up here. I knew the passage that was going to go on. I went over it again last night at home. So I have my Bible dictionary at home, but I have a good one up here at the church. So I came up here about 9.30, did some things, and then went in my office and got on my computer and looked up every one of these names and put the the phonics in it where it's supposed to be pronounced. So as we go through these names, we don't always pronounce these names right. If you're like me, every time I see a list of names, especially in the Old Testament, my heart starts beating fast to say how sometimes we don't pronounce them properly, probably. But you'll get the gist of it. And the whole gist of this message is this. One church, many local expressions of one church. One body, but many members. A church is made up, the word church is ecclesia, called out assembly. It's used by Jesus when he said, I will build my church in Matthew 16. And he's the head of the church. Let's never forget that. No man is the head of the church. No denomination is the head of the church. Nobody is. Only Jesus Christ is the head of the church. He's not only the head of the church, he's the foundation of the church. And he's not only the foundation of the church, but he should be the focus of the church. Amen? So at the very beginning here, this is what I have in the outline. The church is the body of Christ. Christ has two bodies. He has a physical body right now that's ascended to the right hand of God the Father, seated. Occasionally you see him standing, especially there in chapter 7 of Acts, when Stephen was martyred. He stood. He looked and saw Jesus standing at the right hand. The proper place is that he's at the right hand of God. Jesus Christ is prophet, priest, and king. Right now, he's performing his highly priestly ministry, and he's interceding for us. So, he's the head of the church, but the church also is made up of many members. Now, what is a member of the church? It's not a person that necessarily joins the church. A person can join the church, but not be a member of his church. A member of his church is a person that's truly been born again, truly received Christ. And the moment you have, the Holy Spirit baptizes you, not by water, but by spirit baptism into the body of Christ. Water baptism comes some time later. And it's a blessing when believers work together. you know we're gonna cover this later on not today but it talks about some things that there was some division he talks about he said mark them that cause division we'll get to that later on not today but next week and but the body is to work together is to work for the edification of the body of Christ to build up the body to glorify the Lord and to be a testimony in the world in which we live in so Some of the members are more well-known than others. While others are not well-known, that doesn't mean they're not important. This chapter here, actually only a couple of these people are mentioned somewhere else in the Bible. Most of them, this is the only place they're mentioned. And most of us know very little about them. We covered last week Aquila and Priscilla. We know quite a bit about them. They're mentioned here, they're mentioned in Acts, they're mentioned in 1 Corinthians. They're a fine couple that were serving the Lord together. But just because a person is not mentioned a lot doesn't mean they're not important. Obviously in a church, the position will often be the determining factor of people that know the church. You know, when I went to the First Baptist Church, it was always Koppenol's Church. Okay, and I know what they mean by that. It's not Koppenol's Church, it's the Lord's Church, but they mean that he's a pastor. You probably hear they say Saron. Okay, it's just because, huh? Frey's Church. It's not my church. They do it because he's a pastor. That's just the normal stuff. And there's other people, but everybody, let me just say this at the outset. Everybody here is very important to the functioning of this local body of believers. One of the areas I see this very clearly is Vacation Bible School. Vacation Bible School, which will be coming up the end of July, will have 35 to 40 people serving in it. You need all those people serving in it, doing various functions, whether it's the opening here, the music here. whether it's the crafts out in the tent, whether it's the teaching, whether it's the sports, whether it's the refreshments, whatever it is, everybody is important, and there's an ultimate goal, or should be, that we do everything to glorify God, to teach the children and teens, the women, the men, whoever's here, and that's what it is. We all have our own part, but we all are to work together to accomplish the ultimate purpose. what we're here for. And that should be the purpose of this church in every ministry, whether it's here in the pulpit, or whether it's out there now in the children's ministry, or whether it's in the nursery, or whether it was in Sunday school just earlier, or whether it's in the weekly ministries that we have going on here. So I'd like to go through these lists and just talk about these. Again, as we already started, Jesus Christ is the head of the church. He's got a lot of people. Do you think you can do greater work than Christ? This is a trick question, we covered this yesterday. He says greater works will you do. The reason why we can do greater works is not because we're greater than Christ or do greater works, but he sent the Holy Spirit, he promised the Spirit to come on the day of Pentecost, the Spirit came, and now Christ is working through a body. The people. Obviously, each person is important. Our Lord is the head, but he works through the body. It's like any of us that have responsibility, you always accomplish more when you work through a number of people. If you try to do it yourself, you may do a great job yourself, but I'm telling you, you can do a much better job when everybody's engaged, right? Okay, so that's so important. So the ultimate aspect of this message will be, at the very last note on this outline, is what is your part in the Lord's Body of Grace Bible Fellowship? So think about that as I go through this today. So, many members. We all don't have the same office. We don't all have the same talents. We all don't have the same gifts. Certain ones of us can do certain things great, and others do other things great. We all can serve in some aspect. God gifts us in his sovereign grace. He gives you gifts and we have natural talents that we can do. For example, the people playing over there, the instruments. I can't play an instrument. You wouldn't want me to play an instrument. We went up to a fellowship a few months ago, and they had a player piano. And when Marion came in, I was playing it. The piano was actually. I said, look how great I play. She knew. It was a player piano. You could fake it out and stand there and make believe you're playing the thing. And it's playing itself. It sounded great, but it wasn't me. It was the piano. But I think I can do some things well, as well as you can do some things well, and praise the Lord. Now, let's just look at this. Paul's given a gracious greeting. We've already looked at Phoebe. We have a Phoebe here. She's Gilbert's daughter, Phoebe. I knew a Phoebe up home, right down the road from us, right where your son lives, Jerry and Cookie. It was Phoebe Constable, her name was. She was a little different. I remember my grandfather used to give her corn, and she said, it hasn't been husked. She wouldn't take the corn unless we husk it. They said, no, we're giving you the corn. You can at least husk it. I mean, if somebody's giving you it, what, do you want you to do everything? I remember that stuff. And always, there was some always different people up there, home. Not our family, of course. Maybe they were different too, but I'm talking about our neighbors. Okay, but let's look at these people here. Like I said, we looked at Phoebe. She was a wonderful servant of the Lord. She carried the Roman letter to Rome from Centurius and from Corinth area. And now he mentions two couples, Priscilla and Aquila, fine couple, serving the Lord together. They were the ones that took Apollos aside to correct him on some of his doctrine. Elegant man, but he needed some adjustment in his teaching. They heard him teach. He was very eloquent, very well-versed, but lacked something in understanding of the scriptures. So they took him aside and explained that to him. And I see Apollos as a very humble man willing to let this happen instead of saying, who do you think you are? Now he's going to go through this list. Like I said, there's a whole bunch of people mentioned here. And this is the only place most of these are mentioned. There's 35, I believe in this chapter, there's 35 people mentioned, some later on near the end again. So at least 35 names are mentioned, and there's other people associated with those names. So as you go through this, you notice here, he says, salute my well-beloved. Now, there's the first name, so I'll look at my list. Eponitis. That name actually means praiseworthy. Notice he calls them well-beloved. He uses that term beloved, well-beloved, or kinsmen. So these are people that are very, very important. But notice about this man, he says, who is the firstfruits of a Ki unto Christ. Now you might say, well where's the Ki and what's the firstfruits? Acai is in the lower part of Greece. The upper part of Greece is called Macedonia. The lower part is called Acai, and you have Corinth there, Centuria, and in the upper part you have Philippi, Thessaloniki, and Capernaum, but in the lower part. So he's the first fruits. Now, does anybody know what the first fruits were speaking of? the first believer, the first ones, the first servants here in this region. So he right away brings that out. So obviously this was a great man of God. Now, the next one he talks about is great Mary. Now, Mary is not the Lord's mother, is not Mary Magdalene, not Mary, you know, Bethany. It's another Mary. There's several Marys mentioned in the Bible. a great Mary who bestowed much labor on us. So obviously you can tell this woman was a laborer, a servant of God. And so he goes on in verse 7. And as you think of this, think about names today, maybe names in this local church here that would fit right into these names. Because we're just in a different time frame with different names. But hopefully we're the same types of folks as these people are just 1900 years later. Because God always has a name or a place or a place to serve. It's just a different person, but God's part of God's body. These people are back then. We're here today, you and I. Now the next two he mentions is Adronikos and Jenea, my kinsmen. Now the kinsmen we often could think of sometimes as a relative. That word kinsmen is a relative. I have two near relatives, some other relatives here, right? Marion, what's your, oh, you're related to Donna, so I'm related to you through Donna. I really only have two relatives, near relatives here, okay? And then, of course, my son, who, because of Donna, and Jennifer, and their family, but the two nearest ones were them, and then, obviously, our son would be the nearest to me. But all of you really are my kinsmen. in a different sense, as believers in Jesus Christ. So, and my fellow prisoners. So obviously, these two had been not only kinsmen with him, but fellow prisoners. They'd been in prison with him, who are of note among the apostles, who were also in Christ before me. So he mentions here they were, now the word apostle, by the way, We think of an apostle as Peter, John, James, Paul, but in a secondary sense, anybody that's a messenger or sent is an apostle. Not in the apostolic office like these men, but there's apostles today in a secondary sense, so don't misinterpret it. We're not saying there's anybody like Peter, James, John, or Paul today. That office is closed. but they're still apostles and messengers missionaries could be like called apostles because they're sent or you or I as sent ones but not in the primary sense now notice they were in Christ Jesus Christ before me so obviously these two came to Christ before the Apostle Paul and so we see that there those two and he goes on here Greet Amphilis. That means large or enlarged. So he says, my beloved in the Lord. Notice how Paul constantly brings out my beloved, my kinsman, my beloved in the Lord. And I would hope that we would speak of one another this way as well. You know, you my beloved John? Amen. How about you, John? Back there. Full of love. Okay, I'll tell you, one of the marks, one of the highest qualification marks of a church is to have love for one another. You know, I got that verse down here near the end, but I'll quote it right now. Jesus in the upper room, he said, by this all men shall know you are my disciples if you have love one to another. And love is so important. You know, at the end of 1 Corinthians 13, 13 it says, now abideth faith, hope, and love, but the greatest of these is love. So love is so important. And he goes on here and he talks about our helper. Now he calls him a helper in Christ. Notice beloved, kinsman, helper, someone that's helping you. And the next one he mentions here is Stachys. Stachys in verse 9. And Stachys my beloved. Now again he uses the word beloved. So obviously you can tell that Paul has a close relationship with these people. Maybe some of them he hasn't even seen by his personal eyes but he's heard about them and they've been a blessing to the church. And praise the Lord. And then In verse 10, salute appellees. Okay, appellees. Here he says, approved. Appellees approved in Christ. Approved. That's a wonderful saying, to be approved. We're approved in Christ. I think of Ephesians chapter one where it says we're accepted in the beloved. were approved in Christ. And then salute them which are of Aristobulus' household. Now throughout this, there's evidence of local churches that meet in houses. The early church started out basically in homes. And obviously as the congregation grew, they needed a bigger place to meet. I share last week that's basically how this church started in our house and praise the Lord for that. One of the things that we talked a little bit about yesterday at the men's breakfast I don't want to be too critical but there's a danger in television evangelist One gentleman brought up the fact is one man's trying to raise funds to buy a $50 million jet plane. I don't need a $50 million jet plane. That bothers me to no end. Not because I'm jealous or any of that. I don't want a $50 million jet plane. Maybe you could give me a little paper plane that I could throw around. But I look at this and I say, something's wrong with that. Something is radically wrong with that. And this goes on, and I feel sorry for these people that send money into these organizations and support that. Don't support it. Support the local church, support God's work. I want to know, me personally, as a member of this church, where the money's going. I don't want to support something that's going to be buying somebody a $50 million jet plane. So we've got to be careful of this. I see simplicity in the Christian church. I see simplicity among the membership. Okay? And we don't want that to occur. And we need to support the work and encourage the believers in Christ. Now, he mentions a number of people here in verse 11 and 12 and right on through. Herodion, my kinsmen, salute him. The word salute, by the way, means greet. The King James Word, we think it's salute like this. Okay? It means greet him, greet him. Salute him. Salute my kinsmen. And then he uses the word greet. Now obviously the King James, I didn't look up the Greek in here. There's obviously some difference between the salute and greet. It's greet here. Greet them that be of the house of narcissus, which are in the Lord. Now again, he mentions household. It's wonderful when our household, and next week being Father's Day, I'm gonna be bringing this out. The verse I'll be using in the outline is in Joshua 24, 15. Anybody know the verse? But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. But that's what Joshua says at the end as he's coming to the end of his life, earthly life. That's a great saying. We ought to say that emphatically. This house, this household, this home belongs to Jesus Christ. Amen? Put your house under the authority of the Lord. Say, this house belongs to Christ. But as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. We need men and women, Christians today, that give their lives, first of all, give their families, and give their house to the Lord. And say, Lord, use this home, this house, this family, in whatever way you choose. You will never be ashamed or never be disappointed when you give everything over to the Lord. So as I go through some of these people, I see this household, this group, these people, and this is a wonderful testimony. So he goes on here, he says, now the next couple here, some believe, commentators believe they're to be sisters, some even believe they're twin sisters. And some believe they're slaves. The first one is Trigthenum and the other is Trigphosu. They're women. Women of Rome. Very likely had come out of maybe a... Now here's something that's gonna really shock you. You get a slave and a slave owner. Now, in the church, who may be the head? The slave owner, the slave could be the head. He could be the elder and the slave owner could be a member. What? That happened in the early church. There's a book, one chapter book, Philemon, Philemon Onesimus gets saved under Paul's ministry in Rome, and now he's sending him back to the slave owner, but he's not sending him back just to be a slave, but he's sending him back to be brothers. So it doesn't matter what our background is, or our occupation is, or our social status is, we are brothers and sisters in the Lord. The ground is level at the cross, right? Amen. The ground is level at the cross. Never think you're a high flyer. You know, I'm some big deal. Okay. Humbleness. Always be humble. Never feel that you are more important or you have much more to offer than somebody else. You may have a lot to offer, praise God, but a humble person will always realize that and give all the glory to God. So this is a couple here, a couple of women probably, sisters very likely. And that's what he says about them. He says, who labored in the Lord. Again, we find this over and over and over again throughout this passage. They labored in the Lord, they served the Lord. They were servants. What is the greatest thing you could be? Servant. Jesus said, if you want to be great in God's kingdom, remember the disciples are arguing, Hey, Lord, who's gonna sit on your left side? Who's gonna sit on your right side in the kingdom? And actually, they even got mom involved. She's trying to get their boys to sit. Don't worry about your title. Don't worry about your position. Just serve. Why is that so difficult? Okay, God will take care of the places. So if you wanna be great in God's kingdom, be a servant, just serve. And that's the most wonderful thing you can do, to be a servant of God. Right? Everybody agree? You know, a person that's in a high position, if they have an understanding of this, they're going to be serving the people. Right? That's what you're called to do. You know, to George Washington, they wanted him to be president of the United States. He agreed, but he wanted to go back to his farm. But there's a reason he agreed to be president. Why? To serve the country. You want to serve the country. You want to serve the church. You want to serve your family. Okay, you want to serve. What can I do to serve? What can I do to help? And that's what I see throughout this list of these names. Yes, maybe only recognized and realized in this one place, but these are important names that Paul is bringing out in this chapter and saying, these people are pretty important in God's work. And so are you. that now he says salute beloved Persis who labored much in the Lord see that labored in the Lord who labored much in the Lord now the next name salute Rufus now Rufus does anybody know they're not sure on this but anybody know where Rufus may be also mentioned huh Jesus with the cross, remember that? It's in Mark, Mark's gospel, mentioned, he's mentioned. Not sure if this is the same one, but here it says, chosen in the Lord and his mother and mine. Now when he says his mother and mine, this is not Paul's actual mother. When you're in a Christian church, I remember early back, who remembers the quack and bushes? His hand goes up every time. We used to call mom Ma Quackenbush, right? She wasn't our mother. She was an older saint, her and Clark, our brother. They were like our mom and dad. Like Ma and Pa Kittle. Okay? You know, we sometimes call people our mom. sometimes like our aunt. You might say, well, I didn't realize they were your aunt. No, they're not my aunt. They're like an aunt, or they're like a mom, or like a dad. So Paul's using that as a mother here, referring not because she is his biological mom, but in a sense, she's like a mom to him. And that's good. And praise the Lord, his mother and mine. Now he's going to mention in verse 14, a number of people, a number of people here. Okay. Get my notes out again here. Okay. These are a little tougher names here. Salute Asyncritus. Asyncritus. That's what it is. Salute Phlegon. Salute Hermas. Salute Patrabas. Okay? So he mentions these people here. And then salute Hermes and the brother which are with them. So he mentions the number here to salute or greet them. Greet these folks. And then he goes on. and he salutes, the next one in verse 15, salutes Phrygelagos and Julia, okay? The next one is Nero's, Nero's is N-E-R-O-O-S-E, Nero's and his sister in Olympus. And all the saints are with them. So again, he mentions a number of people here. Like I said, we only have their name once in the Bible, but these are very important people. And now, He mentioned something that's mentioned a few times in the Bible. Salute one another with a holy kiss. What is a holy kiss? Well, there's different interpretation. Don and I have been to Mennonite brethren churches. Typically, the men kiss the men and the women kiss the women. Not on the lips, but like their cheek. Anybody ever seen that? In your Anabaptist traditions, you'll see a lot of that. Anabaptists are Amish, Mennonites, Hutterites. That's typically how they greet one another. We go down to an Amish Mennonite church in Weavertown and by bird in hand, and we've been to the, women all sit on one side, the men all sit on the others. When Don and I and Jason and Frank went there, we all could sit on one side or the other side. They didn't make a big deal on it because we were visitors. But typically that's how they sit. And after the service, you will often see men do that and women do that. Okay. Now, I'm typically, and some people try to instruct me, I've always been a handshaker. Right? I haven't been a hugger too much. I'm always a little careful with that. I don't like to hug too much because I don't want to have anybody think wrongly of that. Anybody? Maybe that's the northern part of Europe in me. The southern part of Europe is more Italian, everybody's hugging and kissing and hey, right? But, you know, whatever it is, it should be holy. That means something that's very wholesome, not something that's not wholesome. But you salute or greet one another with a holy kiss. So that's important. Now, We could talk about that a lot, but I'll end it right here. And he says here, the churches of Christ salute you. Now, the churches of Christ salute you, greet you. Paul's writing is from Corinth, Centuria. There are churches there. Now, in the New Testament, here's the proper way for churches to operate, or be. You have a church at Philippi, you have a church at Ephesus, you have a church at Corinth, at Thessalonica, and on and on and on it goes. These churches are unified in Christ, but they're not unified in hierarchy. You know what I mean by that? I believe the most proper way for a church to be is to be a local independent church under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, not connected with a hierarchy. You know what I mean? We can have a fellowship together. Well, each church should be self-governing under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, by the leadership. In this particular church, we have a board of trustees. They're actually, from the state point of view, that's the governing body, not the pastor, not the elders, not the deacons. From a spiritual point of view, it would be those positions. But from a legal point of view, the state sees the board of trustees. Anytime you're incorporated, you have to have a board of trustees. Okay, and now the trustees have to be voted on at an annual meeting. For example, if you have a board of deacons, you can't appoint the deacons as trustees. Deacon could be a trustee, but a trustee has to be voted on at the annual meeting. We have nine trustees here. They get voted on, a third of them each year, three-year term. Now, if one of them resigns or something happens to one, you can't put them in place until the next annual meeting. I'm very meticulous on this, because I believe we should do everything decently and in order. Right? You agree with that? violate unless they tell you you can't preach Jesus Christ. That's different. But you should do everything decently in order. So this is a local independent church under the Lordship of Jesus Christ. And here he's talking about the churches of Christ salute you. The church at Corinth, the church at Centuria, they're greeting you because you're a body of believers. You're a body in Rome. You're a body wherever. And this is the unity we have in Christ. Okay? So think about this. Now I want to end this with this. And by the way, he's going to get into the next section. Like I said, there's some that are causing trouble. You ever notice when I learned this early on, I come up to a pastor and say, hey, wow, praise the Lord what God's doing. And he said, that's great. And now the next thing out of his mouth would be, be careful. Satan's going to try to undercut the work. Whenever something's going good, the enemy's trying to get in there and cause trouble. It happened back here. It happens today. We need to be vigilant. We need to be on guard. Because you can't let a fox into the chicken coop. Right? And so we'll deal with that next week. He's going to deal with that. Those that cause division and are contrary to the doctrines of Christ. Now, I want you to think about this. What is your part in the Lord's body? And I'm not asking this because I'm saying you don't have a part. I'm not saying this because you're not doing a part. I'm just saying this as a challenge to me. I want to know what my part is here at Grace Bible Fellowship. You say, well, you should know. I do know, I believe, but I want to continually know. I want to be refreshed in what I want to continue to do. I don't want to become stagnant or stationary. I want to be dynamic in Christ, not in me, in Christ. And I would hope this would be the desire of all of our hearts. What is your part in the body of Christ? Pray, of course. Encourage, of course. Support. Okay? Teach. Serve. Work in, you know, like I said, somebody said they'd like to work in the children's ministry if there's something to do. I said, obviously, if you want to serve there, we want to give you something to do. We don't want to just have a body standing around. We want to put you to work. not because we're just trying to work you to death, but I would think if somebody wants to be involved in the ministry, the reason they want to be involved in the ministry, they want to serve. Is that right? They don't just want to be there and, you know, they can be there and have fellowship and stand around and drink coffee, but it's more than that. It's serving together. It's working together. It's being part of the body. So as I think about this, I think a lot about this. This is why my idea to come up teaching our young people how to play baseball, not because baseball's an end-all, but it's part. And another thing I like about it, I'll tell you, to be honest with you, it gets them out of the house and into the playgrounds. I ride by playgrounds and I see very few children, unless it's an organized sport, I see very few children out on playgrounds like they used to be. And it grieves my heart. I talked to Donna's brother, Kenny, from Kingston, and he says, the little legs are shrinking. Why is that? I remember walking six miles to a Little League game, and I was crying all the way because I had no ride, and I thought I was going to be late to let the team down. Finally, somebody picked me up. I played first base for the High Falls Fire Company, and I remember I could tell you exactly on the peak road where I was crying, right below Will Woods' house, up on that little flat. Right? When you leave Will Woods house, going towards Stone Ridge, it goes up, and then it goes on the flat before you go to the... I was crying my head out. You know, here's an 11-year-old kid crying his head out because I felt I was letting the team down. You know? And I think about that. Every time I go by that place, I think about that. And I said, and this has had an impact on my life as a believer in Jesus Christ. I don't want to let the team down. Not because I'm an end-all, but I have a part. And you have a part. You know, sometimes we use this super spiritual talk like the Lord will take care of everything. Do we believe that? Yes, we believe that. But He chooses you and me to be part of taking care of that, right? If He wanted to take care of everything, He could take care of everything without anybody. But why does He choose to use you or me? because we are his body. And why did he say greater works will you do? Because he's going to work through his body. He's going to work through you and me. You might say, well, what do I have to offer? You've got yourself to offer. And God will choose you where he wants to place you in the body. I could use an illustration, but I won't use this growing old here. But it all fits together, right? It all works together. Amen? Right, Ed? Proactive, right. You gotta be proactive. It's like that in anything. When you're a member of something, you're a part of something, you wanna grow up your sleeves and say, here I am. Whatever you want me to do. I wanna serve. Don't worry about the positions. Just serve. Yeah, just do it. That's Nike's motto. So I want to challenge you here. I don't want to put anybody in a guilt trip, but on the same time, we need to be challenged. I need to be challenged. It keeps the team fresh. It keeps the body fresh. You know, take the New York Yankees. They got a bunch of young kids playing with them. They got a 20-year-old. He's the second baseman, right? He's playing his heart out. But when they interview him, what does he say? I'm doing this for the team. The team, right? It's the team. It's the body. It's the group. I want to do it for the team. I want to do it to help the body. I want to do it to serve. And that's why when I went through this list, you know what I read in my commentary? A lot of preachers skip this list. Why would you skip it? Why did God put it in the Word? Why is it there? It's there for a purpose. I believe, for me personally, it's there to challenge me. I don't know any of these people. I don't, you don't either. And they're not mentioned any place else in the Bible, most of them. But there are people that are important to Paul in the ministry of Jesus Christ. Amen? And you're important to Paul, or to Jesus Christ. You're important to the work. Every one of you. I'm gonna end with this illustration. We had a missionary couple, Jim and Gloria. They worked in the Amazon region of South America, Brazil area. They had a problem with their motor in the boat. Motor has all kinds of parts in it. They were working on it and a little part dropped little like washer, little pin dropped into the river into the mud. Without that pin or without that little washer they couldn't run the motor. So they prayed, said Lord we need that pin. Now the reason I'm doing this illustration, you might be that pin in that motor and maybe you're not in the motor now and it's not working properly. Well they prayed And he reached down into the river, into the mud, and pulled up the handful of mud. You know what was in his hand? The pen. Huh? Listen. God is going to reach down and pull you up and put you where he wants you. out of the mud, out of the miry clay. He'll reach down, and this is what he did to me. This is what he did to you. He reached down a number of years ago and pulled up a man by the name of Frank Cerone, and pulled up a man by the name of Louis Jack Russo, and pulled up a name by everybody here. He reached down. In his sovereign grace, he reached down and said, oh, there he is. and he brought him up, and he put him in where he wants him, in the motor, in the body, and he's serving the Lord. But he needed you. Could he do it himself? Of course he could do anything himself. But he chooses to use you and chooses to use me in the body of Christ. I'm needed, you're needed. Right? So praise the Lord. And don't get discouraged. Don't think it's all loss. Sometimes we have setbacks. I've had a number of setbacks in my life. You've had a number of setbacks. We've all had, but get back in. How many have seen Jesus down at Sights and Sounds? What do they have on the cover? They have a hand reaching down, right? Whose hand is that? Jesus' hand. Who's he reaching down for? Peter, right? because he was walking on water. I believe that's what the picture represents, right? And he started sinking because he took his eyes off the Lord. And when he took his eyes off the Lord, he started sinking. But he said, Lord, help me, right? Save me. And he reached down and pulled him out. And that's what it'll do to you and me. Sometimes we cry out, Lord, help me. I'm sinking. and God will reach down and pick you up. And then he'll put you in place where he wants you to be and do. God has a purpose for you. Don't ever feel you're on the losing side. Don't ever feel the odds are totally against you. They can be. The odds can seem totally against you. Don't listen to the odds. Listen to the Lord, right? Amen, John? What do you think? It's great having you here, John. It's great having you here. OK, praise the Lord. Tom, we're ready to go for the Lord's Supper. OK, here we are. We're going to have communion now.