Speaker 1: Amen, praise God.
Speaker 1: It never gets old.
Speaker 1: Right, seeing the Lord move in people's lives, right, church, this is why we exist, amen, right To share the good news of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: And I know so many of you in this church.
Speaker 1: This church has prayed for you, kelly Kelly.
Speaker 1: Where are you?
Speaker 1: I know he's over here.
Speaker 1: This church has prayed for you, kelly Kelly.
Speaker 1: Where are you?
Speaker 1: I know he's over here.
Speaker 1: This church has prayed for you and begged the Lord to move and now we get to celebrate and rejoice in that.
Speaker 1: As your pastor church.
Speaker 1: Let me also share with you that a couple weeks ago I baptized a brother that gave testimony that he had hit rock bottom and there was an incredible tender moment.
Speaker 1: Right when he was baptized, you as a congregation stood to your feet and gave him a standing ovation and let me just tell you what an incredible picture that is of the fact that we as a church, right, we stand alongside, we come alongside, no matter how messy, no matter where people find Jesus.
Speaker 1: Right, there is hope, the good news of Jesus Christ can save.
Speaker 1: All right, and it never gets old, rejoicing in that.
Speaker 1: Amen, all right.
Speaker 1: I know that it looks different this morning.
Speaker 1: You can tell this is different.
Speaker 1: We're going to do something that I've titled the state of the church here at First Baptist Bernie.
Speaker 1: Okay, and the executive pastors are up here.
Speaker 1: I've been here five and a half years, okay, and it is time we celebrate what God has been doing here at First Baptist Bernie, okay.
Speaker 1: So this morning it's going to look different.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna interview and we're gonna ask some questions of the pastors here.
Speaker 1: Basically the question of how has God been moving?
Speaker 1: Okay, right, how have we seen the Lord move in incredible ways?
Speaker 1: So there's a scripture passage that I wanna it'll be up on the screen.
Speaker 1: I wanna read it for you.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be our jump off point, but here's what I want to read it for you.
Speaker 1: It's going to be our jump-off point, but here's what I want you to notice about it.
Speaker 1: It's Colossians, chapter 1, verse 6,.
Speaker 1: Okay, paul in Colossians, chapter 1, 3 through 8, gives us a mouthful, like a typical Pauline-like mouthful.
Speaker 1: It's all one long sentence, all right, he's the only one that could get away with that in English class, all right.
Speaker 1: So, but here at the very end of verse 5 and on into chapter 6, listen to what it says.
Speaker 1: Verse 6, sorry, it says the gospel which has come to you, just as it has in all the world also, is constantly bearing fruit and increasing, even as it has been doing in you also since the day you heard of it and understood the grace of God.
Speaker 1: In truth, okay, the gospel is constantly bearing fruit the good news of Jesus Christ that, by the grace of God, news of Jesus Christ, that, by the grace of God, he has sent his son to ransom, to pay the ransom price for our sin and to reconcile us to the Father.
Speaker 1: Now, what I want you to notice in this text, okay, for our purposes this morning, I want you to notice how active the gospel is here.
Speaker 1: Okay, the gospel is here, okay.
Speaker 1: So let me set for you the context.
Speaker 1: Paul is in prison, most probably in Rome, and Epaphras is with him.
Speaker 1: Epaphras was who planted the church in Colossae, okay, so, in other words, the church planter and Paul are not with the church in Colossae, okay, and Paul is writing to them, but he has great confidence in writing to them that amazing things are happening Because the gospel is bearing fruit.
Speaker 1: That's what he says.
Speaker 1: The gospel is bearing fruit and is constantly increasing, like a virus.
Speaker 1: Okay, the gospel spreads and takes over consuming, but in a positive way, bearing fruit for the glory of his name.
Speaker 1: Verse 10 tells us that bearing fruit means every good work.
Speaker 1: Okay, that works.
Speaker 1: Good works shining a light of the gospel begins to just permeate out of God's people, and that we are increasing in the knowledge of God.
Speaker 1: So it grows, the gospel grows in us and spreads to more and more people.
Speaker 1: A love for Jesus spreads to more and more people, a love for Jesus, a care for one another, a unity amongst us, a hope in the promises of God, a hope in heaven, realizing that we are a called out people.
Speaker 1: So we say it all the time church, we are a gospel-centered church.
Speaker 1: Do you believe that?
Speaker 1: Yeah, we're a gospel-centered church.
Speaker 1: So this morning we are going to talk about celebrating the aspects that, over the course of the last several years, we've seen the gospel increasing and bearing fruit amongst us.
Speaker 1: Okay, so I'm not going to overwhelm you with statistics, but the truth of the matter is is we've been growing.
Speaker 1: Right, praise God, we've been growing.
Speaker 1: When we came to the other side of COVID, we kind of bottomed out.
Speaker 1: Almost every church did just bottom out.
Speaker 1: It was like a cleansing.
Speaker 1: It changed the pattern of everything.
Speaker 1: Since then, we have almost doubled in size.
Speaker 1: Okay, praise God for that.
Speaker 1: We have almost doubled in size.
Speaker 1: Okay, praise God for that.
Speaker 1: It's why we have a parking issue and we're asking you to ride the shuttle.
Speaker 1: Okay, awesome, good news for that.
Speaker 1: Also, did you know over the course of the last two years?
Speaker 1: We're going to baptize more than a hundred people in the last two years.
Speaker 1: Praise God for that.
Speaker 1: Also, I want to celebrate real quickly.
Speaker 1: You are an overwhelmingly generous church You're giving.
Speaker 1: It's unlike anything the four of us have ever seen in our churches.
Speaker 1: You are the most generous church I've ever been a part of.
Speaker 1: We exceed budget every year.
Speaker 1: We're already at like 59% in legacy, giving like eight months into the entire thing, and you guys have been faithful to give generously to the work of what God has been doing.
Speaker 1: So praise God for that.
Speaker 1: All right, pastor Mark.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you can clap for that.
Speaker 1: That's good news.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because it's a fruit of the gospel.
Speaker 1: The gospel makes us generous, because God is generous.
Speaker 1: All right, pastor Mark, you two are coming up on five years this fall.
Speaker 2: How about that?
Speaker 1: Has he done an amazing job.
Speaker 1: Church All right.
Speaker 1: So one of the fruits of the gospel, pastor Mark, is heartfelt worship.
Speaker 1: So talk to us about how you've seen God moving amongst us in creating a heart for worship.
Speaker 3: All right, thanks, pastor.
Speaker 3: First let me say what a blessing it has been to be your worship pastor over the last five years.
Speaker 3: What a blessing it has been to be your worship pastor over the last five years.
Speaker 3: It has just really been an honor to see this church grow like this in worship and to see how you have just committed to worship and to growing in that area of your life.
Speaker 3: What this has looked like in our church, I think, is well, the first thing, you know, one major thing that the gospel produces in our life is unity.
Speaker 3: So one thing that this church accomplished, even right before I came on board, was bringing two worship styles together, two worship services together in unity.
Speaker 3: There are churches that are still trying to do that, that are having a difficult time doing that because there's not unity.
Speaker 3: But in this church, that was one of the first things that I noticed right on was the unity being willing to put aside our personal preferences for the unity and the sake of reaching others with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: And that's a big, big deal.
Speaker 3: So we praise God for that.
Speaker 3: You can give God praise for that.
Speaker 3: A second thing is that we've seen the generations come together on this platform, out in the kids building and in the student building as well.
Speaker 3: We've seen all ages coming together to worship God, using hymns, using psalms, using spiritual songs, brand new songs, just to lift their hearts to the Lord, and so that's been special to watch all the generations.
Speaker 3: We're not just a multi-generational church, we're an intergenerational church where the generations are mingling together and they're working together.
Speaker 3: They're working together, and so that's exciting.
Speaker 3: A second thing is, when I came here, you guys were generally a quiet singing church.
Speaker 3: Okay, it was like I'm not sure I want the person next to me to hear me sing, okay.
Speaker 3: And then I look at today when we're singing that Christ be magnified, and you guys are just belting out these songs of praise singing Christ be magnified in my life and I see that growth in you, how we've come along and we're singing together.
Speaker 3: When the choir's singing, you're singing and it's exciting to see you passionate to sing, praise and give thanks to God because your hearts are full.
Speaker 3: I pray that your hearts are full from your lives that are daily lived in the word right.
Speaker 3: And then the last thing that I've loved to witness and I've experienced this just in conversations with many of you is you're starting to connect the scriptures with the songs.
Speaker 3: Like, most songs are written out of inspiration of scripture, most of the songs that we use are written out of inspiration of Scripture, most of the songs that we use and so you're starting to see that scriptural reference in the songs, and so it's bringing more meaning.
Speaker 3: We're not just mindlessly singing these words that we've sung for years and years and years.
Speaker 3: We're understanding that there's a biblical truth to those songs and it makes a difference in our lives, and so that's been a beautiful thing for me to see as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah amen.
Speaker 1: Just to echo what Pastor Mark said, one of the intense fruits of the gospel is unity, is the ability to lay down our preferences in order to worship together.
Speaker 1: You've done an incredible job of leading us in that.
Speaker 1: All right.
Speaker 4: Pastor Mark worship together.
Speaker 1: You've done an incredible job of leading us in that.
Speaker 1: But All right, pastor Mark, you know, pastorally, if you could move the needle in one other spot.
Speaker 1: The next step that you think the Lord wants us to take in worship, what would you think that is?
Speaker 3: Well, I want to see more of what I've just been talking about.
Speaker 3: First of all, I want to see just a continual growth in all of these areas, more of our generations coming together, more of our singing, more of a freedom in this place to respond to God, not just in the singing, but through the truth of God's word, but through the truth of God's Word After we hear the Word of God being preached and proclaimed, to be able to say, okay, how does this change me?
Speaker 3: What do I need to do?
Speaker 3: What are the steps I need to take from here, whether that means responding now to the altar, I would love to see this altar filled with people just passionate to pray and a freedom for us to be comfortable among each other, among family, among friends, to be able to just pour our hearts out, to be vulnerable to one another in confession, to be accountable to one another, to make sure we're walking the way we need to walk and reflecting God's glory the way we need to reflect it.
Speaker 3: And really, when we're able to worship like that, it's a part of even our discipleship process.
Speaker 3: Worship and discipleship go hand in hand at that point, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: You're going to see a theme in that regard, as Pastor Daniel talks about just areas that the Lord's moving in, that he sees Just in terms of a freedom and us being able to just acknowledge life is messy and we are here not to play church.
Speaker 1: We are here to meet the living God, in fact, church.
Speaker 1: Starting next week, I'm gonna begin our fall sermon series and it's going to be on prayer, moving the needle in prayer, both corporately and in your own personal life.
Speaker 1: I want to see us become more vulnerable, begging God in humility, just to continue to move in our midst.
Speaker 1: All right, pastor Daniel, last week you preached an incredible sermon, wasn't it?
Speaker 1: Good church, on the importance of gospel community, using Acts, chapter 2, we talked about that.
Speaker 1: This is what right?
Speaker 1: So the gospel showed up, the Spirit of God showed up, and then suddenly what was produced was a connectedness amongst God's people.
Speaker 1: All right, you two are coming up on four years this fall, all right, time's flying.
Speaker 1: So how have you seen God moving in our connectivity as a church?
Speaker 4: You know, I would say when I got here four years ago, there was already through our growth groups.
Speaker 4: One of the first things I heard is man, the secret sauce at First Baptist Bernie Jason Cohn coined that phrase and he says that's where the magic happens at FBC is in our growth groups, and what that meant is that is where this church feels like a family.
Speaker 4: So there was already healthy, uh, community and connectivity here at the church.
Speaker 4: But one of the amazing things that we've seen God doing is, within those growth groups, that ministries continue to grow.
Speaker 4: We've added new groups, we've been able to start more groups.
Speaker 4: Some of our groups have gotten so big they've had to multiply not split that's a bad word but they've multiplied and they've birthed new groups.
Speaker 4: So that's one of the exciting things that we've seen.
Speaker 4: But another thing that we've pressed into to make sure that, hey, we say we're this multi-generational church, this intergenerational, where we want generations doing life together.
Speaker 4: We said, okay, how do we do that?
Speaker 4: How do we have life-on-life discipleship, where we get into deep relationships with one another so that we can grow and be encouraged and cared for and have accountability?
Speaker 4: One of the exciting things that we've seen here over the last year is a mentoring ministry.
Speaker 4: We're calling it Real Life.
Speaker 4: Some of you are already part of that, but it has just been for that purpose of we see God doing something, we see a hunger for being known and finding people who can walk alongside of us.
Speaker 4: And God has brought generations together here and we wanted to make it easy for new believers to be able to link arms with someone who's been walking with the Lord for a while and have them invest in them, and then, as that happens, for that person to turn around and say, well, hey, god's been doing something in me and now I can turn around and I can invest in someone else.
Speaker 4: And so we're just beginning to see the fruit of that take place.
Speaker 4: And it's creating this culture, I believe, here at First Baptist, where we understand that discipleship is not just a class, it's not just in a worship service, it's not even just in a growth group, but it's when we really start to do life with one another, being poured into and pouring into others.
Speaker 4: Amen.
Speaker 2: And you see that in all of our adult ministries with such a huge focus on how do we get people connected, but how do we do that in our youth and our students?
Speaker 4: Well, I would tell you, our student ministry and our children's ministry we calling those together that's our next gen ministry.
Speaker 4: God is doing something special there.
Speaker 4: Amen, church.
Speaker 4: You've seen it all summer, as we've just given praise to God for the incredible things Baptism this morning We've got another one in the next service.
Speaker 4: God is moving and it's really exciting, and I think part of that is we see families coming, getting plugged in, and so their children are coming and getting plugged in, and so their children are coming and getting plugged in.
Speaker 4: But one of the things that we have really begun to stress through our NextGen team and God has built an incredible team, by the way, I just need to stop and give a shout out to Garrett and Andrea and Teresa and Stacy and Stephanie Ritteman.
Speaker 4: That is our NextGen staff and they are knocking it out of the park.
Speaker 4: They are doing so many incredible things to help you as parents, disciple your kids, and I think that is the key here to seeing what's happening among our adults begin to happen in our children and our teenagers is we as a church want to partner with parents and that has been a big emphasis over the last few years.
Speaker 4: We spent about two and a half years working on something we call the Next Gen Roadmap, and it was really just identifying.
Speaker 4: Hey, there are life stages that children go through and we want to be very intentional to provide resources and to partner with parents at each of those stages.
Speaker 4: The things we do in our very intentional to provide resources and to partner with parents at each of those stages, the things we do in our ministries here on Sundays and Wednesdays and through our special events, we want to be intentional to recognize those stages and be able to speak into those the truth of God's Word.
Speaker 4: But then we don't want it to just be something we do here, because we're only going to get about 40 hours a year with your children, but you guys are going to have each week, you're going to have way more than that.
Speaker 4: You're going to have a lot of statistics say like 50 plus hours a week of waking hours where you have face time with your children.
Speaker 4: We want to equip you to use those hours to disciple your children, and so our roadmap was designed to be able to partner with parents so that this culture of things we're teaching here goes home, and so then our kids are continuing to learn and grow and then they're bringing that back and then they can turn around and invest in their peers, in their friends at school, sports teams, all those things, and we're just seeing it take root and grow.
Speaker 4: We're seeing incredible growth in our children's building.
Speaker 4: They are bursting at the seams.
Speaker 4: Our youth had record numbers this past Wednesday night.
Speaker 4: They had over 150 students in youth Wednesday night.
Speaker 4: That is incredible and about 50 volunteers serving with them, and so God is up to something in the next generation and it's just fun to be part of it.
Speaker 3: It is.
Speaker 3: It's something that we can celebrate together and that we often do celebrate to see.
Speaker 3: God working in the next-gen ministry and families in that area.
Speaker 3: You know, church, family is something we talk about as pastors.
Speaker 3: Quite often is how can we reach the lost, the hurting, the vulnerable better, more effectively?
Speaker 3: How does the gospel teach us to do that?
Speaker 3: So, daniel, if you would kind of explain to us what God has been doing in that area, in reaching the lost, the hurting and vulnerable.
Speaker 4: Yeah, so quickly.
Speaker 4: I mean some of the things that we have incredible people in our church who have a heart for ministries that we would say are not typical among churches.
Speaker 4: We have a side-by-side ministry where we reach out to families that have children with special needs.
Speaker 4: So many times they are the ones who don't get to be part of church because there's nothing for them and God has raised up people here at this church who want to minister in that space.
Speaker 4: Same thing with foster parents and those on this journey of adoption.
Speaker 4: You know we've got ministry here where we come alongside those families and provide encouragement and support and resources and programs where they can get plugged in and begin to grow together.
Speaker 4: We have something we started a little over a year ago called Soul Care, where people who just have a heart to do some basic counseling to say, hey, I can walk with you if you're battling anxiety or depression or some of those things, like I can be a person for you and I will go and get trained and equipped to be able to speak into those spaces Because maybe there's something more right.
Speaker 4: A growth group may not be the only thing that you need.
Speaker 4: You may need someone to help you in some very specific areas, and so God is raising up people in our church who have a heart for those things and we're starting to see all of those ministries grow in so many ways and God is really at work All right, so I'll ask you the same question I did, mark.
Speaker 1: What do you see kind of one of the next steps where you would love to move the needle and see God grow us in those areas of connectivity and stuff?
Speaker 4: It's something that's so exciting to see here at FBC, bernie.
Speaker 4: We are reaching people who come from just every kind of background and stage of life.
Speaker 4: People are coming in here with we all have hurts and habits and hangups, don't we?
Speaker 4: Amen, that's all of us right.
Speaker 4: But God is bringing people here who have this is the first time they've ever truly heard the gospel and responded They'd never been in church before.
Speaker 4: But they're coming here and finding a home.
Speaker 4: And God is bringing people here who are struggling with addictions and different issues.
Speaker 4: And God has raised up people here at FBC who have skill to step into those spaces and be able to provide discipleship in those areas, to take the truth of God's word and invest it into.
Speaker 4: No matter what you come in here with, if it's an addiction, if it's a habit, if it's a broken marriage, right, we have people here that God has raised up and we want to walk alongside you.
Speaker 4: And so one of the things that we are praying about right now is how do we step into that space with even more intentionality to provide care, recovery, ministry where we can say hey, first Baptist, bernie, no matter what has happened in your life, no matter what baggage you bring with you.
Speaker 4: The gospel has an answer, and we want to be a church where you can come and find hope, where you can find healing and freedom in Christ, and so I think that's what God is up to, and I'm excited to see it.
Speaker 1: Amen church.
Speaker 1: Do you believe that?
Speaker 1: Are we willing to be a church that is willing to step into that area?
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 4: All right.
Speaker 1: You said it In the messiness of life.
Speaker 1: All right, pastor Chad, I'm going to ask you the same question that I did Pastor Chad.
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you the same question that Mark did Daniel.
Speaker 1: So Daniel was looking at our groups and kind of what we do discipleship-wise on campus.
Speaker 1: But that question, having a heart for the lost, the vulnerable and the hurting, that's God's heart and the more we get to know him, that becomes our heart.
Speaker 1: So talk to us a little bit about are we doing a good job, not just here on campus, but reaching outside of our walls, into our community, and showing that heart?
Speaker 2: Sure, there's so many ways that God has been using First Baptist for the entirety of it.
Speaker 2: It's just a 127-year-old church and God has been using this church in this community for a very long time to do amazing things.
Speaker 2: There's so many ministries that we have that God started out of First Baptist, like Grace House.
Speaker 2: Or even you hear of partnerships early on with Hill Country, daily Bread and the Pregnancy Care Center and so many others Meadowlands.
Speaker 2: There's so much work happening in our community that it really is just incredible.
Speaker 2: We're laying and building on a foundation that has been really well set and I want to tell you church without that we're in a very different place than we are today.
Speaker 2: Like God has given us so much to build on top of and it gives us such a great blessing.
Speaker 2: For me, as a missions pastor, I've been here almost three years, so I'm like the young guy the shortest tenured guy on this staff.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you, guy the shortest tenured guy on this staff.
Speaker 2: Well, thank you.
Speaker 2: You really get to hit the ground running, because God's already prepared the ground so well with your hearts and with what God's doing in this church.
Speaker 2: And so even this summer, you guys, we went through this terrible thing in our community as the flood hit Kerrville and so many of you gave over $20,000 just to help respond financially to the needs of that need.
Speaker 2: But we did a meeting and 80 plus people signed up to come to the meeting and find out how they can volunteer.
Speaker 2: One Sunday, you might remember, we sent a whole group of volunteers to kind of walk along the side of the river as they were beginning the search for people, and it was such a difficult thing and so many of you turned out it was probably our least attended Sunday of the whole year was because we sent so many people out there to Centerpoint, and I just want to say thank you because the history has been wonderful.
Speaker 2: Your hearts are engaged.
Speaker 2: You know, when I came in 2022, we had about 60 people that went out on missions internationally, cross-culturally, that year, and this year we're on track to be close to 120, almost double the number of people engaged.
Speaker 2: Really, if you think about that, 120 people that represent a whole team of people that are praying for them, funding them, supporting them, and so this community is heavily engaged, not only cross-culturally but also locally.
Speaker 2: I think that we have probably 300 to 400 people per year engaging in missions locally and internationally.
Speaker 2: What an incredible thing for a church our size.
Speaker 1: Yeah that's great, that's great.
Speaker 4: Well, Chad, one of the things I know about you is you're never okay with just staying there Like, oh, this is amazing, let's just keep doing this.
Speaker 4: You're always saying what's next?
Speaker 4: What does God want to do?
Speaker 4: So talk a little bit about what is next in this area of missions and engagement.
Speaker 2: Well, we really our whole heart is to try to engage every believer here with their gifts and talents for God's kingdom purposes.
Speaker 2: Right, so that can be here, it could be in your home, it could be with refugees in San Antonio or it could be, you know, among the unreached around the world, and so a couple of things that we're working really hard on is we're trying to increase awareness and really strategic focus on the needs of the places where the gospel's never been.
Speaker 2: I think that was one of the areas that had really not focused here in First Baptist before I arrived, and it's something that God is really opening people's hearts to within our community.
Speaker 2: So you've heard of us sending teams like Northern Iraq or people going to North India, here in a few weeks Even Pastor Jason's going to go in September and these places where the gospel literally people can live their whole life never hearing They'd be born, live their whole life and die never hearing the name of Jesus, and we're sending people that want to go serve in those places.
Speaker 2: We have a missionary family from our church that's serving in North Africa, and so we've done some things.
Speaker 2: I think they're educational.
Speaker 2: It's trying to build awareness and build understanding, like the perspectives class and other ways to just kind of help people elevate and understand what God's doing and how we can partner with what he's doing.
Speaker 2: It really is a wide open.
Speaker 2: We've tried to have on-ramps at every level.
Speaker 2: If you're looking for a place to serve, you can serve here within the church.
Speaker 2: You can serve here within the church, you can serve here within Bernie, you can serve in the general area and region kind of missions oriented, even in San Antonio among Afghan refugees.
Speaker 2: Or you can go with us and see what's happening other places in the world Similarly and really great start, places like in Mexico, where we have a 20-year partnership, or places like North India, which is one of the least reached places on the planet where you can meet people who have never heard the name of Jesus in their whole life.
Speaker 2: So my prayer and our hope is that God would continue to raise your interest, raise your willingness to serve with your resources, whether that's internal, external, whether it's using your gifts and talents or even coming and going with us.
Speaker 2: One thing that's unique about this church is that God has an incredibly strong group of retired people that just love Jesus and they have both the resources, the finances, the time and the desire to go.
Speaker 2: I've had several people who are in their upper 60s, lower 70s say I have like a decade left.
Speaker 2: I want to serve it where it matters the most, so where can you send me?
Speaker 2: I'm like, oh my goodness, so it's an amazing thing that God is doing here.
Speaker 2: First Baptist really is a unique place and it's an amazing thing how God has really built so much capacity into your hearts and we're so thankful for it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely, church family.
Speaker 1: Please don't hear us in any way tooting our own horns or saying that we are not standing on the shoulders of the 125-year legacy of all who had gone before First Baptist's impact in Bernie, planting other churches, starting local mission partnerships.
Speaker 1: It is absolutely incredible, the legacy of worship that has long been here in this church, the legacy of discipleship.
Speaker 1: So I'll just tell you, speaking for us, it has been an incredible privilege to walk into a healthy church and to see, as our text says this morning right, the gospel continue to increase and bear fruit.
Speaker 1: Amen, that's what the gospel does.
Speaker 1: I want to close with this illustration.
Speaker 1: During the Soviet era, right, the communist government tried to erase Christianity.
Speaker 1: Okay, and everything that they could do right.
Speaker 1: They shut down churches, pastors were imprisoned.
Speaker 1: Having a Bible was banned okay.
Speaker 1: And for 70 years the regime told people God does not exist.
Speaker 1: On the surface it looked like they succeeded, but underground, in hidden apartments and secret gatherings, believers continued to meet.
Speaker 1: They passed along just handwritten copies of scriptures.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they would only have one page of a Bible that they would pass around, and they would read it and read it and read it, until that piece of paper almost fell apart.
Speaker 1: Parents would whisper the gospel to their children, knowing that they could be reported.
Speaker 1: Some Christians were thrown into labor camps in Siberia, and yet even there they would sing hymns, they would share Christ with fellow prisoners.
Speaker 1: When the Iron Curtain finally lifted in 1989, the thought was that the church had been destroyed.
Speaker 1: But instead the world was shocked to realize not only had the church survived, it had actually grown.
Speaker 1: In Russia, in Ukraine, in Romania and beyond, people began to flock to public worship.
Speaker 1: Bibles were being smuggled in by the truckload and a hunger for God's word was overwhelming.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because the gospel is a seed Bearing fruit and increasing In us and growing around us to others, and so I share that story as an encouragement right to us.
Speaker 1: We have the same gospel, the same gospel, the same truth, the good news of Jesus Christ that bears fruit amongst us.
Speaker 1: And this morning has been an opportunity for us to pause and just recognize the faithful hand of the Lord moving through His Spirit in the gospel of Jesus Christ, his Spirit in the gospel of Jesus Christ, to recognize and celebrate God's movement in our church.
Speaker 1: Good works increasing, bearing fruit.
Speaker 1: But church family, it's also about us praying and pressing in for more.
Speaker 1: Do you guys want to see more.
Speaker 1: You guys want to see God do what only he can do Now to Him, who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to the power that is at work within us.
Speaker 1: So, as we close this service, I'm going to ask for us to enter into a special time of prayer.
Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you to begin to bow your heads right now and quietly let's enter before the Lord, and I'm going to throw up some of the topics that we talked about, and I want you to pray specifically for that.
Speaker 1: So, right now, in your seat, would you pray for more salvations?
Speaker 1: Would you pray for the Spirit of God to continue to move and save in our midst, amongst our young people, amongst young adults, even amongst senior adults?
Speaker 1: It's never too late.
Speaker 1: It's never too late to respond to the good news of Jesus.
Speaker 1: Beg God Alright, church family.
Speaker 1: Would you begin to ask God for more and more freedom in our worship, that God would have His way amongst us?
Speaker 1: The freedom to confess sin, the freedom to not be okay?
Speaker 1: When you come in here now, would you pray, not only in our worship but in our growth groups and in our discipleship, in our pairings, the freedom to reach into the messiness of life.
Speaker 1: Life is messy, marriage is difficult, parenting is difficult, but the good news of Jesus provides hope and light.
Speaker 1: Would we be a church that can do that, continue to grow in that area?
Speaker 1: Now, church, would you pray, as pastor Chad mentioned, that we want every member of our church to know their kingdom purpose, how God has gifted them, and to be deployed, to be used God's hands and feet to have purpose?
Speaker 1: Would you pray that the Spirit of God would begin to show each member?
Speaker 1: You know in our culture that it's so easy to just sit in church.
Speaker 1: That's not what God's calling us to.
Speaker 1: Would you right now pray for each member to have purpose?
Speaker 1: And finally, church, would you pray that God would continue to give us a heart for the nations, especially the unreached, those who've never heard?
Speaker 1: We sit in such an incredible location where we live kind of a bubble.
Speaker 1: There are people who go through their whole lives and never hear the name of Jesus.
Speaker 1: Would you pray that that would stir our hearts to do our part, whatever God wants us to do?
Speaker 1: Heavenly Father, we thank you for this morning.
Speaker 1: We come before your throne in the mighty name of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: He is our hope.
Speaker 1: He is our salvation.
Speaker 1: You are our trust.
Speaker 1: King Jesus, father, continue to have your way amongst us.
Speaker 1: We pause to celebrate you, your faithfulness, your moving for the glory of your name, the salvation that's in your son, the work that you have done.
Speaker 1: Father, continue to change us, continue to move us forward so that Jesus' name can be high and lifted up.
Speaker 1: Father, we as the pastors, as the executive pastors, we just publicly say thank you for this calling that you've placed upon our lives and the joy and privilege it is to lead your church and your people.
Speaker 1: Help us to do that well, in Jesus' name, we pray.
Speaker 1: Amen.
Speaker 1: Our church family certainly has looked different this morning, but, as we do every week, we offer a time of response, and the reason for that is we never want this to be about right.
Speaker 1: You just listen and take notes and go home right.
Speaker 1: This isn't a class.
Speaker 1: We are the church.
Speaker 1: So if the Spirit of God has stirred inside of you this morning and you need to pray with someone, if you need to make a decision for the Lord, now is the time for that.
Speaker 1: If you saw Rebecca's baptism this morning and you're thinking, praise God, I need to get baptized too.
Speaker 1: I need to take that step of faith.
Speaker 1: Today is the day of salvation.
Speaker 1: The Lord is near.
Speaker 1: He is our hope.
Speaker 1: This is everything we are talking about.
Speaker 1: If you hear the way that we talk about King Jesus and you're like I need me some of that, okay, maybe you're like Kelly who's been waiting, resisting, thinking Jesus doesn't really want me, and you heard his testimony this morning.
Speaker 1: God is calling.
Speaker 1: Today is the day of salvation.
Speaker 1: So, however, the spirit of God has been stirring upon your heart, you be obedient and move to that Church.
Speaker 1: Would you stand and sing?