It's a privilege tonight to have as our speaker, Dr. Al Baker. I have known Al, I think, ever since the summer of 1979 we met. We were both seminary students at the time, different seminaries, but we were both in the Hopewell, Virginia area for the summer. And so we met then. Al's actually been to Chestnut Mountain before, probably, we're trying to figure out, around 1990 or so, the early 90s, spoke for us then. Al has been a church planter in Virginia, in Georgia, in Connecticut. He's been a pastor. He's toured the world with the gospel. Everybody here knows Linda Sommer, okay? And you know Linda's enthusiasm for the gospel. Well, here's her counterpart. And he's not quite the mountain goat that I've heard Linda called by some of you, but he goes everywhere with the gospel. He has an enthusiasm for revival, for prayer and evangelism, and it's just a privilege to have him and Winnie with us. Winnie's sitting there with the Binghams tonight, and we're grateful that she's with him. And they do have three children and 10 grandchildren, and that's probably the best thing, too, about It's actually 12 now. Hey, it's great to be back. Last time I was here, you had a relatively small sanctuary, and now, boy, it's just beautiful to see what God's done and the commitment to world missions. It's awesome. Now, if you have your Bibles, please turn with me to Matthew chapter 4. I want us to look over the next several days to Jesus' early Galilean ministry. What is He doing? What can we learn? How can we be challenged by it? Now, the Bible, as we know, is the infallible, inerrant, inspired Word of God. It is our only rule of faith and practice. Amen? So, Matthew chapter 4, starting at verse 12, hear God's Word. Now, when Jesus heard that John had been taken into custody, he withdrew into Galilee. And leaving Nazareth, he came and settled in Capernaum, which is by the sea, in the region of Zebulun and Naphtali. This was to fulfill what was spoken through Isaiah the prophet, the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali, by the way of the sea, beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who were sitting in darkness saw a great light and those who were sitting in the land in shadow of death upon them a light dawned. From that time Jesus began to preach and say Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Let's pray together. Father, we pray in the name of Jesus, asking for the anointing of your Holy Spirit. Holy Spirit, we ask that you would come down upon the preacher and every one of us here, and that we would see Jesus. See Jesus high and lifted up. And that we would see that indeed he is the light that cometh into the world. Father, there may be some here tonight who don't know you. We would assume that everyone here at a missions conference does, but that we can't always assume that. So we pray if there is someone here tonight who's not yet in Christ, that you would be very merciful to them and give them eyes to see. ears to hear, give them a new heart that they can repent and believe the gospel. For the rest of us, we pray that we be challenged and encouraged. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Now, there is a tremendous amount of darkness in the world. I think we would agree with that. I go to India twice a year. In about three weeks, I'll be taking three men with me. God's doing a great work in India. I read somewhere where something like 30,000 Hindus a day are coming to Christ. And yet, because of that, there's tremendous persecution. When I was there back in September, when we go, there's always 18 to 20 former Hindus getting baptized every time we go. We're planting Presbyterian churches there. We started three years ago with seven church planters. We now have 14. We pay them $150 a month. And they've now got 51 preaching points or churches established. But it's in the midst of all that that there's tremendous persecution. There was an older man there who had been a Hindu, was converted. We baptized him back in September. He was with his son who's one of the church planters back in December. They were teaching a Bible study in a small village near Hyderabad where several Hindus had just come to Christ. Some teenagers came in, beat them both up. And the president of India has vowed that by December of 2021, he will eradicate Christianity. Now, you know about the caste system. It is utter darkness. I believe someone here at one of the missionaries is going to Kenya. I was in Kibera, a slum there a couple years ago. I'll be back in Kibera in April. I've been to a lot of places in the world. I've been to Kailich in Cape Town and Masafumalele near Cape Town. And I've been to some bad places in India, but I've never seen anything like Kibera. It is horrible. One of our PCA missionaries, Makuku, is there doing amazing work. But darkness everywhere. I heard earlier, one of our folks here is going to Athens, Greece. I believe y'all are going to Athens. My wife and I were there a few years ago and working with the Greek Bible Institute, preaching at a church there. My wife one day went with Dina Petrou down to the Red Light District. And when he went in with Dina is they're trying to minister to the prostitutes. I mean, utter darkness everywhere, all over the world, darkness. Then we bring it a little closer home. We heard about the Cherokee Nation and we heard about the prescription drug addiction. And of course this is everywhere in our culture. Fatherlessness and all the poverty that comes from it. The human trafficking. And let's bring it a little closer to home where we are. There's not one family here who doesn't have darkness. Every one of us have loved ones, family members, maybe who grew up in the church, maybe they learned the shorter catechism, maybe they sat under John's preaching their entire life until they went off to college, maybe they've heard 1,500 to 2,000 sermons, they know the Bible backwards and forwards, and yet I would dare say there's some children here who are grown who've left the faith. I see it everywhere. Darkness, what should we do? What is the answer to the darkness? Well, let's look at what Jesus does. Now, Jesus, of course, is in his early ministry. And I want you to notice a couple of things. Earlier, in chapter 4, of course, he's baptized by John. And we're told there that the Holy Spirit came upon him in the form of a dove. And the Father spoke from heaven, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Then we're told, in the start of chapter 4 that the Spirit of God drove Jesus out into the wilderness where he fasted for 40 days and where he was eventually tempted in three different ways and survived and was victorious over the temptation of the evil one. Here's what I want you to understand. Jesus, of course, is 100% God. Jesus is 100% man. And Jesus was approved by the Father. This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased. Listen to Him. But even though Jesus is God incarnate, He did not begin His earthly ministry until the Spirit came on Him. Now my dear friends, if this is true of the Lord Jesus Himself, How much more should that be true of us as you seek to reach those in your community, those family members who are living in utter darkness? As our missionaries go out to these various places of the world, this work is utterly impossible. What we're asking people to do, they cannot do. We're asking these missionaries and we're asking you to go into your community and to tell people you're living in darkness and you must repent and believe the gospel or you'll be lost forever. But remember this, Paul the Apostle says, In Romans chapter 3, there are none who understand. There are none who seek for God. Together all have turned aside. Together they've all become useless. There's not one righteous. There's not even one. Their throat is an open grave of their lips that keep deceiving. The poison of asps is under their lips. Their mouths are full of cursing and bitterness. Their feet are swift as shed innocent blood. Destruction and misery are in their path. The path of peace they have not known. There is no fear of God before their eyes. Now I do a lot of open air preaching. I'll preach at sporting events. I'll be at Auburn University on the 22nd next Thursday. And I can tell you, is I'm at a sporting event, like I was at the Alabama-Florida State game back in September. We're preaching in the open air. There's thousands of people walking by, trying to give out the gospel in a very positive way to them, and they're not buying it. And as they walk by, I can't help but think of that verse in Romans 3. There's no fear of God before their eyes. Listen, if you're in Jesus Christ, you don't need to fear anything. Because you know that He loves you. You know that you belong to Him. You know that when you die, you're going to be with Him. You're not going to die one moment before, one moment after His appointed time. So the Christian has no reason to fear whatsoever. Now we know in our flesh we do fear. The very thing I want to do, I don't do. But the unbeliever has every reason to fear. He ought to wake up every morning in abject terror because he's under the wrath of God. Now we know that, but they don't know it. None understand, none seek for God, so our missionaries going to Berlin, in Cherokee, in Athens, Greece, wherever it is, Thailand, we're asking them, go now, we want you to go, and we want you to go into this place of darkness, and we want you to minister the gospel of Jesus Christ, and it is impossible because they're dead in their sins. Now, if Jesus had the Spirit, and if Jesus did not begin His ministry until the Holy Spirit came upon Him, this is absolutely vital! You should pray, not only for yourself, but for your missionaries. Holy Spirit, come down upon these people. Holy Spirit, give these missionaries the anointing of the Holy Spirit, so that when they go forward, they can speak with boldness and with confidence that Jesus Christ is the only Savior of sinners. And God, you've got to change their heart. That's the first thing you notice. about Jesus' early Galilean ministry. You'll notice it says there that he left Nazareth. Nazareth, at that time, was a little nine-acre town with 400 people living in it. That's where Jesus hung out. Then it says that he went to Capernaum. Now, Capernaum was on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, about three miles from the Jordan River. And Jesus purposely set up shop there. We now know there were at least 138 little towns or villages right there within a one-to-do day's walk. And we're told a little bit later in Matthew chapter 4 that Jesus went to every one of them. And if Jesus spent two days in each one of these towns, that's 276 days, He spent about nine months of His early ministry in that area, going wherever He could, hitting every single town. That's something else we learn about Jesus and His early Galilean ministry. He knew He must have the Spirit, and He went to people. He didn't wait for them to come to Him. Now one of the things that intrigues me about this church is I am deeply convinced that most of our churches are missing it altogether because we don't acknowledge the gift of evangelism and we rarely have an evangelist working right alongside of a teacher or preacher. And that's what you have here. Right? You've got Kennedy. We know what an evangelist he is. Say what? Okay, D2? All right. Praise the Lord. This is unusual. Most of our churches are heavy on teaching, which is good. You'll never hear me in any way demean the necessity of good expository reform preaching. Absolutely important. You've got to build up the saints. But most of our churches don't have evangelists, and so we're weak. We're sterile. You know, we don't really bring in people who look different than us. But what an evangelist does, because I know Kennedy, they stir up stuff, don't they? There's always something going on, right? That's what evangelists do. Evangelists don't sit in the Starbucks coffee shop and wait for people to come to them. They go. That's what Jesus did. Every single town, 138 apparently, He hit every one of them. Then, of course, Matthew loves to quote the Old Testament because he's writing primarily to a Jewish audience. So he's always bringing the clout of the Old Testament into the passage, and that's what he does here. He quotes Isaiah 9. The people – I love this. He's going to the Galilee of the Gentiles. The people who were dwelling in darkness have seen a great light. John chapter 8. I am the light of the world. Those who believe in me shall have the light of life." Jesus comes into this dark, suffering, condemned world that's under the wrath of God because people have purposely and willfully turned away from Him. You see, God has manifested His goodness. In Romans 2 it says, do you not know the kindness of God is meant to lead you to repentance? But because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you're storing up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God who will render to every man according to his deeds." In other words, what ought to happen, let's use Tom Brady as an example. Tom Brady, this great quarterback for the New England Patriots, beautiful wife, millions of dollars, all those Super Bowl rings. Here's what ought to happen. I know nothing about his spiritual condition. But here it is. What he ought to do is he ought to wake up and say, you know, there must be a God. Look how I am blessed. And he could just go on and on about all his blessings. There ought to be a God. Now, I bet this, oh, there is this God and I am accountable to Him. I should repent. That's what Paul's talking about in Romans chapter 2. But that's not what happens. Because of your stubbornness, he says to these moral sinners of Romans chapter 2. Chapter 1 he's talking about the wicked vile sinners, but now he's talking about nice moral people, you know, people like live next door to you, pretty good people. He says, because of your stubbornness and unrepentant heart, you are storing up for yourself wrath. Last week, I was in South Africa, near the Kruger National Park, and I was preaching to about 100 students from about 20 different countries in Africa. And I was using the analogy, it's kind of like in the dry season, you have these rain barrels to catch water, rain coming off the roof, but there's nothing in there. But when the rainy season comes, the water runs off the roof and is caught into these big barrels. And so the water continues to build up, build up, and eventually it pours out. That's what Paul's talking about. You're storing up for yourself wrath. When you're first born, it's just a little wrath. But the longer you live, the more wrath is being raised up. And the longer you live contrary to God's Word, the longer you live in rebellion against Him, the greater your wrath is. And eventually, one of these days, we don't know when, unless you repent and believe, the gospel is going to be poured out on you. That's what he's talking about. The people who were dwelling in darkness have seen a great light. Do you really believe that? Do you really believe your neighbors, nice people, maybe church-going people, are living in darkness if they don't have Jesus? How about the people of Berlin, people of Cherokee, the people of Athens, Greece, people of all these different, Thailand, people around you, do you really believe that? Do you really believe that if they die without Jesus Christ, they're going to hell? That's what the scripture says. It's an awful reality. So what does Jesus do? He goes in the power of the Holy Spirit. He goes to people. He doesn't wait around for them to come to Him. Now what else do we find out? You notice it says here in verse 17, from that time Jesus began to what? Did Jesus argue? Did Jesus dialogue? Did Jesus spend many, many months, or many, many years establishing a relationship with him. What does it say? He began to preach kérousó. And the Greek word kérousó means to proclaim, to herald the truth. Peter, who had been a coward, who denied Jesus three times. Later on, when the Holy Spirit came on the day of Pentecost, this coward became a bold lion preaching Jesus. In fact, he preached in the power of the Holy Spirit to such a degree that the preaching brought conviction. It pierced them to the heart. And what do they say? What must we do? And he says, you must repent and be baptized for the forgiveness of your sins and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Later on, Paul, in Acts chapter 16, is in prison with Silas. They're singing hymns. You know they're witnessing to the other prisoners. The earthquake comes, the shackles fall off, the Philippian jailer's going to kill himself because he knows he's responsible. All these people got out, he thought. Paul said, no, no, no, no, don't kill yourself. We're all here. I got news for you. If I am a prisoner, if I'm a convicted criminal, and the shackles fall off, I'm out of there. Right? Well, they stayed. Why? Because something must have happened. Maybe their hearts were transformed. Maybe they were converted. The point is that these people who were in darkness had seen a great light. And Paul is preaching. Peter is preaching in Acts 17, the Areopagus address on Mars Hill. Paul says, that which you worship in ignorance, this I Proclaim to you the God who made the world and all things in it, since he is Lord of heaven and earth, does not dwell in temples made with hands, neither is he served by human hands, as though ahead of need of anything." He's proclaiming the truth. In his farewell address to the elders of Ephesus at Miletus, he says, testifying solemnly, from house to house, preaching the full counsel of God, of repentance toward God and faith in our Lord Jesus Christ. That is the message, my dear friends. That's the message for Athens. That's the message for Berlin. That's the message for Thailand. Wherever we go, we must go with the Holy Spirit. We go, we don't sit around. We go in the Holy Spirit and we proclaim the gospel. The boldly proclaim, Jesus Christ is the Savior of sinners. Now this sounds so simple. And I know you believe that because this is a faithful church. But I've got to tell you, this kind of message is losing some significance in our culture. Very, very few churches. trained people in personal evangelism anymore, very few. Now, as I look around our nation, as I look around the world, first of all, in the world there's some wonderful things happening. Listen, Christianity is not going to die out, amen? The glory of the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. I am very optimistic about the future of this world because I believe that Jesus Christ is saving people and there'll be those from every tongue, tribe, people, and nation around the throne of God singing praises to Him. No doubt about it. But at the same time, I look at the Western world, and I look at our country in particular, and I am deeply concerned, and I am deeply grieved. My dear friends, we've got to have a great awakening in this nation. If we don't see millions of conversions that brings about true reformation in individuals, in families, in communities, in churches, in states, in the nation, we're doomed. I have no doubt about it. All you got to do is look through history, you'll see it. We've got to have revival. We've got to have millions of conversions, but we're not going to have it if we don't have power. Now you know what I'm after is I love our theology, Reformed theology, the grace of God towards sinners. It's beautiful, it's astonishing. But what I'm also after, I want to wed good, solid Reformed theology with the unction and the anointing of the Holy Spirit. We need power. Paul said to the Thessalonians, our gospel did not come in word only, but in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. When a preacher is preaching the gospel, he's like a prosecuting attorney. Now if I am a prosecuting attorney in this area, and you've been indicted for embezzling funds, my job is to put you away for 30 years. So what am I going to do? I'm going to garner all the witnesses I can. I'm going to get all of the evidence I possibly can because I want to convince the jury that you in fact are guilty. What I'm after is a what? A conviction. I want a conviction. The Holy Spirit is the one who convicts of sin, righteousness, and judgment. So the preacher, the evangelist, the individual in the church, we need to be filled with the Holy Spirit so that we can do what the Holy Spirit does, and that is to bring conviction. We must have power. We're not going to have power unless we have the Holy Spirit. We're not going to have the Holy Spirit unless we pray. Luke chapter 12, I'm not going to explain the text, but basically he says there, if a son asks a father for bread, he'll not give him a stone, will he? If he asks a father for a fish, he'll not give him a scorpion, will he? If you being evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the father give what? The Holy Spirit to those who ask him. My dear friends, we should ask every day for the Holy Spirit. You get up in the morning, Holy Spirit fill me and when you sin and you will sin, repent, go to Him again and ask for forgiveness. But we're not going to have the Spirit unless we pray, watch this. My dear friends, we're really not going to pray the way we ought to pray until we gain an intolerable burden. Now what do I mean by that? I usually go on for about an hour and a half on that one, so we're not going to do that. An intolerable burden, that's what Ezra had, that's what Daniel had, that's what Nehemiah had. It's an intense agony, grief, and alarm at the status quo. We just can't stand it any longer. Can't stand it in my personal life, lack of holiness, lack of zeal, leaving my first love, you know, becoming a Laodicean type believer. An intense agony, grief, and alarm at the status quo in my personal life. In the church, as we see the weakness of the church that's not able to stand up against the secularization of our culture. We don't seem to know what to do. And then an intense agony, grief, and alarm at the status quo in the world. My dear friends, again, those around us without Jesus Christ, when they die, they're going straight to hell. And as bad as that is, that's not the end of it. Those in hell would give up anything they had if they could stay in hell for another million years. Why? Because they know they face that day. What is that day? That day is the great white throne judgment when they will be judged according to their thoughts, Romans 2. According to the words, Matthew 12. According to their deeds, 2 Corinthians 5. And then they'll hear those words, depart from me, you accursed ones. into the everlasting fire that's been prepared for the devil and his angels. Do you have an intense agony, grief, and alarm at the status quo? Have you come to the place in your own life you can say, I can't stand it any longer? I'm cold-hearted. I'm lukewarm. I don't have a passion for souls. I don't pray for our missionaries. I don't give any faith promise money. Have you come to that place where you realize, you know, I'm just not right? God, I think, is moving me. He's speaking to me about going to the mission field. I've been rejecting it for a long time. Where are you? We've got to see the darkness driven out. And let me close with this. Matthew chapter 15. There's the story there of the Canaanite woman. In Mark 7, she's referred to as the Syrophoenician woman. They're both telling the same story, but Matthew 15 gives you a little bit more detail. Here it is, Jesus is in the Galilean region, but now he very purposely goes some distance to the west to Tyre and to the Phoenician region. And he's going there because that's where all the Gentile pagans are. Again, he's not laying back waiting for people to come to him, he's going. And he goes and people know who he is. He's been doing this ministry for a while. He's been healing. He's been casting out demons. He's been raising people from the dead. He's been preaching the kingdom, not dialoguing, not discussing, preaching the kingdom. And now he comes into this area, and there's a woman. She's called a Canaanite woman. You remember the Canaanites from the Old Testament? They were wicked, vile people. Utter pagans. And she apparently hears about Jesus. And here is this woman who comes up to Jesus and she says, Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. How did she know that? Son of David. That's a title of the Messiah. Somehow or another, she heard it. Somehow or another, she obviously believed it. Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me. My daughter is cruelly demon-possessed. Now, mothers, can you imagine having a daughter demon-possessed? You would never get any sleep. You would be worried all the time. What's going to happen if I go to sleep? Is she going to get out of the house? Is she going to wander into a river? Is she going to throw herself into fire? Is she going to give herself to a man? What's going to happen? You would never get any rest at all. The torment, the emotional, psychological torment that you would go through would be unbearable. And it's 24-7. There's no rest at all. I mean, it's not like you can drop off your demon-possessed girl with a babysitter for a week or two. That ain't gonna work. They're not gonna do that. Nobody wants anything to do with that child. And she comes to realize Jesus is the only one can help her. Listen, she comes to understand that her daughter is living in darkness. Do you understand that your children, even though they've been baptized into the faith until God regenerates them by the Holy Spirit, even though they have the privileges of the covenant of grace and it's wonderful, they still have a cobra heart? They still hate God and they love their sin until God regenerates them. Even their sweet little grandchildren I have, they've got cobra hearts until God changes them. They have darkness. This mother understood, my daughter is living in darkness. Do you believe that? Now what's Jesus' response? Nothing. He's quiet. That sounds rude to us, but I think there's a reason. God promised Abraham that he would be a father of many nations. He made him wait at least ten years. Jacob was promised the same thing, and Jacob's a con artist. We know the story with him. And finally, the angel of the Lord wrestles with him. The angel of the Lord says, okay, I'm out of here. Jacob holds on to him. No, you can't leave until you bless me. Sometimes God wants us to wait. Why? Because it leads to the next thing. What this woman began to realize, she's in utter darkness. Jesus apparently is not going to answer. He's quiet. And in the meantime, his disciples say, Jesus, send her away. She's yelling at us. I got news for you. If you take your child to the emergency room, and your child is sick, and your child's not getting the attention you believe your child deserves, what are you going to do? Are you going to be nice and real quiet? No. Help my daughter right now! Of course she's emotional. She knows that she's tried everything, and it's utter despair. You see, there's darkness, and then there's despair. It's finally dawn on her. There's no hope at all. My dear friends, there's no hope for these people in Athens, Berlin, Thailand, Cherokee or wherever it is. There's no hope at all. They're in darkness in and of themselves. And sooner or later, if we're going to have that intolerable burden, we got to get to the place where we realize there's darkness. And then in ourselves as missionaries, as evangelists, as individual believers in the church, this is utterly impossible. And it drives you in yourself Not to despair. And then Jesus says to her, I've been sent to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. In other words, you're not getting my drift? I really didn't come for people like you. Now, he's setting her up, all right? Of course he did. He goes to the Jew first and then to the Greek, as Paul said. But when she hears that, what does she do? It's beautiful. Matthew tells us that she bowed down. She got on her knees. And she's continually beseeching Him. Jesus, have mercy. My dear friends, we got to get to the place where we realize utter and complete darkness everywhere. And we realize that it moves us to despair, and then it moves us to bow down, to humble ourselves, and to cry out to Jesus for help. In other words, we've got to get to the place, if we're going to have an intolerable burden, we've got to see the darkness, we've got to sense the despair, and then there must be absolute, total surrender. Isn't that what she's doing? I've tried it all, nothing seems to be working. Total surrender. You've got loved ones who've walked away from the faith. You've talked to them. You've prayed for them. You've given them things to read. You've sent John, you sent Kennedy to them, and nothing seems to work. They can't save them. You can't save them. You bow down in total surrender. Jesus, help me. That's what she says. Jesus, help me. And then Jesus says, you know, it's not good to give the children's bread to the dogs. Now, when I first read that a number of years ago, I thought the dogs, like those scavenger dogs that I see running around in India and Africa, a lot of you know what I'm talking about. They're mongrel looking. They're the ugliest things I've ever seen. Now, nobody have a dog like that in their house in this country. But that's not, the Greek word doesn't mean that at all. The Greek word, that's your, it's your house pet. It's Fido. He's your nice house pet, a good dog. So Jesus is not demeaning the woman. She's not demeaning the daughter. What she's saying is that the dog is going to be fed, but the dog must wait its turn. First of all, the children get the bread. But you see, she's not daunted by this. She's not put off by this. She continues because she sees the darkness. She has the despair. She's now totally surrendered. And when she hears that, then she manifests unwavering faith. Did you get this? Then she says, oh, yes, yes. The dogs ought to be able to eat the crumbs that fall from the master's table. That's beautiful. Jesus says, you have great faith, go your way, your daughter is healed. Missionaries, I want you to understand, I know you know this, but I want to really encourage you, your work's impossible. It's impossible. You're going, and you have been going, some of y'all for years, into darkness. You love them, you care for them, but there's darkness. You see it by the way they live, by the way they think. Utter darkness, devastation, destruction. You've seen what it does. And those of you in this church, people in your neighborhood, it's my wife and I tell people all the time who don't know Jesus that are living destructive lives, did you really think that's going to turn out well for you? Of course it's not going to turn out well. It never does. But you can't change the darkness, despair, total surrender. And you probably have to do it every day. But then unwavering faith. That's what Paul had in Romans 4. In hope against hope, he believed, not wavering in unbelief. You hold on to God. Because you see, Jesus came to save people out of this darkness. And my prayer would be that this weekend, God will meet us in a powerful fashion. not just a missions conference, as important as those are, I want us to meet Him. I want us to see the beauty, the power, the glory, the excellency of Jesus. Let's pray. Father, thank You for this congregation. Thank You for the way that You've used it over these many, many years. It's beautiful, Lord, to come back and to see Obviously a great work. It's amazing what you can do when a man like John and Kennedy and the elders here just stay at it. Nothing fancy, just stay at it. Day after day, week after week, month after month, year after year. Lord, I pray that we'd all look to you. We're weak and we're frail, and Lord, we forget all this. We know this, but we forget it. I do. I forget it like every day. So Lord, help us. What an amazing Savior. I pray that we'd just be, I pray that we'd be filled up with Jesus. What a great Savior. We pray in Jesus' name. Amen.