Greetings from Galatians - Part 5

What can we learn from Paul's letter to the Galatians?

On this episode, we continue through Galatians 3. Paul tells us of our right and the responsibilities we as believers have in the care of those around us. We should strive to love, reach, and teach them.

We pray this message encourages your faith, deepens your prayer life, and helps you gain a greater vision for life in Christ. Share this episode with someone who wants to grow deeper in God’s Word.

To learn more about Vision Church or discover how you can partner with our ministry, visit www.ourvisionchurch.com.

Transcript

Copy

SPEAKER_00 0:09

If you have your Bible, we're going to go into God's word. I want you to go to the book of Galatians. Galatians, Galatians, Galatians. We've been in a study of the book of Galatians. We're going to be in chapter 3 today, verses 23 to 29 is what we're reading today. And we're going to be reading the words of the Apostle Paul. To give us a little bit of a recap, Apostle Paul has been, he planted this church a long time ago. He's writing back to them because after they've been following Jesus for some time, they have some people that show up and they say, Hey, before you can follow Jesus, you need to add all these rules. How many of y'all know it is just like church people to add rules where you don't need any more rules? And he shows up and he Paul's writing back to tell them that, hey, you are saved by grace. You are saved because of Jesus. You don't have to add anything else to the blood of Jesus. What he did was enough. So you don't have to follow these feasts and these sacrifices and these special ceremonies. If you want to do it, have fun. But you can't tell me that that stands in the way of your salvation. And so he's writing back to them, and that's where we are. We've been in uh continuing this. And we've been we've been saying this too while we're reading. Uh Paul has his dad voice on, y'all. Paul is like annoyed, he is kind of disgruntled. Uh, he doesn't say niceties, he's just like, I need y'all to fix this right here before I get home. Y'all ever got a phone call? This is just therapy for me. Y'all ever have your dad call you and go, You better fix that before I get home? Like, that's what's happening. Paul's going, I'm not there now, but I'm coming, and you better fix it before I get home. Uh, let's let's read before I say anything else heretical. Uh, before the way of Christ was available to us, we're placed under guard by the law. We are kept in protective custody, so to speak, until the way of faith was revealed. He's talking about the Old Testament. He's talking about the laws and regulations that they had to follow. He's saying the law was good and is good, but it was kind of like a babysitter that was supposed to keep us in line until the real faith showed up. And now the real faith through the person of Jesus has come. And so we don't have to go to the babysitter because our real parents have gone home. Amen. Uh, let me put it another way the law was our guardian until Christ came, it protected us until we could be made right with God through faith. Somebody say faith. And now that the way of faith has come, we no longer need the law as our guardian. So Paul's been saying this for the last few chapters. Hey, and he's repeating himself over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. How many of y'all are tired of me saying over? Like Paul is just repeating himself to make sure he's heard. And he continues this. He starts a new fall here. It says, For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus. And all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes. There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female, for you are all one in Christ. I wanna I want to clarify what Paul is saying here. Uh Paul is not saying that there is no longer Jews and there is no longer Gentiles. He's saying there's no longer Jew or Gentile. He's saying you don't get to walk in and go, only the Jews can be blessed by God, or only the Gentiles can be blessed by God. Only men can be blessed by God or only women can be blessed by God. Only people that go to this type of church can be blessed by God, only the type of people that go to this church can be blessed by God. Only tall people can be blessed by God, only short people can be blessed by God. Paul is saying the division does not matter because God has made us all two children. He said continues in verse 29. And now that you belong to Christ, you are the true children of Abraham. You are his heirs, his and God's promise to Abraham belongs to you. For the next few minutes that we are together, I want to talk to you from this subject. Rights and responsibilities, rights and responsibilities. Let's pray together. Our Father who is in heaven, holy is your name. Your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread, forgive us our sins as we forgive those who have sinned against us. Lead us, Jesus, not into temptation, but we should deliver us from the evil one. For yours is the kingdom and the power and the glory. Amen and amen. Anybody uh the last couple weeks been watching the World Cup? Any World Cup people? Anyone? There's like six of y'all. Okay, some of y'all are like, America! It's like this is World War Three. Uh, I I love I've been watching a little bit, and I find the World Cup in America very fascinating because what it feels like is nobody knew that the World Cup was happening until it happened. Like nobody was watching out and be like, man, I wonder when the next World Cup is. Like, Americans are not soccer watchers. We make fun of soccer, it's what we do. Uh, and so where I say we we do, I'm not even from America, but I guess I'm adopted at this point. And and and and we we're not big soccer watchers, so I thought it was hilarious when the World Cup rolls around. And everybody uh loves this because here's what I know about America. We may not love soccer, but we love winning, amen. We love a good competition. And so I saw people that could not have cared less about soccer, tattooing their faces, buying jerseys. We didn't know that half these players existed two months ago, but now we're all like, oh man, I better, like, I need him to get that red carpet. Like all this stuff uh that we're doing. And uh, and here's my thing. Here's here's my thing. If I could talk to the soccer federation people, I would tell them, listen, uh, I would love to soccer to be more popular in America, but before it gets more popular, there's gonna be some things that they're gonna have to fix. Uh, one of them is that offsides rule. Does anybody can anybody even explain to me what the offsides rule is? In words that I can understand. Like offsides is just, I don't understand. What do you mean by I ran all the way across the field and now I can't make it? But offsides isn't really the reason why we're not gonna make it. The reason why soccer will probably not get popular in America is because not because of the offsides, it's because of the flopping, y'all. Y'all ever watch a soccer game and there's two guys running at each other, athletes at the prime of their life, men of war, like they're just running, and then one of them brushes against the other, and he just goes, Oh. Like, like there's a there was a clip I was watching the other day of a soccer player. He's walking around, and the referee thinks he did a good job, which by the way, that's a bad referee, taps him on the back, and just in case it might have been another player, he oh. I'm like, listen, listen, I've I've been living in America for a while, and Americans like American football. And you gotta recognize in a country where our favorite sport is, you have guys literally putting on armor to bash into each other. Like, that's not a mistake, it's not a foul. It's the gig the joy the joy of the game is I get to hit another guy as hard as I can. If you're gonna get soccer to get big in America, can we at least like stop with the flopping? Maybe give a couple of guys a stick or something. I think I'm inventing hockey. I think that's what's happening right now. I think that's what's happening. Uh but the beautiful thing about soccer is you get to see all these different nations, these different cultures, these different expressions uh live out. You get to see people uh pray with each other and serve one another and care about each other, uh, win or lose, or for some reason tie, because soccer does that. Uh here's what I here's what I see Paul is talking about that. I promise the soccer thing's gonna get connected. Paul is talking to the Galatians, and the Galatians are that they're an international audience. It's a group of people that are very diverse, very different, very have opportunities for division, and Paul is telling them the divisions that you have made super important. Jesus Christ has broken down those walls of division. And Paul has a great reason to talk about this because Paul is not just a Jew that has become a Christian, Paul is also a Roman citizen. Somebody say Rome. See, at the time Paul was a part, uh he wasn't a part of the Roman Empire, but Paul had Roman citizenship. That's how he was able to travel to all these different places, had different rights and abilities. And back in those days, y'all, if you wanted to have it together, you needed to become a Roman citizen. If you showed up someplace and the town was treating you badly, and they found out that you were a Roman citizen, they would turn things around very, very, very quickly. Paul was a Roman citizen, and uh I last week I didn't get to preach. Somebody say awe. Thank you. That makes you feel really better about myself. I really appreciate that. Uh because I was gonna preach a little bit of a message. Uh, how many of y'all have ever seen the sentence e pluribus unum? E pluribus unum. Does anybody know what that means? E pluribus unum? Anybody know what that means? Some of y'all like, I've never even seen that before. Like, uh, e pleuribus unum means out of many, one. Uh it's part of our nation, part of America's DNA. What America is about is this great melting pot, is that uh we show up from different places, different spaces, different backgrounds. We all look different, sound different. And some of us think, man, like just can't have you ever met somebody from Boston? And then have you ever had that person from Boston try to have a conversation with somebody from Louisiana? Like, you're somewhere you're like, I think this is English, but I'm not a hundred percent sure. Out of many one, uh, we come from different backgrounds, we come from different socioeconomic circumstances, we come from different neighborhoods, we come from different, we have different traditions, but uh but there is this nation that God is building. Uh, here's what here's what I love about the the scriptures. The scriptures are teaching this there is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female, for you are all one. Somebody say one. You are all one in Christ. Uh, and here's what I want you to know in the body, we can be distinct, but we can no longer be divided. We can look and go, I'm different than you, but I cannot be divided from you. We can go and look, I'm from someplace different. I have a different my mama. Used to cook different than your mama used to cook, and we used to practice this holiday this way that you practice that way. And I used to get my my peanut butter and jelly and cut off the crust, and you get your peanut butter and jelly with the crusts on. But you I cannot in the Bible, uh, through the kingdom look at you and go, that's not my sister. I can't look at you and go, that's not my brother. I can't look at you and go, I don't want to have anything to do with me. That's why I even love that we had a prayer moment today, because we were walking around and we were strangers before we came into the kingdom. But how many of y'all know when we are in the kingdom, we are not just friends, we are called to be family. And there are things that the world would look at and say, Man, you shouldn't have nothing to do with John's. John, I feel like I always pick you for all my bad examples, and I apologize for that. Like the world would say, Man, you and John have nothing in common. You and John come from different places, you're from different generations, you have different interests. And I tell you, the same blood that is on John and the same blood that is in John, which is the blood of Jesus, has made us brothers. And we need to walk in that spirit that says, Man, I'm not gonna let myself be divided, I'm not gonna let myself be removed, I'm not gonna allow somebody uh to separate me from those that God is making me brothers and sisters. E Pluribus and I'm out of many, one. And the family of God is not just the family of God uh for the sake of being there. Uh, here's here's what I know, here's what I know. Every family has requirements. Like, y'all are not part of the Alexi family. I praise God for that because I cannot afford to feed all of y'all. Uh my son uh he he was asking me this question the other day because he recognized that uh my uh my brother and my parents have the same last name as us. So he's like, are they part of our family or are they part of a different family? And I'm like, I don't know how to answer that question. Like, he's like, well, if they're part of our family, are my are moms but mom and dad part of our family? And I'm like, I need I need like y'all ever have a moment where you feel like you need a better grown-up than you? Like you need an adult pro Max Plus, like to come in the situation and explain it to your kid. I'm having this conversation with them. Uh, and here's here's what I here's what I recognize every family has requirements. Uh, not everybody's gonna be part of this church. How many of y'all know that that is okay? Uh, not everybody's gonna be part of our expression of faith towards Jesus. That is okay. Uh, just like not everybody's part of your family, there are things that are required. Listen, if your last name isn't Alexi, I'm not required to feed you, I'm not required to clothe you, I'm not required to take care of you, I'm not required to pay health insurance for you, I'm not required to take you to soccer practice. Praise God for that, because health insurance is expensive. But here's what I know: we are all part of the Jesus family. And the book of Galatians is this context. It's them saying, What is required for me to get into this family? Well, for you, here's what I want you to know. When God is calling us children of Abraham, my kids didn't have to do anything but say yes to me and my wife to be part of our family. There's nothing that they had to do, they were born into it. Abraham was born into it. Can I I want to clarify that if I can? Uh, how many of y'all know? I just want to take a quick pole poll. Uh, how many of y'all know who Abraham is? Just raise your hand real fresh. Okay, there's a couple, so I'm gonna help us out. Uh, Abraham was the patriarch, he was the father of Isaac and Jacob, uh, father of Isaac, grandfather to Jacob who became Israel. Uh, here's here's what I love about Abraham. Abraham walked by faith. Uh and so there's this generation that's coming up, and what Paul is saying is some of you are trying to get adopted into the family, and you think the requirements are that you do more, the requirements are that you perform activities, the requirements is that you walk in sacrifices, but you're gonna get into the family of God the same way Abraham got in the family of God, and that is by faith. Somebody say faith. And here's the beautiful thing that we get to celebrate as Christians, and I cannot overstate the requirements to get into the family of God is simply for us to have faith in the finished work in the person of Jesus. Well, John, shouldn't we also like dress up for church? In this heat, praise God, we don't have to. Well, John, don't don't I have to like sing a certain way, don't I have to fill out a form, don't I have to uh I need to get baptized before I say yes to Jesus. Don't I have to here's what I know about Jesus. It doesn't matter what mess you're in, what pit you're from, it doesn't matter what what brokenness you're experiencing, it doesn't matter what you walked in feeling like you're disqualified. The grace of Jesus is for all of us wherever we are. And you don't have to, you don't have to qualify yourself. Here's here's what I want you to know Jesus has provided the requirement for you to be in the family of God. And here's the beautiful thing about every family. Once you fulfill the requirements, every family allows you to have certain rights. Like my kids can walk in at my kitchen table. First of all, let's talk about my kids for a second. Anybody's kids home for a summer vacation? Uh isn't it weird how you when I pack my son's lunchbox to take him to school, I put a snack in there, a lunch, and he eats it and he comes home and he's fine. But when he's at home, it's like a black hole has opened up inside of his stomach. And he's just it's like a human vacuum that just goes. Like we went through, we went to Sam's Club, y'all, and bought a 50 uh bag of Doritos, like 50 box bag of Doritos. It was gone in four days. Which means I probably need to parent him a little bit better and keep an eye on him. Also, I'm like, man, where did he eat all that? But you know what? You know what's crazy? When he walks in, he goes, This is my home, so I have certain rights. When I'm at home, my kids have the right to talk to me. When I'm at home, my kids have the right to show up. They have the right to get on the couch, they have the right to play with the dog, they have the right to, they can go into any house, any any of the rooms that they want to. They have the right to open up the water, and I wish that they wouldn't, even though we have a well. So we're probably the reason why there's a drought, because they open up the water and just let it flow. They have the right to, they have the right to do all sorts of stuff that I wish that they didn't do. Here, here, here's what I'm recognizing about so many of us. If we don't, if we engage in the mindset that the church of Galatians is struggling with, we will step into the requirements, but we'll never take a hold of our rights. You need to recognize that in the family of God, you have some rights. You have right to what we just did earlier, where we were praying to God and we knew that God heard us. How many of you recognize that you have the right to access the throne room of God whenever you want to? You don't have to wait for me to come in or for Kia to come in for us to go, hey, okay, Christy, before you pray and before God hears you, Lord Jesus, Christy's about to come in, and uh I know you're not very happy with her right now. So before you like, can I tell you? Christy can go into the throne room of God and say, God, today's been a rough day. I've been really struggling. My husband is angering me a little bit, and I need him to repent. I need to repent. Can I tell you all right now? You have the right to go into the presence of God whenever you want. And, and, and, and, and, and, and, and, and uh, my kids can come in and ask me what, whatever. My kids are bold, they will ask me for stuff. Like my son every other day. Hey, are we going to the pool today? Are we going to the pool today? Are we going to the pool? I'm like, bro, we don't have a pool. Like, I don't know where you think we're going to the pool every single day. But but but but some of us we have a God who has way more than a pool, but we're too timid to come in and ask him. You have the right to ask him. Oh, John, I don't know if I should. Can I tell you, my son? My son, what I'm teaching him in this season is even if you're in trouble, I will still take care of your needs. And some of us, we have a resume of our troubles and our issues and the things that we've done wrong. And so you stop asking God to bless you when God wants to take care not just of your needs, but even some of your wants. I want to tell you this. What kind of prayers are you praying in this season? Here's what I see in the scripture. It says this. And now that you belong to Christ, somebody say Christ, you are the true children of Abraham. You are his heirs, and God's promise to Abraham belongs to you. That is a promise of salvation, it is a promise of hope, it is also a promise of blessing. Can I tell you? Uh, one of the things that is wrong in the church today is we have these things called prosperity gospels and prosperity preachers that are saying, if you just give in the offering, huh? Can I tell you that stuff is messed up? But we also need a theology that says that God loves me, God is for me, God cares about me, God is. Can I tell you it's not just about that, but that is also in the scriptures that God wants to bless you. And here's what I've seen over the last generation of Christians is I see some Christians that are not taking up their right to approach God with their needs. God, I need healing in this situation. I'm broken in my body, but I don't want to bother God with that. God, I've been in this job, and I to be honest, God, I hate the job, I hate the drive to the job, I hate the people at the job, I hate the customers at the job, I hate the thing I do at the job. I hate leaving the job, I hate going to the job, but you never prayed for a better job. Man, God, my my my children, man, then then them kids, they just they talk back, talk back, talk back, talk back, talk back. Yeah, they're talking back to you. Why are you not talking to your father about it? We we we have a God who has all power, all authority, all access, all resources, and we are failing as believers to go to God to say, God, would you help me in this situation? God, I can't do anything about this on my own. I can't make it through. I got I feel like I'm in the valley of the shadow of death and I do not know the way out. God, can I tell you, you have access as heirs to Abraham and as heirs to the promise of God to step into his presence and say, God, I may not know the way, but I know the one who knows the way. God, I may not have the resource, but I know you have every resource. God, I may not be able to provide for myself, but I know you can provide for me. You have rights in the kingdom. You also have the right to belong in the kingdom of God. See, part of this thing that the Galatians are going through is uh the Jewish uh Judaizers are coming in and they're essentially saying this, they're saying, Hey, you don't have the right to belong until you become like us. And Paul, who has been a Jew and has been a Christian and has been a Roman, is walking around, he's going, I don't know about that. I think when we say yes to Jesus, we get to belong to each other and with each other. One of the things that's happening in the life of our church right now that is very difficult is uh we've had a number of our church family, uh, people that are a part of our church experiencing heavy sickness. I've been in the hospital a lot the last couple weeks. We've had members of our church pass away or have members of their family pass away. It's it's easy to be church when we're all cheering together. It's difficult to be church when we need to be crying together. How many of y'all know we are not a church until we cry together? Until somebody shows up and says, I'm sick in my body and I don't know what's going on. Until somebody says, I'm going through a miscarriage and I don't understand what's happening and we sit together, until somebody says, I'm going through the divorce and I wish God would fix it. God would make it better, but I don't know what's until somebody says, My son or my daughter is far from God and they're struggling in addiction, until somebody and and what we do in those moments when we hold each other to it, we what happens there is we begin to belong to one another. Because if I go to church and you have a problem and I sit next to you and you take your problems home with you, then man, like I can, but you know what church is supposed to be? Church is supposed to be. I walk in and I walk in with my problems, but I have a couple people on my left and on my right that are picking up my problems with me. They're saying, I'm gonna pray for that situation, I'm gonna pray for that teenager, I'm gonna pray for that spouse, I'm gonna pray for that new job. Can I one of my favorite testimonies that we got today? I literally got this, I probably shouldn't be saying nothing, but I'm gonna say something. Uh, we had a young man in our church who was um was really struggling with the work situation, and his job had let him go, and it was not a fault of his own. And he was trying to be a provider for his family, trying to be faithful to, and he was like, Man, I don't know where I'm gonna find a job, I don't know what God's gonna do. And he started praying, and then he literally told one person at the church, and that person went, My job is hiring, and he starts tomorrow at that new job. Now we praise God for new jobs, increases, all that stuff, but can I tell you how sad would it have been for that young man to also show up and go, These people don't care about me, I don't belong to them, so let me keep my problems to myself. We are children of Abraham, we are heirs to the promise of God, we are part of the family. There is now neither male nor female, neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free. The divisions that stand between you and I that make it so that we're just church attenders on a seat next to each other, those divisions, the gospel says, have been broken apart back because of the work of Jesus. And we now belong to one another. And so there are requirements to get into the kingdom of God. I'm grateful that Jesus has fulfilled those requirements. There are responsible, there are responsible rights that we get. But how many of y'all know there are also responsibilities? Uh, one of my favorite things we started doing this summer. Um, my kids are seven and four. My daughter just had a birthday. Uh, and we've been um we've been getting them to clean up the house. Y'all. Can I just tell y'all? I'm like, why didn't we start this seven years ago? Like it's just I'm like, all right, y'all clean. No snack until you clean. They're like, okay, dad. And I'm like, I've never seen the carpet this clean since we bought this house. This is great. How many of y'all know that in family we don't just have requirements, we don't just have rights, we also have responsibilities. Um we have responsibilities to one another, we have responsibilities to care about each other, we have responsibilities to serve one another. Um I want to give you a couple of responsibilities that I feel like our body is called to. Um But before before I do that, I want to I want to make a couple of highlights. Um the last couple of weeks we've been uh we've been doing these things called youth nights. How many of y'all are grateful that we've been able to start a youth ministry this summer? And God's been really, really faithful and the team's been doing a great job. And um I it was it was really cool. Catherine, our youth intern, was sharing with me like this past one, this was cool. The the biggest group they had there was high school boys. Some of y'all are like, we should clap for that. Can I just tell you? We should. And half the faces were like, I even know high school boys would ever want to go to church. Like, that's not and and they were showing up, and not only were they showing up, y'all, high school boys, they were talking to people. They were sharing about what was going on in their lives, what what God was doing, what they needed prayer for, and things they were struggling with. And uh here here's here's why I want to talk about responsibilities. If we're not careful, what we'll do is we'll walk in and just claim our rights and never claim our responsibilities. And if all we are excited about is our rights and what we get, we will eventually walk in a spirit of rebellion. Uh in our nation right now, there's this weird um, I don't know what to call it, but it's this uh they've been having these like teen takeover things. Um and I don't know if you've seen them on the news, but it's like thousands of teenagers show up and uh there's delinquency, and some of the stuff I'm sure is fine, but there's fights breaking out, there's people robbing stuff. And here's here's what I here's what I here's what I think as a church. We have the right to say whatever we want to say. And so we could be like we could be the church that goes, man, look at this teenagers and this next generation, and first of all, if that's how you sound, like go to the doctor, that's weird. Like, oh don't do that. Or we can be the church that says, hey, I can I I have the right to complain, but I have the responsibility to make a difference. We have chosen as a church to be a church, we're responsible to make a difference. Here's what I love about that. I love that in a season where on the news they're putting up kids that are misbehaving. At our church, in a little church in the middle of Dinwoody County, we have teenagers, we have high school and middle school students that are showing up to be inspired by the word of God, that are showing up to be built up in the ways of God, that are showing up to build healthy community, that are showing up to be transformed. Can I just tell you, we are responsible for them. As heirs of Abraham, as children of the promise of God, I don't get to look at them and go, that ain't my problem. That's somebody else's kids. They need to fix them. I don't get to look at you and go, that's their situation. Can I tell you, whatever you prayed for somebody about today, don't just pray for them today. How many of y'all would like somebody praying for you all the time? You know how that works? We all just pine somebody and go, I'm gonna pray for Debbie this week. She's not next to me on Sunday, I'm just gonna pray for her this week. Gonna pray for Tequitaon this week. Like, I hope he has a good week. That's how we end up praying for that. Here's your responsibilities to each other. Responsibility number one, you gotta love them. John, I don't want to. They annoy me sometimes. My kids annoy me sometimes. I still love them. I'm sure I annoy you sometimes. I hope you still love me. You gotta love them. Whether they look like you or they don't look like you, whether they sound like you or they don't sound like you, whether they vote like you or they don't vote like you. Whether they're from where you're from or they're from someplace completely different. Can I just tell you we are called to love them? Second thing is this, we're called to reach them. Uh I was coming home last night and um there was a motorcycle accident on the side of the road, and people had stopped, but there are so many people in our community that are in the middle of their accident. They're in the middle of their mess. And one of the ways that we become heirs of God's promise is by not looking at them and going like the Galatians would have been tempted to do is to go, well, I'm a Gentile, so I'm gonna stay on my side. You're a Jew, so you're gonna stay on your side. But instead, to go, you're I'm a child of Abraham, heir to God's promise. And part of what God's calling me to do is to reach you. So we're doing youth nights, we're doing back to school bashes, we're serving our community because they need a real hope in the person of Jesus. And then the third is this we're called to also teach them. See, Paul here isn't advocating for lawlessness, Paul's not walking around saying, Hey, take away the rules, do whatever you want, follow your heart. Like, that's not Paul's not writing a country song, like that's not what he's doing here. What Paul is saying is those things don't separate us, but people still need teaching. People still need renewing, people still need to learn how to do things, how to do marriage, and how to do parenting and how to do man finances and how to can I tell you, we still have a responsibility to teach. The difference is I don't get to hold what I teach and say, until you learn this, you can't get in. It's the opposite. The opposite is come on in so that we get to teach you. Amen. Amen. I want you to do me a favor, would you stand to your feet, Vision Church? And we've been in this study for of the book of Galatians for a while, and we've been gathering on Wednesdays to pray. And uh by the way, if you haven't made it to one of those, I think we only have about three left. So this Wednesday night, right here in upstairs, we'll be meeting, and would love to have you be a part of that. I want to read this scripture one more time. For you are all children of God through faith in Christ Jesus, and all who have been united with Christ in baptism have put on Christ, like putting on new clothes. There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male or female. For you are all one. Somebody say one. But there's a condition to the one. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. The key to unity is not just me saying, Let's be more united. The key to unity is me saying, Let's be more like Jesus. The key to unity is not me saying, you be more like me, or you say you be more like me be more like you. The key to unity is us saying, We both need Jesus. The key to me being your brother in the Lord and you being my sister in the Lord, is that we remain in the Lord. If we're not careful, we'll let that slip away. If we're not careful, we'll get like Judaizers and we'll put on our rules and we'll say this is what vision does, and this is our brand, and this is how we do things, and wear our t-shirts, and all can I just tell y'all that's not the kingdom? Kingdom says, we're all one. We praise God for that in Christ Jesus. We're all one on the good days, we're all one on the days like uh George has been um George has been doing this really funny thing the last couple weeks. He's been uh George Tiller's part of our church. He's been bringing vegetables from his garden. Uh and we we praise God for that. George, can I put you on the spot? Or are you gonna throw something at me?

unknown 33:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 33:46

George has been doing that. George has been a blessing, but last week George lost Trudy Tiller, his wife. She passed away to be in the arms of Jesus. And George skipped one Sunday and he was here. And George, I just want to tell you Trudy's smiling down on us right now. And I'm thankful for the man of God that you are. For how you've led your family in this moment, for how you faithfully loved your wife, and for how you're a part of this church family. We love you. John, that doesn't make me feel good. A family isn't about always feeling good. A family is about belonging to one another. Can we celebrate what God is doing in our body right now? Um that's why I trust. I wanna I want to pray for you. I want you to pray for one another. I want us to belong to one another. That's what God's calling us to. That's the better way. Lord Jesus, we love you. We thank you so much for today. We thank you, God, for the opportunity to gather in your house, under your word, and in your presence. Father, I pray that you would be with us. God, we are children of Abraham. We are heirs of the promise of God. God, it's not about our activity, it's about our faith. It's not about the things that we do, it's about the yes that we've said to you. It's not about our sacrifice, it's about the great sacrifice. His name is Jesus. So, God, I pray that you would make us family. May there be no divisions between us. You've broken down the vision, the divisions between us. So, Father, we embrace today our rights that we get to belong to you and get to belong to each other. And Father, we also take without our responsibilities to love you, to love each other, to love the lost. Empower us to do these things in your name. Amen.