have to do with sin. It is rather a quality comparison of our works, whether done for Christ or done for other reasons. Jesus fully paid for the believer's sin and its penalty. We are not going to be judged for sin again. That has been fulfilled. So it's the judgment seat of Christ determining, have you done these things for me, or have you done these good things for other reasons? So individual soul liberty is every Christian's spiritual freedom to determine how they live their life before Christ. We are directly and personally responsible to Christ and no one else. And we have spiritual leaders, but we do not have spiritual masters. You understand that? Only Christ is the one who is the master over us. So that's just the general idea that we have here. What the scriptures do then in several places is really put some flesh and bones so to speak to this idea of freedom and we saw some of that in Romans 14 and we'll get to some of that. But what I want to do is talk right now about what does freedom in Christ look like. So we're looking at more of the, how does this flesh out? What is kind of sort of the positive side of this? A lot of it has to do with responsibility. We are responsible to be sure of our salvation. The general language of the New Testament is that salvation takes place between the Lord and the individual. In other words, I can't, Make you get saved. You can't help me with my salvation. We can lead someone to Christ, but God does the saving. Second, Timothy 112 says is for this reason, I also suffer these things. Nevertheless, I am not ashamed. So this is Paul talking about the things that he suffers. But what does he say? For I know whom I have believed and persuaded that he is able to keep what I've committed to him until that day. He's not dependent upon anybody else. He's dependent completely and totally on Christ and him placing his faith in Christ. That's it. It's not what somebody else has done or hasn't done. And then 2 Corinthians 13, 5, same author, and Paul, examine yourselves as to whether you're in the faith, test yourselves. Do you not know yourselves, you get that emphasis there, that Jesus is in you, unless indeed you are disqualified. Now, Paul was speaking in this second letter to a church that had really had some significant problems in it. They had done some correcting, but some of them, it seems, were kind of stubborn. They didn't want to change. And so in this context, Paul is confronting those who had not repented of serious public sin. And he's saying, you need to examine yourself. Paul didn't say, I have declared that you don't know the Lord. He said, but you better check yourself. Right? And this is a challenge to all of us, that we test ourselves. We test ourselves and determine, is my faith genuine? It's our responsibility. 1 John 5.13 says this, these things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life and that you may continue to believe in the name of the Son of God. This is John concluding his first epistle. John also wrote the Gospel of John, but this first shorter epistle. And the whole reason for his writing of this is what he tells us in the end, I have given you some ways to test your faith, to compare your faith to basically what is now God's word and determine, am I a true follower of Christ? And by the way, whose responsibility was it? The individual. We are also free from the law. Now this in and of itself can be a huge subject, and we're not going to go into all of this. But being free from the law, it says here in Galatians 5.1, stand fast therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. This refers to the bondage or the spiritual slavery to the ceremonial law. Laws regarding foods and sacrifices, outward ceremonial cleansing and other things. We saw again some of those references back in Romans 14, where there was some issues with food and whether I partake or whether I don't partake and different things like that. The religious ceremonies that the Jews had, and they were instituted by God, within the law appointed to Christ and he fulfilled the requirements of the law through his sacrifice. So he fulfilled all the things that they were pointing to. We still must obey God's spiritual and moral commands, but not the ceremonial law and all the things that go along with it. We are also responsible for our own spiritual growth. I'm not saying that we don't have folks who contribute to that, and hopefully on Sunday mornings, whether it be our Bible Fellowship Hour or the morning worship service, we participate in that. We also have Wednesdays, other times, but we are personally responsible for our own spiritual growth. 2 Peter 3.18 says this, but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. To him be the glory now and forever. Amen. Our growth is to be a continually increasing activity. In what? Well, we see it here in this passage. Growing in grace is growing in God's favor. In other words, living in a way that is pleasing to the Lord. We're also to grow in the knowledge of Christ, continuing to gain a greater understanding of what it means to live like Jesus and live for Jesus. And part of that is knowing who Jesus is better and better. Paul said something similar to the Colossians in Colossians 1.10, that you may walk worthy of the Lord, fully pleasing him, being fruitful in every good work, and increasing in the knowledge of God. Another passage that helps us understand this is 1 Thessalonians 5.21, test all things, hold fast what is good. So again, we see an ending to a letter, Paul's ending his letter to the church in Thessalonica with a bullet point list of do's and don'ts. If you saw this passage, it would be do this, don't do this. Not a bunch of commands per se, as far as new commands, just reminders. Hey, here's what it means. In essence, and this is what I'm trying to tell you, I'm giving these bullet points of how to live your lives, right? One of those instructions was to test or examine all things. We are to apply biblical understanding and godly wisdom to the situations we come across in everyday living. That's what we are to do. And then in Acts 17 11, we see what was said about the Jews in Berea as they compared what Paul preached to the word of God. These Bereans were far more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica in that they received the word with all readiness and searched the scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so. So Paul was commending them for their study. How did they do it? They took what they were hearing and they were comparing it to what they had of the word of God, which at that time was the Old Testament. The Old Testament said plenty. in relation to who Jesus was and even really in a nutshell what the gospel was, what Jesus was supposed to come and do, all those prophecies, all those things that were promised. And so if it wasn't contrary to that, obviously, then that was something they were to be following. And so here they were studying, checking things out, making sure that it was right. They were responsible for their own spiritual growth. Another thing we need to understand when it comes to this area of freedom, what does freedom look like? We are free to pursue what we are convinced is right. Conversely, which is kind of part of this, we are free to not participate in what we consider to be wrong or disagree with. We have that freedom. Getting back to Romans chapter 14 again, verse 5 says this, Now we could have, again, have given an example of whether we partake in certain foods or not, and some of that was Jewish in nature and Gentile and other things, but all of that was related to I don't want to do this or I do want to do this, I'm convinced that I should, I'm convinced that I shouldn't, right? This phrase fully convinced means to make an informed, intelligent, and honest decision that something is right or wrong. Clearly, subjects not specifically addressed in the word of God. Now, why can I say that? Because we don't need to make judgment calls on God's commands. We don't need to make judgment calls on what are clear applications of God's word even. Think of it this way. I've come to make an informed decision that lying is good. I wouldn't say that. Well, I can twist that just a little bit. I've come to make an informed decision that lying is OK sometimes. No. Now, as we get back to what we're to be fully convinced of, we sometimes call these personal convictions. But no matter how strong the conviction, notice I'm not talking about biblical principles, but no matter how strong the conviction, it is still your personal opinion or mine, your point of view regarding something that isn't explicitly encouraged or prohibited in scripture. That's where the liberty comes in. So we are free to pursue what we are convinced is right. We are free to not pursue what we are convinced is wrong. Are there limits to our freedoms? The short answer is yes. There are limits. In other words, what freedom in Christ is not. That's what we're going to be talking about. We've talked about what freedom in Christ looks like, but now, what is it not supposed to be about? Some of these are going to be obvious, but the first one is we are not free to manipulate scripture. 2 Peter 1, verses 20 and 19 through 21 say this, and so we have the prophetic word confirmed. Okay? Which we do well to heed, which you do well to heed, as a light that shines in a dark place until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts, knowing this first, that no prophecy of scripture is of any private interpretation. For prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit. And we see this as a proof text for the scriptures that God gave to us as these are hard and fast. These are not things that we can play loose with. We cannot twist the Bible to say what we want it to say. And by the way, there's plenty of that kind of activity out there. But instead, it is not just for us to privately say, well, this is what it means to me. That's not the same as Christian liberty. That's twisting God's word. Just to give us a couple of more verses that talk about this in 1 Corinthians 11, 1 and 2, it says, So what's he speaking of? what ended up being the very Word of God, the things that we have saved, the things that were preserved for us, to know and understand. This was in real time, but we look back on this and say, this is the Word of God. The other thing that freedom is not about, we are not free to pass judgment. We are not to judge the performance and motives of another person in service to Christ. Going back to Romans 14, verse 4, who are you to judge another's servant? Remember, we looked at that. I believe Paul really put this in perspective. Again, we aren't talking about spiritual truth. It is more about a person, how a person conducts their lives in service to the Lord. Paul returned to his specific principle later in 14 when he says this. For it is written, as I live, says the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. So then each of us shall give account of himself to God. Therefore, let us not judge one another anymore, but rather resolve this, not to put a stumbling block or cause to fall in our brother's way." So the primary thing that we're looking at in this specific topic is that we are going to be giving an account of ourselves All of us, so we're not required to give an account to somebody else, nor can we call somebody else to account for those things that are not explicitly in Scripture, for those things that we have freedom to do or not to do. It's interesting, Jesus dealt with this in a way just before he ascended into heaven. In John 21, It says, Peter then turning around saw the disciple whom Jesus loved, John was talking about himself, who also had leaned on his breast at the supper and said, Lord, who is the one who betrays you? And Peter seeing him said to Jesus, but Lord, what about this man? Now, you got to remember, this is where Peter was just restored, right? He had just said, do you love me? Right? Three times. He had just restored Peter from betraying him. And so here he is now saying, what about John? And Jesus said to him, if I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow me. So what's Jesus saying? Mind your own business. That's what he's saying. Don't worry about what somebody else is doing. Concern yourself with yourself. Next, we are not free to impose our own standards on others. Not quite the same as passing judgment, but it's close. But let's see what the scriptures say about this. Again, Gleaning from Romans 14, verses one through three. Receive one who is weak in the faith, but not to disputes over doubtful things. I wish I had time to talk about this, but just in a nutshell, what it's saying is this. There are those who are newer in Christ, maybe there are those who, for whatever reason, have not matured in Christ, even though they might have been saved for a long time. We don't spend time with them just to try to pick them apart. Right? That's not healthy. That's not good. for God has received him." So what's the point? Neither the one who says, I'm not going to partake in whatever that might be, nor the one who says, I'm free to partake in that, is to pass judgment or to voice their standards on the other person. Galatians 4.10 says this, but now after you have known God, or rather are known by God, how is it that you turn again to the weak and beggarly elements to which you desire again to be in bondage? You observe days and months and seasons and years. Now, I'm inserting this because there's a crucial difference between this passage and Romans 14. The Galatian Judgers, if I can call them that, were not new believers wrestling with how scripture applies to life. These had fallen back into the old requirements of the law. And they were trying to influence other people to do the same thing. It was causing problems because there's people that are saying, wait a minute, we're free. No, you're not. You have to do this, this, this, and this. The point of this is that we do not have to give up our freedom just because someone in error takes exception to how we live. That's not the same as a weaker brother. I'm gonna give you this little story here, and some of you are gonna think that this is like weird and corny, but I grew up in the 80s, all right? Different time. It's only been in the last five to seven years that I have gone to the theater to see a movie. When I was younger, In the church that I went to, it was drilled into me that going to a theater was sin. And if I did, I was being a bad example. Now, in my practical teaching, whether it be years ago with young people or Sunday School Sundays, whatever, my teaching was this. It doesn't matter where you're sitting, it matters what you're watching. You can go to a theater and watch a wholesome movie or you can sit Well, nowadays, just with your phone, and you can be absorbing something terrible. So it's not where you're at, it's what you're allowing in. Okay? But the point is this, my conscience prevented me from going. It was also expensive. It's cheap. But I never put that standard on somebody else. I had no right to do that. You see what I'm saying? I could not say to somebody else, you shouldn't be going to the movie theater. We elevated so many of those things to standards that were on par with scripture. They never were. And they are not today. Colossians 2.16 tells us this, so let no one judge you in food or drink or regarding a festival or a new moon or Sabbaths. Now Paul encouraged the Christians in Colossae to not let anyone judge them falsely for living out their freedom in Christ. It's similar to what we were reading and saw in Galatians. So we have that with us, right? The next part that we see that is not necessarily correct. Are there limits? One of the limits is that we are not free to go it alone. We are not free to go it alone. Hebrews 10, 24 through 25 says this, and let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another and so much the more as we see the day approaching. The idea here is that we need one another. This idea of liberty is not total privacy. The idea of liberty is not individuality to the point of excluding the rest of the body. That's not healthy. Proverbs 27, 17 says this, as iron sharpens iron, so a man sharpens the countenance of his friend. That idea is life sharpens life. You guys know I like to cook and stuff like that, right? Well, one of the ways that you sharpen a knife is you have what's called a steel, and it's just a rod that is designed for sharpening. And you basically rub the knife along it. What are you doing? You're taking the rough edges off. You're making the blade more effective. It takes some interaction. And that's the idea of our fellowship in Christ. The interactions that we have with one another are designed to bring us closer to the Lord. It's designed to take off those rough edges, so we don't go it alone. We are to serve one another, but we're to serve with one another as well, and we're to encourage one another in spiritual growth. And then next, we are not free to cause a brother to stumble. We are not free to cause a brother to stumble. We saw some of that in the Romans passage, but in Romans 14, 13 says this, Don't get in the way, don't hinder somebody else's spiritual growth. In 1 Corinthians, we see this in verses 12 and 13 of chapter 8. But when you thus sin against the brethren and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if food makes my brother stumble, I will never again eat meat, lest I make my brother stumble. Now, we've already qualified this. It's not just someone who wants to put one of their preferences on us. That's not what we're talking about. We're talking about someone who's saying, man, you know, I'm new in the Lord and I'm trying to figure all this out. And boy, what about this? I'm not going to do anything that is going to hinder them. I'm not going to do anything that's going to harm their growth. So to kind of put a little bit of this together, I have a question. Is a spiritually mature person one who insists on exercising their freedoms to the harm of someone else, are they acting their spiritual age? In other words, if a mature person insists on doing what they think is right at the expense of a weaker brother or sister, are they actually acting their age? The answer is no. The last thing, and I mentioned some of these are pretty obvious, we cannot use our freedom to sin. It's amazing sometimes how someone will champion Christian liberty, freedom in Jesus to offend him. It happens. Galatians 5.13 says this, Paul even gives the opposite. Don't use your freedom to serve yourself. Use your freedom to serve somebody else. That's the total opposite of it. So these are the things, again, that we're supposed to really, I would say, be careful, be warned about. These do not constitute freedom. They actually hinder potentially somebody else's freedom, but we're not free to exercise our liberty in that way. So let's kind of bring this to a close then. And I just wanted to say it like this. We can be very critical at times, can't we? Give you some examples. He's wrong for cutting the long on Sunday. She should be home with the kids not working. There's only one right way to educate your children. Or their choice in educating their child is inferior to mine. They drink alcohol. How sinful. He chooses not to participate in this or that. What a legalist. She seems to think she's superior because she doesn't do this or that. Or, we can look at this a different way, she actually does think she's superior because she doesn't do this or that. But one is judging, right? The bottom line is, I cannot project my extra-biblical standards or my ideas of personal holiness on you any more than you can project yours on me. Again, we're not talking about biblical standards, we're talking about personal standards. We can say that they're based upon God's word but if they are these areas that are in question then that's not the same thing. Again I'll go back to this idea that when we are fully convinced in our minds We're supposed to be fully convinced in our minds based upon our understanding of what the word of God says and how the Lord is leading us to live our lives. Let's give a couple of real life situations here. Those who attend, I'm just giving a scenario, okay, those who attend our men's and women's Bible studies are more spiritual than those who do not attend. Now that also means that those who do not attend are less spiritual, right? Attending a Bible study is a very good thing, but a Bible study attendee isn't necessarily more spiritual than a non-attendee. Now, let that sink in for a minute. A Christian who chooses to attend worship services only occasionally is not living an obedient life. I have a biblical pattern set in acts. We have a biblical pattern set in acts of the church consistently meeting together and serving one another. We are told in Hebrews 10, verses 20, 24, and 25. I have the passage wrong here. Let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together as the manner of some, but exhorting one another and so much the more as we see the day approaching. That's Hebrews 10, 24 and 25. What's the point? One is a biblical mandate. One is not. So I can actually stand before you based upon God's word and say that if church is not a priority to you and it's just an occasional happenstance thing, that's wrong. That's wrong. Patrick Scott, you're being very judgmental. Now, I also want to make sure you understand this. I stress the word chooses. Because we can't also turn on and say, you know, I haven't seen so-and-so here for a while. Huh. I wonder what's going on in their spiritual life. Unless they're forsaking the assembling of themselves purposefully. The first example is one of many things a person can do to grow spiritually and demonstrate faithfulness to the Lord, one of many things. The second is mandated. The first is not, the second is. A specific Bible study that we have scheduled is not a mandate. So in one sense individual soul liberty is complex because we are complex people. and our interactions with one another can be complicated. But in another sense, our freedom is simple. Our life must be consistent with God's word, but we have freedom to grow in Christ, to serve the Lord, and to pursue life as we please. Exercising our freedom should be in the pursuit of serving and glorifying God, and serving others, not in glorifying and serving ourselves. I want to leave us with Romans chapter 14, a few verses here. Verse 8 says, Skipping down to verses 18 and 19. You know it's interesting as I use the example of prioritizing our worship services. Doris Pilant Older woman, well into her 90s. We were talking with her one day at her home, and she shared with me that she has a, and you've probably seen her, she has a walker. She said, I exchanged walkers. I exchanged one walker for another because the first walker that I had was heavy. I got a lighter walker. Folks, I struggle a little bit to say this, okay? I mean, it's powerful. I got another lighter walker so that I could put it into my trunk and I could come to church. You want to talk about putting life in perspective like that? I mean, I sat there and said, wow. Sometimes what we determine is the trip hammer that says, I can't go to church this morning. She says, I have to get there by myself and I'm going to get there. Wow. What's amazing is that God does give us the liberty, the freedom, in one sense to even not do what he tells us to do. But let's also remember that we always had the freedom to come back to him and repent, to come back to him in forgiveness. As we're thinking through this stuff, folks, this isn't a subject that comes up very often, but I wanted to marry it with this idea of You know, calling sin what it is and understanding that it's a very serious thing, but then also making sure that we understand sometimes we might slide over into calling something sin that God does not specifically mark out as such. It is a conviction of ours. It's an opinion of ours. And by the way, have I said anything to discourage you from sticking to your convictions? No, no I haven't. As a matter of fact, we see from God's word, you're encouraged to do that. But make sure that it's something that you've really thought through. Make sure that it's something that you've compared to the word of God, as not just a tradition of men. And as we're living out that life, It's really to drive us to Christ and service for Him, and it's to drive us to selflessness. Not feeding our own selves. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, again, this is not something that necessarily comes up in our lives. Maybe partly because our culture is all about freedom and individualism. We really do know what it means to be free. There's many around the world who have very little concept of that. But again, Lord, I pray that our freedom will be spent on service to you and service to others. May you guard our hearts against taking some of the freedoms that we have, some of the opinions that we have, some of the convictions that we hold, and lay those on somebody else as something that they now have to carry when your word is not clear about those things. But Lord, I also pray that you would guard us against pushing things that are clearly your commands into this area of choice, of self-determination when they don't belong there. I thank you Lord that this freedom is not just seeing how close we can get to sin, that's not what it's all about at all. It's simply about being able to live our personal lives how we grow, how we serve, what we do, answerable only to you. It doesn't mean that we don't have a structure here at Church of Leadership, and it doesn't mean that we don't have spiritual counselors, it doesn't mean that we don't hold one another accountable, but it's based upon your explicit word, not in areas of freedom. Lord I pray that you would just protect us from those thoughts that come to mind sometimes about being better than somebody else because we hold to this or we don't, of choices that are made, whatever it might be. I thank you Lord that we have a spirit of unity, that we have a spirit of peace. Again, so many times, Lord, you know my heart and you know that I don't necessarily say things with blanket statements like we're not doing something right. We are doing many things right. We treat one another well. But it's just a reminder, something we don't talk about, that we each have freedom in Jesus. Lord, your grace is so awesome and tremendous. your word is sufficient enough that we don't have to police each other. And frankly even ourselves with a whole bunch of extra rules and do's and don'ts and other things which you have told us to do and not to do, it's enough, it's complete. I pray that we'd be more concerned about those things than the things that we tend to add. In Jesus' name, amen.