All right, church, I want to introduce to you my friend Dan Curry.
He is our Area 9 Texas Baptist representative.
And more than that, he has become a friend to me over the last few years
from when I was working down at Southwestern Seminary.
And I think we golfed together at some point, and that was fun.
But I've gotten to see his heart for the Lord and for ministry,
and he's been a good advisor and voice in my ear,
and I'm very grateful for our relationship.
But he is our Area Representative for the Baptist General Convention of Texas
from Fort Worth, I think, all the way up to Wichita Falls.
And there's probably a lot of other area in there as well.
But he serves a lot of churches, a lot of pastors in that way,
and we're grateful for his service.
Got probably close to 50 years of ministerial experience,
and is a graduate of Wayland Baptist University.
He got his master's degree and doctorate from Southwestern Seminary
and served for about 24 years or so as the pastor of South Oaks Baptist Church
in Arlington, Texas.
He's currently an interim pastor for a church in Arlington,
and we're grateful for him taking this time to come up here
and be with us this morning.
So y'all open your Bibles and be ready to hear what the Lord has given Dan Curry for us.
Thank you, Sam, for the introduction.
And it is a joy to be here today, and it is a wonderful opportunity for me.
I have driven by this church so many times, or driven by Henrietta,
and thought about this church so many times through the years
because my family lived and my parents lived out in Kittiquay, Texas,
out near Esteline.
And if you're going that direction on 287, you know where Esteline is
because it is a speed trap.
And so everybody knows where that is.
But yes, I am the area rep for the Baptist General Convention of Texas,
and so that's a mouthful, okay?
And that being a mouthful, years ago we kind of shortened that to the BGCT.
All right?
Well, then other organizations began to have alphabet names, you know,
and we were going, maybe that's not a good idea anymore.
And so the last few years we have been branded,
we've branded our name as Texas Baptist.
And so that's who we are.
It is the Baptist General Convention of Texas,
but we go by the brand of Texas Baptist.
And you're a part of us as Texas Baptist.
In fact, churches all across this state,
over 5,000 of them make up Texas Baptist.
And you are a part of us through your cooperative program, Giving.
And this is budget time,
or you just passed your budget or sometime recently,
and many of you probably looked up there and said,
cooperative program giving.
When are we ever going to get the cooperative program paid off, you know?
Well, hopefully never, all right?
But anyway, that money is funneled through Texas Baptist,
and there it goes and does ministry and missions across the state
and across the world.
And so it is a great thing.
We're very thankful that you're a part of that.
And I just represent one aspect of that.
We have nine area reps.
We try to be, you know,
a representative for Texas Baptist
to the 5,000 churches that are part of us.
We also try to be a resource person for the pastors and staff
when they have a thought and going,
where can I turn for some advice,
or where can I turn for support?
Where can I turn for maybe some training
in something like evangelism
or something else in, you know, church growth or something?
And we have those resources for that.
And then my favorite part of my job is this.
I get to meet pastors
and be their friend
and be their encourager.
I like the idea of being their Barnabas,
to come alongside them and encourage them,
pray for them,
and when they need some support,
they know they can call me
and I can be their friend.
And so that's the part of the job that I like the most.
And I've got to be that with Sam
and I appreciate Sam, you know,
not only turning to me occasionally
and calling me
and being that kind of,
being able to minister to him in that way,
but he's also ministered to me
in my times of difficulty.
And so it is a mutual thing.
And so it's great to be here
and it's great to be a part of Texas Baptist.
And we're very thankful for your gifts
as to Texas Baptist.
And so enough about Texas Baptist.
Y'all didn't come here today
on this last Sunday of the year
to hear just about Texas Baptist.
I have hopefully a word from God for you today.
And so I hope that you will turn with me
in your Bible
or look it up on your device
or today
in Romans chapter 1.
We're going to be looking at a passage of Scripture there today.
Romans chapter 1.
And we're going to begin in just a moment
in verse 13.
Romans chapter 1, beginning in verse 13.
The text today,
talking about being ready,
is sort of one of my favorite texts.
But it has a little history.
I felt called to preach
when I was in junior high.
But when I turned about 15,
my dad,
who was a pastor of a church
out in West Texas,
at that time,
he was pastor at
First Baptist Church,
Ropesville,
which is just outside of Lubbock.
And dad came to me
and he says,
son,
do you think you're ready to preach?
I go,
whoa,
you know,
I just lost words.
I don't know that I am.
He says,
I think you ought to preach
this next Sunday
on Sunday night.
And he says,
so think about that for a day.
And I did.
And he says,
are you ready?
And I go,
well,
I don't know.
He says,
do you know what you want to preach on?
I go,
no,
I don't.
He says,
well,
let me give you an idea.
All right.
And so he chose this text for me.
I read the text.
He read the text to me
and I looked at it.
I read the text.
I started going over the text.
My dad had,
you know,
a library of books.
I started looking at all those things,
you know,
resources.
And because my dad said,
son,
this is a really rich for,
these are rich verses.
This is really good stuff.
There is lots of great stuff here.
And so I began to look for all that great stuff,
you know.
And so I studied all week long,
prepared,
had an outline,
had everything ready for Sunday night.
I had this passage of scripture and he says,
you know,
I was thinking of what my dad said.
This is really rich.
It's a lot,
got a lot of rich,
good stuff in it.
And I got up and I,
and I preached.
And it was the best seven minute sermon.
Anyone could ever have.
Well,
my dad was correct.
There's a lot of things in this passage of scripture.
And I hate to tell you this morning,
my sermon is going to last longer than seven minutes.
And we're not even going to get to it all today.
We're not going to get to everything in this text,
but it is really rich.
It is really good.
And it is a good way to start out a new year with thinking about being ready.
And so let's look at the text today.
Paul writes to the church at Rome and he says,
I do not want you to be unaware brothers that I have often intended to come to you,
but thus far have been prevented in order that I may reap some harvest among you as well as among the Gentiles.
I am under obligation both to the Greeks and to the barbarians,
both to the wise and to the foolish.
So I am eager to preach the gospel to you also who are in Rome.
For I am not ashamed of the gospel,
for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes,
to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
For in it,
the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith.
As it is written,
the just shall live by faith.
There is a lot to meet here.
A lot for us to chew on today.
And before we really get into all of what is in this text,
let's think about for a moment who wrote this text.
Who shares this with us?
Who is he sharing it to?
It is Paul,
the Apostle Paul.
If we remember,
the Apostle Paul was not always the Apostle Paul.
He was also known as Saul.
Remember?
Saul,
who was the Pharisee.
Saul,
who was the persecutor of those early Christians.
He was Saul,
who was there when Stephen was stoned,
and Saul kept all the garments while he egged those on
to throw those stones at Stephen and kill him.
It is this Saul who was assigned to go to Damascus
to destroy those who were a part of the movement called The Way.
Those who were followers of Jesus Christ.
That was his responsibility.
He was on his way to Damascus in Syria to do just that.
And on that road to Damascus,
he encountered the Lord in a large, bright light.
And his life was transformed.
He immediately recognized
that he needed Jesus Christ in his life.
And when he finally got to Damascus,
God sent someone to share with him
how he could have Jesus in his life.
And Jesus comes into Saul's life.
And we know some of the rest of the story.
He becomes the Apostle Paul.
He becomes the greatest missionary of the Gospel.
He, we look at our New Testament
and realize, you know,
as Paul writes to the churches
where he helped start and helped influence,
we find over half the New Testament
is accredited to the Apostle Paul writing to us.
So we find here, this is who writes this.
This is the person who is sharing with us today
this thing, if he says,
I was obligated to share the Gospel.
I had this obligation.
He had an obligation, I think,
partly because he looked back on his life
and he realized,
I tried to destroy the church.
Now I have this obligation
to make sure that Jesus Christ is known.
I have a debt to pay.
A debt to pay.
I want to tell you today,
if you know Jesus as your Lord and Savior,
somewhere in your life,
someone shared with you how to come to know Jesus
and you have experienced that today in your life.
You have experienced his forgiveness.
You've experienced the freedom
that Jesus Christ has given.
you've experienced the full life
that Jesus Christ wants you to have in your life today.
Then you have also an obligation,
a debt to pay.
The question is,
are you ready?
I grew up in a time when,
as a kid,
that it was very important.
Anyway,
I joined Boy Scouts when I was 11 years old
and I've been a Boy Scout ever since.
I'm still a Scout at heart, okay?
I love the organization.
I'm not, you know,
I'm very supportive of the organization.
I know that they've made some weird decisions lately
and all those kind of things,
but the Boy Scout organization,
the Boy Scout things they taught
have really made an impact in my life.
And if you're a Scout
or know anything about Scouting,
you know that there's a motto
that goes with Scouting,
and it is,
be prepared.
Not a long motto,
just be prepared.
Be prepared.
And it is,
be prepared for everything
that might come your way.
Be prepared.
The question is,
are we prepared
when it comes to sharing the gospel,
this debt,
this obligation
we have as believers,
are we prepared
to do
what God wants us to do?
Well,
Paul, I think,
shares with us here
some hints
in how to be prepared,
okay?
The first
way that we can be prepared
is this.
We need
to be
proud
of the gospel
of Jesus Christ.
Now,
you know,
I use that term,
you know,
we are proud
of the gospel message.
But let's,
what is,
those are real
biblical terms,
churchy terms,
you know,
gospel.
We use it all the time.
Do you know
what it means?
What is the gospel?
The term,
gospel itself,
means good news.
Well,
okay,
so we're proud
of the good news.
Good news
implies that
there's bad news.
Okay?
Let's look at
the bad news first.
The bad news
is this.
The bad news
is this.
Found in Paul
writing here,
Paul's writing
in Romans,
he tells us
what the bad news
is.
The bad news
is that we're
all sinners.
Romans 3,
23,
for all have
sinned and fallen
short of the glory
of God.
That's bad news.
We're all sinners.
We all fall short
of what God
wants us to do
in our life.
All of us do that.
We fit that mold.
Let's don't get
high and mighty
because we go to
church every week.
We just really
need to realize
that we're all
sinners,
you know,
okay?
Now,
that's bad news
to some degree,
but we can look
around and go,
well,
everybody else
is a sinner.
Well,
Paul goes on
and he says
the wages of sin
is death.
Whoa.
Wages.
What we deserve,
what we should get
for our sin
is death.
Wow.
Well,
that verse goes on
and he says,
but the gift of God
is eternal life
through Jesus Christ.
There is bad news
there in that
because we're all
sinners,
we deserve death,
but he also tells us
there is,
there is some
relief here.
He says,
the gift of God
is eternal life
through Jesus Christ.
We don't have to die,
but it's through
Jesus Christ.
Now,
how is that possible?
Well,
Paul doesn't leave us
in the hole there.
He tells us in Romans 5,
8,
he says that Christ
died for us.
While we were yet
sinners,
Christ died for us.
While we were
undeserving,
he died
for us.
And then,
in Romans 9,
and 10,
and 11,
he tells us
the way that we can
receive this gift
of God,
of eternal life,
the way we can be
found,
forgiven,
and free in our life,
the way we can
experience full life
is to make a commitment
to Christ,
to follow Him.
Okay,
folks,
that's the gospel.
That's the gospel.
It is good news.
The good news is,
even though I'm a sinner,
Christ died for me.
I don't have to live
in that any longer.
I don't have to live
there any longer.
I can be forgiven.
I can have a full life,
an abundant life,
in Christ.
We need to be proud
of the gospel.
Are we proud
of the gospel?
We excited
about the gospel?
We excited
about the fact
that Jesus Christ
died on the cross
for us?
We excited
that He shed
His blood for us
on the cross?
Are we excited
about the fact
that we don't have
to die?
Are we excited
that He can give us
full life?
We need to be proud
of the gospel.
That's the first place
to be ready
in this new year.
Let's get excited
about the gospel.
But Paul doesn't
stop there.
He goes on
and he says
that we should also
understand the power
of the gospel.
For he says,
it, the gospel,
is the power
of God
for salvation.
It is the power
of God
for salvation
to everyone
who believes,
to the Jew first
and also to the Greek.
It is the power.
The Greek word
power there
is the word
dynamo,
dynamite,
dynamic.
You get the idea?
All those are
English words
that we've taken
from that Greek word
dynamo
and used,
but it is the ideal
of great power.
Exciting power.
Explosive power.
There is power
in the gospel.
Power.
Here's the,
the power comes
in the fact
that I can't change.
But you know what?
God can change me.
He can change me.
We enter,
we come to the end
of the year,
we begin a new year,
we begin to think
about resolutions
we make every year.
I, you know,
I don't know
where you are
in your resolutions
from last year.
Last year,
I, I began the year
and I had just
one resolution,
okay?
Uh, and that was,
I, I was resolved
to lose 20 pounds
during the year.
I resolved to do that.
Well, I, I'm just
going to tell you,
I'm just not very good
at that, okay?
I'm just not very good
at that, you know?
I, I am doing better
this year because,
you know, but, uh,
I will tell you,
I've had the same
resolution for about
10 years.
And I haven't got
there yet.
And the reason is,
not that it's impossible
to lose 20 pounds,
but me doing it
on my own,
eh, not real good
at that.
You know?
In fact, you know,
there was a couple
of years I got
to December the 1st
and I was going,
okay, how am I doing
with my goal
to lose 20 pounds?
And I would go,
whew, I only have
25 more to go.
You know?
You, you see,
we, we think
we can change our life.
And most of the time
we don't have the power
to even figure out
how to lose 20 pounds.
Much less get rid
of the sin,
the guilt
in our life.
Or to get rid of
all the temptations
that Satan throws our way,
pulls.
He knows our,
he knows every button
we have.
And he pushes those buttons.
We, we think
we can just
handle that on our own.
We can't.
We need the power
of the gospel.
We can look at just the,
the life of the apostle Paul
and see the power
of the gospel.
Paul,
the persecutor
of the,
of the early church.
Paul,
who was,
he was at that time
named Saul,
he was the persecutor
of that early church.
He was destroying
the church
and God,
what,
changed him.
He becomes the greatest
missionary of all times
and the writer
of over half
the New Testament.
How'd that happen?
It happened
by the power
of God.
When I moved
to Arlington
back in 1992,
my,
my daughter
who is very,
she's extrovert
to some degree.
She began to meet
all the girls
in the neighborhood
that were her age.
I mean,
every one of them.
Within about a week
or two,
you know,
we had three or four girls
coming to our house
all the time
from the neighborhood.
One of those girls,
the name was Rebecca
and Crystal found out,
figured out really quick
that Rebecca
didn't go to church
very often
and so she invited
Rebecca
to go to church
with us.
And so Rebecca
started going
to church with us
and on the way
to church,
occasionally I would
have to go,
Rebecca,
we don't say that
at church.
We don't say,
we don't use that word
and because Rebecca's
language was not
necessarily the greatest.
She had incorporated
some terms
that she had
probably heard
from her dad.
Okay?
Well,
you know,
I wanted to get to know
the parents of these girls
that Crystal
was bringing around
and so one day
I went over
and met Rebecca's dad.
He was out in the garage,
his garage.
He had a really nice garage.
I mean,
he had a really,
now he didn't park
his car in his garage
or his truck
but he parked
his Harley
in his garage.
He had a place
for his Harley.
He had this nice floor,
it had been painted,
he had a nice love seat
there in his garage,
he had a big screen TV,
he had a little wet bar
over here on the other side
and his Harley.
Okay?
And when I went over
to see him,
he was messing
with his Harley.
He had,
you know,
sort of a,
well it was a
t-shirt with the sleeves
cut off on it.
Alright?
And his shorts
and his sandals on
and he had tattoos
all over his arm,
on his legs,
everywhere.
Going,
oh wow.
So I met Bob.
You know,
I told him who it was.
It was kind of cold.
Like,
meeting ice.
Okay?
Just cold.
Everything just,
immediately after I told him
what I did,
there was just this block
just between me and him
and, you know,
and he just didn't say much.
You know,
on my walk back
from his house
to my house,
I was going,
you know,
okay,
I just don't even know
if God can fix this.
I don't know if God
can ever change Bob.
Just don't know.
Me of little faith.
Because,
within a month or two,
Rebecca got saved
at church camp.
And,
Rebecca
had to be baptized.
Wanted to be baptized.
So,
Bob came
to her baptism.
He came
to see her baptized.
That was the first time
he had been in church
in who knows how long.
And,
then,
every time the youth
did something,
you know,
Rebecca would give
a testimony or something.
He was there
on Sunday night.
He'd come.
And,
then he realized
on Sunday night
we were kind of casual
at the church.
Not,
well,
just not on Sunday night.
He just didn't know.
But,
on Sunday night
we were especially casual.
We were meeting
in a sanctuasium.
You know what a sanctuasium is?
A gematorium.
And,
and every Sunday night
we had to pick up
the chairs
and stack them
and all those kind of things.
And,
we had this saying,
you know,
at,
at South Oaks
we stack them
seven high.
All right?
And,
so,
we even had t-shirts made.
You know?
Said South Oaks
and on the back of them
it says we stack them
seven high.
And,
it was talking about
the chairs.
And,
and so,
Bob loved to come
because after church
nobody paid much attention
to him.
He'd be stacking chairs.
And,
then he'd sneak out.
Okay?
Well,
one
night
on Sunday night
I had noticed
there was a difference
in Bob.
And,
so he was coming
out the door
and I grabbed him.
I said,
Bob.
I just looked at him
and go,
when did you get saved?
And,
he looked at me
and he says,
preacher,
about three weeks ago
what you were preaching,
you know,
I was preaching
through Romans
and he's going,
he said,
I got to looking
at what you were preaching
and I went home
and I studied it some more
and I,
I just asked the Lord
to come into my life.
And I go,
well Bob,
I can see the difference
in your life.
And he goes,
well,
there's a true difference
in my life.
well,
I said,
Bob,
you need to be baptized.
Ah,
yeah,
I know.
But I'm an old man.
I wasn't that old.
But anyway,
he felt like,
I'm old.
I can't be,
I said,
Bob,
you need to be baptized.
You need to be able
to share with the world
that you've been,
been saved
and you do that
through baptism.
And so,
I baptized Bob
and,
and man,
you talk about somebody
who was excited
about being baptized.
He was excited.
Well,
long story short,
that's been about
25 years ago.
Bob is still very active
in South Oaks Baptist Church
in,
in Arlington.
He has been on the finance team
many,
many times
because he is just really good
at those kind of things.
He serves now
as the topper Sunday school teacher
and has been teaching
for about 15 years.
He is
a great man.
In fact,
this week,
he contacted me,
talked to me,
you know.
Now,
looking at him,
you go,
he's had another life.
See,
I gave up.
But you know what?
There is power
in the gospel.
There's people
in your life
right now.
There's people
here in this community
you've given up on.
But you know what?
God has not given up on them.
There is power
in the gospel.
Paul says
that power
of God,
it is the power
of God
for salvation.
Salvation
from sin.
Salvation
for eternal life.
Salvation.
salvation.
Then there's a third thing
that we also need to,
if we're going to be ready,
we need to be proud
of the gospel.
We need to understand
there is the power
of the gospel.
But there's a third thing.
We also need to understand
we need to live out
the gospel
in our life.
We need to live it out.
Paul writes it this way.
He says,
for it is the gospel
or the righteousness
of God
is revealed
from faith
for faith
as it is written.
The righteous
shall live
by faith.
See,
I grew up
in a Baptist church.
I know
about Baptists.
Okay?
We often,
not always,
not everyone,
but we often
have this tendency
as Baptists
and as believers
and all those
kind of things.
we think,
okay,
now that I'm saved,
I've got to live
by these rules.
All these rules.
Really?
Where do you find that?
It says here
we shall live by faith.
Faith?
We all have a list.
I'd say it.
Baptists are bad
about our list.
You know,
you can't drink,
you can't dance,
you know,
all the cants,
you can't do this,
you can't do that,
can't do all those
kind of things
because you do
all those kind of things
then you ain't a believer.
You can't do
all those kind of things.
We have lists.
We have all this
kind of stuff.
You know?
And,
we have to live by faith.
And what we've done is
we've traded away
the freedom
that we have in Christ
and we just put chains
on ourself.
We need to understand
that we need to live
by faith.
How did we get saved?
We get saved by our works?
No.
We did not get saved
by our works.
We didn't deserve anything.
We were sinners.
There's no way
we could save ourself.
But we think now
we have to live that way.
No,
you don't.
You live
in this freedom
that God has given to you.
Because here's the thing.
Here's what happens.
A person gets saved
and they think,
oh, now I've got Christ
in my life.
I've got God in my life.
And God begins
to transform that life.
He begins to change that life.
He does.
And then Satan comes along.
He tempts and he moves.
And the first thing you know,
a person has made a mistake.
They've sinned.
In their life.
And they're going,
okay, I'm not sure this works.
They've given up.
And now they feel guilty
because they've got
their sin in their life.
And they're going,
and what do I do about that?
I'm going,
they're going,
and Satan loves to use that.
They're going,
you can't talk about your faith.
You can't talk about the gospel.
You can't talk about that
because look at that sin
in your life.
because you feel guilty.
I don't know if you've ever noticed
small children,
when they do something wrong
and you get on to them,
they immediately stop looking at you.
Immediately they,
you know,
you get on to a two-year-old,
three-year-old,
you get on to them and say,
son,
you shouldn't be doing that.
They're not looking at you.
Why?
Because the relationship is broken
because they have sinned.
They have broken something.
They've broken the relationship.
And when we sin,
we break that relationship with God.
Now,
it doesn't mean we're not saved,
but that relationship is hindered.
Just like a child.
A child that disobeys their dad
is still a child.
Disobedient child.
How do they come back?
They come back the same way
through faith.
And when they have faith,
in what?
They have to have faith
that they are going to be saved,
that they're going to be forgiven.
And they come back and go,
hey,
yeah,
I blew it.
I messed up.
I messed up,
God.
Can you forgive me?
Well,
yes,
because when God died on the cross,
He not only forgave our sins in the past,
but in the present,
but all those in the future.
We're saved by faith,
friends.
And what Satan likes to do is going,
now you can't share the gospel.
You can't do that
because you've got this sin in your life.
No,
get rid of the sin.
See,
Satan wants to use it going,
don't share the faith.
Don't share the gospel.
Don't do that.
Don't do it
because you've got this sin in your life.
And really what God wants you to do is
get rid of the sin.
And how do you do that?
You just say,
God,
I've got this sin in my life.
Can you forgive me?
And what happens is,
even a child,
when they go,
Dad,
I'm sorry.
And the dad goes,
all of a sudden,
that's fine.
I'm going to forgive you.
I forgive you.
All of a sudden,
that child will stop looking down
and make eye contact with their father
because now that relationship is mended.
That's what it means to live by faith.
So my challenge for you today
is if we're going to be ready here
in this last challenge is this.
We need to get rid of the sins in our life,
lift up our eyes to Jesus Christ,
renew that relationship with God
so that we can complete the obligation,
the debt we have to share the gospel.
Are you ready?
I have a good pastor friend,
Sam Cliff,
and Cliff is a pastor
of the First Baptist Church in Cleburne.
And he's a pretty neat guy.
He's got a lot of energy.
He was a high school coach
and God called him to ministry.
Now he's a pastor of First Baptist Church in Cleburne.
But he's still got the energy
of a high school football coach
just buzzing around.
I just love to call him.
I go,
Hey Cliff,
you know,
I go,
How are you doing?
He goes,
I'm ready.
I mean,
he always says that.
I go,
Cliff,
how are you doing?
I'm ready.
I said,
Ready for what?
Ready for whatever God wants me to do.
I'm ready.
Wow,
I like that.
I like that kind of spirit.
That's the spirit we need.
That's the spirit
First Baptist Church Henrietta needs.
That's the spirit
the believers in this church need
to spread the gospel
in this community
in 2025.
We need to have that kind of spirit
that says,
You know,
I'm ready.
I'm proud of the gospel.
The gospel has power
to change people's lives.
It has the power
to mend their lives.
It has the power
to give people full lives.
It has that power
to do that.
And Satan is not going
to keep me from doing it
because I am going
to continually live by faith
by trusting him.
Can you do that?
Let's be ready.
Some of you have been in church
as long as I have.
Maybe not as long as I have,
but 50 something years,
60 years,
70 years,
nearly 70 years,
Sam.
I've been in church.
There is this old song.
It's in the hymn book.
Ready.
Ready to go.
Ready to stay.
Ready my place to fill.
Ready for service,
lowly or great.
Ready to do his will.
Ready to suffer grief or pain.
Ready to stand the test.
Ready to stay at home
and send others
if he sees best.
Ready to speak.
Ready to think.
Ready with heart and mind.
Ready to stand
where he sees fit.
Ready his will to find.
Can you say,
today,
I'm ready.
Would that be,
could that be your motto
for this year?
In 2025,
could you say,
I mean,
the Boy Scouts,
it's,
I,
be prepared.
In this church,
in this time,
could you just say,
my motto is,
be ready.
Be ready.
And I'm going to be ready.
Let's stand with heads bowed,
all right?
Our Heavenly Father,
Lord,
you know the hearts
of those that are here.
And Lord,
those who need to respond
to your will today.
And Lord,
we give you this invitation.
We give you this time.
And give this,
this opportunity
for these to make a,
a decision
and to respond
to the gospel
and to respond
to the challenge
that they have been given.
And so,
Lord,
we ask that
as we give you
this invitation,
that your people
would respond
in obedience
to you.
In Jesus' name,
amen.
Sam is going to be
right here at the front
as we sing this time
and sing this song.
And this is the time
to respond.
I am a thorough believer,
in this,
that every time
that we hear
God's word,
he demands a response.
Now,
it doesn't mean
that you need to come down
every Sunday
and grab Sam's hand,
but maybe sometimes you do.
But you shouldn't leave
here today
without saying,
God,
this is how I'm going
to respond
to your word today.
So,
during this time,
as we sing together,
you think about
how you need to respond
to the challenge
of God's word
today.
All right, Sam.
Thank you.