We are so grateful for our church family, and we celebrate the stories of how God has brought us together, what Jesus has done in our lives. We are also a church family with many international partners. We have about 40, and sometimes they are here to join us, and even traveling from overseas. The Keysweathers are here this weekend, and if they're here right now, they can stand up, but that's Matthew and Grace, Elliot, Aubrey, and Jack over here, and we welcome them. They will be in the lobby after the service. Matthew is from grace, and then he became a youth pastor in the sound. And then together as a family, they sense God's call, and they are in Southern Europe, and they are serving refugees. Many people are coming up from Northern Africa, and they're able to care for people, build relationships, pray with people, and also lead people to Jesus. And they're saying yes to God's call on their lives. And that's what we all want to be doing, whether we're in Auburn or overseas, we're all doing that together. We're so grateful for your ministry that we get to partner together. And then our church family, literally, we're ascending church going around the world as bringing the love and light of Jesus wherever we go. So can we give it up again for their ministry and what's happening there? In this series, 12 Weeks of Unity, we're taking 12 weeks and each week focusing on a different element of unity. Today, unity with humility. We're also diving into scripture and looking at different relationships in the Bible. Today, Eli and Samuel and their relationship in the context that that came out of, we're gonna see unity and humility together with them. As we go through the 12 Weeks of Unity, we have 12 devotions. Yes, as a church, we just had 28 days of hope, and every day there was a devotion, a video, a chance to get into scripture together. Amazing stories of how that's happening with friends, with family, with roommates, kids, parents, grandparents, getting together, praying, and getting into scripture. During this series, we wanted to continue that, and that's why we have once a week a devotion and a video, and you can call it Hope Wednesdays. We've highlighted Hope Wednesdays because that's a middle-of-the-week rhythm, and you can access these devotions by texting the word UNITE to our church phone number or going to the website justchoosehope.org. Also on our Facebook page, you'll see different staff sharing from Scripture and praying as well. just more opportunities that we don't just wanna worship Jesus on Sunday mornings, but all during the week, abiding with Jesus together and experiencing more unity. That's our prayer as we walk through this series. We're also gonna be praying for a different church as we continue to pray for all the churches in the sound, but highlight a different church to pray for today, Life Center in Tacoma, and we wanna lift them up in prayer as well. Just another way that we could intentionally unite. Let's go to the Lord in prayer. Father, we give you praise that you are so good and you're worthy of our praise. Father, we worship you in spirit and in truth today. And we thank you that you care so much about us. We thank you that along our journey, God, your grace and presence makes all the difference. As we walk through 12 weeks of unity, we pray for healing, God, and comfort that would come from you. Father, we lift up today churches across the sound and pray specifically for Life Center in Tacoma, that many would grow in their faith today. Many would be encouraged. People would come to know you through this church. Bless Pastor Tyler and all of their leadership teams. God, that they would be united, that they would be glorifying you. And we thank you, God, how they are continuing to share scripture and their lives across the city of Tacoma. Father, I pray that our ears would be open today as you communicate to us with your voice. It's the only voice we want. And we receive today all that you have for us. And we thank you for your overflowing hope. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Jesus prayed for our complete unity, not a partial unity. He looked ahead from John chapter 17 is where we read his longest prayer. He prayed for believers that would come. And in John chapter 17 verse 23, this is his prayer. I in them and you in me. So they may be brought to complete unity. Then the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me. Unity glorifies God. Unity brings joy. And when we're united, two things happen. One, we know how loved we are from God, and God's love comes through other people as well. We experience that love. And then second, as we're united, the world sees Jesus in us. When we have strife and division and gossip and slander, the world doesn't see Jesus. But when we come together with different personalities and ethnicities, and we come together and we drop our pride and our logos and egos, and we gather together as one, the world pays attention, takes notice and says, what's happening over there? What is that unity? And they see Jesus in our unity. For that to happen, we need to be intentional. We need to guard the unity that God gives us, and we need to choose hope, and we need to choose humility. Humility and hope come together. We see this in Ephesians chapter four, starting in verse two, and let's all say these words together from scripture. Let's encourage each other by saying these out loud. Be completely humble and gentle. Be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the spirit through the bond of peace. There is one body and one spirit, just as you were called to one hope when you were called. One Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. Can't you hear that unity in the room? When we focus on Jesus, then we focus on God, we come together united. We will come closer together the more we have our eyes on Jesus. And we declare this truth together. What is humility? Humility is the opposite of arrogance. Humility is the opposite of pride. Humility, and this is where I differ with the definition I saw online. The definition I read is that humility is having a very low view of yourself. And I disagree with that because humility is not about guilt and shame. Humility is not about denying the truth that all of us are made in God's image, that all of us are loved by God. So instead of humility being down on yourself, which I don't think it is, I would say humility is actually having an accurate view of yourself. No one too inflated, no one too deflated. and we know how great God is, and we're designed to worship God, and then we walk humbly with God, secure in his love, and yet knowing we've all sinned, and the only reason that we have this forgiveness is through the grace of Jesus, and so we receive that forgiveness, and we walk humbly with God, and we love our neighbor as ourselves. Humility is very important, not just to think about, but also to live out together. We need a fresh vision of humility and biblical humility. When we talk about uniting, we're talking about healing. Amen? Where there's no division, there's a need for healing. Two people can't walk together unless they agree. A house divided cannot stand. For there to be renewal and restoration and healing, we need God's touch and God's help to lead us. And when you think about how God works, he's the God of hope, he wants to fill us to overflowing, and he works on many levels at the same time. During his 12 weeks of unity, think about these four levels. God of hope works through our hearts, then our homes, then our church, and then our city. God begins with our hearts, and it doesn't stop there. As God changes our hearts, now our families start to change and heal, and there's transformation. And now our church family. And then we can't contain his hope in the walls of the church. There's an overflow that goes out into the city. Notice how God moves on many levels. This is unity with a purpose. There's a lot of unity that's centered around sin. In our lives, in our culture right now, people gather together around sin to do sin, to talk about sin, to celebrate sin. That's not the unity we're talking about. Unity with purpose. As God moves, we wanna have a greater desire for unity. It begins in the heart. The Holy Spirit gives us the ability to be united, but we have to desire unity. Unity is gonna include relationship risks. And this unity with a purpose, It's about our own growth and becoming more like Jesus. Philippians chapter two, verses three to five, we think about the Lord and we redo nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Well, what's the other option? Rather, in humility, value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests, but each of you to the interests of others. And the next verse says, your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus. Is your attitude like Jesus? That's the goal. We become more like Jesus. Our attitude is like Jesus. We have the mind of Christ, and that's when our relationships will start to change. In the Greek culture, Humility was thought of as something very undesirable. Only the slaves... have humility, and they look down upon the slaves, his second rate. Jesus redeemed this aspect of humility, that it's noble, that it's good. He didn't come to be served, but to serve, and he turned the culture upside down. People didn't know what to do, that the Savior would wash feet. The people didn't understand why he would leave heaven and come to earth. And how does it add up that a sinless Savior would go to the cross and literally become sin for us? This is the humility of Christ. Take Philippians chapter two, spend time there this week, just meditate on the words and the humility of Jesus, as together we wanna become more like Christ. There's an aspect of humility that is not appealing, and your flesh doesn't wanna be humble. We all want to be self-sufficient, self-reliant, and unintentionally become full of ourselves, which is the opposite of humility. Why is humility not popular? Because sometimes it's painful and they're serving and there's sacrifice involved with humility. I'll say this, if you wanna be humble, you're gonna need to be secure. Insecure people are not humble. You need a security that precedes the humility in three ways. First of all, a secure identity. Jesus knows who he is. And we know who we are and whose we are in Christ. We have an identity that's secure. We are forgiven, we are loved, we're in God's family forever. When you know who you are, now you're ready to be humble. Because you're secure in your identity, you're not trying to prove and impress. You know who you are, you know whose you are. That's a first security is your identity. A second security is your purpose. You know why you're here on earth. Jesus didn't come to be served, but to serve. So when you're in your family, when you're in your church family, when you're in your city, you recalibrate your thinking. I'm not here to be served. I'm here to roll up my sleeves and serve other people. You are secure in your purpose. And when you're not treated that well while you're serving, you know why you're doing this. It's because God's called you to serve. You have that security and you continue and don't give up even when it's not easy. And the third security, in addition to your identity and your purpose, are your rewards. Do you ever wonder why in scripture does God keep saying, I'll reward you, I'll reward you, I'll reward you. For faithfulness, I reward you. There's gonna be massive rewards, eternal rewards. Why does he keep saying that? Because God doesn't miss one way that you serve. God has never missed a serving word, a serving action, a serving attitude. God doesn't miss it and he's gonna reward you abundantly. Well, why is that important? Because sometimes on earth, we don't have many rewards and no one sees and notices and appreciates. And if you get stuck on that, like, well, why don't I have more applause? Why don't I have more approval? Why don't I have more people rewarding me for what I've done? Why don't I have a promotion? Why don't I have more pay? Why don't I have this title? I want more. You just need to slow down and say, wait a second, I don't want everything on this earth. My heavenly father says, great is your reward in heaven. I'm strong enough to wait and I'll keep serving until that day because I'm trusting God. You need security before you have humility. If you don't have security in your identity, purpose and rewards, you might not be that humble and you might overextend or get worn out and simply quit and give up and forget our good Heavenly Father. Let's not do that, church. What blocks unity? Because all of us would say unity is good. We want unity. And most of us probably today are saying, yeah, biblical humility is also very good. So what is it that blocks this unity? The number one unity blocker is pride. If you see strife, if you see division, you will see pride. Pride divides families. We will not have unity until we drop the pride. You can't just gloss over this. Pride divides families. Humility brings unity. That's always true in every nation and generation. So let's think through a family in the Bible, and we're gonna start with Eli, who was a priest. He was moral, he was godly, he loved serving God, but he lost control of his family, and specifically, he had sons that rebelled and went astray. We don't have all of the details, but different Bible commentaries will point out that Eli was probably passive. Note, passivity is not humility. Some people think getting very passive and retreating, oh, that's humility. No, passivity is not the same thing as humility. And he was a dad who was probably passive. His son started one degree off. didn't really speak up, sons kept drifting, and over time, if you're one degree off, it can get pretty ugly down the road. And that's what happened with his sons. They ended up feeling kind of entitled, as they were Eli's sons, and they were also serving in the temple. Now, 1 Samuel chapter two, starting in verse 12, gives us a picture of what was happening. Eli's sons were scoundrels. They had no regard for the Lord. When you lose a fear of the Lord, you will drift in all sorts of ways. Fear the Lord, honor and respect the Lord, and then you will walk in the light. So they lost an honor and respect of the Lord. Verse 17, we read this. The sin of the young men was very great in the Lord's sight, for they were treating the Lord's offering with contempt. People were bringing their offering to the Lord, and their sons were saying, thank you very much, we'll take that. They didn't offer it up to the Lord, they took the big offerings for themselves. Well, what else? Verse 22. We continue to read more of the story. Now, Eli, who was very old, heard about everything his sons were doing to all Israel and how they slept with the women who served at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting. Not only were they stealing the offerings, they were sleeping with the women who were serving God. So he said to them, why do you do such things? I hear from all the people about these wicked deeds of yours. Know, my sons, the report I hear spreading among the Lord's people is not good. Everyone else recognized the condition of the heart of the sons. Dad was kind of the last one, it looks like, to kind of hear about and say something and do something. And so he does rebuke the sons, and that's what they needed, a rebuke. But at this point, their hearts are so hard, they're not gonna just say, okay, sure, Dad, I hear the rebuke and I'm coming back to the Lord. Their hearts were hard, and God actually brought judgment there. and there was no change, God rejected them. Look at 1 Samuel 2, verses 34 and 35. This is humbling. And what happens to your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, will be a sign to you. They will both die on the same day. And that's what happened, Eli's sons died. Then God says, I will raise up for myself a faithful priest who will do according to what is in my heart and mind. I will firmly establish his priestly house and they will minister before my anointed one always. When someone's in rebellion and has many chances to repent and refuses to repent, sometimes they're gonna end up in prison or even dead. And they're on that path of rebellion. When there's a rebellious heart, God gives many warnings, but then also God will set times in the Bible where he'll say, no more. And he will reject that person in that office and replace that person with someone else. Why does God do it? Because God sees and knows the heart. And God is always looking at the heart. Now you have Saul, who's the first king, and he rebels against God. And then God surprises everyone by choosing one of Jesse's sons, David, that's overlooked. And God knows David's heart. God will raise up David. David will be a king who after many bad decisions is going to repent and be a man after God's own heart. You see it here that God's gonna raise up Samuel instead of Eli's sons because they choose rebellion. God raises up Samuel to be devoted and honor God because God sees Samuel's heart. In Jesus's time, the Pharisees and the Sadducees, the religious leaders were corrupt and hypocrisy. They fooled the people on the outside. They were full of dead man bones on the inside and God raised up everyday people and fishermen. Why? Because he saw their hearts. And God always sees the heart and the corruption. And yes, he's patient. And yes, he gives warnings, but there comes times where God just says, no more of this. I'm gonna move you out of the way and bring someone else in who will honor and glorify me. God's doing that, I believe, in our own country in many ways right now. God is moving on many levels. And you read this text and you think, wait a second, that doesn't sound like a good Father's Day text. I mean, the kids rebel and now they're died and what else happened? Here's the truth we learn from this is that God will honor those who honor God. He says this, it's true for eternity. I will honor those who honor me. And one of the best decisions you can make in humility is that we are gonna honor God because pride divides and humility is what's needed for unity. Now, that's true in the story here with Eli the priest. I also wanna think about church families, not just biological families. Sometimes there'll be a conflict in a church family and everyone's affected and everyone knows and everyone's heart is broken and everyone's just thinking like, come on, you guys be humble and let's get this right. Well, in the letter of the church, and these are the Philippians, and the New Testament's full of epistles, which is letters. God used Paul to write them to many real communities, real churches. The Ephesians had a strong church, a solid church, a healthy church, but they also had this conflict. In Philippians chapter four, verse two, Paul writes, I plead with Uodia and I plead with Syntyche to be of the same mind in the Lord. to come together instead of the strife, to come together and be of the same mind, be focused on Jesus and forgive each other, be reconciled, be restored. Now, why is that important? Well, it teaches us about conflict. My guess is that Uotian Syntyche had no idea how much it affected their church family, that they continued to dig their heels in and have pride and just try to prevail over the other person. You know, that's true in our biological families, that's true in our church family. We have no idea the ripples and the trauma of the strife, the unnecessary strife that we choose and because of pride, we stay in. Jesus forgave us, we forgive one another. Now, when you think about us reading that today, wouldn't you agree that Uotian Syntyche would be shocked that here we are this many years later, couple thousand years later, and we're still talking about Uotian Syntyche, that they are written down in the eternal word of God, and the only mention of them is this conflict that everyone's trying to help them work through. You know what conflict ends up doing? It ends up defining us and leaving a legacy that we never wanted. And we don't realize when we're in it, how far this conflict goes. I remember when my greater extended family all got together, but then conflict happened. That just never happens anymore. That kind of conflict affects generations, not just the immediate family. So we learn from this, to be humble, to drop our pride and our egos, and to treat one another as Christ treats us. Don't treat people as they treat you. That's gonna mess you up. Make the basis be, how does Jesus treat me? And with compassion and forgiveness, because Jesus treats me this way, now I'm gonna treat you different. Not because of who you are and what you've done, not because you've apologized. I'm deciding before you apologize, because the basis is Christ, not you. That's the growing up spiritually, a maturity that the Philippians, and especially Woody and Sintke, need to choose. What about denominations? Have you ever noticed how many denominations we have in one city? Does anyone think that is just a wonderful thing? Is anyone just sit back and go, oh, I see that from scripture. Have all the different denominations, don't talk to each other, and then just stay in your own lane. Everybody be a silo. I just can't find that in scripture. So how do we get there? What happened? Petty things became massive things. and sometimes they were theological, there's a difference, a dispute over one of the minors of the faith, and other times it was personal in church history, and sometimes it was both, a little bit of theological, a little bit of personal, and then we end up with all these different, and here's the sin, the sin is one denomination looking at other denominations, and as there's that split and that strife and a little bit of hatred in there, they end up looking back and saying, we are so much more holy than you. We are so much better than you. Our denomination is superior, and then all the other denominations second-rate Christians. Do you hear any humility in that? Is that not just drenched with irony and pride and self-righteousness? Well, what's it gonna take? Humility, repentance. Here's the truth, we are all equal. In this room, all ages, all ethnicities, all educational backgrounds, all financial situations, all jobs and titles. The truth is in God's eyes, we are all equal. We need to see ourselves as God sees us. We need to see each other as God sees us. There needs to be a recalibration, aligned with scripture, aligned with heaven. God changes our hearts, and part of this is gonna be humility. Now, what about something simple that pride can destroy? What about church softball? Anyone ever play on a church softball team, a church softball league? I mean, you're laughing already because you know, it sounds like, oh, simple, church softball, who wouldn't have a good time? Until someone starts hitting some home runs and boasting. And then someone else makes some errors and everyone else in the team is talking about how did they get on the team? They need to practice more. And now we've got some division on the team. And then, well, what happens after that? The umpire starts making bad calls. And then someone who's probably frustrated at home and work decides to take it out on the umpire. And now he's yelling expletives. And now a few more people start yelling at the umpire. And the rest of the team's looking like, what are you guys doing? This is the name of our church. a Christian league, what's happening here? And there gets more tension. And then the other team says, you guys, don't yell at the refs and the umps. And then what happens? Now we're yelling with the other team. And this whole brouhaha, I never say that word, but let's keep that in the church softball lane. This whole brouhaha breaks out. And you're like, I thought we were playing church softball. Pride divides on every level. And you say, how do we get here? There won't be unity until there's humility. And where are we gonna find humility? The Trinity. Father, Son, Holy Spirit, perfect unity, perfect community, perfect humility. We're made in God's image. Let's learn from our maker. Let's glorify him. Where are we gonna have unity? When we come back to scripture. When we come back to scripture, be kind and gentle with one another, be humble with one another, forgive one another as Christ forgives you. We need to come back to God, come back to scripture, come back to humility, come back to unity and give God the praise for how he'll restore and revive what has been full of strife. Humility is strong. The humility that comes from God is strong. It changes lives. And the more teachable you are, be teachable. It'll accelerate your faith and development. I can tell you how fast you're gonna grow spiritually once I know how teachable you are. I can tell anyone how much they're gonna mature in the faith. It just comes down to how teachable you are with God. The more teachable you are, the faster you grow. I've seen people grow more in one year than 40 years. It's not about how long. It's not about how many sermons you sit through. It's not about how many Bible studies you do. It's about your heart and being teachable with Jesus. And that's what's gonna be the determining factor with your humility, your unity, your relationships. Now, Eli, we talked about him waiting too long, being too passive, right? Come on, dad, get engaged, train your kids spiritually. Well, this is what happened afterwards, which is great. And look at this pivot. Now he's a spiritual dad to Samuel. Samuel is now in the temple and he's gonna train Samuel. We have a lot of dads in this room that are spiritual dads, that you found someone to mentor, disciple. You're pouring in your life to help them to walk with Jesus. It's so commendable. And maybe you bounce back from some things you learned as a dad. None of us can go back to the past. Samuel here, he's gonna learn from Eli. Eli can't live in the past. He can't go back with his two sons, but he can go forward and he can make a difference for God's kingdom going forward. And what is he gonna teach Samuel? He's gonna teach him how to listen to God. That's one of the most important things in our relationship with God, how to listen to God. Samuel doesn't really know. He's kind of confused. He's not sure. And Eli is gonna walk him through this. 1 Samuel 3, verse 10. The Lord came and stood there, calling, as at the other times, Samuel, Samuel. Then Samuel said, speak, for your servant is listening. How did Samuel get to that point? Eli taught Samuel to listen to God. You need to be still. Just be silent. Stop striving. Surrender and just say, here I am, God, what are you saying? And Samuel listened, he was teachable and he learned how to hear God. Now, every time we open up the Scripture, we're listening to God. God communicates through His Word. We're so grateful for the Word of God. God continues to communicate to us personally, and the Holy Spirit helps us as we read Scripture. There are also many times when you're going to be in a situation and there's no Bible verse that's going to tell you specifically what to do. What do we do? We lean in and listen to God. Jesus says, my sheep know my voice. They don't want to listen to a stranger. They want the good shepherd. We listen to the Holy Spirit. We listen to God's still small voice because in ministry, in parenting, in your job, there's going to be split second decisions. And you're going to say, God, please give me wisdom. And you're going to listen. And God's gonna guide you and provide and empower you and you get tuned in. And the more you hear from God, the more you wanna hear from God, you start to value his voice. You start to savor his voice. You know it can be trusted. You know it's full of wisdom and you're tuned in during the day and it makes all the difference. Samuel listens to God and it makes all the difference. He is faithful. In chapter three, verses 19 to 21, we read, the Lord was with Samuel as he grew up and he let none of Samuel's words fall to the ground. And all Israel from Dan to Beersheba recognized that Samuel was attested as a prophet of the Lord. The Lord continued to appear at Shiloh and there he revealed himself to Samuel through his word. God will confine it in those who fear him, who honor him. And this is what happened, because Samuel listened well, he spoke well. When you listen well to God, you will speak well. Listening precedes speaking. If you stop listening to God during the day, during the stressful moments, you will start speaking things that you would like to pull back later. But Samuel listened to God so his words were trustworthy and he was faithful in his generation. The one who listens to God then speaks for God. And people recognize that Samuel's in step with God. Listening is so important. When you listen, you'll be full of truth and hope and wisdom. and peace. Chapter 7, verse 12, we get another glimpse of Samuel's life, and this is near the end of his life. Samuel took a stone and set it up between Mizpah and Shen. He named it Ebenezer, saying, thus far the Lord has helped us. we sing about in some songs. Ebenezer, what is that? The rock of God's help, the stone of God's help. Yes, the Israelites were attacked and the Philistines were coming, but Samuel prayed and God rescued the people. And Samuel had that rock, this stone of God's help. He knew God is the one that gets the glory. The battle belongs to the Lord. It wasn't his prayers. It wasn't his fasting. It's not because he's a prophet. God intervened. And then we also read this in verse 15. He was faithful. And even to his final day, Samuel continued as Israel's leader all the days of his life. From year to year, he went on a circuit from Bethel to Gilgal to Mizpah, judging Israel and all those places. But he always went back to Ramah, where his home was. And there he also held court for Israel, and he built an altar there to the Lord. 50 miles in circumference, he kept running the race, encouraging, strengthening, helping people return to God, leading people to God, running that race. I encourage you today to run the race marked out for you. Your race is different. Samuel's race, he ran it with all God's strength. Run your race humbly with all God's strength. Don't be too concerned about someone else's race. Keep your eyes on Jesus and run your race. The people were fickle during Samuel's day, but Samuel was persistent and consistent with God. God is calling you to go deeper. God is calling you to be humble. God is calling you to be faithful. Don't settle for less than that. We're inspired by Samuel, his prayers of his mother, Hannah, the mentorship of Eli, and he's shining a light in a dark situation. Continue to shine your light for the Lord. If you want to make a difference, you're going to need to be different. A lot of people say, I want to make a difference in this world. I want to see lives change. If you want to make a difference, you need to be different than this culture. Not too many people are slowing down right now. Not too many people are listening to God. Not too many people are saying, God, I'm just here to serve you. God, I'm tuned in. What do you want today? What do you want me to say and do? You're gonna be different before you do something. Being precedes doing. Abide with Jesus and you will bear much fruit. And Samuel was someone who lived that out. You know, humility is always noticeable. I played a lot of sports teams, and in every locker room, you ask the guys in the team, they'll just tell you, yep, those ones are humble, those ones are full of themselves. Everyone on the team knows, it's not a mystery. It's not a mystery. It's not a mystery in your family. who's humble, who's full of themselves. It's not a mystery in a church family, who's humble, who's full of themselves. It's never a mystery, it's never hidden from God. Choose humility, choose hope, choose the way of Jesus. Jesus is the way, you'll never regret it. You'll never look back and say, oh man, being humble, that was the wrong way to go on that one. Really messed up right there. That's never gonna happen. So humility is the lens through which people see Jesus in you. How are people gonna see Jesus in you? It'll be through the lens of humility I brought a visual today and I brought this camera and I think I know how to open it Photography is not my strength, but there's a couple things to learn from this camera. Now. There's two different parts here We've got the camera the body and the lens which one costs more. I The lens, the lens, 1045 is a smart crowd right here. The lens costs a lot more. What does that tell us? The lens is costly and humility is costly. A lot of people don't choose humility because humility is a costly. Think about Jesus, not only leaving heaven to coming to earth, but on the cross, no one has ever been more humble than Jesus. There's no greater demonstration of humility. Was that easy on the cross? No, humility was to lay his life down. Humility is costly. Unity is costly. There's value in the lens that exceeds the camera. Also, there's different types of lenses. There's a fixed lens, and then there's a zoom lens. A fixed lens might be 50 millimeters, but a zoom lens could be everything from 24 to 30 to 40 to 60 to 70 millimeters. There's a big difference between a fixed lens and a zoom lens. A fixed lens has one setting to focus. A lot of people have humility in one setting. They've got humility mastered in one setting. You meet them at church, they're a whole lot different than when you go to their house. They have humility mastered when people are watching, but no one's watching, oh, the humility doesn't work anymore. Be more like the Zoom in a lot of different settings. The humility of God, where you live, work, learn, or play, when people are watching and they're not watching, don't just be fixed on one setting. Well, what else? The lens is valuable, and for that reason, you don't want any dust on your lens. Now, there's a lens cap. You can take that off, and it protects the lens. The cap protects the lens. I'm gonna reattach this, because I don't want this being open for very long. Dust gets on the lens. In our lives, humility, that's when people see Jesus, because when you're the most humble, that's when you're most like Jesus. And people see Jesus in your humility. But what happens in our life? Dust gets on the lens. And when dust gets on the lens, people are a little bit confused because I see some Jesus there, but then I see a lot of dust there. And what do you need to do when there's a lot of dust on your lens? Clean it off, get it right, repent, apologize. Some of us, we've taken the cap off and we lost the cap. We're just doing life like this and the dust is getting thick. We need to find that cap, set that limit, get that boundary, get that accountability, and make sure that the lens is clear because it's gonna be through the lens of humility that people see Jesus in you. Now, Let's take it one step further with the lens, and let's go to a lighthouse. There's an incredible invention, the Fresnel lens. And this lens, as you look at it, the glass has specialty cuts, hundreds of specialty cuts. Why? Because without those specialty cuts, the light would be scattered. But with all those strategic pieces, the light comes together as one beam. Now think about your own life. Every small thing, my Scottish coach used to say, ah, it's the we things. It's the small things. That decision to pray, that decision to forgive, that decision to start reading the Bible every day, that decision to serve, that decision to, and all those little things, they build up a stronger light. You are the light of the world, and when you make decisions that are right, the small things, there ends up being a massive light. Now think about the body of Christ. Alone, we can only shine the light so far. But together, when we are united, there is one beam that's very strong. We need all of the body of Christ. That Fresnel lens isn't just five or 10. When the entire, the specialty cuts come together, when the body comes together, there is a light that shines in the darkness that the sound can't help but notice because the light of Jesus is now going into the dark places. And when you take a Fresnel lens and now you actually put it in the lighthouse, here's the incredible part. As that Fresnel lens shines out, the difference it makes, with an ordinary lens, ships can see the lighthouse from eight miles away. But with the invention and the innovation of a Fresnel lens, ships can now see the lighthouse 20 miles away. What a difference. The ships are looking. People are reading your life. They might not be reading the Bible, but they're reading our lives together. And when we're humble and united, what happens? The light of Jesus goes out and they say, this invention with the lens has saved millions of lives. And when they think about the shipwrecks and what's gonna come from this. It's incredible. Lives are saved through the light shining. The light of Jesus still saves today. Micah chapter six, verse eight. This is what God calls us to do. He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the Lord require of you? To act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God. Anyone see in Portland what happened in the amusement park this week when the ride got stuck and people were literally hanging upside down? Not for two minutes or five minutes, but 10 minutes. And people were treated medically for that because what all the blood was rushing to their heads as they were hanging upside down in midair. Kind of terrifying, but I thought of that picture. Sometimes in life, when you're blessed or you've had success in different areas, sometimes all the success runs to your head and it's not good, and your head swells. And this world right now is upside down. Instead of being humble and looking to serve, we are looking down upon other people, divided, expecting everyone to serve us, and it's absolutely flipped. This is the time to shine the light of Jesus. His radical humility, His consistent humility. Has anyone ever played the limbo before, limbo stick? You know that game where you put the stick up here and you think, oh, that's pretty easy to get underneath that. And then they lower the stick and you're just like, what am I doing to try to get underneath this thing? And to get underneath it, it's a little bit uncomfortable. It's a little bit vulnerable. When you look at Jesus in his life and you read through Philippians chapter two in the gospels, you watch it and it's like, how low is that stick going to go? The dissension of Christ, how could perfect, sinless Jesus the Messiah Become sin on the cross and give us his righteousness and take our sins And we are humbled when we see the Savior of the world laying down his life for us And we just take that in with awe and gratitude and worship and that changes us That changes us to get nothing else will change you in terms of your humility and your unity than abiding with Jesus. He's the one who's gonna change it. He can heal and restore families today, marriages today, with kids today, but it starts with abiding with Jesus. He'll start in your heart and he'll go to your home and your church family and he'll go into the city. The call here is to abide with Jesus. Humility is a place of strength. Doesn't look like it. We always mock humility. Humility looks like weakness. They mock Jesus on the cross. Humility and faithfulness is a place of strength. Why? Because God opposes the proud and he gives grace to the humble. When you humble yourself, you access the Lord's power and his power in your weakness. It's not your power, it's his power. Humility is always wise. Humility invites God's healing and restoration. Fathers, I encourage you to walk humbly. Fathers, maybe your dad was absent or abusive or just kind of aloof in some disappointing ways, but we all have a heavenly father who heals. We have a heavenly father who is good. We have a heavenly father who is faithful. We have a heavenly father who is eternal. We have a heavenly father who keeps his promises. We have a heavenly father who loves us and likes us. And when you abide and connect with your heavenly father, he brings healing because he says he is a father to the fatherless. And he will empower you to be the dad that you never had. He brings healing. And it's for all of us, our Heavenly Father. That's where you're going to find the healing. That's where you're going to find the humility. That's where we're going to become united as we turn to our Heavenly Father on this Father's Day. And let's take this moment now just to humble ourselves before God. What is God calling you to do? Your heart, your home, your church family, this city. What does real humility look like? Biblical humility, where you have a security in your identity and purpose and in God's rewards. You know who you are and you know what you're called to do. God, give us the grace, we pray, to abide with you, Jesus, We're so grateful, Jesus, for your humility. Give us the mind of Christ. We choose hope. We choose humility. We choose unity. We choose to follow you, Jesus. And we pray that you would be glorified in our relationships, in our responses. We pray that you would be glorified in our lives. Come heal today. Come renew today, Jesus. We want to be like you. And we give you praise for your grace and your patience and your love. and we thank you what you're doing as we gather now with you in Jesus name amen amen you've got a couple options as we finish now the prayer team's over to my right to receive prayer also every sunday it takes humility to say i want to follow jesus but you can make that decision and let the prayer team know let me know i'll be with them it takes humility to say i want to be baptized water i want to go public with my faith I want to have a church family. I'm tired of doing this alone. I want to get a group of people and study the word together every week. I want to serve. If any of these, every week people make these decisions. If this is an interest for you, just text that word to the church phone number. Our team will follow up with you. Again, the prayer team's to my right, and let's walk humbly together with the Lord in unity. Have a great week.