Good morning. Happy New Year. Good to be here with you today. If you don't know me, my name is Eric.
I'm one of the guys here on staff at Watermark Church, and it's great to see all of you in this year of the dog.
I want to start out today with a story. It's not an amazing story. It's actually a pretty boring story,
but there's a reason I'm going to tell you this story.
It was a little over a year ago. I was at a wedding banquet here in Hong Kong.
The party was going well, and the groom walks up to me, and he says,
Hey, Eric, I need your help. We're running out of wine.
So I called all the waiters together, and I said,
Hey, we need you to fill up some buckets with water, and then we're going to do something really special.
It's not what I did. I grabbed a friend.
We ran across the street to the grocery store.
We picked up 24 more bottles of wine, got some boxes to carry them back, put it on my credit card,
came back, and the party kept going. Very unspectacular.
But I tell you that story to introduce the story of Jesus today,
because I think sometimes we can miss how unspectacular the setting of this story is.
It's a wedding. The fate of the universe does not really hang in the balance in this moment,
and yet Jesus steps in and does something super incredible in this moment,
and I want us to catch that today.
So like Kevin said, the past few weeks we've been looking at who is this man.
We've been looking at Jesus.
We've seen that he is the one who gives the second birth,
the birth in the Spirit, and offers us life.
We've seen that he is a healer who offers us a new way to live.
And today, we're going to see that he offers us more than anything and anyone else.
That he offers us satisfaction that our souls crave for.
That he is the Lord who wants to give us the abundant life in all of life,
from the trivial moments to the most important ones.
And to get there, we're going to see a problem, a solution, and a challenging truth.
But before we jump in, let's pray.
Father, we thank you for today, for this time together to look at your word, to learn about you.
We pray that as we come together today, that we would see Jesus,
that we would see his beauty, and that we would fall in love with you,
and recognize you as the one who truly satisfies,
who truly gives us what our souls are longing for.
In Jesus' name, amen.
So this passage starts out with a problem.
A little context.
In the book of John, John has just finished introducing Jesus,
telling us a little about who he is.
Jesus has called his first five disciples,
and he is now back near the area where he grew up.
And he goes to a wedding, and he gets to bring his disciples with him to this wedding.
He gets a plus five or so, which I think is pretty special.
I've never gotten a plus five at a wedding.
And a little background on the context of this wedding,
because in verse three, John says something that sounds pretty everyday,
when the wine ran out.
It sounds pretty trivial, pretty commonplace.
To help us understand the significance of this comment,
I think we need a little more background on Jewish weddings 2,000 years ago.
In a lot of ways, they were very similar to Hong Kong weddings.
It was a chance to throw a huge party and invite all your friends and extended family,
a massive celebration,
and it was a chance for you to show off your generosity and wealth.
Like in Hong Kong, the groom was expected to pay for everything.
And also like in Hong Kong, there was a lot of honor and shame to be gained or lost,
depending on how good or bad of a celebration it was.
But in some ways, it was a much bigger celebration than your normal Hong Kong wedding.
See, these celebrations could last up to a week,
which means you need a little bit more food than you do for a Hong Kong wedding,
although I think the average Hong Kong wedding probably has about three days worth of food.
So you probably don't need too much more, but a little bit more.
And the stakes were higher in these weddings.
So it's possible that if the wedding ran out of food or wine early,
the bride's family could sue the groom for bringing shame on them.
And it could become this legal dilemma for the groom
if he did not plan or prepare adequately.
To run out of wine in a wedding was a huge deal.
You made sure that you planned enough in advance that you didn't let it happen
because there was not a grocery store across the street
where you could send your groomsmen with a credit card.
And so when he says, when the wine ran out,
it sounds like a fairly commonplace, not a big deal thing, but it was.
It was rare.
It was shameful.
It meant that the groom was either poor or worse,
too stingy to provide adequately for his own wedding celebration.
And it tells us that Mary, Jesus' mother, somehow learns about this dilemma,
comes to Jesus, and tells him they have no wine.
Now, John later tells us that this was Jesus' first miracle.
So my assumption is Mary is not expecting Jesus to do what he did.
She is not thinking, ah, if I tell him he's going to find some water,
turn it into wine, party's going to be all set.
No, she's his mom.
She probably knows he's a good problem solver.
I mean, he's God.
He's got to be a good problem solver, right?
And she's just thinking,
how can I avoid this awkward social situation?
I know a guy who's really good at solving problems, my son Jesus.
She just wants to avoid social awkwardness.
She wants some help with what she sees as a trivial situation.
But Jesus hears her comment, and he sees something way deeper going on here.
See, he knows that he is the Messiah,
the Savior that God has promised,
who's coming to save and rescue the world and bring God's kingdom to earth.
And he's read the Old Testament,
and he knows that when the Old Testament talks about God's kingdom,
imagery of abundant wine is everywhere.
If you look at Isaiah chapter 25, verse 6,
it says,
On this mountain, the Lord of hosts will make for all people a feast of rich food,
a feast of well-aged wine.
If you look at the prophets Joel and Amos,
they talk about how the mountains during this time will drip sweet wine.
And then in the time between the Old Testament and the New Testament,
this imagery just gets blown up to epic proportions.
There's this Jewish writing from between the Old Testament and the New Testament,
and they say in this writing,
when God's kingdom comes,
on each vine, there will be a thousand branches.
And on each branch, it will produce a thousand clusters.
And guess how many grapes will be on each cluster?
A thousand.
And each grape will produce over 35 gallons of wine.
So if you're a math person, that's 35 billion gallons of wine per vine.
Probably a slight exaggeration, but you get the image.
God's kingdom is a kingdom of abundant wine, an abundant celebration.
And Jesus knows this.
He sees this opportunity to provide wine at this party
as a way of giving a glimpse into the work that he's going to do
and a foretaste of what he's going to accomplish.
So Mary comes looking for a boost to the party,
looking to avoid an awkward social situation,
and Jesus sees an opportunity to display his glory.
He sees spiritual meaning of cosmic importance in the midst of the mundane.
And I think that is why he answers the way that he does in verse 4.
Jesus said to her,
Woman, what does this have to do with me?
My hour has not yet come.
Quick side note,
woman is not as offensive of a way to respond to your mother in that culture
as it is in ours.
It was actually a quite respectful term,
but not really one you would use for your mom.
It would kind of be like me calling my mom Mrs. Scott.
It's not, it's respectful,
but it's not really a way a son talks to his mother, right?
And I think what Jesus is doing here
is Mary has become comfortable around Jesus.
And Mary has this expectation that Jesus is there
to fulfill her desires and make her life easier.
And Jesus is saying,
No, that's not how you come to me,
even if you're my mother.
If you're coming to me,
you have to fit your life into my plans,
not the other way around.
And that's true for all of us here today.
It's a challenge to us that when we come to Jesus,
he's not there to make our lives easier.
He's there for us to fit our lives into his plan.
And that's just something to keep in mind
if anyone ever tells you that we should be praying to Mary.
Now back to Jesus' comment.
He says,
What does this have to do with me?
My hour has not yet come.
Now in the book of John,
when Jesus mentions his hour,
does anyone know what he's talking about?
It's the cross.
Every time, always.
Jesus' hour is referring to the cross.
So Mary comes and says,
Hey, the party needs more wine.
And Jesus is like,
It's not time for me to die.
It seems like an odd response.
But why is Jesus focused so quickly on the cross
when he realizes that the party is out of wine?
It's because Jesus is the one
who's bringing this kingdom of abundant wine.
But because of our sin,
that kingdom has to be purchased at a price.
He knows that if he gives a glimpse
into the kingdom that he's going to bring,
he can't do it without thinking of the price
that it's going to cost him to bring that kingdom.
And that price will be the cross.
There's deep, spiritual, loaded meaning
in Jesus' response.
And I think this went right over Mary's head.
Because rather than recognizing
all of this deep, spiritual, cosmic meaning
in Jesus' words,
she simply turns to the servants
and says in verse 5,
Do whatever he tells you.
Which is good advice.
And that brings us to
the solution to the problem.
It tells us here,
there were six stone water jars
for the Jewish rites of purification,
each holding 20 or 30 gallons.
Now, notice what these jars are holding.
It's water.
And if you look through the book of John,
water shows up again and again and again.
So a couple weeks ago,
Kevin talked about Jesus' conversation with Nicodemus,
where Jesus says,
you have to be born of water and the Spirit.
And in John chapter 1,
John comes baptizing in water.
In John chapter 4,
Jesus has a conversation with a woman at the well
where he asks her to give him some water.
Water is all over the place.
It shows up many more times as well.
And if you look through,
every time water shows up in the book of John,
you notice a theme.
Water in and of itself is never a bad thing.
But it's also never quite enough
to get you what you really want or need.
So when Jesus is talking to Nicodemus,
being born of water isn't a bad thing,
but you need something more.
You need to be born again.
When John comes baptizing in water in John chapter 1,
he's baptizing in water.
Why?
So that he can point to the one
who's going to baptize in the Spirit.
When Jesus comes to the woman at the well
in John chapter 4 and asks her for water,
he ends up rebuking her
because he says there's something more that you need.
There's a living water that will satisfy you
and quench your thirst forever.
And you should have asked me for that.
The water in and of itself isn't a bad thing,
but you need something more every single time
because the water itself is not enough.
And it's the same at this party.
The water is not a bad thing,
but what the party needs isn't the water in the jars,
but wine.
And why does the party not need the water anymore?
Well, it has to do with why the water is there
in the first place.
It says it's there for ceremonial cleaning.
A little bit of background.
In the Old Testament, God has the Israelites.
They're his chosen people.
They've got promised blessings.
They're supposed to obey God.
And they fail.
Again and again and again.
And eventually, they get sent into exile
as a punishment for their failure.
After 70 years, God sends them back into their own land
and they realize, hmm, when we disobey,
things don't go too well.
So let's obey from now on.
And they realized that if you took all of the commands
that God gives in the Old Testament,
you could create extra commands
to keep you from accidentally breaking any of God's commands.
And so one Jewish teacher realized,
you know, if we just have water
and wipe our hands off with it before meals,
that can keep us from accidentally breaking
these other laws that God has given us.
So it's not something that God explicitly commanded,
but the Jews practiced it in Jesus' day
to help them be more obedient to the other laws
that God did give.
And so they have these jars at this party
to help them wash,
to help them avoid accidentally breaking God's commands.
But here's the thing.
The water can't do that.
The water symbolizes purity,
but guess what?
At this party is the one who is full,
who is pure.
The water symbolizes cleaning from things that defile us,
but Jesus is at this party
and he's the one who's going to bring
the ultimate cleansing from everything that defiles us.
The people at this party have the water
to help them fulfill God's law,
but at the party is the man
who is the fulfillment of God's law.
So the water in and of itself isn't a bad thing,
but it can never achieve the cleansing that it symbolizes.
It's just not enough.
So where have the Old Testament religious systems
gotten this party?
Out of wine?
In danger of being shut down early?
Basically, their reliance on tradition
and their own obedience to achieve blessing
can never give them what their hearts truly desire.
And I think if we look around this room today,
most of us don't try to follow
Old Testament religious systems
as a way of achieving blessing in our lives.
But we do turn to other things.
For many of us, it's our jobs.
We believe that if I can work hard enough
and if I can do well enough,
my job will give me the meaning and the purpose
and the fulfillment in my life
that I truly crave and desire.
And so we pour ourselves into our jobs
and we work insane hours
so we can get what our hearts desire.
Maybe for some of us, it's relationships.
We believe that you're nobody until somebody loves you.
And so we pursue relationship after relationship
because we believe that my identity
and my fulfillment in life,
that the abundant life comes from having someone to love.
and we end up cutting corners
and dating people we know we shouldn't date
and sticking around in relationships
long after it's clear
that this is not a healthy place for us to be
because we believe that that's the path
to the abundant life.
For some of us, it's social media.
If I can get enough likes on this post
and it's going to prove that I'm somebody.
And so we custom build this image of ourselves
that has nothing to do with our real lives
and put it online
because we are chasing those clicks and those likes.
And the more clicks we get,
the more we feel like I've made it
because we believe that getting likes
is more important to true abundant life
than being truly known.
We're just like the Israelites.
We have our own systems.
We believe that these things that we can achieve
are going to fulfill us
but just like the Old Testament law
couldn't bring what their hearts truly desired,
none of the things other than Jesus
that we rely on in life
are ever going to truly satisfy us.
Instead of giving us the abundant life
that we long for,
what do they give us?
They give us stress
because who am I going to be
if I lose my job?
They give us anxiety.
What is it about me
that makes nobody want to date me?
They give us fear.
Why hasn't anybody clicked like on my picture yet?
Does everyone hate me?
The things we long for
cannot be achieved through our efforts.
It's only in Jesus
that we can find the security,
the stability,
and the freedom that our souls crave.
He is the only source
of the truly abundant life.
And he demonstrates this at the party.
He tells the servants,
fill the jars up with water.
Symbolically showing that he is the one
who fulfills completely
the Old Testament law.
But he doesn't just fill them
and leave them full.
He has them fill the jars
and then pull wine from them.
It's almost like he's saying,
by fulfilling the law,
I'm inaugurating the new age
of God's kingdom,
the kingdom of the abundant wine
right here, right now.
The water of the law,
it's not bad,
but it can never get you
what you're longing for.
But my kingdom
will bring you satisfaction.
The other things you long for,
you cling to,
to get you that life
can never satisfy you.
Only I can.
So he has them draw the water,
bring it to the master of the feast,
and that brings us to
a challenging truth.
The master of the feast,
he tastes the wine,
and he realizes this is delicious.
So he calls the groom over
and he says to him,
everyone serves good wine first,
and when people have drunk freely,
then the poor wine.
But you have kept the good wine
until now.
Notice what he's saying here.
Not only had the party
run out of wine,
not only was the party
in danger of being shut down
because this groom
hadn't adequately prepared.
But the wine they were relying on
to fuel their enjoyment
up to this point
was nothing compared
to what Jesus offered them.
How often in our lives
do we try our best
to squeeze every drop
out of the mediocre
that we can provide
when Jesus is ready
to offer us something
so much greater,
something so much better,
if only we would ask.
And something else,
by this point,
literally any wine
would have made them happy.
They were expecting
the boxed stuff at this point.
If Jesus had shown up
and been like,
here's some boxed wine,
I got it on sale
at the supermarket,
they would have been ecstatic
because the party
can keep going.
And what does Jesus
bring them instead?
He gives them
the good stuff.
How often in our lives
do we reach a point
where we're so desperate
for anything good
to happen
that we take
the spiritual equivalent
of boxed wine?
And Jesus is showing us
and reminding us
that he doesn't give us
the cheap stuff.
He always gives us
true abundance.
But here's the really
challenging truth.
That abundance
often doesn't look like
what we expect.
We believe that
the true abundant life
comes from fame,
from money,
from power,
from comfort.
But Jesus says,
no,
true abundance
is about a relationship
with me
where you come to me,
you submit to me,
and you trust in me.
It's about a relationship,
not stuff.
If you look back
in verse four,
remember Jesus' comment
where he said,
my hour has not yet come.
In this moment,
his focus is on the cross.
His focus is on the price
that he has to pay
to bring us
this kingdom
of the abundant wine
and to make that
a reality for you
and for me.
And he actually
uses wine
to talk about
the price
that he was going to pay
in another meal.
In the Last Supper,
he sits down
with his disciples.
He pulls out
this glass of wine
and he says,
this cup
is the new covenant
of my blood.
He's saying,
the price
that it's going to cost me
to bring this kingdom
of abundant wine
is the wine
of my blood,
but I'm willing to do it.
Why?
Is it so that we can be famous
and rich and powerful?
No.
It's because it's about
a relationship
and that's the price
that it costs
to have that relationship
with us.
And Jesus
was willing
to pay that
because he
cares about you
and he cares about me
and he loves us.
And here's the second half
of the super challenging truth.
the abundant life
brought Jesus
to the cross
and he says
that if we're going
to have the truly
abundant life,
that we live
that abundant life
on the way
of the cross
as well.
That the way
to abundant life
is not by pursuing
our power
and our fame
and our prestige,
but it's by
laying down
our desires
every single day
and pursuing him
by loving
the people around us.
I don't know about you,
but that's scary to me
because it feels
way easier
to just pour myself
into my job
and believe
that if I can do
really well
and I can achieve success,
that that's going
to give me
true life.
And what Jesus
is saying
is that best case scenario,
that's the boxed wine.
And even if I can
get that boxed wine
for a little bit,
it's going to run out
eventually.
So here's my question
for us today.
What will it take
for us to recognize
that Jesus is so much better
than the other things
that we're relying on
for this abundant life?
I think step one
is recognizing
how powerless
these other things are
to satisfy us.
And I think,
you might call me crazy,
but I think Madonna
expressed this
really well.
In an interview
with Vogue,
she said,
my drive in life
comes from a fear
of being mediocre.
That is always pushing me.
I push past
one spell of it
and discover myself
as a special human being.
But then I feel
I'm still mediocre
and uninteresting
unless I do something else.
Because even though
I've become somebody,
I still have to prove
that I am somebody.
My struggle
has never ended
and I guess
it never will.
She's saying,
I feel this pressure
every day
to wake up
and prove through my efforts
that I am somebody.
And on a really good day,
I get the spiritual equivalent
of boxed wine.
But then I wake up
the next morning
and I realize
I'm out again
and I have to go
produce more
every single day.
I can't rest.
I can't let it go.
And I recognize
that fame
and money
and success
can never give me
the deep desires
of my soul.
I'm chasing
what I think
is the abundant life
and what I feel like
is the best way
to do it,
but it has me trapped.
I can't stop.
If I ever stop trying,
I'm afraid
that it's all
going to disappear
and be gone.
And how clearly
does that express
what so many of us
feel and experience
when we try
and accomplish
and achieve
the abundant life
on our own?
But Jesus comes to us
and he says,
stop.
Stop striving.
Rest.
The best that you
can accomplish
through your efforts
is mediocrity.
But I've come
to bring abundance.
See my beauty
come to me.
And how can we know
that when we stop
that he's going
to be there
and he's going
to provide for us?
Well, look what happens
in this story.
Look at the drama
that plays out here.
It's actually
a reenactment
of the gospel story.
There's a man
who has this duty
but it's a joyful duty
to provide food
and drink
for his party.
It's a joyful duty
because if he does it well
everyone's going to have
a great time
and they're going to have
the best party possible
and he fails miserably.
And for his failure
he deserves shame
and honor
and punishment.
And in the moment
of his failure
Jesus steps in
and does for this man
what the man
could not do
for himself
provides for him
in a way that the man
cannot provide for himself.
And because of the work
of Jesus
at this party
the groom
who deserves
shame
dishonor
and punishment
instead is given
praise and honor.
That's the story
of the gospel.
We have
a duty
but it's a joyful duty
to obey God.
And God tells us
that when we live
our lives
obediently to him
that's going to be
the most abundant
fruitful
joyful way
to live
and it's a blessing
to have
this responsibility
and yet you and I
every single one of us
fail miserably.
And for our failure
we deserve shame
dishonor
and punishment.
And in the midst
of our failure
Jesus steps in
and does for us
what you and I
cannot do for ourselves.
On the cross
he pays the price
for everything
that we've ever done wrong
and gives us credit
for his perfection
so that although
we have failed
through the work
of Jesus
you and I
can be given
praise and honor
and glory
in God's sight.
See when we
stop striving
that's when Jesus
steps in
and starts fighting
our battles
for us.
He demonstrates
that here
he demonstrates
that on the cross.
and on top
of that
think about this
whose responsibility
is it
to provide
the wine
for the feast?
The groom.
Who does
actually provide
the wine
for the feast?
Jesus.
Do you think
there's significance
to that?
Probably.
In the Old Testament
over and over
and over again
God refers
to the Israelites
his special people
as his bride
and in the New Testament
it calls the church
the bride of Christ.
What's Jesus
showing us
by providing
the wine
at this feast?
He's showing us
that he is
the greater groom.
He is the one
that our souls
are longing for.
It's about
a relationship
with him
and he is going
to do something
that's going
to call a people
to himself
and give us
unite us
to him
in the most
intimate relationship
possible
for eternity.
So as we ask
the question today
who is this man?
We see that
Jesus is the Savior
who rescues us
through no work
of our own
and offers us
abundance
in the place
of our failure
and Jesus
is the greater groom
who is seeking
a bride
for his own
possession.
John concludes
the story
by saying
that Jesus
displayed his glory
by doing this sign.
We've been discussing
the glory of Christ
lately.
We've been saying
it's sort of like
a diamond.
It's the fullness
of who he is
but when you look
at it from
different angles
you see
different things
and in this story
Jesus shows us
another glimpse
of who he is
and I think
what he's trying
to show us here
is that everything
we're looking for
in all our
religious systems
and all our
self-reliant efforts
is found in him.
We're not going
to find it
anywhere else.
He is the only place
where we're going
to find the truly
abundant life.
Not our jobs,
not our relationships,
not social media,
nothing else
and because of this
it's worthwhile
to forsake
everything else
in order
to pursue him
because that's
the path
to the truly
abundant life.
He did the first
of his signs,
he manifests his glory
and his disciples
believed in him.
I think there are
two closing things
that are super
significant
in this last comment
about the disciples
believing in him.
John tells us
the signs in the book
of John
are recorded
so that we can
believe and have
life by believing.
Jesus does the signs
to lead to believe
and it tells us here
that the disciples
believed.
But what does that
mean?
Everyone at the party
saw the sign
but only the disciples
believed.
And that tells us
it's possible
to see the work
of Jesus
and not believe.
And I think
there are some
of us here today
who are in this place
that we've been
coming to Watermark
for a long time.
We've been hearing
about Jesus,
we've been seeing
the difference
that he makes
in people's lives
and we still
haven't believed.
And God's calling
to you today
if this is you
and saying
Jesus is
the only path
to the abundant
life that you desire.
All your efforts
cannot get you
what he offers.
Stop striving,
stop relying
on yourself
because only Jesus
can give you
what your soul
is craving.
And yes,
pursuing Jesus
it means a path
of letting go
of your self-reliance
and embracing
this path
of the cross
the way of sacrifice
and trust
but it will bring you
the true abundance
that you have
always craved.
So if you're here today
and you haven't
trusted in Jesus
I challenge you today
trust in him
he's the only path
to the truly abundant life.
But the second thing
this passage shows us
it says
the disciples
believed in him.
Now think about this
they were already
his disciples.
To become his disciples
they had
to believe
in him somehow
and yet it tells us
that after seeing
this sign
they believed in him.
So what I see here
is that it's possible
to believe
but not believe.
Or in other words
there are different
levels of belief.
For the disciples
they probably believed
that he was
a good teacher
maybe that he was
sent by God
to teach God's truth
but they see this
and they realize
that he is powerful.
And the book of John
is a journey
of the disciples
going deeper and deeper
and coming to see
more and more
of who Jesus is
and growing in their belief
until they reach
the point where they recognize
this is God.
He is risen from the dead
and he is the savior
who is here
to rescue us.
And I think there are
some of us here today
who are sort of in this place
where we believe
but don't believe.
And God's calling us today
to just believe.
I think there are probably
some of us here today
who maybe we say
I believe that Jesus
can forgive my sins
and that he's going to
give me eternal life
and that's going to be great
but I don't really believe
that he has the power
and he alone has the power
to give me the most
abundant life possible
here and now
today.
And he's showing us
that yes, he does.
The call is to believe.
Jesus is reminding us
that he cares immensely
about the everyday moments
of our lives
here and now
and he wants us
to have the most abundant
life possible
right now.
Think about it.
Jesus came to earth
literally to save the world.
The things that he did
included raising the dead,
giving sight to the blind,
casting out demons,
things that are really
big deals
and he gets dragged
into providing food
and beverage
at a wedding party.
He has the same conversation
that I had with a friend.
If I had the conversation
it can't be that significant
of a conversation
that like the fate
of the universe
hangs in the balance
at it.
But he still stepped in
to help in this
relatively trivial situation.
Why?
Because he cares.
Because he wants us
to have the most abundant life
right now.
And he cares about
the problems of our lives
even the trivial ones.
But it's not just
the trivial ones.
In providing for this
fairly trivial situation
he gives a picture
of his provision
for our greatest problem
as well.
Just a reminder
him caring
and wanting
an abundant life
for us
doesn't mean
everything's going
to work out
the way that we want
it to all the time.
But it does mean
it's going to work out
in a way that's
ultimately best for us.
So this week
when we're tempted
to find our identity
by pouring ourselves
into our jobs
or relationships
or social media
remember
only
Jesus
can bring the abundance
that our souls crave.
The truly abundant life
is found in the way
of the cross
the way of sacrifice
service
and self-denial
and that Jesus
is trying to show
you and me
the inadequacy
of everything else
that we're going to rely on
instead of him.
It might be uncomfortable
but it's the path
to the abundant life.
Will you trust
in him today?
Will you believe
and pursue him alone
for the abundant life?
Let's pray.
Jesus
we thank you
that you alone
gives the abundant life.
We thank you
that you
care about
trivial moments
and trivial situations
in our lives
but that you also
care about
the big moments
and the big situations
because you care
about us.
We thank you
that you offer us
the truly abundant life
not this mediocrity
but true abundance.
We thank you
that by offering us
true abundance
you offer us
the chance
as well
to rest.
You alone
give us a chance
to be free
from our striving
and our efforts
to achieve
what only you can give.
so I pray
that this week
as we go
throughout our weeks
that we would
learn to rest
in you alone
that we would
have freedom
from our striving
that we would believe
that we would find
our abundance
in you.
Thank you
for your love.
In Jesus name
Amen.
Thank you.