If you would remain standing and open your Bibles to First Corinthians, Chapter 14. First Corinthians, Chapter 14, this week will be in the first 19 verses here, the word of the Lord. Pursue love and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy for one who speaks in a tongue shall not speaks not to men, but to God, for no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the spirit. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to people for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but the one who prophesies builds up the church. Now, I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongues, unless someone interprets so the church may be built up. Now, brothers, If I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I bring some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? If even lifeless instruments such as the flute or the harp do not give distinct notes, how will anyone know what is played? And if the bugle gives an indistinct sound, who will get ready for battle? So with yourselves, if you're if with your tongue you utter speech that is not intelligible, how will anyone know what is said? For you will be speaking into the air. There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is without meaning. But if I do not know the meaning of the language, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker, a foreigner to me. So with yourselves, since you are eager for a menace to stations of the spirit, strive to excel in building up the church. Therefore, one who speaks in a tongue should pray for the power to interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful. What am I to do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will I will pray with my mind also. I will sing praise with my spirit, but I will sing with my mind also. Otherwise, if you give thanks with your spirit, how can anyone in the position of an outsider say amen to your Thanksgiving when he does not know what you are saying? For you may be giving things well enough, but the other person is not being built up. I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you. Nevertheless, in church, I had I would rather speak five words with my mind in order to instruct others than ten thousand words in a tongue. Let us pray. Heavenly Father, we come now to hear from your word. We approach your word today in anticipation that you will teach us. That you will change us, that you will make us more like Christ, because we have come in contact with you. Father, we ask today that you would be good to us and merciful to us and that you would send the spirit to do work among this group gathered. Please change our hearts. We ask that you would give us a love for those around us. That you would help us to find ways to care and to love and to minister to each other. The ways in which you have blessed us in gifting. And Father, we ask that you would help us to not get caught up on things that are unimportant, but that you would help us to have full understanding of your word and that we would go and apply it and not just have a head knowledge of it. We ask today that you would do this great work among us, that you would grow us closer together in love and unity. We pray all these things in Christ's name. Amen. Last week, Mike said that he was going to punt and talking about tongues since chapter 14 covers the topic in great detail. And so to carry this imagery forward, I'm here to catch that punt. However, I want you to see that I waving my hand up in the air is a fair catch signal. What this means is that you are going to have to not tackle me on the way out. You get to watch me catch this topic and explain it. Some of you have probably seen this chapter coming and you were expecting or maybe wanting a thorough lecture on cessationism versus continuationism. And how one is the proper way and everyone else are heretics. I want you to hang with me. That is not the point of the text today. Deciding if certain gifts continue or not isn't Paul's main point. We will examine this topic as the text allows throughout chapter 14. However, if you leave today still wanting a lecture on that topic, Or if all that you draw out of this sermon today in this text is information about tongues and prophecy, you have missed Paul's message to us in your effort to do an exercise in systematic theology instead of gleaning Paul's message to Corinth as a message to us also. Now, now that I've disappointed probably most of you or some of maybe some of you, at least, We need to get to the question of what is this text actually about? And as you probably have picked up in the previous month of us working through First Corinthians, the church in Corinth was a mess, to say the least. We might even say it's a disaster of a place. And most of us, if we walked into a church like the church in Corinth today, we would spend one Sunday with them and never go back. And we would probably and rightly so tell others that is a very unhealthy place. They don't understand the gospel very well. What they're doing is damaging to the people. Because they've got many, many problems that range over the divisions over leadership, sexual immorality. They're spooing each other. They're participating in idol worship. They've got divisions of class. We saw that as they are divided on the Lord's Supper. But if we look at an honest evaluation of the Corinthian church, we see characteristics that many churches have today. I would say that it would be hard. You'd be hard pressed to find a church in this area that's got as many problems as Corinth or ones that are as bad. But we all have these problems. And over and over, as Paul has addressed these problems, he points back to their unity in the gospel. And the outworking of love from that every problem, it seems that that he's addressed has been has been done so in a way that he said you should love one another as you work these things out. So I was working through this and I was looking back through the last few months of text, I thought, how many of these problems would be solved if they look to Christ and lived out their faith and deferred to the other brother Christian in an effort to build them up? I thought probably all of them. And I thought back to some of the churches that I've personally been members of and seen the problems. And even in this church, we're not perfect. I thought about the problems that we've had off and on throughout years, and I thought, how many of these problems will be solved if we walked out our faith, deferring to our neighbor Christian in an effort to build them up? I think probably all of them. Paul is always instructing the church that they should care for those around them, those in the church around them. So we've seen in the past two chapters specifically, there is an issue with spiritual gifts. We saw in Chapter 12 that many gifts are there are many types of gifts that are given to different people. They're given for the building up of the body. And we also saw last week that are in two weeks or two weeks ago in Chapter 12, that each person is needed in the church. And that each person has a purpose in the body. And then last week in chapter 13, we saw that love will last. And without love, we're we're noisy gongs or clanging cymbals that are our actions without love or or not pleasant. I don't know if you've ever been into a band hall with kids that are learning to play percussions, especially middle school band students, and they're banging on cymbals and gongs. It's not pleasant. And so Paul has set us up with this and that leads us into chapter 14. And Paul is now going to target a specific problem in the Corinthian church. They have a problem with the spiritual gift of speaking in tongues, or at least what they're calling speaking in tongues. And this gift, the speaking in tongues, has become important in the Corinthian church. And as we will see, it has gone off the rails and it's turned into a major issue. This problem is, is that their speaking in these tongues is not building up the church. Meaning is being done in an unloving, uncontrolled way. In fact, it's being done to build up individuals. And so after setting up this framework in chapters 12 and 13 of service in the church, of purpose for all believers and of love, Paul now is going to embark on correcting this problem. We're going to see the first five verses that his main point is that spiritual gifts, especially and particularly in this passage, speaking in tongues are to be used to build up the body or what we may call edification of the church by pursuing love, not just the spiritual gifts, but love and the spiritual gifts together. Then secondly, he argues that spiritual gifts should be intelligible gifts. Meaning that they should be accessible and understandable. And thirdly, we're going to see Paul apply how they should be done in the church and their the effects of them in the church at the end. We see these things as main point. He's going to argue that the spiritual gifts should be for edification of the church. Secondly, they should be intelligible or I would say accessible and understandable. And thirdly, he's going to give the application and effect of speaking in tongues particularly. So let's embark on this together, not in this systematic exercise of if tongues continue, but instead how Paul is actually saying we should handle spiritual gifts. So we pick up in verse one, for Sue Love. and earnestly desire the spiritual gifts, especially that you may prophesy. For one who speaks in a tongue speaks not to men, but to God. For no one understands him, but he utters mysteries in the spirit. On the other hand, the one who prophesies speaks to God for their upbuilding and encouragement and consolation. The one who speaks in a tongue builds up himself, but the one who prophesies builds up the church now. I want you all to speak in tongues, but even more to prophesy. The one who prophesies is greater than the one who speaks in tongue unless someone interprets so that the church may be built up. Now, drawing back on what Paul has already said, he starts with pursue love, pursue love. This doesn't mean that they are not to continue to pursue spiritual gifts, but they are to not do that alone. They are to do it with love. In fact, based on the word order that we have here, you can see it in English, pursue love and earnestly desire spiritual gifts. Coupled with the order of chapter 12 and 13, we see that pursuing love first and foremost governs our pursuit of spiritual gifts. If you are pursuing spiritual gifts and work in the church outside of doing it for the love of the church body, you are doing it wrong. Paul makes that very clear. Pursue love and also desire these spiritual gifts. They don't go separate from each other. They must go together. And if they don't, we're going to see that we end up building up ourselves. Now, for the past few weeks, We've been looking at this section of scripture, 12, 13 and 14, these chapters that talk about spiritual gifts. And I know for a fact some of you haven't been here for all three of those sermons. So I want to take a moment to refresh our memories about what spiritual gifts are. We're supposed to pursue love alongside these gifts. What are these gifts? Wayne Grudem, and it's just my theology book, has a great definition. He's very good at taking these more complicated ideas and writing it in a way that all of us can understand. And he defines it this way. I think this is very good. A spiritual gift is any ability that is empowered by the Holy Spirit and used in any ministry of the church. This broad definition includes both gifts that are related to natural abilities, such as teachings showing mercy or administration, and gifts that seem to be more miraculous and less related to natural abilities. So he says now he would go on to say, and I would agree that not all natural abilities are necessarily spiritual gifts. For example, if you're a gifted NASCAR driver, that is a natural ability. That is not a spiritual gift. If you are a natural driver that can make it through Houston on a daily basis without getting killed, that is a good ability to have. But that is not necessarily a spiritual gift. Although some natural abilities tend to be used and empowered by the spirit in the church, such as teaching as an example or administration or leadership or showing mercy. Now, we do get several lists of spiritual gifts because some of you go, I don't know what this means as to which you want to have a definition. Well, we have in the New Testament several lists for us. In 1 Corinthians 12, verses 8-10, and then again in verse 28, Ephesians 4-11, Romans 12, 6-8, 1 Corinthians 7, verse 7, and 1 Peter 4-11 gives us lists of spiritual gifts. Now, these lists are all different. Not one of them contains all of the gifts, and some of those gifts that are given are expressed in several different ways. They look different in the way we apply them. I've condensed these lists together so you can just hear them. You can look them up later if you'd like. The list includes apostles, prophets, teachers, miracle workers, healings, helps, administration, tongues, words of wisdom, words of knowledge, faith, gifts of healing, prophecy, evangelists, pastor, teachers, serving, encouraging, contributing, leadership, mercy, marriage, celibacy. These are all in those lists. Now, those are all spiritual gifts, these gifts that are at working out into the body for a specific purpose of of building up the body. Now, with that in mind, we turn back to what Paul has said. Pursue love. Work on the wanting these gifts. But we have a problem, Corinth. We have a problem specifically with one gift, speaking in tongues has gone awry. So he's going to he covers this and and he contrasted with another gift prophecy, which in reformed circles, in my mind, is a very unfortunate two gifts to use because of many people feeling on these two things. But this is the contrast that he makes. And here is Paul's arguments. As we look at this argument, I want you to notice the example in which he is setting on how to deal with these matters, these matters of speaking in tongues, these matters of the way people are treating each other. He is being very pastoral. So pastors, elders pay close attention, men at home that are leading pay close attention, women at your house. Pay close attention. Teenagers, pay close attention. Everyone pay close attention to how he handles this. It is instructive to us all on the manner in which we are to handle these issues. Which will lead me to believe that the tone in the church in Corinth was very, very nasty. Paul could have easily criticized them harshly for their use of tongues. He could have laid it on him with harsh words and a tone which would tear them down to belittle them. He could have turned them into second tier Christians. He could have told them they're worthless, they don't really understand the gospel. These things that I've heard reformed folks say about other folks. These things that I've heard Baptists say about other folks and other conservative groups. But he doesn't do that. He doesn't write as if he's in the comments section in Facebook. He doesn't write as if he's in a Twitter battle. He isn't harsh or argumentative. And he only not only provides correction, but he demonstrates love as he corrects them. He tells them to pursue love. And then now he's also demonstrated and we need to see that. So this is Paul's arguments in a very loving way. He says. That speaking in tongues are not edifying because they are unintelligible, they are gibberish. Instead, Paul says we should he says, I hope that you would speak in prophecy instead, because that can be understood and can be helpful in building up the body. You see, the use of unintelligible speech is useless. It's useless in the church body, and Paul knows that when you're gathering together, you're not doing anything. It's useless. You might as well be speaking into the air. But. If you were to prophesy what she says would be beneficial for building up encouragement, consoling other people, this is a better way. So he's contrasting what he sees as a danger, a spiritual gift. He calls it a spiritual gift, a legitimate one, which most of us don't like to hear. He calls this a legitimate spiritual gift. At least at that time, we could talk about the other arguments of other things later. But he's saying this is a legitimate thing that has gone awry and it's not building up the church body. Therefore, you should be doing something instead that is useful. You should be speaking prophecy and encouraging one another or asking for someone who can interpret this tongue. And then it would be useful in the church. The context is that this is not happening in the church. Instead, it seems that people are showing up, they're speaking gibberish and in doing so, they aren't doing anything but building up themselves. And Paul is pointing out that this is not edifying the church. This is his main point. The thing you are doing, is not building up the body of Christ. I love how he doesn't say you're speaking in tongues wrong because we're not supposed to do that. He points to a deeper issue. You're doing this for the wrong reasons. I think it's interesting also, as he does this, he's pointing to the corporate nature of the church gatherings. Our gatherings are not supposed to be individualistic experiences in which we are trying to show off our skills. Instead, we are to be working to build up others as we interact with them. Edification of the church is an appropriate use of a gift of a spiritual gift. This is his main point, that the church should be built up. Let me ask you, when we pass tongues for a moment and just consider spiritual gifts in a general sense. Do you see spiritual gifts in this manner? Do you see that their use is not for your own good, but instead for the good of others? Maybe you know this, but you've never thought about it in this way before, but our gifts are gifts are to be used for the good of others, for the building up of the church and not for your building up of yourself. That's what others gifts are for, is to build you up. You see, you aren't merciful as a spiritual gift because it makes you feel better. You shouldn't be. You shouldn't be a teacher because it builds your own ego up. You shouldn't serve others in the hopes to gain standing in the church. Brothers and sisters, if your use of your spiritual gifting is for yourself, you don't have the attitude that Paul is arguing for here to the Corinthian church. Spiritual gifts are for the edification and the building of a church. Let me ask you again, do you see spiritual gifts in this manner? Or maybe you never thought about it before. Paul goes on, so he set up that this is the purpose of these spiritual gifts to edify the church body. And he goes on specifically talking about tongues, but this also will apply to other spiritual gifts. They are to be intelligible, meaning they should be understood and I think also accessible to other people. And he starts in verse six and says this. Now, brothers, if I come to you speaking in tongues, how will I benefit you unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? If even lifeless instruments such as the flute or the harp do not give distinct notes, how will anyone know what is being played? And if the bugle gives an indistinct sound, who will get ready for battle? So with yourselves, if your tongue you utter speech is not intelligible, how will you know what is said? You'll be speaking into the air. There are doubtless many different languages in the world, and none is without meaning. But if I do not know the meaning of the language, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker, a foreigner to me. So with yourselves, since you are eager for manifestations of the spirit, strive to excel in building up the church. So he continues his arguments. And he says that your gifts and specifically your tongues should be understandable. They should be able to be understood, and I would say the meaning behind them accessible to the church. And Paul uses the example of musical instruments. He says, if musical instruments make indistinct notes, how are you going to understand the music? How are you supposed to understand what's being conveyed to the music? If you don't think music conveys or doesn't tell a story, then read about it or listen to classical music. It's fantastic in that way. Paul says, How are you supposed to understand the music? Also, if a bugle doesn't make a distinct and discernible sound, how will people know to get ready for battle? In the same way, if you speak with tongues that are understood, how are people supposed to be built up? They won't. That's Paul's point. If what is said is not intelligible, People will not be able to understand and be built up. You might as well just be speaking into the air. It's wasted. Completely wasted. Now. After he gets done with this music, he says. That if tongues are understood. Then the people in the church become foreigners to each other. It's very interesting to me, because what is the church supposed to be like? Not foreigners, but family, brothers and sisters. He's used this over and over. Now, brothers, I speak to you in this way, beloved. And now he's saying the opposite, that you will be foreigners to each other. This spiritual gift does not bring you together. But now he's saying it does the opposite. It tears you apart. You're driven apart from each other. And this is not what is supposed to be happening in the church. There should not be separated parts in the church, but one diverse body brought together by Christ. He says speaking in these unintelligible tongues does the opposite of that. It drives a wedge in the church and sends people apart. So. He is clear here, he's making his argument that they should not be speaking in tongues and they should not be using more generally their spiritual gifts in a way that drive people apart. And then he says opposite of that, the very end. Strive to excel in building up the church. Strive to excel in building up the church, not strive to excel to speak in tongues, not strive to excel to be a good teacher, not strive to excel to be great at mercy, strive to excel in building up the church. Brothers and sisters, do you do this? Is this your mindset when you come together with the beloved? Do you work in your spiritual gifting to strive, to excel, to build up this local body? Or do you completely ignore your gifts altogether? Do you ignore places to serve in this church? Do you ignore places to build up this church because you're not thinking about a way to excel, to be good at building up the body? Or maybe you have an area of gifting that you know you're gifted. This is a spiritual gift that you know you have. And that need is being met in the church. Do you maybe, instead of excelling to build up the church, refuse to serve in another area? I'm not gifted in that. I can't do that. When we all have multiple places we can serve, because we have that attitude, our our desire then is not to actually build up the body, but to do what we want to do. Maybe. You haven't ever even stopped to consider if your efforts in the church are actually building up the body. Let me encourage you, based on what we've seen in chapter 12 and 13, brothers and sisters, you are needed here at GRBC. We are all parts of the body working to contribute. We tell you, encourage you in this, the Lord has not only gifted you with the gift, but he has empowered you to be able to use that to build up the body. You have the Holy Spirit residing in you. You have the ability not only of yourself, but because you have been redeemed by Christ and the spirit in you, you now have the ability to participate in building up the church. You have the living God. The third person of the Trinity dwelling inside you, you have this ability. Are you using it for that? Are you using it to build up the church body? Are you withholding this gift from the church years ago? A friend from seminary that was asked to plan a church and or be part of it. And I knew the other guy planning and he decided not to be part of it and for various reasons. But one of the guy that was doing the main planning said, you know, I asked him, how long will you withhold the gift that you've been given by God from the church? And that has haunted me for years. How long? Let me ask you this. How long will you withhold the gifts that God has given you from the church? Let me encourage you to strive and excel using those gifts to build up the body. Now, Paul finishes, which is what I will call application of when you apply these things to the local church, what happens. And then maybe the effects of that. We start in verse 13. Therefore, one who speaks in a tongue should pray for the power to interpret. For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful. What am I to do? I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also. I will sing praise with my spirit, but I will sing with my mind also. Otherwise, if you get things with your spirit, how can anyone in the position of an outsider say amen to your Thanksgiving when he does not know what you were saying? For you may be giving thanks well enough, but the other person is not being built up. I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you. Nevertheless, in church, I would rather speak five words in my mind in order to instruct others than ten thousand words in a tongue. The effect of unintelligible speaking in tongues is that no one is built up. Therefore, be intelligible, is what Paul is saying. Be intelligible. They can't understand, they won't be built up. And maybe you've experienced, I know you have, you have experienced, I'm confident of this, you have been in a place and experienced someplace where you didn't understand the language. If it wasn't in another country, in another culture, maybe it was in a classroom. or in a work setting or in a doctor's office where someone was speaking and you may even spoke the same language, but you had no idea what they were talking about. I've been in some of those meetings at work, I have been in doctor's offices and doctors and nurses talking, I had no clue what they were saying. It was English. I didn't understand it. I wasn't built up, I didn't know what was going on. Paul saying it's like that, if you're speaking unintelligibly, no one will understand. So be intelligible. He's clearly instructing them to stop speaking in tongues unless translated, because it's not useful to the church body. Now, we at GRVC don't have a problem. I don't think with around, no one's jumped up. We don't have a problem with people standing up and speaking in unintelligible tongues. I'm very encouraged that we have last count seven languages spoken in this church. I think that's I think that's really cool. We don't have this gibberish, as Paul's saying, that no one can interpret being spoken, building people up in the church. I don't see people coming in week in and week out trying to show off their spiritual superiority by speaking in some babbling, unintelligible tongue, but Do we have similar problems with other gifts? I've already asked you if you saw your spiritual gift as a selfish act, which is not the proper use. I've asked you if you think about excelling and building up the body or if you ignore your gifting completely. As we see Paul's words here about being intelligible, I think we must ask ourselves, If we have been using a spiritual gift in a way that is a detriment to the body. Most people would say you can't do that spiritual gifts are for the ministry of the church, but it's clear here in the text that speaking in tongues is being used in detriment to the church body. So I would think, based on his argumentation, that spiritual gifts can be used sinfully for the detriment of the body. Have you ever tried to force a gift upon the church in a way that is actually not edified the body? This doubt, this no doubt happens when we are excited about serving the body, but we don't actually examine to see if our application of the gifts has done or is doing damage or if it's not building up the body at all. Maybe it's not damaging. It just has no effect of building up the body. They give you some examples, teaching or trying to encourage or talking with people in a way that's unintelligible, meaning that you are completely over their heads without concern that they don't know what you're talking about. That is unintelligible speech, teaching without perception or I will say trying to encourage or talking to people without perception as to the needs of that person or the church. But instead, just going right on in with what you want is not helpful, nor is it understood. It's not intelligible to people. Maybe in an effort to be merciful, you have become a burden to the person you're trying to provide mercy to. I've seen this happen. Folks want to help and they end up being more of a hindrance to the person they're trying to help than actually helping. We're so excited to do this, we don't pay attention to what's going on. Maybe there's leadership that leads people away from the gospel. Not only in the church leadership, but leadership in the home, leadership in organizations and other places, leadership is is a is a specifically listed gift that can be used to not build up the body, but to pull people away from the gospel. Or maybe You like to serve other people because when you serve other people, you look good in the church. Everyone knows that you will serve them and you like it. You like people calling on you. You like knowing that you're the one who does the service with no regard to if it's actually helpful or not. Or maybe your words of knowledge and encouragement actually intimidate or tear down others instead of building them up through love. And you don't even realize it because you're so gung ho and using a spiritual gift that you pursued it without love. And you've done it in a way that is, I'll say, unintelligible. No one is in understanding what's what you're trying to do. In fact, you're hurting the body. The brothers and sisters, Paul, big concern here isn't necessarily it's partial. It is the use of speaking in tongues. But bigger than that, he's speaking about the use of spiritual gifts. We in conservative American reformed Baptist churches and I just got really narrow. Back up, we in conservative churches, I'll just leave it blank, reformed or not. We like to make these sections about speaking in tongues and prophecy, and there's there's information to be gleaned from that. We'll continue to talk about that. And that's helpful information. But the bigger concern that Paul has is that the church would be building each other up using the gifts that we have been given in a way that edifies and builds up the church. If you see if you don't see that today, you've missed Paul's point to Corinth. I want to close. was a quote that Michael three weeks ago from John Piper. So I was listening to his sermon, we were gone to the ministry when I got back to listen to it. He read this quote, I emailed him and asking for it because I thought it was Piper did a very good job of explaining the use of spiritual gifts. And this is what Piper says. We are recipients of grace. It is our duty to distribute the grace to others. The vehicle by which we make these disbursements is our spiritual gift. They are the abilities by which we receive the grace of God and disperse that grace to others. Faith is what the house owner wants in all his stewards. And grace is the only currency that can purchase faith. Faith feeds on grace and is strengthened by grace. God gives us His grace in Christ. Then we, in the exercise of our spiritual gifts, disperse that grace to others and thus feed their faith. It is the free and precious grace that strengthens the heart in faith. Brothers and sisters. Christ has died on our behalf. And we have received grace through faith so that we can walk by faith, and part of that is loving on the church. You can't do that apart from Christ's work, apart from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. Many of you, I know, are doing these things. You're exercising your gifts in encouragement and building up of this church body. Let me encourage you to keep on doing that. For those of you who have never thought about this, let me encourage you to go to find ways To seek, to walk out your faith and to encourage this church body. To build and to strengthen it through your spiritual gifts. I'll close this last sentence. So, church body, go. Disperse faith to others through the gifts. These vehicles that you have been given are God's trust that you can do it because he has given you the gift to do it with. Let us pray. Father, we are thankful that you. Not only have found it good to save us. And to allow us to have communion with you through the work of Jesus. But you find it good and pleasing. To to have us participate with you in your body. Father, I find this completely baffling that you would trust me, that you would trust us as a church. to be part of your work in this kingdom. That you would not only allow, but that you would desire for us to be a part of your work. Father, we ask that you would strengthen us in the spirit so that we would want to build up this church body, that we would want to use our gifts in a way that is edifying, in a way that builds up our brethren. Father, I ask that when we come here, that you would always make us reminded that you would put it on the forefront of our minds to serve others and to build them up. And Father, when we are down, we are in the pits of despair. We are depressed. We feel so far from you. We ask that you would provide dear brothers and sisters in this congregation to exercise their gifts and building us up. When we struggle in this life, when we struggle dealing with the culture, we struggle with different difficult things in our marriages and with our children, with our co-workers, with our neighbors. We ask that you would bring willing and loving and capable brothers and sisters to come alongside us, not foreigners who drive us away. But loved ones who draws closer to you. Father, we ask that you would do this work among us. We pray all of these things in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.