Mark chapter 10. I know that Evan read the passage we'll be drawing from, which is Romans chapter 12, but I just wanted to open up with Mark chapter 10 and read verses 28 through 30. Peter says to the Lord Jesus in Mark 10, 28, Lord behold, we've left everything to follow you. And Jesus said, truly, I say to you, there is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or farms for my sake and for the gospel's sake, but he shall receive a hundred times as much now in this present age, houses and brothers and sisters and mothers and children and farms along with persecutions in the age to come eternal life. Let's pray together. Our Heavenly Father, we thank you how in the Lord Jesus Christ, we have the best of prospects, not only in the life to come, but also the many joys and blessings and gifts you give to your children in this life. So we pray that we would wisely assess what we have as the people of God, and we ask that the Spirit would come to give us eyes to see. Give me a mouth to speak. In Jesus' name, amen. Well, this week, a man visited us from Florida, and he asked me as we were driving from the airport, so what's your vision for Harbor Church? And I admitted, well, I'm not very big on catchy slogans, so I quoted from our covenant where Matthew 28, the Great Commission says that we are to go. make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you. And profoundly, that is our vision. But as I thought more about this question that he was legitimately asking, how I saw Harbor Church ministering on the lakeshore in our generation in 2019 and beyond, I thought, you know, that's very reasonable. Like last week at the evening service at our annual business meeting, we tried to express some of that to you. So into this mental brainstorm that I was encountering this week came an Al Mohler briefing podcast. And the title of the section was this, listen now, The Therapy Generation, What the Trend of Millennials Seeking Out Therapeutic Help communicates about a generation starving for, listen now, meaningful community. That's what we have here in Harvard Church, community. And Moeller interacted with a Wall Street Journal article that had a subhead that said, people in their 20s and 30s seek medical health help more often as new habits and technologies change the nature of treatments. And in the article, there's a discussion about a 27-year-old woman named Christina who said she's been in therapy ever since she was nine years old. Quote, she said, going to therapy was just something kids of divorce do. And it's become an ongoing life basic in my life experience. And it's interesting how 20s and 30s today pursue therapy as another form of self-improvement and personal growth, sort of like yoga or meditation, or even preventative Botox, I'm told. Mueller goes on to express in the article that hiring a therapist for a per hour fee is replacing something in the lives of millennials. What's it replacing? You know what it's replacing? Things like parents and family, because those have broken up. In fact, one person said, I like my therapist. I have a good relationship with my therapist. It's not like I'm trying to figure out how I can put a stop to this. Why would you put a stop to the closest thing that you have to a parent in this world? And it's true, often this generation is without parents, also without friends. That would be discounting the cyberspace superficiality of friends who are out there. Quote now. from the article. They just don't have relationships, so they have to go out and pay someone to be involved in this kind of conversation about their lives and meaning and organization and habits. So what's happened? Instead of family, we have these other sources of brainwashing therapy that takes place in a culture that has scrapped a theological worldview that says God is authority, And our generation's being categorized by saying self is authority. And this is just an ongoing way of life. Instead of family life or church life, people have therapist life out there. Moeller analyzes this way. He says, that's very sad. It's actually a heartbreaking article when you consider how many of these millennials might not even seek this kind of therapy if they had good relationships with parents and friends. But this article also reminds me, Mohler says, as a Christian, of something that is one of the most important dimensions of the reality of being part of a local church. a local gospel-believing, Bible-preaching church. It's a church. If it really is representing an authentic congregation, vibrant and Christian faith, it's going to be made up of multi-generational membership, where you find younger Christians, younger adult Christians, millennial Christians, in very healthy relationships with older Christians. I would simply ask the question, is that what you see in your church? I know what I want to see in our church, in Harbor Church. And what kind of a vision we have for Harbor Church, Molo goes on and says this, I'm afraid that in too many of our churches, churches that believe themselves to be very biblical and gospel-minded, the age group simply hang around with one another. The millennials with the millennials, older adults with older adults, children with children, teenagers with teenagers. Boller says there's something fundamentally unhealthy about that. At least one thing intelligent Christians should consider is whether or not an article like this is a reminder to all of us in the church of what we should be doing. And this brought into my Florida visitor and annual business meeting mental storm just a thunderclap of conviction and clarification regarding what your pastors ache and pray for regarding harbiture. We desire to be like David. It's described of him in Acts 13, 36. David served the purpose of God in his generation. And we do, we want to serve God in our generation. It was said of Esther in Esther 4.14 that she was raised up for a time such as this. Beloved, we have been raised up for a time such as 2019. 2 Chronicles 12 speaks of those men of Issachar who understood the times with knowledge of what Israel should do. And so our desire as pastors, our desire in our generation, in our times, when we consider the lakeshore, what's it like out there? How can we minister to it? Beloved, the lakeshore, this is our target mission field. It's littered with the wreckage of dysfunctionality. It's littered with divorce marriages, broken families, spiritual and emotional brokenness, isolated loneliness, people who've been left behind in the gutter, frankly, to match with the morning sermon in need of being adopted by a heavenly father and then being welcomed into the family of God. Isn't that what the Lord Jesus promised? that you give up all for Christ, you still receive in this life brothers, sisters, mothers, fathers, children in the house of God. And so, we see here that we are harbor church. And just as Joseph was enfolded into the young family this week, Harbor Church seeks to enfold spiritual orphans from the lakeshore into our family, into our church, where there can be fathering and mothering and brothering and sistering and true befriending taking place in spirit and in truth. And so I just want to lay out to you a vision in eight points. The vision of eight points using Romans 12 as a survey blueprint of what our house, what our family, what our community here seeks to be. And I think it's a wonderful portrait we find here in Romans chapter 12. So consider with me the first of eight, a sacrificing community. What is the vision for Harvard Church to be? A sacrificing community. Look there in verse one. I urge you, therefore, brothers, by the mercy of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice acceptable to God. Now by this I mean we're being called as a Church of Christ here at Harbor to be a community whose members aren't just in it for themselves. There are other organizations on the lake shore like that. MVP Fitness Center. You join that, why? You're in it for yourself. What can it do for me? Add to my physique. Same with Zealand Recreational Health Facility or Planet Fitness. What's in it for me? What do I get here if I become a part of this? But the context of Romans chapter 12 is so different. It's in the context of being blown away by God's mercies, what God has given to us. Verse 33, oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and the knowledge of God. He's given us Christ, and in Him we have everything. Instead, you think of these Romans 3 through 8, instead of being hellbound, because God has given to us His Son, we are heavenbound. And so in view of what has been given, we are compelled to give, and to give our lives as sacrifices. Like it says in Mark 10.45, the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give, give his life as a ransom. So what is Harvard Church? We're a sacrificing community. The one that is the centerpiece of our focus is the Lord Jesus, who on the cross, as John Flable says, there he stood as a brass pillar till the last breath was beaten out of his nostrils. He did that for us. He gave for us. And if He sacrificed Himself on the cross, then I will sacrifice myself in 2019 and beyond. Offer our bodies as living sacrifices. A sacrificing community. live among ourselves as Christ esteemed others more highly than himself. He submitted himself to death on the cross. That's how we're to treat each other at Harbor in the family of God. When we have problems, we don't just, what does our culture do when there are relational problems? It's an easy divorce culture. I'm outta here. No, not so at Harbor Church. We love one another. If you're giving marriage counseling to a man, and he says to you, well, my wife is such a belittling woman, she undercuts me emotionally. I'm outta here, I'm gonna divorce her, and I've heard that. And just to say to the man, you're a Christian, go hang on her. If she's the cross that God has assigned you to, then go hang on her and don't let go till death do you part. Now I'm not saying once you're a member of a church you've got to stay with the church till death do you part. But the reality is that when there are painful relationships that we have among the people of God, we don't go crawl off the altar. No, we stay on the altar and we sacrifice, even when we're offended by hurtful treatment. If you're at MVP Fitness and there's a broken treadmill, or a broken elliptical, or a broken bench press, you say, this is junk. I'm outta here. I'm gonna find somewhere else that's just more together. But that's not how we deal with each other in the Church of Christ. No, we sacrifice. We roll up our sleeves. We get our hands dirty. We perspire. We help repair. If it's the music, or if it's the nursery, or if it's the Sunday school, or friendliness, or lack thereof in the church, we're a sacrificing community. But secondly, consider how we're a non-conforming community. That's in verse two. A non-conforming community. Don't be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. We turn our backs on the world. It's out there that hums by on Douglas Avenue and beyond. What is the world here? Trench says this, it's that floating mass of thoughts and opinions and values and impulses and aims and aspirations that at any time are esteemed by our age. So Harbor Community is not a pulse-taking community. We are not a trending, won't they do that on Twitter? Trending. So we all follow along with it. No, we are not a trending, tracing enterprise here. We're not seeking to match up our ministry and our practices and our convictions and our teachings so that we can get the political correctness seal of approval out there so that we're applauded by the Holland Sentinel. or we're cheered on by the Hope College faculty, or we're endorsed by the Hope student body, or we get honks by the beach-going passers-by here. That's not what we're all about. We're a non-conforming community. That doesn't mean that we seek to irritate others? No, I think we should become all things to all men, so that by all possible means some may be saved." We're willing to adapt so that we can be effective, so we can get into the hearts of people. But the reality is that we won't compromise the truth. It says we're not to conform. The word conform is skamatidzo, which means to be fashioned by something as by a container, like if you were out on the beach and you had a pail, you can fashion a nice tower by forcing the sand into that pail and then, ah, there you've got that turret for the castle there. No, no, we are not to conform in that way. We're not to conform to the gender propaganda out there, or the sexual revolution, or the pro-abortion pressure, or the doctrinal apathy, or the entertainment impurity, nowhere to be transformed. That word is metamorpho, which is like a butterfly. It's different. A butterfly breaks out and flies above it all. That's us. We are to be a church. Our mind is to be led by truth, not by those around about us. So we're a counterculture. The way we worship, the way we believe, the way we teach, we're not man-centered, we're God-centered. How do husbands relate to their wives? We don't get that off the Twitter feed. How do parents discipline their children? We don't get that off of Parents Magazine or Psychology Today. How do we love one another in a community? We're not going to be like MVP or like Zeeland Recreation. No, we're going to, like Jesus says in the High Priestly Parent, John 17, they will know you are my disciples by the way that you love one another. Oh, the way that Harbor Church, God willing, deals with one another is so different than the way they deal with each other out there. Because we're a sacrificing community. We're a non-conforming community. Thirdly, consider we're a humbling community. Verse three, a humbling community. Every man among you ought not think more highly of himself than he ought, but rather think of himself with sound judgment. Out there, there's something trending, and that is everybody has to have their own brand. I'm branding myself, one might say, on Facebook, on Instagram, on Twitter. I have my brand. You know, it's interesting how in the church there can be people who have their brand, too. Even go back to the first century, 1 John 9, the Atrophies. He had his own brand. He was all about branding himself. And the brand was, I'm first. Diotrephes who loves to be first. And a community, a church that isn't a humbling community, but a puffing up community, that's a proud cancer. In any body of Christ, that will be an absolute plague. And we are all prone to this theotrophies plague, this prone to exaggerate our own self-esteem. I know the issue has been we need to have more self-esteem. We don't. We have this default setting of having too much self-esteem. And that's what will happen when Christ dwells among us in the Spirit. We'll be a humbling community, not thinking of ourselves more highly than we are. What we fixated on was our default setting, which is my right to be recognized, and my sensibilities, and my felt offenses. I can feel this often. Why wasn't I considered in the church? Why wasn't I chosen? Why wasn't I recognized? Why wasn't I assigned? Why wasn't I heard? But I have seen, in Harbor Church, Herculean, heroic humility among you, my brothers and sisters in this community. Humility that would be unthinkable in other circles on the lakeshore here. I have certain things in mind. I think of a man who aspired to full-time ministry, but The body didn't agree with that, and that man settled in as a mighty churchman in this congregation for years and years and years. That's a mighty man. A humble man. I'm also thinking of a member who was overlooked to a high-profile appointment in Harbor Church, but was very willing to count it all joy for the sake of Christ and throw himself into crucial backstage service where there's little applause. That's mighty man humility. I'm thinking of a woman who was subtly relieved from her influential role in the church to make way for a certain sister who was deemed to be more suitable And this sister just stepped aside, and there was no drama queen gesturing or huffing or puffing. She just considered, I will offer this up as a drink offering on the altar of sacrifice to the Lord Jesus. That's a vision that we're a humbling community. Or fourthly, a committing community. verses four and five, a committing community. Paul says, we are members in one body. All members have not the same function, but we are individually members of one another, a committing community. Do you realize that committing is really out of style in 2019? People will say, where do you get the idea of membership in the Bible anyway? It just seems so distasteful, so intrusive. Join us, commit to us. Where is that in the Bible, membership? Well, right here, it's present three times. where it speaks of, we are members of one body. All are members who do not have the same function. Individually members of one another. In fact, if you turn to 1 Corinthians 12, which is a parallel passage speaking of the church being a body, the term member or membership is present 15 times. The body, we're members. Eye, ear, nose, members, the body. The church is the body of Christ with members. It says there in verse 27 of 1 Corinthians 12, you are Christ's body and individually you are members of it. So the point is committing to the body of Christ is healthy, it's wholesome, it's biblical. The kidney does not function independently on the piano, pulsing all by itself. No, the kidney is implanted, like a baptism is plunged into the body of the Lord Jesus Christ. Attached. And so, among us, The members of this body, there's a wonderful inner connectivity. There's a wonderful accountability, a mutual responsibility, and a sensitivity that we have here in Harbor Church. It says in 1 Corinthians 12.26, if one suffers, all suffers. There's this organic pain feeling that we have as we're connected one to another. What do you do in cyberspace with the relationships that we have there? If we have a problem with someone, we can just push that unfriends them out of here. Beloved at Harbor Church, we don't unfriend one another. We don't just stop showing up. We're part of the body. We're a committing community at Harbor. That is such a counterculture. But come on with me, fifthly, we're a contributing community, a contributing community, and that's in verses six through eight, and then also 13. It says there, since we have gifts that differ, let each exercise them accordingly. And then verse 13, contributing to the needs, practicing hospitality. So we have different gifts. Exercise them accordingly. So we're in Harbor Church. We're a member of Harbor Church. We all have a function. We don't just come here to be Takers, we're to be givers. We're part of the body. A kidney has a really important function, as does a liver, as does a heart, as does a lung, as does an eardrum, as does a little toe. We all have important functions. Each has peculiar gifts, it says. We each have gifts that differ. Take in Esther's day, she had a sense of destiny. I am put here for a reason. I was raised up for a time such as this. For every one of us, we're part of the body of Christ here. To be convinced God has put me, I am a man of destiny, a woman of destiny, a young person of destiny in this church. God put me here for this time. I'm gifted peculiarly. 1965 to 1971, there was a wonderful sitcom on television that I used to watch with my dad. It was called Hogan's Heroes. Hands up. Okay, even the guy from Florida. You watch Hogan's Heroes, it was a setting in a POW camp. Klink was the commandant. Schultz was the sergeant who knew nothing. But in that Stalag 13, amongst these allies, there was this underground espionage team that had different individuals, each a part of that team. There was Kincheloe, gifted in electronics. Carter, gifted in explosives. Lebeau, he was a gifted impersonator. Newkirk, he was a safecracker. And Hogan, he was the ringmaster. of all of it, and they were a crack unit that together crippled the Third Reich by blowing up bridges and by foiling Axis plans. And so, beloved, that's what we are. We are Harbor Church. We are a troop of spiritual, mighty men and women who are armed to the teeth with gifts by the captain of our salvation. And we have been endowed to storm the gates of hell. And each of us needs to be convinced that we are each sovereignly armed in such a way that we contribute crucially to the unit. We're gonna sing of him, O church, arise and put your armor on. I love that hymn. And for us to individualize it. And even, yeah, every part of the body, the little toe is so crucial. Georgia may be watching on the internet tonight. What can she do? She can barely get out of her house, but Georgia, she has this war room in her house. where if I want something to get done, I will ask this mighty soldier in the kingdom to pray that God would do work. We're all a contributing community, and for us all to have that sense of conviction that we have been raised up for a time such as this. But sixthly, then, we're also a loving community. A loving community. 9A, In 10a where it says, let love be without hypocrisy. Be devoted to one another in brotherly love. It says not with hypocrisy, meaning don't just love with the face. putting on a nice face. Judas loved Jesus in Gethsemane, putting on a nice face. He kissed the Lord Jesus, but it was fake. It was deception. What we need to love more than just with the face, like it says in 1 Peter 1.22, love the brethren fervently from the heart. So that's what's among us by the Spirit of God, that fruit of the Spirit, which is, it begins with love. Not just with externals, not with just a civil facade, not just with window dressing on the outside, but on the inside being full of resentment and irritation and disgust. No. Love. Love covers over a multitude of sins. Love buries offenses. If it's a love, again, by the Spirit of Christ, back to 12.1, I urge you, by the mercies of God, we love because God first loved us. He buried our offenses against Him really deeply. They're out of sight. Far as east is from the west. They're buried in the depths of the sea. How should we deal with offenses against one another? Manton says this, love is like an echo. It returns what it receives. So then we even think about the idea of mission and what kind of love did we receive from the Lord Jesus? Luke 15 describes Him as this good shepherd who leaves the 99 and he goes off to seek out and to fetch the one that's lost. And I think of me and I see myself as this lost sheep dangling over a cliff with only my fur being held by a twig that's sticking out from the edge of the rock with a 10,000 foot fall into hell. And my Lord Jesus came and sought me and found me and he snatched me up from that branch. So, that's how we've been loved. We need to echo back that Love we receive from the Father to our fellow men. We need to be a community that's a loving community, that has a shepherd's heart so that we lift up our eyes and we see the fields are white unto harvest. I mentioned in the opening. Beloved, in this world of broken toys, broken relationship, dysfunctionality, atheism and sin, There are people out there who are wounded and broken. They're lost. They're lonely hearts. They're needy. There's no one to talk to out there. We should go out there and seek them and find them. You know what? We don't have to look too far. They're out there. Even this morning, Michelle, I don't know all the details, but Michelle brought a woman this morning that she just met. She met her on 8th Street. I think it was 8th Street. and said, why don't you come to church with me tomorrow? And she did, and there she was sitting in the back row just this morning. There are all kinds of people like that. You're an MVP. You're running your five kilometers on the treadmill and you're sweating buckets, but you can still talk to the guy in the treadmill next to you. Who knows what kind of a lonely life he lives? You're at Granville State University. You're in the classroom there. Yeah, you can walk around with blinders on. Like, we can lift up our eyes and see that the fields are white for harvest. In the neighborhood, there's so much trauma in the neighborhood. If you just get beyond the portcullis that goes down, the garage door that closes, and the neighbors, you get beyond that, you talk to them, listen, the snow is melting. People will be out there in the yard. You can talk to them again to make hay this summer. And Rosaria Butterfield has that book, The Gospel Comes with a House Key, doesn't it? Man, that house key, you talk about a weapon. Talk about a kingdom weapon in our culture to invite homeless people, family-less people, friendless people into our home. That is such a mighty weapon. Or maybe even you give, listen to this one now, you give a pass to somebody that they can come to your ice pond anytime. Who would do that? Who has that kind of equipment? Well, someone might. in the impact that that can have on a young man who doesn't have a dad. And he can come and you can check him up against a snow bank in the ice pond every now and then. You bond with him. A lifelong difference can be made. Come on over to my house. It's a place you can call home. That makes you uneasy to say that, doesn't it? Makes me too. That takes me beyond my comfort zone to love. But did Jesus go beyond His comfort zone to love us? We must. Hey, I'll have coffee with you. Beloved, I'm not against a certain program. There'll be a program, this Women's Bible Study. It's a wonderful program. I think it's really very useful, very helpful. But overall, beloved, I don't think this generation fundamentally needs our programs. Like there's some unique strategy we need to find. I believe that this generation needs our personal love touches. And they're expensive. Christ loving us was very expensive. I am convinced that the contemporary strategy that will pick the lock of our generation is this personal relationships with people. A loving strategy. And in our community, I would hope that the vision that we would have, that harbor church, even especially on Lord's days, when a soul wanders in to our flock, what do we do after the service? We don't just sit and talk with this comfortable person and that comfortable person that we know. We lift up our eyes. And we welcome those who are coming among us that are strangers, we don't ignore them. So that when they leave this building, they can say, if I actually became a part of that community, I would have a mother, I would have a father, I would have a sister, I would have a brother. I would have a child, a daughter, a son, I may even have a grandparent if I became a part of that community because they touched me and there was an expression of love. I wouldn't even need to pay a therapist if I came to Harbor Church. That's a vision. that we have, it's a family. And let me say this, some of you are so good at rolling out a red carpet of relational warmth to visitors, and I highly commend you. And as the apostle says in Philippians 1, let us abound all the more, and that is Harbor Church. But seventhly, seventhly, come on, we gotta move, we have eight. Seventhly, a sympathizing community, a sympathizing community, Verse 15, listen, it says, Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. Now that speaks of sensitivity. We're a body. I've already quoted from 1 Corinthians 12, 26. If one suffers, one member suffers, all suffer. Let me get really transparent with you. A while back, I had a skin tag on the back of my arm. And I needed to cut that thing off. It would be another appendage if I didn't cut it off. So I took the nail clippers and I thought about, oh no, the pain that it's going to exert, to snip that off, the blood that will pour out. I recoiled from it, I stayed away from doing it, just the thought of it. almost made me hyperventilate because of the pain that it would bring. And so it should be in the Church of Christ, the way, even the smallest parts of harbor, there should be a holy sensitivity. Stuart Elliot says this regarding the church, this rejoicing with those who rejoice, weeping with those who weep. He says, you shouldn't have a cool detachment from other people's joys and sorrows, but fully share in them. Take them on your own heart as if they were your own. And the best example we have is the Lord Jesus. In John 11.35, Mary and Martha's brother died. And the text says, just two words, and Jesus wept. He felt for them. He mingled his tears with Mary's and with Martha's. Even just this last week. We prayed this morning for our son Calvin and daughter Sarah and the way they went in on Thursday for a gender reveal. This is going to be really wonderful. We're going to find out if it's a boy or a girl. Well, they found out it's a boy, but they found out a lot more than that. It's a boy who's broken, who has a really serious problem. It's probably very severely damaged organs. And Calvin called And I said, sounds like you got a cold or something. What's the matter? A long pause, and he hung up. I'll call you back. And he called me back and he told me about the brokenness and, well, come on over to the house. And they came over to the house and they drove up. And there Calvin gets out and Sarah gets out. I'm trying to shovel away. And we just had this three-way hug and we just wept right there out in front, just shoulders heaving. And that was so easy, so natural, because these are mine. These are my people. But you see, who's our people? It expands when we become part of the church of the Lord Jesus Christ, that we weep with those who weep. We rejoice with those who rejoice. So in Harbor Church, we hear of it, don't we? A parent dies. That person lost their parent. Or there's a job loss. Or there's a romance breakup. Well, the statement comes, my child is in the far country. There's a marriage conflict. There's depression. We need to have our aeterni out with a sense of tender awareness. So often, it's said of the Lord Jesus Christ, his bowels of compassion erupted. The Greek word is splangitsumai. It's like a bursting of the intestines. There's intestinal sympathy that the Lord Jesus had, sympathy. And not only for those who are sweet, you think in near the tomb where Lazarus was, Martha came to Jesus and Martha wasn't sweet when she first came to Jesus. Martha was kind of petulant. Jesus had traveled a distance to be there and Martha says, Lord, if you'd have been there, if you'd have been here, my brother wouldn't have died. And so for us, you think about the way we deal with one another, Beloved, listen, in Harvard Church, we don't shoot our wounded here. We don't. We don't sharply rebuke just because they show wobbliness. But if somebody has been shot through with a calamity and with a pain, and they're off somewhere in a bush, just trying to catch their breath like a deer who's been shot, trying to somehow get, we need to go out to the bush and find them and be with them and nurse their wounds. Weep with those who weep. A sympathizing community. And you realize that if we're to weep with those, we rejoice with those who rejoice, well that encourages and it calls for vulnerability. How can I weep with you if you never cry? How can I empathize with you if you never divulge your hurt? There's a problem we can have. We, our church, we, some circles, there can be this tendency to want to present an I got it all together, bold face mask, right? Am I the only one? I don't wanna see, don't let him see you cry. Don't let him see you ache. But it's essential, beloved, if I were to weep with those who weep, then there's got to be a displaying of a struggling, teary face. I still remember it was over here in the annex. We were in a small group. Oh, about six years ago, there was this couple who came among us, and they were in our small group over there, maybe five years ago, and they said this in our small group as we were giving prayer requests. It wasn't just, sometimes we can have these very bold-faced prayer requests about sometimes superficial things, but the man said, the wife was there, and even tear run down the wife's cheek. He said, our daughter is addicted to heroin, and it's tearing our hearts out. Who knew? And they taught us a lesson about the need for vulnerability. There's an important word. The younger generation has the word authenticity. Anything can be overdone. But you know what? We need to be authentic around here. You think so? It's good for us to seek to be real, the real deal. To be able to say maybe in a prayer meeting or in a men's breakfast group, I'm working third shift and I'm really battling with anger in the home. I'm scarring relationships. Would you please pray for me? That should be standard procedure among us. Galatians 6.2, bear one another's burden. Oh yeah, but Pastor Mark, you can overdose on that. You can end up vomiting all over everybody, all your difficulties, and then you end up embarrassing people on the stairs. I know, I know, any good thing can be overdone, but listen, at Harbor Church right now, that's not our problem, of overdoing it, of being overly transparent. May God help us to be a sympathizing community, a divulging community, so our relationships can have real depth to them. That's a vision for Harbor Church. What do you think? And then just lastly, a peacemaking community. A peacemaking community. Ephesians 16-21, but just focus on maybe verse 18. Be of the same mind. If possible, as far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. In the community of God's people here, we worship the great peacemaker, the Lord Jesus Christ. Blessed are the peacemakers, they shall be called the sons of God. That's what it ought to be. As far as it depends on us, live at peace with all men. We're willing to go the extra mile to make it happen. But there's no reason why I need to do that. I didn't deserve it and they didn't make me go that extra mile, but we're willing to do that. If your enemy's thirsty, give him a drink, verse 20. You can heap hot coals on his head. This is so essential in any community, even more so than MVP or Planet Fitness. We're living together month after month, year after year, even decade after decade. Oftentimes, two or three years is enough. I'm in a church, then I'm out of here because I'm having friction. Time to go somewhere else. Let the gospel do its work. Let the glory of the gospel be displayed by the grace of God among us. In any family, there's going to be friction. There'll be collisions. There'll be disagreements. There'll be conflicts. Nursery spats. Not at Harbor, no. Well, could be. Sunday school misunderstandings. Officer scuffles, weaker and stronger brother scruples. I mean, there was a problem in the church in Rome like that. There was a problem in the church in Corinth like that. Maybe in Holland like that too. Yodian syntyche feuds like in Philippi. Corinth, I'm of Paul, I'm of Apollos. Harbor Church, I'm of pastor number one, I'm of pastor number two. Yeah, I felt that my side wasn't respectfully heard. In fact, I'm, you know what? There could even be things that might make us uncomfortable to come to church because of relational fallouts. And there could be a tendency I can feel at my own heart bearing grudges and, but beloved, this is a wonderful. platform on which the gospel can display its true glory, this counter-cultural expression of the grace of Christ among us, that people are marveled. You will know that they will know you're my disciples by the way that you love one another. You could be enemies, but you're Brothers and sisters, we claim to be disciples of the man who made peace with us, canceling a fortune of debt. How can we hold the grudge and choke one to death for maybe a silver dollar black eye that they gave to us? Not really worth that much. It's okay. It's a man's glory to overlook a transgression, it says in Proverbs 19.11. 1 Corinthians 6 says, why not rather be defrauded? Why not rather be wronged? It's okay, and in the end, it's not gonna make any difference, really. I guess I close with this. Part of harbor church history lore. I'm changing the details to protect the innocent. There was a conflict between two men in this church, quite severe, many years ago. But then there was a storm that happened, and one of the men had a tree fall on the house and broke in on the roof, and it needed damage, and more storm was coming. Well, the offended brother, where there was grudge between the two, got up at night, went off to the house, and the two of those men worked on top of that roof, and those men bonded together as the one was loving the other. You know what? Those two men, they can't even remember now what the big conflict and the offense was, because the gospel displayed itself there in that overlooking of an offense and loving one another for the cause of Christ. Beloved, this is a wonderful vision for Harbor Church. And I know it's not very trendy, and it may not be glossy, but I think it's really biblical and Christ-glorifying. And may the Lord Jesus give us His spirit. So something like that can really happen so that we can draw people out there. We're Harbor Church. There's so much wreckage that litters the beach of the lakeshore that people to come into this harbor and be repaired and be restored and be saved and be heaven bound. Let's sing a song about these themes.