This is a step of faith. This is God's people saying, we want to be used of you. We want to reach the community here. We want you to be glorified. The completion of this building means something way, way beyond brick and mortar and drywall and foundation and columns and windows. You know, the completion of God's buildings all throughout sacred history recorded in the Word were very important occasions, significant turning points in the history of the people of God. Take the tabernacle, for instance, when it was finally erected in the wilderness, as recorded in Exodus 40, 36, 33 through 34. Let me read you what it says. So Moses finished the work. Then a cloud covered the tent of the congregation and the glory of the Lord filled the tabernacle. What about when the tabernacle after the wilderness wanderings was taken and erected more permanently in Shiloh? Joshua 18, one says of the whole congregation of the children of Israel assembled together at Shiloh and set up the tabernacle of the congregation there and the land was subdued before them. And the presence of the Lord was there. It was a significant occasion, too, as well, when the tabernacle was moved to Jerusalem, when the ark had been returned from the Philistines and as The tabernacle came from Shiloh and was erected in Jerusalem, as 2 Samuel 6, verse 17 says. Hear the words of the Lord. And they brought in the ark of the Lord and set it in its place in the midst of the tabernacle that David had pitched for it. And David offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord. And there was a great celebration. This was especially true at the completion of Solomon's temple. Hear what 1 Kings 8.22 says, in the words of Solomon himself, And the Lord hath performed his word that he spake, and I am risen up in the room of David my father, and sit on the throne of Israel, as the Lord promised, and have built a house for the name of the Lord God of Israel. It was true of the temple that was built by the exiles that returned from their time in Babylon. Miserable led the way in that great effort. And Ezra 5.16 says, and the children of Israel, the priests and the Levites and the rest of the children of the captivity kept the dedication of the house of God with joy. And we have that to look forward to as we continue this week and on into our special dedicatory service next week. All those times were times of prayer Times of reading and teaching the Word of God. Times of refreshing. Remarkable times of revival in the history of the people of God. And you know what 1 Corinthians 10 and 11 says? It says, all these things are written for our examples, that we may have admonition from the Lord from those things. We're poised, really, at a similar moment in the history of our church. There was the Curtis Street Church here in Simpsonville. The wonderful and long, useful and ongoing useful facility on Grandview, now Altizer Hall. The Davenport Road expansion, says the Lord, brought those wonderful properties and facilities and now this climactic completion. All of those places were of God. All of them, the acquisition, the building, were done for His glory. All of them were intended to bring a righteous response from the people of God and His fellowship. And they did. And how we respond now, at this time, is important to God. You know, maybe you've had an important question forming up in your own thoughts. I have. Actually, I've had a couple of them. They're about the same thing. They concern God's greater future favor. in this place. Can we have it? Will we have it? Certainly, the erection of a new facility doesn't guarantee that, does it? I want to attempt to answer those questions tonight. Can we have it? Will we have it? God's greater future favor on this ministry. From a wonderful, powerful section in 1 Timothy 3, I invite your attention to verses 14-16 at the end of that chapter 3 that contains wonderful qualifications for those in leadership in the assembly of the saints, those that are pastors, overseers, shepherds, and those that are deacons, And it climaxes with one of the great 316 references in the English Bible as the remarkable effect of the incarnation of Jesus Christ is presented. But we have these words in this one paragraph that are quite personal by Paul to Timothy, who was pastoring the church in Ephesus. They're words to Timothy, but words to the church as a whole, and words to believers in every generation. He said, these things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly. But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. And without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the Spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory." And from this simple paragraph, but truth-intensive paragraph, I want to challenge you. I want to challenge all of us. Let's resolve together to pursue the marks of a ministry that is destined for God's greater future favor. I think they're here in this paragraph. We find them. And by reading and thinking about this passage, I hope, I trust, your faith will be increased. I hope that your hope will grow. Your zeal will burn hotter for the work of God. Your vision for the future will be clearer. And you'll be more exhilarated in anticipation of what God can do and what God will do. Can we have God's greater future favor in this place? Yes. Yes. If we pursue the marks of a church that God's willing and ready to bless. First, I want you to see that we can have our Father's greater future favor if we resolve to have a church that is marked by spiritual excellence. These things write I unto thee, hoping to come unto thee shortly. But I tarry long that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth." We Americans, all of us, have an addictive ritual, don't we, every four years around the summertime? The Olympics. Ah, yes. We enjoy turning on the tube when we've got some time in the evening or over the weekend. And we watch the vaulters and the sprinters and the ballers and the swimmers. And we watch them all pursuing to achieve their great burning desire over four years to get gold, hopefully. To get the best. To achieve the highest. to excel, to reach excellence. It's compelling, isn't it? I like to watch it because it's compelling. I don't necessarily find myself drawn with great magnetism to any of the particular sports, though I do fantasize about the Olympic weightlifters, you know. But it's definitely a fantasy at this point in my life. Paul wrote, He said that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, in the church of the living God. Ought is an important word, isn't it, men and women? The best way. The ideal way. The way that is most pleasing to God. must be a church that is marked by spiritual excellence found in what is written. And that's what he says here in verse 14. These things write I unto thee. I hope to come to thee shortly. But I may be delayed. But I've written to you. And God has written to us so we can know how we ought to behave. what the ideal actually is. It's certainly found here. In all that is written in this letter, in this epistle, and throughout the epistles, and throughout the revelation of God, it isn't, I know that you'll agree with me, found in our culture. It is not found in our traditions. It's not found in our imaginations. It's certainly not found in our preferences. It's found in the revelation of God. It is written. And so we have presented to us a challenge to saturate ourselves with God's perception of what is excellent. That we may approve things that are excellent. And that means, in Philippians 1, 9, that are best. That we may run to win in this race as the church, 1 Corinthians 9, 24, says to us. To actually get the gold. Paul is using an Olympics illusion, an athletic illusion, in that passage of Scripture in 1 Corinthians 9.24. A church marked by what? Spiritual excellence as derived from the revelation of God. The acid, the litmus test of everything we do and every way we do it must be the revelation of God. A church marked by spiritual excellence about how we do church. How we behave in the house of God, which is the church of the living God. Interesting that twice over, as the church is described, it is the house of God. He possesses it. It's His house. It is the church of the living God. It's God's flock. It's God's household. It's God's body. We are God's people. We are God's assembly and gathering. It's all about God. And who He is and the kind of God He is and the kind of people we should be to reflect that God as a holy God and a sacrificing, loving God. It is easy. It is so simple for church to become a very man-centered thing. But that's not the best thing. The best thing is that it's a God-centered thing. A God-centered church is the best kind of church. Not what we find necessarily appealing or entertaining or familiar or comfortable. And I'm not all for putting on horsehair shirts, you know, underneath our clothes and making ourselves miserable and doing things that make us uncomfortable. But I'm for doing anything and I'm for doing everything that makes it so that when people walk in these doors, they meet God face to face as they meet God's people face to face. What pleases Him? Both internally but also externally. Externalism is a deadly thing if our heart is not right before God. But a heart that is in some measure right before God that doesn't reflect itself in every way externally is a strange thing for sure. What is best in attitude and in our actions? What is best both spiritually and physically? What is best in heart and in appearance? What is best in lifestyle and what is best in worship style? Men and women, can I suggest this? If we wanted a word that describes God's heart about church, it is What is the best, not what's OK, not what's acceptable, not what's workable, not what's comfortable, but what is best and reflective of his nature and his character. This is what will make Calvary the standout ministry, the standout church, the unique place. God is concerned that everything about us. Our motives and how we do church, our conduct, be right. And you know, that is exactly what this text says in verse 15. But if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself among the people of God, with the flock of God that you have fellowship with. This is talking about how we conduct our life. I mean, in the language of the New Testament, What shows? What is demonstrative to other people? Now, let's let this passage begin to fill out the picture even more fully. If we want to have God's greater future favor, we have to have a church that is marked by spiritual excellence found in Scripture clearly. about how we do our fellowship, our church, our worship, our lives. But we need a church as well that is marked by an intense family intimacy. Look again, would you please, at v. 15 for just a moment. And notice that Paul wrote, because he was concerned that they know how to behave themselves, it says, in the house of God. Now, this is not a reference to God's physical house, to a church facility or building such as this building. This is a reference to his household. Actually, we could take the word house in this case and we could actually translate it from the language of the New Testament as family, the family of God. How we behave ourselves in this family. The degree to which we achieve a family closeness, a closeness that demonstrates great care and compassion and concern for others in this fellowship and outside this fellowship is the degree to which we will achieve the ideal God desires. And this is based on right family relationships. Your intimacy with your Father, your Abba Father, as Paul put it in Romans 8.15, is everything to how the family relationships will work here. If your relationship is right with Him, then your relationship has a very good start with everyone else who is in this fellowship of believers. Because the whole family in heaven and in earth is named for Him. We are, by grace, His offspring as believing people. Ephesians 3.14 tells us He is, in the words of the Lord Jesus in Luke 11.2, our Father. And we, Christians, we are brothers and sisters. John put it this way. We know that we've passed from death into life. Because we love the brethren, he that loveth not his brother abideth in death. But whoso hath this world's good, and seeth his brother have need, and shutteth up his vows of compassion for him, how dwelleth the love of God in him?" John asks in 1 John 3, 14 and 17. We must, as brothers and sisters in Christ, transcend the normal kind of relationship that people have with others outside their physical family. Now it is normal familial. attention and love that makes parents take care of children and brothers and sisters see about brothers and sisters. If there's some compelling concern or need in the family in terms of time and interest and help financially and whatever we can do, that is normal. That is the way normal human beings, ones on the better side of things, behave. In fact, people who are really bad in a lot of ways, can be very attentive to their families and think their families are of great importance. But now we're being told that people who are not our blood kin, they deserve our attentiveness, our concern, our compassion, both spiritually and materially. I mean, this really breaks out of the normal human pattern, doesn't it? Totally. Somebody else's car breaks down in the family. Somebody else is short on food because he just lost a job a month ago and he's gotten his final paycheck and things are really tough. We know that. This is family we live with. Someone's child needs some kind of medical help and there's such an unbelievable gap between what their health insurance will cover and what the deductible they'll have to pay is. that they're just absolutely frozen. They cannot do anything. And we can multiply examples of this family-type concern and sometimes confrontation and attention and ministry to other people. Let me suggest too that these family relationships that should be unique ought to be something that is magnetic to people outside the body of Christ. They look at it and they are puzzled. In fact, Jesus said in John 13, 35, by this shall men know that you are my disciples because you love one another. They're shocked at the intimate concern on the very family level that you show for people who are not your blood relatives. We are an anomaly in the earth but we're to be also characterized by a great family loyalty. How do you treat family. Well you know sometimes when people treat you wrongly or do the wrong thing again just talking about normal human beings here. We can get to a point pretty or fairly quickly where we just aren't really going to put up with that. But you know, with family, we do put up with things, don't we? We do as Paul describes it in 1 Corinthians 13 when he discusses love. Love bears all things. It covers all things. It puts up with a lot. And it goes beyond that, and it forgives. I'm reminded of the words of Peter in Matthew 18, verse 21 and 22, where he said this. Then came Peter to Him and said, Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him, till seven times Jesus saith unto him, I say unto thee, until seven times, not until seven times, but until seventy times Seven. You've done the math. It's not too tough. That's four hundred and ninety times. Now living in a family relationship. That's not really that out there. You know what I'm saying. I mean, that kind of thing can happen as a wife. I'm sure she's forgiven me four hundred ninety times for some things. And I won't talk about it on her side, you know. I'm the one that needs the forgiving. And, you know, that's hyperbole by the Lord Jesus. He's intentionally making an overstatement here. He's really saying our forgiveness needs to be limitless. There's no end to it. From our brothers. And our sisters. Rather than that's it, you know, I've had it. I've 10 times. He's done that 10 times to me. She's done that 10 times to me, you know, and I'm just not going to talk to her anymore. I'm not going to talk to him anymore. I am just going to sit on the other side of the church. We're going to change our situation so we can avoid them. It's just not worth it. To go to the trouble and the time no. We are willing to cancel out the offense to eliminate in our thinking the trespass. And we bear our brethren's burdens when they're overtaken at a fault, Galatians 6.1 says. Brethren, if a man be overtaken at a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such in one in the spirit of meekness, consider in thyself, lest thou also be tempted. I mean, somebody fails. They blow it. They really blow it. And they are wandering from God. You haven't seen them here for two months. And you know that they are not just going somewhere else. They have walked away from their relationship with the Lord. You know, somebody's caught in sin. You know, they're having a very serious problem in their life. Well, that's not just, oh no, that's not just a moan and groan. Oh, I'm so sorry. That's so bad that that's occurring. That is God speaking to you and saying to you, then go to them, get to them, talk to them, plead with them, restore them. That brother is, in a sense, like fallen off down into a ravine and tumbled down and broken his leg and he's lying down there at the bottom of the ravine and he can't climb back up. He's got to have somebody pick him up and bring him back up and splint the leg and get him to the doctor. That's the picture in Galatians 6.1. That takes time and that takes trouble, but we don't just let people go. We restore, so we put up with and we forgive and we restore. And we encourage as Ephesians 429 says, let no corrupt communication proceed out of your mouth, but that which is a good to the use of edifying, that it may minister grace unto the hearers, that we build people up by what we say. We encourage them in the Lord, in their ministry, in their life and their work. We don't let people leave this assembly on a Lord's Day ever without a good word of encouragement being spoken. As we're in Sunday school with them, or as we're in the hallways, or just leaving a service, or before a service gets started, your words matter. You are a channel of grace that God will flow through to strengthen, to build up, And you know, we can just say this, I think together, as a family of God, Christians resolve disagreements. Christians agree to disagree agreeably. Christians bury their preferences. Christians are reasonable and flexible. And when principle and Scripture is at stake, we stand up, we do the right thing, we say what we need to, we don't run and we don't hide. But we do this in a godly Christian manner. We don't pout. We don't bail. And we don't have a war. I've pastored two churches, several churches, but two churches that when I came to them, they had just had a war. And let me tell you, it's not a pretty picture. It's damaging to everybody. Damaging to the people in the assembly. Damaging to the pastors that had pastored before. Damaging to the testimony of Christ in the community. The two concepts of Christians and conflict and fighting in the Assembly of the Saints are utterly self-contradictory. It doesn't fit. We have great unity here. God has favored us. The brethren dwell together in unity. And we need to work and pray hard to keep it that way, because we are family. We are family. And that's the way family is. You know, there's more here that God tells us. He says we're to be a church of spiritual excellence. That's a mark we must have on us if we want to know God's greater future favor. We're a church that needs to have intense family intimacy. And we're a church that needs to be marked by an increased awareness of His divine presence. Look at verse 15 again, would you? That if I tarry long, that thou mayest know how thou oughtest to behave thyself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God. The living God. And we're going to have an increased awareness of His divine presence Through the through our faith in the fact, the revealed fact that this is so. Christ is here, we are part of his assembly. You know, I can be at home at my house and I've had this happen on numerous occasions. I'll pull in the driveway and I'll come in the front door and I'll go into my den study area and I'll be there for quite some time. And I'm relatively quiet. And another member of the family will, you know, come down the stairs and will come to or near the den. Oh, Dad, I didn't know you were here. I didn't I didn't I didn't hear you. I didn't see you. But I was there. I was there. For a whole hour. God. is here. That's a fact. 1 Corinthians 3.16 says that we are the temple of the Holy Spirit. And in that passage of Scripture, men and women, it's not talking about your body, your physical body as it does in 1 Corinthians 6.19. It is talking in 1 Corinthians 3.16 about the church. the temple, which is a dwelt corporately by God. That same idea is presented in Ephesians 122, where the body of Christ is called the church and then described as the household of faith. That is a temple built on the foundation of Jesus Christ, the chief cornerstone, and the teaching of the apostles and the prophets, a temple that is built up and fitly joined together and inhabited by the Holy Spirit of God. It is a fact. God is here uniquely. Now, He indwells your heart personally, and He indwells your body physically. Scripture teaches this. But the New Testament teaches that God uniquely and supernaturally and dwells a corporate body of the saints. There is a sense in which we have such great unity at Calvary Baptist Church as a local assembly that God, the Holy Spirit uniquely dwells here in us together. And I don't mean the physical place, the building. I'm talking about us corporately as a body of Christians. And that's why churches have atmospheres. And why they have certain personalities. Because, of course, there's lots of different kinds of people in them and they're unique people. But it has to do with the way the spirit of the living God is indwelling those people corporately. And the sum of the parts is far greater than the parts. This is bigger than you and me individually. What is happening here is a supernatural phenomenon. God is here. It's a fact. Just as Jesus said in Matthew 18-20, for where two or three are gathered together, two or three, there I am in the midst. That is a fact. Jesus Christ is here tonight. You know, at times, I'll be sitting at home and thinking about coming to church Sunday morning or Sunday evening. And the thought will occur to me, I really want to go because Jesus is going to be there. Sure wish faith was sight. Sure wish we could put our hand in His hand. and hear His voice. But He's here. He's here. And men and women, this awareness, this increased awareness of His presence is cultivated by an expectation that He will manifest Himself here. He is alive and working in us. Philippians 2.13 says, it is God which worketh in us to will and to do of His good pleasure. As Ephesians 3.20 teaches us, the Spirit of the living God is here in our midst to do abundantly above all that we could ask or think according to the power that worketh in you. He is alive and working in us. And He will manifest Himself especially to us as obedient Christians. Listen to these remarkable words from John 14.21. He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, He it is that loveth Me, and he that loveth Me shall be loved of My Father. And I will love him and will manifest Myself to him. How? How? We love the Word. We obey the Word. We hunger and thirst for the water and the bread of the Word. And as the wise men, we do the Word. We have a promise from God. And this is a biblical kind If I could put it this way, mysticism, not a strange Eastern religion mysticism, but the real deal, men and women. He will manifest Himself to us. And He does it through a song, a testimony, a verse explained, a sermon point applied, A shocking illustration given. The example of somebody's life. And He manifests Himself to us by conviction of sin. We're surprised by God. We come to church. We really felt pretty bland when we got up that morning. And we really didn't feel into things, you know? Not really into it. Of course, I know none of you are like that. But we go. And we come. And God is here. And we're surprised by joy over His goodness. We're surprised over the freshness of a promise from God that we see in a manner we've never seen before by illumination. We're surprised by a renewal of hope and the prospect that God will and can do what we wish He would do. We're surprised and rejoice when He manifests Himself through an answer to prayer, when He leaves His fingerprints all over a situation and we literally smell the aroma of His presence. Or, it can be routine. It can be mundane. It can be just what we do. Or it can be coming and knowing God is here and God will manifest Himself. Marked by spiritual excellence. Marked by intense family intimacy. Marked by an increased awareness of the real presence of God in our midst. Because it's the church of the living God. The one who is alive. And a church that will know God's future favor in a greater way. is a church that's marked by fidelity to the truth with zeal. There's a remarkable description here in verse 15 and in 16 where it says, which is the church of the living God, the final phrase here, the pillar and ground of the truth. And without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. God was manifest in the flesh, justified in the spirit, seen of angels, preached unto the Gentiles, believed on in the world, received up into glory. The church is the pillar and ground of the truth. What does that mean? I mean, the church actually is built on Christ and His Word. But the church also then is to pursue this distinctive mark itself, having been built upon the foundation of Christ and His Word. The church should pursue this mark of being also the supporter of the truth, the supporter of all kinds of truth at every different level. It says the supporter in the sense of the foundational truth, the pillar and ground of the truth. We should be supporters of the clear and unequivocal major and clear teaching and doctrines of the Word of God, we should always be in favor and speak clearly about the inerrancy of the Bible and the true nature of God and His great works in creation in a six, literal 24-hour days by the power of His great might, about the true nature of man and the true nature of Christ and the true nature of the Spirit, and the true nature of the church, and the true nature of the future. The major doctrines of the Christian faith. We, the church, are those that support those truths. And then all the pillar truths that come up out of the foundation, like those pillars coming up out of the foundation of this building and in many other places. All those other pillar truths We are the supporters, the pillar of advancing the truth of God. About what marriage really is and what immorality really is. And what modesty really is versus indecency. And what sobriety and self-control is versus alcohol and drug abuse and use. and what is right and what is wrong and what is virtuous and what is sinful. It is the church that gives voice to these truths that are found in the revelation of God. And men and women, as we stand silently by and are not bold and are not forthright and are not courageous for the truth, we are not pillars for the truth in the great structure of God's revelation as it's been given to us. But in the world, the church, yes, is a supporter both of the founding truths and the pillar truths. But it is the great advocate and supporter of truth at the gospel level. Look with you at the text of Scripture where it says, without controversy, great is the mystery of godliness. Marvelous is the revelation of God. That's what that means when it says mystery. The previously concealed and now revealed magnificent truth of what? Of godliness. Of the transforming power of the gospel of Jesus Christ to deliver men from sin and to deliver Christians from sinful living. into a life of holiness. Great is the mystery of this godliness that God transforms people in from being human and base and apart from God and a rebellion against God and makes them faithful children who obey and walk with and follow God. And it's all rooted and centered in Christ and His amazing grace as verse 16 unfolds it. God was manifest in the flesh. We see these pairs of descriptions. It is God the Divine who is manifested physically in the flesh, the Scriptures say. The divine human nature of Christ in a unique identity and a unique salvation as a result. Vindicated by the Spirit. Justified in the Spirit means vindicated. The Spirit of the living God supernaturally proved that Jesus said who He was. Just read the miracles of the Gospel. They were done in the power of the Spirit as the Spirit descended upon Him and empowered Him in a unique way like no other person who ever walked the face of the earth. Victory over death and demons and disease and weather and food and drink. Everything! By the power of the Spirit of God, He was the God-Man. And it's this God-Man, the Bible says, who was seen of angels and preached unto the Gentiles. Look at the great universe-wide witness to Jesus. The angels observed Him, saw Him at His birth, attended Him in His temptation of the wilderness, We're present in the Garden. We're present at the resurrection. We're present at the ascension. And millions and millions of them in heaven sing His glory and His praise and watch all of His great works to this hour and to this day. But also, men of every tongue and every tribe throughout the world, in the thousands, preach Jesus. That's amazing. Today, this hour, As I speak, thousands of men and women proclaiming this Gospel, this Good News throughout the world. And God calling more people to do so. And here is the magnificent and amazing fact by grace through Christ. He's believed on in the world and received up into glory. This supernatural Gospel This death, this criminal death on a cross by a man two millennia ago, suffering between two thieves, miraculously delivers humankind, individuals, from sin, eternal death, eternal condemnation, and grants them the gift of eternal life. Men and women, that's just miraculous. That's all there is to it. You don't want to talk about logic when you talk about this, really. God just did this, and here's the amazing thing. You preach that message anywhere in the world, and people believe it. And they turn to Christ. And they're saved. Why? Because there's something in humankind that causes them to hear the voice of God when they hear the Gospel. Jesus saves the lost. And Jesus saves the saved. The Bible says that He was received up into glory. Right now, He's at the right hand of the Father. And this grace not only saves, but it sustains as He's there in intercession for us as believing people. So the truth at every level is supported by the church. And the truth at the Gospel level is supported, advanced by the church. Being truth-centered is a mark of a ministry that God will favor. God's greater future favor on our church is all about God. But it's also all about us. Will we resolve to pursue the marks of a church that God richly blesses? Remember the churches in Asia Minor? Chapter 2 and 3 of Revelation? Jesus commended some of them. And Jesus condemned others of them because of what they weren't. We will have an identity. We do have an identity in the mind and the sight of God as a church. Will we resolve to pursue the marks of a church destined for God's greater future favor. Spiritual excellence. Intense family intimacy. Increased awareness of His presence. And zeal for the truth. A people who read the truth, apply the truth, obey the truth, teach the truth, defend the truth, and spread the truth. Will you make these resolves to more fully and consistently and intensely pursue these things so that they become the marks of the church God blesses here in this place? I want to invite you. to do that tonight, to begin to do that this evening. Look at this as a beginning, a starting place, a place to determine, to resolve. I can certainly more consistently, more intensely, more determinedly pursue these marks, these elements, these ideas. I invite you to bow your head before the Lord with me tonight. And to stand to your feet as you do. The instrumentalists will begin to play quietly this evening. And as they do begin to play, with our heads bowed and seeking the Lord together. Times like this are important times. The completion of great projects. Thank you once again, Father, for giving us exactly what we needed from your word. And I pray that our hearts, as our hearts respond to what we have heard, that it would be true resolve, spirit empowered resolve. Help it not just to be responding to an ideal because it's something that we think we want. Help us each, I pray, to claim the promise of your blessing and your favor. and wholly yield ourselves to You with complete self-abandon, willing to give all, to deny self, to give all, to see these things come to pass. But we're Your instruments. We're Your body. And so we want to carry out the will of our head. Thank you for what you've done here tonight. May this truly be a milestone for us as a church. Please do great things here. Glory of Your name. In Jesus' name. Amen.