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[0:00] And it's interesting when we talk about anger, it can feel like a bit of a prickly subject, but there's a healthy, ordained, righteous anger that can happen as well.

[0:14] And I want to talk about that too. And it's interesting that we're talking about the summit because it's always a litmus test for me, especially when we're talking about God's house here today.

[0:25] We're talking about Jesus flipping tables, getting that angry, but in a right way. And so it's always a bit of a litmus test just to see, okay, something happened to a building that's a part of the church.

[0:38] How are we going to react to this? And when I was talking to Jamie about it at first, the worst I've seen of him, and we've been through so much of this last year, was, well, great.

[0:54] I think that was an appropriate response. But what happened afterwards is actually kind of beautiful. Things just seem to just come together. And it's true, like just a few days before we had decided to replace the roof.

[1:04] And now all of a sudden, if there was any question whether that was the right decision or not, the decision was made for us. And we had the summit here on Wednesday for the Monday and Wednesday groups, which have merged to the same day.

[1:18] And Derek and Addie and I, we slogged through a year of amazing growth and build and chaos. And somehow, someway, Tyra organized Wednesday so that both Monday and Wednesday felt disorganized last year by comparison to what happened this week.

[1:37] It was pretty impressive. I miss her that she's gone, and that's unfortunate for today. But I will just say that even with the building being challenged, great things are happening.

[1:49] Great things are yet to happen. And I have a feeling when we go back, when we're able to go back to that building, even better things will abound too. But the attitude that I encountered was just precious.

[2:01] Let's just get to it. I think even Sean Joy was just like, you know, even if we got to do it in a tent, you know, and that's fine. It's not about the building. It's about the people.

[2:11] And I think that's an appropriate way to step into our passage today is that it's not about the building. It's about the people. This is God's house. But to fully dive in, let's just talk about the temple in Jerusalem for a bit.

[2:26] So the temple, you know, it had the holiest holies. It had this smaller building that's surrounded by many courtyards. And those courtyards had different purposes and different functions.

[2:37] And one of them that we're going to talk about today was the court of the Gentiles. And anyone was welcome in there. People that were desperately wanting to come and seek the Lord and worship him there from all over were to come to the court of the Gentiles.

[2:53] And it's kind of an interesting atmosphere. And I wish that's where it stopped, but where it continues on is that it was also a large marketplace. There was a couple of things that happened to happen.

[3:04] One of them, and there was one of the marketplace issues, was the money changers. Now, this wasn't a bad thing. Sometimes bad things can happen from good.

[3:14] Because it all depends on how we approach it and our heart and our attitude towards it. So building the roof coming down, it could have been catastrophic emotionally, but it wasn't.

[3:26] All it does is just rally us together and we just keep moving forward. Money changers in the temple were to be there so that the proper currency was given. And that because people were coming from all over, the currency would have to be changed.

[3:40] And so the money changers had a functional purpose. They really did. And the money wasn't always spent on bad things. It was to, you know, redo roads. It was to help things with the temple. I mean, these are positive things.

[3:51] The problem is, is the system was so corrupt. It was often taken advantage of. There was often things that went wrong. People would charge more. They would be, you know, extort God's people.

[4:02] It would be a nasty situation. And that's what we're stepping into here. So when it's, we talk about Jesus flipping tables or being table flipping mad, as I like to say. It's not for nothing.

[4:14] Okay. The other part of it too is, where's the doves, the animals. Now, the way that it worked was that you would bring an animal sacrifice and you'd bring it to the temple.

[4:25] But the problem is that animal had to be seen and deemed as spotless, without blemish, without anything wrong with it. And you can imagine if it's an honest person, oh, God, we've taken good care of this.

[4:38] The Lord would be so pleased with this. Right? But if it's a dishonest person, you could bring the sweetest, fattest calf, the best thing, the best dove, the best lamb.

[4:48] You could bring anything you want and it wouldn't be enough. And we'd be rejected. And you'd be forced to go and buy one of the temple offerings at 10 times the price. So you could bring a perfect dove and anything.

[5:02] The guy could have woken up on the wrong side of the bed. And no, no, that's unacceptable. Go buy one and it's 10 times the price. So Jesus being table flipping mad comes down to what keeps people from worshiping.

[5:19] What happened there? Why did he get angry? And where does our anger being good and righteous and right start becoming sin? Because anger by itself is a healthy emotion.

[5:32] There's nothing wrong with feeling anger. I don't want anybody to suppress the fact that they should feel anger. Sometimes it's the right thing to feel. But what we do with it, how we act out in it, well, that can be problematic.

[5:47] And that can be sinful. I was sharing a story earlier about a guy that I knew when I was a youth pastor. His name's RJ. It's Ronald James. But like RJ was what we called him.

[5:59] And there was something that my friends and I used to do that was pretty fun, though when I look back on it, it was pretty stupid. We used to take an old car, if we had one, anybody had one, and we would drive it because we lived in the mountains.

[6:13] We would drive it as far into the mountains as we possibly could on roads that four by fours should have gone. And these were two-wheel drives. There were times we had to lift them off of rocks in order to continue on.

[6:25] And I've got to say, it was pretty fun. It really was. And you'd have to walk off the mountain, which sometimes would take several hours, but still, it was worth it. So RJ was going through a really hard time, a very difficult time in his life.

[6:39] And he came to me, and I could just see all of this bottled anger just really built up inside of me. The thing is, he was such a sweet spirit.

[6:50] He was a nice kid. And he was from a home where you're not allowed to show anger. It would be deemed as disrespectful. And I can understand.

[7:01] Yeah, there are some outbursts it's best left not to do, for sure. But we're going to get into that. But RJ's problem was that it was constrained. And he comes to me one day, and he says, I really need help.

[7:14] I really need help. I feel all of this, and I don't know what to do about it. And I said, okay, well, we're going to do two things. All right? We'll pray. We'll do that. We're going to get into the Word. We're going to do that. But first, I have something else.

[7:26] So I grabbed a couple of baseball bats. We took a car. I drove a truck that was a 4x4. And I drove up to the last known vehicle I knew up on the mountain. And we stopped there.

[7:37] It was a Honda Civic in 1983 that my friends and I left there. And RJ, I just had a buddy. I said, we're going to beat this car up. And he went, what?

[7:48] And I said, yep. We're going to beat this car up. It's a wrecker. We're going to pull it off the mountain anyways once the snow dies down and all this kind of stuff. And he's like, well, okay. And he takes the bat and he goes, bat, like this.

[8:01] This is a real light one. No, no, no, no. You've got to just lean into this. Right? So I showed him. Right? I took a dent in that door. And so RJ starts beating this car. Right? Just repeatedly beating this car.

[8:12] Tears running down his face. He just runs over. He hugs me and stuff. And I'm like, it's okay. It's okay. You're loved, RJ. It's okay to feel this way.

[8:22] You've had tragedy. You've had things that have just made you so angry. Don't hold them in, brother. Let's get this out. Let's pray about this. And you know what? He was better. His problems didn't go away.

[8:34] But the way he approached them were better. And I took him to this passage. I took him through when Jesus was angry and what right anger looks like. Because it's wrong for us to suppress it.

[8:47] But it's wrong for us to do the wrong thing with it. So let's read this. Verses 12 to 14. And Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple.

[9:00] And he overturned the tables of the money changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons. He said to them, it is written, my house shall be called a house of prayer. But you make it a den of robbers.

[9:11] And the blind in the lame came to him in the temple and healed them. Now, you know what a real tell is here.

[9:23] We can think of this with our earthly mindset and think that Jesus just went to town. In John, it actually, that particular gospel, it shows that he fashioned a whip or fashioned a cord.

[9:35] And so we're thinking like, man, I've never seen Jesus like this. The thing to keep in mind is that verse 14 has the real tell of what this must have been like.

[9:46] Because in verse 14, you see that the people that needed Jesus for healing were still there. This wasn't frightening. And if anything, I wonder at times if they're sitting there just thinking, man, it's about time someone did this.

[10:01] They were unafraid of Jesus, even in his anger. And that tells me something, that righteous anger makes sense. The people who were guilty, who were doing evil, who were doing wrong, who were extorting from people, they ran.

[10:19] Because they knew their time was up. They got caught. But the people who actually needed Jesus felt safe. Isn't that interesting? How if we don't read that verse along with the others, we can look at this as a blind rage.

[10:32] And that is not what happened at all. There are some that will say for him to fashion a cord or would have taken an hour. I've never read that. And I know a lot of scholars that actually think it was probably about five or ten minutes.

[10:45] And I can imagine he's just sitting there and he's thinking, this is so wrong. You know, this isn't right at all. I see all of this. I see the people are so loud selling the pigeons.

[10:56] They're so loud selling the doves. They're so loud doing this that the people that have come to seek me in my father's house are here. And they're not allowed to even pray. They can't pray because everybody's so loud.

[11:06] I'm trading money. I'm trading doves. And the whole reason for them to come there would be drowned out by the marketplace. And because of that, Jesus fashioned this cord that, no, this is not what church is supposed to be.

[11:25] This is not what the temple is supposed to be. This anger we see in him, it wasn't explosive. It's John chapter 2.15. You can see where he fashioned a cord.

[11:37] And there's a few types of anger that we can find in the word. I do think it's important to take a moment and just define that a little bit more. Because we can see it in different ways.

[11:49] This is a righteous anger. This is an anger that's directed towards sin, wrongdoing, and evil. Now, I'm sure we've had the moments of righteous anger when we look around in the world.

[12:02] My own experience with it was when I was on mission in Mexico. And there was an adult outreach that was happening in one of the adult work camps.

[12:13] And people were literally robbed, taken from Oaxaca in the south. And they were brought up to the north. They could never afford to get home. They were brought up on a lie. And we were told, like the one person that took us through, her name was Davida.

[12:29] And we were told, don't paint the fingernails of the kids. Don't paint the faces of the kids. Don't do anything like that that you'd do at home. And I remember one woman on our team was like, well, why?

[12:42] And I said, well, because these kids will be sold into prostitution. And there was a part of me that was just like, I had kids at home. They were at home.

[12:53] I was on this on my own, this particular one. And I was feeling that building of that anger. But it wasn't there yet. And then we went out. And Davida took myself and another person to the places where the white people are not supposed to go.

[13:07] Okay? And we went anyways. And we went to one of the corrugated metal boxes that was a house. About 10 by 10 feet. And this woman comes. And we were going to invite them to come to the outreach that we had that night.

[13:20] And this woman comes to what I could only call a doorway. The best description I could find for it. Big, beautiful smile. Oh, welcome. You know, welcome.

[13:31] Like we felt welcomed. And behind her, two girls, roughly 11 and 12. They came behind what I'm assuming one of them was their mom. And they came behind her.

[13:42] And again, just brightest smiles you can imagine. And we invited them. You know, through an interpreter, we were talking. My Spanish is terrible. I'm trying.

[13:54] We walked down a little bit further. And I said, Davida, like what's going to happen to those kids? Like where's their school? I just said, oh no, they're not going to school. He said, they'll be in prostitution within the next few months.

[14:06] And inside, it was like that's what snapped. Because my own daughter wasn't that far off from that at that point. And I remember just that sense of like, no. It was from inside and it was deep.

[14:20] No. No. And I thought, there's something we have to do about this. She said, you can't. I said, surely the United Nations, surely.

[14:31] She says, no. Entire families disappear when you take pictures. You guys come down with the best intentions. It's not going to solve it. To this day, I feel an unresolved anger that I have to submit to the Lord on a consistent basis over that particular situation.

[14:48] There was a lot that happened that particular evening. I'm not, I've talked about before. I'm not ready to bring it up again. But I will just say this. At the end of the night, I lost count of how many people came to Jesus.

[15:00] I had originally started counting around 30 and then it just kept going for hours. And even in the midst of what we would consider something to be righteously anger over, angry over, the Lord still comes, shows up, saves, delivers.

[15:19] It looked untidy. It looked untidy. It looked untidy. It didn't look right. But he was there and he did his work and the Holy Spirit came. I don't know what else to say.

[15:31] I'm still processing the anger even though I look at all of that and think that mission on paper was a great success. And yet in my heart, it was a massive failure because I couldn't help those two girls.

[15:50] Ephesians 4, 26, be angry and do not sin. Do not let the sun go down on your anger. I think that's what I've had to work with is a verse like this of recognizing that the anger may persist.

[16:04] The situation may persist. The wrongdoing may persist. But we can submit it to the Lord on a consistent basis. Father, I don't get it. But you are God and thankfully I am not.

[16:17] And you are on your throne. And I know justice will come for those girls. Even if I can't help. There's another kind of anger that's a selfish anger.

[16:28] And it comes when our desires, our pride, our comfort or expectations are challenged. When things just don't go our way and we're feeling angry about it like that. James chapter 4, verses 1 to 2.

[16:41] What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not this, that your passions are at war within you? You desire and do not have. So you murder. You covet. You cannot obtain.

[16:52] So you fight and quarrel. You do not have because you do not ask. There's a selfish anger when we cannot celebrate the victories of other people because we wanted that. That's a selfish anger.

[17:04] And it needs to be submitted before the Lord. There's also bitterness. Anger that is held onto and allowed to grow into resentment toward another person. Ephesians 4, verse 31.

[17:16] Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you along with all malice. Now the New Living Translation says this one. Get rid of all bitterness, rage, anger, harsh words and slander as well as all types of evil behavior.

[17:32] It's an interesting take. And then there's explosive anger. Anger that controls us and comes out through shouting, aggression or harmful actions.

[17:45] Proverbs 29, verse 11. A fool gives full vent to his spirit but a wise man quietly holds back. I call this the shoot first and ask questions later attitude.

[17:57] It's where we just get angry. We're not curious. We may not even know the person but we're just mad. And we're going to fire out and blast out like that. That is sinful anger.

[18:10] And I want to give you an example of where we do it a lot. Messaging and text. Okay. I tell you right now. Some of you are laughing and I'm laughing at myself because I've been here.

[18:22] Okay. You send something and you don't quite mean it the way it sounds. But man, when you read it aloud, it sounds like that. And I want to give it. Aaron, can I borrow you?

[18:34] I want to give an example of this. Is that otherwise? Aaron, you filthy sinner. I'm praying for you, man. I really am. All right.

[18:45] Thank you. But you take that in a text and you get a bad reading of it. You filthy sinner. I'm praying for you. You see the difference between the two, right?

[18:58] Like it's just, I mean, obviously Aaron and our friends, I mean, he knows, right? That I'm a filthy sinner. These are two sinners that are arm in arm loving one another, right? That is real.

[19:09] But you read that, you filthy sinner, I'm praying for you. That's where it can go wrong. Okay. That's why the shoot first and ask questions later never works.

[19:22] And there's been some texts or some messages that I'll get where I'm just kind of looking at it. And I know the intent with which it was sent was to harm. But I look at it and after I chuckle a bit, I'm like, okay, Lord, give me insight how to pray for this person right now.

[19:36] Okay. Just let me, let me just pray through this. And I usually put it down. I forget it ever happened or, you know, try and deal with the issue if it's something to deal with. But we have to pray to be able to process explosive anger.

[19:48] We really do. Because it can lead to abuse and harm. And what I did with Aaron, if we weren't friends, would be harmful. Okay. To say to somebody else, you're a filthy sinner.

[19:59] It's like, well, no, I'm first in line. Get behind me, buddy. That would be a better approach. Anyway. Yeah, we can't shoot first and ask questions later. Try our best to approach things with curiosity.

[20:13] Okay. If we're feeling that sense of outburst, like, oh, I'm going to write them a text and give them a piece of my mind. Just look at it and say, how did you come to that decision? Help me understand.

[20:26] I want to be on your team, but I'm not yet. Can you just give me some insight of how you came to this? That kind of questioning diffuses anger very quickly. Because the other person, if they're over the top, well, they look like an idiot at this point.

[20:41] Okay. Because if you just back down and say, well, look, I was hurt by this. Okay. That's something real. That we can talk about. Okay. Curiosity really does win the day when it comes to anger.

[20:56] There's also a passive anger. It's expressed indirectly through withdrawal, silence, sarcasm, avoidance, or deliberate coldness. You're dead to me. Sorry, Diana.

[21:07] I shouldn't be. No. Okay. You're dead to me. There we go. All right. You're dead to me. I'm going to pretend you just don't exist. That's just easier. That is actually a form of hatred.

[21:18] That is sinful. That needs to be repented of. Jesus would never be angry like that. What a cold day it would be if we believed that Jesus would be angry with us like that.

[21:33] It is so much the opposite in God's kingdom, the right side up kingdom. No, it would be, I love you, even though you hate me.

[21:45] Even though you throw me on that cross, I love you. That's the Jesus way. And so when we look at anger and we want to lash out, we want to be passive aggressive.

[21:55] We want to send angry texts. We want to do this. And all of a sudden we feel justified in our actions. Ask ourselves, is this how Jesus would be angry? Would Jesus treat someone like they don't exist?

[22:09] Never. In fact, the only time we can sort of see where that might have happened, Jesus was leading the woman to a place where she, remember, this first encounter with the Samaritan, right?

[22:24] That we can see, that first encounter. And she was like, well, I'll take the scraps that the dogs take. And Jesus is trying to break through religion there with his boys. And he's saying, isn't this a waste of time?

[22:38] Right? And he was dragging out of her faith that would teach. And he rewarded her with a beautiful, beautiful lesson. That's the only time that we can see that Jesus ever even went to the idea of ignoring someone.

[22:53] And it had a heart of love. And it was teaching the disciples. And it was making her feel welcome and loved. It was very different than just someone saying, you're dead to me. I'm not going to listen to you.

[23:07] There's also godly correction. Anger that moves us towards confronting sin with the goal of restoration more than punishment. If you feel this anger, it can be anger you feel with yourself sometimes.

[23:22] You look in the mirror and it's like, man, you did it again. You blew it again. Right? That is that kind of anger. You could be with a best friend.

[23:33] You could be with someone very close and near and dear to you. And they do something. You're like, why don't you keep doing this? That is that kind of anger. That's a loving anger.

[23:44] It isn't out of punishment. It isn't out of judgment. It's more just like, I want more for you than this. I want more for you in this life and with our father than this. Let me help you.

[23:55] Stop being so independent and let me walk beside you. That's an anger or a frustration, even if you want to call it, that I think is in the right place. It's a godly correction. Galatians chapter 6 verse 1.

[24:07] Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. So we learn some things about Jesus here.

[24:20] And I love learning about Jesus. And I want to be able to, every Sunday, that we can look at some way we can learn about Jesus, whether we're in the Old Testament, New Testament. He is everywhere. And it shows us one of the fiercest displays of his anger was directed against those who exploited people, and especially those who did it in the name of religion.

[24:39] His fiercest anger was poured out on those people. He was quoting from verses 10 to 11 that we were reading there. He was quoting from Jeremiah, sorry, 12 and 13.

[24:52] We were quoting earlier. He was quoting Jeremiah 7 verse 11. Has this house, which is called by my name, become a den of robbers in your eyes? Behold, I myself have seen it, declares the Lord.

[25:03] So Jesus' anger was directed against those who made it impossible for regular people to come and worship. His anger was directed towards that.

[25:14] This can be a challenge for us. And it may seem like we can think, well, we don't keep anybody from worship. I have to share a bit of a story from when I first met Jesus my first Sunday after Christmas Eve.

[25:29] Because I came to the Lord at Christmas Eve. I was steering guard, rescue Mary gentlemen. And, you know, it was just something about that. I'd had some questions I was asking prior to then. I was invited to come to the Christmas Eve service.

[25:40] God, rescue Mary gentlemen, you know. That nailed me. Right there, the Lord got me through that. Okay? And then there was an altar call, and I went up, and I gave my heart to the Lord. So the Sunday after that, keep in mind, I was raised in church.

[25:54] I didn't know how you talk, what you do. I didn't know how you dress. I didn't know how you acted. Nobody gave me those lessons. So I go, and I'm kind of leaning on the communion table at the back. Right?

[26:05] And I'm talking to some of my friends. This guy comes up and says, don't you stand or sit on this. Don't do that. And I'm like, whoa, okay. I'm really sorry. Like, and I'm looking at the table thinking, it's wood.

[26:16] Like, from an ignorant point of view. I was coming at it from that space. It's like, I don't know what this is. I'm really sorry. I was terrified of that guy for years. Years. Because of that encounter.

[26:28] And the thing is, I came to know what? He was a godly man. Right? He just had this way of being. But it was something where it's like, look, I didn't know the language. I didn't know the rules to the church.

[26:38] I didn't. I get where he was coming from now. Okay? But to a brand new believer. To someone who had never been into a church before. Outside of a funeral.

[26:51] It was a little much. Do you think I worshipped freely that day? I was standing there going. Had my hymn book. And I was like, you know. Looking at guys.

[27:02] Like, you know. Am I standing right? Should I sit? It was all about worrying about what this guy thought. And it took me a while to kind of dial down from that. We can get in the way of people worshipping.

[27:17] That is table flipping mad Jesus stuff. Do you see that? We can get in the way of people worshipping. If we worship a building over the people within it.

[27:28] We can get in a table flipping mad Jesus situation. When we value process over people. I'll say again.

[27:39] The real tell in these three verses is the last one. 14. The lame and the blind were still there. This was not an aggressive anger.

[27:53] This was not Jesus frothing at the mouth. And you know. Yes. He turned some tables. And yes. He chased some people out of there. But he chased the people that were guilty. Of doing God and his people wrong.

[28:08] The people that were left there were unafraid of him. And they received healing. And that's a beautiful thing to consider. Jesus' anger was directed against those.

[28:19] Who made it impossible for regular people to worship. In the house of God. It was Isaiah who said that God's house. Was a house of prayer for all people. Isaiah 56.7 These I will bring to my holy mountain.

[28:33] And make them joyful in my house of prayer. Their burnt offerings and their sacrifices. Will be accepted on my altar. For my house shall be called a house of prayer. For all peoples. The court of the Gentiles was the only part.

[28:47] The Gentiles were allowed. But everybody else. Everybody would be welcome there. But they had to be there themselves. They were there with a longing in their heart. To connect with God.

[28:59] They weren't there to take a selfie. Or they weren't there on a tourism trip. Or anything like that. They were there to go and worship. They had that heart. And in all of the buying.

[29:10] And the selling. And the yelling. And all of the stuff that was just wrongful. That was going on. Could you imagine trying to pray in that environment. You've come from somewhere else. You want to honor God.

[29:21] With all that you have. And all that you are. And somebody is like. A dump for this. Mama. And they're yelling. It's hard to concentrate on that prayer. Don't go sit on that table.

[29:32] You see what we can get trapped into. If we're not careful. People over process. Always. This building were to fall.

[29:44] I would grieve with you. And I've just got here. But we would keep on meeting. Even if it was a tent outside there on the grass. Or we all show up at Jamie's house.

[29:54] Whatever. We all. Sorry Chelsea. You get what I mean though. The church is more than a building. Right? The spirit of bitterness.

[30:06] The spirit of argument. The spirit of division. Could get into a church. That makes worship a challenge. We. We can work on that. We can get so concerned with our own rights and positions.

[30:21] Even our practices and procedures. In a church. People can be hindered from worshiping God. People over process. Always. Worshiping God.

[30:34] In a spirit of disunity. Did not go together. We talk about that. And we say fear and faith don't live in the same heart. And you're right. And that's an easy one to think of.

[30:46] Did you ever stop. That worship. And division. Did not belong in the same house. Right? We can block people from worshiping. With a spirit of disunity.

[30:57] So if you want to make Jesus table flipping mad. Get divisive. No. Don't do that. Jesus did all of this.

[31:11] But moved on to healing the blind and the hurt people. And they were still there. They didn't leave. So what does God want with this house? What does God want with his house?

[31:22] This one. Because this. And I'll say it every week if I have to. This is not our church. This isn't my church. It's not your church. This is the Lord's church.

[31:33] And we get to come here. And hallelujah for that. And I tell you. There's days where I wake up and I come here. I feel like one of the most blessed people on earth. That I get to hang out with this group of people.

[31:46] I really, really feel that. Okay? But if the building fell down. I'd still feel that way. Because of you. Not the building itself. So what does God want?

[31:57] Well, God wants prayer among his people. 1 Timothy 2 verse 1. First of all, then I urge you that supplications, prayers, and intercensions. And thanksgivings be made for all people.

[32:09] He wants us to be a people of prayer. He also wants people to be helped. If there's a need. If there's something that has to be done. You know, I read this book by Francis Chan.

[32:22] It was just great. And it was about his board actually. Sitting in the circle. And they were praying over the church. Which is always a good thing for boards to be doing. And this one guy was just really moved.

[32:33] And he threw his keys into the middle of this circle. And he said, if you need a card, you can take mine. And this other guy was in insurance. And he just said, if you need help restoring something.

[32:48] Let's talk and I'll make it happen. Another guy who was a carpenter said, if you need something fixed at your house, I'm going to come help fix it. And they went around to what, you know, I love it.

[32:59] Aaron mentioned it recently. What's your drum? The idea of what you worship with. Whatever you have in your hand. Whatever talent, skill, and ability you have. You throw that in the ring with the church. And you say, whatever you need, I'll be there for you.

[33:12] I'll help you in this way that I can. That is a spirit of unity. That is something that's building together. That is way bigger than a building. It's a heart of a church of people that love one another and love their Lord.

[33:26] So he wants people to be helped. And there should be power in God's house. The power of God working in his church to change people. I pray that we are not the same people a year from now that we are today.

[33:39] I pray that we are continually grow closer to him. That we can look at ourselves and just say, Father, I want to be more like you and less like me. That, Lord, when people see me, they see more of you and less of me.

[33:54] And that means some of the rights, some of the privileges, some of the things that we value or hold most dear or get in arguments over, they've got to fade away. There also has to be praise.

[34:08] Honest worship. Without worrying about a thing. Just simple, honest worship. And I love that we have that here. We really do. So I want to leave with this in closing.

[34:22] Because I read from Ephesians 4 earlier. Ephesians 4.32 is one of the consistent verses I pray for this church with. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.

[34:36] If you need to go beat up a car, I'm your guy. Come talk to me, okay? But even better than yet, let's be a people who love one another with tender hearts, forgiving one another, recognizing that we are forgiven by the Lord.

[34:53]  Lord, let's pray. Okay.