Sermon Transcript
Amen. My name is pastor Jeff [inaudible 00:00:04], and. Just kidding. My name is Shannon Popp. I'm the group's pastor. Sorry to disappoint you if it's your first time here and you were looking for pastor Jeff. He is here. You can still shake his hand and chat with him. But we just finished up going through the book of first John. Pastor Jeff just finished going verse by verse through that, really showing us the love of God in and through us in a new way each and every week, even though it seemed like it was the same thing over and over.
And it was so refreshing to me to be able to hear God's truth verse by verse through that book. He'll be back up here, God willing next week. But today, we are going to be going through a chapter in Hebrew. So if you have your Bible, go ahead and pull it out. Turn with me to Hebrews chapter 12. And we're going to be looking at a few verses here this morning. It's interesting that we don't really know the author of Hebrews because the author never identifies themself, but we know who the author was writing to and it was the Jewish culture who had become believers.
It's these Jews that grew up in Judaism and following God, the same God that we serve today, but falling or following Jesus, they step over the threshold of following Jesus. And the persecution that they started to endure at that time is like what we think of in the end times, that they weren't able to buy, trade, sell. They weren't able to go into community because they were Christians and because they were following Jesus Christ. And so they were literally being pulled out of their homes and beaten and separated from their families.
And they were under such heavy persecution that they wanted to go back. They were thinking to themselves, is it worth it to follow Jesus. And so the entire book really of Hebrews is about don't give up. Whatever you're going through, whatever's happening in your life right now, whatever struggle, whatever hurt, whatever pain, don't give up. We're going to look at Hebrews 12 and we're going to look at the first four verses.
This is what God's word says, "Therefore, since we have so great a cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin, which so easily entangles us. And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of who faith who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself so that you will not grow weary or lose heart. You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin."
Will you pray with me? Father God, we thank you so much that we're able to gather in a place like this under very little persecution. Father, we're thankful that we're able to gather together to worship you, to seek your face, to hear from you. So father, that's our hearts cry, that in this moment that we will seek you, that we will set aside the distractions in our lives right now. We'll wholeheartedly focus on you and your word and what you're speak to us.
Father, we ask that you speak to us in such a way that draws us closer to you. That compels us not just to be listeners or learners, but that we can live this out in our lives. That we're transformed by the power of your spirit. And that when we leave this place, we leave in enjoy and praising you. Pray this in Jesus name. Amen. Have you ever been manipulated to move a very large object in your life before? I've been manipulated into helping people move a lot, but there's this one time where it was about 20 years ago that my mom arrested my two brothers, my two cousins, Dave and Dan and I to move her baby grand piano.
Even from just saying that, you know that it was a mistake just from the beginning. I have no idea why she didn't want to pay a piano mover. But anyways, we went over there. We were able to take the legs off and wrap it up and move it over their new place. And when we were in their new place, we were going back and forth on how we should get this back on its legs. Could we hold it and then screw the legs in or not? Or should we put the legs on and then try and flip it? Well, we decided to put the legs on and decided that we would be able to pick it up and flip it over and set it on its legs.
And so, as we were doing this, there was this moment that the baby grand piano became top heavy. And all at the same time, all of us said at the same time, "You got this?" And unbeknownst to us, I have no idea. My mom is a prayer warrior. She was there in tears, hoping that we didn't damage her pianos. Somehow it went and flipped over and landed on its legs, not destroying the baby grand piano at all, not a scuff, not a mark on it. And to this day, we still look back and tell the story of, "Did you hold that? Were you the one doing that? How did that happen?"
And so, because of that, I've entitled this message, you got this. And so we're going to unpack these few verses here, Hebrews 12, verse one. It says, "Therefore, since we have so great, a cloud of witnesses surrounding us." Now, some think that what this is talking about is that we have people who have gone before us living in heaven, who are looking down on us and cheering us on. I would say that if we just let the text speak for itself, we can see what it's actually saying to us. Because the first word of this text is therefore.
And anytime you see the word therefore you should be asking yourself, what is it there for? And the reason why it's there is because what comes before chapter 12. And what comes before chapter 12 is chapter 11, because that's how math works. But the reality is chapter 11 is the faith chapter of the Bible. And this is where we understand what faith is. The description of faith is given to us in chapter 11. And really, in verse six is the best description. And it tells us that it is impossible, impossible to please God, without faith. Let that settle in.
It's impossible, no matter what you do in your life, no matter what you say in your life, no matter what's going on to please God without faith. And then it says that faith is two things. One it's that we acknowledge who God is and that he rewards those who seek his face. And then it goes on to talk about these men and women of unbelievable faith. And it tells stories like Abraham, when God came to Abraham and he said, "Abraham, I want you to get up. And I want you to move your family." He says, "Sure, God, where am I going?" He said, "I didn't tell you. I'll tell you when you get there."
And then he goes to Noah and he tells him that it's never rained on the earth before. The way that the earth was plenished with water was from the ground up. And he says, "It's going to rain. Something that you don't understand, something that you don't know, you're going to have to have faith. You're going to have to trust me. And not only is it going to rain, it's going to cover the whole earth. And so I'm going to bring these animals to you. You're going to put them on this ark."
And so by faith, Noah grabs his hammer, he grabs his nail and he grabs the wood and he starts building the ark. Sarah, a woman well advanced in years, beyond the years of bearing a child. God comes to her and says, "You're going to have a son." And she laughs. We can see the unbelief and the fear of what that must be like to be 90 years old and think about chasing a two year old around your house and the fear that's there. So faith is not the absence of fear or the absence of unbelief. The opposite of fear is certainty, is that you know the outcome and you know, all the details, so what do you need faith for?
And so these men and these women are walking through life by faith. It's not that there's no fear. It's not that there's not a lot of pressure on them. It's that they're willing to step forward because they trust God. God comes back to Abraham and says to him, "I want you to go and kill, sacrifice your one and only son." And so Abraham gets up the next morning, gets the supplies, takes his son and his servant. And they go to the mountain where he's going to sacrifice his son. And so what we see here is that these stories, the testimony of God in the lives of the people that went before us should fire us up to trust and obey God.
That the stories of those who went before us should fire us up to trust and obey God. And that what we should be allowing to happen in our life is the people around us, sharing their testimony, sharing their stories should give us the confidence that God is a good God. He's a faithful god. He's reliable in everything he says. And that not only is he the promise maker, he's the promise keeper. I've had a lot of opportunities in my life to go around and share the gospel.
And I was part of a campus ministry for a long time, where I got to go on public school campuses into a classroom and share the gospel with students in there. And I remember this one time I was at Smokey Hill high school out in Aurora. And as the students were coming in, there was this 15, 16 year old girl who came in. And she was really struggling. You could see it all over her face. She was sad. The weight of the world was on her. And then as I started to share the gospel, she was like a dry sponge in the back of the classroom, just soaking up the goodness, the nutrients of the gospel.
And that day she accepted Jesus Christ as her Lord and savior. It's amazing what God can do. But then she started coming back. Amen. She started coming back that I would share the gospel in the morning on these campuses. Then I'd go back in the afternoon and I'd start to train these students in how to lead the club. And she kept coming back in and she made this statement. She said, "I believe that God saved me so that I could share the gospel with other people."
Amen.
Amen. Amen. And so she would leave every one of those trainings and she would say, "I'm going to share the gospel with somebody I know and somebody I don't know. I'm going to share the gospel with somebody in my family, a friend or a complete stranger." And she came back the next week and told us this unbelievable story about how she went to the dollar store. And she had $3. Her stepdad took her there. She was going to go in and get her three items and go right back out. And as she was walking around the corner, she appeared around the corner and there was a man in his fifties there most likely homeless.
And he was putting a soda in to his bag. So she kind of froze for a second, took a step back and then felt like God was saying, "Hey, this is the moment that you pray. For step forward in faith." So she steps forward and she walks over to this gentleman in his fifties and says to him, "I'll buy that soda for you." Obviously, this freaks him out, but he reluctantly gives her the soda, goes outside, waits for her. And as she's handing him the soda, she says to him, "Do you know, God?" And his response still breaks my heart.
He says, "I've been running from God my whole life. And I think the reason why you saw me attempt to steal that soda is because you're supposed to tell me about your God." And so she does, she starts sharing the gospel. She's starts sharing her faith and her testimony and talking about how God brought her out of darkness, out of being dead and made her fully alive. And then she invites him to her church and gives him a little card with the times and the days on there. And says, "If you show up at eight, we have a free meal come to my church."
And so she goes to church, she's waiting for him and he never shows up. But the next week, her stepdad who was in the parking lot, watching all of this take place. And a little backstory on him is that he'd never been to church in his whole life. That this girl Hailey, would go with her grandmother and her siblings, but her stepdad would never go. He's driving down Hampton Avenue that next week. And he sees the man, he pulls over and picks him up. And this guy just starts talking about Jesus and talking about wanting to go to their church, but he doesn't have a ride.
And so her stepdad says, "Well, I'll give you a ride." And so from that point forward, he on Sunday mornings, would go and pick him up and then go to church. And they both sat in church. They both heard the gospel. They both got baptized on the same day. Praise be to God. Right? Amen. Amen. Yeah. We should be allowing the stories of those around us to fire us up, to trust and obey God in our own lives. Says, "Therefore, since you are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every encumbrance and the sin, which so easily entangles us. And let us run with endurance the race that is set before us."
The writer here is saying that this life that we live is like a race, but it's obviously not a sprint. It's more like a marathon, but it's hopefully a long, long life and years of running. And I don't like to run. If you see me running on the side of the road, please stop and pick me up. I'm probably being chased. Call 911. Let people know. Because the only thing I think about when I'm running is that I want to stop running. And what the writer here is saying, don't stop. Don't stop.
And it's interesting to me that he says, lay aside every encumbrance and the sin, which so easily entangles us. And what he's saying here is that there seems to be a difference in the decisions that we make. That there are decisions that we make that yes are sinful and that we know that that is sin and that we should step away from that. But he's also saying there's other decision that we make that are pushing us down. And what he's doing, he's making the separation that there are things that are pushing us down and things that are holding us back.
And that we have the ability in our life that God has given us to make decisions, to make choices in our life. And that God is completely sovereign, which means he's in control of all things at all times. And that includes the situations that we're in right now and the things that we're going through that are hard. It includes the great times in life, but that God is sovereign. And within his sovereignty, we have responsibility and that we need to be making choices. And my assumption is that most of us in here this morning, it's not that the majority of our decisions are whether we're going to sin or not.
It's whether we're to do the good thing or the very best thing in life. This is what I mean, that I try and wake up most mornings, do my quiet time early. Go to the gym and then make it into work. But sometimes, and I don't know if any of you can identify with me at all, but sometimes I wake up and I just don't want to go to the gym. And so I don't. And so I just skip the gym and I come right to work. But then there's something all day long that's kind of pulling at me that I skipped the gym and I'm feeling guilty and I should go work out.
So at the end of the day, when I leave work, I have a choice to make. I can go to the gym or I can go home and eat dinner with my family and see my kids and hang out with them and tuck them into bed. And see, neither one of these choices is necessarily sin. But the reality is one is much better than the other. Because if I go to the gym, if I make that choice, then the reality is I don't get to spend time with my family. And the best choice is to go home, even though I'll miss the workout and even though I need to work out because I'm getting older.
But what he's saying to us is that we need to lay aside those things that are holding us down and holding us back, and that there's decisions in our life that we're continually making over and over that aren't the best choice. And when he's saying that we're running this race he's saying, if you're going to run a marathon, you're not going to put on your ski boots, your ski pants, your ski jacket, and your ski hat to go running. And he's saying, if you continue to make choices that are good, but not the best choice, what you're doing is you're putting on things that are weighing you down from following Jesus.
Then he says the sin in our life that we continue to get entangled in, it's weighing us down and that we're holding a 45 pound plate above our head and that we're trying to run a race with things that are clinging to us and holding us back. And the weight of sin that's holding us down. And that what we should be doing is living a life that's worthy of our calling and that we're walking and following Jesus with all that we have. And so how do we do this? Verse two. Verse two says that we are fixing our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfector of faith. This is amazing.
This is the good news. But we're supposed to be fixing our eyes on Jesus. What do you fix your eyes on? What are you allowing your eyes to gaze upon? What are you looking at? Who are you looking at? What are you putting in the place of Jesus Christ in your life? When you wake up in the morning, do you grab your Bible or do you grab your phone? Do you start searching for Jesus in the good news in scripture or do you start scrolling through your day and how busy your day is going to be start looking at your emails? What is it that you in your life that you are fixing your eyes on?
It means to attach our eyes to Jesus. There's a story in the Bible of this happening and what happens when we take our eyes off Jesus. Peter and the disciples are in a boat and they're out on the sea of Galilee. And all of a sudden this figure starts walking towards them. And of course, they start freaking out thinking that it's a ghost. But Jesus calls out and says that it's I. And Peter being Peter says, "Lord, if it's you call me to you." And so Jesus says, "Come." And so he steps out of the boat. He's walking on water, he's got his eyes fixed on Jesus and he's continually walking towards him.
But then so many times in our life, what we do is that we take our eyes off Jesus and put it on our calendar, put it on our day, put it on our schedule, put it on our spouse, put it on our kids. And there's nothing wrong with that as long as we're looking through the lens of Jesus at our day. But we continue to fix our eyes on the wrong things in our life. And this passage says the way to leave sin behind, the way to run the race with endurance is to fix our eyes, attach our eyes to Jesus. Because the reality is, you go where you look.
It's just natural for us that we go, where we look. In high school, I was going with a friend and we were going over to pick up another friend whose place we'd never been to before. We were in his car. He was driving. I'm making that point clear at this point right now that he was driving, not me. And as we were looking out the driver's side window trying to find the building number and the apartment number, he hit a rock, which was more like a boulder. And he actually drove his car up on the boulder.
And we had to climb out the driver's seat. Because the reality is, you go where you look. And whatever you're looking at, whatever you're gazing upon, whatever you're fixated on in your life, you're going to go that direction. So what is it? Is it your job? What's getting in the way of your relationship? Is it a home? What is it that's stopping you from fixing your eyes on Jesus? Because the good news is, is that he's the author and the perfector of our faith. This word author has a deep meaning to it.
It really has this idea of somebody forging their way through an Amazon rainforest with a machete, trail blazing the way through that. And that what Jesus is saying that he's doing as the author at the beginning is that he's saying that he's the one that's coming into our heart. He's the one that's doing the work. And our role is to fix our eyes on him and follow him. Because the reality is it's a lot easier to just be a follower than it is to be the leader. We know this in our businesses, at home. When you're leading the meeting, there's a lot more work for you than when you just show up to the meeting to be a part of it.
I was able to do over a decade of student ministry and had the opportunity to take hundreds of students all across our nation to the Grand Canyon, to California. One time I had the opportunity to take 100 high school students to California, which was crazy. You can imagine the planning that had to go into that, the blueprint that was set out. And then when you're working with high school students, you have to know that every time you make a plan, you have to plan that that plan is going to fail and to be ready for that plan to fail.
And so part of the plan was we were going to take them to Santa Monica pier, which you should never do. That place is not a safe place. And I did not know this before we got there. But we had made a plan and we were getting ready to leave. I was praising God that we had all the kids. And the bus drivers called me and said that they couldn't get into the parking lot to pick us up and that they were forced out onto highway one and they just witnessed a car accident. And now they're at a standstill, they're not going to be back for at least a half an hour.
And at the same time that this is going on, I have two parents that were drivers coming up to me who had brought their sixth grade daughter with them telling me that their daughter was lost at Santa Monica pier. So [inaudible 00:21:04] I'm on the phone trying to figure out what's going on with the buses and all of a sudden their daughter's lost. And so I asked them, "Well, where's your daughter? "And they say, "Well, the last time we saw her was at the bathrooms."
So I look over their shoulder, I see the sign for the bathrooms. And I'm, "Okay, it's all right. Bathrooms are right there." And they say, "No, the bathrooms where we had lunch, which is a half a mile away from there." And so I hang up the phone and thankfully we found her. She had got stung by a bee. She was restaurant trying to call her mom. But the reality is, is that as a leader, it's much more difficult. And the good news of what this passage is saying is that Jesus Christ is our leader. But so many times in our life, what we want to do is we want to step out in front.
We want to step out in front of God and go our own direction because we do have ability. And even though we have that responsibility within God's sovereignty should be seeking the sovereignty of God. We should be seeking his face and his will and his desire and wanting what he wants. And the good news is he tells us that he is the one that's forging his way into our life. And he's the one that is forging his way and that we follow him, that he's the pioneer in our heart and the perfector in our life.
If he's forging his way into our heart and he's finishing it in our life. He's the captain of our soul and the completer in our life. He starts it, he's doing it. He's finishing the work in our life. And this is the good news, that he is the author and the perfector. And the reality is what we should be doing. It's not a passive keeping our eyes on Jesus. It's actively following him. Because this imagery of going through a rainforest that's never had a trail before, that if you take your eyes off of the leader, you could fall off a cliff, you could get lost.
And that's what he's saying. The way to let sin go and to leave it behind you, to throw off the things and the decisions that you're making is to keep our eyes focused on Jesus, because he is the author and the perfector of our faith. It says, the rest of verse two says, "Who for the joy set before him endured the cross, despising the shame and has sat down out at the right hand of the throne of God." Isn't that good news? That Jesus is seated at the right hand of God. That he's not up in heaven, worrying about what's going to take place and how things are going to happen, but that he's seated at the right hand of God.
It says that, "For the joy set before him, he endured the cross." Not that the cross was joyous to him, but that what he was able to do is have a perspective that went well beyond the cross, that he knew that he was going to be beaten and battered and bruised, that he was going to be treated like a criminal, that he was going to hang on a cross and that he was going to die.
And we know that in the garden of Gethsemane, that he was sweating drops of blood, and this, he knew he had full perspective of what's going on. But the way that he was able to persevere with joy in his heart was to have perspective over what's actually happening, to be able to look beyond the circumstances that he was in, to be able to see what God was doing, God, the father was doing with him. And when he is in the garden of Gethsemane that's what he's seeking. He's saying, "God, if there's any other way." And so we're seeking God's face and that we need perspective.
And that perspective comes through prayer, and that we need to be seeking God through prayer to gain his perspective. Because if we knew what God knew, we'd want what God wants, because God sees tomorrow like we see yesterday. And we need to have the right perspective so that we can persevere. A couple years ago, I got stuck in Vail after it snowed 24 inches in 24 hours. Which yeah, I know it was really rough. And I woke up the next morning and we knew there was going to be a ton of powder on the backside. And so we were on the backside of Vail on the first lift and we were getting ready to take our first run.
And my friend Buck took off ahead of us, which he always did. And he also had this habit of cutting underneath the ropes, which the ropes, if you don't know, actually tell you where to stay and where it's safe and where to go. And if you go underneath there, it's not safe. Well, he cut underneath the rope and started hauling down the hill. And from my perspective where I was at, because I had the bird's eye view, I could see that where he was going, had no return. And sure enough, by the time we got over to the rope, he was long gone and he turned around and he realized that the powder was way too deep.
There was no way he was going to climb up. So he continued on down. And what he told us later is that he went on down the run, had to hike out about a half a mile through fresh powdered snow, un-groomed, untouched, which he said almost killed him. To this day, he said he almost died there. Made it to midterm and hitchhiked down 24, down I70 back to us to get right back to where we were so that he could join us for the last run of the day. But the reality is if he would've turned around before he went his own way and looked at me or us, we could tell him, "Hey, there's no lift over there. Don't go that direction."
And what this passage is saying is that when we pursue Christ, by keeping our eyes focused on him, continue to seek his will, then we'll be able to have perspective so we can persevere through the trial that we're in and that we need to be able to be seeking God's will. Because the reality is, and I do this and I can't speak for you, but that all the time I'm saying, God, I want your will. But then what I do is I start to do it my way and I start to grab hold of it. And I start to say, well, I can do this and I can do that and I have this experience and I have this wisdom.
And so really what it's saying here is that we need to have God's will, God's way, and that we need to submit to what he's doing in our life. Because if he's in control and we believe that he is, then everything that's going on in our life, he's brought into our life now to strengthen us for what he's going to do in the future. Verse three, "For consider him who has endured such hostility by sinners against himself, so that you will not grow weary and lose heart. He endured." Jesus Christ endured, and he's telling us we can endure too. And that we can go through this life without growing weary or losing heart.
The reality is, if you're going to go on the Colorado trail, which is between 200 and 300 miles of a hike, takes between four and six weeks depending on the route that you take, you better take the right gear and you better take the right food. So what this is telling us is that if we're going to go on this journey with Christ, that he's forging his way forward for us and that we're to follow him, we still need to be feeding ourselves through the word of God, through worshiping him, through prayer. We need to take with us the right gear. That if you take the wrong gear with you, it's going to slow you down.
And that what he's saying is that the decisions that we make, we need to start to make the right decisions, the best decisions that are just the good decision. Leave the sin that's hindering us behind. And the way that we can do this is that we have each other. We can gather together. And so many times we come into a place like this, and we just assume that the person sitting next to us doesn't struggle in the way that I do. And we don't understand that everybody in this room has their own struggles, that I have my own struggles.
And they're not that much different from each other, that we're struggling in the same way. And that one of the ways that we can leave that behind is praying and asking God to come into our heart, to purify our heart, and then to confess our sins to one another and be healed and to live life with each other. And that we need to be on mission with Jesus Christ, with his body. Verse four, "You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood and striving against sin."
What this is saying is that there are no martyrs sitting in this room right here. What is saying that is, if you still have breath, there's still time. That if you're still alive, there's still time for. That we shouldn't give up. Whatever you're going through in life right now, whatever it is that's hindering you from following Jesus, whatever the sin is that you feel entrapped and entangled in, you can step away from that. You can move away from that by the power of Jesus Christ in our lives.
So what it's saying here is that if you still have breath, don't give up. Don't give in. Don't give in to the pressures. Don't give into the temptation and that we can persevere. Because perseverance comes on the heels. Perseverance comes on the heels of perspective. And perspective comes through prayer. And that if we will continue to seek the face of God and understand who he is and what his will is for our life and do his will our way, then it can give us perspective for the future, which will bring perseverance in our life.
So really, what this is saying is that we're feeble and we have weak knees and that we need Christ and we need him. And so one thing you can take away from this is you have to realize that God is working in your life even if you don't see it. God is working even if you can't see it, because when you're in the valley, you can't see the highest peaks. You can't see the light. And so you have to understand that God is working, even if you don't have perspective, even if you can't see it, but God has a plan.
He's got a plan for you. He's got a plan for your life. And he's got a plan for the situation that you're in. And secondly, is you can do get up. Because Proverbs tells us that a righteous man gets up seven times a day and that you need to not give up, not to give in, but you need to get up and press in, press in to Christ. And the reality is what this passage is saying, is that not just are there people that went before us in history whose stories should fire us up. But it's saying right here in this room, there are stories all throughout this room of people who God has worked in their life.
And so that's one of the reasons that we have groups and small groups is because we need to be together with one another and hear other people's stories and their testimony of God's work in and through their life. And that should fire us up to be able to trust and obey God today. Or maybe you feel that you have trusted God and that you don't need that to fire you up. Maybe what God's asking you to do is go get into a group so that he can use your story, your testimony of how he's worked in your life to fire other people up.
And we don't just have to look at the pages of scripture or other people, we can look back at our own lives and realize that God has been faithful in my life. And that should give me faith for the future. Realizing that he not only is the one that promises in his word, but he keeps it in our lives. That he is the pioneer and the perfector. He is the author and the finisher. So I started this message by saying that the title of it is you got this. But the reality isn't that you got this, the reality is God's got this.
Amen.
Amen. God's got this. And the thing is, you're not alone in this. And I think so many times what we do is we move away from people when we're going through the hardest time in our life, that we hunker down. And you have to realize that there are people who care for you. And right after this service, there will be people up front who can pray with you and talk with you, walk with you through your situation. The reality is God's with us. God's spirit is with us. He's not a God that put this world in motion and then took a step back, but that he's moving in and through us, he's an active God.
And if we're going to continually follow him and attach our eyes to him, to fix our eyes on him, he's moving. So we're going to have to continue to move with him. But the reality is, God's got this. Final story as I close. A few years ago at Cherokee Trail High School, another high school student story, because I think that us, as parents and adults can learn a lot from high school students and their faith. She was one of the leaders in our campus ministries there. And she started to get these headaches that started to last longer and longer for days on end.
So her mom finally took her into the doctor and the doctor came out and gave her the diagnosis and said that she had a brain tumor that was too large and too close to the nerves for them to operate. And like any parent would, her mom started crying. And this 15 year old girl told her mom, "Mom, don't worry. God's got this." See, we're [inaudible 00:33:26], we're weary, we're broken. And we can't even do any of this without the power of God in us and through us. And what God is asking us to do, he's saying, follow him in doing that he's active and he's we're in your life to accomplish what you could never do on your own.
Let's pray. Father God, we thank you for the good news of your son, Jesus Christ and your word and how it teaches us, how it refreshes us and revives our souls. Father, help us to take this good news, to fix our eyes on you, to share stories of what you've done in our life and hear the stories of those who've gone before us. Let us sharpen each other, trust in you and be obedient to you because you are faithful. You're a good, good God that is reliable in every way. So father, help us to stand and to sing, to sing this out and to let your faithfulness reign in our life. In Jesus name, amen.